Tag: transphobia

Hello American Allies

The New York Times is reporting that the Trump administration is trying to ‘define trans out of existence’. Of course, you can’t erase people by changing definitions, but it is certainly within the federal government’s powers to make the lives of trans people significantly more difficult. The consequences of the Trump administration’s actions would be extremely dire.

This change in definition is coming from the Department of Health and Human Services. They have an Office of Civil Rights. Alas, this is is headed by a Trump political appointee, but they are reachable by the public. While emailing them is possible, I suspect it’s more useful to send snail mail or fax. The pile of documentation is harder to ignore. There is a service that allows users to send a limited number of free faxes per day. Upload a PDF and send it to your regional office. I’ve put my own letter at the bottom of this post.

I’d also like to suggest you contact your representatives and two senators. Even if you know they agree that trans people deserve civil rights, it’s helpful to them if they can say there’s been an outpouring of concern. And if they don’t agree, an outpouring may help change their minds, especially so close to an election.

Speaking of which, I’d like to encourage you to vote – and to do so strategically. This is an emergency situation for trans people and many other vulnerable groups. Voting for a Democrat won’t overthrow capitalism, but a lot of people live in the wedge issues that separate the parties. Vote for the people who can’t vote.

Fellow Americans abroad, it’s not too late. You can still request your absentee ballot. If you’ve requested your ballot and haven’t received it, you can get a backup ballot for overseas voters called the Federal Write-in Absentee Ballot. Depending on where you are elligible to vote, some states will accept this ballot even if you have not previously registered.

 

 

Example Letter

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am writing to oppose the proposed change with regard to gender. Making this fixed, genetic, and unchangeable flies in the face of medical opinion and common sense. A significant minority of people do change their genders. Trying to prevent this is a serious violation of their civil rights with no discernable state interest. This is unamerican.

Relying on genetics is also unscientific, as there are many people who’s physical sex characteristics are at odds with their genes. The Olympics quit using this definition after a woman who was found to be genetically male later gave birth – thus showing that the tests are not reliable even for people who are not transgender.

I strongly encourage the department of health and human services to do it’s job of protecting health instead of going out of it’s way to harm transgender people.

Thank you very much for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,

Speaking up

Friends, I need you to say something if somebody around you is saying or doing something transphobic. Even if it’s awkward.

Why This is Important

I watched the BBC’s coverage of the election night and they interviewed many Trump supporters. I know these people are not representative of voters as a whole, but just about every single one of them said, without embarrassment, on camera, that they were against transgender people. These folks are largely misinformed and afraid of a false picture of trans people.

It’s dark times in the world. If somebody starts talking badly about minority groups, it may not be just talk. They may be working themselves up to action. Maybe they’re going to say something mean or do something mean or cast a ballot. They may be trying to gauge what people around them think – to determine if there’s consensus before they act. It’s up to you to speak up. Firstly, to let them know there’s not consensus. Secondly, depending on your relationship with them, to bring them around. Unfriending bigots has not worked out. We need, instead, to talk with them.

The SPLC has a great resource on talking to bigots. You should read it, but I’m going to give you some trans-specific devices here as well. (Trigger warnings for trans people.)

If you think this is less important than climate change and nuclear proliferation, remember this is why people said they voted.

Getting Started

There are two easy sentences I want you to have ready, that help with many a situation. Memorise them, Practice them:

‘Trans women are women.’
‘Trans men are men.’

A lot of transphobia involves assertions that we are not really our current gender. We are. Be ready to say it directly.

Modelling

This is a gentle way to challenge transphobia, but alas, is still very awkward. This makes it a good place to start.

In modelling you re-state what somebody just said but with correct language.

Them: I think Bradley Manning is a [hero/traitor].
You: Why do you think Chelsea Manning is a [hero/traitor]?

Them: He was Bradley when he leaked the documents.
You: Yes, she leaked the documents before she transitioned.

When talking about somebody trans, use their current name and pronouns. Don’t say, ‘When Bradley was a man.’ Say, ‘Before Chelsea transitioned.’ This respects her current identity and helps keep people from tripping over pronouns. It’s very hard to get the right pronouns for somebody if you keep switching them up depending on when you’re talking about.

Perhaps your friend gets frustrated:

Them: This isn’t important!
You: It’s important to trans people. I know my trans friend said…

You Have a Trans Friend

We’re friends. I’m your trans friend. I’m giving you permission to use me as rhetorical device in conversations. First we need to talk about when you can use this:

Scenario #1:

Them: Trans people are [ugly|crazy].
You: My trans friend is [fairly unremarkably average looking | in ok mental health].

Yes! This is a good usage of having a trans friend – as a counter-example to a blanket assertion.

