What does it mean to be White and LGBTQIA+?

Here we sit down with Trystan Reese (seriously, just Google him) to talk about what it means to hold the identities of White and LGBTQIA+ in the US today.

Some questions include:

• What does it mean to be a person who is both White and Queer? A person who is White and trans?
• Is there a difference between a White Queer person and a Queer White person?
• What patterns are you seeing within White queer and trans community as it relates to racial justice?
• How do we make sense of the vast overlap in the Venn diagram of White trans and queer culture and cancel culture?
• How do we show up intersectionally?

Trystan Reese is an established thought leader, educator, and speaker, focusing on issues of transgender inclusion, social and gender justice, diversity, equity, and inclusion. He is a professionally trained facilitator and curriculum designer, studying under Rev. Dr. Jamie Washington at the Social Justice Training Institute, mastering the art of anti-racist facilitation, consulting, and coaching. He studied Intercultural Organizational Development under Beth Zemsky and was mentored by Trina Olson from Team Dynamics. He has completed two immersive leadership training programs at Rockwood Leadership Institute and learned management skills and conflict resolution strategies from Leadership Development in Interethnic Relations. Trystan has also been organizing with the trans community for nearly two decades and has been on the frontlines of this generation’s biggest fights for LGBTQ justice.

Trystan launched onto the global stage as “the pregnant man” in 2017 when his family’s unique journey gained international media attention. He was invited to give closing performances for The Moth Mainstage in Portland, Albuquerque, and Brooklyn; the video of the Brooklyn event has garnered over 2.5 million views. Trystan partnered with many major media outlets, including CNN, NBC, People, and Buzzfeed, to bring his message of love and resilience to the mainstream.

As the founder of Collaborate Consulting, Trystan provides customized training solutions for individuals, organizations, and communities interested in social justice. He has trained hundreds of medical providers on LGBTQ inclusion, has delivered keynotes at dozens of conferences and convenings, and released his first two books just last year, “The Light of You” a book for 3-5 yo reading levels and then a book for older folks “How We Do Family: From Adoption to Trans Pregnancy, What We Learned about Love and LGBTQ Parenthood.”

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TRANSCRIPT DISCLAIMER: The following transcript was auto-transcribed by Descript software. It will be updated and cleaned in the coming weeks. Please reach out if you would like a transcript in the interim.

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Welcome to our podcast. We’re so glad you’re here refocusing on Whiteness without supremacy or shame. Listen. Like. Follow.

Instagram: @the.spillway | Facebook: @WithoutSupremacyorShame

For a transcript of this episode and more, please visit our website, www.thespillway.org

Mentioned in this episode:

The Spillway Community Guidelines

1. Engage sequentially. The show is a serial not episodic. We do this so we can build relation and find common ground and context. 2. We stay in our own lane. The Spillway is about White people talking to (predominately) White people about White people and White culture. We're not out here to critique anyone's actions but our own. 3. Our combined fabric of destiny. (3a) As Dr. King said, our humanities are deeply interconnected to each other. Racism negatively impacts me, too. (3b) The Spillway is one mechanism within a larger framework needed to sustain racial equity and justice. We're not a one-stop shop. 4. No one right way to liberation. We all share the same goals, but not every method works for every person. If this doesn't work for you. That's okay. Maybe it works for someone else.

But it can- so his last statement was the first time

since Fred, that I've cried on

the podcast.

What about this one made you cry or did like, felt so

deeply emotionally resonant?

The, the, you need to be, I mean, I'm going to need to listen to it again.

Cause I think I was also just like bubbling over with emotion.

So I was listening and not listening at the same time, but I think the

directness of like, you need to be comfortable in your own skin, comfortable

with who you are as a White person.

And that way you can show up in anti-racist spaces.

With confidence, speaking with confidence, making mistakes with confidence.

And I was like, oh yeah, I don't...

no.

No idea.

And I think that's what he does for people.

Is he, like, he's really friendly, but he comes in and he likes strips you bare.

Right?

So that you can move forward.

Yeah.

Like there's no, there's no.

Yeah.

Like even when you asked him why he was here, he was like,

well, I'm a loyal friend.

And also, um, what else did he say?

He said, I'm a loyal friend.

Yeah.

That's work.

That needs to happen.

Yeah.

Summarizing that

it wasn't like, oh, well I've, you know, engaged, like looked at your

blah, blah, blah, or blah, blah, blah.

You know, it was like, this is why these two things.

This also doesn't have to go in this podcast, but I have, how

did you feel was interested?

Cause I didn't have the monitor on, cause I was looking at the questions when he

said, you know, as a typical White person, you went to the blah, blah, blah to you.

And I was like, oh

my God.

Yeah, no, I appreciate it.

That, because that is what I do.

And I think that that's the, yeah, I'm going to intellectualize something,

especially because I feel, I feel scared to be vulnerable around

my gender in this space because I don't want to center her my gender.

Because they have shame around centering my gender and what that's

done to relationships that it's like, oh no, no, no, let me not go to this

emotional place around my gender.

My therapist is working overtime on this question.

They were very scared.

They were like, oh, so you're in this.

You don't have to worry about your gender anymore.

And I was like, oh shit, that's a really interesting way of putting that.

Yeah.

Um, but it is, I'm going to immediately go to an intellectualizing level.

And also that's how you process the world too, as a human.

Right.

But also we have a mental experience and emotional experience

and a physical experience.

And I was only showing up in a mental, out, in a physical way, like even like

mentioned that my heart was racing, but like my emotionality was so disconnected.

Right.

Yeah.

Even the way you said it, you were like my heart's racing and then also

this thing, like it was sort of, yeah,

yeah, yeah.

Like two thirds of my body was there.

It was like showing up, but it was, I, to me, it was really helpful.

And also there was like on recording.

I mean, there's so many different times that it's like fucked up in this podcast.

Um, but I'm here to do the work with everybody.

I'm not some, like, you're not

already.

Fixed or whatever, cause that doesn't exist,

right?

Yeah.

This ideal of perfection of within this space, have I been

working on it a little bit longer?

So I know some different things.

Yeah, sure.

Uh, yeah, but I, yeah, let's the, he was talking about like

being messy or being imperfect around like that's, I'm there too.

I think when you start a business or when you run a business, there's this weird

fucking ballsy that you're just supposed to have all your fucking shit together.

Um, and I got a lot of shit together, I think.

Yeah.

More than I have.

So there you go.

*singing* it's

not a competition

Sure.

Is

um, The Spillway podcast, we talk about what it means to be White in the

U S today without supremacy or shame.

And the ultimate goal here is to move beyond supremacy, culture

and shame culture, and invite more compassion, understanding, empathy,

and patience into the heart of White people and White culture.

We're doing this as wait.

People are just beginning to acknowledge the real ways that

our humanities and futures are all intertwined and inextricably linked.

Despite the fact that people of Color have been saying this for centuries.

Because we can have so many different experiences within this

identity of big White and Whiteness.

This first season is devoted to exploring White people and White

culture at the intersection of gender and right out of the gate.

