Privilege can lead to double-perception; two people look at the same thing and see something entirely different. I used to think of a particular street as a fine place to walk, and was taken aback when a friend of mine told me she’d never walk there alone, because of all the street harassment she’s experienced there. What she sees on that street is invisible to me, because of my privilege.
There was an impressive example of this double-perception on CNN this week. Piers Morgan, a CNN host, interviewed trans activist and author Janet Mock.1 Morgan, who has a record of pro-lesbian and gay advocacy, thought the interview went great. Mock did not; she thought Morgan’s focus on her surgery, his gendering her as male up until the surgery, and his repeated interest in how her boyfriend reacted when she came out to him, was sensationalistic and objectifying.
(Of course, those are all common mistakes made by cis people who don’t know very much about trans issues. But as Amanda Hess points out, it’s not unfair to expect that a professional journalist – particularly a highly-paid journalist with a staff – will have done some research to prepare for interviewing a trans activist, rather than just repeating common mistakes of cis people who haven’t done any research.)
The producers of Morgan’s show made things worse when the interview was broadcast; their caption identified Mock as “Janet Mock: Was a boy until age 18,” and they advertised the show with a tweet saying “How would you feel if you found out the woman you are dating was formerly a man?”2
Amanda Hess perceptively describes how Morgan got things wrong from literally his first words to Mock:
“This is the amazing thing about you,” said Morgan. “Had I not known your life story, I would have absolutely no clue that you ever would have been born a boy. A male. Which makes me absolutely believe you should always have been a woman. And that must have been what you felt, when you were young. Take me back to when you first thought, ‘This isn’t right. I’m not Charles’—which is the name you were first given when you were born in Hawaii. ‘I’m a woman. I’m a girl.’”
Notably, this is not a question. This is Piers Morgan assessing Mock’s legitimacy as a woman, based exclusively on her physical appearance, then assuming that Mock’s own experience of her gender identity conforms to his own, and finally, putting words into her mouth. The opening statement set the stage for a ten-minute interview fueled by Morgan’s own superficial understanding of what it’s like to be trans, as opposed to a legitimate attempt to understand Mock’s experience, which is his job.
But this isn’t something that would be immediately visible to most cis3 people (myself included). What most cis people would see is that Piers Morgan clearly liked Mock, treated her respectfully,4 called her beautiful and her life story inspiring. Our privilege may make it difficult to understand what the criticism of Morgan is about.
Piers Morgan’s twitter account received many critical responses (including some critical tweets from Mock herself – and some extremely rude tweets from folks other than Mock), and Morgan – clearly furious at the criticism, when he thinks of himself as such a great ally! – responded with tweet after tweet angrily declaring how unfair the criticism was and how pure his soul is (“For the record, I’m not anything-phobic.”)
Morgan invited Mock for a follow-up interview, during which Mock tried to explain why she thought Morgan’s questions were harmful (“Being offensive and being kind are not mutually exclusive things. I think that we can be completely have great intentions and be good people but also be ignorant and have a lack of understanding about these issues”), and Morgan – while remaining marginally polite5 – seemed mainly interested in expressing his own anger at what he clearly felt was unfair criticism.
What’s exhilarating to me is that, ten years ago, Morgan would have been able to monopolize the conversation. He would have done the interview; any criticism of the interview would be ignored by him and his producers, in the unlikely case that they ever heard any of it; and that would have been that. But now Morgan finds himself sharing the conversation. He can’t control or shut off the response to his show on Twitter. As Mock herself said:
That’s the special thing about social media now is that we can talk back. Piers doesn’t have the final say… Our media is just as valid.
I don’t think that the response on Twitter was perfect. If the goal was to make Piers Morgan understand his mistakes, then the whole exercise must be called a failure. But I don’t think that was the goal – Piers Morgan is only one man, after all, and the movement will continue even if Morgan remains befuddled. What’s more important is how this has shown that Janet Mock’s community – a community consisting to a great extent of trans women of color, surely one of the most marginalized groups there is – is able to talk back to power and insist on controlling their own narrative.
After his second interview with Mock, Morgan concluded with a three-guest panel – none of the panel members were trans, of course – mostly dedicated to attacking Mock (and defending Saint Piers). But one panel member, Marc Lamont Hill, really got it. (Thanks to Grace for pointing out Hill’s contribution.)
MARC LAMONT HILL: I totally get your frustration Piers, but I think this is one of the challenges of being an ally and I think you can be frustrated for communities when allies of that community when they’re questioned or challenged or critique say, “Hey, wait a minute don’t critique me. I’m your best friend. I’m an ally.” It’s like when why people pointed a number of black friends they have or men talk about the binders full of women that they’ve hired.
You know, it’s really important for us to take critique and think about it. Now, I agree with you. I actually wish Janet in the interview had questioned you and challenged you on your use of language around boy and manhood. I think you’re wrong to do it. I think she should have challenged you on it. But I do understand her point of being scared. This is a national interview on a major show, on a major network. I could see how she was intimidated and upon watching it later had a different response.
But for me Piers, the bigger issue isn’t the use of language. It’s the fact that so much of the interviews centered around the sensational aspects about genitalia that so much more about trans life, trans experience that I wanted you to cover… if you talk about surgery and when you talk about saying a boy until 18, it implies that she — her womanhood is… That was a very dangerous point. Trans identity does not change upon surgery. You can have a penis and still be a woman, a trans-woman. [Said to another panelist:] You’re confusing sex and gender. You should really read a book on this.
* * *
Some more links worth reading. Again, thanks to Grace for many of these links:
A video of The first Morgan-Mock interview. A transcript of the interview can be found here.
A video of the second Morgan-Mock interview. And a video of Marc Lamont Hill’s remarks during the discussion panel. Transcripts of both the interview and the post-interview panel can be found here.
