Monika: What helped you overcome that fear in the early stages of your transition?
Fran: It’s easy to look back now with 20/20 hindsight and say, “What were you so afraid of?” But when I was confronted with my reality, in that huge moment of honest clarity a decade ago, I was frightened beyond anything I’d ever experienced, and for all the reasons you brought up. (But I was more exhausted and relieved that I finally confronted it and didn’t have to fight it anymore.) It all boiled down to that universal question: “What will people think?”
It’s why I took such tiny, timid baby steps, in the privacy of my house, the first few months, with only a couple of friends knowing what I was doing. Tiny steps, little pebbles that would make for a strong foundation. Then, it was my closest friends at home. Then it was, gradually, my friends in the Tower District in Fresno. Each step gave me a little more strength and reminded me I wasn’t alone in this process.
Monika: What was the most pivotal moment with your family during that time?
Fran: My family said all the right things when I finally did come out, but as I mentioned, it was 14 months of weirdness before all was well with the folks. I was pretty much at my breaking point, between the stress of the family and the joblessness, when I had the longest conversation I ever had with my father, about 40 minutes on the phone from California, the week before Thanksgiving 2010.
And the turning point? It was when I mentioned how I had been on hormones a few months, and how they cleared up 35 years of depression like that. And what I didn’t know was that, as he was going through his first go-round with prostate cancer at that point, the doctor had put him on estrogen to shrink his prostate. It was a common ground, it was something medical, and he could relate in some way. So that was a really good, and unexpected, icebreaker. That one conversation became a bridge neither of us expected, but both of us needed.
Monika: How did that conversation shape your wider coming out to the extended family?
Fran: The second half of this was that I called one of my cousins in Pennsylvania right after I got off the phone with him. My folks were leaving it up to me to tell the relatives, and I hadn’t started yet because of the resistance I was getting from my immediate family. I figured she might be the safest place to start. And her response was, “We love you. Come on home.” So I called my father back and told him what she said, and he said, “That’s good.” And I felt his sigh of relief over the phone from 3,000 miles away. And a month later, when I came home for Christmas, all was well. That was when my tower of anxiety crumbled once and for all. That moment with my cousin made me feel like the bridge back to my family was finally complete.
Monika: How do you look back on those difficult moments now, and how have they shaped your perspective?
Fran: Looking back on it years later, I realized that my parents’ path was governed by the same overriding fear I had: “What will everyone think?” In their case, it was the extended family and their circle of friends, many of whom they knew from church. In the end, they walked the walk of their faith, put their fears behind them, took me back in when I was in dire straits, and we interacted on the day-to-day, and all was, well, normal and mundane from that point. The way it should be. It was a quiet, powerful form of acceptance that brought real peace into my life.
Monika: Did you experience any significant losses or unexpected gains during your transition?
Fran: As I said before, I did lose a couple of friends over the transition, and that really bothered me at the time. In time, not so much, then not at all beyond a mild annoyance. Besides, I made more friends than I ever knew I could have. It was the biggest surprise of my entire trip. And none of the jobs I’ve had since have laid me off for gender reasons; I was among groups of people discarded during larger layoffs. I gained a sense of community I never expected, and a deeper, more resilient version of myself.
That said, while I’m the person I projected myself to be in the everyday world when I first went full-time, and generally, I walk confidently, there are still times when I’m not in familiar places when I open that extra pair of eyes in the back of my head, keep on the lookout for situations that could get ugly. That hasn’t gone away.
|
| My house is my studio. Franorama 2.0 is on the air, Cygnus Radio, March 2015. |
Fran: The simple answer: it’s complicated. And it depends on whom you ask. On a certain level, some trans people are thriving. There are more opportunities and fewer prejudices than there were even a decade ago, now that there’s a greater understanding of who we are and what we’re going through.
Also, the old prejudices are dying out as older generations either accept us or pass on. I find acceptance to be a generational thing. To my teenage nieces, for example, it’s no big deal. Same with the co-workers at my current job, many of whom are in their 20s and 30s. It's encouraging to see how quickly attitudes can shift when younger generations lead the way.
Monika: What about legal protections and safety? Do you think trans people are truly gaining equal footing in society?
Fran: Sure, some of us are doing well, but are we really doing all that well if not all of us are treated the same? After all, there are still 31 states where our legal civil rights aren’t recognized, often with strong resistance from Republicans and/or the so-called “religious” right. And there are still far too many places where trans people present themselves at their own risk, especially trans women of color. Also, there’s acute economic inequality; as a group, trans people make a hell of a lot less than non-trans people. We’re not there until we’re all there. We still have a lot of work to do, as if the current swamp in Washington hasn’t made that any clearer. Progress isn’t truly progress if it only benefits a few and leaves the rest behind.
Monika: How do you balance hope for the future with the reality of what many trans people are still facing today?