And episode two, we spoke with breakthrough for men, founder,

Fred jealous about White men.

And in episode four, with the among many things, co-founder of, we

are finding freedom of Angela and Weiss who works with White women.

And while both of these episodes use these broad categories of women and

men, we thought it was important to dig even deeper and hold space for

gender nonconforming non-binary and transgender people who some of us

identify within these categories of women and men and some of us don't.

If you've never listened to an episode of The Spillway podcast or heard the

origin story of The Spillway, you wouldn't know yet that gender nonconforming

non-binary and transgender justice and liberation has been my, kind of like my

bread and butter for the past decade.

And I use the shorthand G N B T for gender nonconforming

non-binary and transgender folks.

But my work in the community.

Broadly LGBTQ youth and young adults inspired me to go to grad

school and come out with three masters from an Ivy league school.

And I say this because this wasn't a decision that I took

lately or cheaply through this education work and field hours.

I came to truly understand the transformational change that comes

through interest convergence.

When says, people says gender people show up for GLBT justice,

systemic and interpersonal shit got fixed a lot faster, a lot faster.

And seeing that there weren't a lot of White people consistently

fighting for racial justice.

I refocused my trajectory in the last semester of loss.

And in changing this trajectory, the oddest thing happened nearly

every White LGB and GNB and person.

I considered a confidant, a comrade or ally within broadly the social justice

movement, this particular group of people, a family refused couldn't didn't know

how or wouldn't support my work publicly.

I could jump on a phone call or go for a long walk with other

White, LGBT, or Jean BT people.

And we couldn't stop talking about The Spillway or the work of

White people in racial justice.

And at the same time, they couldn't do something as simple as publicly

commenting on our social media, sharing our work with friends or family, how

even liking more than two or three posts.

And I thought maybe it was isolated to individual experiences and it was just

these specific weight, LGB and GBT folks who I knew didn't know how to publicly

support a friend or a family member.

Who's starting a new adventure or working in racial justice as a White person.

But then I started asking White, queer and trans folks who work in

racial justice or racial justice, adjacent spaces to be on the podcast.

And I couldn't get anyone to respond.

This episode was supposed to be sandwiched between episodes two and four, but

I got six different rejections from people, people who fancy themselves,

community leaders and social justice that mostly came in the form of not

responding to my emails or referrals.

So this episode just kept getting pushed back further and further.

I was afraid we wouldn't be able to include it in season one.

So what the fuck is going on?

My thought was, if I'm doing something wrong, surely a friend or a family

member would tell me my therapist pointed response to that was, well,

maybe this is them telling you we can have this conversation privately, but

we don't talk about this publicly, but why is this airing our dirty laundry?

Or is it a conversation we need to have when companies not over.

And then of all people, Tristen, Reese emailed me the Tristen race.

For those of you who haven't tuned into trans and queer liberation in the past

five or six years, Kristin Reese is an established thought leader, educator and

speaker focusing on issues of transgender inclusion, social and gender justice,

diversity, equity, and inclusion.

He is a professionally trained facilitator and curriculum designer

studying under Reverend Dr.

Jamie Washington at the social justice training Institute

mastering the art of anti-racist facilitation consulting and coaching.

He studied intercultural, organizational development, other Beth Sinsky and was

mentored by Trina Olsen for team dynamics.

He has completed two immersive leadership training programs at

Rockwood leadership Institute and learn management skills and conflict

resolution strategies from leadership development in inter-ethnic relations.

Trustin has also been organizing with the trans community for nearly

two decades and has been on the front lines of the generation's

biggest fights for LGBTQ justice.

Tristan launched under the global stage as quote, the pregnant man in

2017, when his family's unique journey gained international media attention,

he was invited to give closing performances for the moth main stage

in Portland, Albuquerque and Brooklyn.

The video in Brooklyn event has garnered over 2.5 million views.

Tristen partnered with many major media outlets, including CNN, NBC people, and

the Buzzfeed to bring his message of love and resilience to the mainstream.

As the founder of collaborative consulting, Tristin provides customized

training solutions for individuals, organizations, and communities

interested in social justice.

He has trained hundreds of medical providers on LGBTQ inclusion has

delivered keynotes at dozens of conferences and convenings and

released his first two books.

Just last year, the light of you, a book for three to five-year-old reading

levels and then a book for older.

How we do family from adoption to trans pregnancy.

What we've learned about love and LGBTQ parenthood.

He is married to his partner, Beth, and they live in Portland, Oregon with

their three kids, Lucas, Soli, and Leo.

They are very happy trust scent.

It is so wonderful to have you join us today.

Welcome.

This is so exciting to finally have this conversation.

Uh, I don't know if you saw the context part of this on the script that we've

worked out for this, but it as, uh, this episode is now I think number

13, maybe 12, I think on the order.

And it was supposed to be number three, we reached out to so many different

people to try to have this conversation and we continually got ghosted or

no.

Like, did people write you back and say why they could weren't

interested in having a conversation?

No, they just didn't write back at all.

I didn't write back at all at all at all.

And so.

Yeah.

Like two things are coming up for me.

One.

Why did you say yes, cause that feels like a, just after no after no after

no, uh, what to, you said yes, like let's have this conversation or this

conversation is important to have, or I want to show up in that space.

Um, but then to, yeah, go ahead.

I'll do one at a time.

Sorry, go for it.

Well, number one, like I'm a very, very loyal person.

And if a friend asks for a favor, I try to do it, you know?

And so of Angela and being like, Hey, these are some people that

I love that I'm like, great.

I'm happy to have that conversation.

And then number two, things are still pretty locked down

here in Portland, Oregon.

And so even if like things aren't legally locked down,

there's still so much separation.

And so honestly, like being a guest on podcast is one of the few

social interactions that I get.

It's an opportunity for me to really have like a deep, thoughtful conversation.

It just happens to be recorded.

And I hope that I don't say anything that, you know, causes any kind of harm.

And if I do, that's fine, I'll hear about it.

And then, you know, I'll try to tend to it.

Um, but it was just a chance for me to talk about something that I really care

about and hopefully be challenged often.

That's what happens with the questions, you know, it deepens my learning as well.

So it's.

That's so great.

Yeah.

You've answered both one and two that I had help.

Yeah.

Cause it is it's like, why, why did you want to show up in have this conversation?

Uh, and I think it's also with like the email that I sent out.

I kind of sending like the same email of, Hey, I want to talk about

White people, White people with White people, uh, so that we can be better.

And this like combined destiny and our mutuality and our shared fabric of destiny

combined best.

What

did you say?

Combined destiny?

Oh,

combined destiny.

Yes.

Yeah.

I mean, ever since, I mean, I've been working with White people for years, but

ever since I've heard Resmah Medicam in an interview basically say like, he doesn't

want to work with any White people who haven't been working with White people

creating a new White culture for them.

Years.

I was like, yes, great.

I'm on the right track, you know?

Um, cause that's what I feel called to do.