Just to show it can be done much better, a video of Melissa Harris Perry interviewing Janet Mock.
The Deadly Logic Behind Piers Morgan’s Awful Interview With Janet Mock – COLORLINES
Did Piers Morgan ‘Sensationalize’ Transgender Activist Janet Mock’s Story? | Mediaite
How Piers Morgan Screwed Up His Interview With Transgender Advocate Janet Mock | ThinkProgress
Piers Morgan grills trans activist Janet Mock with invasive, sensationalist questions – Salon.com
Under fire from transgender advocates, Piers Morgan has an ‘incredibly annoying day’ | Twitchy
Piers Morgan’s Failed Interview With Transgender Advocate Janet Mock: 3 Lessons Learned — Fusion.
Piers Morgan and the psychology of the privileged
Piers Morgan’s Meltdown: Five Ways To Be A Bad LGBT Ally
Janet Mock Schools Piers Morgan On How To Tell Transgender Stories | ThinkProgress
Nicely-done animated gif set of Janet Mock from the second interview.
- It’s relevant to mention that Morgan is a white cis man, while Mock is a trans woman of color. [↩]
- Unfortunately, this sort of thing is par for the course for mainstream news coverage of transgender people. Here’s another example.. [↩]
- “Cis” is short for “cissexual.” From Wikipedia: Sociologists Kristen Schilt and Laurel Westbrook define cisgender as a label for “individuals who have a match between the gender they were assigned at birth, their bodies, and their personal identity.” [↩]
- On the surface, at least [↩]
- On mainstream cable TV news, “marginally polite” practically makes you Miss Manners. [↩]
This is why I don’t identify as a feminist ally, or a male feminist, or an anything ally. Too many people seem to be primarily interested in those identities as a shield. And I’ve lost count of the number of times someone has said “Hey, [X offensive thing] is OK with me, and I’m just about the biggest lefty around, so just don’t worry about it!”.
I respect attempts to object to offensive phrases and words. But use of language like “Is that kitten a boy or a girl?” is such an integral, common and useful part of English, that I’m not sure trying to recast words like boy or man as referring to subjective identity and offensive if mis-used is very helpful. It makes people who do it seem like cranks and marginalise themselves.
Refer to trans men and boys as men and boys. Refer to trans women and girls as women and girls. I don’t see what’s so complex about that, nor do I really see it as a “recasting.”
I also think you’re missing the point if you think it’s just about “phrases and words.”
Finally, I don’t really think it’s helpful to worry too much about not seeming like cranks. Half the worthwhile ideas in the world were once thought of as cranky ideas.
I heard an interview from some time in the 90’s with Philip Seymour Hoffman describing his research playing a trans character. He spent time with 3 trans women, I think one post-surgical, and referred to them all as “he.” It was so jarring, even listening to it casually. So there has been some progress.
It is true in so many areas that you can think you’re being supportive and empathetic and still say something hurtful.
Mom, you should leave comments here swearing and insulting other comment-writers and in other ways breaking all the comment rules. Because there’s no way I’d dare to moderate YOU!
Time is really changing things. As I understand it, it’s quite possible that in the 90s, one or all of the trans women PSH interviewed either used “he’ to refer to themselves in the past tense, or simply didn’t feel secure enough about the issue to object to “he” even if they were uncomfortable with it. But yeah, it does make things age badly.
I try to think of things aging badly as a sign of progress. When “Ace Ventura, Pet Detective” is no longer broadcast on TV because the transphobia is simply too cringe-inducing for general audiences to stomach, then we’ll know progress has been made.
I haven’t seem the interview, so what I’m saying here comes with not just a single grain of salt, but a couple. What I read in those two quotes are two things that I think define much of the discourse around such issues: conflicts that arise because of a specific group’s perspective that their definition of their issues is he only way to look at it and that other perspectives (like Morgan’s question about the genitals) aren’t valid but offensive and should not be imposed on them.
I’m not sure that is always the case, because that’s not how social debates around such complicated issues work. Empathy cannot be demanded, it has to be extended. And yes, certainly that is a matter of privilege. But the general idea behind such a conversation should be to build bridges, to help people see that their perspetive is not the only one, to help them develop empathy.
Effectively stating that that’s not necessary, because social media can keep the majority discourse in check by creating agenda setting snipes, is also saying that the lack of privilege aspect isn’t as pronounced as it was before. That, on the other hand, seems to imply to me, that extending empathy towards those who don’t understand but try, to help them see your point, is no longer only a matter of practicality, as it would be in a situation more defined by asymmetric privilege, but progressively also an obligation towards the general social discourse.
I would think that “Don’t ask questions about a person’s genitals, unless you are that person’s doctor or intimate partner or otherwise have some reason for needing the information” is just common courtesy.
@Someone: The thing is, Morgan is not one of “those who don’t understand but try”. He’s not trying – in fact, he is doing the opposite of trying, he is actively resisting people’s attempts to educate him.
Ruchama,
well, I somehow get the impression that a lot of people who are conversant with respect to such matters seem to forget that most people really aren’t. So I’m not sure it’s common courtesy to avoid asking the questions most people will be interested in, given that the person interviews appears to be an activist trying to talk about these things with a more general public while, apparently, promoting a book aimed at said public. To me, it seems, not asking these questions would be bad journalism. Someone suggested on Slate that his lack of empathy was bad journalism because he failed to understand the person interviewed. It certainly sounds like that to a degree. But at the same time, ignoring the genital aspect, something the audience will have been likely most interested in, would also not seem like particularly good journalism.