Scenario #2:

Them: I think what you just said may actually be kind of transphobic.
You: I have a trans friend!

No! Do not use me as a shield.

Scenario #3:

Them: Oh my god, the weather is too hot!
You: My trans friend likes the heat.

No! Only bring this up where it’s relevant.

Tl;dr: Bring up having a trans friend to challenge blanket assertions and stereotypes.

This is also a way to make things personal. If bigotry could be challenged by facts and statistics, it would already be over. Human connections are key to ending it. This is why Harvey Milk encouraged gay people to come out. Unfortunately, this strategy doesn’t work as well for trans people, partly because there are so few of us. I need you, my friend, to help humanise us.

Bathrooms

One place people have been campaigning against us is our access to toilets, bathrooms and changing rooms. This is specific to trans women, so having a trans man friend (me) won’t be as useful, but I can give you some pointers.

If somebody you know starts talking about feeling uncomfortable about sharing facilities with trans people, remember your very first two sentences: Trans women are women. Trans men are men.

What we now call ‘rape culture’ used to be referred to as ‘male violence.’ Sometimes people will start talking about ‘male bodied’ people. But: trans women are women. Violence does not stem from bodies. If certain classes of bodies were the sources of violence, then there’s no hope of ever combating it. It would be a biological fact.

Violence comes from culture. Rape culture is what Donald Trump has done and bragged about. It’s not embedded in his physical form.

Trans women inhabit the cultural space of womanhood. Terms like ‘female bodied’ don’t reflect cultural roles. They reflect only what a birth certificate said.

So how do you talk about this?

Them: I’m worried about male bodied people in the changing room.
You: Trans women are also effected by rape culture.

You’ve responded to their fears, you’ve modelled a correct way to talk about trans people and you’ve shown that trans women have fears in common with them. If you want to make a personal humanising connection as the conversation continues, that’s where your trans friend comes in.

Again, I’m not a trans woman. But I (and nearly every trans person I know) have had to physically run away from a scary transphobic incident in a toilet. When I use a public toilet, I get out as fast as possible, which is something I’ve heard most of my trans friends say. Those of you who have been bullied in school bathrooms can relate to this, I’m sure.

I’ve also been barred entry to toilets. Being denied entry to one toilet did not give me access to the other toilet. I just wasn’t allowed to pee at all. But when you’ve got to go, you’ve got to go! I used to make a habit of trying to hold it. Part of this involved drinking less water. I got some weird infection from chronic dehydration. Again, this is common among trans people.

If I’m not allowed to pee when out about about, this limits how long I can stay outside my home. If I can’t use a toilet at work or in the train station, I can’t keep my job. Keeping trans people out of public or school toilets keeps us out of public and out of school. Special ‘family’ toilets are great for people who want them and we should build more of them, but they’re not always available and mark us out. I’m a man. I use the men’s room.

I’m sharing this so you can use it – because emotion and human connections matter more than facts and figures. This is not statistics, this is the life of someone you know. Make it personal.

Keep Trying

Conversations are going to be awkward. The first one often won’t change minds. If somebody says something and you’re unsure how to respond, think about it later to come up with a better reply.

Even if it feels like you’ve failed and made things uncomfortable, do remember that you have communicated a lack of consensus. This is important.

Also, if you spoke up in public – say, to challenge a sex change joke, you don’t know who overheard you. Hearing jokes like that sucks. Hearing a subsequent challenge restores hope.

Finally

Feel free to share this. I will try to answer questions in the comments.

Responding

Yes, respond!

If you just unfriend somebody, they are allowed to believe they are in a consensus where such jokes are allowable. This helps create a climate of hostility against trans people, especially trans women. It’s important to let people know that dehumanising trans people is not considered acceptable by everyone they know.

How you decide to respond is a bit more complex. Has anyone else responded? If someone else has already responded, how you you further engage depends on how the conversation is going. It may be enough to simply click like on their challenge or post that you agree with them. Jumping into the breach, ready for a flame war, may be counter-productive.

Its also necessary to be aware of who is witnessing a conversation. If you take a micro-aggression and blow it up into a flame war, this will be uncomfortable for people who are members of the effected class. It may be best to start gently and take further discussion to private message, to avoid alarming or harming bystanders. Starting publicly is a good idea for a few reasons, one of which is that it shows open solidarity with people effected by prejudice, in a place where they can see it when (or if) they see the comment that caused you to reply.

And, indeed, starting gently can often be the way forward. White fragility is a thing where if you tell a white person they just did or said something racist, their reaction is often hugely out of proportion. This kind of fragility exists in greater or lesser degrees for other kinds of prejudice as well. It may be that the best way to deal with a transphobic joke is to not mention the word ‘transphobia’, but rather say that you think their joke isn’t funny because it’s unfair or mean.

