The outpouring of support for trans folks after the trans ban on military participation has been filled with testimonies of trans veterans professing their patriotism and walls of text proclaiming that “trans people are not a disruption.” What if some trans people WANT to be a disruption? What if our plan all along was to disrupt state controlled systems of gender? Below are five musings by disruptive non-binary people to fill your day with utter chaos and inconvenience:
On Being Nonbinary by Coley Alston
Prince already told you:
"I'm not a woman.
I'm not a man.
I am something you will never understand."
But you look at me like you weren't forewarned by the Purple One.
The expression on your face doesn't look like a person's , it looks like a meme.
You might shrug or laugh, but you're the joke.
With your elementary understanding of gender.
Or maybe you're angry or pissed
But I don't need your permission to exist.
-on being nonbinary
I hope you are uncomfortable by Autumn Detchon
I hope that every time I enter the room you are uncomfortable.
Troubled by the empty spaces I fill
Afraid to revel in the negative space
That creeps on the edge of yours and mine
And I hope that you inhale deeper
Filling the hollows of your chest with tender connection
I pray the places I hold space in ruin your day.
Grasping for that quickened heartbeat
that shakes you from your cold pedestal
and thrusts you into soft, wet, cavernous truth.
I pray that you stay there soaking in your own awakening.
Nose and mouth full of sticky, sweet epiphany.
I hope that my transience upsets you,
That I was not built for war makes you nervous.
All of the places where there should be armour
You find that I am exposed and raw.
I hope that it angers you when my lovesong scatters your power
Your soldiers naked and unmoored, were never yours to own.
Reasons not to ask a trans person to be patient with you while you struggle to learn their pronouns by Taylor Paglisotti
Reasons not to ask a trans person to be patient with you while you struggle to learn their pronouns :
1. We need our patience for other situations, like when it's not safe to come out and we are forced to be misgendered for an extended period of time, or when insurance companies are denying us treatment.
2. We probably have a lot less patience to go around than you, because being trans is emotionally exhausting, especially for trans people of color, disabled trans folk, trans folk who are low SES, and femme trans folk who experience transmisogyny. Capacities for patience are depleted when we are getting denied housing or employment, or when we are being harassed or physically assaulted.
3. It's not our patience you should be asking for- you should be asking for forgiveness. If you mess up my pronouns, fail to self-correct, and I or someone else in the room has to correct you, the next this out of your mouth should be "sorry". Not a long, drawn out apology, just a quick "sorry", and then you correct yourself and move on.
4. You're not asking for patience because you care about our feelings. You're asking for it so you can feel better. I'm going to go out on a limb and assume that you're asking for patience because you are feeling uncomfortable. You're probably uncomfortable because you're feeling bad about having misgendered us multiple times. Maybe you're frustrated with being corrected multiple times in one sentence, maybe just being corrected once was enough to make you feel weird. Either way, you're trying to make yourself and your mistakes feel validated, and you're prioritizing your desire for comfort over our rights to be treated with respect.
5. You've probably already used your share of trans patience. If we get to a point in the conversation where you've misgendered us multiple times, it's likely we're already being patient with you because we're still conversing with you.
6. It's a sign that you haven't done the work. Most of us trans folk have been misgendered before. We get it. Those of us who use they/them or neopronouns really get it. When we disclose our pronouns, we know it's likely we are the first person you've met who uses these pronouns. We know that changing the neural pathways that govern speech takes time and practice. But usually when you ask for patience, you're indicating you haven't spent any time practicing. There are a million resources online that can teach you how to get better at using unfamiliar pronouns. The fact that you haven't found them and used them shows that you don't see it as your responsibility to practice gendering people correctly. Before interacting with a trans person, you should be asking, "What can I do to make sure I'm treating trans people with respect?" Stop asking for our emotional energy and start doing your homework. In the grand scheme of things, misgendering shouldn't be an issue. It's the simplest of trans inclusive behaviors to enact. It doesn't cost any money. It doesn't involve any policy change. All you have to do is commit the time to learning and practicing. Using correct pronouns is a baseline requirement for interacting with trans people. If we're ever going to address broader issues of systemic violence together, we need you to show basic respect.
Cash by Avey Nelson
After college, my buddies and I started striking matches in the back porches of Phoenix gay bars,
smoking and talking ennui.
Narcissistic and voyeuristic. Carrying "queer theory" on my tongue as if it still held an edge.
Too big tank top and shopping mall haircut,
I couldn't have scraped up anything other than a purely anthropological experience if I tried.
In the expanse of American cityscapes,
Phoenix sprawls unique
in that it still boasts a collection of bars directed at a clientele
beyond the strictly Grindr demographic.
Cash is a country lesbian bar situated on the flip side of the interstate.
The first soft Google –
Yielding yellow Bleeding Cowboys plastered on a web 1.0 interface –
marked it as a site of redemption for four years lost to a Catholic university.
Negotiating rides and company from a predominantly male cohort,
I was there at last, ordering my first,
second,
third G&T.
Dark wood punctured by neon and stale summer midnight air.
Line dancing,
and two-stepping within the framework of a different sort of line.
Downed two more
and leaned back into the comfort of the boys I'd come with.
One was beautiful;
the other was straight.
Last call and my subsequent sixth drink
melted into 2AM close dancing, slow, with a stranger,
kissing on the dance floor, kissing against the brick out front.
Said she'd drive me back to Gilbert, said she was headed that way,
and then I was going 90 to the suburbs
next to the kind of driver a psychiatrist would later tell me to avoid in the name of "harm reduction."
30 to my 21 with a career I'd look up on LinkedIn later.
In the parking lot of my concrete silhouette apartment complex,
I asked her up for a drink.
Asked as if I was some kinda classy cocktail city queer who knew what's up
and not some “not quite punk nothing” two months out of undergrad
with nothing but a bottle of Jameson in the freezer.
She took a swallow of the Jameson before kissing me again.
I was studying for the GREs at the time
and the prep book lay flat across my wood pulp desk.
I’d never eaten a girl before, but gin and Jameson told me it was easy.
Might have been.
Wasn't as political as I thought it’d be
and wasn't as funny as I made it sound later.
Smoking Camels on the balcony
with the inflamed bruise of a desert sunrise still miles away,
she told me she had to get back to her kids.
Plural.
Said okay.
She told me good luck,
told me to go and get my PhD,
told me to call her.
Wasn't gonna call her, but wished she'd stay.
An hour later, I was sitting across from my best friend at an empty Denny's, laughing as the runny egg morning sun leaked across white houses.
Congratulations by Ben Polson
Congratulations, we will take you out of poverty if you promise to risk your life and limb to help us kill the citizens of another country.
Congratulations, we will take you out of slavery if you promise to help us kill some of those funny looking foreigners.
Congratulations after years of history being sexually assaulted and having your financial security put at risk because of our troops you can join our ranks.
Congratulations, we'll stop following you on vacation until we can discharge you for who you sleep with.
Congratulations, now you can order band aids and bombs straight to your door with USA prime.
Congratulations. You're a disruption. We don't want you anymore.