Abbe Faria @2: Is anyone actually asking we stop referring to the female family dog as “girl” or the male cat as “boy”? I don’t think anyone’s even asking we stop referring to newborn humans as girls and boys based on genital appearance. The point is that some humans are trans, and once they’ve made that clear–and in Mock’s case, her female identity is incredibly clear–it’s rude to go on referring to them with the wrong words. If Mock’s caption had read, e.g., “Transgender Activist,” the same info would have come across, without using language she has specifically said does not fit her.
When someone comes out as gay or lesbian, we don’t describe them as “Was a heterosexual until age 18.”
SomeOne @9: There is nothing wrong with folks being curious about transgender people’s bodies and genitals in general. But no one is entitled to information about a specific individual’s body, unless they’re the person’s partner, doctor, etc. They’re called private parts for a reason. Most trans people don’t mind general question about the transition process, the various choices trans people make, and so on. However, questions about our own bodies are invasive, and would never be put to a cis person. And for the record, anything anyone might want to know about trans folks’ bodies and surgery options is easily googled.
To use an analogy, it’s normal for people to be curious about penis size–what’s the average, how much variation is there, etc. It’s fine to ask questions about this. But asking an individual man the exact size of his penis is rude.
Rimonim,
ok, it’s a fair point that probably such questions should have been (and probably could have been) of a general nature. On the other hand, considering your cis penis size example – if a person writing a book about penis sizes used his personal story as an example for his general points about how penis sizes affect men in general, I’m not entirely sure that the question would not be asked specifically in that case, and I also don’t think think it would be an unfair question.
I mean, #redefiningrealness? It seems to me like a logical question just as her answer seems logical. In fact, it seems like a perfect setup to get the point across that she apparently wants to make with the book. He created a teachable moment, whether intentionally or by accident. So, back to the privilege point, I suppose. But really? I mean, she’s an author going on a show using her story to promote a book about her story in a broader context. If she wasn’t expecting a question like that, if she hadn’t thought about how to deal with that question, then her publisher assigned the wrong PR person.
So, sorry, I’m sceptical, but it seems a bit like an attempt to use a social media shitstorm to create additional attention for marketing purposes. Which apparently worked. Possibly even for him.
This is deeper than rudeness. Trans activists want sex to be a matter of identity, but Morgan – for example – partly conceptualises it as physical (which I illustrated with the kitten quote). I’m sure they’re sincerely offended, but the root of the dogpile on Piers Morgan is about regulating concepts of sex by shifting language rather than just being upset over impoliteness to Mock.
I think Ampersand’s point about ‘cranks’, and how these ideas have gone from not being universal within the trans community to forcing a right of reply on cnn within 2-3 decades is worth thinking about.
Abbe, you keep on talking as if this were a matter of mere semantics (“shifting language”), when it’s about more. There’s something fundamentally ludicrous and unfair about referring to someone who identified as, and lived as, a girl and young woman for YEARS before getting surgery at age 18, as having been a “boy” until 18. It’s a way of conceiving gender that’s radically at odds with how all the trans people I know describe their own stories.
And that what makes the way Piers approached the first interview – when he was positive he knew all about her story, and asked leading questions which assumed the answers he thought he already knew – so problematic.
No right of reply was “forced” or even asked for, that I know of; doing a follow-up interview seems to have been Morgan’s idea.
Also, keep in mind that 20 and 30 years ago, trans people had to conform their lives (or at least, how they talked about their own lives) to a narrative written mostly by cis doctors, or else they could not get medical recognition and could not get treatment. It’s inevitable that, as people are less forced to conform their own narratives to doctor’s preconceptions in order to get help, the way they talk about themselves and their lives has altered in some ways.
Change is inevitable, and in this case change is good. Even if it makes cis people uncomfortable, it’s good that as trans people move closer to the mainstream, they have taken the lead in the cultural conversation about transgender lives.
Finally, a minor point: I think the term “dogpile” is silly, given that Piers Morgan is far more powerful and wealthy than any of his critics, and that there are many people who have taken his side in this debate. (I know, now I’m arguing a semantic point.) Nor is it a dogpile in the sense that he’s being a gentleman while some of the critics on Twitter are rude – he’s very rude on Twitter, too.
That’s a terrible analogy. Mock’s book is not about surgery, nor is it about genitalia. Yes, her book is to a significant degree about being a trans woman of color, but being trans is not primarily about genitalia or about surgery.
I think this accusations of bad faith is, in this case, both groundless and overly cynical.
As far as I can tell, your logic is something like this: “The questions seemed reasonable to me. But Mock says they are unreasonable. Therefore she is acting in bad faith to publicize her book.” I think that’s not fair, as well as needlessly insulting to Mock. It would make more sense to conclude, not that Mock is purposely being unreasonable, but that Mock doesn’t agree with you about what is reasonable.
I understand that. Yet to others it (apparently) does have something to do with it (and yes, it has *something* to do with it). You said above you have no problem calling trans-men men. Yet you do differentiate between cis men and trans men, *because there is a difference* that needs to be denoted at least when the issue at hand is that very difference, if only to explain why one part of the group has privilege the other has not, because of that difference. She has every right to define her own experience and ask others to accept it, but it strikes me as unfair to expect that a priori from a general audience and someone asking for that audience.
“Abbe Faria @2: Is anyone actually asking we stop referring to the female family dog as “girl” or the male cat as “boy”? I”
There is a Tumblr link I would really like to show you right now, but sadly I’ve lost it. Suffice to say, yes, someone is actually asking that.
If someone presents as a trans girl, then you should call her a girl. That isn’t recasting.
If someone presents as a boy, and then comes out LATER as a trans woman, and asks that folks reconsider prior experiences/summaries/analysis to take account of the fact that she was actually a trans girl, then it is recasting. It may not involve any recasting for the woman in question–she is just the same person that she always was–but it involves recasting for everyone else, since they have to adjust.
