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:)
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Every trans member of these boards that has had the spoons to engage (and I'm sure those who haven't), has shown incredible bravery and poise over the last while on these boards.
You're all incredible, though you shouldn't have to be. You should be allowed to just be, and hopefully this week next year that will be at least a little more true.
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I don't really have the health to make a big post about this so.
It's Transgender Awareness Week. Other peeps can make more substantial posts if they like.
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Just remember. You are Valid.
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I see, am aware of, and appreciate you. Please continue to do, live, and be.
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shit we've been rumbled
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I can't think of anything witty to say, so here's a trans lobster. Love to all my trans siblings.
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Trans friends: what are some things you wish people (cis or trans but primarily cis) would know/do/be aware of?
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Is Paizo planning their own Transgender Awareness Week news post, I wonder? :Ic
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Trans friends: what are some things you wish people (cis or trans but primarily cis) would know/do/be aware of?
What I wish they would know: that being trans is not “being in the wrong body,” that there are trans people who don’t want to pursue physical/medical transition, and that there’s more joy in the transgender experience than suffering.
What I wish they would do: Ever speak up for us. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve seen a cis person, even an outspoken ally, go to bat against transphobia unless they were joining a conversation that was already ongoing and being les by us. You can call hate and nonsense out when you see it - we would all like a break from defending ourselves 24/7, and that’s what being an “ally” is supposed to be for.
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Trans friends: what are some things you wish people (cis or trans but primarily cis) would know/do/be aware of?
Trans children are the most vulnerable group of all and must be protected. Laws restricting their access to life-saving care represent the worst form of child abuse. Be aware, especially if you have kids, that trans kids may not naturally realize they're trans if they don't understand that it's an option, and it's important that they be given ample opportunity to safely experiment with names, pronouns, clothing and so on. It won't "confuse" them any more than growing up already does.
Oh, and Ru Paul's Drag Race gives real drag a bad name.
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Of note: Transgender Day of Remembrance is on the 20th.
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Wishing you all an environment in which you can be you, without judgements and limitations.
On a positive note, I am noticing that (at least in my country) this is improving over generations. For (my) children these topics are already a lot more natural than they were for us (well me…).
For my kids genderfluid or trans classmates are already part of their normal, they have openly LHBTQI+ teachers. They don’t know anything else than that marriages can be between men and men, women and women and women and men. While for us (well again me…) it may still be a learned thing and require conscious effort, for them it can be the natural way of things. While it doesn’t diminish your challenges, at least this (hopefully) gives hopes for a better tomorrow.
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I'm not trans (probably), but you all have my 100% support and protection. Queer community solidarity.
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Cis white dude here. I plan on spending at least some time each day learning about transgender people and their history and experience, and how to be a better person towards them.
Can anybody summon the energy to point me towards good sources to educate myself? I'm a bit afraid of what a basic google search would turn up in terms of disinformation and hateful bile.
If not, I'll risk it.
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Sending my support out to all my transgender fellow gamers. I agree this would be a great place to share resources where people can learn more. <3
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Yay to all my Trans friends out there!
Once the warm weather is back, I want to invite you all to Jacob Riis Beach in Rockaway, NYC! It is one of the most wonderful inclusive and free places I have ever experienced! You are invited!
Speaking of "You are invited!" I plan on celebrating this week by getting back into one of my favorite musicians, Trans synth godmother Wendy Carlos
The Thieving Magpie
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Cis white dude here. I plan on spending at least some time each day learning about transgender people and their history and experience, and how to be a better person towards them.
Can anybody summon the energy to point me towards good sources to educate myself? I'm a bit afraid of what a basic google search would turn up in terms of disinformation and hateful bile.
If not, I'll risk it.
Okay, so the simplest and most direct resource I can give you are some trans Youtubers--Contrapoints, Kat Blaque, Jessie Gender, Philosophy Tube and Mia Mulder. A few of these figures are controversial or have posted pretty hot takes at times, but honestly, I think they're all perfectly fine as introductions to this stuff. Just don't get sucked into the Youtube fandom thing. It's exhausting.
I haven't read any books about this stuff, so I can't help you there. I know there are some excellent texts. As for articles, they're all way back in my browsing history on a dead laptop, so I can't help you there, either.
Oh, the Helicopter Story incident is not where you should start out--it's pretty heavy, and extremely nuanced, and I think it's easy to simplify it into "wow, trans people are so mean to each other" when things are way more complicated than that--but it is a valuable article to read eventually. Well-meaning cis allies drove a lot of the destruction there, after all.
