Well, hi everyone. Welcome back to the Trans
Narrative podcast. I'm Caroline.
On today's episode, we're joined by trans artist and creative's
Fox Camp and Ryan Clinkin, whose works fans visual art,
performance and storytelling. Both artists use their craft to
explore the intersections of identity, emotion, and
transformation, creating pieces that speak to the beauty, grief,
and resilience of the trans experience.
Be what you want to be that makes you happy, and spread out
the expression of what it means to be human and push that beyond
if you want what it means to be human.
And to be clear, any person who is masculine can present, you
know, flamboyantly and effeminately, like without being
gay, you know, it's just traits that we should uphold and we
should celebrate just as much. In this conversation, we discuss
how expression becomes resistance, how community feels
creativity, and how trans artistry redefines visibility
and belonging. And joining us once again, Fox
on the run. There's an old 70, something
like that. Fox Trans Welcome back.
Hi, thank you for having me again.
Thank you for being here. Gosh, I never usually introduce
after the fate of the music, but here I am, first time in a
while. Ryan Fox, welcome back to the
trans narrative. It's so good to have you both
here. So glad to be here again and
again. Yes, we love that.
So. So the last time you've been on,
which I don't know when because I, the editor, doesn't tell me
that in advance, how have you all been?
What have you been doing since we've last spoke?
Fox, let's start with you. What have you been up to since
we last had you on? I will pretend it's much longer
time than it's actually been for your editor's sake.
No, I was thinking about how how quickly life moves our it's
still June when we're recording this, but I've got booked to.
Place them now. Why'd you tell them that they
spoiled the the the the illusion?
The illusion OK, well, we can cut that out right and just.
No, because I'm going to forget to cut that a little part.
OK, I've got some DJ gigs coming up for Pride later on in the
summer. I've got a bunch of like I do, I
do work for nonprofits and a lot of like video and editing work
for like government and not exclusively queer nonprofits,
but people working in nonprofit space that often helps with like
that overlaps with queer activism or indigenous activism
and anti poverty. So I've got a lot going on
there. Still working on the book.
Hopefully it's it's happened too close together.
I want to be like I got the book done.
But yeah, I'm working on working on our third anomalous
transmissions collection. And yeah, I think that that's it
with me. Ryan, where have you been
getting up to? Kicked off Pride season and have
been in drag a lot. Got to do Sea Lord Pride in
their golf cart parade and performed in the show called Men
At Work. And then coming up in the next
two weeks I have my show that I host, King Awakening and we're
having our showcase for the young baby kings that are coming
up in our community. We do the showcase the month
after we host a workshop, so it gives them some time to get
their stuff together. And then I'm actually a winner
of a karaoke competition here called Pride Idol.
So I'll be singing on mainstage for Pride Saint Louis Festival
and working with Jordan Braxton on a protest March the Saturday
of Pride. And then we'll be in the Pride
parade that Sunday. And I had a really good brunch
today with my friend who I haven't gotten to see in a
while, so that was really, really nice.
Love a good brunch? I love a good brunch too.
So Ryan, tell me, how has your relationship with gender change
since we last had you on? Gender has been good, gender I
it's been good. I'm coming up on my one year
post op from getting my hysterectomy done, so I noticed
since. Thank you.
I, it was, it was a really great decision.
So I finally feel like all my hormones have settled because my
body does not produce any estrogen anymore because I did
a, a total hysterectomy with an opherectomy, which means they
removed the ovaries as well. And I feel really settled in
that I healed up really well. I've got minimal scarring from
where they inserted the the scope and the the little
microbot arms that they use everything with.
They stick that scope in your belly button, by the way.
Oh, it's like a matrix in a bad way.
It kind of so I'm looking. Good way.
But yeah, now I got that bug in my head.
Yeah, I'm looking forward to celebrating my one year post op
for that. And I'm coming up on nine, yeah,
nine years on testosterone and in February, which is, you know,
still about 8 months off, but the years seem to be flying by,
honestly. Congratulations.
That's it. Thank you, Fox.
How about you, I? Have been moving more and more
towards just a full time, identifying full time as a
woman. I think especially when it comes
to CIS hat people outside of the queer community.
I like, I think transition for a lot of us, at least in my case,
like I knew kind of kind of where my my goal and where my
like where dysphoria was pushing me and what kind of my goal for
transition was. And I left a lot of grace for
people to kind of like figure that out on their own time.
