What's In a Real Name?

You know me by my real name.

That wasn't always true. For a long time, I didn't know the name I used to have wasn't real. Then when I realized it wasn't, I had to find my real name. I looked for months until I found a name that was real.

Then when I found it, I had to ask, and sometimes plead, and sometimes demand that others use my real name. I often shouted or cried when they didn't because when they didn't use my real name, they made me feel like I wasn't real.

I was real. I am real.

I had to go to court for everyone else to recognize my real name, to recognize me as real. I've been shamed for my real name, been asked questions that made me feel less than human, been asked to prove that name belongs to me because it is a woman's name and to have it there are people who think I need to deserve it.

How dare I decide what name I want for myself? How dare I determine my own reality?

I grew up in a country that does not allow me to change my name unless I get married. I was a citizen of that country even though I lived in the U.S. I couldn't leave the U.S. without being made to feel I wasn't real. For ten years until I became an American citizen, I could not leave the country because I couldn't face the possibility of not being real.

My name is my real name. It's the name of my reality, not the reality that someone else has built for me, a reality I no longer am. It's a name that's more real to me than any other name because I chose it, and had to fight for it.

We must fight for our names and the names of others. We must fight for everyone's right to be real.

45 Years After Stonewall, The LGBT Movement Has a Transphobia Problem

“The story that isn’t told enough and, when it is, with too little force, is the degree to which trans people continue to be marginalized within the LGBT rights struggle, treated as tokens when convenient, yet denied the basic respect, rights, and resources needed for our equality.”

Read more in The American Prospect

Imogen Binnie, Nevada

“Eventually you can’t help but figure out that, while gender is a construct, so is a traffic light, and if you ignore either of them you get hit by cars.”

On the Grave of My Privilege

I am trans.
I am Filipino.
I am queer.
I am albino.
I am slash
in man / woman.

The lowest rung. Abject of abjects.

Yet you see me, as,
cisgender,
Caucasian,
heterosexual,
able-bodied,
woman.

I'm like a privilege machine made of broken parts
held together by the string of perception.

Take away a part and the spring will unfurl, the
edifice unravel.

#NotAllofUs
#YesAllofYou

Had I been born not white, not mutant
You would see me as mistake,
a half-man freak
because you could tell my face
is too man for the Oriental doll
picture in your mind
when you examine my race.

How f'd, for life to be better as an ill-visioned albino
then a fully abled visible racial minor key.

Had I been born not trans or slash, I would be
a half-baked potato
of a feminine man who loves men
queer of queers and, damning of damnings:
ugly.

Had I been born not queer I would
to you be weird
because I would want women as
a woman when
I could be a man with women and
wtf?
why take off your penis for that?

And if I weren't Filipino
then my body would,
chances are,
not be
small
petite
womanly
for white.

And so, oh panel of judges
get out your 10's for
I get the perfect score,
technical merit plus artistic expression
in my quintiple somersault of
norm
nativity
for an unnative self
and you hand me the medal of privilege I
wear around my neck,
like a tombstone staked
into my soil.

Project, Interrupted

2005. I went through this period when I was enamored with beautiful men and being seen with them, to prove to myself that I was attractive. I had this habit of sitting by the window at the now closed Lotus Tea Room in Chelsea, which had a wonderful koi pond inside right next to my favorite table. I was going to take my beautiful lovers there and take pictures of them for a series. But I only took two men there before the Tea Room closed, or I no longer needed the validation. I'm not sure which came first.

The Last Shred

This is the only piece of you I own. A torn receipt from our first date, when I took you to a crepe place in Chelsea after coffee gone rogue, talk for hours that led to wandering the city in the rain, that led to watching a show about love on a whim, that led to this. And when you asked me how I liked to communicate I said I sometimes wrote letters, so you wrote me your address on the back of this receipt.

It's the only thing I have left that you've touched, because I refuse to go back to anywhere we've been. Not the bakery where we had hot chocolate. Not the theatre where we saw that love show. Not the subway stop to your apartment. Not this crepe place, where you told me you've never felt such an immediate connection with anyone. Nor have I.