Where you go from there depends on who you are talking to and the circumstances in which they made an ill-advised comment. Your first priority should be solidarity with people effected by the comment. Your next priority is bringing your friend around, so that they see why they said was problematic and why it’s important to respect people different from themselves.

It isn’t easy speaking up and it’s hard to know the right thing to say. Remember that it’s easier for you than it is for somebody who is the target of hateful speech or jokes. This is a skill and it takes practice and it will go badly at least some of the time. Indeed, as we’re all living in a prejudiced world, sometimes it will go completely wrong and you will end up saying something problematic without meaning to and get yelled at by somebody you meant to be an ally to. You should still speak up.

Speaking up won’t work every time, but it will work some of the time. This is how the world changes and becomes better. Minds can and will be changed

Racism and Plunderphonics

A google search for ‘Plunderphonics racist’ returns no relevant results. So here is a rough draft to address that.

Plunderphonics is a tape cutup movement invented by John Oswald. Of course, doing tape cut up pieces from pop culture ephemera and applying tape music techniques to these sources was already occurring. For example State of the Union Message by Ruth Anderson had come out some time previously. As had Bye Bye Butterfly by Pauline Oliveros, who, like Oswald, drew all her material for that from a single song. I think its fair to say that his name recognition and subsequent musical career owes a lot to having got into the charts.

Oswald’s charting record does contain musical merit. Pretender, based on Dolly Parton’s recording of The Great Pretender pulls out hidden depth and vocal timbres in her voice. The choice of material is especially clever, given the rich timbres of her voice. This richness makes her slowed voice a convincing baritone. The program notes suggest that she is secretly a a drag queen (or trans woman), suggesting her femininity is so over the top, it must be self-consciously performative. Indeed, Ms. Parton does not seem to object to this interpretation of her gender presentation. She once entered a drag contest dressed as herself and has repeatedly identified with gay men, as well as been open about the bodily transformations she has undertaken to present her image.

That piece appeared on an earlier EP as well as the one that charted. The one that charted also featured Dab a remix of Michael Jackson’s Bad. the program notes on the Plunderphonics website note that “This is probably the most complicated piece on the album.” And talk about the structure. Officially, it was the copyright violations inherent in this piece that lead to the record eventually being suppressed. Oswald was sued by Jackson and his record label, who forced him to destroy all copies in circulation, never offer the record for sale and never to distribute it in any of the formats that existed at the time. As this was before the web, he has taken advantage of MP3s not being listed to upload the album and its cover image to his website.

However, it was almost certainly the cover image which lead Jackson to sue. The album cover is a modification of the cover of the Bad album, except the iconic image of Jackson in a leather jacket has been manipulated so it shows the jacket slightly open to reveal the torso of a naked white woman.

This album was never on sale. Instead, he sent it to college radio stations across Canada. These stations were influential. Getting a lot of college radio play could get an artist into the charts, which it did for Oswald. Because college radio stations offer a way to get in to the music industry, they used to receive a very high number of promotional recordings – many more than the staff could hope to play on the air or often even listen to and evaluate. This staff was made up of college students who tended to be mostly white men between the age of 18-22. Oswald’s crass joke about Jackson’s race and gender would have appealed to many of these young men, who then took the time to listen to the record and discover it had musical merit.

Although the image was unsubtly racist, there was no trace of that in the audio. Thus, only the DJs saw the image, not the public who came to like his skilfully produced music. Oswald was therefore able to very cannily employ racism as a path to a successful career.

He has cast himself consistently as the victim of corporate bullying, picked on by a superstar out to bankrupt him. However, despite his losing battle with one record company, he has since been commissioned by record companies to do remixes of work in their back catalogues. The lawsuit has hardly destroyed him, but instead, cast him into a victim role which has thus far seemingly prevented any discussion of his own use of structural power against Jackson. Oswald may have been disadvantaged in terms of industry connections, but, as his record cover reminds us, he is a cis white man and therefore, empowered to police the otherness of black people who do not adequately conform to racial and gender stereotypes.

Oswald is not somebody who happens to have done a racist thing. Oswald is someone who owes his entire career to successfully deploying racism. The Plunderphonics cover is not dog whistle racism – it is clearly, indisputably racist. He has never apologised for this and in interviews has doubled down, going so far as to say that Jackson’s body modifications mean that he should have no right to control his own image. He’s framed this in terms of copyright, but the message is clear enough.

As a music tech teacher, Plunderphonics often appears on course syllabuses. Everywhere I’ve taught, the undergrads have included a significant minority of BME/PoC students. Their presence is much rarer doing postgraduate degrees. The number of black composers doing non-pop electronic music is worryingly low and suggest that there are structural issues dissuading people from carrying on in art music. I don’t think covering Oswald helps with this. I also have objections in silently participating in a system where he continues to benefit from his past deployment of racism and transphobia, especially given the absence of any kind of apology.