And part of that was being like, yeah, you can use they them
pronouns. That's fine.
And now I'm because then if you do that and you're a trans woman
and you're like, sometimes I'm a tomboy, though.
And I'll get people. They will never use she her.
They'll always use they, which is a thing and a feeling and
being like, I don't like that. I think that's, that's a big
aspect of it. And also just like I've been on
hormones for this year, will be 6 years in October and I'm
finally really happy with what's going on with my body.
Probably for the first time ever, I can look at myself and
put clothes on and be like, I'm very comfortable in this.
And, and when I was doing like kind of the long hair,
androgynous, but like a mab kind of leaning stuff, I was not also
super comfortable. So that's kind of been a big
change. I think that it's drifting more
towards that identity or moving more towards that identity.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that's it.
That's all I can say about that. I have not really had the
opportunity to get some of the some of the surgical
interventions I'd like. Specifically getting hair room
for my face. That would be fantastic.
That's a major source of dysphoria.
But I got nice boobs, so I'll take the trade off.
That was that was free, government supplied.
OK, I'm done. Come on Canada, giving us the
hormones. Yeah, they pay for them in your
low income too. It's great.
As long as you're on the pills. You don't get the shots for
free. Oh, the United States needs to
catch up with that. Yeah, yeah.
We also like not to like be. There's a lot of American
listeners. Canada's healthcare system isn't
perfect, but it does lots of things immeasurably better than
yours. So change that I.
Feel like we've been trying to, but we keep ending up with not
great politicians that keep trying to ban any kind of
healthcare for everybody. Yeah, when a third of your
country is just like, bad luck, better die, you're like kind of
screwed. So I have to ask because I
prefer the term trans mask for myself but like in public I say
like trans man or trans male. Are you at the point where like
you prefer trans woman over like trans femme?
Yeah. And I think that really depends
on the audience that I'm dealing with.
As far as as far as as far as the general public goes, I
prefer to be introduced as a trans woman who is non binary
and is, you know, primarily FEMA presenting.
And like, when you're dealing with queer people, you're
dealing with the LGBTQ community and discussing identity and
presentation and transition and like the intersection between
all those things, there's a huge discussion to be had.
But when it's people that you're just introducing to the idea of
transis and like, you know, when you're in trans spaces, queer
spaces, you know, all sorts of trans people and all sorts of
identities. And it's easy, easy, really easy
to forget that most sis have people.
You're the only trans person that they know, they know, you
know. So there's a big, big difference
in between how I mediate identity with the public and how
I mediate identity with with queer spaces, in queer spaces.
And part of that's because, yeah, go ahead.
So I so actually, so Ryan, so Ryan, let me ask you this
question. So how has, how has disability
shaped your understanding of masculinity, transness in your
drag performances? Let's kind of get into kind of
what you wanted to talk about today a little bit, which was,
you know, advocacy in the disability community and the
intersection of that within queer and trans community.
So for me personally, I actually only recently was diagnosed with
what we would consider like a disability literally within the
last. Like I don't even think it's
been a full six weeks at this point.
I had a back injury that's now caused me and I got the back
injury almost 10 years ago, but it's caused me to develop
osteoarthritis, other known otherwise known as degenerative
disc disease. I have that.
Yeah, more people have it than I realize, but I'm 26 years old
and when I was looking up a lot of people that do end up getting
it, they are not in my age range.
So in my lower lumbar my the cushioning between the discs and
my spine is deteriorating, I hope not rather rapidly, but
rapid enough that it's causing a significant amount of pain,
which actually does not present in my back at all.
It presents all in my left hip and shoots pain all the way down
my leg. So there's days that I have to
walk with a cane and there's days that I'm perfectly OK.
And I feel like how that's intersected not only with like
how I do drag, but with my trans identity is it's given me, I
would even say more community. My best friend Wes is somebody
who was born with a tethered spinal cord.
And you know, they are somebody that talks about being trans and
disabled and has been such a like perfect person to lean on.
I'm still kind of navigating how this impacts my transness.
But as far as like drag goes, I kind of have to slow it down a
little bit. I'm I go a little hardcore, you
know, getting the windmill windmill donkey kicks in.
I was performing last night and actually did a like from my
knees, did a full back bend and got done with a number and said,
oh, I should not have done that. I burnt.
Yeah. So I, I think I'm still just
learning how to work my body now, now having like the pain
that I do and the diagnosis that I got.
