transgender

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My Heart is Heavy with Grief and Anger

Posted by Aibird on June 13, 2016
Posted in: Author. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

In Orlando, Florida, a gunman, after seeing two men kissing two days prior, decided to target a gay bar during Latino night with a trans headliner. There were a lot of cisgender LGB folks as well as trans LGB folks in the bar that night. He killed 50 of them and injured 53 others. This is the largest mass shootings in America, the largest death toll in a single few hours since 9/11, and it was targeting LGBTQIA people. This happened in the early morning hours of June 12th, 2016.  You can read the play by play of what happened in this link from Slate.

I don’t know how to feel right now. A friend of mine lost a friend that night, and all I can do is say, “If you need me or anything at all, let me know.”  What more can be said? I want to cry, rage, and hide all at the same time.

I attended a vigil Sunday evening at my capitol building. A good hundred or so people showed up, and we wept together. Talked about how the gun violence has got to stop. Talked about how we need to support one another, to stand firm on the side of love, to not let hatred win. Because what happened early Sunday morning on June 12th, 2016 was a hate crime. A hate crime against LGBTQIA people (specifically people of color as most were Latinos).

The current rise of anti-LGBTQIA rhetoric and legislation in this country most definitely played a role.  This wasn’t the only attack this weekend. This weekend was Pride weekend, where Pride festivals across America happens in various cities. Pride exists to honor the memory of Stonewall, where LGBTQIA people, specifically trans folks of color, first fought back and demanded equal rights. The festivals exist to affirm our existence, to affirm that we do matter and that we can eventually overcome the hatred spewed against us. We will continue the fight for equal rights —  the rights straight, cisgender people already have. We will continue to proudly proclaim that love will win out. That’s what Pride is all about, but this weekend hatred was spewed forth upon our communities.

In Los Angeles, there was a confirmed  report of a gunman who planned to attack the Pride event that day — he had a car full of weapons and explosives, and if he had not stopped to wait for a friend, there might have been a second mass shooting Sunday. That horror was just barely prevented. There has been other attacks on people at Pride events in other cities, some anecdotal and some reported to police. I can’t say this enough: the anti-trans and anti-LGBTQIA rhetoric and legislation in the majority of states most definitely has an effect and it’s a damaging one; these attacks stem from that rise.

I write this in tears because I fear for my life and the life of my loved ones and friends. What happened in Orlando? It could have happened anywhere in the US, and with the rise of hatred toward folks like me, is there anywhere that is safe?

I don’t have the energy or patience to deal with folks who don’t like the existence of LGBTQIA people or view our lives as morally wrong. I’ve seen enough people celebrating the deaths of people like me, enough people quoting Bible verses as they tell me that folks like me deserve to die, that we are sinful abominations. I’m tired of it, and yet I can’t escape it because it saturates America’s discourse, where even the act of me taking a piss in a bathroom causes the hateful folks to rise up in condemnation of my existence.

I post this in hopes of solidarity and to remind everyone that we, LGBTQIA folks of all races and professions — we do exist, and we matter just as much as cisgender straight people. We don’t deserve deaths like this.

And so, we must remember those who have died. We must not let their deaths be used to fuel more hatred: http://fusion.net/st…pulse-massacre/

Anderson Cooper reads their names and their stories. (A heart-wrenching video).

Remember them. Don’t let the politicians or the murderer’s 911 call shape the discourse. This has nothing to do with radical Islam. The murderer wasn’t even a practicing Muslim. He was born in America, raised in our American culture, and came to hate folks like me. There are more people out there like him who try hard to cause harm through legislation, through conversion therapies, through denial of basic services, through denying us jobs and/or housing, through firing us for coming out. The hatred of LGBTQIA people is prevalent in America, and don’t let the politicians with their hateful rhetoric demonize innocent Muslim folks and refugees. Don’t let this act of hatred be used to fuel more hatred.

Love has to win out. It’s got to. Because right now, when I think about all we’ve lost in my community — the folks in Orlando, the dozens of trans folks murdered this year, people we lost to suicide because they felt life was too dangerous and painful to live, the folks who have been hurt, assaulted, beaten, harassed, discriminated against — all of us, I start to lose hope. I start to wonder if there is any good in this world. I start to wonder if maybe life is too dangerous, that maybe it would be better if I left this world. Then I think of some of my favorite movies: The Lord of the Rings, and I think of what Sam said to Frodo when Frodo lost all hope:

FRODO: I can’t do this, Sam.

SAM: I know. It’s all wrong. By rights we shouldn’t even be here. But we are. It’s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn’t want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy. How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened.  But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something. Even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back only they didn’t. Because they were holding on to something.

FRODO: What are we holding on to, Sam?

SAM: That there’s some good in this world, Mr. Frodo. And it’s worth fighting for.

There is some good in this world, and it’s worth fighting for. Love will win out, but we got to work together. Support one another. Listen to one another, and stand up for one another. Fight this fight together.

Remember to take care of yourself in this time of grief. Hug your loved ones. Tell your friends, especially your LGBTQIA friends and family, that you love them and support them. Stand firm on the side of love and stand up against the hateful rhetoric and legislation that is harming LGBTQIA folks like me. Remember that you are loved. That you do matter. Love must win out.

A Primer on Writing Trans Characters

Posted by Aibird on June 13, 2016
Posted in: Books, Characters, World Building, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , , . 2 Comments

Introduction

A question I’m commonly asked is: how does one write a trans character? I also get asked this question in regards to writing gay, lesbian, or bisexual characters, and/or how to write a person of color. There is a lot of overlap in these questions since a person can have a variety of skin colors, and that same person can also be trans or cisgender as well as gay, lesbian, bi, asexual, or straight; therefore, some of the articles I will link offer excellent advice on writing people of different skin tones and ethnicity as well as different genders and sexualities.

In this primer, I will focus primarily on gender identity. I will provide some common definitions, how to worldbuild with trans characters in mind, things to keep in mind when designing a trans character, and steps you can follow when writing trans characters’ stories. I will also have a list of resources at the end of this article for further reading.

How to use the guide

Think about the setting of your story and the characters you wish to create. For writers whose settings are real locations in current or historical time periods of Earth, you may not need to go through the worldbuild section. Instead, you can research how gender is perceived and how people are treated within your chosen location and time period, then go straight to the Designing Your Character section. For example, if your setting is 1800s Ireland, then do some research to see what it was like for men and women in that time period, then go straight to the Designing Your Character section of this primer. If you are writing an alternate Earth history, then you may find the content of the worldbuild section helpful. If you are creating your own science fiction or fantasy universe, I highly recommend going through the entire primer and not skipping any section in order to assist you in deepening your understanding of your world and characters.

