>“As a trans person, I’m always going to have to deal with people discriminating against me,” one woman said.

>Living in a rural locale with an active local music scene let her focus on aspects of her identity that were more important to her than her gender identity.

This is my experience as well. I don't experience more stares or scowls in rural areas than I do in urban centers. Even in San Francisco, being visibly transgender is often uncomfortable.

This is one of those cases where causality is implied but is questionable. Finding lovers in the sticks is hard enough; it is exceptionally difficult if you are queer, and that's going to influence behavior and choices in all sorts of ways, and those can be rationalized in all sorts of ways, too.

A less charged example: adults living in cities are (probably) more likely to participate in, and value participating in, team sports. Let's assume they report honestly as such on a questionnaire.

Obviously, there are more opportunities to play sports in cities, but does that imply that rural folks wouldn't partake at about the same rate if they could, even though they say that they wouldn't?

I can see plausible arguments in either direction, and for several kinds of selection and reporting biases.