So by the time I went to your apartment two nights later and you told me you've looked me up, and you told me you could tell you were just scratching the surface, I fooled myself into thinking you knew. You must know. And when you kept reassuring me, kept telling me how much you loved parts of me others have thought unlovable, that others needed to grow to love, I thought, you must know.

So I took this shred of paper and used the address on the back to write you a letter. And in that letter I told you that I knew you knew.

But it turned out you didn't. And it turned out you couldn't take it. And it turned out you never wanted to see me again.

I want to let it go so it would land in this flowing creek and dissolve as it leaves me but I can't. It's the last I have of you. Apart from me, it's the only shred I own that you've touched.

Mourning My Manhood

I woke up today missing my manhood, not in the sense of body parts but in the sense of the man I was before I became a woman. Not in a regretful way, but more that I don't think I spent enough time thinking about the things I liked about being a queer, feminine man. Part of it was that I found this footage of me at a kiss-in demonstration I did when Ralph Reed spoke at Harvard in 1996, where I ended up kissing a man dressed up as a nun.

Some things I miss about being a feminine, queer man:

• I miss challenging people when I walk hand in hand with another man.
• I miss not caring what other people think.
• I miss people not paying attention to me on the street.
• I miss needing to be brave when people do pay attention to me, call me a sissy or a faggot, and how I defy their words by refusing to look down.
• I miss not being bound to the expectations of my gender, already unable to conform to them by sleeping with men and not behaving in a masculine way.
• I miss challenging people when I wear feminine clothes.
• I miss being perceived by other people as a minority.
• I miss not feeling guilty about having casual sex.
• I miss not feeling a little threatened or afraid whenever I sleep with someone new.
• I miss not crying nearly as much as I do now.
• I miss loving a man as a man.

Top Ten Awkward Questions I've Been Asked By People Who Don't Know I'm Trans

10. You have such athletic shoulders. Are you a swimmer? [More like a drowner.]

9. Do you have an extra tampon? [Damnit, I keep forgetting to get one.]

8. What do you use for birth control? [Nothing! Er, condoms.]

7. Why is your voice so low? Do you smoke? {No, I just like being sultry.]

6. What were you like as a little girl? [I was like a little boy.]

5. How did you lose your virginity? [Which one?]

4. Doesn't seeing that baby just make your uterus ache? [Maybe the spiritual one, yes.]

3. OMG you're so bitchy. Do you have PMS? [Nope, born this way.]

2. Do you and your boyfriend plan to have kids someday? [Nope, even if I can.]

1. What was the date of your last period? [Um, never?]

May 25, 2001

“Living as a woman has been extremely enlightening, and I’ve come to know myself much better by doing it. People have been asking me whether this is a temporary or permanent thing. The truth is that I don’t think those distinctions apply in this case. My feelings about my gender haven’t changed. I feel comfortable being either gender, and I think that I am probably going to identify as transgendered indefinitely, regardless of how I may appear to other people.”

— An old, retired blog

On Being Cissed, or, The Night That Janet Mock Mistook Me for Cisgendered

I used to love being cissed. Being cissed is when a transperson mistakes you for a cisperson. It's like being dissed, except by a transsister who mistakenly thinks you're a cister.

I first got cissed twelve years ago when I went to this tr***y bar Jacques once, to see my friend Brenda at a beauty pageant (she finished first runner-up). Post-millennium it was the kind of place where drag and trans weren't sliced in half. I got there late and there were no seats left, but I noticed a couch and a spot in the middle of it. But as I headed in that direction the bearded black man (BBM) at the end of the couch shook his head to indicate there was someone sitting there. I'm small so I walked over anyway, and perched on the arm.

I must have chatted with the man but I don't remember about what. But I do remember a tall, slim tr***y girl with relaxed hair and lush, dark skin and tight jeans stomping in our direction. She stopped right in front of me and BBM to form a tight little triangle among us.

"You know, cunts are bad for you," she said, then plopped next to BBM on the couch with a half-turn.

And I will never forget what BBM said: "I knew she'd be mad. Good thing you're not trans."

That was the first time I got cissed and loved it.