Important Things to Keep in Mind

Trans people are a diverse group, so I will cover a few of the most common gender identities. Trans women were assigned male at birth but are women. Trans men were assigned female at birth but are men. There are also non-binary people, who could be assigned either male or female at birth and may use various identifiers such as genderqueer, neutrois, agender, and others. Although some intersex people are trans, not all trans people are intersex. You can view the transgender language primer link I provided in the definitions section to read more about the various terms and identities.

The gender identity of a trans person is real, and it is important to respect their pronouns, to use their chosen name, and to not out them without their permission. When talking about transgender people before they transition, it is important to  use their current pronouns unless specified otherwise by that individual; do not use the sex assigned at birth pronouns.  Also, avoid the use of their “deadname,” which is the name they were given at birth but is not their chosen name. Even if discussing their life before transition, it is still better to not use their deadname unless they give permission. When writing the character’s story, seriously consider whether it is even necessary to provide the dead name ever. In most cases, it will not be relevant to the plot.

Why is this important? Because trans people exist, and representation really does matter. In this essay by a transgender woman, she discusses the power of representation and the tragic tropes people often use when writing transgender characters. Negative portrayals that show us as comedic relief or as a villain only serve to perpetuate the stereotype that we are not serious (or real) or that we are dangerous, which can also cause tremendous harm — trans people, due to discrimination and rejection of who they are by today’s society and sometimes their family and friends, already have high suicide rates and rates of being murdered for who they are. Negative portrayals can aggravate those rates by perpetuating harmful myths, which can lead to increased harassment, lack of acceptance, and other harmful behaviors perpetuated against trans people.

Tragic portrayals done respectfully can be important in showing how society treats trans people today and gather sympathy for trans people. However, in our current culture (in America where I live), most of the stories I see of trans folks are tragic portrayals. Having an overabundance of tragic portrayals is exhausting to a trans person, who already faces discrimination and injustice and makes it hard to hold out hope for positive change in society’s treatment of us. At this point, I am desperate to read anything but a tragic and/or negative portrayal, so that I can enjoy seeing a trans person flourish and thrive rather than wither and die.

Positive portrayals provide hope for the future and shows people that trans people can do awesome things too, where trans people are shown as human beings just like everyone else and that we are just as worthy of rights and respect as a cisgender person. It’s important to think about how we portray characters, especially if you wish to write a trans character respectfully. We often underestimate the influence literature, video games, movies, TV shows, and other media can have on our perceptions of others and ourselves.

This isn’t to say you can’t have trans people as villains, comedic relief, or have them experience great tragedy and/or death. But if that is the only portrayal of trans people you have in your stories, then there is a problem. Trans people can be heroes as well — diversity in representation such as providing balanced portrayals is also important. Let trans people be heroes, and let them experience interesting story lines that aren’t only about their gender identity. Think about all the diverse portrayals of straight, cisgender people, then consider how, with some alterations here and there, you could give a trans person similar diverse roles in stories.

Diversity can help to deepen your worlds and stories. Diversity can also provide you with more opportunities for conflict, character growth, and societal change, which can give you even more ideas for future stories. Writing diverse characters and diverse story arcs also challenges us to learn more about people not like us; this can increase our ability to emphasize with others, helps us reconcile diverse worldviews, become more accepting of other people, and pushes us to challenge any biases we have that may be holding us back as writers and as people. Writing diverse characters can be a fun and interesting journey, but it will require you to do some research, but then as writers, we should all be used to research by now!

In order to start our journey, it is important to understand the terms we will be using. I have provided a short list of terms, but I included a resource for a more comprehensive list of terms that you may encounter as you research and explore the transgender community.

Definitions of Terms

Gender identity means a person’s internal sense of what their gender is. Some describe it as their brain’s gender. The person’s gender identity may or may not align with the sex assigned at birth.

Sexual orientation denotes who a person is attracted to. Gender identity and sexual orientation are not the same thing. A trans person can be any sexuality.

Sex assigned at birth means that at birth the doctor looked at the baby’s genitalia and labeled them as either male or female (rarely if ever is any other test used to determine sex). (Note: if the genitalia is ambiguous due to various Intersex conditions, the doctor may do surgery without permission to force the baby into either male or female. This is a common practice in America.)

Cisgender means people whose gender aligns with the sex assigned at birth, i.e., they are not trans.

Transgender means people whose gender does not align with the sex assigned at birth. This is often shortened to simply trans. A transgender person can be a woman, man, neither, or an third gender altogether. Trans people may or may not experience gender dysphoria, and they may or may not decide to physically and socially transition. Again, there is a lot of diversity within the trans community.

Non-binary denotes a person who does not identify within the male/female binary. Non-binary people fall under the transgender umbrella, although not all may identify with the term trans. See the Transgender Language Primer for definitions of various non-binary identities.

Gender Expression denotes the external appearance of one’s gender identity, usually expressed through behavior, clothing, haircut or voice. A person’s gender expression may or may not conform to society’s gender norms.

Transition denotes the process a person may undergo in order to align their body and/or their gender expression with their gender identity. Physical transition may or may not involve hormone therapy, various surgeries, and voice training. Social transition involves changing how a person expresses their gender and may or may not include changing their behavior, clothing, haircut, or voice.

Gender Norms denotes society’s rules, expectations, and roles that define for each gender a set of behaviors, gender expressions, characteristics, and roles. Norms often include how society enforces these roles, expectations, and rules.

Gender Roles denotes society’s expectations for each gender in regards to the familial, workplace, and social positions within society as well as the characteristics and traits society associates with each gender.

Socialization is a sociological term that refers “to the lifelong process of inheriting and disseminating norms, customs, values and ideologies, providing an individual with the skills and habits necessary for participating within their own society.” (Definition from wikipedia).