I have some friends who have like similar degenerative back
problems, a little bit older, but like not that much older.
And yeah, it's seeing what they go through and this challenges
and accommodations that are required to go through something
like that is a lot. So I feel for you and I really
hope that you've can manage the contours of it without too much
trouble. Yeah, I'm still kind of
struggling at times to consider myself disabled.
I I think we have such a black and white view of what
disabilities are. And so automatically you think
of like somebody always on a cane or always on crutches or
always in a wheelchair. But for me, it it with how I
said, you know, I'm sometimes on a cane and sometimes I'm not.
Sometimes I feel like I'm like getting looked at, like I'm
faking it on the days that I don't need my cane and that kind
of stuff. That's a story I've heard a lot
from people who who have disabilities like that, who who
have like what hidden disabilities or whatever they
call invisible disabilities is. Kind of what I've been calling
it. Yeah, where?
Yeah, Sometimes you're totally capable, sometimes you're not.
I was in a car accident 09 years or so ago now and I was lucky to
be mostly OK, but there's still like some structural issues that
come up for me. And there are days where like I
will have slept funny or exerted myself the wrong way the day
before. And then just like we're sitting
too long with bad posture and I just cannot, I have to take a
day and just lie in bed and stretch and like, do body care
because otherwise it's not, I won't be functional.
I can, I can appreciate that. And also like, I know I've been
in all sorts of different specifically performance venues
because not just for queer people obviously, but like so
many queer, queer performance venues specifically are not
really that accessible because. They're not.
You're putting them wherever you can, you know, like we got cheap
rent on this like 60 year old bar that has a little stage, but
like, you know, it's down a flight of steps and then up a
flight of steps. And no, we can't put a ramp in.
We don't have any money or space or whatever, you know that kind
of. Brian, do you feel there's
pressure within the community to push towards, push through pain
to be seen or validated? How do you resist that?
Honestly, I feel like resisting it is actively, you know,
talking about the pain that I face.
I know I'm not the only entertainer in my area that is
disabled. My good friend Vincent Vandal,
who's also a drag king, he has EDS Allerdanlow syndrome and
he's been got an amazing support since I got my diagnosis as
well. He Co hosted the trans power
hour with me the other day and he said he's made it a point to
at the end of the show, if he's hurting, he's going to come out
on his cane. And he said, you know, I don't
want to hide. I don't want to.
And, and of course I'm you know the gist of what he said.
Of course, that he said, I think it's OK to be an entertainer and
present and do what I need to do, but still also talk about
how this impacts my body. And you know, him and another
colleague of mine, Moxie Cotton Rose, who has a permanent broken
bone in her foot. It's one of the, I don't know
exactly what bone it is, but it's like it's just never going
to heal is my understanding. And she talks about living with
that as well and the pain that that causes.
I think if we're more open and honest about where we're at
personally, I think it makes more people comfortable to talk
about what kind of pain they're in.
So you said, you know, you, you had mentioned about receiving
your diagnosis recently and I know what that's like because I
had a car accident in 2018. It was only in 2023 that my
doctor was like, oh, well, we found this note from your
accident years ago that said it's this disease.
And I said, oh, that would have been helpful to know, you know,
And there was this like, you know, there's like this sense of
grief and also a relief. How has, how has naming this
helped you relate to yourself differently?
Understanding what it is that you're actually going through?
Because 10 years you've dealt with this, but you've only now
recently come to understand what it is.
Yeah, the pain I felt in the last 10 years, it kind of goes
it's it was on and off until more so this year.
I always had, you know, what I would call flare ups in the
winter. And so you know, I, I always
knew from my previous back injury that my, my back never
healed correctly because my original injury I knocked, I
just got a place in my spine and it pressed a nerve that shot
pain down my hip. And so I did, you know, X-rays
and Mr. is on my hips and they couldn't find anything.
So I did physical therapy for my spine and in doing excuse me for
my hips and in doing that knocks the two other discs out of place
in my spine. So I had to see, I think it was
four or five different specialists before we found it.
And at that point I was on crutches pretty consistently.
And after they realized that it was my spine and they found the
disc slipped, I was in a back brace for a while.
And then I, I thought it was going to be generally, you know,
OK, I was a 1718 years old when this originally happened.
And now having the pain that I do, which is more intense than
my original back injury, I was kind of heartbroken because I, I
felt like it's taken a lot out of me, you know, I can't do
nearly as much as I used to be able to.
