Speaker 1: But also I just like these sort of artifacts of
Speaker 1: like vintage transphobia, because like transomid today is so strategically
Speaker 1: organized in this top down way from the right, where
Speaker 1: like they have a playbook about how we're going to
Speaker 1: mobilize people around these fears.
Speaker 2: Hello, Beauty Translated listeners, Welcome to another episode of the podod.
Speaker 2: This week, I am talking with the writer by the
Speaker 2: name of Jamie Kalis. Jamie is a contributing writer at
Speaker 2: the New York Times magazine. He's also writing a book
Speaker 2: called The Third Person, which is a book about non
Speaker 2: binary gender in America, which will be out in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty four. We discuss it in the interview coming up.
Speaker 2: And he also runs the trans archival history account known
Speaker 2: as sex change dot tbt on Instagram. This is how
Speaker 2: I came to know Jamie through his Instagram account and
Speaker 2: the trans archival posts that he makes as a part
Speaker 2: of research for his book on non binary gender in America.
Speaker 2: I wanted to talk to him about his experience researching
Speaker 2: for his book and also archiving trans history essentially for
Speaker 2: all of us to enjoy on the lovely Instagram. He's
Speaker 2: really posted a great community on his Instagram page. Of
Speaker 2: some awesome people who just love the history. And we're
Speaker 2: here because we love our history. So please enjoy my
Speaker 2: conversation with Jamie Kayless about his Instagram page sexchange dot tbt.
Speaker 2: All right, listeners, today, my guest is a writer by
Speaker 2: the name of Jamie Lauren Kayless. I came to know
Speaker 2: them through the Instagram account they run, which is at
Speaker 2: sexchange dot tbt, which is an amazing archive to the
Speaker 2: trans experience and the community as it was pre and
Speaker 2: earth Internet. Many of the posts I have found on
Speaker 2: this page have resonated deeply with me and have even
Speaker 2: been an inspiration in the direction I'm taking the podcast.
Speaker 2: Please welcome my guest, Jamie.
Speaker 1: Hi, Jamie, Hi, Carmen, thanks so much for having me
Speaker 1: on the show.
Speaker 2: So, Jamie, before we get into the Instagram account, which
Speaker 2: I love. Sex Change tbt is an awesome archive and
Speaker 2: it has both showed me a bunch of new things
Speaker 2: that I never knew existed from our history, but it
Speaker 2: also has reminded me of some old things that I
Speaker 2: had forgotten about. So it's been a really awesome Instagram account.
Speaker 2: I love it. But can you tell us about who
Speaker 2: you are?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Sure, I guess the easiest way to get into that
Speaker 1: is to go backwards from getting into the Instagram account.
Speaker 1: So I'm running this Instagram account. I'm not like a
Speaker 1: historian or anything. I'm a journalist by training or a writer,
Speaker 1: I guess. I work at the New York Times magazine,
Speaker 1: which is a whole other can of worms. I'm from Pennsylvania,
Speaker 1: so like about an hour outside of Philadelphia in a
Speaker 1: town that's sort of rural, sort of suburban.
Speaker 3: The town is called Doylestown.
Speaker 1: It's like one of the places that's always on electoral campaigns,
Speaker 1: like profiled as like the quintessential swing district. So definitely
Speaker 1: like felt kind of far from cities and like didn't
Speaker 1: know gay people, but also had exposure to kind of
Speaker 1: like arts and culture and like assorted other types of
Speaker 1: freaks that I've been in New York since twenty fifteen,
Speaker 1: and I've lived in Chicago, LA a couple other places.
Speaker 2: Tell me a little bit more about being a writer
Speaker 2: for the New York Times. Tell me a little bit
Speaker 2: more about that. You said New York Times, correct.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, I write for the New York Times magazine
Speaker 1: and was doing that pre transition, and I'm still there.
Speaker 1: I'm currently on booklya of working on my book, but yeah,
Speaker 1: trans stuff was like not my interest when I got
Speaker 1: into writing, Like not that it wasn't my interest, but
Speaker 1: I'm very much a generalist. I do a lot of
Speaker 1: culture stuff, celebrity profiles, things about technology, and obviously like
Speaker 1: I am trans. But in the beginning of my transition,
Speaker 1: I was like not that interested in transh history, intercommunity
Speaker 1: discourse kind of stuff. But then as I started thinking
Speaker 1: about writing this book, and basically my book is about
Speaker 1: history and present of non binary identity in America, I
Speaker 1: was drawn to it partly because I started getting really
Speaker 1: afraid that someone else was going to write a worse
Speaker 1: version of this book. And I was doing a lot
Speaker 1: of complaining to friends and saying, oh my god, someone's
Speaker 1: going to write this book.
Speaker 3: It's going to be for idiots.
Speaker 1: And my friends kept saying, well, why don't you write this,
Speaker 1: You like really have the skill set to do this.
Speaker 1: Your journalists you sort of are asking the right questions.
Speaker 1: And I said, oh my god, I'm never going to
Speaker 1: write a gender book. I don't want to be one
Speaker 1: of those people. But then the more I started thinking
Speaker 1: about the subject matter, like what I really like about
Speaker 1: trans stuff, and maybe a lot of people knew this
Speaker 1: before me, but it took me like a while to
Speaker 1: come around to it. But like trans history really overlaps
Speaker 1: with everything, so it's like it's gender, but it's also
Speaker 1: like history of media, history of medicine, history of culture,
Speaker 1: history of the arts. So when I started looking into like, okay,
Speaker 1: like what would it mean to put this book together?
Speaker 1: I was just one delighted by like how much it
Speaker 1: overlapped with other things I had written about and the
Speaker 1: other things that I think make a good story. And
Speaker 1: also just like the depth of archival material. Obviously there
Speaker 1: are tons of people doing really good work in transistory,
Speaker 1: but compared to all the other historical things that have
Speaker 1: ever been research, the archive is relatively unexploited, right, Like
Speaker 1: you can still go in and find a corner that
Speaker 1: no one has really had the time or the interest
Speaker 1: in going through. So I've just become really like sucked
Speaker 1: into archival research in a way that was not really
Speaker 1: foreseen when I started working on this project at all.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think that correct me if I'm wrong,
Speaker 2: But it seems to me like the Instagram account sexchange
Speaker 2: dot tbt has been a way of keeping track of
Speaker 2: the research you've been doing for this book, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, so it's I mean a lot of it
Speaker 1: was just like I was accumulating all this material when
Speaker 1: I was going to visit archives and like taking pictures
Speaker 1: of stuff or like using some of the online resources
Speaker 1: like Digital Trands Archive. I was just having like tons
Speaker 1: and tons of screencaps and like no one to really
Speaker 1: share them with, and was becoming sort of lonely in
Speaker 1: my research. And then I started thinking, Oh, I can
Speaker 1: put this stuff online. And obviously there's like the sort
Speaker 1: of cynical like, oh, I would love to have a
Speaker 1: huge platform to promote my book. So like I was like,
Speaker 1: this is a really good way to gather the audience.
Speaker 1: But also I just think most of the people synthesizing
Speaker 1: this material are academics. There's obviously people all over the
Speaker 1: place working in it. But I was like, oh, there's
Speaker 1: like not really a great Instagram account that's like putting
Speaker 1: this out in a way that people can really access.
Speaker 1: The negative side of that is like it really does
Speaker 1: currently reflect a lot of the biases of like the
Speaker 1: current chapters that I'm researching. Rights, Like a lot of
Speaker 1: what I've been working on is like trans mail conferences
Speaker 1: in the late nineties early thousands, and a lot of
Speaker 1: what I'm writing about is kind of like the whiteness
Speaker 1: of those conferences or sort of like who they did
Speaker 1: and didn't represent. So like the archival materials I'm working
Speaker 1: with kind of reflect all those biases, And when you
Speaker 1: move it from one platform to another, it's like not
Speaker 1: necessarily like I think in the ideal vision of the
Speaker 1: Instagram account, it would be a lot more expansive, but
Speaker 1: right now it's like a side project of a different
Speaker 1: project that I'm working on.
Speaker 2: Well, maybe it's just reflective of, I guess, the limited
Speaker 2: visibility that trans people had at the time. But I
Speaker 2: want to also, I want to back up to something
Speaker 2: you were talking about earlier, and how when you first
Speaker 2: started journalism, how transnis and trans issues weren't really like
Speaker 2: super that important to you. But it sounds like at
Speaker 2: a certain point it's like your transition coincided with these interests.
Speaker 2: Do you care to talk maybe just a little bit
Speaker 2: about your own journey with your gender before we dive
Speaker 2: more into the Instagram.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I haven't quite figured out like the good
Speaker 1: way to narrativize this because I lived like most of
Speaker 1: my life as like a somewhat beautiful heterosexual woman. I mean,
Speaker 1: like I dated men, had long hair, got to blow out,
Speaker 1: like all that kind of stuff, and like somehow, in
Speaker 1: the course of the past however many years, like I've
Speaker 1: ended up being essentially a man, And when I look back,
Speaker 1: it's like I can narrativize it all these different ways.