I'm mainly linking that article 'cause it's all I've really got, aside from recommending some Wachowski movies. :P
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Happy week
Is there a significant event that associates this week with Transgender people?
Dunno, I've never taken the time to Google it.
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The specific event is that at the end of Transgender Awareness Week is the Transgender Day of Remembrance, which was started in 1998 to mourn our trans siblings who were lost in the previous year due to hatred and violence. It's a somber day, and a somber week leading up to the day.
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Just a week?! You deserve a whole month!
Still, I appreciate everything that transgender writers and artists have contributed to Pathfinder over the years (Amber Stewart, Crystal Frasier and Kalindlara being a few of my favorite writers!), and for educating me on the struggle that is being transgender, and for giving transgender people a place to contribute and feel welcome (even if I know it doesn't always feel that way!).
"Shine on, you crazy diamonds!" -Pink Floyd.
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My partner informs me that while spending an entire week being aware of them may be a profound display of endurance, please could I stop with the staring right now?
*wink*
What I wish they would do: Ever speak up for us. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve seen a cis person, even an outspoken ally, go to bat against transphobia unless they were joining a conversation that was already ongoing and being les by us. You can call hate and nonsense out when you see it - we would all like a break from defending ourselves 24/7, and that’s what being an “ally” is supposed to be for.
This is so thorny for me (and I imagine a few others besides) - there is definitely a conversation to be had about "nothing about us without us" as a guiding principle versus the degree to which people with privilege (and thus a degree of social capital) can really move the needle I terms of rejecting normalised transphobia. The primary thing that stays my hand is the sense of not wanting to talk for trans people - how to square that circle is something that really does eat at me.
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Honestly, talking for us is usually fine--just don't talk over us. If someone's really out of line, it's rarely wrong to at least voice your disagreement.
It's thorny. Heck, it's thorny for everyone. Someone misgenders a trans person in front of me, Catulle, I don't know any better than you whether I should Start Something or Mind My Own. Generally, I decide to mirror whatever that trans person does just to be safe and take them aside later to ask them what they'd rather I do in the future. But there are similar situations where I start a scene immediately.
But if no obviously trans people are there? Well, someone's gotta start a ruckus. Might as well be you.
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You're heard.
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Trans friends: what are some things you wish people (cis or trans but primarily cis) would know/do/be aware of?
Every trans person ever possess a bottomless capacity for sarcasm. It's truly quite disturbing.
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It keeps the lights on.
Oh, and Ru Paul's Drag Race gives real drag a bad name.
I have heard a lot of rumblings on this one, from a lot of different directions. Has the time come for the show to end? Should RuPaul stop performing in general?
Yay to all my Trans friends out there!
Once the warm weather is back, I want to invite you all to Jacob Riis Beach in Rockaway, NYC! It is one of the most wonderful inclusive and free places I have ever experienced! You are invited!
Speaking of "You are invited!" I plan on celebrating this week by getting back into one of my favorite musicians, Trans synth godmother Wendy Carlos
The Thieving Magpie
I still can't believe the naked part of the beach is real.
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I have heard a lot of rumblings on this one, from a lot of different directions. Has the time come for the show to end? Should RuPaul stop performing in general?
Oh, and Ru Paul's Drag Race gives real drag a bad name.
The time for the show to end came when they decided to use slurs for segment sections, and when Ru was vocally transphobic.
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From what I can see, Drag Race has basically served as a show for mostly cis gay men to dress up and pretend to be mean, aggressive trans women for laughs and scandal. We can say they're just pretending to be cis women, but I think that's pretty transparently a massive simplification. The aesthetics of "masculine" bodies dressing up in women's clothes and make-up for laughs will always catch us in the crossfire.
Drag is a lot more than Ru Paul's Drag Race, and I wish real drag--drag that embraces the full opportunities offered by the medium to explore gender and appearance--got way more attention. Comedy and absurdity is fine! But I have yet to see any evidence that anything makes it out of that show but catchphrases and caricature. I know some people use Drag Race to work things out about their own gender and identity, but I don't think Drag Race offers anything that real, actually subversive drag doesn't do better. I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that me thinking the only ways I could wear dresses or makeup were as either Ru Paul or Dr. Frankenfurter delayed my transition considerably.