Um, but I think maybe one of the reasons that people go to do is

because it is so fraught, you know, it is, it's almost embarrassing at

times to be like, oh, I'm a White person that works with White people.

That's just not our, I don't think there's a large cultural understanding of how

very important that work actually is.

Um, particularly for people who are brand new to this work, it

feels very counterintuitive.

And unfortunately that newness, I think sits, right.

Like one of the other markers of that newness is like so much externality, so

much, you know, performance, um, that unfortunately you kind of hit that spot

where people who are new are like, oh my gosh, you shouldn't be doing that.

And also I want to talk about how you shouldn't be doing that, like really loud.

Um, so, so yeah, it can be.

Well, I think with that scariness, the thing that was, I think, striking

for me was, and I think we're going to start jumping into the questions here.

Um, I noticed that every single person I was having this conversation in

private, uh, and just my social circle by who I am was a majority of lake

GLBT folks, LGBT folks, um, just like this beautiful LGBTQ rainbow of like

family members that I'm surrounded by.

And we would have these conversations about White people and showing

up in racial justice in private.

But as soon as this conversation went public and I'm making social media

posts, creating a podcast, trying to get people into this conversation,

that's where there's a whole other level of ghosting occurred.

And so it almost felt very.

Uh, intentional, but also curious of like, what is going on with this overlap

with queer folks, with trans folks, uh, who are so invested in this work

in private spaces, why can't we then translate that into public spaces?

I'm wondering if you have any thoughts about the kind of intersection of gender

and sexuality and race and how we try to show up in spaces collectively?

Yeah, I mean, I can't speak for anybody else.

I can just say for myself, you know, being a queer person, being a trans person, I've

been out as trans and on the front lines of trans movements for over 20 years.

And I think that I know even more like at a deeper level, the physical,

emotional, spiritual toll of making a public mistake, um, for me.

Being in the queer movement, like I've been called out, I've been called in.

I've been canceled just like over and over and over again.

That's part of how you learn.

It's also part of how you get destroyed by your community.

And so for me, the stakes feel really high.

I'm not naive about what the stakes are.

And so my guess would be that a lot of queer and trans folks know that doing

or saying the wrong thing on such an important insensitive topic comes with

grave consequences for many of us.

Um, and so for me, I know that's why I have to be really thoughtful and

intentional about who I have this conversation with what I say when I have

this conversation, you know, who the audience is, how public or private it is.

So again, like, I don't know, I'm not other queer people, but for

myself, the stakes just always feel super, super, super high because

our community is particularly prone to destroying each other.

Yeah.

With that in mind, um, Some, sometimes the simplest

questions are the hardest one.

So, um, what does it mean to be a person who is both White and queer,

a person who is, you know, White and trans and you know, of course, like

you said, you can't speak for others, but what, what has your experience been

where like, in what way?

Um, so to be, so somebody who's White and queer, what does that feel

like within that community, um, for you in terms of your social justice work?

Yeah.

You know, it's so funny.

It feels like I used to be a performer, a professional performer.

And you know, when I was a dancer, the.

You know what you would say when performers or dancers are doing

something again, like sort of as beginners on stage, but what you

would say is, you know, it was good, but I could see the choreography.

Right.

And that means like, you can kind of just see them saying, and now I go here

and now I do this, and now I do that.

There's a sort of an awkwardness of it.

And I think I spent like at least 10 years in it, in that awkwardness, you

could sort of see the choreography.

And for me, the, it really is about right-sizing your

humility and your confidence.

So as a White person, how are you humble?

How are you willing to follow the lead of other people?

But then as a queer person, how do you trust your voice, your experience,

your expertise, to really be able to be part of a conversation, be part

of a movement, not be so small that you never do anything ever, you know?

And so I feel like it isn't really until recent years when I've been able to more.

Fluently more gracefully, do both, you know, be able to be humble and

know, okay, this is the time when I'm sitting back and listening and learning.

And when are you confident?

When are you like, okay, I really do have something that is needed

in this conversation as a queer person, as a trans person, as a queer

parent, as a trans person, who's given birth, you know, trying to

figure out what's that ebb and flow.

And the times when I look back and I have the most regrets are when

I was not humble enough or when I was not confident enough, you know?

And so that's, that's really been for me.

What does it mean to have some experiences of marginalization, but some

experiences of privilege is trying to find that flow and it's always imperfect.

I think with that flow.

There's I I've experienced this as I think when we start go around,

when we're in shared space and you kind of like name your positionality

and share that with everybody.

And I've always been really curious, uh, when wait people show up or

talk, you're either a White queer person or you're a queer White person

and that distinction that happens.

And I'm like really curious if you like, experienced a difference with that,

because as you're talking about this flow of the confidence, but also needing

to take up space sometimes within your vulnerabilities, how we then identify

ourselves and then put ourselves forward in public spaces, kind of depends on where

we're at with that conversation, right?

Yeah.

I mean that, that distinction between being a queer White person

or a White queer person, I don't know that I'm familiar with that.

I'm wondering if you can say more.

Yeah.

I, so for me it really started to capitalize itself into this

really beautiful point when I was in a mixed space and.

A lot of my coworkers would talk about their experiences, being a Black

people and centering their Blackness.

First, I am a Black lesbian, I'm a Black queer person.

I'm a Black gay person.

Um, but then White people, we would show up and say, oh no, I'm queer.

Oh.

And then wait.

And this Whiteness was almost like afterthought, uh, to then,

oops, wait, I need to bring that back into the conversation.

And so I've always, it's been this kind of, uh, it's just something that I've

been more attuned to since I've heard a lot of folks of Color talk about,

oh no, I'm going to send her my race first because that is what you see.

That is what you understand that me first from across the room.

Hmm.

Um, Well, I mean, I think that's also developmental, you

know, I think when any of us really begin to explore our identities, I

think it's very natural that we want to go to the place of marginalization.

First, we want to really avoid the conversation about privilege

and the ways in which our lives may have been easier than others.

And so it's also interesting to think about, well, of course people may

center their Blackness, whereas queer folks may center their queerness.

Well, yes, we're both centering our points of marginalization.

We're both censoring the parts of ourselves that feel

most under attack most often.

And I don't think it's until later on when, you know, it's interesting

to be in mixed spaces and to have, you know, people of Color,

particularly Black folks center there.

there's this gender identities or their heterosexual identities.

And they're really whined to lean into where as their own privilege, you

know, and not falling back on their marginalization similarly for White queer

folks, when are we willing to center our points of privilege and not, you know,

so, so yeah, I think it's interesting for me, my Whiteness is the thing that I feel

colors my life more than anything else.

Um, so I always think of myself as White first because it just feels to me

like that's the thing that most, yeah.

Like every part of my life is probably impacted most by my Whiteness than

my queerness and my transness than any other part of my identity.

But that's just true for me.

Yeah.

I think in doing this and in shifting, I think a lot of my focus.

Refocusing away from queer and trans justice.

That's what I went to school predominantly for.

And then shifting into racial justice.