Speaker 1: But like, I don't know, kind of was just like
Speaker 1: always felt like something was off. I had like a
Speaker 1: lot of other various journeys before this one. I spent
Speaker 1: a couple stints in the looney bin. I got sober
Speaker 1: in twenty fifteen, So like this was not my first
Speaker 1: big narrative arc of my life, and in some ways
Speaker 1: it like crept up on me as like a little
Speaker 1: bit of a surprise. At some point I started thinking, okay, well,
Speaker 1: like what if instead of kind of like resisting those questions,
Speaker 1: I just started following my desires and see what they yielded.
Speaker 1: So like I very much did not set out to transition.
Speaker 1: I think I had like things of like okay, well,
Speaker 1: like what if I dressed a little more this way?
Speaker 1: And then I was like, okay, well, like do I
Speaker 1: want tops or are hormones for me, and these things
Speaker 1: kind of just compounded into what, in hindsight was a transition.
Speaker 1: But like for a while, I felt very frustrated by
Speaker 1: that because it didn't seem to be what I saw
Speaker 1: represented as the quote unquote trans narrative arc. Now I
Speaker 1: think I'm meeting a lot more people that like were
Speaker 1: straight women or like transitioned kind of by accident and
Speaker 1: ended up being happy. But I think I found that
Speaker 1: really alienating at the time, when like back then it
Speaker 1: was very much like born in the Wrong body type discourse,
Speaker 1: which was not my experience at all.
Speaker 2: And as the discourse has opened up, I think a
Speaker 2: lot more people have realized that they are not as
Speaker 2: sis as they thought they were, and that they are
Speaker 2: really a lot more trans than they thought they were.
Speaker 2: When did that journey start for you?
Speaker 1: I think I started like thinking about transition pretty seriously
Speaker 1: in like twenty seventeen, when I moved back from Los
Speaker 1: Angeles because I had just broken up with my boyfriend
Speaker 1: at the time and can't come back to New York.
Speaker 1: And it felt very much like, okay, like let's like
Speaker 1: some of these questions that have been annoying me, Like
Speaker 1: it's time to just sort them out and get on
Speaker 1: with my life. And then since then I haven't really
Speaker 1: kept track of like when I started hormones and I
Speaker 1: had top surgery during COVID. I guess I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm not like a big milestone celebrator, but yeah, I
Speaker 1: think twenty seventeen conceptually is like when I would pin
Speaker 1: it at.
Speaker 2: So around that time, you were talking to all your
Speaker 2: friends about wanting to write this book, and I just
Speaker 2: love the fact that it came out of a passion
Speaker 2: of not wanting someone else to mess it up. Do
Speaker 2: you have any idea of when we can expect that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll give you the little spiel. So it's called
Speaker 1: The Third Person. It's going to be out from FSG
Speaker 1: right now. It's scheduled for winter twenty twenty five, so
Speaker 1: like maybe January twenty twenty five, we'll see. It's like
Speaker 1: weird because you're writing and then they're always moving the
Speaker 1: deadline depending on how fast you can write it. But
Speaker 1: it's for a general audience reader, whatever that means, So like,
Speaker 1: it's not a gender studies book, it's not for academics.
Speaker 1: I noticed there was like a lot of books that
Speaker 1: are like memoirs from non binary people, and then there's
Speaker 1: a lot of books that are like guides of like
Speaker 1: give this to your parents so they know how to
Speaker 1: use pronouns. But there isn't anything that's like looking seriously
Speaker 1: at like what is arguably a major cultural shift happening
Speaker 1: and kind of trying to historicize it. Right, So, like
Speaker 1: a lot of the way people talk about like non
Speaker 1: binary identity is like, uh, this is like a new
Speaker 1: thing that's happening all of a sudden, and then like
Speaker 1: the backlash to that from trans people is always like
Speaker 1: We've been here all along, and it's like I think
Speaker 1: I'm like looking for this middle ground where it's like, yes,
Speaker 1: gender variance or gender diversity has existed all throughout history,
Speaker 1: but the particular categorization non binary is like a very
Speaker 1: specific thing. It's not just saying that like people can
Speaker 1: be all different genders. It's like a particular way of
Speaker 1: like packaging identity and talking about it. So like what
Speaker 1: I wanted to do is like look back into history
Speaker 1: a little bit and say, Okay, well, like what are
Speaker 1: all the people who are in this category, Like where
Speaker 1: have they been in other points in time where they
Speaker 1: butch lesbians, were they like super effeminate gay men, were
Speaker 1: they transmn? Where they trans women? Like kind of where
Speaker 1: were these people before? But then also kind of like
Speaker 1: what are like the political or cultural shifts that happened
Speaker 1: in order to like bring these people together under the
Speaker 1: specific category of non binary. It's not the same thing
Speaker 1: as saying I'm gender queer or I'm androgynous, or I'm
Speaker 1: like fem or whatever. Like there's a lot of there's
Speaker 1: a lot of baggage associated with non binary identity, and
Speaker 1: like it's very much tied into like corporate diversity culture
Speaker 1: or like marketing schemes. Like I wanted to kind of
Speaker 1: like give that some serious thought in a way that's
Speaker 1: both like trans affirming but also sort of asking like
Speaker 1: big conceptual questions about like what types of problems does
Speaker 1: it raise for us as a community, or like who
Speaker 1: does it affirm and who doesn't an affirm, and like
Speaker 1: is this kind of like the way forward or not.
Speaker 1: So that's become a lot bigger of a project than
Speaker 1: I thought, And I don't know if I have the answers,
Speaker 1: but it is coming along and hopefully I'll pull it off.
Speaker 3: We'll see.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm excited to read it because I think these
Speaker 2: are also questions that as somebody who is not a
Speaker 2: member of a non binary community, as a trans woman,
Speaker 2: I've I mean, I consider myself to have had like
Speaker 2: a non binary phase at one point in my life.
Speaker 2: But everyone is trying to understand and find points of
Speaker 2: reference for these concepts.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think it's like a really it's kind of
Speaker 1: a bizarre category, right, because it's like non medically transitioning people,
Speaker 1: medically transitioning people, people coming at it from both directions,
Speaker 1: people passing through it in a temporary way. So it's
Speaker 1: like for me, who essentially lives in the world as
Speaker 1: a white man ninety nine percent of the time versus
Speaker 1: like someone else from any number of positions coming to
Speaker 1: non binary. Like our experience of the category and sort
Speaker 1: of like what it does and does not do for
Speaker 1: us is so different, and I don't think we quite
Speaker 1: have a good way of talking about that within the
Speaker 1: community or outside of it. So that's just been really interesting,
Speaker 1: like talking to people that have come at it from
Speaker 1: all the different directions about kind of like what do
Speaker 1: you think you're getting out of this in sharing this
Speaker 1: category with all these other people who have essentially nothing
Speaker 1: in common with you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good question, and I'll get to that
Speaker 2: a little bit, like when we talk about language and
Speaker 2: stuff like that and how language has evolved and how
Speaker 2: the word trendsexual has re emerged for that reason. Yeah,
Speaker 2: we'll talk about it here in a second, but let's
Speaker 2: talk more about the Instagram accoun sex change dot tbt.
Speaker 2: What does the name mean? Just tell us about the
Speaker 2: name itself.
Speaker 1: I think like, and this is maybe tied in a
Speaker 1: little bit to like the resurgence of transsexual but like,
Speaker 1: I feel like so many of us are like so
Speaker 1: exhausted by kind of like mainstream you're so brave like
Speaker 1: empowerment discourse. So I just thought it was a funny
Speaker 1: name because like it feels so extreme and like inappropriate
Speaker 1: to be like I got a sex change. And also
Speaker 1: it like kind of like the sex change sort of
Speaker 1: circulates like on daytime TV talk shows in the eighties
Speaker 1: as like the most fringe thing a person can do.
Speaker 1: But also it's like today normal people that just like
Speaker 1: shop at Target and get married and whatever. So I
Speaker 1: wanted to pick a name that kind of like was
Speaker 1: in conversation with that historical thing, and then I just
Speaker 1: put tbt on the end because I thought it would
Speaker 1: help people maybe understand that it was an archive account.
Speaker 1: Although I noticed people share stuff and they'll get mad
Speaker 1: at it because they'll think it's like contemporary discourse. So
Speaker 1: I don't know how effective the name is, but I
Speaker 1: like it.