For a comprehensive list of terms and definitions, please see this lovely list: Transgender Language Primer

Worldbuilding

I have an extensive list of resources and articles I have written regarding worldbuilding. You can view that here.  In this section, I will explore how gender can influence society (such as the culture of your country and/or planet). When you engage in worldbuilding and/or designing your characters, many different influences from society, language, and history can increase the complexity of your character’s journey, of how characters interact with each other, and of your plot lines. I have provided some questions for writers to consider:

  • How many genders does your society and/or country have? Some cultures on Earth have up to five genders. In fact, biology is showing more and more that even humanity is not as simplistic as having just two sexes. Think of gender as your identity that is within your brain. Your sex is related to your biological make-up such as secondary sex characteristics or chromosomes; however, studies show that using sex to determine gender is not always reliable. Also, there is some evidence that one person could technically have cells with very different chromosomes. The point here is to show that even gender can be incredibly diverse.
  • Is gender neutral pronouns common in your society? What types of pronouns does your society’s language have?
    • As a side note: In American society, gender neutral pronouns are rare, but people are slowing changing the language over time by using gender neutral pronouns within written and spoken works/discussion.  There are many languages in the world where there is multiple gender neutral pronouns or the language may not have any gendered pronouns at all. (Finnish is an example of a language that doesn’t have gendered pronouns (or nouns) like what we see in English.) Remember language also affects how people perceive others, and languages are not static. If a language doesn’t have gender neutral pronouns, this can change if enough people use gender-neutral pronouns, which is how languages evolve — folks changing how words are used over time.
  • How does your society treat each gender? Is one considered “better” or “stronger” or “more intelligent” or “more simplistic” than the other? How is gender perceived and experienced within your culture? What are the gender  roles? This leads into my next question about gender norms (rules or expectations enforced by society).
  • Has the treatment of each gender changed over time? Was some genders treated differently in the past? How did that change over time?
  • What rules and/or expectations does your society enforce for various genders? This can manifest in various ways (this list is just to get you started):
    • What types of employment are accessible to what genders?
    • In what ways are people of each gender typically presented in the media/entertainment, educational, and/or political discussions?
    • How do people view the body (as in are there specific body parts that society labels is for one gender only?)
    • How people view sex (as in how is consent taught? Is specific sex acts considered belonging to one gender only? Is one gender presented as more dominant in sex than the other genders?)
    • What clothing is taboo (or allowed) for each gender?
    • What types of physical or psychological characteristics are associated with each gender?
    • How are people of certain genders treated in public?
    • What actions a person of a specific is allowed to do in public and what is considered taboo?
    • Is one gender considered better than another gender and how this power differential is enforced?
    • If people transgress the gender norms, how does society punish them (if society punishes them at all)?
      • (For example, in America, if a man (cisgender or trans) acts too feminine, other guys may beat him up, insult him, abuse him, and/or demote him until he acts the way society states a “man” should act. In some extreme cases, the man could be killed. Or if a woman (cisgender or trans) acts too manly in America, she can be dehumanized, abused, raped, verbally harassed, insulted, and/or demoted until she acts the way society states a “woman” should act. Again, in extreme cases, the woman could be killed. Also, note that this enforcement is even more harsh for trans people in America, especially if they do not “pass” as a cisgender person. Many trans people, especially non-passing and non-binary people, are often seen as “transgressing” the gender norms, and so they experience harassment, abuse, destruction of their property, loss of jobs or denied jobs, loss of or denied housing, loss of rights, unable to access public services, etc. In some cases, they may be driven to suicide or are murdered.)

When you think about gender norms and their enforcement, think about socialization. This can be a complex topic, so reading sociological theory on socialization may be useful. How we are socialized by society today may not be how people in the past were socialized, as socialization of norms is changeable over time. Think of it this way. You know how we are socialized to think pink is feminine and blue is masculine? At the end of the 1800s and early 1900s, blue was actually considered feminine. Things like this can change depending on time period and culture.

For example, in American culture, guys are supposed to be tough and show little emotion, and masculinity is associated with power, sexual prowess, and violence. Femininity in America is often associated with being overly emotional, not smart enough, weak, or bossy. However, in some societies on Earth, the masculine person is expected to show more emotion than the feminine person and their gender roles are polar opposite of how gender roles are perceived in America.  These socialized perceptions and gender norms have an impact on how people are perceived and treated. And all of what I’ve discussed thus far? That’s all learned behaviors and perceptions. I bring this up because I want writers to think outside the box. To avoid having these biases and/or socialized perceptions color your world-building.

The Sociological Images page does a good job of breaking down how a society enforces and perpetuates its norms. Also see their “for instructors page” as it has a lot of good resources for learning more about sociology and societal norms.

Designing Your Characters

Now that you understand the backdrop of your world in regards to gender, think about your character and how they inhabit that space. By understanding the environment, space, history, and personality of your character, you can develop intriguing story lines that move beyond stereotypes. Although there is a time and place for stories about the act of transitioning, there’s also much to be said about giving your trans character different types of story-arcs. You don’t have to make their entire plot line about them being trans or about their transition. Remember, trans people are very diverse, exist in all sorts of professions, and there’s more to them than just their gender identity. Their gender identity is only one facet of who they are. Also, recognize that a trans person can be any sexuality — gender identity and a person’s sexuality are not the same thing, so a trans person can be straight, bisexual, gay, lesbian, asexual, or pansexual.

The following questions can help you better understand your character and the space around them, so when you write, you can include little details that add depth to their story-arcs and their interactions with other characters and societal systems.

  • How does the character navigate their society? (Is there roadblocks that prevent them from accessing certain opportunities or areas of society? Are their laws that prohibit their movement or restrict their rights? Do they have laws that guarantee their rights? Is society accepting of them or not? How do they react to these things? What is their opinion on the state of society?)
  • How does the character get through a day? (As in how to people respond to the character’s existence? Is it positive, negative, and/or neutral? Do they feel safe going about their day?)
  • Does the character encounter discrimination? How do they deal with discrimination? (Is there legal recourse for them? Programs or resources to help them access healthcare, employment, education, basic needs requirements, etc…)
  • What sort of movements exist that challenge the society’s gender norms? Or is your society accepting enough that there is no need for such movements? Is your character connected with such movements and what do they think of them?
  • How does your character experience gender? Do they have dysphoria? Will they transition physically or socially? Or are there roadblocks that prevent their transition? How do they react to society’s view of people like them?
  • What does your character like to do? Hobbies? Work?
  • What is your character’s spirituality or belief system? How does that influence their behaviors and thoughts?
  • What is your character’s worldview — how do they perceive their place in society? What do they feel about some of society’s laws or expectations? What sort of political theory to they adhere to?
  • Where did your character grow up and what was their childhood like? How does events from their childhood influence them today? What lessons did they learn during their childhood in regards to life, society, and their view of  themselves?
  • What is their family like? How many siblings do they have? What are their parents like? Does their family accept their gender identity?
  • What is your character’s sexuality? Have they dated anyone in the past, and if so, why did the relationship end? Are they interested in dating anyone? Are they in a relationship?
  • If in a relationship, did your character marry the person or not? Why? Do they have kids?  What are their kids like? Do they have any pets?
  • Who are your character’s friends? Why did they choose those friends? How did they meet? How deep are the friendships?
  • Is there anyone your character really dislikes? Why do they dislike them?
  • What was their education like? What did they study? Why did they decide to study that particular subject(s)?
  • What type of employment does the character have? Why did they choose to apply for that job? Or were they forced into that job due to societal norms or family pressure?
  • What is a typical day in the life of your character? (Think of a day before the big events of your story changes their life forever.)

