ELI EARLE: Okay.
QUINCY MEYERS: Great.
TALI ILKOVITCH: Looks like the mic is working.
QM: Fantastic. Looks like this is working, too. Great.
TI: And we're live.
EE: And we're live.
QM: Alright, great. Now, I think I will sit here. So, we will get into some ice
breakers and to a main prompt. Will you do us the honors of a land acknowledgment?TI: Yeah. Absolutely. So, we're gathered here today on the homelands of the
Mary's River or Ampinefu Band of Kalapuya. Following European invasion and the Willamette Treaty of 1855, Kalapuya people were forcibly removed from their lands and have been subjected to a long [unintelligible] legacy of dispossession, displacement, oppression, assimilation, and genocide which settler colonialism continues to perpetuate to this day. We also want to acknowledge that queerness has been made other in indigenous communities by colonialism and white settlers and that millions of indigenous women and girls remain missing, abducted, and lost from their homes. We extend love and gratitude to this land and its indigenous community. Despite these challenges, Kalapuya peoples persist and continue to uphold traditions through vitalizing and revitalizing songs, dances, languages of many local dialects, ceremonies, gender experiences, worldviews, and fulfill various roles of stewardship to contribute to a reciprocal relationship with the natural world. The living descendants of the Kalapuya are represented within the Grand Ronde Tribes of the Grand Ronde-I'm sorry-the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde Community of Oregon and the Confederated Tribes of the Siletz Indians. Among these tribes are two-spirit Indigenous folks who navigations of these intersectional identities are an act of resilience in itself worth celebrating. Queer solidarity with local indigenous communities is essential for liberating us all from colonial suppression and violence. We must reflect on and act towards supporting indigenous sovereignty and respecting indigenous lands. We take this moment to give thanks to Marys River and Champinefu Bands of Kalapuya and their traditional homelands on which we stand. May we center that this land, this community, and this world has an indigenous past, indigenous present, and indigenous future and you can learn more about whose land you're on at native-land.ca.EE: So sorry, I need to sneeze. I didn't want to sneeze in the middle of the
land acknowledgment or BLM statement [laughs]. I'm good.QM: Good. Were you able to pull it up?
EE: I'm sorry. It was one of those things where it was like you think you need
to sneeze and then it stops. I apologize for that.QM: Yeah, was anybody able to pull up the BLM statement?
EE: Yeah, I can do the BLM Statement.
QM: Great.
EE: Yeah. Okay. We also want to take a moment to acknowledge that Black lives
matter with this quote from Alicia Garza, one of the co-founders of Black Lives Matter: "When we say that Black Lives Matter, we are talking about the ways in which Black people are deprived of our basic human rights and dignity. It is an acknowledgment that Black poverty and genocide is state violence. It is an acknowledgement that one million Black people are locked in cages in this country-one half of all people in prisons or jails-is an act of state violence. It is an acknowledgment that Black women continue to bear the burden of a relentless assault on our children and our families and that assault is an act of state violence. Black queer and trans folks bearing a unique burden in a hetero-patriarchal society that disposes of us like garbage and simultaneously fetishizes us and profits off of us is state violence." That was a quote from Alicia Garza.QM: Thank you, Eli. My laptop is actually charging, so someone could bring up
the ice breaker for me.EE: I remember what it was.
QM: Oh, great.
EE: Alright, so, to get started we're going to go around the circle and the ice
breaker is if you were famous, what would you be famous for? So, share that and your name and pronouns. I guess that means I start [chuckles]. My name's Eli. I use they/them pronouns. If I was famous, what would I be famous for? I don't want to be famous [chuckles].I guess in this hypothetical scenario, I would want to be a famous Civil Rights
lawyer or something, because I want to go into law and that seems like a good thing to be famous for.TI: Hell yeah. I'm Tali. I use they/them pronouns, and, I'd probably be a rock star.