Speaker 2: That's funny, I mean, and I think that's the interesting
Speaker 2: thing about the page is that a lot of the
Speaker 2: posts do kind of mirror some of the contemporary discourse.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I'm a huge fan of it. And like
Speaker 2: I said up top, like you've through the page, You've
Speaker 2: introduced me to a lot of transfigures that I never
Speaker 2: heard of before, and also reminded me of things that
Speaker 2: I had like long forgotten about as somebody, I've been
Speaker 2: transitioning for more than fifteen years, and you've reminded me
Speaker 2: of things that like are from my past and my
Speaker 2: history where I was like, oh shit, I forgot about that. Hey, listeners,
Speaker 2: we're going to go on our first break here. We'll
Speaker 2: be right back with more from Jamie Kayliss. So yeah,
Speaker 2: let's get into some of those posts that we like
Speaker 2: from the account. And I didn't categorize mine as well
Speaker 2: as yours, but maybe we can kind of do this
Speaker 2: as we go, But yeah, we have some of the
Speaker 2: posts from the I thought you and I could talk
Speaker 2: about and just kind of give our commentary on them.
Speaker 2: So the first one is one that you posted recently
Speaker 2: as this the Garfield.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I guess joint to back up and tell
Speaker 1: you a little bit about like where I find this stuff,
Speaker 1: because I feel like that's like a key thing. So
Speaker 1: like there's this amazing website that I feel like everyone
Speaker 1: should know about because like it looks like I'm doing
Speaker 1: a lot of work, but actually they've saved me a
Speaker 1: lot of time. Which is Digital trans Archive, which sort
Speaker 1: of like corrals all the trans materials from different collections.
Speaker 1: So like there's trans archives at New York University, there's
Speaker 1: trans archives that like USC and digital trans archives like
Speaker 1: scans all the gender newsletter periodicals, so like between kind
Speaker 1: of like the seventies and like the serious dawn of
Speaker 1: the internet maybe in like nineteen ninety six, like the
Speaker 1: main way that trans people talk to each other was
Speaker 1: through print newsletters, which are all scanned on digital trans archives.
Speaker 1: So like, most of the work I'm doing is not
Speaker 1: like unearthing this stuff from a closet somewhere, although I
Speaker 1: do do a little bit of that. A lot of
Speaker 1: it is just like sitting down for twenty minutes and
Speaker 1: like reading something and like taking screencaps of what's interesting.
Speaker 2: Before we move on, I want to say first just
Speaker 2: about Digital trans Archive, because you have also introduced me
Speaker 2: to Digital trans Archive. Next week, Well, I'm interviewing Dallas Denny.
Speaker 2: So I've oh nice, I've been I've been reading all
Speaker 2: of like Aegis and Chrysalis and stuff like this and
Speaker 2: just being like mind blown. So thank you for introducing
Speaker 2: me to Digital trans Archive. And if you haven't checked
Speaker 2: it out, please check it out. You could spend hours
Speaker 2: on that website just sifting through old posts and stuff.
Speaker 1: Okay, I'm so jealous you're talking to her. She's like,
Speaker 1: she's such a good writer, and I feel like, like reading
Speaker 1: all this old stuff, it's like it doesn't feel like
Speaker 1: homework because it's like people bitching about like whatever their
Speaker 1: problems were, yeah, which are like quite similar to our problems,
Speaker 1: so it's like it doesn't actually take a lot to
Speaker 1: like get interested in it. She comes up in my book.
Speaker 1: I've kind of been meaning to try to talk to her,
Speaker 1: so you should.
Speaker 2: She's very prolific, so sorry, let's talk about this Garfield post.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so this is kind of this is like a post.
Speaker 1: I'll describe the post first. So it's a cartoon. It
Speaker 1: says a ts' is worst Nightmare. And on one side
Speaker 1: it has like a sort of plump and happy Garfield
Speaker 1: and it says before srs. And then on the other
Speaker 1: side it has a kind of ragged looking cat and
Speaker 1: it says, yeah, I think this cat is a famous cat,
Speaker 1: but I don't know. People in the comments are calling
Speaker 1: it build a cat, but I've never heard of this cat.
Speaker 1: But this like falls into like a bigger category of
Speaker 1: posts that I like from trans newsletters, which is like
Speaker 1: when they take a comic strip or a cartoon from
Speaker 1: a normal like mainstream newspaper and they change the text
Speaker 1: or sometimes they don't even change the text, but like
Speaker 1: they put it in a context that makes it trans right.
Speaker 1: So this is like it's very like shit posty contemporary
Speaker 1: feeling of like, oh, like we're looking at a thing
Speaker 1: that everyone else in society is looking at it, but
Speaker 1: like we're seeing it in a distinctly transway. So like
Speaker 1: another one that I posted on the game, yeah, yeah exactly.
Speaker 1: And like sometimes like like this other one that was
Speaker 1: actually the.
Speaker 3: First post on the account.
Speaker 1: It's like a cartoon and it's on the one hand,
Speaker 1: it shows like a woman scubbing the floor and it says,
Speaker 1: ten years ago, I was just another oppressed housewife. Today
Speaker 1: I'm a successful corporate executive accepted by my peers. Sure
Speaker 1: it worked for me, but a sex change is not
Speaker 1: for everyone. Like this is just a normal comic that
Speaker 1: appeared in the paper, essentially making fun of people who
Speaker 1: get a sex change. But like if you put it
Speaker 1: in a trans newsletter, all of a sudden, it becomes
Speaker 1: this like sort of like yeah, so, like I love
Speaker 1: stuff where it's like things taken out of context and
Speaker 1: like put into another context. And I think that stuff,
Speaker 1: like for the most part, plays pretty well on the account.
Speaker 1: There's like another one that I found that was like
Speaker 1: a Tellytubby's fan site that was like, here's why all
Speaker 1: the different Teletubbies are trans. And I think people like
Speaker 1: do that a lot, right, Like you see that meme
Speaker 1: today where people will see like a kind of like
Speaker 1: short chubby man and a tall beautiful woman and they'll
Speaker 1: be like, it's Steve for T.
Speaker 3: It's ste for T, and.
Speaker 2: It's Sandy Debdo and like, yeah, Cameron Diaz, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: it's it's like we've been shit posting and meming this
Speaker 2: whole time basically, Yeah, but through like print newsletter and
Speaker 2: stuff like that and like these online Like it's amazing
Speaker 2: one that I have that kind of mirrors that. It's
Speaker 2: not a comic, but it does mirror the advertisements of
Speaker 2: the day. It's the aegis PSA, which AGIS is the
Speaker 2: American Educational Gender Informational Service used to be known. I
Speaker 2: discovered by looking through some archives. It was originally the
Speaker 2: Atlanta Educational Gender and Informational Service and Dallas, I guess
Speaker 2: between the year of nineteen ninety one and nineteen ninety
Speaker 2: two changed it to American. So I thought that was interesting.
Speaker 2: So yeah, this one mirrors a car ad of the day.
Speaker 2: It says, before trading in your old equipment, go for
Speaker 2: a test drive first, and it goes on to talk about,
Speaker 2: you know, before you get a sex change, make sure
Speaker 2: that you have you know, lived in your chosen gender
Speaker 2: for a time to you know, make sure that you
Speaker 2: don't regret it basically, and it says, don't be sorry,
Speaker 2: be sure, and then you know, for more information you
Speaker 2: can visit Agis, and I just thought this was fascinating
Speaker 2: because it mirrors like car ads of the day of
Speaker 2: the nineties, but it's also like kind of an important
Speaker 2: informational I don't know, for the time, especially because Agis's
Speaker 2: philosophy was all about depathologizing transsexualism and their philosophy was
Speaker 2: all about bodily autonomy. But make sure you know the
Speaker 2: risks and the benefits and things like that. So I
Speaker 2: love it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I love how this went.
Speaker 1: It's funny because this did not do well on the
Speaker 1: account at all, I think because people hate the message
Speaker 1: of it, which is like you have to do this
Speaker 1: real life test. But like, I think a lot of
Speaker 1: trans people in that time, and like probably some even
Speaker 1: today are like like people in their time kind of
Speaker 1: were thinking about things in terms of like what were
Speaker 1: the norms available to them?
Speaker 3: Right, So like it.
Speaker 1: Doesn't seem that far fetched to me that like trans
Speaker 1: people would be like, actually, like the real life test
Speaker 1: is good. But I just think it's so funny because
Speaker 1: it's like so like eighties guy car, Like it sounds
Speaker 1: like it's like advertising a bulick, but it's like advertising
Speaker 1: a sex change, which I just think is like that's
Speaker 1: the kind of stuff I love when it's like you
Speaker 1: can kind of see the like print culture of the
Speaker 1: time being reflected in like the transprint culture at the time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, Yeah, And so yeah, it does talk about
Speaker 2: the standards of care for the Harry Benjamin International Gender
Speaker 2: Dysphory Association, which I don't we don't use the Harry
Speaker 2: Benjamin scale anymore basically informed consent as the way to go,
Speaker 2: but I think it's still something important to think about
Speaker 2: and talk about, you know, because we do have people
Speaker 2: that detransition and end up regretting having surgeries and things
Speaker 2: like that, and it's one of those things that I
Speaker 2: don't think gets talked about in a way that is
Speaker 2: like free of judgment, free of politics and things like that.