I've begun to notice how frequently within White spaces, White racial

justice spaces, how two-dimensional the conversation can be.

And we're only talking about race.

Uh, never have I ever been.

So mis-gendered than when I started showing up in weight anti-racist

spaces, uh, even if my pronouns are in the zoom link where we do a go around

and we're naming our positionality and who we are and how we like to

be addressed, the mis-gendering just feels consistent and constant.

And that feels like a scratch.

And I'm.

And then I wonder, is this like White non-binary human?

When do I start to assert my nonbinary desks in this space?

Because then it might then distracting from the racial conversation.

And I don't want to do that.

And so I feel like if you have any pointers tips or tricks as to how

to like navigate the conversation of being consistent in the, the,

um, it's weird, I'm feeling my heart accelerating a little bit.

This feels like more of a tender question than I anticipated.

Uh, when, when we show up for racial justice and gender justice and

sexuality justice, how do we do that?

Simultaneously intersectionally without sacrificing parts of our humanity.

Yeah.

I mean, firstly, I'd love to hear from you more, you know, like

what, what, what do you lose?

What does the group lose when you are?

Mis-gendered

like, what's the impact on you?

On me?

I feel invisible.

Um, in that I'm only being understood in one way, uh, in

this like flattened experience.

Um, it's actually interesting.

I didn't realize that you trained under Jamie Washington and, uh,

Jimmy Washington did some trainings for an organization that I worked

with and it was only like 16 people.

And so it's this very like intimate space.

Um, and he was very clear.

We only talk about race here, never deviate from that conversation.

Never deviate from race whatsoever.

And then that was the first time I think I was ever in a, uh,

Uh, a training space with race.

And so it's always been this kind of anchor for me of no, don't deviate.

Don't, don't make this about something.

That's not about race.

And so what I feel like when we go into like, the what's missing is, oh,

sometimes the rest of the world is missing when we're only focusing on

one part or that like not the rest of the world, but like the rest of

the colors, the rest of the cran box.

It's just like not being used right now.

Cause we're focused on this one note.

Yeah.

Well, the reason I ask about the impact is because what I've found is I think you're

able to frame what is respectful dialogue?

What does it mean to be in community with people?

What does it mean to hold nuance?

Which, you know, White culture hates nuance.

We want things to be either or good, bad, this, that.

And I think for me, when I'm able to frame that part of what it means

to be in a community together is to lean into discomfort and to embrace

nuance and to make sure that people are able to really show up fully.

And so to me, being able to assert that part of this conversation, poking the

space is that we're going to use the names that people want us to use for each other.

We're going to use the pronouns.

We're going to pronounce people's names correctly.

We're going to be mindful of how much space we're taking up.

When are we, you know, shifting in, when are we shifting back to me?

That's not.

I don't know that doesn't feel like a distraction.

It's part of how we're called to do the work, I think.

And so that's usually how I frame it and I do, if it ends up being useful,

you know, I do think talk about the impact, you know, that the impact of

White people not being willing to hold nuance, you know, not being willing

to understand that, you know, gender is fluid, the impact that that has on

non-binary people in this space is the same impact that it's going to have

on people of Color when we bring those same ideologies to those interactions.

So, yeah, I mean, I love, love Dr.

Washington's work, obviously.

Um, I did study under him and I think there's a way to say

this is not a distraction.

This is the work is how are we going to treat each other as White people?

How are we going to show up?

Right.

Um, that doesn't feel like a distraction to me, especially if you want.

Super ideological, which White people love that the gender binary

is a creation of White supremacy.

Right.

Right.

When you get rid of that binary as part of the work.

Yeah, go ahead, Jenny.

No,

I, sorry.

I'm like just like listening and soaking and because my work is

not in social justice circles.

Um, what I do every day, um, is not in it.

I, I have been learning to, to engage in these conversations and

they make me super uncomfortable because I haven't had the practice.

And, um, in, on one of your podcasts that you were on that I was listening to just

kind of, um, you know, doing my research.

Um, you said that the only way that you can sort of get used to.

Leaning in to being uncomfortable and having these conversations is practice.

And I think that's how you learn how to navigate those spaces.

Not you specifically, but a person is if you, if you just dive in and,

um, you know, obviously you want to be mindful of other people and the

context within your house that you're having those conversations with.

But I think if you don't, um, just kind of go, go towards it.

And that's what Loran has taught me, um, which has been so valuable is like,

just do it, just get in there and, and, you know, you're going to make mistakes.

Um, but you learn from them.

And I was just thinking about that as you were talking.

I think that's also why I asked the question of Laura

and about the personal impact.

And of course, like, like a typical White person, you like went immediately

to the Headspace, you know, of like, there's this racial justice framework

that teaches a long haul, long haul, but like also part of how we manage ourselves

is to really honor that that's harmful.

That hurts that's traumatic.

And, you know, you don't have to do the White racial justice person thing either

of being like, well, it's not as harmful.

It, it, none of that matters in your body.

You know, when you have that, like, you know, you said like, oh no, my heart,

you know, I heard a starting to raise.

It's like, we have to really, we have to tend to, that we

have to tend to ourselves.

Um, and so I think, yes, Jenny, like having the conversations in safe

places with other White people, you know, so we're not causing harm.

Um, and having them from that place, hopefully of curiosity and openness

and, um, and, and wonder, you know, as opposed to what, but isn't this true?

Isn't that true?

No, you know, you can ask like, Hey, how do I balance that?

And, um, and, and that way we're able to tend to ourselves and not

get into some kind of a weird.

Well, your discomfort, Laura, and about being mis-gendered

is less important than racism.

Like how, who does, who does that help?

You know, like it you're, you know, you really, you deserve to be in spaces

where you are able to show up fully.

And I don't think you're asking for too much, you know, to have your basic basic

needs met, which is the pronoun stuff.

You know, that, that's what it feels like to me.

Um, but yeah, there really aren't Jenny, there aren't

enough spaces for people to be.

You know, to be imperfect, to show up and say the wrong thing and have someone be

like, Ooh, so here's something, you know,

wait, just, excuse

me.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, that's like why I have a job to be honest is like, I am a person who

can create those spaces where I'm able to as a facilitator to say, Ooh, pause.

So let's talk about that word you just use and let's do a little rewind.

So tell me more about why you use that word articulate to describe your

Black colleague, you know, like to have that kind of a conversation,

um, where people aren't, you know, where shame is it used as a weapon.

Um, but people are really able to learn and grow because goodness knows.

We need those spaces otherwise, how are we going to learn and

grow?

Um, speaking of your, your work, how does it, so you touched on it

a little bit, like that's what you do, you go in and you're like, let's

talk about these words that you're using, um, and how they're they're

they may be landing for other folks.

Can you talk a little bit more about how your consulting, um, group helps

others navigate and thrive in the interconnectedness of our world?

Yeah.

Well, I kind of have the opposite path of Loran.

They said that they studied the queer and trans stuff, came to

the racial justice stuff later.

Um, my professional training is in anti-racism work and I've really

taken those principles and applied them to queer and trans equality

and liberation and justice fights.