There's also a whole history of cis black male comedians caricaturing and stereotyping black women that I very very much can't speak to, but probably connects here (this issue is only something I've heard a few Youtube commentators talk about, so I'm just repeating what they said here).
tl;dr: I believe there is genuinely nothing subversive or radical or empowering about depicting men dressed as women as a hilarious and frightening oddity.
It's not even really about Ru Paul himself, though yeah, he seems like an ass. I just think it's a bad premise for a drag show. If a transphobe can enjoy it, it's not drag.
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I've met several performers, one or two who were actually on the show. However due to the circumstances, I really couldn't pick their brain on this subject- or anything else really as I was either at work or attending a friend's (sometimes also drag) performance. I am also aware of my age, and the fact that time is moving forward, and that what was cool or at least understandable by me may not be for anyone coming after me, as it were. I am not a regular watcher of the show and don't know many people who do, as the show is nowhere near as popular as it once was. Still, I will keep these responses in mind should it come up in conversation, especially professional conversation. Thank you.
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As one additional thing I wanna say, there's a difference between "ugh, this queer thing is too aggressive and offensive and in-your-face about it" and "this thing is mostly just serving a crowd-pleasing caricature of queerness so cis audiences can laugh at their biases being pandered to". A lot of Pride is intentionally in-your-face, and I don't enjoy those parts of it, but that's just personal comforts. I'm shy. The "aggressive and offensive and in-your-face" stuff is a pretty important part of queer activism and I greatly respect it from afar.
I haven't seen Drag Race. I haven't even been to a drag show--mostly because I was afraid people would act the way I've seen people act about Drag Race, but still. I'm not informed on this aside from talking to other people and seeing how Drag Race is enjoyed and referenced elsewhere by cis people. I just don't like it, and I feel pretty confident that my criticisms are on the nose in this case.
Jacob Riis Park in Rockaway, NYC.I still can't believe the naked part of the beach is real.
It's real. And it's fantastic!
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Ehrm…why isn’t there a Paizo Blog about this? Seems…weird.
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Ehrm…why isn’t there a Paizo Blog about this? Seems…weird.
Your post was at approximately 4:30 AM Monday morning Paizo time. As far as I know blog posts don't go up on the weekend.
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They don't publish on the weekends, no.
And it's worth pointing out that Transgender Awareness Week is not when I'm looking for a company to make a blog post for trans people, that's what I expect on the Trans Day of Visibility. Transgender Awareness Week is something that is less celebratory and more focused on making people see the issues that the transgender community faces every day, and it coincides with the Transgender Day of Remembrance, a day in which we mourn our dead. TDOV which was back in March is meant for celebrating the community and uplifting each other, and Paizo did publish a blog.
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Oh, the Helicopter Story incident is not where you should start out--it's pretty heavy, and extremely nuanced, and I think it's easy to simplify it into "wow, trans people are so mean to each other" when things are way more complicated than that--but it is a valuable article to read eventually. Well-meaning cis allies drove a lot of the destruction there, after all.
I'm mainly linking that article 'cause it's all I've really got, aside from recommending some Wachowski movies. :P
I just read the isabel-fall-attack-helicopter]the Helicopter Story incident you linked to. Very heavy that's a hard read to wake up to but glad I read it. KC don't know if you saw the private message I send you but it needs an update after reading this. Of all the many times I've been misgendered when growing up none of them was on the internet, had they been I don't think I could have just laughed them off as I did in person, words on the internet hang there, they don't go away (unless removed) but otherwise, they are all ways there to hurt you every time you come across them.
Now I'm realising the saying "sticks and stones" works great for me in person but not online. This is the one online that gets me:
Five Reasons There Shouldn't Be A Men's Roller Derby. Before moving to Arizona I went to roller derby practices 5 to 6 days a week, Besides the men's team I had started, most of the practices I went to were for women's teams that let us drop in. Since I moved to Arizona I have never been able to play again. Even the skate shop owner here has been rude when they find out I play roller derby. I order all my skate parts now from out of state.
I think it's easy to simplify it into "wow, trans people are so mean to each other" when things are way more complicated than
another way to simplify it that might sound better is it really speaks to the dangers and harm that can come from making assumptions online, even when your intentions are good. But again it's a long heavy read best everyone reads it for themselves, there's a lot to take in and think about in it. I'm ging to have to read it a few times to really let it all sink in
looks out my window today the view looks different...
