Let’s assume for a moment you’re a decent person. Let’s assume you’re a well-meaning cisgender (ie, your sex at birth matches your gender identity today) person who very much supports the trans community and wants to stand in solidarity with them but may not know where to start.
Luckily, a certain dapper gentleman, artist and activist, CN Lester, has provided those of us who need a little help with “10 seriously easy things cis people can do to make the world a better place for trans people.“
Take, for instance, the first point about language use. RuPaul’s Drag Race and Girls, both entering new seasons, use “tranny” and “she-male” so casually, as a punchline usually, like in this Girls Season 2 Inside the Episode segment (at the 3:16 mark). Does this make either show the worst thing in the entire world? No, but as Lester says, “the majority of words and phrases used by the mainstream media to describe us are neither friendly nor accurate.”
Some really fantastic, openly trans-identified artists are increasingly becoming more and more high profile — the super intelligent and adorable actress Laverne Cox, for instance, appearing on the Katie Couric show (where she was asked some not so tactful questions, to say the least). Closer to home, we have artists like musician Rae Spoon, currently with a biographical film at the Sundance Film Festival. We have countless other individuals to look up to, but unfortunately, the gay and lesbian community still has some catching up to do on being trans-inclusive.
While being a decent person in general may seem like common sense, it’s a surprisingly uncommon phenomenon.
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