Transtastic: On Coming Out as a Political Act

Posted by GabecloseAuthor: Gabe Name:
Email: transtasticgabe@gmail.com
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About: Gabe is a trans(itioned) man. He's taken T, had top surgery, come out to everyone who could ever want to know and then a few other people, just for kicks. Now he's just another 22 year old guy, who happens to have spent three quarters of that time as a woman. This blog is about his adventures in boyland and toyland, as well as anything else related to being post physical and social transition but still very much trans self-identified.See Authors Posts (29)

A friend, K, recently told me of her mixed emotions at missing an opportunity to come out as a lesbian. She explained how some kids she worked with had made gay jokes and, rather than let them know that she herself was queer identified, she simply told them that a good friend of hers was and so she didn’t like the jokes. K was agonizing over the decision because she and I share the attitude that coming out is an inherently political act, and one that we value quite highly.

As with other columns, I should be clear about what I’m not saying. I’m not saying that every queer and/or trans person should feel obligated to come out to everyone they meet. There are plenty of circumstances when it’s not appropriate, or when it’s simply not relevant. I’m also not saying that there is anything wrong with choosing to not share one’s trans or queer status with the world—in fact, for many trans folks (as Tobi so eloquently wrote about), the presented gender is the real gender, and nothing is being hidden. To imply that a trans person should feel obligated to come out is to suggest that they are somehow deceiving the world, when in fact, they’re being quite honest from the get go.

What I am saying is that, when I tell people I’m trans, I don’t just do it because I want them to know. Yeah, that’s the immediate goal of the conversation. But the long term outcome is bigger than that. I want the world to know that trans people exist. I not only want people to have images of trans folks as existing in their very midst (Gasp!) but to know that trans folks can be successful and sane, two adjectives not traditionally associated with trans folks.

I think back, sometimes, to my parents’ reaction when I initially came out to them. They were terrified at the life I might have as a trans person. I can’t help but wonder how their reaction would have been different if they could have seen me today. Let’s be clear—I haven’t done anything particularly special with my life. But I’m doing okay. I went to college, got decent grades, and got a job after graduating. Over the years, I’ve had friendships and romantic relationships that make me happy and that are no less healthy or more tortured than any other kid my age.

So when I say that coming out feels like a political act to me, I mean that my very existence, and the existence of other trans folks who are going about productive lives, is a political act. It seems to me that it’s easy to deny rights or protection to a group that doesn’t exist, which trans people may as well not, for all the exposure the average person has to us. It’s also easy to marginalize a group that is perceived as uniformly emotionally unstable, as trans folks have been portrayed in the past.

But it’s not so easy to imagine denying me, or any number of my trans friends, protection from harassment and access to affordable, appropriate, medical care. And I suspect that the more people know trans folks, the harder it will be for folks to remember why anyone ever questioned what the right answer was to issues of antidiscrimination laws and health insurance. It’s not that I think the 20 year olds that I come out to today will immediately go out and join a campaign to mount trans friendly legislation. They won’t. But I do hope that when they get to vote on legislation like that, someday, they think of me or my friends, and realize how ridiculous the status quo is.