Um, and more recently I've really been centering my work more

fully in the queer and trans.

Conversations.

Um, mostly because I really want to make sure that the racial justice work goes to

racial justice, practitioners of Color.

And so there are lots of times when the queer and trans stuff naturally lends

itself to intersectionality, you know, so it does end up seeping into racial

justice, um, uh, disability, justice ages, um, you know, a lot of those other pieces,

but when it goes too far into that realm, I do try to bring in facilitators, uh, you

know, across lines of identity to do that.

Um, but yeah, I work with, uh, I, um, do quite a bit.

Of one-on-one coaching with White staff members, particularly White

staff members who are the subject of some kind of discrimination complaint.

So like if a staff member of Color goes to the union and says, I believe that

this my White manager is mistreating me based on my race or based on my gender.

If it's a man in a non-binary or a person, a woman, um, I'm often like an external

coach that's brought in to help sort of with that White person into shape.

Um, and so that's a lot of the work that I do.

That's actually my most fulfilling work is that one-on-one where again, someone's.

Let's be like, I don't know what I did wrong.

I had this interaction and then I found out later I did the wrong thing.

I don't get it.

And I'm able to sort of go okay.

Point by point.

Here's what I think happened.

Can you understand why that happened?

Here's what this is connected to.

That's larger.

Like I just used the articulate example, which I use that as, as an

example, a lot, a lot of White people have no idea that the word articulate

is a passive aggressive inside.

Particularly the Black and Brown people, particularly to Black people, they have

no, they would have no knowledge of that.

Yeah.

I didn't.

I made that mistake and Loran was like, um, and I was like, oh, people don't

know, people do know.

I know.

Yeah.

And it is so harmful to Black and Brown folks, particularly Black people.

That, of course, if your White manager calls you articulate in a meeting,

that's going to hit you in a rock lake.

And so it's like, how do we thread that needle someone's caused harm, but they

legitimately had no idea that was harmful.

Right.

So that's some of the work that I do is that one-on-one coach.

Um, yeah, and then I do lots of large group training.

And again, particularly from that LGBTQ plus lens and the trans specific lens, and

I do lots of writing and content creation.

So I help people, you know, create inclusion strategies that are, don't just

show up in June, but are year round might help them rewrite their entire website.

I helped them develop a training series.

I helped their employee resource groups, uh, partner meaningfully with

organizations, you know, grassroots organizations, um, that kind of work.

Yeah, it's great.

I only work with who I want to.

I worked in the nonprofit movement for 15 years, I guess.

Um, and I left to start my own business a year and a half ago and

I feel like I've just hit my stride of like really loving what I do.

Oh, great.

That is lovely.

I feel like a lot of people during the pandemic where.

I'm going to do my own thing.

Like some, I feel I did that too.

I started my own business and I feel like, I dunno, it was something,

I was just like, I'm I don't want to work for others anymore.

I want to, you know, do my own thing.

I mean, I want to work with other people, but I want to do, you know, I have a

vision and all that, so that's cool.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's been hard, you know, the pandemic has been really difficult.

Um, and so, so, so, so, so many ways, but yes,

you mentioned that you're working more with LGBTQ folks.

And one of the things that we've been asking since this is like a partner

sibling episode, two White men and White women, if we're thinking about

White queer and trans folks, um, we're kind of asking some of the very same

questions and I'm noticing that they're kind of like sitting differently or

fitting differently in this framework.

Cause we've just kind of copied and pasted some of the questions just so we could be

consistent as we like do this community assessment of Whiteness and White people.

Um, but do you see, or are you finding, um, any patterns within

White queer and trans communities as it relates to racial justice?

Okay.

Well, primarily I don't work with queer folks.

Um, primarily I work with straight folks on their LGBTQ, like acumen

and, um, competency and fluency and all of those things and humility.

Um, yeah, I mean, I've done a lot of work with White queer folks.

Um, and I'm considered continuing to see the same patterns now that

I have been over the last 20 years.

Um, which is this obsession with, um, putting others down in order to

avoid thinking about your own work, you know, it's, um, it's a point

of real, real trauma for me, um, is treating each other as disposable.

Uh, it it's, it's just, it's incredibly painful to watch

community members get treated.

Badly by other community members over and over and over again.

And I keep thinking, we're going to learn, you know, I keep thinking

about some of the sematic work that's trickled into the mainstream, you

know, with some of the awareness of trauma trickling in the night.

I just keep thinking, people are going to understand like, oh, this

is a trauma response on my part.

And I'm projecting onto somebody else.

This isn't really about them.

And some tweak they did or whatever, this is really about me.

And I need to do some of the healing, you know?

Um, I keep thinking people are gonna, I don't know, kind of assess, like,

what's, what's the goal in my work?

Like, what do I want, do I want like less racism?

Do I want less homophobia feeling still?

Yeah.

Okay.

How do we get there that, and then like, what are effective strategies?

Um, how do we build that?

The movement that is, I don't know that people are desperate to be a part

of, you know, I just keep thinking that shift is going to happen.

And, um, and I've had to sort of develop my own little pockets of community because

I think large scale that's, I would say continues to be the, the, the big, the

big pattern theme trend is this obsession with rightness, that there's one right

way to do something, um, which is really rooted in Whiteness and White culture.

And it's, um, sucks.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's sucks so much

fucking eat it, eat it.

I didn't even realize that I was, oh, hi friend.

I didn't even realize, sorry, my dog barked.

Um, I didn't realize that I was even in that culture until I started to

push back even just like the little bit slightest and then it was, oh, wait.

You're right.

I'm not conforming to the ideology, even by like a degree difference.

Oh shit.

Oh this, oh, now I'm getting othered.

And it was really intense to like, feel that for the first

time, um, that I had done that to other people of, oh no, no, no.

I need you to be ideologically in line and I need you to tow this mine forever.

And if you don't, uh, we can't be in relationship and thinking

about something like, just not just, we can't be in a

relationship, but you are a bad person.

When a capital B capital P you are a bad person, you are toxic.

And every single person who knows you is also a capital B capital P bad person.

Yeah.

And you must be ostracized.

Permanently

and your life must be destroyed.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, I've been doxed.

My staff of Color have been doxed because I am a White person

that works with White people.

And some people don't think that I should be doing that work.

It's rough

what's needed in this moment.

What's needed to meet this moment because I think like, even thinking

about The Spillway, it's like our mission statement is about trying to

focus and recenter, compassion, and love and empathy and patience into

the core of what it means to be White.

Um, and I feel like if we just, if I not, we all don't have to do this if you

don't want to, but I like, I just want to keep like, yeah, this like perpetual.

Okay.

You just fucked me over.

Let's try again.

Okay.

You just fucked me over.

Let's try it again.

And like the welcome, welcome, welcome.

However many times you need it to hear welcome.

I don't know, but it's just it's so I don't know.

I'm rambling at this point.

Yeah.

I mean, I don't know.

I don't know how we help people more embrace nuance because

there really is a spectrum.