Speaker 1: Enough, unfortunately, Yeah, I mean, like I feel like this
Speaker 1: is maybe a controversial opinion, but I'm just like, I mean,
Speaker 1: partly I hate the message of this ad because like,
Speaker 1: would it be the worst thing if you made a
Speaker 1: mistake and you changed your mind? Like to me, that's
Speaker 1: like the ultimate in bodily autonomy is the opportunity to say, like, wow,
Speaker 1: I've made a grave error and it doesn't end my
Speaker 1: life and it's not going to make me an outcast
Speaker 1: from society. I can just like revise my choice and
Speaker 1: move on with my life. Right. Like the idea that
Speaker 1: like if you end up being some type of like
Speaker 1: not passing individual, that it would like necessarily ostracize you
Speaker 1: from society, I think that's just like an insane way
Speaker 1: to look at transition, right. I think if detransitioners very
Speaker 1: much as an ally, no matter how much society wants
Speaker 1: to like frame them as the enemy of our people
Speaker 1: or something.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, no, I agree, But personally I don't hate
Speaker 2: the messaging. I think people are still going to make
Speaker 2: the decisions they want to make, but it's like pause
Speaker 2: maybe for a minute, and have a thought. Right.
Speaker 1: I feel like most people I know are like wrapped
Speaker 1: up in the anxiety of like, oh my god, if
Speaker 1: I make this choice, Like like like people will spend
Speaker 1: years mired in the decision. I know I did, like
Speaker 1: years miired and kind of the questions about like should
Speaker 1: I really do this or not?
Speaker 3: And it's like it's not like do or don't do.
Speaker 1: I feel like there's so many points at which you
Speaker 1: could back out and be like this is actually not
Speaker 1: the right path for me.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, Yeah, let's talk about the transphobic stuff.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so this is another category of thing that like
Speaker 1: people don't like to consume but that I'm obsessed with,
Speaker 1: which is like old transphobic mainstream culture garbage. So like
Speaker 1: I love like Sally Jesse Rafael appearances where like trans
Speaker 1: people go on TV and like like this is like
Speaker 1: a transcript from the talk show I think it's Heraldo
Speaker 1: and the title of the episode is Transsexual Regrets. Who's
Speaker 1: Sorry now? And like I just like this stuff because
Speaker 1: I guess there's two reasons. One, like sort of transphobic
Speaker 1: talk shows were like some of the main ways that
Speaker 1: future trans people came into contact with the idea of
Speaker 1: transnis or like not the idea of it, but like
Speaker 1: the actionability of transition. Right, So, like you're sitting in
Speaker 1: your town and being like I have these weird feelings
Speaker 1: but I don't want to do it with them, and
Speaker 1: then like you see this horribly offensive TV show but
Speaker 1: like you can pull out kernel of it being like, oh,
Speaker 1: like this is the future that like could possibly exist
Speaker 1: for me, and like maybe there's a positive thing within that.
Speaker 1: But also I just like like these sort of artifacts
Speaker 1: of like vintage transphobia, because like transphobia today is so
Speaker 1: like strategically organized in this top down way from the right,
Speaker 1: where like they have a playbook about like how we're
Speaker 1: going to mobilize people around these fears of like trans
Speaker 1: women in bathrooms or like our daughters being mutilated and
Speaker 1: having their breast taken away by surgeons. Right, Like there's
Speaker 1: a very sort of like prefabricated playbook, but like the
Speaker 1: transphobia of the past, which still exists today, like the
Speaker 1: same flavor, but it's very like idiosyncratic rights.
Speaker 3: Like part of it is just like really.
Speaker 1: Prurient interest in like what's going on there, and other
Speaker 1: parts of it are like this kind of like erotic
Speaker 1: fixation on like wow, we're like attracted to trans women,
Speaker 1: but also we like don't know what to do with
Speaker 1: that feeling, but also we find it abject. Right, It's
Speaker 1: like kind of all these different feelings that are tied
Speaker 1: up in this like way that's like not part of
Speaker 1: a right wing political strategy. It's just like people trying
Speaker 1: to cope with like exposure to what is to them
Speaker 1: a totally new phenomenon. And I just find that like
Speaker 1: so interesting and like obviously offensive, but like there's some
Speaker 1: like emotional distance from it where you can like see
Speaker 1: it to be like wow, there like was a time
Speaker 1: in which like the type of transphobia that exists today
Speaker 1: that feels so like inescapable was actually like part of
Speaker 1: this sort of like broader question about like how do
Speaker 1: we like integrate diversity of all kinds into society.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I mean they have I mean it's like
Speaker 2: a panel of like different people on here. They have
Speaker 2: some people regretting section change. I have Kate Boornstein on here,
Speaker 2: which I find interesting.
Speaker 1: She's a lesbian transsexual in the program.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that, And I'm actually very curious to
Speaker 2: go back and like watch this and almost see what
Speaker 2: Kate because I know Kate Bornstein's probably like extremely uncomfortable
Speaker 2: about all of this because you know basically what they're
Speaker 2: doing as they're pitting you know, people who have detailed
Speaker 2: de transitioned regretted having surgeries, which I agree, like that
Speaker 2: is kind of the pinnacle of bodily autonomy, is to
Speaker 2: be able to have that ability to make that choice
Speaker 2: and then eventually regret it if that is the case.
Speaker 2: But yeah, you have people pitting de transitioners against a
Speaker 2: trans woman and one transsexual psychologist and one psychologist for transsexuals,
Speaker 2: which is a very obvious point they're trying to make
Speaker 2: there is that one as a trans woman.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's right.
Speaker 1: It's like they've gathered up people that are actually maybe
Speaker 1: on the same side of an argument, but they've put
Speaker 1: them as like the two opposing sides. But I wonder
Speaker 1: like if at the time, like is Kate Bornstein interacting
Speaker 1: with these people as if they are the enemy. I
Speaker 1: don't think she would, but like, yeah, I'd be curious
Speaker 1: see the episode, and I haven't been able to track
Speaker 1: it down.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think what would be interesting to see is
Speaker 2: just how they're all dealing with like the narrative that's
Speaker 2: trying to be pushed by this, you know, by this episode.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And like when you go into like the archives
Speaker 1: of trans newsletters, like there's people talking a lot about
Speaker 1: like okay, like should we go on these talk shows
Speaker 1: or not. They're obviously trying to push a narrative like
Speaker 1: to what extent can we like use this as a
Speaker 1: way to do outreach, And like there's a very like
Speaker 1: sort of in the eighties and early nineties, like it's
Speaker 1: the same like twenty five people doing the talk show
Speaker 1: circuit and they're always like running into each other in
Speaker 1: elevators and being like oh you again, like good to
Speaker 1: see you. So it's like funny that it's like sort
Speaker 1: of a scene of like who were the public facing
Speaker 1: transsexuals at that time, and like they were refining their
Speaker 1: like talk show appearance skills.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's i mean not too much different from today.
Speaker 2: Like today we have like the trans people who are
Speaker 2: like really visible and the ones that are like always
Speaker 2: out there on the forefront. But now with like social
Speaker 2: media and stuff like that, it's much easier for more
Speaker 2: trans people to be visible. I just think it's really
Speaker 2: interesting because even recently I saw an interview from it
Speaker 2: was like Jubilee, which produces like these they produce like
Speaker 2: these video interviews of it was three D transitioners talking
Speaker 2: to three people who've transitioned and decided, you know, that
Speaker 2: that was right for them. And it's fascinating because that
Speaker 2: was released literally like last week, and then this transcript
Speaker 2: here is almost the exact same thing, but just like
Speaker 2: a different color of it from February fourteenth, Valentine's Day
Speaker 2: of nineteen eighty nine, which is mind blowing.
Speaker 1: You know, I would love to write something about de transitioners.
Speaker 1: I'm like, I'm obsessed with how they're like used like
Speaker 1: trans people are. Yeah, Like I think it's I I mean,
Speaker 1: there's I think there was a pretty recent story about
Speaker 1: I forget the woman's name, but like she was a
Speaker 1: de transitioner and then she got kind of like mobilized
Speaker 1: by the right and then she retransitioned and then kind
Speaker 1: of like has been that's been her project, exposing the
Speaker 1: right wing architecture.
