Transgender rights law at stake in Massachusetts referendum
BOSTON — Nicole Talbot isn’t old enough to vote next month, but she isn’t shy about urging Massachusetts residents to keep a state law that protects transgender people from discrimination, including the right to use restrooms that match their gender identity.
It makes her feel safe, Talbot said, which wasn’t always the case for the Beverly teenager, an accomplished singer with dreams of a Broadway career. For as long as she can remember, she felt she was a girl — like the time she insisted upon being a princess at a preschool Halloween party — even when the world beyond her mother subjected her to taunts and discrimination.