Me, Robin

A mirror reflects who you see, and it can give the impression that you can see who you really are. But it is no coincidence that every culture has a saying for the idea that we are the product of the best of our friends. And that is something no mirror can show.

When we are the best of our friends, that is different for each of us, simply because our friends are different. And even if we share a lot of friends, we will still find different qualities in the people around us. When we think of ourselves as having good qualities, we should always reflect: who showed me how to be like this? When we answer this question, we recognise the good in each other.

If our friends shape us, and we shape them, then it is entirely logical that we shape each other into better people. Into people who can take care of us. In other words, when you teach somebody your language, you teach them how to talk to you in your own way. You teach people how to be with you, and vice versa.

A friend is, with all these qualities, the original safe space: a refuge from hatred, bigotry, insecurity, and a safety net when you fall. Family is the web you are born in: your friends are the first web you make yourself. Every now and then, when you think about your friends and how and why they made you better, tell them. It reminds them that it was worth making you.

A few months back, I optimistically¹ asked for ideas on the burden of understanding. I had a lot of great conversations on the topic, mostly in person, with a range of friends. Some queer friends shared their own stories, and some straight friends explained how they’ve dealt with concepts new to them.

My straight friends focused mostly on exposing people to diversity. And this is a pretty effective idea. People who actually know a greater variety of people (heritages, sexualities, gender identities, physical and mental divergencies) tend to be open to increasing that. At the same time, people who have never met a single black person tend to vote the most racist. But this approaches the idea from the top down: it says, if people just knew you, they’d care. But it ignores that if they don’t care yet, they won’t care to get to know you. The question remains, how do you get somebody to listen?²

The narrative from the queer friends was universal: you can’t convince family. They will either get it or they won’t. Every single queer person told me the same thing. So for a few months, I struggled with this matter.

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A few weeks ago, my dad called. He told me he’d been having a few ‘illuminating conversations’. I told him that he was ironically vague with that statement. Then he explained that he had talked to old friends. A lesbian couple he’s known for years, and a drag performer he’s known for decades³. They, essentially, told him the ‘let people be people’ angle. They told him about the haters, about how a lot of people simply don’t fit in the expectations others have of them, and how that isn’t their fault (sound familiar?). They talked about being your genuine self, and how it’s worse for me than for him.

And with that, my straight friends and queer friends meet in the middle. What my parents needed to hear, they heard from someone they trusted. When they heard it, it opened their hearts to me again.

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I don’t recall ever having talked to these people. Maybe I did, when I was younger. I have a spotty memory of my youth. But they defended me, in my absence and in a position that was clearly beleaguered. They’re the greatest ally I didn’t know I had, and it moves me to tears just thinking about that. And I’ve thought about this idea of an ally. An ally is someone who defends your rights when you’re not there; a great ally is someone who also defends your humanity.

When I asked for help, everybody told me it was out of my hands, and I learned to accept that. It gave me the distance I needed to just… let it take some time. And then, by sheer chance, somebody else spoke for me.

Here’s a compliment I get more often than I care to count. It’s a weird one, no matter how you twist it, and I’d like to talk about it.

It usually comes from someone who has been appraising me from a distance. It usually comes as the person is about to leave. They tell me, It’s so important what you do.

What, if you please, is it that I do? I am drinking wine. I am making faces at my friends who are trying to rope me onto the dance floor. I am discussing, right before you come over, how I ‘trick’ horny men by not being the woman they think I am. Then you come over and tell me that you think what I ‘do’ is important. So, please, what do I do?

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If you’re willing to follow me down this path, there are a few things that occur to me. The most common angle is this: according to you, I could be an obvious dude¹ wearing make-up and a dress. In that case, what you’re reading into me is bravery, a sort of standing up to the status quo. The compliment is then for a battle that you imagine I am fighting. Whether or not I am actually fighting, this assumption shows me that this is not about me, but about how good you are for accepting me. For how liberal you are. It’s the more common variety of virtue signaling.

The compliment could be for me being visibly unconstrained by the gender binary. If that’s the case, you’re already aware of the different burdens on and expectations of women and men. Your compliment, then, is preaching to the choir, isn’t it? If that’s the intention, maybe just tell me I look great. That would be good. I love hearing that.