For a longer list of character questions, see this thread on Legendfire Writing Forums.

Do not be afraid to use gender-neutral pronouns if there are characters who are of a third or fourth gender (or no gender). You can even meld the gender neutral pronouns into the society of your character’s world by making it a commonplace and/or important to the culture. When integrated into the setting (world) and characters, gender neutral pronouns will seem essential and not jarring to readers. For example, in science fiction, writers will use a variety of techniques to denote people (or aliens) of genders outside of the male/female binary:

  • Writers may use actual gender neutral pronouns such as ve/vir/vis (Alastair Reynolds has a character who uses these pronouns in one of his novels).
  • Or they may use a pronoun native to the language of the character (common with stories that have aliens in it like the Xenogenesis trilogy, where the aliens denote their third gender as just ooloi, or in Julie Czerneda’s works where it is a word native to the alien language).
  • Another approach involves writers using humanity’s tendency to stereotype and denote things by human’s norms. In this case, humans may decide to use only one pronoun for the entire alien species.  (The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula Le Guin does this, where the human observer denotes all of the people on Winter as “he.” Ann Leckie does this in Ancillary Justice, where humans denote everyone within the alien species as “she.”) As a caveat: this particular approach may be useful for aliens and human stories, but I find this approach to be limiting and somewhat troublesome when used for non-binary characters (human or not).

 

Writing the story

Writing the story can often seem daunting, especially to people who are uncertain if they can portray trans characters well. I’ll tackle the steps to take in a bit, but first let’s discuss ways of writing the story your characters inhabit.

Once you have designed your characters, be willing to place them in diverse roles within your stories. You can make them the hero, the antagonist, an important side character, or peripheral characters that influence the plot in minor ways. It only takes a sentence or two to establish that they are trans. This can be done through a conversation the characters have, how other people interact or react to your character (such as microaggressions), the character’s inner thoughts about society and what they experience, or through well-worded descriptive details. The best way to explore how to do this is by reading books that feature trans people. Or think about how trans people may discuss being trans to other people — sometimes it comes up naturally in conversation. I will include a list of books to try at the end of this primer for you to explore how others have written trans characters.

For an example, I will use myself. A few days ago, some friends were sharing experiences of harassment (namely cat-callers). As a trans person who was assigned female at birth, I have experiences with this from when I was not yet out and was still perceived as a woman by nearly everyone. Since I was with friends, I joined the conversation by saying, “I get that. Before I came out or even considered transition, I experienced that too. I remember this one time…” Another example was when I was with friends on a hot day. I made the comment: “Ugh, I hate that feeling of sweat inside the binder. I’m totally going to take a nice shower when I get home.” My friends then shared their own discomfort with the heat, we laughed about it, and the topic changed to something else. In both these instances, my sharing of my trans part of my identity was brief and not the focus, but in both instances I felt comfortable and safe enough to share my experience.

By reading and listening to trans people’s stories and experiences, you can compile all sorts of ways to slip in details that the character is trans, where it may or may not be crucial to the plot but it is another interesting detail that develops the character further.

Here is a wonderful example of a writer doing a good job in creating a trans character. In Dragon Age Inquistion, there is a character who is trans, and the main indicator is some dialogue where the character mentions that they bind. Here is a blog post of how the writers and developers of Dragon Age Inquistion researched the subject and implemented the character in a respectful way: Building a Character: Cremisius “Krem” Aclassi. This article also shows the steps involved in writing a trans character well:

  1. Research and lots of it. Best way to do this is to listen to the stories of trans people. Read about their lives and read stories by them. Read up on definitions and concepts pertaining to trans people and the issues they face.
  2. Look for roles trans people can have in your stories — try for diverse roles in a variety of professions, and try to avoid making their story-arc just about the fact they are trans. Trans people are just as interesting and complex as cisgender people. Trans people can be any profession, any sexuality, any ethnicity or race, any socioeconomic position. Diversify!
  3. After you write your story, look for beta readers who are trans, and ask for their critiques. Listen to their constructive feedback on how to improve, and don’t feel defeated or sad if their reaction is less than stellar. Learn from your mistakes, fix any errors, and keep doing your best to diversify your characters. The best way to write diverse characters is by trying, learning from the experience, and trying again when you mess up.
  4. Understand that no matter how hard you try, some folks will love what you write and other people may not. As long as you do your best to write trans characters respectfully, that’s what’s important.

Remember, you don’t have to be a trans person in order to include trans characters! Writing trans characters may seem hard at first, but I challenge you to try anyway. Realize that trans people are just like you, and by writing about them, you can not only better understand trans people but also grow as a person and a writer. If you have any questions or want to see certain sections covered in further detail, feel free to drop me a note, and I’ll see what I can do.

Resources:

Legendfire Writing Forum Thread discussing how to write trans characters.

The Gender Book is a good 101 primer about trans people and issues they face. I highly recommend starting here.

Tips on writing trans characters (article published at Strange Horizons).

An article published on SFWA that provides tips on writing characters of different races and/or ethnicities. A lot of the advice is applicable to trans characters as well.

An article published on Walrus called Rise of the Gender Novel. It discusses how trans people are portrayed in literature.

Kat Blaque’s Advice on How to Write Transgender Characters (a YouTube video):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3fbvOX8Zh4 (I highly recommend this resource. Kat Blaque is a trans woman, who does a wonderful job offering tips on writing trans characters well.)

Lists of books with a trans protagonist:

There is an unspoken epidemic

Posted by Aibird on July 26, 2015
Posted in: Author, Feminism, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

There is an unspoken epidemic in our country.

Since January 1, 2015, there has been sixteen trans people, fifteen of them trans women, murdered in the US and one in Canada. Majority were trans women of color. Both race and gender play a factor in the deaths.