So when my pain started consistently showing up after
the winter of this this past winter, I went to my doctor and
I said, look, I don't know what this is.
Can we do X-rays? Can we do Mr. Is?
Can we do whatever we can? And it didn't help.
We had an ice storm here. And I fell on the ice three
times because Saint Louis did such a poor job of like
preparing us for that storm. So I thought maybe, you know, I
just slipped another desk. And so we did X-rays on my hips
to make sure that I didn't fracture anything when I fell
and nothing came back. It looked pretty standard.
But when we did the X-rays on my spine, my doctor found the
deterioration between the discs and I was relieved to have that
diagnosis. Absolutely.
But I've been slowly grieving. What I thought I was going to
spend the rest of my life with in my body because I don't I'm
not harsh on my body by any means unless I'm performing and
I go maybe a little too hard. But it's grieving for me on this
has looked a little up and down because I have such an amazing
support system. I feel like I haven't been, you
know, too down on myself, but I still have these moments of, you
know, I won't be able to walk pretty consistently without
being in pain. I can't, you know, just go out
and do whatever without taking my pain meds with me.
I usually have to take my pain meds about once or twice a day
to function. And even on the days that I do
have to take it twice, sometimes I'm still in a significant
amount of pain. So it's, it's non consistent on
where I'm at. Honestly, I think as soon as
they find you're not able bodied enough to do something that
you're not worth having around. Luckily my my day job doesn't
feel that way. I've been pretty open with them
since getting my diagnosis and and telling them when I'm
having, you know, worse pain days than others of like, hey, I
can't lift this. Like I, I work in a kitchen
right now for a local BBQ chain and I'll, I'll tell them
straight up like I can't lift that 50 LB bag of onions today.
Like if you can get me some help.
So I'm I'm lucky in that aspect, but absolutely, like if you
aren't able to put your body through the most, then it's kind
of like get out of the way, which really sucks.
Capitalism just kind of really sucks.
Yeah, what? What kind of care is capitalism
incapable of providing, especially for for people with
disabilities, especially trans people with disabilities?
Exactly. Yeah.
Yeah, I mean. I'm asking you, I was asking
Ryan, like what way? Like what are like, what are
some things that care that that that that that like capitalism
is capable of providing like? I'm going to be real, I at this
point I'm unsure like I if you're not able bodied enough
and you're not sis like I, is there anything that really can
provide? Yeah.
And I think let me. Oh, sorry, go ahead.
I think that really speaks to this.
When we talk about intersectionality, a lot of
people don't really have a great grasp of what that means
specifically. But I think when you start to
talk about like layered exclusion is a really good way
of looking at it. Because maybe you're not able
bodied, but you're CIS hat and you have a specialization that
doesn't require you to do physical labor capitalism.
And you you only have that one intersection.
But the second you know you're queer and disabled, then you
know there might be two different reasons why you won't
get a job that you're otherwise qualified for, right?
Like either if the disability doesn't disqualify you, the fact
that you're queer might be. And if you're queer and black
and disabled, then the first two don't disqualify you, but you
might not get hired because you're a black person and you
make this company uncomfortable for whatever reason, right?
And that's a good way to talk about, it's a good way to
understand for people how intersections work.
Sometimes it's like they all interconnect to make life harder
for you. But sometimes when you don't
have the other things that are holding you back, it's enough.
It's something that'll just come in and shut the door for you.
I'm pretty good at having put together diverse spaces.
My, my method, which is not everybody's method, which is to
just kind of like, at least in this, this is specifically in
the spaces that I moderate, it's been to be tolerant, do the
paradox of tolerance thing where you're tolerance of essentially
everything except intolerance and to only step in if there's
like interpersonal conflict or if somebody is like really steps
over a line. And a lot of that comes from
just like I, I am not a rule maker and I don't like enforcing
them. So in more organized spaces
where you're dealing with the general public, and this is, you
know, a big deal here in queer spaces in Vancouver is being
inclusive and intersectional and having that kind of at the
forefront of the organizing style and the inclusion.
And like, like we're moving away from exclusively, you know, sis
gay bars here. There's still, you know, there's
still, there's still businesses that cater more explicitly
towards like the bath houses that cater specifically towards
primarily sis gay men. But by and large, like the
entertainment, queer entertainment here is a lot more
diverse. People are actively going and
seeking out of drag kings and trans mask performers and
specifically trans performers to put and trans people of color to
headline their events and kind of more generally be celebrated
directly by the organizations and the venues that that we're
participating in. Instead of just kind of like
trying to fight the cliquishness that can happen.