I am guessing that what I ‘do’ is exist. That’s true. But that’s not brave. That is the inevitable outcome of surviving, and of choosing to present as my true self. Simultaneously, it is not cowardly to not be out. Not everybody is afforded the luxuries I have. My privilege is that I can be out, in the first place, and to not worry about being attacked for existing in the second place². So no, I am not brave. That’s not something I do, either.

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I’m not discounting the compliment wholesale. There is likely a good intention behind it. It also takes guts to walk up to someone queer and compliment them. I am easy-going, but I understand that fabulous strangers can be intimidating. But if you compliment them so you can show them how good of a person you are, I am not here for your feel-good-quota. And if you compliment them for how pretty they are ‘for a man pretending to be a woman’, then perhaps you need to think long and hard about your intentions.

Some people are happy to tell you: what’s inside is the only thing that matters. They tell you this to reassure you that you are truly Yourself. They tell you to just trust your guts.

And there isn’t a single person who doesn’t also have a knot in that very gut. The world outside always rains in. What we are on the inside isn’t all rainbows, hopes and dreams. It is also fear. We are afraid of ourselves: of who we are, of who we were, of who we want to be. We are afraid of the outside: of who hates us, of who sees us, of who doesn’t. Whatever it is that’s outside of us, it’ll come in, whether we want it or not. We trust our guts: they tell us to be afraid when we should be.

People tell us that what’s inside is the only thing that matters. What’s inside is also Fear.

And our fear is legitimate. There are predators out there who wish us harm. There are opportunists who, when lifted up, leave us on the ground. There are fires to put out in every building and our attention and energy is limited. This means that our fear is not only legitimate, but also reasonable.

To have a reason for fear is brutal, grotesque and unfair, but it’s real. It’s real, and it’s inside of us. What’s inside is the only thing that matters.

In the beginning, things were simple. We were all born naked. In the beginning, basically, we woke up.

We woke up from a sleep – who knows how long, who knows how deep – and we emerged from a real drag. In our many varied dreams, we had whole lives lived. We scaled mountains, rode bicycles through the rain, consoled friends, danced all night, broke hearts, had hearts broken; we made family, lost family, made friends, lost friends; we witnessed greatness, cowardice, doubt, insecurity, pride, bluster; we lived whole lives in our dreams.

We woke up from a long, deep sleep, and were born naked. This morning, we woke up. We were born naked.

When we look in the mirror, we look for someone there. An answer to a question. In the morning, we try to find an image of ourselves. In the beginning, we’re a face looking for a face.

The person we find in the mirror is not always who we want to see. These can be trying times, and they may last for a long time. You may see the dreams you dreamt, the family you lost, the pain you felt, the hopes you held. You may see someone who manifestly is yourself, but not You at all.

In the beginning, we dress ourselves and face the day.

So, let’s imagine a hypothetical situation where you are out, but your family is having none of it, and you worry that this is due to they themselves having to come out as well – a common phenomenon, in the same way that ‘coming out’ isn’t a single action but rather something you will be doing for the rest of your life. We’re all imagining it, right? It’s a testament to our creativity.

Your family carries a burden – we’re still in hypotheticals here – because, while you live your life and know your truth, for them it’s basically a story. A story that isn’t always very acceptable. This post is a two-part question: what is our responsibility to others coming out with us; and what sort of support can we provide to those who do?

‘You have to make it easier for us’

Do you, as a queer, trans or otherwise out-of-the-norm person, carry not only your own burden but also that of your family? Are you responsible for your mom’s happiness? For your dad’s discomfort? I’m of the mind that the answer is a big, loud fuck no. But here we are anyway. The question is how deserving they are of sympathy for putting you in that position.

If they are personally against whatever you came out as, then they’re trying to smokescreen you with excuses. But if there’s any genuine love for you, then most likely there’s a social reason. In a strong Christian environment it might be difficult to even associate with gay people. It doesn’t take a very conservative mind to be distressed with the idea of a man in women’s clothes. In a society that proudly supports the loud expression of whatever comes to mind, like the Dutch, a tranny is a tranny¹ – and even if I feel comfortable with my own life and the choices I’ve made, there is still an environment that I don’t ever move in, but that my parents work in every day.

