Trans Day of Visibility Their Collective ROUND UP
I will be sharing the experiences of 3 Their Collective members. I would like to note that these 3 members are white settlers and we are missing the POV of any Indigenous or BPOC transgender humans in this blog post. Following, I have tagged a CBC story about John Saddleback, discussing reclaiming Queer and Transgender Indigenous identities.
Meg Johnston (she/they)
This year was not only my first time experiencing Trans Day of Visibility as 100% out neuroqueer, nonbinary individual, but also my first time being visible as a non-binary entrepreneur. I have been out to most people in my life for a couple years but, never came out or openly discussed my gender or sexuality with my Dad. Last month, my local newspaper did a feature on small businesses in our area. At that time, I made a decision to not only to self identify in the article as a neuroqueer entrepreneur who uses they/them pronouns, but also to let my Dad know…. before he read about it in the newspaper!
My entrepreneurship journey is closely tied to both my coming out as being gender nonconforming or non-binary and my recovery from severe autistic burnout. Unmasking and dropping all unnecessary tasks led me to slowly reduce the amount of female “gender affirming” care I was participating in. It’s really difficult to describe gender dysphoria to someone who has not experienced it personally, but I want to emphasize that previously doing these things were non-negotiable for me. I would have an extremely difficult time being in public wearing shorts with hairy legs, or have any visible facial hair. I have spent thousands of dollars on hair removal from my face that I naturally experience due to hormonal differences in my body. In the past I found this experience to be extremely distressful.
Suddenly, I was left with a choice, drop the act or die. I know this sounds painfully dramatic to anyone who has not experienced autistic burnout, but I promise it is not. Suicidal ideation has been part of my story since I was 15 years old. Accepting my non-binary self, the “tom boy” other's told me I wasn't when I was just a young kid, before the noise of fitting in became to loud was the first half of the story.
Simultaneously, I became cognizant of my internalized ablism and accepted that it was unlikely I would return to full time employment as an human with both autism and adhd. This led to my partnership with Chelsea and the creation of Their Collective.
Chelsea Bleau (they/them)
Nonbinary is an inherent identity but also a form of resistance. It is something I did not choose, but it is also an act of protest. This is why, when speaking about my identity in depth, I also include trans masc (nonbinary masculine), genderfluid, and genderqueer. Nonbinary is a protest or a challenge of gender norms and gender binaries, and that protest is an action and behaviour and ultimately a choice, in the same way that transitioning is a choice, but being trans is not.
Nonbinary is an inherent part of self and a conscious political stance. It is not something I decided to be, but it is something I recognized and was grateful to be able to name. It is deeply personal, but at the same time, it is even deeper than who I am, as it not only reflects me as a person but also the way I view the world. I embody being queer because that is how it is lived through my body, but I am nonbinary because of how it is lived through my intellect.
Nonbinary is a framework that challenges how Western colonial society thinks about gender. In reality, binary identities are not even fixed. Nonbinary as a framework throws the entire binary away because it acknowledges the neglect of objective truth. Nonbinary as a political stance is gender anarchy in order to rebuild and progress. Society sees my queerness as a failure to conform to societal structures, but I see it as a refusal to abide by unrealistic societal expectations. It is also deeply scientific, as humans are extremely complex beings. Humans are not computers, and biology is never binary.
Nonbinary began being used in the 1990s and gained more prominence in the 2010s. The concept of gender anarchy, or the refusal or nonconformity of gender, has been present throughout history for hundreds of years. It is Trans Day of Visibility today, and I agree with the sentiment that visibility is worthless without safety, support, or understanding.
Niko Alexander (he/they)
I remember the day clearly, when I said to a trusted adult, shaking and insecure, “I think, on the inside, I might be a boy.” I was 12. I was told, in not so pleasant terms, to never speak of this again should I ever want to live outside the padded room of a hospital. That threat plunged me deeply into shame and denial, keeping me from myself for years. Until I realized that just on the opposite side of that fear was everything I’d ever wanted.
23 years later, here I sit, having built a career, a life, a love, a family centering my queerness - barely 4 years since coming out. 4 years of fight and loss and grief. And 4 years of rebirth, creation and coming home to myself. The trans experience is not for the faint of heart. But my god, I couldn’t be more grateful to be trans, to have been forged in this incredible fire.
Thank you so much for spending some time with us today and we can't wait to get to know you better at www.theircollective.ca