The media often presents them as a novelty — using the wrong name and pronouns, describing them in ways that dehumanizes them. The media will often go so far as to paint them as sex workers, despite it being a false claim for most of the cases. Rarely will other publications comment on it.  Often only trans people seem to speak up for them. We cry out in anger and pain at the losses, and yet our cisgender so-called allies are often quiet. Sometimes our cisgender queer allies will demean the dead further by arguing over whether they were even women, and if trans women in general are even allowed to be called women. This is just more violence done to them after their deaths and further violence done to the living. By arguing against our identities, people are engaging in verbal violence that causes direct harm. Couple this with how discriminatory our culture is toward trans people, staying alive becomes incredibly difficult. It’s why the life expectancy of trans women of color is 30 to 35 years old. Those within our country often don’t allow them to exist, and many of us face violence whether it is physical, psychological, or verbal.

To honor our dead, I will repeat their names so they are never forgotten:

Papi Edwards, January 9th, Kentucky
Lamia Beard, January 17th, Virginia
Ty Underwood, January 26, Texas
Yazmin Vash Payne, January 31, California
Taja DeJesus, February 3, California
Penny Proud, February 10, Lousiana
Bri Golec, February 13, Ohio
Kristina Gomez Reinwald, February 15, Florida
Sumaya Ysl, February 22, Canada
Keyshia Blige, March 7, Illinois
Vanessa Santillan, March 28, Florida
Mya Hall, March 30, Maryland.
London Chanel, May 18, Pennsylvania
Mercedes Williamson, June 2, Mississippi
India Clarke, July 21, Florida
K.C. Haggard, July 23, California

They never should have died, and the outrage and grief over their deaths haunt me still. May they rest in peace.

There is an unspoken epidemic in our country. Since December 26, 2014 to today, there has been over a dozen suicides by trans people, possibly more as not all get coverage. These are sometimes younger trans folks and sometimes older. They are all over the country. And their suicide notes, if they have any, are always the same — lamenting the fact that our country is too hostile, the discrimination too great, and the lack of hope of it ever being better the final straw. The media, if it even acknowledges their deaths, often fails to gender them correctly, often using the wrong name and putting their chosen name in quotes. Studies have shown that over 41% of trans people attempted suicide, and that study and similar ones show that it is due to a tremendous amount of discrimination at nearly all levels of our lives. 1 in 2 transgender people have been sexually abused at some point in our lives. These numbers are significantly higher for trans people of color than for white trans people — as the intersection of race and gender identity makes life exceptionally harder.

For many of the trans people who have died, their families may decide to not honor who they were in life and will bury them with the wrong name. Even in death they are misgendered and forgotten, their true selves lost by an uncaring world. Can people not see that misgendering a trans person is in itself a form of violence? It is a denial of a trans person’s identity – of their true self — and to misgender us is to violently deny our existence as well as placing us in danger.

There is an unspoken epidemic in this country. Trans people like me and many of my friends are the victims of a war against us, a war we never started nor wished for. We wish only to live out our lives as ourselves, but society will not have this. We are not allowed in public spaces without others questioning our right to exist. We face the threat of violence from people we know and from strangers. We face people misgendering us, and others treating us like we are monsters to be reviled. Police often will treat transgender people badly, often claiming suspicion of prostitution when there is no evidence. Still others try to (and sometimes do) enact laws to make it harder for us to access healthcare or even to use the restroom.

There is an unspoken epidemic in this country, and until justice is served and equality given, I will not be silent.

Personal Narratives

Posted by Aibird on May 10, 2015
Posted in: Author, Philosophy, Writing. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , . 2 Comments

We all have our own personal story, which is how we explain to others our past and who we are. In the writings of Paul Ricoeur’s Time and narrative, volume 3 (University of Chicago Press, 1990), “narrative theory is a theory of personal identity rooted in the stories we tell about ourselves.” Think for a second about your own identity and how you make sense of it. Think about how the stories you tell yourself about your past; you may call them memories, but a memory is just an encoding of an event in your mind. You still need to make sense of that encoded event and place it within a time frame that you concocted or others coerced you into believing. This enduring identity that we hold about ourselves is tied into the narrative conviction that it is the same character — the same person — who continues through these diverse acts and words through life and death.

Yet, what if something challenges this narrative? What if we encounter a truth or an event that upturns a lot of what we believed to be true in our personal narratives?

A Look at Personal Narratives in Battlestar Galactica

Battlestar Galactica examines this very idea in the character arcs of the Sharons — model eight. In an essay by Daniel Milsky in the Battlestar Galactica and Philosophy Anthology, this idea of identity narratives is examined in detail.  Before I continue, be warned, readers, I may include a few spoilers within Boomer and Athena’s story lines. If you don’t wish to read further, that’s fine, you can skip the next two paragraphs, as these next two paragraphs are the only spots where I will have a few minor spoilers in Boomer and Athena’s story lines. I am using them as examples of personal narratives, how these narratives relate to how we perceive our identity, and how these narratives can change.

For Sharon “Boomer” Valerii, she believes she is human and has this thorough narrative of her life as a fighter pilot with the Galactica. She believes she is a member of the crew and a woman from Troy, as well as Chief Tyrol’s lover. This is all aspects of her identity that she holds dear. However, as the first season progresses, Sharon begins to experience disruptions to this narrative that calls into question something she held incredibly dear — that she is human. How does she respond to these disruptions? For example in the episode “Water,” Boomer wakes up soaking wet not long after the bombs used to destroy Galactica’s water tanks are planted. She can’t remember why she is wet. Part of this is due to her being a sleeper agent and her stubborn refusal to acknowledge this truth could exist. This culminates in the moment where she shoots Admiral Adama — she has no memory of it, but the evidence that it was her is plain as day. This narrative disruption to her internal story tears Boomer apart, and the response from the crew — especially after the shooting — who proceeds to vilify her and treat her as a less than, an ‘other’, an Cylon, further disrupts her cognitive view of herself. She struggles to rewrite her internal narrative to include the idea that her identity as a human was fabricated. This is a shocking truth.

In direct contrast to Boomer’s story line, Sharon “Athena” Valerii knows she is a Cylon. She is tasked by Model Six and Doral to seduce Helo, who believes she is “Boomer” returned to rescue him. However, Athena finds that she has come to return Helo’s love for her and starts to identify more with his goals. Model Six, watching this transpire, chooses to call Athena by her chosen name rather than her model number, and her reasoning for it is summed up in the narrative of identity: “I choose to to think of her as one of them,” she says to Doral. Doral asks if it’s because she dislikes her. Six’s response is very telling: “Because in the scheme of things, we are as we do. She acts like one of ’em, thinks like them. She is one of them.” Here Model six is defining Athena’s narrative of her identity, one that coincides with the actions Athena has taken and how she interacts with Helo and his group. So not only do we construct our own narratives, but others construct narratives about us based on our actions. For Athena, this narrative constructed by the Cylons eventually ends up casting her out as no longer “one of them.” Athena had started to redefine her own narrative based on Helo’s love for her, especially as she starts to love him in turn, so when the Cylon’s tell her to either convince him to stay with her or kill him, she chooses to escape with Helo away from the Cylons. She has chosen to redefine her previous identity narrative as a Cylon into one where she lives as a human in a human relationship. Note she hasn’t rejected her Cylon identity, but only added to its narrative, enriching it with her new experiences.