You know, like if someone fucks you over, that's very different than if

someone used a word that you didn't like in a tweet six years ago.

Um, if someone is a sexual predator, that's very different than if they had

a mutually destructive relationship when they were 17, you know, like

they're, it's a, it's a spectrum.

You know, somebody posts something that you don't like.

Again, like that's very different, you know?

And so I think there is like being able to understand that people aren't capital,

BP, bad people, you know, maybe they did make a mistake or maybe you were wrong.

Maybe you misinterpreted what they said, and you have an opportunity

to just like ask questions and be curious and try to bridge that

gap between whatever someone did.

And however it hit you, you know, but, but large scale, like,

I don't know how we do that.

I just don't.

I mean, I've done a lot of restorative justice sessions.

I've done a lot of healing sessions.

I do a lot of conflict resolution myself as a practitioner.

Um, and there are some people that you're able to do that with.

And some people you're not there to hurt, you know, they really just want to

annihilate people that they disagree with.

Okay.

You know, but how do we make sure that we're able to understand

who are the people who are in this for the right reasons.

You know, and, and who aren't.

I just don't think we're able to do that yet.

And I think that's another pattern.

And another failing of, of the White queer movement is the

tokenization of queer people of Color.

If one queer person of Color says something, then all the White people

are like, well, that must be true.

Right?

It's like, well, that's not true.

You know, if we, and then if other people of Color jump in and they're

like, I disagree, then everyone's like, well, you're not Black enough,

or you're not clear enough, or you're not trans, you know, it ends up being

this really brutal thing like that.

I mean, I left social media.

These platforms are not designed to eradicate racism.

These platforms are not designed for White people to build a better White culture.

Um, they're just not, and I just can't be, I just can't.

Be a part of that anymore.

It's really, really detrimental to Whiteness and queerness.

I left because I couldn't do it anymore.

So I don't know.

That's a long way of saying Loran.

I'm sorry, I don't have an answer.

Go ahead, Jenny.

No

one.

I'm sorry.

I didn't mean, I was like, um, we've seen that a lot with folks who do

this work, um, like yourself, um, a lot of people that we've talked to,

or, you know, not on social media, like maybe they're on LinkedIn.

Um, but they're not on social media and have Angela.

And actually her, what she said is, you know, because most of Loran's work is

on social media right now because we're just starting this out and there, you

know, building, um, building The Spillway essentially from the ground up, um, But

her advice was to have like a group of people that can respond to trolls, like

your group of what did she call it?

Loran, do you remember like the troll patrol?

Yeah, the troll patrol.

Um, and so you've built that right.

Love.

I mean, there's obviously me, but

I, well, I think that was the other part.

I reached out to 10 people who I went to school with, or people who had expressed

interest in The Spillway 10 people and a majority of them are all MSWs.

So they like went to school for social work.

I heard back from two people and other eight people just like

didn't even respond to the email.

Uh, and so, yeah, there's, I've got a, uh, too strong troll patrol on a love them and

make them homemade pasta as a thank you.

I mean, I've, I've had people call that tone police.

You know that if someone were to call me like, and, and people from the

left who've called me really horrific, hateful, transphobic, homophobic

words, you know, removing those things.

Then it was like, well, you're not, you don't welcome dissent.

Um, your tone policing, you know, how dare you tell people

how they should engage with you.

Um, and that's when I said, oh, oh, there's no way to win here.

Okay.

Like people really genuinely, aren't interested in creating a better culture.

Okay.

That's fine.

We just have different goals then.

So I need to utilize other tools, um, because this is, you know, I can only

work with people who also want the same thing that I do, you know, and there

are enough of them that I don't need to engage with people who are solely

interested in making others feel bad.

I don't need to do that work.

Someone else can do that work.

I also can physically write, I physically cannot do work with people who are only

interested in destroying people's lives.

Yeah.

Why do you think the Venn diagram is so strong between cancel

culture and the queer movement?

Why is the overlap so strong?

Do you think?

Oh, I've thought about this a lot.

And it's because it's because of power.

Um, for so many years, perhaps all of our modern existence, the only

social political power that queer people have had is the power to shame.

That's it?

We weren't elected officials.

We weren't teachers.

In many cases, we weren't parents.

We weren't bosses.

We didn't have the ability to hire and fire people.

We didn't have the ability to shut down businesses or to regulate.

Our only power was to make people feel like crap in the hopes that

they would feel bad enough that they would stop doing harmful

things against the queer community.

It was our only tool.

And so we got really used to using it.

And I don't think that the queer movement has sufficiently

evolved for people to understand.

Like, if you, if whatever, where they say, like, if all you have is a

hammer, everything looks like a nail.

People are acting like, all they have is hammers.

You don't.

Just the Emmy bro.

You know what I mean?

Like just email me, just call me.

I am not a nail.

You don't have to hammer me.

Yeah.

And when you're being hammered, your only response is to protect yourself.

That is it.

That's all you can do.

You know?

Um, and so I just don't think that we understand as queer folks that

we have so many other tools we can use to be in community with each

other, you know, everyone's really responding or reacting from that

disempowered place when we're not that disempowered in a lot of ways anymore.

Um, yeah.

That's why I think

just need to sit in that for a minute.

That was big.

Right.

And yeah, it just feels like a lot

and it's also hard.

It's hard to come to someone and say, Hey, I didn't like what you posted.

Can we have a conversation about it?

That's hard.

It's easy.

It's easy to screenshot something, put it in your Instagram stories and tell

everyone what a bad person this person is.

It's easy to destroy.

Someone's life.

It's easy to call someone garbage and trash.

That's easy.

It's much harder to come to someone like a human and say, Hey, can you tell me more?

So you're also going to get more likes that way.

If you trash somebody that hits that it's that dopamine or whatever that,

you know, each time you're like, oh yeah, I'm onto something, you know?

Yeah.

Looking at the time.

I can't believe it's already time.

Uh, but it's about time for like our last two questions.

Sure.

Um, Jenny, on the list, is there anything that you really want to get

out into the open before we do the.

The typical last question.

Oh, let me do it just a very quick story.

Sure.

Um, to hammer home this point, which is that there was, I was

walking down the street in Portland and I saw a tote bag in the window

that said, um, uh, say his name.

And I screamed.

I like took a picture of it.

Um, it was against police violence.

I took a picture of it and I got ready to post it to my Instagram stories

for this before I left social media.

And then I was like, no, I'm not going to do that.

I didn't do it.

I put my phone away.

I walked in the store and they said, are you the owner?

And she said, yes.

And I said, I want to talk to you about your tote bag.

The woman who created that hashtag that campaign say her name specifically

created it to raise awareness and stop the brutal murders of Black women.

And she has specifically asked people to not change it, to say

their name or say his name because it's specifically for those people.

And so.

I don't think it's appropriate for you to have that tote bag in the store.

And she was like, oh my gosh, I had no idea.

I'll take it down now I'll send it back to the company and I won't sell it again.

And so that's just an example of like, there is a different way.