QM: I am Quincy. I use ze, hir, and hirs pronouns. What would I be famous for? I
think I would be, if I had to be famous, which does not sound great, but I'd be famous for something, like it'd be for something that I've written, at least I would like that. So, a writer.ROSE RACHEL: I'm Rose. I use fae/faer pronouns. What would I be famous for?
That's a good question. I don't know, either something science-y. I'm a biochemistry major, or social justice, I guess?ANONYMOUS: I'm [Anonymous], she/they. I guess I'd be famous for like doing a
math thing [laughs]? Like presumably making something that's useful enough that my name gets stapled to it, and people will recognize it. Like, I don't feel like that's famous, though, because like, except for who even knows the mathematicians' names except for other mathematicians?RR: You could make a transform. Those guys always get their names on stuff.
QM: There you go.
GROUP: [Chuckles]
XANDER OMOTO: Xander, they/he pronouns, and I'd be famous for painting.
QUINN CHRONISTER: I'm Quinn, they/them pronouns, and realistically: streaming. I
stream videogames. I just started, so I'm not out there at all, but I would love to be, and then this could be a part of that but my dream would be voice acting, is doing voices and stuff like that.INDIGO ALEXANDER: I'm Indigo. I use they/them. My first thought was that I'd be
famous for being an art teacher. I know a little bit of all these types of art and I'm famous for like teaching and getting people into them and they get much better, but I have a little bit of all of them.TI: Awesome. Well, I just want to share a little bit of context, why we decided
to have a recorded session this year and a lot of it has to do with, one, is legacy and preserving our legacy. So, in comparison with history, which emphasizes the past, reflecting on our community's legacy reminds us that our experiences and our stories as trans folks are ongoing. The legacies of our elders and our ancestors inspire us and influence our own lives to shape the world that we live in and the stories and experiences will influence the lives of those who follow us. All of the students that come after us, the trans folks, will have something to build on and know that there's already a legacy of trans students here at this institution. Institutional memory is also really important, which, at social institutions, so like OSU, that were not built for queer and trans people, especially queer and trans people of color, it's of increased importance that we take intentional steps to preserve our legacies from systemic erasure and preserving our strategies for acquiring resources, maintaining our community's interconnectedness and resilience and resisting systemic oppression and uplifting each other makes navigating these institutions easier for those who come after us. It's important we retain continuously the efforts that we take to dismantle systems of oppression from social institutions that exclude us in the first place.QM: I can do the prompt. Alright, so, with that context, our prompt for sharing
today is: how do we retain resources and knowledge that strengthen our community, both inside and outside of institutions? How do we preserve our stories and ongoing legacies. Do you have a personal example of resources, stories, and knowledge being passed down to you or passing these things down to others? Yeah, and, I guess since I shared the prompt, I can start and we can go around the circle and share just a starting place on those questions and, again, if someone wants to pass that's all you need to say: pass, and that will be respected.EE: If anyone does pass, just because they want more time to think, then we can
have a second round where we go back around and see if anyone wants to add anything.TI: Also, if y'all want a little more time to think about the prompt and let it
sit-in we could also write for a little bit. I could grab some paper.QM: Yes. That is also an option.
TI: How are people feeling? Are people ready to dive straight into the
discussion? Or do we want to kind of like think about the prompt a little bit?QM: I can also repeat the prompt.
ANONYMOUS: Is the full thing what's in the email?
EE: I believe it should be.
ANONYMOUS: Okay.
EE: I believe I sent the full prompt in the email. But not everyone has the email.
IA: Yeah. I'm ready to talk. I've got my talking point ready.
QM: Great, you do! Please.