Narrative Disruptions and Fragmentation

In both of these examples, we see how narrative disruption can cause traumatic effects as well as profound transformative moments. Not only do we tell ourselves stories about our own narratives, but others often will develop narratives about who we are. As Milsky writes in his essay, “The Narrative Disruptions of Model Eight,” one of the ways we construct these narratives is “to engage in the process of ’employment,’ the way in which we arrange events and actions that give a sense of wholeness to the story with a beginning and an end. Emplotment is what makes the story intelligible. The beauty of emplotment is that we are able to take discordant events and heterogeneous episodes of our lives and tie them together into a coherent plot permitting readability to our lives.” This readability to our lives is how we understand our own identity and past, and also plays a role in how we react in the present and make our decisions about our future.

However, like I mentioned in the Boomer example, events may transpire that call into question some of the deepest held beliefs about our identity, and this disruption can cause tremendous pain and torment. How we resolve that torment depends on how we take these disparate events and fuse them into a coherent plot, tying our lives into a readable whole. Some may do this by disregarding the disruption and trying to edit it out of their life, as if it never happened. However, no matter the amount of avoidance, the event still influenced us, and it can never be completely erased.

You can see a bit of this in C.S. Lewis’s Narnia series. At the end of The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy end up in Narnia, very different from their lives on Earth. Eventually, over time, they integrate this disruption into their narratives and live out their lives as the Kings and Queens of Narnia. They have redefined their narratives to integrate this new reality into it, but once they are returned abruptly to Earth and their child bodies, this narrative is again disrupted. The magic may slowly cause them to forget parts of the Narnia narrative that had defined them for so many years, but it’s never fully forgotten. In Prince Caspian, it is revealed that the four had talked a lot about Narnia amongst themselves. They had tried to make sense of what happened, because not all of the memories were fully erased by the magic. Their abrupt return to Narnia in Prince Caspian further disrupts their personal narratives. Susan at one point in the group asks the others if they remember these ruins they are at, and she feels a great sadness at seeing them. Even though she cannot remember the exact details, her unconscious mind recognizes that seeing this should evoke sadness. This disruption to her personal narrative causes conflict and the longer they stay in Narnia, the more they remember the last time they were there. The books never dig too deeply into how these four characters integrate these disruptions into their narrative, but it is hinted that for Susan, after she and Peter are told they cannot return again, attempts to avoid the memories and move on as if it didn’t happen.

Avoidance of a narrative disruption often leads to further traumatizing moments, as no matter how hard we try, we cannot fully erase that dissonant event in our personal story line. Our mind may play tricks by inducing flashbacks triggered by what may seem random moments — something that we smelled, a sight we saw, a color, a person, or whatever the cause. This post-traumatic stress response is very common when a traumatic event happens in our lives. However, our running from these traumatic moments is often a type of self-defense mechanism. As Milsky writes about Starbuck’s running from her traumatic past, “coming to accept the factual disruption may be so traumatic that it could lead to an incoherent narrative and, thus, cause an identity fragmentation. In this case, we might imagine that the awareness of the factual disruption became so central to her story that she is unable to get a grip on her current narrative.” For Starbuck, integrating and accepting what happened to her risks fragmenting her identity as that avoidance had become part of how she defined her own identity. In her story line, she has to go through the fragmentation and put herself back together in order to find a coherent narrative to her personal story.

My Experience with Narrative Disruption

For trauma victims and those experiencing disruptions to our perceived beliefs and identity, this can be a common theme, as I know from my own experience. I spent nearly a decade and a half of my life trying to run from the idea of me not being a woman — I first encountered this thought in high school, but I had no words in which to describe it and had no way to process what this meant. This disrupted the narrative told to me by everyone in my family and amongst my friends — that my gender was female because that was how I was assigned at birth. I could be no other way. However, how I understood my own body served as a dissonance to that narrative. I spent numerous years hating how my body was because I understood cognitively that it was wrong somehow, but I didn’t want to face the idea of how it was wrong or what I could do about it. I didn’t want to disrupt the narrative people had thrust upon me for fear of losing them and everything I knew. My identity was tied up in a fabricated narrative, and when the sexual assaults happened, this further fragmented my identity. It left me doubting my memories and my knowledge about how my body should be. I struggled against accepting that the sexual assaults had happened, and tried to ignore them — tried to run from them. This sent me on a journey that spanned several states, but in the end, you cannot run from yourself forever.

Like Starbuck and the two Sharons, I had to finally confront my own self and my own truths. I had to make sense of the disruptions in my own personal narrative, and resolve the incoherent and fragmented parts of it. I had to redefine my narrative and start to heal from the trauma and the fabricated parts forced upon me by others. We are not static beings. The narratives we tell ourselves are forever changing as each day provides us with new experiences that we must now incorporate into our evolving narratives. Did these disruptions within my own narrative change my identity? No. I always knew that I wasn’t female, and this incoherence with the narrative given to me from birth doesn’t mean I changed my gender identity or that my identity was altered when I accepted that I was trans. Nor did sexual assaults alter my identity either — it disrupted it and forced me to either run from the truth of these horrid events or find ways of integrating it into my narrative. This integration does not condone what happened to me, but it does allow a way to heal and move past it so that it no longer haunts my footsteps.

Integration

This integration of a disruptive event is best shown in Battlestar Galactica when the Final Five discover they are Cylons. They decide to integrate it into their personal narratives by discussing this disruption right after the event happened. They stood together and declared who they are and what they stand for and how they will recommit to that. This integration allowed them to handle the disruption without fragmenting their identities, and it also minimized the traumatic post effects.

Post-traumatic stress often sets in because we do not stop to process the emotional impact of the traumatic event and integrate that event into our narrative. The longer we prolong that process the more intense and damaging the post-traumatic stress symptoms can become and is often why PTSD develops within people. In order to address PTSD, part of the healing process may require facing the traumatic moments and re-integrating it into our personal narrative in a way that invokes healing and coherence.

