Transgender Teen’s Suicide Sparks Online Petition

About 60,000 people are calling for the family of the teen to put her chosen name, Leelah, on her tombstone.

A 17-year-old transgender teen named Leelah Alcorn, who committed suicide on Sunday morning in Kings Mill, Ohio, has prompted advocates to petition for “Leelah’s Law” – a bill to ban conversion therapy in the U.S. The petition on Change.org by the Transgender Human Rights Institute has more than 88,000 supporters.

“My death needs to be counted in the number of transgender people who commit suicide this year. I want someone to look at that number and say “that’s f—d up” and fix it. Fix society. Please.“

Alcorn wrote in her suicide note posthumously posted to Tumblr on Sunday. It has more than 200,000 shares.

Alcorn, who was born with the name Joshua, came out as transgender to her parents three years ago. As conservative Christians, they took away her phone, computer and enrolled her in an online high school. They told her, “God doesn’t make mistakes,” and took her to conversion therapy.