An Open Letter From a Disappointed Trans Person: You Have Let Us Down
If you do not stand with us, you stand against us.
I had hoped I would never have to write something like this. That society would have evolved enough to realise that trans peoples’ lives actually matter. That, you know, people would give a damn about people dying.
I really thought things would be better by now, I really did.
When I realised who I was all those years ago, I’d hoped maybe things would have improved to the point people weren’t actively trying to deny trans people their rights.
If anything, the situation has only deteriorated.
I never thought I would see the day where people I have always considered my friends — close allies, those who always claim to have supported me — are now sharing such flagrant lies dressed up as journalism. “Men Don’t Belong In Womens’ Sport”. “[insert conservative here] DESTROYS Transgender Cult With ONE Point!”.
And you know what? I no longer have the energy, the motivation to counter it anymore.
I sure did, at one point. But I’m just exhausted now. I’m tired of having to speak up and justify myself and everything I’ve ever said or done for some nobody on the Internet, just because I happen to have been born slightly different. This was an accident of birth, a lottery, and I am made to be reminded of this every single day.
I no longer have the patience to defend myself against countless slurs against my very existence. But hearing them, day in, day out, just goes to implant one, solitary, droning feeling in the back of your mind.
“I’m not welcome”.
I’m not welcome in the workplace, where hundreds to thousands of trans people report discrimination. I’m not welcome in university, where notable professors and academics cite outright lies to deny my existence (some going so far as to use sockpuppet accounts on Twitter and KiwiFarms…yes, that KiwiFarms). I’m not welcome in sports, where some of the best of British sportspeople go out of their way to make their anti-trans thoughts public knowledge. I’m not welcome in Parliament, where some of our highest-ranking elected officials meet with anti-trans groups on the regular with the goal of legislating us out of existence. I’m not even welcome in a damn bathroom or a locker room because society believes I am a pervert, a monster, a deviant.
All because of that lottery of birth that the world would deem the defining quality of my existence.
Well I, for one, am tired. And I can guarantee you I am not the only trans person who feels this way.
To our cisgender allies, the people that love us. Please, speak out for us where we can’t speak out for ourselves. Shout it from the rooftops. We’re here and we aren’t going away. Stand with us rather than sitting on the fence. Write to your MP. Join the LGBT+ and feminist societies in your university. Defend us when we aren’t around, not just to our faces. Make the effort to understand who we are. Stand in solidarity with us, and make it clear you will not stand for any transphobia.
To the trans people I know, with support in their lives. The ones with parents that accept them for who they are and friends that will defend them through every little mean remark they get. Please, never take that for granted. You genuinely do not know how lucky you are to have this. Speak out for, and reach out to, those who don’t, because by the grace of God, do they need it.
To those who don’t. Please, reach out to someone. You are loved. Even when the entire world feels against you. There are people like you out there. And they have your back even when sometimes it feels like the rest of humanity doesn’t.
To those in the British media. In the tabloids and the broadsheets, the red-tops and the rags — you said nothing. You did not speak up when the Mail, the Times, the Express started printing the most outlandish things. You stayed silent hoping it would all just go away. You are complicit in our dehumanisation and I hope that one day you realise this.
And to those who would deny us who we are, I say only this:
The people you currently find yourselves in alliance with — the American religious right and the Christian fundamentalists? They will turn on you the second they deem it politically convenient, much like you have with us. And all of these single-issue groups are the same: “Fair Play for Women”, “Womans Place UK”, and the newest group, the “LGB Alliance” — that last one being particularly unsettling to me. Anyone who is actually lesbian, gay or bisexual within this group will, eventually, find themselves having their rights infringed by the same people they’re buddying up with to deride and demean trans people. You know how the old saying goes. First, they’ll come for us, and you won’t speak out because you aren’t one of us; so what will happen when they come for you? Make no mistake — I will stand with you, so it is a crying shame you will not reciprocate.
It has been nearly five years since we lost Leelah Alcorn, and the moment I heard of her passing I would have thought that half a decade later, things would have improved. Sadly, they’ve only gotten worse. Her suicide note ended with the words “fix society. Please.” — it is to our eternal shame that we have not done this.
With the amount of trans people — almost all trans women of colour — being murdered all over the world, and almost nothing being done about it besides meaningless platitudes from politicians who wouldn’t give a damn about us if they weren’t desperate to mop up every vote they can; with the media demeaning and slurring trans people at every opportunity, even concocting headlines with zero corroborating evidence (“Call Me Nicola” comes to mind here) just for a few extra pounds in revenue; with a new anti-trans group cropping up every other day with the single goal of marginalising trans peoples’ very existence…society needs to change.
But I am so, so tired of shouting “I exist” only to hear a chorus of “no you don’t”.
This is why the suicide rate for trans people is so high. I don’t care what some white guy on the Internet thinks (even if Daddy bought you a fancy Harvard Law degree); being trans isn’t what causes us to want to kill ourselves. People wanting us dead, to dehumanise us, is what causes us to want to kill ourselves.
We could be so, so much better than this, but collectively, we have chosen not to.
You have let us down.
And I’m tired of it.
Please. Stand up for trans people, before it’s too late for us.
