Human Dignity: An individual or group’s sense of self worth and self respect; physical and psychological integrity and empowerment.

It's past midnight and the road, usually consumed by putrid smoke and a cacophony of screeching car horns, is nearly deserted. I jog carefully on the wet pavement, sidestepping any apparent puddles, towards home. Ignoring the ringing phone in my pocket, I think about how I'm going to evade my parents this time while simultaneously calculating my punishment based on precedence. My legs implement a more leisurely pace and begin to breathe a lot easier after I realize I am doomed anyways.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see a woman beginning to approach me from some distance away. Curious, I slow down, thinking she will need my help. I start to practice my deep voice, ready to assume the role of the Chivalrous Knight. But as she gets closer, her deception becomes clear. A streetlight illuminates her masculine face and she calls out "bhai," (brother) in a voice deeper than mine while beckoning me towards her. Almost instantly I back away, labeling her as some sort of threatening presence, only on the basis of her gender and tight-fitting clothing.

Almost unconsciously, I begin to sprint and don't stop for at least 200 meters, after which I continue to jog until I am home at last.

This incident took place more recently than I'd like to admit.

Confronted with a topic like human dignity, I decided it would be best to discuss the people whose dignity our Pakistani society compromises the most. The khwaja siras (transgender people) in our society are openly disrespected with emotional abuse, including gender related pejoratives and common employment discrimination. A sense of self worth is difficult to foster when parts of our society believe that their existence is a curse for their families.

In these conditions physical and psychological integrity is impossible to provide. The fact that most khwaja siras are forced to resort to begging is evidence of their lack of empowerment.

A population of between 80,000 and 300,000 is unevenly discriminated against simply because of the way they were born. This is disgusting, made more so by the fact that the perpetrators of these injustices use religion as an excuse for their biases. A testament to this injustice is the interfaith coalition of Sunnis, Shias and Christians in Imamia Colony, Lahore. Hatred against the khwaja siras is apparently powerful enough to unite religious sects that antagonize one another so openly.

The situation is bleak; however, somewhere in the abyss, there are small candles of hope. In 2009, the Pakistani government began using “third gender” identity cards; then, in 2012, it granted transgender citizens many of the same rights enjoyed by cisgender Pakistanis. In 2013, the khwaja siras voted and ran in the election.

Despite this progress, the fact that a teenage boy would be frightened by a transgender person illustrates the deeply rooted social stigmas against the transgender community. The only way to remove that stigma is to offer them the same level of human dignity that we share with our peers; the same human dignity that is the right of every individual.