The success of Plunderphonics is racist and transphobic. I’m going to cover other remix artists instead.

Crucify Him

I recently read the suicide note of Leelah Alcorn and keep thinking about how far we haven’t come since I was a teen. This is my story. It comes with a trigger warning. Don’t read it if you knew me before I was 18 – none of us need that.

Every year on Palm Sunday, the Catholic churches of my youth would do a small bit of drama, where they would semi-act out the scene where Pontius Pilot condemned Jesus to death. The priest played Jesus. Other readers played the other speaking parts. And the congregation played out the braying mob who called for Jesus’s blood. ‘Crucify him!’ we called out in unison. Or rather, chanted in a dull monotone. Repeating the same scene we did every year for the 18 years I was compelled to attend Catholic mass.
My parents were devout Catholics, and so was I by default for my childhood. Before I could read, they took me to a picket at a women’s health clinic, where I carried anti-abortion signs filled with the mysterious symbols of English writing. I went to Catholic school. I played trumpet at mass. I volunteered at my parish, putting together the paper inserts of church bulletins. Church was a place I could go and get some peace away from my family for a bit.
I don’t know if we had more or less dysfunction than other aspirational, middle class families. The popular thing to do in those days was take your misbehaving kids to therapy, so my mother took us. I went to three different shrinks until I was a teenager and I never trusted any of them. They were not there for me. They were there for my parents. Anything I said to them would be repeated on.
For my brother, they wanted to know why he didn’t like school. For me, they wanted to know why I was not conforming to gender roles.
I’ve repeated this story many times to shrinks since, to the point I don’t trust my own memory of it any more. They also weren’t looking to help me, but were working as gatekeepers. They ask about the parts where I didn’t fit in, but they don’t ask about the part that hurt. Here is the part that hurt: I didn’t know what I was – I only knew what I wasn’t. And what I wasn’t was normal. I told my parents at 14 that I liked girls. They were the first people I told. This was a huge mistake. My mother told other parents. Their kids told everyone at school. I was bullied – sometimes by my friends. (They got teased for spending time with me and shielded me from that, mostly, but also became frustrated with it. I had no official support at school, but neither did they. Why would a 14 year old know what to do when getting flack from all sides for even hanging around with somebody who seems so queer?)
It was Catholic school. Everyone was in the closet. The LGBT staff were afraid they would be fired if they came out. The only teacher who addressed LGBT issues at all was the religion teacher. He had us read about Sodom and Gemorrah, because he thought it was funny. When we didn’t understand the story, he claimed that it was God killing all the ‘faries’.
And thus my safe-haven of church evaporated. I’d read Ratzinger’s letter to American bishops about the pastoral care of homosexual persons. I was ‘intrinsically disordered’. I was unwelcome at church, bullied at school and bullied at home.
My mom hadn’t just outed me as school. Family dynamics had shifted considerably. I was no longer the perplexingly non-conformist child. I was the black sheep. My brother, finally freed from that role, relished his newly raised status. He and my mom would trade queerphobic quips and hate speech at the dining table. I felt unolved and unlovable. If I should somehow attract someone on the basis of unnatural lust, they were not welcome. I could never bring a partner home. There was no place for me in the world.
I pondered suicide. If God hated me, he would send me to hell, which would not be an improvement. Or else, he might not exist, in which case there was hope for a life without him. I knew that happy LGBT people existed and if I could make it, I could join them. I pondered running away from home, but decided to hold out until I turned 18.
My parents did love me; they were just really shit at communicating that. My mother’s friends told her to pack me away to conversion therapy. To throw me out of the house and leave me homeless. In the end, the advice she did follow – to bully me straight – was the kindest advice she received. She thought Jesus wanted her to make my life hell, so she did. But not enough to kill me or make me homeless or make my plunge into the minimum wage, insecure life of an emancipated minor.
I turned 18 and I went to university. I’d picked my uni based very largely on how LGBT- friendly it was. I went from being an outcast to being popular. I got into a relationship. But I didn’t know what it felt like for people close to me to be nice to me. The relationship was awful. And I used my social capital to bully other people.
When I was at university was when I first heard that transgender men existed. I was immediately interested. My my girlfriend, who I spent 9 years with overall, forbade transition. She was a lesbian, she said, so if I transitioned, she would leave. I was used to threats, conditional love and non-acceptance, so I agreed. As we bullied away most of my friends, who did I have aside from her?
My life became less and less tenable. And finally we broke up. She’d had enough, I’d had enough. It took a few years of questioning and of me desperately trying to force myself into boxes that didn’t work, before I finally did transition.
This isn’t an ‘it gets better narrative.’ My mother died and I inherited money. I used it to transition and then move to another continent. My life is ok now. It’s really good in fact, but this is not only because I stuck it out. It’s because I have privilege. I can’t make promises to trans kids that things will definitely get better for them. I desperately wish I could. I can say: the future you think you see is not the future you will have if you stick around for it. You will be surprised if you stick around. I really want you to stick around.
When I first moved away from home, at 18, my parents told me not to come back. But it was half-hearted – the kind of rows people have to make separations easier, but with the particular viciousness of our established dynamic. They paid my student feeds. They called me after a week to ask when I was going to visit. They met my girlfriend and came to see her as part of the family. All their threats vanished. Their disapproval slowly melted away. They forgave me. I forgave them. I stayed at my mother’s bedside when she had cancer. There was love there. Some clergy told them not to push me away and in the end, they went with the kinder version of their God. Their love gradually triumphed over their queerphobia.
Not every religious person has access to loving clergy. There are many in pastoral care who will happily sacrifice other people’s families to feed hatred. There are many who will turn their backs on their own families. They can’t face the truth of it, so they call their abuse ‘love’. It’s what Jesus wants.
And so, they stand in a mob, dully shouting ‘crucify him’, at their own children, just like we did at mass every Palm Sunday.
We like to think, when reading history, that we would have provided haven on the Underground Railroad, or joined the Resistance in Nazi-Occupied France or marched with MLK or somehow been on the side of the angels. When we read about privileged allies who helped Others at great personal risk, unless we’re part of the Other, we imagine ourselves as one of the allies. Of course we would have known that something so evil was wrong. But on Palm Sunday, the liturgy forces us to acknowledge the lie of this. ‘Crucify him!’ we say of the ultimate victim – the one we have defined as someone who never did wrong. The news might say ‘he was no angel’ about most innocent victims of state violence, but Jesus was better than an angel. Christians read every year about how the chief priests persuaded the crowds to say Jesus was guilty.
When clergy say Jesus demands violence, cruelty, abuse, neglect, ‘conversion therapy’, homlessness and death for LGBT people, they order parents not to love their children. They say Jesus does not love. They say Jesus is a monster who deserves no loyalty or respect. The world would be better off without such a hateful God. We’d all be better off if they would just crucify him.
Whose side are they on?

