I want political campaigns to understand that my sexual and gender identities are not the sole source of my identity and certainly not the sole source of my backing of a political canditate. So, yes, your canditate might be phenomenal on trans* issues, when none of the other canditates really have much of anything at all to say, but if you canditate doesn't have much to say about the health care issue other than the slogan 'medicare for all', then I start to get suspicious. When I try to discuss with you how what's really needed is a comprehensive overhaul of the way that medicine is practiced in this country, and you hurry up and get off the phone with me, I'm not going to back your candidate. Period. I don't care how fabulous he is on trans* issues, I trust some of the other candidates to rise to the occassion when given a chance.
I want political volunteers to understand what when you think touting glbT issues should be the main point of our conversation, when I've already moved past ... I'm not going to vote for you candidate. I'm not a single issues voter. I never have been. I'm not about to start now. I'm not about to take everything else that defines me and toss it to the wayside for one thing about me. Is it important? Yes, it's very important. It's why I stopped voting Republican, right after they told me I wasn't a real person. I'm not going to get into the delicacies of what is/isn't a trans*American, except to say that yes, I see myself myself in that group, and yes, Rien IS my name, even if it's not legally so, and yes, I like zie/hir when describing me, but if you absolutely have to gender me, most of the time I prefer male genderisms. But that's not the point.
The point is, I also care about schools. I care about health care a lot more than that. Gay marriage doesn't really apply to me right now. Yes, I'd love for everyone to get married, but I'd also like there to be discussion on genderqueer and trans*Americans and how they matter too. And how the 14th Amendment just as equally applies to them as anyone else. Religion and personal squicks should not come into the discussion. If you defend free speech, you should be defending trans* rights.
I want campaigns (a very specific one) to understand that Medicare For All is a great slogan, but what about the fact that I was under my father's private insurance, but it just stopped at the St. Croix river because of arbitrary boundary lines? Why can't we discuss erradicating those lines and make insurance provide full coverage across the United States? Why can't we discuss tort reform? How doctors are billed? How patients are seen? Why if you go to Abbott Hospital with psychiatric issues you can wait up to 12 hours for a bed? Why aren't we discussing the personal stories, ways in which people have gotten screwed? Why can't we discuss the silent majority, the ones who have too high of premiums, but haven't had a medical tragedy yet? And ... how are we going to pay for it? Let's dicuss how to pay for these changes your canditate wants to make.
Let's discuss schools too - especially here in MN. Let's discuss national graduation rates versus MN graduation rates. Let's discuss funding for higher education - let's discuss the way that the future of America are consistently getting screwed by student loans. Let's discuss the economy and deficits and why why cutting GAMC is bad, and what to do about it instead.
Let's not assume, when I answer the phone and tell you that I am Rien and that I prefer sir, that GLBT is the core of my political existence.
I want everyone - and not just political campaigns - to understand being genderqueer and trans* is who I am. But there's so much more to me than that.
25 February 2010
15 February 2010
rape and blame (again. and again. and again.)
trigger warning: rape
Must we go over this again? Must we? Dear humanity, you fucking suck. No love, me.
Let's break it down, as it were.
"A majority of women believe some rape victims should take responsibility for what happened"
I just ... what? WHAT? WHAT THE EVERLOVINGFUCK?
Let me tell you something. It is NEVER a woman's fault when someone else lays claim to her body. EVER. Does not matter how drunk she is, what she was wearing, what she said two hours ago. NO IS NO. Period. No-one has the right to her body, and we shouldn't be okay with the fact that we live in a society that clearly seems to perpetuate this idea that there are times when a woman doesn't have a right to her own body, that victim blaming is okay, that women are somehow 'at fault' for their rapes.
I'm too tired, and too angry, and too sick of dealing with this to offer up my rapes again. I can't emotionally do it again, break them down, spit out all the pieces for the world to see. I just can't do it. But I've struggled over and over again with the idea that it wasn't my fault, that I didn't deserve it, and that no-one but me has the right to my body and what happens to it. This? This makes it harder. A majority of women in the UK, according to that survey, would blame me, in some part, for what happened.
I'm not going to sit here and defend those nights and my choices in them. Because you know what? IT WASN'T MY FAULT, NOT EVEN A LITTLE BIT. I didn't consent and there is where it all ends. I didn't consent, game over. Period. End of conversation. There's no bloody fucking need to dig down and analyse what I was wearing, or what I said, or how I fucking existed inside of a space at any given time. Because to do that is to suggest that there exist circumstances in which I forfeit my body. And I refuse to accept that. Absolutely refuse to accept that. No matter what, I still retain the rights to my body.