IA: What I was going to say is that something about this, about the idea of
knowledge and these trans communities being passed down and stuff like that reminds me of just like the knowledge of how to, I guess, medically transition or sometimes socially transition, these kind of, or like what providers you can go to and stuff like that, how like that typically and historically has not had a website or a book or something you can go to, or you see a queer person or a trans person in class or at a bar or something, and you're like, oh shit-I'm like that. So, you go talk to them and you're like: hey, yeah, I think I'm like you, so tell me your secrets [chuckles]. And they tell you what they know. They're like, yeah, go to this doctor. Go to this hotel, maybe, historically. All these kind of-but these kind of knowledges always come in my experience where I know from other trans folks, they come from just like it is directly passed down from trans people to trans people kind of information. That's how we've gotten by for, I don't want to say time immemorial, but just like that's seemingly just in our contemporary times, at least, how we've all gotten by and it's a very community-based thing. Sometimes I'll meet trans people who have been without community and they don't know how to-and they feel really frustrated, because they don't know how to do these things, like how to bind or to talk or how to put on makeup or a whole bunch of these kinds of things. But, that's the first thing that I think of when I hear talking about legacies and passing on trans knowledge.QM: Those networks are so important.
EE: The thing about, I guess, having that be passed down instead of there being
a website or a book or something you can go to is, I guess that's part of that is like a safety thing, you know, keeping those spaces and places and processes safe, but also that makes it so much more susceptible to being erased from history. Currently, for my history class-and this isn't me going, this is me responding. Currently for my history class I've been trying to write a paper on the history of abortion pre-1800s, and it's very much a similar thing, of the knowledge was passed down orally through communal networks and there's so little, and it's so frustrating. Yeah.EE: Are we going this way? Or this way? Are you ready?
QC: I can go.
EE: Okay.
QC: So, I come from a place where I didn't really have access to any kind of
queer content or representation or anything like that, so I really feel like I've just been getting an avalanche of information in the past couple of years, and as I find myself, as I find people similar to me. Really, for me, I just want to be an advocate, that it's okay whether you can get mental help for it, whether you can get physical help for it, whether you're in a safe environment or not. For me, the way that that comes through is writing. My passion is creative writing, and so through my goal is probably poetry and short story writing. I just want to make these topics, like, not like well-known, but just put a spotlight that there are those hardships, that this is a more or less a common thing that people can experience and it's not basically it's not a sin to experience this stuff. I feel like, but kind of touching on the point of having a written culture down is like, I'm not scientific. I'm not technical. I can't really put down the numbers. I don't do the research. I just-I write what I feel, and I think that my voice could resonate with so many people if I just put it out there. That's where I want my legacy to be.QM: Beautiful.
EE: That's a really good legacy to work towards.
XO: I've been reading more trans fiction recently, and so I think for me that's
where, like, even though the stories aren't factual, there's still truth to them. I think that that's where I found wisdom from the trans community being passed down. For me, just to say, I'd love to read your work when it comes out.QC: I'll tag you all [laughs].
QM: Perfect.
ANONYMOUS: I'm not too sure what I could say of substance about my engagement
with community knowledge and legacy and so forth. I'm the sort of autistic, that means I did a ton of research before I fully accepted, yeah, no I'm trans. All of the, basically just the medical side of stuff and things like that. Yeah. I'm super glad the stuff is online. I would have still been a confused weirdo if I hadn't been able to, you know, have some kind of resource that isn't a person that I could look and like, hey, how do you tell if you're trans? But, I don't know. I feel like, I don't feel like I've interacted with legacy in a way that's more meaningful than just being in pre-existing queer spaces and getting informative content, in that respect.EE: Well, I think that is kind of like worth mentioning, is that in your
experience you got all this stuff from the internet, which is like a whole amalgamation of research and people's personal experiences, and I think that, I guess that's some important commentary on how the internet has changed things for our community, massively.ANONYMOUS: I mean, like, you were saying, the fact that you can, even if you're
in a physical space where that sort of stuff isn't even remotely mentioned, let alone accepted, you can at least theoretically have some amount of community, or at least community knowledge online.RR: I guess I'm in the same boat as a lot of you were, you know, before I came
here I knew maybe 3, maybe even 4, trans people where I grew up personally. No, it was 4. You know, so I didn't have access to a lot of that legacy before I came here, like, a lot of it from the internet. I knew a lot of trans people on the internet, and [sighs] some of those spaces are really good. Some of those spaces are really nice and really positive. Some of them have been the most toxic spaces I've ever been in. You know, it's... I don't know what to say about that. It is what it is, I suppose. I'm thankful that I'm here now and that I have other trans people to talk to in person, you know, and get that knowledge that's been passed down. I spend a lot of time thinking about this, because I ran into a situation earlier today where it's like I'm trying to research something and, oh now, the archive for this is run by a TERF now, and the stories they tell are not going to be necessarily all the stories that were there, right? Or, even representative, maybe. So, it's like, it feels like no matter where you are it's just so tenuous... To have a way to wrap this up? I don't know. I feel like I have thoughts on this. Give me a second.GROUP: Yeah.