Bullying as Journalism

EDIT: ESPN actually is the publisher of the article, since they own Grantland.
Submitted to https://r.espn.go.com/members/contact/tvindex

Dear sir or Madam,

I am writing because I saw an advertisement for you on an article that I think you may not wish to be associated with. You may be aware of article on Grantland in which the journalist, Caleb Hannan, harasses his subject to the point of suicide. He is clearly aware of the harm he knows he causing her and uses it as part of his narrative arc. I’m sure that you do not wish to have your name associated with this kind of horrific bullying. Yet there is a link to you at the top of the page, implying endorsement. I would like to strongly encourage you to end your relationship with Grantland. I would also like to enquire if you have any policies which would apply if one of your own journalists submitted a similar story.

Thank you for your time,

Charles Hutchins

I’m not linking to the article. A ‘journalist’ decided to investigate the inventor of a new kind of putter. He speaks to her former employer who had used the threat of outing to get her to drop a discrimination lawsuit and then decided to out her anyway. He then called up everyone she knew to tell them personally that she was trans and ask them for comment. Having completely socially isolated her, he then calls her on the phone and tells her he’s going to out her in the press. She wrote him an email saying he was engaging in hate crime, which he included in the story. She took her own life, and he made sure to mention that the person who told him about this hated her and quote that person’s misgendering. He straight up caused somebody to die and then reported his role in it without a hint of remorse.
I’ve read some hateful shit. I’ve read bullying. I’ve read things that are intended to make the victim feel bad. But this, this kind of bloodless dispassionate, emotionally blank destruction of another human being is something I’ve never seen before. This is worse than anything I’ve ever encountered before. He kills someone and really is not at all bothered by it.
There’s a link to ESPN at the top of the socippath’s article and so I wrote to them. Their other adverts are automatically served by outbrain and are the same meaningless shit you see at the bottom of every article on earth. I clicked through on something that’s gone viral and the website is making money off of this. Because they have no qualms about bullying someone to death. Because it’s just a trans woman, so who cares.

Julie Bindel

There’s been a new round in the ongoing Julie Bindel vs trans people row. She was scheduled to speak against pornography at freshers week at Manchester, but pulled out because of rape and death threats, which were scary enough that she reported them to the police. I want to be very clear that rape and death threats are wrong. I hope the police catch whoever did it. Obviously, I don’t know if the person who did it is trans or a misguided ‘ally’ or is somebody who is really insecure about feminist discourse on pron. There have been a lot of easily findable abusive tweets from trans people to her, but none I saw were threatening.