There is no 'responsibility' to be had on me. Let's do this society, and a future society all a favour and start placing the blame SOLELY where it belongs. And that's on the men who did this to me, the men who do this, the perpetrators, and not the women. Not the ones who have had something stolen from them, but the stealers. I won't get into what was taken. I won't get into the devastation of my soul, the way I don't get to be made whole again. I won't, because I've done that, and I'm sick of it. I'm sick of defending myself. I'm sick of the fact that it's with people that I love, and yes, some of them are women. I'm sick of constantly living in a world where it is my fault. BECAUSE IT'S NOT AND IT NEVER WAS! [Maybe if I scream it loud enough, people will wake the fuck up.]
I'm sick and sick and sick and sick. And the saddest part? I don't know how to change a thing. I don't know how to make the world see that someone who doesn't consent isn't at fault. I don't know how to end the cycle of victim blaming. I don't know how to stop men and women from perpetuating that how a woman dresses or acts is groundwork for what might happen to her. I'm sick of thanking men for acting like decent human beings, because to do so is to increase their power over me. I'm sick of how defining this is, of how it doesn't go away. I'm sick of all the little times I feel guilted into thinking something must have been my fault. I'm sick of screaming IT'S NOT MY FAULT, because that should be a given.
I don't even know what to say anymore, I don't know how to start. I don't know how to say Lara took Timothy's 'side' and my mother just blamed me without seeing red and wanting to punch walls and throw up. I don't know how to tell of how many people yelled at me after the rape at 18 to go to the police. And the number who blamed me, somehow, for being a scared 18 year old, who didn't go to the police, who kept it hidden for two years. I don't know how to fully understand the fact that there is no justice for that. Because there wasn't, and even with Timothy there wasn't justice, not really.
And every day that a woman thinks that I need to bear some responsibility for what happened is a day that justice continues to cease to exist. It's so terribly unfair, over and over and over again.
crossposted in as many places as I fucking feel like putting it
Must we go over this again? Must we? Dear humanity, you fucking suck. No love, me.
Let's break it down, as it were.
"A majority of women believe some rape victims should take responsibility for what happened"
I just ... what? WHAT? WHAT THE EVERLOVINGFUCK?
Let me tell you something. It is NEVER a woman's fault when someone else lays claim to her body. EVER. Does not matter how drunk she is, what she was wearing, what she said two hours ago. NO IS NO. Period. No-one has the right to her body, and we shouldn't be okay with the fact that we live in a society that clearly seems to perpetuate this idea that there are times when a woman doesn't have a right to her own body, that victim blaming is okay, that women are somehow 'at fault' for their rapes.
I'm too tired, and too angry, and too sick of dealing with this to offer up my rapes again. I can't emotionally do it again, break them down, spit out all the pieces for the world to see. I just can't do it. But I've struggled over and over again with the idea that it wasn't my fault, that I didn't deserve it, and that no-one but me has the right to my body and what happens to it. This? This makes it harder. A majority of women in the UK, according to that survey, would blame me, in some part, for what happened.
I'm not going to sit here and defend those nights and my choices in them. Because you know what? IT WASN'T MY FAULT, NOT EVEN A LITTLE BIT. I didn't consent and there is where it all ends. I didn't consent, game over. Period. End of conversation. There's no bloody fucking need to dig down and analyse what I was wearing, or what I said, or how I fucking existed inside of a space at any given time. Because to do that is to suggest that there exist circumstances in which I forfeit my body. And I refuse to accept that. Absolutely refuse to accept that. No matter what, I still retain the rights to my body.
There is no 'responsibility' to be had on me. Let's do this society, and a future society all a favour and start placing the blame SOLELY where it belongs. And that's on the men who did this to me, the men who do this, the perpetrators, and not the women. Not the ones who have had something stolen from them, but the stealers. I won't get into what was taken. I won't get into the devastation of my soul, the way I don't get to be made whole again. I won't, because I've done that, and I'm sick of it. I'm sick of defending myself. I'm sick of the fact that it's with people that I love, and yes, some of them are women. I'm sick of constantly living in a world where it is my fault. BECAUSE IT'S NOT AND IT NEVER WAS! [Maybe if I scream it loud enough, people will wake the fuck up.]
I'm sick and sick and sick and sick. And the saddest part? I don't know how to change a thing. I don't know how to make the world see that someone who doesn't consent isn't at fault. I don't know how to end the cycle of victim blaming. I don't know how to stop men and women from perpetuating that how a woman dresses or acts is groundwork for what might happen to her. I'm sick of thanking men for acting like decent human beings, because to do so is to increase their power over me. I'm sick of how defining this is, of how it doesn't go away. I'm sick of all the little times I feel guilted into thinking something must have been my fault. I'm sick of screaming IT'S NOT MY FAULT, because that should be a given.
