Royal Oak Teen’s Film on Gender Affirming Care in Running for C-SPAN’s Audience Favorite

Royal Oak, MI – Royal Oak High School senior Ani Ceccacci is one of a dozen students across the country competing in the C-SPAN StudentCam documentary competition, with a short documentary exploring transgender rights and access to healthcare for trans youth called  “Gender-Affirming Care: It Saves More Lives Than You Would Think”

The film is just over six minutes long and includes interviews with transgender youth, a therapist, and an activist who share positive perspectives about gender-affirming care, mixed with news clips showing the anti-trans rhetoric and legislation that causes harm to young transgender individuals.

In the film, Ferndale Pride Director Julia Music states that transgender youth are “used as pawns.”  And therapist Ann Abbey says “That misconception trans folks are going to be unsafe to others, that’s the part they have wrong.”

Ceccacci is excited about the film and the contest.  When asked why they picked this topic, Ceccacci said “I would say this topic is so important to me because it directly impacts my future, some of my friends futures, and the trans community as a whole. Gender-Affirming care is healthcare and having our rights stripped away is devastating, so spreading awareness through this documentary is advocating for those who aren’t able to.

“I struggled to find authenticity through other news covering this topic and figured the most important and impactful ideas we could hear, would be from those directly affected. The prompt for this competition was to send a message to the president about something effecting your community and that’s exactly what I did, I knew this was my chance to get my message out there so that one day I still have a chance of getting the Gender-Affirming Care I hope to receive.”