There is a lot of confusion in the media and from Ms Bindel herself about why trans people are so very displeased with her. She imagines that it was an extremely rude and insulting article she wrote several years ago, which I won’t bother to quote. Some media has reported that it’s a philosophical disagreement about the origins or cultural significance of trans identities. Both of these things are wrong.

Trans people protest Bindel because every time she has the opportunity to speak about us, she advocates against us receiving appropriate healthcare. She wants to uphold our freedom of how we identify and that’s nice and all, but a lack of appropriate healthcare would be a tremendous crisis. the NHS started covering transition for the same reason that San Francisco Department of Health does: it’s much cheaper to do it than not do it. If there is no legal, prescription access to hormones, this will not stop people from taking them. It will however, prevent them from being appropriately monitored. Unmonitored hormones usage is not particularly safe and cause problems from blood clots to cancer as people get their levels wrong. In the NHS’s case, they found they were treating trans women who had, in desperation, attempted or succeeded in castrating themselves – dealing with the shock, the blood loss, infection and everything else that goes wrong when people try to perform surgery on themselves. In San Francisco, they found that lack of access to hormones lead to the impossibility of passing, which meant that some poor trans women were extremely vulnerable and whose only economic opportunities were in survival street sex work. Their HIV rates were around 70%.

Lack of access to healthcare kills. When she uses her very public platform to prevent us getting treatment, she is advocating that some us die.

In the past, she’s written about trans regret. This is when somebody transitions and then changes their mind. To a cis person, this must seem like the worst thing ever. In reality, the regret rate is around 1%. This is lower than for most medical interventions, including for cancer. For the 99% of people who are happy, they go on to lead productive lives, pay taxes, etc. Trans people tend to be much more economically produce post-transition, to the point where the medical intervention pays for itself in increased tax revenue.

There is a law in the UK called the Gender Recognition Act which prevents discrimination against (many) trans people and provides a mechanism by which people can update their documentation. When this was a bill, she and the Guardian actively campaigned against it, by finding every regretter they could and misrepresenting studies to claim the regret rate is much higher than it actually is.

These days, there are a few trans voices that get columns when issues about us come up, but for a long time the only people writing about us were cis people. Bindel became a public ‘expert’ on us because she already had a column – because she was cis. She’s still more famous than our rising star columnists and she still gets platforms over and over again where she proclaims that her ideology requires us to die. That the diagnosis of gender dysphoria should be eliminated and we be left to our self-identification without any medical support.

I wish that people would stop sending her abusive tweets. I wish people would stop offering her platforms to speak. I think that advocating for the removal of healthcare from a vulnerable population should disqualify one form speaking on any human rights issue.

Vigils and Protests

Hate crimes against trans* people now outnumber hate crimes against LGB people. Because of the increasing globalisation of our struggle, it’s appropriate and important to hold vigils for those killed, whether they were local or half a world away. Let’s be clear, these vigils are protests

Some issues arise. If vigils were not protests, it would be right and appropriate that the family have complete control of the speakers and what happens. This is the case at all funerals and memorial services. However, hate crimes are not isolated incidents. A hate crime is an act meant to target and terrorise an entire community. A vigil is a more public event that must therefore address the larger context in which the person was killed. These events therefore, should have input from the family, but also belong to the community effected.

Anyone can plan a protest or a vigil in regards to hate crimes. Alas, there are many opportunities. Yesterday, I went to a protest/vigil outside the Jamaican High Commission in London in response to the murder of Dwayne Jones. The planners of this event see hate crimes as a global problem and plan many such protests. This is unquestionably a good thing to do. They are fantastic. I’m glad they exist and they take these things on.

However, groups working to call for justice do need to have a bit of training, as was illustrated recently in New York. This is some of what you need to know:

If the person killed was trans, it’s appropriate to have signs and chants that mention homophobia, but you must prominently mention transphobia. These two things are linked, but if somebody was murdered for being trans, it’s confusing and incorrect to make signs that they were murdered for being gay. ‘Trans’ is not a type of ‘gay’. Certainly homophobia is also a problem in places where trans people are murdered, but the issue at hand is transphobia. Again, its ok to link these things. A vigil for a victim of a hate crime is always about the larger climate, but it’s important not to accidentally erase what happened to the individual in question.

Use the correct pronouns. If the pronouns are unclear, go for ‘they’ or something gender neutral. Do not assume that somebody’s birth assignment is the correct way to refer to them.

If you have a trans group in your area, reach out to them or their leaders as soon as you decide to start planning and invite them to the meetings.