I don't even know what to say anymore, I don't know how to start. I don't know how to say Lara took Timothy's 'side' and my mother just blamed me without seeing red and wanting to punch walls and throw up. I don't know how to tell of how many people yelled at me after the rape at 18 to go to the police. And the number who blamed me, somehow, for being a scared 18 year old, who didn't go to the police, who kept it hidden for two years. I don't know how to fully understand the fact that there is no justice for that. Because there wasn't, and even with Timothy there wasn't justice, not really.
And every day that a woman thinks that I need to bear some responsibility for what happened is a day that justice continues to cease to exist. It's so terribly unfair, over and over and over again.
crossposted in as many places as I fucking feel like putting it
05 February 2010
disjointed. and visceral gets used twice.
There are little pieces, and there are big movements and moments. And there's everything in the middle, all the stories untold, puzzles never finished. It's how we build identity, of both who we are and who we want to be. Like the way I know my mother really does care, even on some selfish level, about what happens to her grandmother, despite her assurances that she isn't upset about it. Like the way my uncle is deeply angry about what happened to his sister. Like the instances I let myself cry. There are little defining moments built into the massive movements; Tucked underneath a death, a wedding, and a tragedy are the caring, the anger, the crying.
I really need to work on that piece of non-fiction I wrote five years ago about the night my grandfather died. I was nine years old, and I didn't know him very well- he was old and too sick by the time I was old enough to want to know him. But I still sobbed and sobbed and sobbed when I heard he was going to die. I can remember looking out the window and seeing our reflections (my father was holding me as I sobbed) and seeing red – one of us was wearing it – and just crying my heart out. What does that little piece say? Today, I don't get worked up over his death, but sometimes, when I think hard enough about Bill's, I do. I never imagined a decade and half later that it would still be so visceral. William Francis. Born 1 Feb 1945. He died of a heart attack in the summer of 1995. That death, the death of an uncle that I considered my favourite person in the world, hurt. I didn't cry when I was told. I didn't cry until the funeral, and even then, I did it without provocation, when the priest was giving a prayer.
Those are the little moments.
I cry at death, and at senseless tragedy. I consider the most defining moment for my generation to be Columbine and not, as many wish every generation needing a moment would have, the 9/11 attacks. Columbine was guns at schools and we were all kids. We were so little. Perhaps this is clouded by what came after, of the memorial service my school held for the victims. Everyone then knew I wrote poetry, and I think they all expected me to write something that would be picked for this. Columbine, friend of mine. I didn't write it, but it was my poem, and the poem of my classmates, and the children across the country; it was our mantra, it threaded us together into one group. Unified, but only we could belong to that unity. We were all shocked and mourning, and Columbine belonged to all of us. 9/11 was the Pentagon, and fields, and the twin towers. It was away from us, on the East coast. It was visceral, yes, but it wasn't the slaughter of us, by us. It wasn't kids killing kids, it was a collective across the country, it belonged to the entire nation, and thus could never define us.
Four little words. A big moment full of little moments. Pieces of character we only reveal when we think no-one's watching. It's better than the lies we tell ourselves when we think no-one is watching.
I really need to work on that piece of non-fiction I wrote five years ago about the night my grandfather died. I was nine years old, and I didn't know him very well- he was old and too sick by the time I was old enough to want to know him. But I still sobbed and sobbed and sobbed when I heard he was going to die. I can remember looking out the window and seeing our reflections (my father was holding me as I sobbed) and seeing red – one of us was wearing it – and just crying my heart out. What does that little piece say? Today, I don't get worked up over his death, but sometimes, when I think hard enough about Bill's, I do. I never imagined a decade and half later that it would still be so visceral. William Francis. Born 1 Feb 1945. He died of a heart attack in the summer of 1995. That death, the death of an uncle that I considered my favourite person in the world, hurt. I didn't cry when I was told. I didn't cry until the funeral, and even then, I did it without provocation, when the priest was giving a prayer.
Those are the little moments.
I cry at death, and at senseless tragedy. I consider the most defining moment for my generation to be Columbine and not, as many wish every generation needing a moment would have, the 9/11 attacks. Columbine was guns at schools and we were all kids. We were so little. Perhaps this is clouded by what came after, of the memorial service my school held for the victims. Everyone then knew I wrote poetry, and I think they all expected me to write something that would be picked for this. Columbine, friend of mine. I didn't write it, but it was my poem, and the poem of my classmates, and the children across the country; it was our mantra, it threaded us together into one group. Unified, but only we could belong to that unity. We were all shocked and mourning, and Columbine belonged to all of us. 9/11 was the Pentagon, and fields, and the twin towers. It was away from us, on the East coast. It was visceral, yes, but it wasn't the slaughter of us, by us. It wasn't kids killing kids, it was a collective across the country, it belonged to the entire nation, and thus could never define us.
Four little words. A big moment full of little moments. Pieces of character we only reveal when we think no-one's watching. It's better than the lies we tell ourselves when we think no-one is watching.
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