I think when you start to silo identities like that, which is
good. We're also like the disability
conversation that's been been focused on.
There are challenges, absolutely, especially like I
kind of mentioned with venues and things like that, making
sure they're accessible can be really, really challenging.
Some of the more prominent trans run spaces in the city do their
best to kind of minimize that, which is really good to see.
I think some of the things that come up for me that are
difficult are when you have like competing needs, especially
disability needs. Like there's, I don't wear
glasses anymore, but I wore glasses for most of my life and
I was lucky enough to get laser eye surgery.
And I have, I still part of that is that like people don't really
think of vision loss and that's how like if you're blind, you're
disabled. But I was like unable to make
out features on my hand like 3 inches in front of my face.
So going from that to being in good light, full sight and in
bad light, having a lot of difficulty making things out and
seeing things and then competing with people who have like light
sensitivities and trying to, you know, create a space that meets
everybody's needs is play unilaterally is hard.
And I think that the best organizing spaces that I've been
in are the ones that recognize that every identity and every
individual has different accessibility needs or identity
care needs. Whether that's, you know, trans
masked people who have different who have different transition
care requirements from trans feminine people who have
different transition care requirements from non binary
people or like however you fall under the umbrella, whatever
your individual needs are, they don't always overlap and they
occasionally conflict. And I think finding space in our
organizations and communities to be grace, to have the grace to
give everybody some time and some space where their needs are
being met and their identities are being centered.
I am so you know, in Fox specifically, you know, your
work critiques media packages for the, you know, queerness for
the masses. So and, and, and in your
performances, Ryan, you know, you've, you've mentioned
performing through pain and reclaiming joy.
I, I wonder, you know, what does gender like?
What does it look like outside of, of these rigid ways?
And more importantly, I guess, Ryan, I want to start with you.
How has how has capitalism specifically shaped, you know,
how you look at how we should dress, speak and and even
perform? I think in, in my experience,
in, in the masculine experience, at least capitalism is shaped
how we view masculinity is very rigid like it.
And I think that's where we get a lot of our critique of like
effeminate men and like assuming automatically that if you know
you have any effeminate or flamboyant traits, that somebody
is gay. And while, yes, often times that
is true, if you are not meeting that one like rigid, this is
what a man knows and he looks like he's from corporate
America, then it's it's seen as like less valid, if that makes
sense. And that's where I like, I like
to out of drag in drag. I I play with and toy with
effeminate traits all the time. Like I I like to say, you know,
in my makeup, yeah, I draw on a mustache and a goatee and some
thick ass eyebrows, but I do my eyeshadow more effeminate.
I do, you know, I wear highlighter that like, pops and
glitters. I think capitalism really
affected me at the beginning of when I started performing
because I was not doing that nearly as much.
I wasn't putting on the illusion, more of a gay man.
And to be clear, any person who is masculine can present, you
know, flamboyantly and effeminately, like without being
gay. You know, it's just traits that
we should uphold and we should celebrate just as much.
And there's a whole aside of how capitalism has affected, you
know, performance communities because there are some people
that are drag entertainers for a living.
I am unfortunately not one of those people.
That's kind of a hobby that, yeah, I make a good little bit
of money here and there. But I if I'm making sense, I
think that's how it affects more of a masculine side.
Yeah. So, you know, Fox as a writer
and storyteller, you know, how do you, how do you build futures
that don't mimic the systems that we're trying to break away
from? It's a lot of imagination, I
think that. So there's this, this idea when
it comes to capitalism to tie us all together.
Most people can't imagine a world without capitalism, right?
Most people living today, it's it's like this concept called
capitalist realism. Even though a lot of people, you
know, hate it, they can't imagine a world where it doesn't
exist. Which is why so much of our like
futurism. Science fiction is dystopian in
the way that it is because nobody is.
Very few people at least are looking forward and going.
What does it look like? What for the system look like
without capitalism? There's a couple authors if you
like sci-fi who do it. Kim Stanley Robinson probably
bumps to mind. That's the most obvious example
of a leftist sci-fi writer who who tries to do that.
He wrote the Red Mars series, which is about a Mars colony
that goes through a undergoes a revolution and then comes out as
like a socialist society on a planetary scale.