[Brief Pause]
RR: I guess, I'm thankful for those online resources, archives and stuff when I
was still, you know, closeted at home and I'm thankful for the ability to talk to other trans people now and being out and maybe in different ways.QM: Lovely. Well, I think for me when I think about preserving trans knowledges
and legacies, I look back on my relationship with my gran, who came out as a trans woman, at least to me in 2009. Having that familial connection gave me a lot of opportunities to learn from elders, from her, but also from friends and trans communities that she met and was able to introduce me to over time. I had the opportunity, fortunately, before she passed away in 2021 to actually do some oral history interviews with her about her life and it was part of my undergraduate senior project. I am so grateful that we have that recorded now. I wish I had the opportunity to update it before she passed, but I still have those recordings and I learned so much from what she was saying. I think the biggest thing was after hours of interviewing, realized, well she mentioned something that I found interesting that was identifying with change, something that she said during her last interview. I asked-this wasn't on my interview question sheet-but I asked what does that mean? She pauses and says, this is going to sound weird, but I think if I have been assigned female at birth I would have transitioned to male, and being fascinated by these stories of change and physical transformation, even from childhood, being fascinated by the movie The Fly, which is an old film where a man changes into a fly or being fascinated by werewolves. I went from there, and I guess the point is it made me realize that identifying with change was okay and made me realize that, oh, maybe the stories I've heard through primarily a cisgendered media, aren't the only stories. That left me open to finding more gender queer and non-binary stories and realizing, oh that's a possibility for me. Of course, online archives and resources there was helpful. When I say archives, I don't just mean archives at universities, I mean also things on platforms like YouTube, for instance. Although, for me it was mostly YouTube is where I found a lot of those. I don't think I would have made the connection as well if my gran hadn't said what she said during the interview. Now I have that moment recorded forever. I'm so glad that I do now. That memory will live on, even though she's gone now. These are the things that I think about when I think about preserving our knowledges and legacies as trans people.XO: Thanks Quincy.
TI: I have, like, just so many, so many thoughts on this subject, but what's
coming up for me right now is-it might be kind of like a dark way to think about it, but also a way that feels empowering for me is I think about Magnus Hirschfeld, who was a German physician in the 1930s prior to World War II, and he had a whole, I think it was called The Institute of Sexology I want to say, but it was an entire library of information about trans patients and transition and queer and trans health. That was one of the things that the Nazis went to first to burn and get rid of and destroy. It makes me think about how powerful those resources were that they felt so threatened by them that they had to destroy them. It makes me feel really empowered to think that we have the opportunity, especially at a learning institution, to create these resources and get to share them with people. I also think about, like, I am a Jewish person and I was raised around a lot of talk about the Holocaust. Everybody always talks about people's shoes and stuff and one thing that really stuck with me that I heard in Sunday school one week is that the shoes are really important because each of those people were a story and many stories. It reminds me of all of the stories that we lost and all of the stories that didn't get to be told, and I think of the AIDS epidemic, too, and how many people were lost and how many stories were lost and how much knowledge was lost. I think it's so important that we get to be together and we get to talk about these things and talk about our survival together and how we've been able to persist through all of these affronts to our survival and just like how powerful that is, that we're here. We have the strength to show up and do these things. It's what comes up for me.QM: Certainly relevant these days.