Fran: In a generation, “trans” may be an afterthought. But the people living in the here and now, those suffering from prejudice, poverty, and violence, can’t wait a generation for their rights to be recognized. They might not live long enough to see that future. No congratulations for the victories yet, the fight is still being fought, and there’s a sense of urgency about it. Hope is powerful, but it needs to be paired with action to protect those most vulnerable.
Monika: While some legislative and cultural victories suggest progress, the reality on the ground for many transgender women is still marked by fear, exclusion, and even violence. From so-called “bathroom bills” to deadly attacks, it feels like basic safety and dignity are still up for debate. How do you process these painful contradictions?
Fran: I’ve been spoiled, and I know it; I’ve worked in two states (California and Connecticut) where trans discrimination is illegal under civil rights laws and in a third place where it’s also illegal. (While New York State didn’t have trans protections yet at the time, New York City did.) But there’s the rub, none of us should have to feel “spoiled” or “lucky” that governments recognize rights already guaranteed to us as citizens of the United States.
Yes, I’m one of those people who believe that trans rights are protected under the Civil Rights Act, and to discriminate against trans people violates the very spirit of the law. Which, at the moment, as I said, 31 states are doing. We shouldn’t be begging for something already guaranteed by the laws of our country. Beg, no; demand, yes. It still shocks me how controversial it is to expect the law to protect everyone equally.
Monika: The fight over restrooms seems symbolic, but it has very real implications, especially for trans youth. How do you respond to this ongoing rhetoric?
Fran: I’m as outraged, livid pissed, as everyone else over the “bathroom bills,” especially when it comes to trans kids. Don’t get me started. I have very little patience with ignorance to begin with. It’s the worst form of stupidity, a willful disregard of facts, even when confronted with them. Discriminatory laws always seem to come from states with a significant religious “right” population, where people often use the word “Christian” when they mean the opposite, or say “conservative” when they really mean “radical.” North Carolina, of course. Texas. Mississippi. Missouri. What the hell happened to common sense? To live and let live? To kindness? Getting all Christ-like here, what happened to “Love your neighbor as yourself,” “Love one another as I have loved you,” and “What you do to the least of my brothers, you do unto me”?
I’ll step off the pulpit right now, since I know I’m preaching to the choir here. Until we can flip Congress and flip state legislatures (again, spoiled here, all five representatives and both senators in Connecticut are Democrats), we don’t stand much of a chance, especially with the Supreme Court on the precipice. When it comes to the rights of trans children, it’s not just political, it’s personal and urgent.
|
| I don't think I ever looked better than this. Heading to a wedding, Fresno, September 2010. |
Fran: I’m also outraged, but with a sad feeling of helplessness, at the violence that trans women suffer in the everyday world. Since I’ve come home, I’ve regularly attended the Hartford observances of the Trans Day of Remembrance at the Metropolitan Community Church (where the minister, the Rev. Aaron Miller, deserves a shout-out for the work he does). Any given year, over 300 trans people, at least the ones we know about, are murdered.
Most of the victims are women. Most come from Latin countries with a huge Catholic influence: Argentina, Brazil, Mexico. And in the States, most, if not all, of the victims are women of color. Through the second week of August 2017, 18 trans people we know of had been killed in the States, all but one of them women of color (Black, Hispanic, or Indigenous). The pain is compounded by the fact that so many of these stories never even make the news.
Monika: Do you think enough is being done within local communities to honor those we’ve lost and support those still at risk?
Fran: At last year’s Day of Remembrance, I met a woman who lived in Hartford. She’s Black, in her late 40s, very sweet, and she, too, waited a long time to transition. At work (she was a bank guard), she was treated very well by both co-workers and customers. Home was a different story, though. She told me how she was assaulted in front of her own apartment building one day by the boyfriend of one of the other tenants.
I mean, what do you do if you’re a gentle soul who economically can’t get away from your situation and have to worry constantly about a beatdown or getting killed? I just didn’t know what to do except hold her hand as she told me her story. It reminded me that sometimes the most radical thing we can do is simply listen and show up.
Monika: As someone who has witnessed both progress and pain firsthand, what keeps you going in the face of all this?
Fran: My frustration, though, is nothing compared to the fear she’s had to deal with daily. That’s what drives me: knowing that if I’m not actively pushing for justice, I’m leaving people like her behind.
Monika: Within the LGBTQIA+ acronym, the "T" often feels like an afterthought. Do you think the transgender population has been able to carve out enough space to advocate for its specific needs and priorities within the broader LGBTQ movement?
Fran: What I say might piss off some people, but my own experience is that there really is no trans “community.” Part of it is the natural but mistaken notion of painting all of us across the spectrum with the same broad brush. You and I know we’re all as different from each other as non-trans people.