Speaker 2: Well, it's kind of like the ex gay movement of
Speaker 2: the of the nineties. I think it mirrors that quite
Speaker 2: a bit in this sense. Not like you've got all
Speaker 2: these like outspoken anti trans detransitioned and I'm not saying
Speaker 2: everyone who's de transitioned is like that, but you know,
Speaker 2: those are the people that go on Tucker car go
Speaker 2: on like Fox News and stuff like that.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: No, I mean I feel like there's like this weird
Speaker 1: thing too, where it's like no one really seems to
Speaker 1: talk about the fact that like the vast majority of
Speaker 1: de transitioners, at least in my understanding and like from
Speaker 1: people I know, are people who still stay like trans
Speaker 1: or like queer. It's not people that like they de
Speaker 1: transition into like norm cis life. A lot of people
Speaker 1: just like go in one direction and they say, actually, you know,
Speaker 1: like hormones aren't for me or.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Like so it's like I think, like the argument has
Speaker 1: been framed totally wrong, and it just really mobilizes this
Speaker 1: way to be like, oh, like this is a permanent
Speaker 1: choice that will ruin your life, and ideology has affected
Speaker 1: these crazy.
Speaker 3: People and it's I don't know, it's a load of bullshit.
Speaker 2: And maybe the ages, maybe the ages add that we
Speaker 2: were looking at before as kind of a the trans
Speaker 2: community's way of like trying to like protect from that. Okay,
Speaker 2: do we want to look at the next one? Do
Speaker 2: we want to look at that?
Speaker 3: Yeah, let's see super commercial.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, this was just another one kind of in
Speaker 1: the in the Transphoba.
Speaker 2: Category in the sense that I consumed this kind of
Speaker 2: shit as a child and thought that this was what
Speaker 2: I wanted to be.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So the commercial, I'll describe the premise. It's like a
Speaker 1: woman's coming home for her high school reunion and she's
Speaker 1: like sort of an earl. She's like a mid nineties hottie,
Speaker 1: like tight cheetah print dress.
Speaker 2: Nineties supermodel type.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like very sort of like statuesque beautiful, and she's
Speaker 1: like walking through high school reunion. Everyone's checking her out,
Speaker 1: and then like she sees a guy and he's like, wait,
Speaker 1: who are you? I never forget a face, and then
Speaker 1: it's like Bob Johnson and then she's kind of like
Speaker 1: m hmmm, like good to see you, like a little
Speaker 1: bit flirty. And it's funny because like there's nothing outwardly
Speaker 1: transphobic about the commercial, Like it's like, oh, so she's
Speaker 1: a hot girl and her friend remembers her and then
Speaker 1: she like kind of flirts with him. But like just
Speaker 1: the fact of someone being trans is supposed to be
Speaker 1: the thing that you're scandalized by. And it was an
Speaker 1: ad for Holiday Inn and it compares sort of like
Speaker 1: the money you spend on your sex change with the
Speaker 1: amount of money that's been spent on Holiday in renovations.
Speaker 3: I guess that's the transphobic thing.
Speaker 2: They released like a copy like a I guess like
Speaker 2: a brief description of it where it says and Holiday
Speaker 2: Inn's first super Bowl appearance since nineteen eighty six, So
Speaker 2: this was their first super Bowl commercial in eleven years
Speaker 2: that they had made and they decided the transsexual women
Speaker 2: was like the perfect punchline for their commercial. The transsexual's
Speaker 2: physical changes since high school are a metaphor for one
Speaker 2: billion dollars in system wide upgrades.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 2: Wow, that is bleak.
Speaker 1: I wondara this this actress. I wonder if she trans
Speaker 1: or SYS.
Speaker 2: She's probably so if I had to gues.
Speaker 1: I wonder how they like cast that. I mean, I
Speaker 1: would the casting call, I'm sure is awful.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, like for Felicity Huffman, Rebecca Remain. I mean,
Speaker 2: you know, clockysis allies have been haven't been betraying us
Speaker 2: for years? I say, like as a trans woman, I
Speaker 2: used to watch those things as a kid and be like,
Speaker 2: you know, that's me, Like I used to like identify
Speaker 2: with that. And it's interesting because it does kind of
Speaker 2: like leave like scars on your psyche almost like just
Speaker 2: like these uh, like I've talked about before. How like
Speaker 2: one of the first things in like trans media I
Speaker 2: consumed was Silence of the Lambs as a kid.
Speaker 1: Do you feel like now you can look back on
Speaker 1: this stuff and see it in like a kitcher camp
Speaker 1: way or is it a little bit like oh okay,
Speaker 1: so like it does sort of feel like formative.
Speaker 2: It does. It does like as I can acknowledge that
Speaker 2: it's transphobic, I can acknowledge that it's definitely problematic, and
Speaker 2: but I look back on it with like rose colored
Speaker 2: glasses almost like I'm like, wow, this is fun, you know,
Speaker 2: Like for me watching into twenty twenty three, maybe at
Speaker 2: the time, if I was a trans woman at the time, yeah,
Speaker 2: I probably would have been pissed off. You know, I
Speaker 2: probably would have been like, Wow, they made a fucking
Speaker 2: Super Bowl commercial with a trans woman as the punchline.
Speaker 2: But now I'm like, wow, you know, this is a
Speaker 2: moment in trans culture. But yeah, it's camp. To me,
Speaker 2: It's just all fun and games. All right, listeners, We're
Speaker 2: going to go on our last break before we wrap
Speaker 2: up our conversation with Jamie Kayless. Okay, now this one.
Speaker 2: I'm excited to talk about this one because this one
Speaker 2: you posted recently, and this one is the Inner Community drama.
Speaker 1: So this one is from Tapestry, which is a It
Speaker 1: was sort of like the big trans magazine, and it
Speaker 1: changed titles a lot, which I feel like you'll see
Speaker 1: reflected in the drama. But it was Tapestry. It was transgender,
Speaker 1: transsexual tapestry. It was transvestite tapestry. It was just ts tapestry,
Speaker 1: like it's been every different combination of trans. So this
Speaker 1: is a letter to the It's two letters to the editor,
Speaker 1: and the first one is titled too much about Transsexuals,
Speaker 1: and it's a person complaining that, like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: the most recent issue it had too much information for transsexuals,
Speaker 1: like what about cross stressers and like transvestites. And then
Speaker 1: the other letter is titled too much about cross dressers,
Speaker 1: and it's someone who's a transsexual saying, oh my god,
Speaker 1: everything was about cross stressors. There was nothing for transsexuals.
Speaker 1: So it's like kind of these two camps that like
Speaker 1: both read the same magazine jostling for like who's the
Speaker 1: magazine actually for which, Like people loved this post, I
Speaker 1: think because they're seeing a lot of like non binary
Speaker 1: versus transsexual drama sort of within it.
Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely absolutely, That's why I lived for it. I
Speaker 2: was like, this is fucking incredible, and it was posted
Speaker 2: two days ago. It has one thousand and forty six
Speaker 2: likes because so many people have resonated with this one,
Speaker 2: because it really really does echo what's going on today.
Speaker 2: Except I just wish they would cross dress.
Speaker 1: Cross dresser has like sort of disappeared from the discourse
Speaker 1: as a category, and like I don't.
Speaker 3: Really know, like it's still.
Speaker 1: And there's older cross dressers. Yeah, there's people like in
Speaker 1: their sixties and seventies to cross dress, but like, yeah, like,
Speaker 1: who do you see as like the analogus to cross
Speaker 1: dressers boys?
Speaker 2: I was gonna say, like timboys, gentrified sissycds.
Speaker 1: It's funny because I've been looking like I'm dying to
Speaker 1: like read some femboy discourse, and I think, because like
Speaker 1: I'm coming from like trans guy social media, I'm not
Speaker 1: seeing it. But like, is there like a corner of
Speaker 1: the Internet where like trans women are doing femboy discourse?
Speaker 2: Yes, there is, and I don't personally care about it.
Speaker 2: I'll be honest with you. I'm much more interested in
Speaker 2: going after the people who are not gender bending in
Speaker 2: the slightest and still waving around the trans flag like
Speaker 2: every day all day, because to me, it's like those
Speaker 2: are the CIS people that are calling themselves trans that
Speaker 2: I'm just like, baby, you just have pronouns that's not
Speaker 2: being trans. But yes, there are trans women who are
Speaker 2: mad about femboys, and I'm not one of them personally.
Speaker 2: I like it because I think we need to be
Speaker 2: encouraging this type of gender bindy activity that doesn't necessarily
Speaker 2: mean that somebody has to be non binary or even
Speaker 2: has to be a trans woman, you know, like why not.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I think that what gives people anxiety
Speaker 1: is like it's like a category scarcity thing, right, Like
Speaker 1: there's no problem with femboys. It's like, I think people
Speaker 1: start getting anxious when they're like, well, those people are
Speaker 1: like someone's gonna mistake me for being in the category
Speaker 1: that they're in, or like these people are just like
Speaker 1: not realized versions of what I am or vice versa, right,
Speaker 1: and people start arguing over real estate when really it's like,
Speaker 1: I mean, I think what's nice about fenboys is like
Speaker 1: they've cordoned off their own category and they're not like
Speaker 1: they they seem sort of like a verse identity politics stuff,
Speaker 1: and they're very much just like we want to have
Speaker 1: twitch dreams and like that's kind of the extent of it.