As a side note, integration of disruptive events may also explain how some people, when they encounter a person or event that challenges their religions beliefs or political beliefs, may choose to reiterate what they believe in order to attempt to deal with the disruption to their belief system. They are trying to integrate the experience into a box that makes sense to them, even if it means adding some fabrication to make that event fit. Accepting a truth that goes against your current belief system causes tremendous cognitive dissonance, and many may choose to run from it or alter the truth to  better integrate it. It is rare for a person to integrate the truth as it is into their belief structure as this often may require some rewriting of their personal narrative.

We are resilient and imaginative species, and we adapt and re-tell our narratives in order to integrate our new experiences the best we can. Narrative disruptions can happen and cause conflict with our identity, but we can adapt and rewrite our narratives as these are never set in stone. Although we may redefine our belief structures and how we view ourselves and our world, that doesn’t mean all of who we are is now changed or lost.  Some aspects of our core identity will often remain the same even during these transformative moments in our narratives.

Reference: The Narrative Disruptions of Model Eight. (2008). In J. Steiff & T. Tamplin (Eds.), Battlestar Galactica and philosophy mission accomplished or mission frakked up? (pp. 3-15). Chicago, IL: Open Court.

This weighs heavy on my mind

Posted by Aibird on March 19, 2015
Posted in: Author, Writing. Tagged: , , , , . 7 Comments

Note: I first posted this to Facebook. Placed it here with links as a call to action.

I know a lot of trans people in my life, and in the past year, I had to convince several of them to please stay alive. At least two of them were unsuccessful in attempts. This terrifies me, and yet at the same time, I can understand their pain and fear and frustration. It’s hard to see the worth in living in a society like ours.

Society treats us like we’re garbage. There has been numerous times where I’ve encountered people referring to me as an “it.” I’ve had death threats leveled against me. In an alarming amount of states, politicians are putting forth legislation that would make it harder for me to use public restrooms (if I can at all). Studies have shown that trans people have tremendously high rates of discrimination in health care, housing, employment, and are often in poverty. Since the start of this year in the US alone, nearly a dozen trans people have died — some murdered and some by suicide, and these are only the ones reported and found. It is hard to not feel like society is waging a war to destroy us.

Over 40% of trans people will have (or have) attempted suicide. Society tells us over and over that we are better off dead, that we shouldn’t exist, and even in our deaths, we are erased. Families often refusing to honor pronouns, burying us with the wrong names.

For all my trans friends out there, please know that you are loved. Yes, society treats us badly, but I care about you and I don’t want you to die. Please, stay alive with me and let’s build our safe space together.

And to my cisgender friends, please don’t sit on the sidelines. Please fight against society’s war on our bodies and identities — and please help remind us that life is worth living, that we are beautiful and worthy in our own rights, that are identities will be respected and honored, and that we do have hope for a better future.

I really want to believe that life can get better. That death isn’t our only option, and that someday we will live in a society that respects all trans people, affords us the care and dignity all should have, and doesn’t try to kill or vilify us. Please, you have to help us fix society.

The Bullets We’ve Taken

Posted by Aibird on February 17, 2015
Posted in: Author, Blogging, Feminism. Tagged: , , , , , . 3 Comments

When I was a child, I used to walk along the cracks in the pavement at recess. Carefully walking as if on a tightrope. Each step I took a vivid reminder of the fine line I walked at home and at school, where one false move and I might garner attention. Whether it was good or bad attention, I could never guess, and there were times when being invisible seemed the best option. I often dreamed of flying in space, of going to Mars, and it didn’t bother me that such an endeavor could take months if not years. I’d read those words and think, “I could be myself up there. And it’d be safe.” I may not have understood some of the more dangerous aspects of space, but I did understand it’s isolation. There in space I could be by myself, away from the scary and dangerous aspects of life on Earth, and look back on the beauty of the planet without fear.

It was sometime in second or third grade I decided I would seek out good attention by being everyone’s friend. I’d become Samwise Gamgee, who was loyal to a fault. When my friends started to falter, I’d channel my inner Samwise, pick them up, and carry them until they could walk again. I adored the verse in the New Testament that read, “No greater love has one than this, than to lay down one’s life for a friend.” I imagined the many ways I could die, saving the life of another. There in the streets of a large city, a gunman would start shooting at my friend, and I’d leap heroically into the line of fire. My friend would run to safety, and I’d kick the gun out of the attacker’s hands and somehow win the fight despite the multiple gunshot wounds.

If I was anything, I was ambitious. Heck, as a young child, I wanted to not only be the first person on Mars but also the first person to write a novel in space on the way to Mars. I always had lofty goals, even when it came to defending my friends against the terrors of the world.

But there are some terrors in which you cannot defend. How do I fight an oppressive system that views people of color as less than human? That strives to strip them of their humanity and often their lives, without warning? I have no defense against a system that de-values the lives of transgender people like myself, where it misgenders us, violently attacks us, and tries to strip away our humanity. No matter how hard I try, I can’t demolish a system that tries to rape, demolish, and exploit anyone who identifies as female. How do I stop a culture that treats rape as a joke, vilifying survivors, and sympathizing with rapists? How can I defend those I love against toxic forms of religion that seek to strip away our rights, steal our humanity, and leave us for dead on the side of the road?

I’m just one person, and a flawed one at that. I’ve been an outcast in every group I’ve tried to join. I have been that friendly person that people admit is nice but never stop to truly see me as me. I am just a wall decoration, a friendly atmosphere, a hopeful sentence or two that uplifts their spirits. I am nebulous and undefined, and when they turn to look at me, they force labels on me, often against my will, where I am confined to their version of me, their version of reality. There is no room to breathe, and if I speak up?

Speaking up is out of the question, for now, as I struggle with my gender and seek transition, I’ve lost that right. I am the one that fell between the cracks. The survivor that never really had a support system, not even when I presented as a woman. I am not a woman, but I’m not a man. How can I walk into these women-only spaces seeking safety and healing from the horrors of our rape culture? I can’t for I don’t belong. How can I enter into feminist discussions about sexism in society? I lost that right the moment I injected testosterone into my system. I had no voice to begin with, and now that I finally decided to be myself, I find that I still have no voice. Many demand I stay silent, but hasn’t my entire life been silent? Written in bits and pieces and scattered through a thousand journal pages, many of which will never see the light of day.  Instead, I try hard to amplify the voice of others, but in the end, it is never enough.

I am not a woman, but I’m not a man. I lie somewhere inbetween, lurking in that grey area that lacks definition. My body is my own, and the alterations I seek aligns it more with my brain and my own self-image. But society and parts of my family would not see it that way. To them, people like me are the problem, the reason for the war.

