The press and free speech landscape has totally changed. There is far less news reporting today. Instead, we have this endless stream of - largely meaningless and speculative - analysis by sideline commentators and self-proclaimed "experts."

The most important people for me, at least in the last couple of years since I came out, are my supersecret trans friends and confidantes. I think I need to come up with a code name for this circle.

I think that some of today's focus on freedom of information and trans rights have a tendency to focus on the actions of individuals and how they should be regulated by governments. However, I think it's important to remember that it is the institutions themselves - schools, tax collection services, banks, human resources decisions, health departments, police departments, prosecutors, courts, and prisons - where the most devastating and systemic problems occur today. The scale of these problems is simply unimaginable.

I didn't really have anyone in particular who inspired me or that I found fascinating as a kid. It wasn't until I was in my early twenties that I began to find people - and they were all historic figures - that I began to relate to and find some inspiration in.

On a transparency front, I would say that I certainly dream of a world in which our local, state, and national and international governments and other organizations have a 21st century, digital-era transparency built into them by default.

I am merely asking for a first chance to live my life outside the [U.S. Disciplinary Barracks] as the person I was born to be.

I don't believe that Freedom of Information laws, which have arbitrary time periods or broad blanket exemptions, meet the level of transparency that society needs today.