We all have different backgrounds, experiences, ages, places on the spectrum, economic statuses, cultures, and yes (as I painfully found out in the last election), political persuasions. What we do share is the sense of being different in similar ways, of knowing what it’s like discovering, as some call it, our authentic selves, of having to fight for our civil rights, of having a certain degree of fear. There’s a common thread running through all our differences, but it’s too easily overlooked.
Monika: Have you ever felt more supported or understood by allies outside the trans umbrella than within it?
Fran: As it seems to be the problem with much of our society now, our differences get in the way. Don’t get me wrong, I do have friends who are trans, and they’re friends for the same reason my non-trans friends are my friends: they’re good people, we have some common references, and we share good chemistry.
But in the larger, day-to-day world, I found I’ve been treated much better by non-trans people than by any LGB and especially T groups. I learned it early on, in the first months of unemployment and job-hunting, when I’d make trips up to San Francisco, for Pride events, and for job seminars and job fairs at the LGBT Center. Up there, I encountered a lot of cliquishness and standoffishness, and judgmentalism, something I definitely wasn’t expecting. I wish it had been different, but I couldn’t ignore how isolated it made me feel.
Monika: That must have been disheartening. Did you encounter similar exclusion in other aspects of social or professional life?
Fran: I’ve also felt the downside on both coasts when I’ve applied for jobs with name LGBT organizations, either strung along after an interview or, like the rest of the world, not even the decency of a rejection. (And you’d think people who’ve been through lousy treatment in the job world would know better than anyone how to treat others in the same boat. That was a real shock.) And I’ve felt it at home with some of the people I’ve encountered at trans nights at clubs, some great people, but some degree of cliquishness and looking down noses. You really start to see the cracks in the supposed “community” when you’re treated like an outsider in spaces that claim to be safe and inclusive.
Monika: You mentioned being judged for embracing your past. Has this kind of internal policing been common in your experience?
Fran: I post a lot on Facebook (which is where you found me, of course), and sometimes that includes throwback photos, and some of those are of me in my Frannie 1.0 days. I might not have liked myself much then, but I certainly don’t disown my past. I’m not ashamed of it.
One day, I got a Facebook message from another trans woman I knew from the clubs and considered a friend, she said, “You’re beautiful as a woman, but I wish you’d stop posting photos of yourself as a man.” I was too stunned to even respond in anger. I mean, who the hell was she to judge me or my life that way? It made me realize how deep the insecurity and internalized judgment runs in some parts of our community.
Monika: Given all of this, what’s your hope for how the trans community, or the idea of one, might evolve?
Fran: In a roundabout way, I’ve seen the differences and the downside of transition, and, in my case, anyway, they’ve come from within our loose, splintered, dysfunctional, dysphoric tribe, as if we don’t have enough crap to face from outside of it. And that’s something we have to get past before we can move forward. We may or may not like each other much, and I don’t have to have coffee with you, but damn it all, let’s treat each other well … and let’s unite over the ties that bind us and fight the common enemies. If we splinter into factions again later on, fine, but let’s confront the big issues and win first. God, now that I think about it, I feel like I’m talking about the Democratic Party. I believe solidarity doesn’t require sameness, just shared purpose and respect.
|
| A sea of storms beneath the surface. Cafe Nine, New Haven, March 2016. (Tom Hearn photo) |
Monika: In recent years, there’s been a surge in transgender representation across media, from headlines and television to cinema and literature. In your view, how authentic or helpful are these portrayals?
Fran: Well, we’ve come pretty far, not all the way, but pretty far, in a relatively short time. I mean, you can see Transparent, a series created with a lot of nuance and sensitivity, with quite a few trans people in side roles and behind the scenes, and Jeffrey Tambor capturing the awkwardness of a 70-year-old trans woman coming out after a lifetime in the closet; or Laverne Cox, trans people shown in a positive, or at least more accurate, light. And I’m a big fan of Showtime’s Billions, and was pleasantly astounded this past season to see the first non-binary actor in a meaty role in a big-time series (Asia Dillon). Trans on TV or in the movies isn’t people playing dress-up for yuks anymore. It's heartening to see the change, even if it’s still evolving.
Monika: Has media coverage improved in terms of how it addresses gender identity and transgender issues?
Fran: There’s also been a huge shift in tones of news stories, and how the media approaches gender dysphoria, from Associated Press style to news outlets that even get the pronouns right for non-binary people, to coverage of political issues (as we’ve seen with the “bathroom bills”). I was on the news copy desk at MSN when Chelsea Manning’s prison sentencing and coming out took place, and my colleagues did ask me about the right way to address this. And I know that my former paper in Fresno, the Bee, has taken great pains in this regard. Progress doesn’t happen overnight, but we’re seeing clear steps forward.
END OF PART 3
All the photos: courtesy of Fran Fried.
© 2017 - Monika Kowalska
No comments:
Post a Comment