People want black and white depictions of the world, where everything is neatly ordered and fits into simply defined categories. That’s not how reality is. Nothing is ever neatly defined, and there is a whole spectrum of color beyond these narrow two-sided definitions. Our culture scorns diversity, and those that dare to fight against its tyranny, hostility, and discriminatory transgressions — they are met with a war that seeks to destroy them through a mountain of misinformation, death threats, and loss of life. For people like me, we are the casualties in a fight society wages against anyone who doesn’t fit the narrow cisgender, white, straight ideal. We ask for equal rights with those who already have them, and we are shot down and painted as monsters and freaks.

When I stand up in those dreams and take those bullets, the bullets are the transphobic remarks, racist diatribes, homophobic slurs, sexist actions, harmful words that society hurls at us by the minute.

I stand here shattered into a million pieces. For years I kept trying to piece myself back together, to try to see the whole again, but now I stand here amongst this shattered glass, amongst the streams of blood, and raise my hands toward heaven. I can’t fight an oppressive, sick system that seeks to destroy the marginalized and anyone it deems ‘not good enough’ to live. I keep trying, and in the end, I have realized my own deception.

My death will not save anyone. No matter how much I love, how much I try, my death is not the greatest love of all. And what about my life? Will it mean anything in the end? Will my words, my actions, my dreams ever matter to anyone? Will the bullets I’ve taken, help others in their journey? Will the trauma I’ve experienced ever truly heal? Will I ever be able to feel safe in this world? Will those I love ever feel safe? Will they ever be heard and respected as they are? Will I?

I don’t know. I walk along the cracks, balancing precariously between hope and despair.

Memorial to Those We Have Lost

Posted by Aibird on January 2, 2015
Posted in: Author, Writing. Tagged: , , , , . 1 Comment

On December 28, 2014, Leelah Acorn jumped in front of a truck and died. Not long after her death, a scheduled post to her tumblr appeared on the internet — her suicide note.

Why did she die?

She details it in her suicide note; how her parents forced her into conversion therapy, isolated her, and in the end she saw no hope for herself. Yet even in her darkest moment, she hoped for a better future. In her own words:

“The only way I will rest in peace is if one day transgender people aren’t treated the way I was, they’re treated like humans, with valid feelings and human rights. Gender needs to be taught about in schools, the earlier the better. My death needs to mean something. 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 fucked up” and fix it. Fix society. Please.”

So many people within the trans community have seen her post, read her words, and thought similar thoughts: “That could have been me.”

A friend of mine wrote me a text three weeks ago. She wrote, “I tried to hang myself.” I remember sitting there, my phone in my hands, and tears blurring my vision. “Never try to hang yourself,” she wrote, “it hurts and my neck is still really red.” She tried to make light of it, but the words still sat there between us. If her mother hadn’t stopped her, hadn’t gotten her help, I would have been standing at her funeral, watching as they buried her in the ground. My hands shook as I begged her to please not try again. To please stay alive. That there is hope, but even as I typed those words, I wondered, is there hope?

She believes she will never pass as a woman, and that she will never be able to live her life as her true self. Just last night, she sent me a text about her feelings of hopelessness. I don’t know how to help, because she can’t see what I see. She does pass; she is a woman and has always been, but she can’t see that because society beats us down again and again with messages that trans lives don’t matter. How we identify doesn’t matter. How we present doesn’t matter. Our bodies are a public billboard for people to smear their hate. In some parts of the world, coming out means being forced into conversion therapy or even being murdered. What hope do we have?

46% of trans men and 42% of transwomen have attempted suicide according to a new study by the Williams Institute and American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. What drives people in my community to suicide? Most media outlets will try to paint us as mentally unstable and broken, as less than human, and that’s why we do it. It is hopelessly ironic that very attitude is part of the reasons. Society vilifies us, paints us a sexual deviants, as freak shows, as less than human, our bodies public. If any of us transition and this is discovered, it’s treated as an expose, as if we are the ones cheating and lying to society about our “biological sex” and thus the hate mail and harassment escalates.

In March 2013, Lucy Meadows killed herself. She worked as a primary school teacher, and only wished to live as her authentic self. Instead, she received hate mail, harassed by the media, and her life turned into this public display — a circus firestorm that painted her as a freak for transitioning. Everyone who had sent the hate mail, the media that had torn apart her life — all of them are complicit in her death. The sad truth is this is far too common, where the media paints us as freaks to dissect and mount like a butterfly pinned to a display board.

Each time a trans person dies by suicide, society is complicit in their death. Leelah died because her family rejected her true self and forced her into conversion therapy, cutting her off from her friends and support groups. That’s psychological abuse, so yes, her family is complicit in her death. Even now they deny Leelah’s true self, trying desperate to erase her words and her self and paint her how they wish to see her. They deny her identity, and in turn wreck damage even in her death. Leelah will not have a memorial or a funeral to her true self. Her family will not give her such dignity or respect. They claim to love her, but they reject her true self, and when you reject someone’s true self, how can you ever claim to love them? Do you not love the image of who you want them to be rather than the person?

Trans lives do matter. We do exist. We should be treated with respect, dignity, and equal to the rest of humanity. We are not less than human. We are not broken freaks. Our identities are true and right for us, and that should be respected and honored.

Yet, that is not how society is. That is not how we are treated. Being trans is often like a death sentence, where we walk on this border between life and death in a society that vilifies us and often hates us. We do not choose to be trans; it is a fact of our lives, inescapable.

So many of my trans friends have no jobs, not because they can’t work, but because no matter how hard they try, very few companies are willing to hire them. We struggle to obtain healthcare for our needs; some of us being denied it to the point of dying from lack of it. We struggle to earn enough money to eat and afford shelter, yet so many of us homeless and starving. We struggle to live as our authentic selves, where so many of us are rejected by our families; so many of us are victims of abuse, domestic violence, and/or rape. Where some of us are murdered for being trans. We struggle to have the dignity to use the bathroom, where so many of us are banned from using restrooms, forced to hold until we find a safe place or worse forced to use the restroom that puts us in danger of our lives. We struggle to stay alive, and if we dare to fight back against our attackers, some of us end up in prison — often in the wrong gendered dorms. The statistics are bleak, and our stories often not heard. Often times, cis (non-trans) people will rewrite our lives, erasing our identities, in order to avoid acknowledging we even exist. Is it any wonder that so many of us seek relief through death?

How many of us must die before society changes? We must do better. We have to try.

Leelah’s plea echoes in my ears. “Fix society. Please.”