I don’t see what is so complex about that, either, though you seem to think it is.
Similarly:
It depends what they did first, right?
I know quite a few people who had happy, active, hetero sex lives and romances–often for many partners across many years–until they realized that they were gay, and many of them refer to themselves as being bisexual then, not gay. Which makes sense.
When somebody changes their name, do you continue to refer to them by their old name? Do you refer to them in the present by their new name and refer to them in the past by their old name? Not if you have any respect for them.
I don’t see what’s so hard about this other than refusing to grant the most basic respect to people even if you find them to be weird or they make you uncomfortable. Well, I guess I do see it and it is sad making.
Amp:
From what I have read of what he’s had to say about First and Second Amendment rights it would appear that he doesn’t do proper research when talking about those things, so this should be no surprise.
Shows you how low the bar is these days to be considered a professional journalist. Not much of a profession, apparently.
So, it has been difficult to suss out how to write productively on this topic. I don’t have much time to write, just now — gotta make a living and honor other obligations. And when I do start to engage with it, I spend a lot of time processing the despair, and the rage, and the stabby pain behind the eyes.
I completely understand why other trans people have vented, on this one. And I support them.
That said, I’m going to try not to vent. It’s not my job to educate anyone on these issues, but making effort is part of what pushes this boulder forward, and it also helps me to better understand these issues, and to articulate my understanding. I’m working on a larger post about this, but I want to reply directly to some of the things people have written here.
So, here goes.
Ampersand:
Sweet heavens, yes. Yes. Yes.
Also when people watch That Scene in The Crying Game and say, “Dayum. Dude’s got issues. Throwing up? Seriously? What is his problem?”
Also, also, also… too many to mention, and if I start down that road I will get depressed and angry and not be able to finish this post.
SomeOne:
With all due respect, those interviews are what the post you’re commenting on is about, and they’re not long, so I’m not inclined to spend more effort than this sentence engaging with you until you trouble yourself enough to watch them.
rimonim:
Yes. As Melissa Harris-Perry managed to do – the on-screen caption for her segment interviewing Mock about her book was “Foot Soldiers”. Harris-Perry introduces her as an activist. Harris-Perry’s first question: “Why a memoir, as part of your activism?”
Morgan’s first question, by contrast: “Tell me about when you first thought, ‘This is not right. I’m not [redacted]’, which was the name you were given when you were born in Hawaii. ‘I’m a woman. I’m a girl.'”
Translations:
Harris-Perry: Tell me how this memoir fits into your strategic thinking.
Morgan: Tell me about the first time you thought you weren’t a boy.
Mock has made it clear that she wrote the book to forward her activism, to offer another narrative, to put her experience out there for girls growing up now who don’t see themselves in the standard narratives the media has so far broadcast. Yes, she told the story of her transition, but that was not the end, that was the means to the end.
Abbe Faria:
“Trans activists”, eh? As I once commented elsewhere,
All trans people want our identities to be respected as a matter of course. Characterizing us all as “activists” makes our opinions sound agenda-driven in some nefarious way, beyond our simple desire to be treated as the people we are.
As for “dogpile” and “shifting language”… thanks, Amp, for being an awesome ally.
gin-and-whiskey:
Sure.
Suppose you have a piece of onyx. It’s a beautiful stone, polished and shaped. One day you are showing it to a mineralogist friend, who informs you that it is actually obsidian, another black stone which can be shaped and polished. With your permission, she taps it with a small hammer to split it and you see that, indeed, the interior has the undulating glassine surface of obsidian, and not the crystalline structure of onyx. Its actual nature, visible when you can see the inside, is not what it seems, from the outside.
Your understanding of the stone has changed, and you now know it’s obsidian. When you tell the tale of how you found it, you say, “This is actually obsidian, but when I found this I thought it was onyx.” or even, “It looked like onyx to me.”
You don’t say, “Back when this was onyx…” or “Back before this was obsidian…”
Because you understand that the thing’s nature has not changed. Only its visible appearance has changed, and consequently your understanding.
However, with trans people, other people routinely assert that their prior understanding is factually true. “When you were a boy”, “When you were a man”; these phrases make an implicit assertion of reality.
Better by far to say, “When you seemed to be a boy” or “When we all thought you were a boy” or “When you presented as a boy” or even just “before you transitioned”. All of these convey the meaning without denying the legitimacy of the trans woman’s expressed experience.
So, yes. It is a re-casting for the spectators and not a re-casting for the trans person. What the spectators don’t have to do is assert the primacy of their own perceptions over that of the person whose actual experience it is. That’s invalidating, and that’s why trans people, when we have the resources, object.
Why do people do this, asserting that their perception trumps the lived experience of the person they are perceiving? I don’t know, but I suspect that it is basically ignorance; they have never had to think about this reality before, and since they treat men and women differently (and we all do), it takes time and effort to learn, to wrap their heads around it.
But to do that is to say, essentially, “Hey, I don’t care that it’s obsidian, or whatever your bizarre term is. It’s a smooth black stone, okay? That’s what we mean when we say “onyx”. And when I hang with mineralogists they make all this noise if I don’t call it obsidian, but that don’t mean it’s not onyx.”
At one point, Piers Morgan, attempting to punch way above his weight as he tried to argue from his limited understanding, said as he berated Janet Mock in the second “interview”:
This is why only the most hidebound (and offensive) writers use the phrase “sex change”, and why even the terms which supplanted “sex change”, namely “sex reassignment surgery” (SRS) and “gender reassignment surgery” (GRS) are now outmoded terms, and being replaced with “gender confirmation surgery” (GCS). The old terms reflect an inaccurate, external-observer-centered understanding of what that surgery means, and Piers Morgan demonstrated that the old terms can be weaponized to explain to an intelligent and articulate trans woman just how wrong she is when she tries to get a word in edgewise to explain her own life to someone she just met. The new term centers the lived experience of the person undergoing the risks of the surgery. Which is as it should be.