And then there's some subsequent books from that.
And this is actually super relevant.
We'll talk about one of his stories is it's like 2312, I
think it's called. I'm going to look and it is
2312. So, you know, 300 years in the
future, humanity is essentially colonized the solar system.
And for some people who in that world they have like, you know,
when you're a he's again sits that man writing this.
So it's not, you know, coming from a queer perspective
specifically, but the two main characters.
One of them is not openly said but it's neurodivergent and
they're both I think 1 was I'm going to use these terms because
it's what I have available. One is AMAB, 1 is AFAB and they
both have they both identify with their assigned gender at
birth, but they also both had like gender care that provided
them with like the other set of reproductive organs and both had
like sired children and both had born children.
And then when the yeah, this is an adult show, then they fuck
and they do the whole like hermaphrodite kink thing.
Do I want to say that? No, but that's what happens in
the sex. Do I want to say it's kink?
No, but that's what happens in the scene that he writes.
He writes and it was read that pretty early on in my transition
and was kind of like he may not get it, but at least, you know,
he's doing something interesting with gender in a society where
like that shit doesn't matter is really, you know, you turn
people people are also living to be hundreds of years old.
They have, you know, brought wide-ranging experiences that
are not necessarily focused on how much profit they're
generating for a system, how what the value of their labor
is. And I think like that all
together in a package is such a brilliant vision for an anti
capitalist future and not a capitalism free and not an anti
capitalist future, A capitalism free future where like where
hard work is something that you can do if you want to.
But there's just as much value in taking the slow route and
meeting the people and smelling the roses along the way and
enjoying the small moments of life and creativity and art and
the pursuit of excellence without the promise of reward.
Yeah. And this book.
It's pretty good. They go surfing on like Saturn's
rings or something. It's crazy book.
That sounds really cool. Yeah, it is.
It is kind of like the final sequel, I guess, sequel to the
Red Mars series because it's set in the same universe just years
later, hundreds of years later. And so when I'm doing my own,
I'm going to, sorry, I'm kind of talking a bit here.
But so when I'm doing my own writing, and I guess this ties a
little bit into the post genderism, which I think I think
there's a level to which that we need to abolish the strictures
of what you're assigned gender at birth is and what that
implies for you and the pressure put on you by society and the
people in your life to conform to your assigned gender at
birth. I think that we can do without.
I think that I think that a totally androgynous society
would also be boring. So so I don't think that like
gender abolition to the point of saying, well, we no longer have
this like hyper because you know, what would have not to,
what would have drag would kind of cease to exist.
These ideas of these stylized gender performances and playing
with this breadth of human experience.
I don't think flattening that into androgyny.
Think about like gender without identity, like what is gender
without like, what is gender? What is our relationship?
You know, what would drag me in a world that that didn't, you
know, I guess you could say like to modify gender to this sense
of like rigid, rigid rigidity. You know, what would we would we
like? And I don't see this is because
you got to be careful when you do this because this is where
like the turfs come in and they're going to hijack our
language here and then they can turn it against us.
So like this question of like, if we lived in a world where we
were all free to be free of ourselves and we didn't identify
ourselves with our genitals or, you know, lack thereof, like.
Would the terms trans and queer and things like that?
What would our relationship to community be, you know, outside
of of that, you know, and, and, and it's of course that just
intersects with everything else. Like what's a world without, you
know, consumerism? What's a world without
colonization? What's a you know, and it's, you
got to start somewhere, right? You know, so it's, it's and, and
I think that, you know, your work Fox really encapsulates
like this, this this vision of, of a world that that it's
outside of this and sees humanity as it is and not as a
function of, of somebody else's like need to accumulate late
control, you know. Yeah, I definitely, a lot of my
work right now is, is I think that's the stuff that I'm
specifically working on at this moment is trying to break free
of that. Something I like to think a lot
about is that, you know, any individual has the potential to
become anything right, regardless of where they start.
And I think that that is what I would like to see when I
consider the abolition of gender.
Like you are born as a human and you do you want to become like,
you know, oh God, I want to use that example.
Do do you want to become like a cool dude bartender and like
come up with new drinks and stuff?
Do you want to become like a badass, sexy, what was the movie
in the 90s Coyote ugly bartender?
Do you want to be somebody who it's like, it doesn't matter, do
what you do What become the person that you want to become
based on this like wide diversity.