Speaker 1: So I sort of love them, but like, yeah, they
Speaker 1: don't seem really like jostling to be in the trans
Speaker 1: community at all.
Speaker 2: They don't Yeah, but the trans women love to come
Speaker 2: after them.
Speaker 1: I think cross dressers it's like a little more complicated, right,
Speaker 1: because like a lot of cross dressing organizations, like in
Speaker 1: the mid twentieth century to late twentieth century, a substantial
Speaker 1: number of those people became trans women eventually. So then
Speaker 1: like they're already sharing kind of like the same institutional space,
Speaker 1: but like it's a little bit different in the present, right,
Speaker 1: because like it's very easy for a community to like
Speaker 1: go off and have their own corner of the Internet
Speaker 1: and like not be part of the same newsletter and
Speaker 1: like have to argue over like who owns it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and so this is an interesting little like relic
Speaker 2: of the past that wouldn't really make sense in like
Speaker 2: today's context, because yeah, people would just go find a
Speaker 2: new sub reddit or something like that. But yeah, there's
Speaker 2: a lot to be said about like cross stressors becoming
Speaker 2: trans women and stuff like that. But that's a whole
Speaker 2: other conversation. Okay, let's look at some of you the
Speaker 2: and this relates to a lot of your research recently
Speaker 2: for FtM gatherings and things like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so like a lot of and I don't think
Speaker 1: I necessarily expected my research to lead me here, But
Speaker 1: like I became really interested in gender queer because like
Speaker 1: that was the first category that I had exposure to
Speaker 1: that like was neither what was caught at the time,
Speaker 1: like FtM or MTF right, And there was sort of
Speaker 1: like gender queer, which was this other category. And my
Speaker 1: book has like a whole chapter kind of getting into
Speaker 1: like okay, like to what extent is this the same
Speaker 1: as non binary and to what extent is it different,
Speaker 1: but like at the same time as gender queer and
Speaker 1: like predating it a little bit. There was all these
Speaker 1: other categories that were like circulating in FtM spaces, mostly
Speaker 1: white FtM spaces. Like one of the big categories was
Speaker 1: tranny fag right. So like I was trying to figure out,
Speaker 1: like I mean, obviously it's like pretty self evident what
Speaker 1: it is, right, it's like a gay trans man, but
Speaker 1: like it's not quite right because there was all these
Speaker 1: like before we had sort of like intermediary categories to
Speaker 1: describe people that were like going in one direction but
Speaker 1: maybe not going all the way to becoming like a
Speaker 1: man or a woman. There was like all these ways
Speaker 1: that like FtM guys were like softening sort of like
Speaker 1: their relationship to manhood. Right, So, like people were identifying
Speaker 1: as like a trans boy or just a boy, or
Speaker 1: like all these kind of different ones that were circulating,
Speaker 1: and one of them that I found a lot in
Speaker 1: the archive was tranny fag or transfag. And this kind
Speaker 1: of like existed before the big community tranny gate, Like
Speaker 1: it's a racialized category, we maybe shouldn't use it. And
Speaker 1: there was lots of sort of like young trans guys
Speaker 1: in their twenties identifying as tranny fags. And there was
Speaker 1: a huge AOL email list that like was one of
Speaker 1: the central FtM sort of like communication networks, and like
Speaker 1: not even all these guys were gay necessarily, but it
Speaker 1: is like sort of a category that like you could
Speaker 1: put on FtM to either like soften the sort of
Speaker 1: madness of it or like mark it as a distinctly
Speaker 1: queer masculinity or kind of like make it somehow seem
Speaker 1: like more subversive in a way. Right, Because a lot
Speaker 1: of people came into like FtM culture in the nineties
Speaker 1: with a lot of anxieties about like like feminist concerns
Speaker 1: about like okay, well, like I don't want to be
Speaker 1: like a man in the way that man exists today.
Speaker 3: I want to be a man in the way I
Speaker 3: want to be a man.
Speaker 1: So like I'm obsessed with like archival things that document
Speaker 1: these like bizarre little categories that have died out, and.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about because the bizarre little category has definitely
Speaker 2: the name for it has died out, but I think
Speaker 2: it exists still within trans mask culture even just you know,
Speaker 2: and this I definitely want your perspective on. This is
Speaker 2: my These are my observations as a trans woman. But
Speaker 2: my observations as a trans woman are that there are
Speaker 2: a lot of people on the masculine spectrum of transness
Speaker 2: that are conflicted about associating with maleness and masculinity. And
Speaker 2: that's where I find, like I see, I personally see
Speaker 2: more trans masculine people using the term trans mask. I
Speaker 2: very rarely see trans women using the term transfem because
Speaker 2: we don't have any like reservations. I guess about the
Speaker 2: word woman.
Speaker 1: It's it's fraut, right, because yeah, I like, I don't love.
Speaker 1: I think I like the categories trans mask and transfem
Speaker 1: as like if you're looking to talk to like a
Speaker 1: specific broad constituency of people, right right, But like personally,
Speaker 1: I don't. I did, Like, so I would say, I'm
Speaker 1: just looking to talk to transfem people, or like the
Speaker 1: other day I was looking to talk to like medically
Speaker 1: transitioning transfem people, right, So like that could be someone
Speaker 1: non binary or a trans woman. So like it's good
Speaker 1: for like drawing these big categories. Like I don't identify
Speaker 1: as like trans mask personally. I mean I know a
Speaker 1: lot of people do. I think it's like it's obviously
Speaker 1: a category that I'm in. But like I think, because
Speaker 1: I was once a woman, I don't see women as
Speaker 1: an inherently virtual category. And I also don't see man
Speaker 1: as an inherently a moral category. But also like we're
Speaker 1: a lot deeper into sort of like many more waves
Speaker 1: of feminism since the wave of the nineties, right, So
Speaker 1: like in the nineties, we were like still in sort
Speaker 1: of like the end of like lesbian separatism and like
Speaker 1: sort of all these anxieties about like who's really a woman?
Speaker 3: Right? What are the right ways to be a gay woman?
Speaker 1: Whereas now I feel like we've had like third wave
Speaker 1: feminism and sort of we've had like it's like normal
Speaker 1: for a man to be a feminist. So like I
Speaker 1: think personally, I don't have a lot of discomfort about
Speaker 1: the idea of being a man, but also like I
Speaker 1: love men, so like I'm not like I don't have
Speaker 1: a lot of hang ups about it, but like I
Speaker 1: don't know. It's like it's hard to like condemn other
Speaker 1: people for like having these sort of like fraud relationships
Speaker 1: to it, because like none of the gender positions are
Speaker 1: like great.
Speaker 2: Right, No, I agree, and I'm not necessarily condemning, but
Speaker 2: I just notice that sometimes those people tend to also
Speaker 2: hold views that maybe like kind of trans misogynistic because
Speaker 2: they see people still as like a bio essential view
Speaker 2: of like male and female even though they're using trans language.
Speaker 2: Does that make sense? Have you ever seen the Instagram
Speaker 2: account Worst of Lex.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's funny. I just followed it this morning. It's
Speaker 1: such a good account.
Speaker 2: It's a good example of what we're talking about too.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And it's weird because I do think there's like
Speaker 1: degrees of this, right, Like there's people that are like
Speaker 1: a very like AFAB core, where they're like I accept
Speaker 1: any gender and I put it all into the umbrella
Speaker 1: of AFAB and it's like kind of transphobic in a way.
Speaker 1: But then there's also just people that are, like I
Speaker 1: like everyone to the right of man. So it's like
Speaker 1: it could be a trans woman, it could be a
Speaker 1: non boundary person, but like, uh fuck this men, right,
Speaker 1: And like I'm just like very opposed to this thing
Speaker 1: that like seems to purport that like trans people have
Speaker 1: some inherently more enlightened relationship to gender. Right, So, like
Speaker 1: I know lots of trans women that are like total
Speaker 1: idiots about gender, and I know lots of trans men
Speaker 1: that are idiots about gender, and I know lots of
Speaker 1: CIS men that are enlightened in some way that I
Speaker 1: find like polit respectable. So to me, it's like patriarchy
Speaker 1: is the enemy, not like men or like male socialization
Speaker 1: or like whatever you want to call this like sort
Speaker 1: of like category that people most us in this annoying way.