Grace
There was a post here. Now there’s not. I’m considering an edited response, while I read Grace’s post.
Not everyone who makes blunders is “out to get” or disrespect transsexual people. I’m getting fairly old, and I have never met a transsexual person (that I know of) in person in my entire life. I have never really thought about the issue too much, and I may well say things that seem offensive just out of complete ignorance.
Anyone who does something unusual in life comes up against that. You can’t learn about every possible situation in life. Buzz Aldrin punched a guy in the face because he asked if the moon landing was really faked. He could have been trolling, but lots of people really believe that out of ignorance or stupidity. Strong reactions like that are just not classy. I have also never personally met an astronaut in my life.
Great comment, Grace!
Tristan, as has been addressed before, this wasn’t some off the cuff unplanned interview. Morgan had plenty of time (and resources) to not make these blunders in an interview, and yet he chose not to.
I can’t imagine what your Buzz Aldrin example was meant to prove, but it certainly doesn’t prove your point. Bart Sibrel wasn’t innocently asking Aldrin if the moon landing was faked, he lured Aldrin under false pretenses and demanded he swear on a bible the moon landing wasn’t faked, and insulted and harassed Aldrin when he refused. Hardly an innocent off the cuff question.
Just to be clear: I’m not defending Piers Morgan. I don’t like the guy either.
I was talking in general – it is just impossible to be on the forefront of everyone’s situation.
For instance here:
—————————–
“This is why only the most hidebound (and offensive) writers use the phrase “sex change”, and why even the terms which supplanted “sex change”, namely “sex reassignment surgery” (SRS) and “gender reassignment surgery” (GRS) are now outmoded terms, and being replaced with “gender confirmation surgery” (GCS). The old terms reflect an inaccurate, external-observer-centered understanding of what that surgery means, …”
——————-
I would have had no idea as to what are modern terms and what are outmoded terms. Should I? Should someone have very explicit knowledge about a fairly rare situation that I am in with regard to work?
With regard to Buzz Aldrin – OK, I stand corrected. I just remember that some idiot asked him that, and Buzz Aldrin punched him.
Do you mean “lived (i.e. what she experienced) experience” and not “expressed (i.e. what she outwardly expressed) experience” here? I’m sort of going to assume you do, since this doesn’t make sense to me otherwise.
Well, sure! This seems perfectly reasonable to me. (Not that you should care, but still….) However, last time I suggested that, I was told that this was ALSO wholly inappropriate, as it inappropriately referenced the trans status and/or transition.
Well, one main reason is that people can lie, misrepresent, be mistaken, etc. If you only deal with lived experience then there’s no verification possible.
Recently-married Jane may insist that she never really loved her prior boyfriend, it just looked that way, even if that’s false. Recently-diehard-liberal Paul may insist that he never really supported the Republican agenda, it just looked that way even if that’s false. Recently-started-gay-dating Sam may tell his current boyfriend that he always knew he was gay and that he never enjoyed hetero sex, even if that was false. EVERYONE lies sometimes, usually in conformance with their self interest.
For that reason, challenges to “lived experience” are commonplace. I can tell Jake until the sun goes down that I generally detest demands to adjust my language to suit the preferences of the listener, whether it relates to transfolk, deities, royalty, or anyone else who makes such demands. I can tell him that I have no particular stake in trans issues per se, but a larger stake in social control and communication. And no matter what I tell him, he can still think (and say!) that I’m lying/misrepresenting/mistaken and that my statements are based on transphobia, or dislike, or whatever. This is a statement about me which directly conflicts with my lived experience. And still that is still perfectly OK for him to do–at least in my opinion.
A second reason is that there’s a broad social benefit to being able to judge people by what they choose to demonstrate to you; there’s a lot of social pressure to both offer a day-to-day consistent presentation; and there’s a broad social benefit in our ability to assume, generally, that the presentation has some link to what lies beneath. There’s a good reason that “reinventing yourself” stories of all kinds often include moving to another place. Of course, every general rule has exceptions and in cases such as delayed-transition transfolk (or anyone who wants to make a major change in self-presentation) then it’s apparently a harm rather than a help. I don’t deny that, but I don’t think that it’s either surprising or inappropriate that people tend to expect a match. And I’m not sure that I think that we should change the general rule of expecting a match, or anticipating consistency. We could try to carve out an exception just for gender, but it would be tricky to do while maintaining the general rule.
A highly-related third reason, of course, is that most encounters are entirely based on presentation and not “actual reality.” Of the 100 people you meet per day, do you actually know what they are thinking? Feeling? Wanting? More to the point, for the ones who aren’t specially relevant somehow, do you even give a shit?
What you seem to be IS who you are, at least to the vast majority of people who encounter you throughout your life, and to 100% of the people who encounter you on the Internet (where it’s “all presentation, no real.”) It’s all they ever know.
So the suggestion that we should privilege “Bob’s internal identity” over “what Bob presents to us” is scary to people in a general social sense, because it raises the possibility that anyone (and therefore possibly everyone) could retrospectively change and be significantly different than what they seem to be. And you can see that people react very poorly to that in general, if you look at the various Internet and real-life folks who have admitted that their presentation and reality were substantially different.
One more attempt at getting across my point:
My 93-year-old grandmother calls Asians “Orientals” and blacks “colored”.
With the latter, she’s almost back in style with “people of color”. In any case, she has no malice towards anyone. Frankly, she has a lot of empathy for everyone. Those are just the words she grew up with, and she unfortunately didn’t take Asian studies or African American studies or Queer studies at university.