At least one of the speakers you have must be trans. If you are in the UK, the Camden LGBT forum may be able to help you find somebody, or the Peter Tatchell Foundation may also be able to help. Also, some of the trans people involved in the planning may be able to speak or know somebody who can.

If the person is a member of a racial or ethnic minority, this should be reflected in who speaks. If they were located overseas, a person from that country or their diaspora should speak.

Remember to invite trans people and trans groups to the protest. If you’re in the UK, send a message to Protest Transphobia.

Reach out to potential allies. If you were planning to protest against hate crimes in Greece, you could reach out to other groups recently targeted there, such as migrants and sex workers. Or a protest about Russia could also include drug addicts, as they also suffer brutal repression under Putin.

What if you can’t do all of these things? Don’t worry. As long as you use the right pronouns and mention transphobia, you’re ok. If you’ve made mistakes about this in the past, don’t worry about them. Now you know.

Edit to add: solidarity

The important key here is solidarity. LGBT-phobia is a problem not unique to any religion or culture. Speakers at the event must not place blame on a either. They can call for social change a change in government policy, but they should not compare any other country negatively to their own. For those based in the UK, remember that homophobia and transphobia in most commonwealth countries came from the colonial law imposed by Britain. If you are in the US, full equality is still lagging. If you’re in Australia, you’ve got major issues with asylum seekers. Etc. There is no country I know of that’s completely safe from hate crimes, so focus on what you want to see change, not on how anybody else should be more like privileged countries or classes. If you are feeling at all smug about your country, just don’t get up to speak. We’re there in solidarity, not judgement.

How to talk about Pvt Manning

Some news outlets seem to have absolutely no idea how to talk about Chelsea Manning, who was known until last week as Bradley Manning and has been sentenced to 35 years in prison after she sent classified documents to wikileaks. They’re confused on how to describe her actions before she announced her social transition and which pronouns they should use to talk about the period in her life when she identified as a gay man.
(hint: see previous paragraph)
Chelsea Manning is already famous under a different name, so it’s fine to mention her former name. But really, don’t get cute about pronouns. It is more confusing, not less, to have a jumble of ‘he’s and ‘she’s. You know from her press release that she wants to go by ‘she’, so use ‘she’ whenever you’re writing about her, no matter what period of her life.
If you want to talk about something inherently gendered, then you might want a wee bit of vocabulary. She identified as a gay man for a while, meaning that’s what she told people she was. Other people at the time read her as male, because that’s how she presented herself. If ‘read’ is too jargony, try ‘viewed’, or ‘perceived.’
You can talk about her childhood, but again, avoid being cute about it. For example, if you want to use the word ‘boyhood’, is there a good reason for it? Is it somehow very important to the sentence or is it a word she used herself? Don’t project gender unless you’re using the subject’s own words or unless its needed. ‘She was a quiet child’ is fine. ‘She was a quiet boy.’ is confusing and unnecessary. ‘She seemed like a normal boy.’ is ok for two reasons – one is that the gender is an important part of the sentence. She didn’t just seem like a normal child, she seemed like a normal boy. The other reason that it’s acceptable is the word ‘seemed.’ She was perceived as a normal boy, which is about how she was viewed, not what she actually was. ‘She was a normal boy’ is not ok because it is factually incorrect (she already knew she wasn’t really a boy) and because it’s confusing and because it’s contrary and coercively assigning a gendered identity that the subject has not assigned themselves.
In summary, use ‘she’ all the time. If you have to use gendered terms to refer to the past, put wiggle words around it: seemed, appeared. (I’m sure journalists are well familiar with such words.)
If Manning keeps making headlines, at some point, it will become appropriate to drop the “who was previously known as Bradley Manning,” much like it’s no longer necessary to mention Wendy Carlos’s former first name. The point of mentioning the old name is not to draw attention to it, but to ensure that the reader knows who is meant.
Normally it’s rude and somewhat irrelevant to talk about the medical aspects of a person’s transition. However, because Manning is going to a prison that has specifically said it plans to violate her rights with regard to appropriate treatment, it’s definitely on topic in this case. Manning has said she wants hormones. She has not said that she wants surgery. It is not necessary to mention that she doesn’t currently want surgery. At some point, the repetition of this fact may become problematic. While media likes to make a big deal of ‘the operation,’ the reality for trans people is that hormones are much more important and that there is not one single dramatic moment during which transition occurs. Not all trans people have operations and there are a variety of operations available, rather than a single, monolithic process. The discourse around ‘the operation’ is a media construction. Which is not to say that trans people don’t often need operations, just that the context has been distorted in popular culture. This distorted context can cause statements about anyone’s lack of plan for surgery to make them seem as if they lack legitimacy or authenticity or further other them. Most trans people start out by seeking hormones and don’t immediately make further plans. Therefore Manning’s statement is entirely unremarkable and should not be treated otherwise.
Finally, and this should be obvious, people have a right to their gender identity that is inherently their own human right, unconnected to whatever else they’ve done in their lives. Whether you think Manning is a hero or a traitor, the only correct way to refer to her is through her current name and pronouns, as she has publicly requested.