Speaker 2: Male socialization. My favorite, my favorite dog whistle that they
Speaker 2: love to which is basically like just call me a tranny, okay,
Speaker 2: like right, right, it's like say what you mean, right,
Speaker 2: say what you mean, penis wielder, you know whatever, But yeah,
Speaker 2: thanks for getting into the discourse with me on that
Speaker 2: a little bit. And I agree, like it is silly,
Speaker 2: and I personally have seen lately in the trans community
Speaker 2: that I feel like there are certain transactivists that are
Speaker 2: almost trying to like present transness as like the morally
Speaker 2: right way to be. And I don't personally agree with that.
Speaker 2: I just think it is just a way of being.
Speaker 2: I don't think SIS is any better. I don't think
Speaker 2: trans is any better. I don't think non binary is
Speaker 2: any better. I just think we are.
Speaker 1: And I think it's funny because it's like people forget that,
Speaker 1: like trans people just start off as people.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 1: This is like like one of my big sort of
Speaker 1: like drama viewpoints is like I'm really skeptical of like
Speaker 1: T for T as an ethos, like I love trans
Speaker 1: people dating each other, but like my my friend Asa Saransin,
Speaker 1: he's a writer, he calls like sort of like T
Speaker 1: for T as a politic, like it's the queer of
Speaker 1: trans right, like people that think of it as like
Speaker 1: if you'r T for T, it's like somehow the more
Speaker 1: enlightened position, Like I think anyone should date anyone, and
Speaker 1: like if you're in a loving relationship, that's great, and
Speaker 1: like I think it is nice when trans people date
Speaker 1: each other or like to non binary people date each
Speaker 1: other or whatever. But it's like, I don't know, you
Speaker 1: see it like circulating as this like enlightened political position,
Speaker 1: and like I'm just very skeptical because like I've even
Speaker 1: seen like transmit and trans women date each other and
Speaker 1: sort of treat each other like shit.
Speaker 2: So like, yes, yes, absolutely absolutely, but yeah, it's just
Speaker 2: another relationship.
Speaker 1: Like I don't know, I think love can be like
Speaker 1: very political, but like I also don't think it is
Speaker 1: inherently so like a lot of sort of like desires
Speaker 1: tangled up in like all these things that are like
Speaker 1: not necessarily like virtuous.
Speaker 2: Right, right, Okay, let's look at I had a couple
Speaker 2: other ones that I wanted to look out. Okay, this
Speaker 2: one is problematic, and there were things I hated about
Speaker 2: this one. There were things I liked about this one,
Speaker 2: the ten Steps to being a Successful transsexual, which I
Speaker 2: thought some of it was hilarious. Some of it I
Speaker 2: hate it. But first of all, I love the image.
Speaker 2: It says, take a walk on the stupid side instead
Speaker 2: of the wild side, and it's a trans presumably an angry,
Speaker 2: pissed off trans woman wearing a blue Cross Sucks T
Speaker 2: shirt and like you know, blowing making raspberries. Yeah, and
Speaker 2: it says be the obnoxious cry baby you always wanted
Speaker 2: to be.
Speaker 3: Ya.
Speaker 1: So this is from twenty Minutes, which is an amazing newsletter.
Speaker 1: I forget who the author is, but like this newsletter
Speaker 1: is like always running sort of like drama, like like
Speaker 1: they're always like saying what they would other people don't
Speaker 1: want to hear, and then like people write in and
Speaker 1: they're mad, and it's like it provides a lot of
Speaker 1: great content. But this is like a list of ten
Speaker 1: steps to a successful transition.
Speaker 3: Do you want to do some of them?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Okay, So I liked the first one just because I
Speaker 2: do know some trans woman with some ridiculous fucking names
Speaker 2: and it has nothing to do with passing or anything
Speaker 2: like that. But I'm just like, great, another transo woman
Speaker 2: with a crazy name. But if you're if you're really tall,
Speaker 2: muscular and overly male appearing, damn, just call me a brick.
Speaker 2: Don't pick a frilly, fussy name like Felicia or Betsy Ann,
Speaker 2: which I just I just thought was hilarious. This third
Speaker 2: one was a good one. It says do everything you
Speaker 2: can to ensure success, but be prepared to deal with rejection.
Speaker 2: Getting all bit out of shape if you get red
Speaker 2: is counterproductive. So like when they say if you get
Speaker 2: red getting clocked, if somebody sees you clock to you,
Speaker 2: just let it roll off your back, baby water off
Speaker 2: a duck's back, honestly the best way to deal with it.
Speaker 2: As a trans person.
Speaker 1: Usually I feel like it's great advice, but like easier
Speaker 1: said than done too.
Speaker 2: Oh yes, oh yes, it's great advice, easier said than done.
Speaker 2: I've certainly gone off on people before. I like number
Speaker 2: four because this is just no matter if your trans
Speaker 2: or cysts, this is true. Like, no matter who you are,
Speaker 2: this is true. Don't force yourself down people's throat. Just
Speaker 2: as you have every right to be who you are,
Speaker 2: the rest of the world has every right not to
Speaker 2: like you. And at a certain point I disagree with
Speaker 2: that because obviously, you know, they don't have the right
Speaker 2: to like take away my rights, but they don't have
Speaker 2: to like me. Then there's like some respectability politics.
Speaker 1: And here I think it's funny because it's like this
Speaker 1: is written as a list of someone being like here's
Speaker 1: how you should be, but it's also very clearly this
Speaker 1: person working through like whatever their own anxieties about like
Speaker 1: sort of like the public face of trans people in
Speaker 1: America are, which is what's so much Internet discourse about,
Speaker 1: like someone being like, here's the way you should treat
Speaker 1: trans people. It's like, oh, this is actually just like
Speaker 1: you wanting to say how you want to be treated.
Speaker 3: Which I think is very Like.
Speaker 1: That's why I always try to take it with like
Speaker 1: a grain of salt when I see people doing these
Speaker 1: sort of insane threads on Twitter about like here's all
Speaker 1: the things you need to know about trans people, and
Speaker 1: I'll be like, actually, like I don't agree with this,
Speaker 1: and I'll be like, oh, right, this is like for
Speaker 1: this person's own edification. It's not necessarily a declarative statement
Speaker 1: of truth.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And it's interesting to look at those kind of
Speaker 2: posts through that lens because I think that's very true.
Speaker 2: And then, of course, just the last thing I like
Speaker 2: about your page or the trans home pages that you've shared,
Speaker 2: it's trans home pages. These are just different screenshots that
Speaker 2: you took, I'm assuming, like on the way back machine,
Speaker 2: and one of them is reasons to cherish being a transsexual.
Speaker 2: I read this sometimes for my own betterment and to
Speaker 2: uplift myself. It says, because being transsexual is often so hurtful,
Speaker 2: so filled with sadness and longing, with shame and loss
Speaker 2: and difficulty, it is easy to come to the conclusion
Speaker 2: that the whole thing is utterly a curse, perhaps inflicted
Speaker 2: by arcane and evil ancient gods. Oh probably, But there
Speaker 2: is an upside too. Most human lives are utterly mundane,
Speaker 2: devoid of any real uniqueness, and the average person supplements
Speaker 2: through an existence devoted to filling the rules expected of them. Oh,
Speaker 2: then there's like the FtM Pride Ring. Then you have
Speaker 2: the trans teene Hangout. It's all of these different homepages.
Speaker 2: I loved different like trans teens talking about like looking
Speaker 2: for other people to connect with.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I love it. A big chunk of
Speaker 1: my book is about sort of like ale homepages. And
Speaker 1: there's a really good book coming out called The Two
Speaker 1: Revolutions that I think the subtitle is The Transgender Internet.
Speaker 1: It's by Avery Dame Griff and he writes a lot
Speaker 1: about like kind of like how homepages and geosites were
Speaker 1: sort of some of like the first open ended places
Speaker 1: like where trans people could document their experience. Right, It's
Speaker 1: like you had the trans memoir before that, but it
Speaker 1: was very sort of like this linear narrative of like
Speaker 1: realizing your trans suffering, transitioning then the book ends, or
Speaker 1: you had sort of like these talk show appearances. But
Speaker 1: like on homepages people could kind of like organize their
Speaker 1: experience in these really chaotic ways, right, So like you
Speaker 1: could have like yourself dressed in your women's clothes, but
Speaker 1: you could also have men's clothes, but you could also
Speaker 1: have like stuff about like how you like to watch baseball, right,
Speaker 1: So like it was like a way to bring together
Speaker 1: kind of like all the different parts of a person
Speaker 1: in a way that was like a lot more holistic
Speaker 1: than anything that had existed before. But I also just
Speaker 1: love them because they're like I mean, also, it's like
Speaker 1: some of the first time you see like young people
Speaker 1: really be part of trans media, right, because like kids
Speaker 1: don't have addresses to receive like a trans newsletter, So
Speaker 1: like you start seeing like nineteen year olds or like
Speaker 1: seventeen year olds making these kind of websites and they're
Speaker 1: very sort of like comic sands, like bad HTML like
Speaker 1: selfies on like a grainy camera. I just love this stuff,
Speaker 1: and this is like I feel like people love to
Speaker 1: see this on the account because like they remember kernels
Speaker 1: of it from being much younger.