What punishment should we dole out to her? Or maybe we should cut her some slack?
On the other hand, I have seem some pretty hate-filled people, with only pretended empathy for the “right” groups and no empathy for the wrong groups, use exactly the right, modern terms.
I need to make some clarifications.
#10 #16 The point of the kitten example is that “boy” can be used to refer to physical sex, without any concepts of identity or social roles. That’s it. I’m not accusing anyone of anything.
#13 #20 Re: “Shifting language”. In the not too distant past the idea of gay marriage was a contradiction in terms. It was impossible, the concept didn’t exist. People have had to re-write laws to say marriage was between a man and a woman, because the idea it could ever be otherwise had never occured to the original drafters. I’m not trying to suggest this is mere semantics, I think it is important.
Re: “Recasting” is the technique of repeating an error back to someone in corrected form. That is what Mock was doing to Morgan, why she gave a complicated answer when asked if she disputed that she was born a boy. It didn’t work, per the Kitten example, he did not see he has made an error and got very confused. It also means an attempt to remould the meaning of words. I didn’t intend it to carry the re-interpretation of the past sense discussed in #17 #20.
Caveat: I’m extremely tired, but can’t sleep (thanks, midnight shift plus daytime duties!) so I reserve the right to re-read later, once I’m rested, and recoil in horror at what I wrote and re-phrase it. Thank you for your consideration.
Tristan:
Sure. I’ve said offensive things out of ignorance. We can’t be expert in everything. I’m completely comfortable holding you to a different initial standard than I would hold a very-well-paid reporter with a full-time production team.
However, I would hope that both you and the very-well-paid reporter would react better than Morgan did when, figuratively, every trans person in the room gasped or exclaimed in anger. His reaction was basically to say, “What? WHAT?! What on earth was wrong with THAT? Oh, come on! This is lunacy! You dimwits, I’m on your side, and THIS is how you treat me? Well, I never! I’m just very, very disappointed. In all of you. I expected better.” And he did it FOR 24 HOURS. It boggles my mind that no one on the production staff turned to their most LGBT-savvy person and said, “This is a clusterfuck. Find me someone who can explain to Piers why people are reacting this way.” Apparently, the whole team said, “Wow, poor Piers. Yeah, let’s let him wing the re-interview with exactly the same amount of thought and prep which went into the last one. Oh, and let’s follow it with a panel of people which is 2/3 people with no expertise in this area.”
I would hope that pretty much anyone would do better than that, on the second try, even if on the first try your foot went into your mouth up to the hip.
Also, on the FIRST try, I would hope that a reasonably thoughtful person would hesitate to ask questions about genitalia. Maybe interviewers get so used to asking the hard questions that they lose sight of when the push is appropriate. I suspect that it’s something like that. But even so, if I were interviewing one of those skateboarders who grinds a rail, falls, straddles the rail in a cringeworthy manner, and is carted off to the hospital, I would not consider myself classy if I asked, “So, did the surgeon have to remove any tissue?” or “What do your testicles look like, now?” or “Since the accident, do you have trouble getting it up?” or “Did you dress right or left before the accident? How about now?”
Maybe I simply can’t see all that from a cisgender perspective. It’s possible (though I have to say that compared to most people I had basically no body modesty or problem answering questions about my body … until I transitioned and certain coworkers got really irrational about the topic … and even so, I think I would have hesitated to ask these questions of other people, on tape). Any cisgender people care to comment about how you would feel if you were asked questions about your genitalia, in a circumstance where you might or might not have had surgery on them?
There’s a point where it just seems kind of obvious to me to say to your guest, “Hey, among the questions I’m considering asking are some which I could see being potentially sensitive. Want to set any boundaries before we begin?” As I understand it, politicians do this all the time. But then, they are professional interviewees, and Mock clearly isn’t (yet).
Not until you’re prepping a Q&A session, not necessarily.
But now you do! Yay, Internet! (With apologies to Tom Lehrer, is everybody listening? There will be a short quiz, next period.)
gin-and-whiskey:
Sorry, that wasn’t as clear as it could have been. I meant the experience which the trans woman has had and has communicated to you.
Context, context, context. In suggesting ways to reference the person as she was before transition, I’m assuming that you’ve already cleared the hurdles of relevance and confidentiality – that you are not discussing great baseball players in a room full of people who don’t know your dinner partner is trans, and you’re just using their transition as a handy marker for time. If you haven’t cleared those hurdles, then sure, handle it differently. “When you were younger.” “Back before [some event you both know to be roughly contemporaneous with the transition].” And so on.
Sure. And then decent people will not unnecessarily reference the fact that previously, she really, really seemed to be over the moon for her prior boyfriend, and if it IS necessary, they will phrase it in such a way as to avoid the reaction of “Goddammit, get it through your thick skull that I never loved him!” If it’s necessary to refer to it directly, they will say, “Back when we all thought you were in love with [prior boyfriend]” or “Do you have a copy of that quartet of sonnets you wrote?” and not “Do you still have those poems you wrote when you were head-over-heels for [prior boyfriend]?”
And, you know, there are exceptions to every rule. If she’s about to hare off into the distance with a career cocaine dealer and you think it’s because she’s miffed about something [prior boyfriend] said but she really actually still loves him, then by all means, violate the Grace’s Decent Behavior Rule. Competing harms and all that.
—
I tried to reply to the rest of your comment, but I got lost. I’ve re-read it a dozen times or so, and I see a lot of generalization which is sufficiently vague that I’m pretty sure I’m not getting a good picture of what you’re trying to get at. Maybe I’m just too tired.