An Open Letter

Background information below.

Dear Madam or Sir,

I am writing to ask what trans-run or trans-lead organisations or campaigners you are collaborating with for your campaign to drive mobile billboards around the Daily Mail?

I am also writing to ask you to reconsider this campaign. While I broadly agree with your goals, this campaign is expensive and I think the money could be better spent elsewhere. Due to the effects of economic discrimination, most trans people in the UK are far from rich. Many struggle to meet normal expenses or those transition -related expenses that are not met by the NHS. Obviously, harassment from the Daily Mail makes the daily lives of many trans people that much harder and contributes to the economic discrimination they deal with, and it’s a good use of funds to fight this. However, because these funds are limited, it’s important to be judicious as to how they are spent. Existing community organisations like Trans Media Watch are already running campaigns around newspapers and other British media. They also have relationships with media organisations and MPs. Donating money to them would certainly go further than a short-lived publicity stunt involving mobile billboards.

Indeed, I wonder who the intended audience of the billboard campaign is. Surely the Daily Mail is already aware that they’re full of hate. After Leveson, Parliament is certainly also aware. I would think even the general public is broadly aware of this at the moment. Therefore, it seems this would most succeed in drawing attention to your own organisation rather than the problem at hand. And while I’m sure you’re a very worthy cause and have admirable values, again, I don’t think you should be asking trans people to pay for your advertising campaigns. Would you consider dropping the billboard idea and raising money for a pre-existing trans organisation instead, like TMW, GIRES, Press for Change or one of the many other advocacy or front-line groups that are dedicated to helping trans people or improving our lot politically?

I fear that most of your money will not come from tans people at all, but from those with a strong and commendable interest in being allies, who want to Do Something and feel good about themselves in the process. Again, this is not the most judicious way of directing those well-meant donations. Our allies can feel just as good about themselves if they give to an established, long-running, sustainable campaign that succeeds at meeting it’s goals as they would feel giving to this publicity stunt. Perhaps they might even feel better, as the organisation the decided to support keeps making progress, vs having only a fleeting feeling of do-gooding which dissipates quickly as the Daily Mail continues to be awful after your short billboard stunt ends.

Thank you for your time,
Dr. Charles Céleste Hutchins

I’m not linking to the fund raising campaign that I’m writing to because I would rather not send users to their site. Briefly, this group has decided to raise £5000 to ‘encircl[e] [the Daily Mail’s] headquarters with mobile billboards plastered with the stories of the people whose lives [they have] ruined.’ This is all related to the untimely and tragic death of Lucy Meadows. She was monstered by the press in general, and specifically her home town paper, but outrage has largely fallen on a Rush-Limbuagh-esque columnist named Richard Littlejohn who wrote some rather nasty things about Lucy a few months ago.
There was a candle-lit vigil in front of the Daily Mail headquarters on Monday in reaction to this. Accounts I’ve read say that a large number of cis people showed up to stand in solidarity. Indeed, at the last protest I went to that was in regards to how the media treats trans people, cis people also outnumbered trans people.
I see this absolutely as a positive thing. I’m very happy that we have allies standing with us and that outrages against us are drawing general outrage. However, as with any instance where one is acting as an ally, it’s important to remember that allies are necessarily present in a supporting capacity. This means listening to those with whom one is allied and letting them take the lead and decide the direction of things.
I strongly suspect the the US-based for-profit company running this fund-raising campaign has slightly overstepped the normal boundaries of being an ally and tried to move more into a leadership role. Indeed, as they are for-profit, what is their revenue model? It’s obvious that they, like every petition site, are harvesting our personal information to sell it. How much of the money their raising for this silly stunt are they keeping? How much is going to overhead? How much is allocated for graphic design? Who is doing the graphic design? Who is going to be included and excluded from this billboards? Who decides? Is this even a trans-specific campaign? What is their ultimate goal? To target DM advertisers? Subscribers? To get the paper to entirely re-think their content?
This is all a reminder to pause and think before donating on something, including rage-donations. These can be really powerful and positive, like in the case of Feminist Frequency. But in that case it was very easy to see where to donate. Because Meadows cannot tell us what she wants, we need to be wary of those purporting to speak for her or for the community in general. The most important thing in giving money is not that feeling you get upon having done so, but whether it actually goes to the goal you are trying to support. Are you helping the person targeted? Are you making lasting change? Alas, we can’t help Meadows and I don’t see how this could make lasting change.