EE: Yeah, unfortunately.
QM: I know.
EE: Thank you for sharing that, Tali. How do I follow up on that? [Laughs] I
don't know. When I look at the prompt I guess the first thing that comes up for me, the most obvious thing, is I guess the ways that I feel that resources, knowledge, and stories are passed down to me or have been passed down to me primarily, a lot through my work in the Pride Center. I just get to hang out with cool queer people all day, and they teach me things. See, Tali, you've taught me a lot. I'm going to be an LL next year slash I'm kind of in LL now. It's a weird situation. I guess that means that I will be the one trying to pass on these, kind of everything that I've witnessed us building within the past year, two years now that I've been here at the Pride Center, like, all the work with Trans Story Circles, you know? We've been building up to try to get another archived session since before I was here. So, trying to continue those types of work and also trying to make sure that, I guess, there's a lot of stuff that gets lost through the turnover of, especially like a university setting, with the revolving doors of students who move through these spaces and who aren't usually here for more than 5 years-ish. And so, I feel like the longer I've been here the more resources and everything that I've been able to accumulate in my mind. And so, I want to make sure the people who come after me also know about those things. Literally just today we got the updated trans phone book of resources that's a giant book this thick, and I didn't even know that we had the original one but now we have the updated one. And, so. Yeah. That can be difficult, because the way things are now we don't exactly get opportunities to share things with oncoming staff members all the time, certainly not as much as I think we should to best prepare them. We'll get by and I guess in preparation for leaving next year I'm just going to try and teach people as much as I can. Those are my rambling thoughts on it.TI: Thanks, Eli. You're going to kick ass.
EE: Thank you.
QM: I know I can relate to what you were saying about and thinking ahead to next
year graduation. I know that that's something that's on my mind as I'm about to graduate very, very soon. Too soon. The effort I've been putting into making sure that those who are going on can continue events like this and have the knowledge and resources to do so and making sure that, like for instance, my scrapbook pages actually get into the scrapbook to be shared in the future and feeling more seriousness around that now that it's actually about to happen in a few weeks. Boy, I can't believe it. I guess that's a long way of saying I can relate to what you were just saying about thinking about your work here and continuing and preparing to pass the knowledge on.TI: We can definitely, like, open the discussion up a little more now.
EE: Usually once we go around once we do that.
TI: Yeah. We also, like, if anyone listening to other folks had a story or an
instance that popped up while people were talking, feel free to jump in and share.EE: Yeah, anything that resonated.
QM: Also, take a second to go get a little snack. So, folks want to take a
second to get a snack, now's a good time.QC: I'll get the mic and double check.
QM: Yes.
EE: Hello? [finger snaps]. Okay. It's picking some stuff up.
TI: We like play it back and it's like [makes static noise].
EE: Honestly, that's why I turned the fan off. That's what I'm worried about.
QM: Oh.
ANONYMOUS: I mean, you've got so much white noise from the ventilations and the fluorescence.
[discussion regarding the recording equipment begins]
EE: Is the camera working?
QM: The numbers aren't moving.
EE: The numbers on the camera aren't moving?
QM: It looks... yeah. Maybe if someone could come take a look.
EE: Okay, hang on a sec.
QM: It's picking up sound. It looks like it was running at first.
EE: This little thing that says "A End". I don't know what that means.
TI: The camera's transphobic [chuckles].
QM: I guess it'll... it looks like it maybe recorded sixteen minutes.
IA: Okay, sixteen minutes was in the middle of your thing. Do you remember what
you were saying and we'll just continue from there?[Group laughs.]
EE: Let's redo it, yeah!
QM: I mean, I guess there would be audio?