It can certainly be difficult for family to deal with coming out, and I’m thinking a good part of this is the level to which they are informed. When they come out with you, they don’t have any of the language to support you. And so they are put on the spot in their own way: they are supposed to fight for someone they love, but they are under-equipped and need to fight back against bigots who have had plenty of experience with expressing their views. That leads me to the bigger question.

A manual for the co-outed

What is needed to turn a struggling relative into an ally? Sure, every person and every coming-out has its own story, its own deviation from the norm that needs explaining, but what’s the overarching approach to making this a shared coming-out?

Being a good ally requires education. It requires the ally to understand, at some level, the struggle that their friend, child or parent is going through, and then to turn that into protection. Because care without protection is, basically, I’m here if you ever need me, whereas care with protection is I defend you even if you’re not here. The question whether you love me enough to defend me is undercut by having to defend something you don’t understand. That’s, obviously, a tough call, especially when confronted with not only other people’s bigotry but also all sorts of internalised notions that you might not be aware of.

Any time the answer is ‘education’, I struggle to accept it. Because I think education has to come from both sides: if you don’t want to learn, you won’t. It’s also the background for one of my core sayings, which is that you can’t turn a true believer. Nobody has their minds changed forcefully. So if you already don’t believe that my existence is valid, what amount of education is going to change that?

And this is the real question, which I’d love for you to answer on Twitter or to otherwise tell me about (find me on Facebook, for example). I’d love to hear some ideas, and will try to compile some thoughts in a future post if it turns out to be worth it.

Kinky Boots is a feel-good movie turned feel-good stage production based on a presumably slightly more grounded real-life documentary about a struggling shoe factory turning to a niche market in order to survive. And for the most part, it works. The romance is predictable but cute. The hero’s journey is predictable but executed well. What I think isn’t that good is the writing of the lead woman.

Chiwetel Ejiofor shines in the part of Lola. He’s a great counterpart to Charlie, the stubborn sort of character that Joel Edgerton seems to be made for. The problem is with Lola’s portrayal. The letter of the script says she’s a drag queen, and definitely not a transvestite. Let me quote her directly: I’m not merely a transvestite, sweetheart. I’m also a drag queen. It’s a simple equation. A drag queen puts on a frock, looks like Kylie. A transvestite puts on a frock, looks like… Boris Yeltsin in lipstick.

It’s obviously written as the sort of shade a drag queen would throw, but Lola is a successful queen: she doesn’t need to attack anyone but hecklers and bastards. When she’s heckled at her own show, she not merely responds weakly, she’s actually crestfallen and retreats miserably to her dressing room.

The film in no way suggests that it is somehow not congruent for Lola to say something negative about transvestites, or to be so hurt when challenged on the fakeness of her breasts. If we’re reading the film more critically, there are a few things that should give pause, and the above quote is, to me, the core of the issue. When we read it now, eleven years later, Lola is a drag queen who doesn’t yet realise that she’s a trans woman. In this context, her remark is a statement of insecurity: ‘I am more than just the clothes I wear, unlike other men in women’s clothes’.

Can you out a fictional character? Well, here we are. It is not common for drag queens to be dressed up all of the time. Most drag queens are men who dress up for entertainment purposes – and not just as women, but as larger-than-life goddesses. Lola is always in drag. She’s always Lola. Calling her Simon – her name assigned at birth – is used as an attack, as a means of dragging her down. There certainly are drag events in this film: they are the exception in Lola’s life, not the rule. As I read it, she’s a woman first, drag queen second.

The story’s plot, ultimately, is about Charlie’s arc. His journey takes him from insecure to not so insecure. Lola is not provided the same courtesy, and it’s a missed opportunity. She never finds closure on her father, she never accepts her own identity, and we’re left to wonder what becomes of her after she quits her drag show (spoilers!).

At the end of the film, we are given the underlying moral lesson that the writers had in mind. After all the struggles, Lola is considered more of a man in a dress than Charlie will ever be as a ‘regular’ man. It seems a massive irony that this is what Lola takes away from it, but then again, she opens her show with the phrase Ladies, gentlemen and those who are yet to make up your mind. Maybe it is you, Lola, who has yet to make up your mind.