There is a different way.

Yeah.

Cause she could've responded any way.

You have no control over how she was going to respond.

And so to walk into that space and be like,

it's hard.

Yeah.

It's hard but much more effective.

How long would it have taken it, taken for her to see that hashtag and then

everybody pile on and then she's got like 84 DMS about how terrible she is.

Right.

Would she have removed the total.

Maybe not what she have doubled up.

I don't know, but just like another way as possible as I'm saying,

okay, go with your questions.

Go ahead.

Right.

That was wonderful.

The like, um, how you had to approach that conversation too, because

you couldn't run in there and just start screaming and pointing your

finger saying like, how fucking dare you, you need to take this down.

It was like, you came in with curiosity, you came in with compassion, you

came in with a desire for relation.

And this work is so relational.

And if we forget that, which we are constantly, then we're not

able to actually like be in good community with ourselves and

with others that's fucking sucks.

Well, and also you went in there with that, you know, the

example of articulate you went in there being like, maybe she

doesn't know, maybe she has no idea.

So here's that information.

And then once she had that information, she was like, oh yeah.

Okay.

Instead that's the strategy.

Like there are different tactics.

Canceling is a tactic, right.

But it's not the first one.

It's when all the other things haven't worked, then we go to a boycott, you know?

Um, and I think people just don't always know that.

And as White people, like we have to be able to do that work because folks

of Color, they shouldn't have to make sure that their bodies are settled

and that they're going to approach it with curiosity and compassion.

Right.

If we don't want to tone police, people of Color, we have to tone police ourselves.

We are able to be effective.

I'm not personally impacted by, you know, hashtag say his name.

I'm not Black.

I have no right to get to that place of being so activated

that I'm yelling at someone.

I don't have any right to do that.

I got to settle and then bring that settled, you know, energy to that

conversation so that she has the opportunity to learn and grow, which

doesn't happen if you come in guns, a place, metaphorically speaking.

Okay.

Was she White?

Oh, of course.

Okay.

Yeah,

you have this very literal microphone in your ear right now.

And this is a podcast for White people, um, who are seeking to do this work.

Uh, what do you wanna tell them?

What do you want every White person listening to this to know?

It's a massive question.

Yeah.

I mean, I mean, I don't think about every White person

because this work is developmental, you know, everyone's in different stages.

Um, I think for people who are newer.

Th the work I really encourage, especially people who listen

to podcasts for White people.

Um, I really encourage White folks to develop a sense of pride around your

White identity to think about not just the things that you're embarrassed about or

ashamed of, but what are the things like who are the White people who are doing

the work that you admire and look up to?

Um, what are the parts of your culture that you are really proud of?

Because really it's only when we're able to feel settled confidence

secure in who we are, that we're able to engage with other people and not

tokenize the low color, um, and not, you know, shame ourselves and others.

Um, and then for people who've been doing this work for a little bit longer, the

advice I usually give is to understand that, like you don't have to do all

the things, you know, racism, White supremacy, White dominance is in every

aspect of our culture, which is bad news, but the good news is wherever you feel

called to do this work, you're needed.

So, if you're an artist, you don't have to go marching the streets.

If you're marching the streets, you don't have to be hosting

in a way to affinity spaces.

If you're, you don't have to do all the things.

If you have social anxiety, don't go to a March and don't feel bad.

And if someone else says, well, you're not marching the street,

you're not doing the work.

Fuck them.

You know, there's so many different ways to do this work.

We need everyone and we need everyone in there, you know, genius, Eno.

So I think that's what I see as White folks really beat themselves

up because they're not able to do all the things and I'm like, stop.

Just like, let that go.

Um, because you can't do all the things

it did feel, I I'm like still struggling to unpack that shame.

It's like this intergenerational trauma of queerness and transness of the only

way that we are able to get anything done was to save the people in power and

shame them people in positions of power.

Oh,

also it's like, well then does shame work better than love?

You know, we asked Fred that question.

I think we also asked Amy and Angela in that question, if memory serves,

um,

and the, the questions were varying degrees of different things,

except for Fred who was just like love.

Absolutely.

Right.

Um, but it's like if, if queer and trans folks hadn't done that to start,

would there have been any changes?

Right.

Like if they had, if they had doubled down on love, like, would

anything have happened because they weren't getting love.

So like

what's,

I feel like, yeah, that one's, that one's so tricky.

And then it's like, if we're not receiving love, it's really hard

to turn around and then give love.

Sorry.

I need to silence my phone.

I think a lot about like, act up, act up with so successful for, for many reasons.

But one of them was these like deployed shame tactics to do public

demonstrations about shaming, the mainstream, like SIS hat society, and

saying you're not doing anything for us.

You're literally watching us dying or you're not even watching us down.

You're just ignoring your problem altogether.

And that had like tremendous, uh, tremendous, like the tremendous

things for the movement.

Um, but those are like hard concrete, actionable things of, I need you to do

more research on, uh, on HIV rather than, Hey, you've got some unconscious bias

here or there's some racism happening.

Yeah.

I feel like that's what we were shaming.

I'm saying we, as if I was there, um, shame was used as this

tactic to get a tangible thing.

And like the tangible thing, when we're talking about race and racism

and sometimes not, it's a social thing to, it's a relational thing.

And so it feels really different to the place.

Shame for relation

is it though?

I feel like, like queer and trans folks were dying of aids.

Right.

And like, I mean, other people were too, but we're talking specifically about

queer and trans folks are dying of aids.

Um, and they were like, you need to help us.

Now we have, uh, people of Color dialing from police violence, you know, from

healthcare disparities, from all that.

Right.

So it seems, it feels like, I mean, it feels different for sure.

And I think my theory is part of that is social media, but I think

it's SIM a similar level of risk,

similar level of risk.

What do you

mean for the, for the people of Color?

Um, as like queer or gay and trans folks in the late

eighties and early nineties,

right?

Like different circumstances for sure.

Different histories, but lives are on the line still.

Right?

Right.

That's the similarity.

I think it's also easy.

For the general population to forget about physical people

because of the COVID experience and social media mixed together.

And that's how we were able to stay connected to each other.

But then it was easy to forget that those people, those little circles

of the face on it are actual humans.

Right?

So that I think has made a level of separation that allows for more, you know,

cancellation and things of that nature.

Well, but it also reminds me of Sam and the focus group from previous

episodes from that period of sort of focus group that Sam was saying, and

then social media happened like eight years ago and then everything changed.

And that to me is actually people with marginalized and decentered experiences.

We're actually just given a platform to share their experience that's shale.

And so it wasn't that social media change that it was that, oh, you're actually

hearing people's experiences and ideas that are different from your own that

have often been invisibilized because the media, because society, because education,

because religion, because medicine exclude these voices from textbooks, from the

news, from, uh, just like entertainment.

And so now here they are.

And so it's not the psych, oh, this was a whole brand new idea.

But rather that idea has always been there.

And you're just now hearing it for the first time.

Cause you're being introduced and exposed to an integrated

and, uh, being in community.