But also that might be so like reading over some of the post
genderism stuff and being like, you know, we've, I I'm on board
until it gets to like a future where, you know, all
reproduction is done through assisted reproduction as opposed
to people actually having sex for reproduction purposes.
And like there. Yeah.
The whole, I think the ability
for anybody to fill any role in a family or in a society without
being restricted by a gender role that was placed on them
without their consent. That's what I think of when I
think of that. It's the involuntary aspect of
it. Yeah, You know, that
fundamentally gets to me. Not that somebody wants to be
like a bombshell or a cool dude or a androgynous swamp creature.
Like be what you want to be that makes you happy and like, spread
out the expression of what it means to be human and push that
beyond if you want what it means to be human.
But if that make people angry when you're like.
And specifically, the work I'm working on right now is
ultimately A transhumanist fable because that's where my
characters end up is in is in a transhuman form that posts not
even posthuman form. Humans still exists.
We're given the opportunity, you know, even in a world where you
could do that, people are still going to choose to be human
because being human is still a beautiful, magical, wonderful
thing. And I don't think that like, I
don't think that deliberately pushing all that away is, is
necessarily the way we should go.
But we, we do need to be in a position of, I've long held the
position that as long as society, society needs to
support the individual in growing and the individual needs
to support society in growing. And if you have that interplay,
then you have healthy communities.
Absolutely. Do you find that a lot of the
people that are, you know, saying like just touching on
what you were saying are very similar to the people that are
like, no, can get pride, no leather of pride, that are very
uneducated, they're very young, and that they would rather
almost gatekeep in certain ways because they think the community
should look this one specific way or that pride should look
this one specific way. Do you think those are
connected? I think every trans person,
every queer person at some point or another has run into whether
it's inter community violence or extra community violence, this
idea or internalized am I queer enough?
Am I trans enough? Does this person not think I'm
trans? Does this person not accept my
identity? And you're not alone in that.
And I mean like. Even asserting your own needs
and identities around and being like, this is what it means to
me to be a trans woman or this is what you know, this is, these
are the things I do to deal with this for you.
Because for whatever reason, you know, like I have some friends
who who need to like do pretty extreme hair removal that feel
comfortable in their bodies. And I know people who just don't
give a fuck who both identify as trans women and they're both
valid, right? Like the you're both women.
Women have this broad swath. There's no one way to do it.
What it kind of boils down to is like, what, what are you
identifying as and just accepting that?
And the, the things that I where I start to kind of go and you
know, I've seen communities where there are trans people
going like that person is using the language of transness to
cause harm to the rest of us. And I'm like, I may not like to
hang out with that person, but I'm not going to deny they're
transness because, you know, you know, just because they're using
terms for themselves. And maybe they're even acting
like chasers, which is totally a thing that can happen within the
trans community where you get trans people fetishizing other
trans people and sexually fetishizing other trans people
and themselves. Or they're doing it because they
want to get attention from, you know, a certain subset, a subset
of the Systec community that they feel will give them
validation. I'm not going to go and tell
that person that they're not trans, so they're not part of
the trans umbrella or that their identity is invalid.
I think there's space to be like, hey, you know, when you go
and tell people that you're a slur and you're, or like, you
know, you identify closely with Blanchard's typology or
something like that, and you go, yeah, I.
Think. You're kind of reinforcing and
and then like selling that for money, you're kind of, and
you're like, hey, you know, that's kind of reinforcing a
whole bunch of negative stereotypes about me
specifically. And then people are going to
like that, I think, is a conversation that can be had in
the community without invalidating their identities.
I think that the I think that problematic people deserve to be
held accountable as the problematic person that they say
they are. I think that they're owed
because if somebody, because listen, I thought my whole life
to be who I am, damn it. If I'm problematic in some
degree, please address it to me at least as the woman that I am,
right? Like, you know, to invalidate
who I am as a person. That just reinforces again,
these these rigid, you know, heteronormativity of ways of
living. So.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I can appreciate that.
And especially too like don't misgender people because you
disagree with them, right? It's not it's like this the you
can't don't punish people by making their inclusion or their
their validation or whatever conditional on people performing
a certain way. Like that is not something that
not something that I was brought up in the trans community to do
or brought up as a person to do. And yeah, and I think too, like
not just with TikTok, but real life and other situations,
people will conflate personal conflict with like attacks on
identity and stuff like that. And that is also a big problem.