---

The last time I got cissed it hurt like hell.

I went to Janet Mock's reading at the Brooklyn Museum. I'd been looking forward to it all week after listening to episode after episode of the podcast she shared with her boyfriend Aaron. I adored the Miss Janet of that podcast. Like her, I had a childhood thing for Janet Jackson ever since I danced to "Miss You Much" at my 6th-grade variety show in the Philippines.

So there I was in the front row, which became the second row because the organizers added a row for Miss Janet's friends. And she was tall and radiant and cis-looking in a way I didn't think I aspired to be, until I saw those hips that gave nothing away. So she talked, and she read, and I laughed. Then when the Q&A came, I took my time playing my question over and over in my head so I can make sure to impress her and get it right.

In the meantime, some dude asked a privilege-y question about why Miss Janet thought she needed to "resort to prostitution" to fund her transition.

I was twenty feet from her so I could tell Miss Janet looked pissed. "First of all," she said "I don't call it prostitution. I call it sex work because it's work." Then she talked about her struggle for survival and her need to transition as quickly as possible.

I don't remember the next questions after that, so intent I was in making sure to phrase my question in the best way possible, to in some way be recognized as Miss Janet's transsister. When my turn came, I took a breath then told Miss Janet that I had been following her work, that I had been reading her blog and listening to her podcasts.

Then I asked this question: "How do you think it would help the trans community if more transwomen who have the privilege of being mistaken for cis make their stories public like you did?"

"I don't completely understand the question," Miss Janet replied.

I panicked.

"Well, you pass," I said. I didn't want to use the p word because I know she didn't like it, but it was the only way I could make myself clear."What would it mean for the trans community for more women like you to come out as trans?"

"I don't like the word passing," Miss Janet snapped. "When I walk down the street, I'm just being. I'm not making a political statement because no one can tell that I'm trans."

That was when the transsister moment in my head got lost. In what? Transmission? Translation? I didn't understand why she took it that way. I tried not to take it personally. Maybe she was still miffed about the question about sex work, and was taking it out on her well-meaning transsister. Maybe my blonde hair and light skin didn't give off enough of a woman-of-color vibe, and she thought I was being all presumptuous by counting myself among her infinitely passable kind. Maybe, maybe....

"So," Miss Janet resumed, "would a trans person like to ask a question?"

And just like that, I found myself cissed.

It took me a while to realize what happened, so long that an identifiable trans person was already asking a question by the time I caught up. I don't know what was in Miss Janet's head. Maybe I'll have the opportunity and the courage to ask her one day. But I know what she said, and in my heart I felt cissed.

To be cissed is to feel like your world isn't yours. It feels like a hand has reached across time to shove that part of you that didn't know if you could or should, and tell him, her that he, she doesn't exist. To be cissed is for your tribe to cast you out without knowing it, leave you to languish in that dark place between who you are and who they think you are.

To be cissed is to get exactly what you wanted, only to find out that it hurts like hell.

Transscript 1: From an Old, Young Friend

Hey! Strangest thing: I was having morning coffee and saw a link to yoru website, where I learned your secret! So cool -- I had no idea! Anyway, I'm totally disappointed that we never got to find out you didn't have a cervix :/

Hopefully you can forgive me for being young and nursing a "broken heart" and running off like a loon. I'm as old now as you were then, if you can believe it, which helps make it clear i was an idiot when i was young (i know, i know join the club).

Anyway, love your website, great to hear from you, and your writing is amazing.

<3,
-------------

3 Reasons Friends(+) Thought I Might Be Trans

1. "You have sociolinguistic speech patterns reminiscent of a gay man, but I figured you're from California and they all just sound gay over there."
2. "I noticed that you were unusually assertive for a woman, but I figured you were just American."
3. "It wasn't very hard for me to notice that you don't have a cervix."

What Johnny Thinks of Men Who Reject Women They've Already Slept With After Finding Out They're Trans

“My mom makes this anchovy dip everyone loves then they ask her what it’s made of and she says anchovies and they say oh no I don’t like anchovies.

You’ve already had the dip. You like anchovies.”