Content note: This blog contains reflections that include the naming of slurs and derogatory language related to gender, sexuality and identity. These terms are included in the context of critical reflection and are not used to cause harm. Please take care while reading, especially if this language may be distressing.
As a trans woman, I have lived many lives. I once presented as a cisgender, heterosexual man. I then experienced the world as a gay man. Then, I came out as a transgender woman. At each step in my journey, the way the world treated me has changed for the worse. My experiences, I believe, have given me a rather unique lens.
First, because I have experienced the sharp contrast between living as a heterosexual man (in disguise?) versus being a trans woman. Reflecting on the contrast – of a past experience of relative privilege and safety, to a contemporary reality of harassment, discrimination and marginalization, gifted to me a righteous fury driven by the belief that no one – of any gender or sexuality – should be mistreated, shamed and made unequal because of who they are.
Second, because my three steps (straight-gay-trans), and the journey through each as the world changed how it treated me, formed in me an analysis of gendered oppression not based in discrete categories of identity, but as an overarching system seeking to maintain the marginalization of all those deemed inferior, all those whose gendered and sexual existence fall lower on the hierarchy of cisgender, binary, heterosexual and male. I have come to perceive homophobia, transphobia and misogyny each as an expression of gendered violence. To me, they are three sides of the same oddly-shaped coin. Whether I am called a c*nt, a f*ggot or a tr*nny, it is coming from the same place: a desire to control who we can be, who we can love, and how we can live.
In our social justice movements, we often highlight differences, and with good reason. We highlight the unique experiences of disabled women, racialized women, queer women and beyond. That work is vital - without highlighting those differences, we could not adequately expose and address the unique experiences at the intersections of oppression. By building from the experiences of those at the intersection, we can lift everyone up. But while we center those intersections, we must also remember our shared struggle. Our experiences, of life and of oppression are not identical, whether we are women, queer or trans people, but they do have common (nasty) ingredients. What unites us across our differences is a shared struggle against a world that wants to keep us in our place, unsafe and unequal without rights and freedoms.
More than that, we – as feminists and 2SLGBTQIA+ advocates – are united by a shared dream of a future where freedom includes everyone: where we have freed ourselves (and in fact freed everyone) from the systems and norms that have perpetuated our inequality for generations.
I urge you to understand the contemporary attacks on trans and queer people as I do: as an attempt by those who do not want us to be free to reassert control. To use the public’s lack of familiarity with transgender people as cover to reassert misogynistic, homophobic and transphobic power. At their core, these are attacks on everything feminists stand for.
In Alberta, the provincial government is infringing on bodily autonomy - putting bans on gender-affirming surgery and hormone therapy, and on self-determined name or pronoun changes in schools, all under the guise of protecting children from evidence-based gender-affirming care. If this precedent stands, access to safe abortion could be at risk next, because underpinning both attacks on gender-affirming healthcare and abortion is a desire to restrict bodily autonomy and control our bodies.
In 2023, the Government of Saskatchewan used the notwithstanding clause of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which allows for the suspension of specific charter-protected rights, inclusive of equality rights (i.e., the rights of women, trans and LGBTQ+ people). They invoked the clause to suspend the charter-rights of transgender youth and limit the freedom of trans youth to come out and be themselves at school. It was invoked in response to a judge’s injunction to stop the implementation of a policy he had concluded would cause gender diverse youth to suffer “irreparable harm”.
The notwithstanding clause is not meant to be used flippantly. The Charter provides one of the most powerful checks and balances on government power, created to ensure the protections of the fundamental rights and freedoms of individuals in Canada. The flippant, and increasingly frequent, use of the notwithstanding clause facilitates its further usage. If governments and legislators can simply get around our equality rights, what meaning or depth do those rights have?
The rhetoric and vitriol targeted at queer and trans people is an attempt to roll our culture back 50 years, to a time where it was okay to use violence and mistreat those who are different. It should come as no surprise that anti-queer rhetoric is growing in conjunction with the rise of increased harassment of women. Both have the same purpose: to recreate a culture where a powerful few determine what kinds of gendered experiences – of womanhood, manhood and beyond – are deemed acceptable.
You might not understand trans people. I do not need you to. I do not need you to be an expert on gender affirming healthcare, or to know the definition of every gender identity. Rather, I need you to see a shared humanity and a shared struggle for freedom, equality and human rights. If we do not come together in that shared struggle – as women, as queer and trans people, and indeed, as workers, racialized people and beyond, we will see Canada changed for the worse, and the reversal of hard-won gains that generations of activists, of communities, have fought for.
United, we win. Divided we lose.
Fae Johnstone is the Executive Director of Queer Momentum and a board member with YWCA Canada. You can support Queer Momentum’s advocacy at www.momentumcanada.net/join.