Speaker 2: Yeah, when you shared I think you've shared screenshots before
Speaker 2: Susan's Place, which was one of my first ever websites
Speaker 2: that I ventured to learn about myself, and that just
Speaker 2: like took instantly took me back. But yeah, it's a
Speaker 2: great Instagram account. Thank you so much for sharing those
Speaker 2: posts with us. Before we close out the episode, I've
Speaker 2: been talking a lot of my guests about this. I've
Speaker 2: had Julia Sarano on recently. I've had Calpernia Adams on recently.
Speaker 2: I've had a bunch of like trans elders on recently,
Speaker 2: and we've been talking about the euphemism treadmill, that activist language, carousel,
Speaker 2: whatever you want to call it, and on the podcast
Speaker 2: we don't really We just use whatever language that we
Speaker 2: want to use to describe the trans experience. What are
Speaker 2: your thoughts as you've been writing your book, as you've
Speaker 2: been going through these archives on the evolution of language
Speaker 2: in our community.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it's something I now spend probably ninety
Speaker 1: percent of my time thinking about, just like on a
Speaker 1: personal level, I started writing this book very much identifying
Speaker 1: as non binary and kind of as I've like sorted
Speaker 1: out what that category is, like I go back and
Speaker 1: forth on a day to day basis of like am
Speaker 1: I in this pool people?
Speaker 3: Am I not? Something?
Speaker 1: Also I've been really delighted by is like the resurgence
Speaker 1: of transsexual and thinking about that because when I interview
Speaker 1: older people, they're always sort of like scandalized or delighted
Speaker 1: in this like funny way. And I think people like
Speaker 1: it a lot because, like I mean, I think there's
Speaker 1: a camp of people that like it because it like
Speaker 1: delineates them from non binary people, as like we are
Speaker 1: sort of like medically transitioning people that have a distinct experience.
Speaker 3: But then also there's people that.
Speaker 1: Just like it because it feels so like scandalous in
Speaker 1: comparison to sort of like liberal inclusivity discourse, to be
Speaker 1: like I'm a transsexual and you can't say that because
Speaker 1: you're not trans. And so that's been really fun to
Speaker 1: kind of track. But like on a I don't know,
Speaker 1: I think like on a personal level, I'm a lot
Speaker 1: less concerned with sort of like identity terminology, and I've
Speaker 1: started to frame it a little bit more around questions
Speaker 1: of like desire and solidarity, right, So like the first
Speaker 1: question would be like, well what do I want? Right,
Speaker 1: Like what are my specific desires for myself? And like
Speaker 1: those don't have to really square with categories, and then
Speaker 1: sort of like who are my people?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 1: And like who am I in solidarity with? Like when
Speaker 1: I think about myself, like I don't know, I'm like
Speaker 1: a worker and a communist before I'm trans, right, so
Speaker 1: like my solidarity is with like working people, or like
Speaker 1: my solidarities are like against capitalism, and like there are
Speaker 1: plenty of trans people who I would like not think
Speaker 1: of myself necessarily as in solidarity with, and like those
Speaker 1: things sort of transcend identity categories a lot for me.
Speaker 1: I don't know, I think trans just like as a
Speaker 1: big umbrella is good because like it's confusing. So it's
Speaker 1: like like I don't know, I think like my my
Speaker 1: girlfriend is a non transitioning, non binary person, and like
Speaker 1: we have really different experiences, right, And like I think
Speaker 1: a lot about like Okay, well, like are we a
Speaker 1: tea for tea couple? No, but we're also not a
Speaker 1: transfer cist couple. So it's like I think a lot
Speaker 1: of times like categories sort of fail to describe like
Speaker 1: what sort of the dynamics between people are. And I
Speaker 1: think it's a lot better sometimes to just say, like, Okay, well,
Speaker 1: who are we actually talking about here, Like who are
Speaker 1: we addressing? What do these groups have in common? What
Speaker 1: don't they have in common? And like that just demands
Speaker 1: like a much more ROBUSTI course, than I think we
Speaker 1: have on the mainstream right now. But I don't know,
Speaker 1: I kind of have faith we're going to get there,
Speaker 1: because like, what's the alternative? We never get there and
Speaker 1: we just like have hair splitting arguments forever.
Speaker 2: Right until the end of time. Yeah, I think usually
Speaker 2: when I talk to the trans elders about the resurgence
Speaker 2: of the word transsexual, they're surprised because they're afraid to
Speaker 2: use the word transsexual because, you know, for the past
Speaker 2: I don't know how long it's been beaten in their
Speaker 2: heads that like that's like not the word anymore, and
Speaker 2: now people are using it again to talk about our
Speaker 2: specific experience, as I like it for both reasons to
Speaker 2: be able to talk about my specific experience and also
Speaker 2: because it is a more scandalous it's a less marketable term.
Speaker 2: It's a less you know, it's it's just it's just
Speaker 2: I just like it for those times.
Speaker 1: I think it's those things when I scan through all
Speaker 1: the accounts that I follow from the account, because I'll
Speaker 1: follow back like I don't know anyone that seems kind
Speaker 1: of interesting, or like when I'm in the mood to
Speaker 1: fall people, and like I think it's just so funny,
Speaker 1: Like I felt there's like probably two hundred accounts that
Speaker 1: are like TS Britney Spears, TS whatever, right, Like I
Speaker 1: feel like everyone like wants to attach it to sort
Speaker 1: of like it's like a way to make a normal
Speaker 1: pop culture thing trans.
Speaker 3: It's like that always makes me laugh.
Speaker 1: Like some of the accounts, like if you scroll through
Speaker 1: who who I'm following, like it's just some of the
Speaker 1: best most insane user names ever. It's like it's just
Speaker 1: I don't know. I feel like like being in the
Speaker 1: archive has made me a lot more sympathetic to people
Speaker 1: in the present, but then also scrolling through the feet
Speaker 1: of the account makes me be like I hate every
Speaker 1: trans person who's not me, but also I love all
Speaker 1: of them, and like I think it it's like a
Speaker 1: very It's been a lot of fun and I'm just
Speaker 1: learning so much and a lot of times people comment
Speaker 1: and they know a lot more than me, which is
Speaker 1: really cool.
Speaker 2: I love the account. Thank you for following me, Thank
Speaker 2: you for finding me interesting enough.
Speaker 3: So compelling, eminently compelling.
Speaker 2: Ah, thank you. I appreciate that. Well, Jamie, would you
Speaker 2: like to give us your socials and any other places
Speaker 2: people can find you?
Speaker 1: Yeah, so you can just follow the account at sex
Speaker 1: change dot tbt on Instagram. That'll kind of connect you
Speaker 1: to all my other things. I on Instagram, I got substack.
Speaker 1: If you can stand to open the New York Times,
Speaker 1: I'm in there a lot.
Speaker 3: Yeah, That's that's about it. I'm all over the internet.
Speaker 2: Awesome. Thank you so much for being here today, Jamie.
Speaker 2: It was great to be with you.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So good.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I had a lot of fun. All right, listeners.
Speaker 2: That brings us to the end of this week's episode
Speaker 2: of Beauty Translated. I hope we'll enjoy. As we are
Speaker 2: wrapping up this season, the next few episodes I have
Speaker 2: planned for us. We spoke with Jamie about our trans history,
Speaker 2: and next week I'm going to be speaking with a
Speaker 2: woman who actually was creating the history. Her name is
Speaker 2: Dallas Denny. She is the woman behind Chrysalis Magazines and
Speaker 2: TSTV Tapestry, which were trans publications the eighties and nineties,
Speaker 2: long before we had internet to be able to learn
Speaker 2: about the trans experience. So stay tuned for next week's episode.
Speaker 2: I hope you'll enjoy it. As we close out this
Speaker 2: Pride Month, we're going to be extending our Pride Month
Speaker 2: programming into the month of July, because we celebrate Pride
Speaker 2: here at Beauty Translated Podcast three hundred and sixty five
Speaker 2: days a year, not just during the month of June.
Speaker 2: So I hope you'll enjoy our Pride programming that we
Speaker 2: have coming up in the month of July. Stay Beautiful Bye.
Speaker 2: Beauty Translated is hosted by me Carmen Laurent and produced
Speaker 2: by Kurt Garan and Jessica Crinchinch, with production assistance from
Speaker 2: Jennifer Bassett. Special thanks to Ali Perry and Ali Canter
Speaker 2: for their support. Our theme song is composed by Aaron Kaufman.
Speaker 2: Beauty Translated is proud to be part of the Outspoken
Speaker 2: Network from iHeart Podcasts. For more iHeart Podcasts, listen on
Speaker 2: the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.