July 1, 2015
Page 7
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O PINION
Remembering My History and Who I Am
An act of
terrorism and
nothing less
D ANTE J. J AMES
(copy, use italic
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‘that and those’ in
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graph and at end)
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ing on my father,
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ming in the aftermath of the
massacre in Charleston (“trag-
edy” is just such a benign
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grandson of a slave, his father
the son of a slave. I have pho-
tos of my great grandfather
BY
taken after emancipation. I am
the great grandson of a slave.
The conversations about
race, racism, bigotry, the con-
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sion; these conversa-
tions are not abstract
ti
d discussions for me,
n nor for many others
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im
immediate lineage to
s slavery.
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a and grandson of a
s slave, my grand-
father and father. I can still
feel my grandfather’s beau-
tiful, smooth, dark leathery
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hear the gruffness of his voice.
They are both long since gone,
and the chance to, as an adult,
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able. It is my obligation to not
forget, to consciously remem-
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last month, last year, and the
years gone by, create a con-
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the government, (the most
recent NPR story describing
a World War II experiment
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in a room and subjected to
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to try to help non-black folks
understand.
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father, grandfather and great
grandfather had to suffer?
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diffusing the conversation
about racism by describing the
murderer as “mentally unsta-
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fact that the immediate cause
of his acts in that church, mur-
dering those African American
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not mental illness? Why do I
need to explain that the prob-
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My current job is to address
institutional racism in govern-
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my colleagues, my bosses un-
derstand the need to say some-
thing, to express that they
hear, see and feel the pain that
this mass murder has caused?
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nothing less.
The perception of constant
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by killing or failing to care,
killing or failing to provide
needed and deserved services,
killing or ignoring, killing
or failing to speak, killing or
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fect the system, the system of
a person’s biology or the sys-
tem of government.
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My father, grandfather and
great grandfather deserve no
less.
Dante J. James is director
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and Human Rights.
When Claiming an Identity as Transgender
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questions
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questioning
their
gender or are con-
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in the gender uni-
verse, they’ll express very sim-
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gender to describe themselves,
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some things that I tell people
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stuff and some other informa-
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The modern meaning of the
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la term for anyone that doesn’t
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society based on their gender
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sexuals, genderqueers (people
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no gender, a combo of male
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ers, and everyone
else that is gender
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so that they could
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oppression. Many
people incorrectly
assume the term is
just a synonym for
transsexual. Most transgender
activists still use it as an um-
brella term.
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der-variant people to claim an
identity as transgender, gen-
derqueer, transsexual, etc. It
makes other trans people feel
less alone and it educates cis-
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comfortable identifying as the
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trans. It disrupts the assump-
tion that everyone is cisgender.
There are real differences in
levels of privilege in transgen-
der communities that shouldn’t
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phobia someone experiences
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have doesn’t determine if
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feel about themselves. It also
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take hormones and get sur-
gery. Many trans people don’t
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surgery. There isn’t one cor-
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not appropriate to respond by
policing people’s gender iden-
tities.
For many transgender peo-
ple having their gender iden-
tity invalidated is a frequent
experience. The most common
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er people assume their gender
based on appearance and then
use incorrect gender pronouns
or gendered language. For
example saying “Have a nice
day miss” to a trans man inval-
idates his gender identity as a
man. Another example is say-
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refer to a genderqueer person
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pronoun.
When people misgender
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their gender is, that is a type
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avoid this is to ask “What pro-
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is much preferred to asking
“Are you a boy or a girl?”
For various reasons many
people have an urge to engage
in “gender policing.” This
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bother, harass, or attack peo-
ple because their gender ex-
pression stepped outside the
expected norm. This happens
to everyone but it especially
impacts trans folks.
Here are some examples.
When a little girl is told she
can’t play soccer because it’s
not ladylike. When a trans
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to reject the validity of trans
people’s genders and maintain
the gender status quo.
It’s important to understand
that transgender, transsexual,
and other terms have specif-
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sexual is a medical term and
is often used as part of a per-
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transsexual man or transsexual
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scribe myself, but only rarely.
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other people call me a trans-
sexual. This is because the
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tory of pathologizing the gen-
der differences in people. The
term transsexual is also often
associated by MTF (male to
female) and FTM (female to
male) transsexual descrip-
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one should use the language
that feels good for them. For
me, male to female implies I
used to be a man. I don’t like
that because I disagree that I
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don’t like that either.
Another thing to keep in
mind is that transgender, trans-
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There are many different cul-
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meaning of gender is. Gender
diversity has occurred in some
form in every historical peri-
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on to everyone.
Ariel Howland is gender-
queer and a trans woman. She
is an activist, a professional
speaker, and an aspiring writ-
er. You can follow her work at
queersocialjustice.wordpress.
com.