ABSTRACT
The concept of Trans rights has gained more currency, a seeming consensus has emerged about which law reforms should be sought to better the lives of trans people. Alan Freeman's critique of what he terms the "perpetrator perspective" in discrimination law is particularly helpful in conceptualizing the limits of the common trans rights strategies. The two legal reforms, anti-discrimination bills and hate crime laws, have come to define the idea of "trans rights" in the United States and are presently the most visible efforts made by nonprofit organizations and activists working under this rubric. Hate crime laws are an even more direct example of the limitations of the perpetrator perspective's conception of oppression. Hate crime laws frame violence in terms of individual wrongdoers.