Except this, which seemed cogent:
But this is true all over the place. We meet people, and we form ideas about them, and they turn out to be different from our guesses and conceptions. Bob, whom we know only because of his prize-winning mallows, turns out to be a former Airborne Ranger. Sally, who seemed so morally upright and dependable, turns out to have a recent string of DWI convictions. We overhear something and learn that Paulette is a sexual assault survivor. We watch as the next-door-teenager, Jack, who has babysat our kids, gets arrested for domestic assault on his girlfriend.
In all these cases, we re-assess our understanding of the people, and they turn out to be different from what we might have thought, in better ways and worse ways.
We still don’t say, “So, Bob, last month before you were a Ranger in your youth…” We say, “Bob, last month before I knew you were a Ranger…”
What am I missing?
Maybe it would help if someone could suggest a parallel case where someone’s identity has not changed, but our perception of it has, and yet we would nevertheless, even on reflection, assert our prior perception. Maybe I have a blind spot, here. Can you suggest such a case?
Grace
Well, as a cis person, I would find that entirely odd an inappropriate unless I had explicitly agreed to it beforehand. I would probably refuse to answer.
I’d like to add, though, that I think this part of the discussion is a bit of a red herring, in that if Morgan’s only sin was the question on genitalia, then the response would be quite different. If he was otherwise respectful and attentive to what Mock was saying, then the defense that he’s being a journalist asking uncomfortable questions due to public interest would hold some water. I think more people would be able to buy the idea that these questions could serve to educate and inform the public if he gave any indication that he is actually interested in them as *part* of a greater understanding of Mock’s experiences, rather than being interested in them *instead* of being interested in what she actually had to say. Not saying it would be acceptable then, but at least it would be a more defensible offense.
I cannot suggest any such case. But I do think there’s something else at play here, which I have demonstrated myself in a different thread in the not-so-distant past here. Specifically, cis people have a really hard time to accept that trans people’s identities haven’t changed. Which is a genuine problem – of cis people. And the answer to it is that cis people should try harder, not that we should expect trans people to continually accommodate us.
I would probably discuss my episiotomy with anyone who asked, within reason, with different emphasis depending on whether the person who asked was pregnant/likely to be versus just curious. I can’t imagine discussing any other part of my genitals, though. To be frank, I kind of enjoy freaking people out with my episiotomy story and I’m fascinated by medical stuff, so I doubt I’m normal in this respect; I should think that in general the standard would be not to talk about areas usually kept private unless the person whose areas they are brings up the subject.
I agree with Eytan Zweig that this is a bit of a red herring, but you did ask.
If I’m talking about stopping my child-raising days and mention my vasectomy and someone then asks some sort of related question (“does it still work?” “did/do your nuts hurt?” “can you still get it up?”) that seems pretty par for the course. Or, if I am arguing circumcision strongly enough–especially if I add “me stories” then I might expect someone to ask about my foreskin. Generally nobody asks about it out of the blue, at least not in recent times.
Hugh @16: Ok, I should have known some dark corner of the internet would come back to bite me on that one. Suffice to say that the vast majority of ordinary trans people, and all recognized leaders of the community, consider saying “good boy” to the dog either a) a complete non-issue or b) so low-priority as to be an effective non-issue. Why, I ‘m a trans man, and I probably said “good girl” to my two dogs half a dozen times today! Of course, I could say “good potato” in the appropriate tone and neither would ever know the difference.
Gin-and-whiskey @17,
Not really. I have known numerous people who were in decades-long straight marriages and came out in their 40s, 50s, and beyond. None of them would be described as “heterosexual until 45,” unless someone was being a disrespectful jerk. They would be described as “in the closet until 45.” People accept that they really are gay and probably always were, even if they lived a straight life for X number of years. A few people feel their sexual orientation actually changed mid-life–they usually have to explain this to people, because others assume they were just in the closet.
I have no idea what your point is about people coming out as bisexual. Some people are gay, some people are bi, some people switch up their labels at various times.
I think some people may misunderstand what trans people mean when we say things like “I didn’t life my life as a boy” or “I never considered myself a girl.”
We don’t mean that no children are really boy or really girls. We don’t mean that there isn’t a 99%+ rate of congruence of genitals to gender identity.
We mean that we, as specific individuals, quite seriously, quite literally did not feel like or live our lives as our assigned sex.
We may have carried an unshakable uneasiness and depression deep in our bones. We may have known there was something absurd about our assigned gender. We may have actively, explicitly rejected it. We may have been visibly, persistently gender variant. We may have had our childhoods marred by bitter tantrums over clothing and grooming. We may have never even once gotten a gift we wanted, because adults asked and then responded to our requests with disgust. We may have been hounded about our gender and sexual identities by family members, teachers and strangers since well before puberty. We have been insulted, rejected, bullied or attacked for sticking out like the ugliest sore thumb, like giant zits on the face of Lady Liberty that everyone had the itch to pop.
Trans people are not cis people. Trans children are not cis children. I can’t speak for Mock, of course. What I know is that my gender expression and sexual orientation were a matter of open speculation among the adults in my family from the time I was 2 years old. (I only learned of this when I came out as trans.) I was visibly gender-nonconforming years before I could tie my own shoes.
The best way to say the truth is that I’m a guy who was assigned the sex female at birth. That actually describes my experience. If someone were to say I was a girl until age 20 (when I began medical transition), that would be a partial truth–but it would obscure a lot more than it reveals. If someone were to say I am still a girl now, because I have not had genital surgery, it would be bizarre, to put it very mildly. No one has mistaken me for a girl for years.
Hill said:
In academia, it is often said that gender is a social construct based on how masculinity and femininity are perceived in a culture and that sex is a physical manifestation of maleness and femaleness.