An idea that you maybe have never had the chance to yet.

Right.

And then you have Tristin, who's utilizing those very platforms to have his voice

heard and to engage in this conversation.

And then he can't.

Right.

And then it has to leave because it's too painful.

Not, you know, it's just too well, I think he said that he, he knew it

wasn't the right place to like, make a difference and to him and that

for him, it was damaging personally,

right?

Yeah.

They physically, physically can't do this work anymore on social media.

That's super sad.

And it, he said it wasn't, I mean, he, I don't know if he said this

explicitly, but he said it was due to the.

Actions of his own community.

Right.

Which is cuckoo bananas.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I still can't get, I still can't wrap my head around that.

Like I understand it.

I see it.

I witness it and like, I, I guess I just like don't understand the, how and why

as queer and trans folks, we have put up so much shit from the outside world that

then we like turn and do it to each other.

And I think in some like categorical way, it makes sense in that like, oh,

Hey, you are a family or I trust, or I see you that you can still hold me in.

So I'm going to like unleash my anger because they know

we're still going to be okay.

Uh, kind of like how you're always like meet to your partner sometimes

when you're like hangry, you know, everything's going to be fine where

you're just like, oh, I need desperate.

And I'm going to be really angry about that.

Um, but that is just not what's happening.

Within cancel culture and specifically White queer and trans cancel culture.

It almost made me wonder though, too.

It's like, if cancel culture is this like dog whistle for queer and trans

people for people on the right.

If it is, if it's like, okay, so like a dog whistle, it's like something that

only other people who know what you're talking about can hear it or see it.

So like, uh, if people are saying, oh, no, cancel, cancel culture to actually

saying cancel queer and trans people.

Because when I look at, um, like Prager U or Ben Shapiro, or I think it's the

daily wire daily caller, and there's like a daily, it's very confusing.

They're the ones that are like trying to start their own, like

kid's show, um, to fight woke media.

Um, They are always bringing up, uh, trans folks as tech talks or

Instagrams, and like putting them up on the screen and then making fun of

them all the time, all of the time.

And they get like hundreds of thousands of views and likes and comments on these

pieces about how awful and stupid trans people are when it's really just like

a really cute human who just got a new haircut and is like doing a pet check.

And they're like, oh, mis-gender mis-gender mis-gender oh,

mis-gender mis-gender, it's awful.

Um, but then they're like, oh, this is just like some stupid pronoun

in the bio liberal with blue hair.

We need to, we need to cancel the cancel culture.

Huh?

It doesn't make me think of maybe cancel the cancel culture is.

Well, no, it's cancel culture as a problem.

Cancel culture is a problem.

And it's also a problem, the way that people are receiving

counsel culture, sometimes.

So as something that is like markedly, uh, largely queer and trans driven, I

was going to say that cause to cancel, cancel culture where like these dog

whistles or homophobia or transphobia.

And I just, I feel like power is different.

I mean like trans people in GBT rates are used as a wedge issue politically.

And that just means that one party believe that Jean BT people should

be seen as human and the other side feels differently or like we should

just treat humans differently.

And I mean, regardless one side, which is already in places of political

power, believes GLBT people are people.

And that's a huge step from where we were just like 10 years ago, 15 years ago.

And.

I dunno, I guess it just depends on how you look at, uh, like if we, as Jean

meaty, people are just these powerless minority victims, or if there's this

coalition of power pushing GLBT rights and justice into the mix of policy and law.

And I think the truth is that it's both, it's both, and it's not this either or

thinking it's a GLBT population, not a community and laws and policy are nothing

but a specific cultural value statement.

And right now it's both some pockets of the U S LGBT people who

are vulnerable to discriminatory values and policy and other pockets.

Gene BT people are claiming positions of social power in

government and rewriting policy.

Uh, so I guess unless one site decides to budge or we can both

budge together cause we're, co-creating our future cancel culture.

It's just going to be here for awhile.

Well, it's also just like that doesn't make any sense.

Cancel, cancel culture.

Like, are we just gonna keep canceling, canceling culture and

canceling more culture and canceling, like it isn't making any sense.

That's where I got

cancel, cancel culture from Caitlin Jenner.

I know, I forgot about her.

I forgot that she's still like

doing stuff.

She was running for governor.

Oh, stop.

Really

in California that make that make sense.

And she was like standing out by this like factory or this like I, in my head,

I see this like large dirt pile and she's like, we need to cancel, cancel culture.

And that this whole speech about that.

Oops.

She probably didn't know what she was talking about.

Also.

I said, I just said like, oh my God, that man.

Her running for governor and I'm in California, but

she's Republican, isn't she?

Yeah, no.

Then that doesn't make sense.

I think that that's where I think Caitlyn Jenner is maybe like this

really beautiful example of someone who I don't agree with and then talking

about cancel culture and how unfortunate an awful cancel culture has become.

And then I like try to hold the complexities and multitudes of

someone like Caitlyn Jenner.

And I am not going to like try to docs or like go on her page and troll her

stocks mean Tristin used that too.

I have no idea what that means.

We can very intentionally try to get some of that.

Okay.

Gotcha.

Let me just confirm.

Cause it's D O X, X cat

hair keeps tickling my lip on my microphone.

Yeah.

It's oh God.

Yeah.

Nevermind.

That was wrong.

Doxxing.

Um, uh, is by publicly exposing someone's real name or address on the internet.

Oh, right.

Yeah.

I've heard about that.

That's happened to a fair amount of people.

Um, and I also don't, uh, actively want to engage Caitlyn

Jenner, but I'm not going to

like, yeah.

Yeah.

You're not out to shut her down.

You're just like, I don't agree with

you.

Yeah.

It goes back to, we all, don't have to be friends and family

and best friends together.

And if you say something that hurts, we'll talk about it.

Um, but also.

I'm not going to force you into that conversation either, right?

Yeah.

Well, and having those conversations takes longer, then social media

lets us or life lets us, you know, we're all on our phones.

Like boop, boop, boop.

As on my phone, scrolling through stuff and you know that I've had

some mental health issues lately.

And like I said to my partner, I was like, oh, I'm so sad.

And he was like, it's probably your fault.

And it was just like, and, and then I started, I was like, no, it's fine.

And then I was like watching a monkey in a lab, be tested on and

it just like crying and he was like, you need to, you need to stop.

And I was like, I didn't even realize I was looking at it again.

Like I thought like I didn't even, yeah.

It's not crazy.

Yeah.

That's great.

It's like makes me want to get off social media.

That's not good for our brains.

And I'm not saying, like, I think a lot of beautiful and necessary things

have come up social media, not saying we should shut it all down, but I think

it, I don't know where it's going to.

It's just, it feels like it's spiraling out of control, but that

also feels like how the rest of the world, it feels a little bit,

so yeah.

Yeah.

We just need to be responsible to each other.

should we do like a little thing where I'm like, Hey

friends, thanks for listening.

Just a little reminder rate, review, subscribe, share with your friends.

It helps us out there.