I, I think, I think anybody who's been in any social,
especially social subcultures for long enough, this isn't just
queer subcultures, but you like run into somebody you don't
like. And then that person is like, or
like you run into a person you have some conflict with over
something that has nothing to do with your identity or your
intersections. But then it's kind of that it's
kind of becomes about that they're like, in order to harm
you, they're like, this person is a transphobe.
They said transphobic things. This person is actually really
harmful and bad, but it's just because they don't like you for
whatever reason, or you had a conflict and, and the conflict
has nothing to do with this, but in order to like keep you from
community, they will do that kind of thing because they know
it's harmful. And yeah, there's this.
Go ahead. One of the things my, my, my
probably greatest and only contribution to the the field of
sociology. But every subculture reproduces
the flaws and features of the dominant culture in unique ways.
That includes queer cultures and, you know, other, other
subcultures like the king community or the furry community
or the gaming community or whatever.
They all have unique ways of reproducing, you know,
capitalist, patriarchal, gendered perspectives.
It's not a world without expression.
I think it's a world where expression is no longer like
policed or marketed, you know, like it's it's a space that
imagines a world for all of us and can be free without the
conditions of what it means to be, you know, and I just have
really enjoyed this conversation today with both of you.
You know, it's been a long time since we've had an episode where
I've talked more than you know, and this is I enjoyed these
panel types episodes and Fox, I've really enjoyed you being
here and Ryan, I've enjoyed you being here and audience, you
know, if you're interested in in participating and having your
voice heard on this program, please e-mail us at
transnarrativepodcast@gmail.com. That's
transnarrativepodcast@gmail.com. And more importantly, I want to
thank the audience for being here and showing up week after
week and giving us your time and your attention and, and
supporting us and being here and, and, and, and helping us
write the trans narrative week after week.
And Ryan, thank you for being here.
Thank us. Thank you for giving us your
time. Caroline, thank you for having
me again. I enjoyed our last podcast
together and I really enjoyed this one.
Well, thank you for being here, Fox.
Fox can thank you so much for returning once more.
I appreciate my pleasure. Thank you.
It's. Nice to get to chat with you
too, Ryan. It was really interesting to
hear it was. Great to meet you, Fox.
Yeah. So we've both all of us have
kind of talked about like this expansiveness within us this
yearning to at least for me to, to, to be free from the confines
of what the system demands from us.
And I want to ask both of you before we depart, I think, I
think I'll ask Fox 1st and then Ryan in one sentence.
What? Who are you becoming in this
moment right now? Wow, that's so hard.
See, Ryan, you have to think about it.
Yeah, you put me on the spot, I think.
I think I'm really kind of growing into what the witches
witches would call a Crone role. Kind of like I've, I've turned
40 this year and I'm really focused on creating healthy,
supportive structures for the people who I care about in
communities that I care about and providing, you know,
knowledge and guidance and support and hopefully material
support. And that's kind of, you know, a
big departure from being younger and more aggressive in terms of
fighting for like getting people to see my way.
Exactly. And, you know, going out and
yelling for change instead of planting a garden and, and
nurturing it. That's been a big shift.
I think both obviously have their place and I don't at all
regret where I've been or like, and I absolutely support people
who are still on that journey because it takes the whole
community to do to empower change.
But I think that's been the real shift for me lately is moving
into more of a like responsible role as opposed to a little bit
more of a wild card role. How?
About you, Ryan. Oh, I think, oh, this is a too
broad of a question for such a specific answer.
But I'm working on being probably disabled and being that
visibility as a trans person, as a drag entertainer, as a
community leader and like as a, as a like trans mask person.
Specifically being that visible reminder for somebody else or
that visible person for somebody else that they can say like, oh,
he's making it through. I can do that too.
I think that's where I'm going with things.
Yes, inspiration time. Brian Cox, audience, thank you
all for being here and and giving us your time.
And before we go briefly, Fox, what is the message that you'd
like to leave our audience with as we carry on into this week?
Yeah, go out there, be weird, be yourself, let your freak flag
fly. Create the life you want and the
body you want and the personality you want and
celebrate it. Because you are literally one in
a billion. There'll never be another one
like you and you need to honor. That Ryan what's what would you
like to leave our audience with? You're the, you know, fade us
off into our music. What's What would you like to
leave our audience with? Oh my favorite go to always is
be gay, do crime but don't actually get in trouble.
Just be gay, be happy, be queerly yourself.
Like just go out and don't let anybody get you down.