The opening sentence of Wikipedia’s article* on “sex and gender distinction” reads:
But I’m not sure I entirely understand how this understanding is relevant to this discussion of Mock or other trans people. In other words, it seems pretty clear to me that Mock is not making a distinction between sex and gender; she certainly doesn’t say, “I was physically male and I identified as female.” If I’m understanding correctly, her whole point is that she was always a female, because a baby born with a penis who is (presumably) XY is still a female if that person is trans.
I guess I’m not seeing how the distinction between sex and gender applies in this situation. If anything, it seems like Piers might have been trying to make that distinction and Mock corrected him.
Amp, you write:
I can’t speak for Abbe, but I feel like the full quotation of what Abbe said was about “regulating concepts of sex by shifting language.” I don’t think that the language is the end goal, but it does seem like modifying language is important to modify the understanding of the concepts that the language represents. Or, perhaps a better way to phrase it is that the language use is being viewed as a symbol of whether the speaker understands sex and gender in the same way that the person criticizing the speaker understands these concepts.
For example, since it isn’t just about semantics, I think you’d agree that Mock’s position is not simply, don’t say that I was a boy until age 18. It’s more than that; it’s: I wasn’t a boy, ever.
But that means–it seems–that the interview isn’t just about Mock’s lived experiences, precisely because Mock is not just critiquing word choice. Mock is also critiquing Morgan’s understanding of sex and/or gender. Which is a legitimate thing to do, but it also means that in addition to doing some research to prepare for the interview, Morgan might have needed to accept new conclusions about the nature of sex and gender.
*I get that Wikipedia is not an academic source, but it was a pretty succinct explanation of how every humanities scholar I’ve known has been taught to use those terms.
Tristan:
First: I accept that your grandmother’s strength is as the strength of ten because her heart is pure, and that she bears malice toward none, and empathizes with everyone. What follows is not directed at your grandmother.
—
Thank you. That certainly clarified your intent. Indeed, this thread has been all about punishment, and not in the least an attempt at civil discourse about the complexities surrounding the title topic.
Nobody move! Don’t say anything. You might hit Tristan’s grandmother! Shhhhhhh! Don’t speak! Don’t. Speak. (nobody… speak… shhhhh…)
(back away quietly. don’t disturb them. we’ll just have to limit expressing ourselves to when they can’t hear us, and shut up when we see them coming.)
Why, hello, Mr. Tristan! It surely is a fine day, today, isn’t it? A fine day. Here, we’ll get those bags for you, don’t you worry about a thing.
—
Sure, Tristan. Cut yourself some slack. Cut your grandmother some slack. Who cares what these pesky minority groups find important? It’s not like they make a difference anyway. It’s just too hard to even try to keep it all straight.
It’s not your fault. You keep inviting these people to your parties, and they just choose not to come…
Ah, well. You remain awesome. Their loss. Carry on.
—
Tristan, you have NO IDEA how much slack you already get cut.
Grace
Ummm … OK.
Zinnia Jones provides some perspective on Piers’ “vilification”.
Grace
Tristan – I have way less insight, but probably more patience (because nobody is constantly crapping on me and then looking up innocently and saying “what? WHAT?”), than Grace so I’ll take a stab at this.
Let me try boiling it down to the very basic, as I understand it. It is not a problem that you don’t know anything about trans people, assuming that your ignorance isn’t the result of deliberately ignoring trans people’s issues that are a germane part of your life. (“Dad, I think that I am trans…” “LA LA LA I don’t know anything about that GO AWAY.”)
It is a problem when a trans human being, standing right in front of you, says – not even about your own behavior – “hey, this over here, this is hurting me. This is causing me pain.” If your reaction is “well, I don’t know anything about trans people, so let’s talk about why your pain is probably misguided instead”, then you’re being a dick. If you’re talking about “why am I being punished just for not knowing anything?” then you’re being a clueless dick.
If your reaction is “well, I don’t know anything about trans people, but I know what pain feels like. I’m really sorry this hurt you. I hope I’m not hurting you in my ignorance; if I am I hope you feel able to tell me so I can try to stop. It sucks that you are hurting. I’m so sorry.” then you’re being a mensch.
Is everyone a mensch? No. If you’re not a mensch, are you automatically a dick? No. There are gradations. And I’m not saying you’re being, or are, a dick – a) not for me to judge, and b) as Grace notes, you’re being cut a lot of slack which implies that at least somebody sees some compassion and empathy in what you’ve posted.
But if, as you say, you don’t know much…then you probably are talking an awful lot. “I don’t know, and if you have the time I would appreciate you explaining X, Y, Z…” that’s one sentence.
I don’t watch a lot of network TV, but I saw a promo for a show (probably awful in its trans-ignorance, but this bit was OK) where an actor hassles a putatively-trans waitress so they can see how bystanders react. The promo had one bystander who said to the actor-hassler, very simply, something to the effect of “Hey. She’s a human being just like you and me. Just treat her like a human being.”
There’s more to being a good ally, but “hello fellow human being” is a solid start on being a good human being. And “hello fellow human being DON’T PUNISH ME FOR NOT KNOWING ALL YOUR FREAKY ARCANE SECRETS” doesn’t count.
Robert,
It amused me that the very next link I loaded after reading your post at #40, was this.
(Don’t neglect the mouseover text.)
Grace
Stephen Colbert’s 2/18 interview with Janet Mock had a similar message to the XKCD comic.
Grace – That made my night. I may stop randomly stabbing people on the bus, just to see where the buildup of causal momentum takes us.
The New York Times is reporting that Piers Morgan’s show on CNN will be ending sometime in March of this year. (via The A.V. Club)
Just read that. I’m sure both of his regular audience members (not counting the very possibly more numerous right-wing critics that are lurking so as to seize upon his latest absurdity) will be sorely disappointed.