ANONYMOUS: I mean, I had to explain one thing about like I'm sure glad the
internet exists. Oh, boy.EE: The audio is the most important thing.
QM: Okay. Maybe it stops like that?
EE: Do you know how to get it going again?
QM: Let me just.
RR: I was like, I'm sure glad the internet exists but, wow, some space is toxic.
EE: Oh, the memory card is full.
QM: Ugh! That's why. Whups.
TI: The archives are transphobic.
GROUP: [Laughs]
EE: We have the first sixteen minutes and we have the mic, so hopefully that
will be enough for the transcriber to know our voices, at least, hopefully–ANONYMOUS: The "trans"-scriber. [Laughs]
EE: –We should refer to each other by name as much as possible.
QM: Right, as to make their life a little easier. Yeah, and this looks like it's
still running, so that's good. Anyone can continue. I'm just going to make sure there isn't like a memory card in here or anything like that.TI: Maybe we could try to just say our names when we start talking.
EE: Yeah. That would be good.
QM: Let's do that.
EE: That could probably get edited out in the file transcript.
[discussion regarding the recording equipment ends]
TI: We're recording the legacy of trans people's ability to adapt to our
non-ideal situations.[Group laughter]
IA: Who said that?
QM: Right, exactly.
[Group laughter].
ANONYMOUS: It's some person named Tali.
IA: Tali, they. You have to have the badge.
ANONYMOUS: No but how do you pronounce the parentheses?
IA: It's like a glottal stop [makes noise] if it's just like.
ANONYMOUS: Tali [makes noise].
[Group laughs].
RR: I'm Rose. I have to leave soon.
EE: Okay.
RR: I do want to say something.
EE: Okay, yeah. Say your thing.
RR: At the risk of going on an autistic tangent, this makes sense in my head. It
may not be relevant in the reality.EE: That's okay.
RR: Disclaimer. You know, I played a videogame from like 2002 over the summer
called Siberia. The general plot is that you're like a lawyer who's tried to track down a missing heir of a factory. You go across all these different locations that he visited and there's very much a sense of you know it was in its heyday when he was there, and everyone talks about this guy very happily who's completely autistic coded by the way. We talk about, like wow, things were great when he was here. It sure does suck that he's gone now. You go past a town that's factory's closing, not closing, but fallen on hard times, a university that kind of had its heyday a while ago, abandoned city resort that few people go to now, and I think about that like I want the university to collapse 20 years after I leave. It's going to do that regardless of what I do. I would like people to remember me, I guess, so that if in 20 years you came here and asked was Rose here? How was she? And people will be like, oh, yeah, I remember when she was here. She was really cool. It's sad that she's gone now.QM: That makes sense.
RR: I hope that for all our trans friends, you know.
IA: I'm Indigo, and I think that in response to that whenever, like, my old
community in Eugene, whenever we'd be around, or a bunch of us hanging out and maybe someone who's trans or just one of those queer friends who's like maybe passed on or moved to a different town or something, we talk with them and we're like-oh, shit. I remember they taught us this. I remember they were always talking about this, you know. It was always things that they had taught to us that we would always remember and be like, yeah, remember when we played Edward Fortyhands with them or something. Do you remember when we played this drinking game or whenever we did this? It's just like, this kind of like context memories of things you shared and lived together through I think always stick around, so I don't know. I just always remember just talking about it and being like, remember when, just those kind of things. I always feel hopeful or I feel bittersweet in those moments where I'm like, oh, man, I miss that person a lot. I feel a little envious. I'm like, oh, I envy how people are talking about them. I hope people talk about me that way. Then I get hopeful and I go, you know, I think that whenever I move on or you know, in this realm where I was from that people will talk about me like this.ANONYMOUS: I guess specifically unless-oh, [Anonymous] speaking-I guess
specifically and this less building off the notion of personal legacy and in a slightly-less trans specific context for that, for so much of my life I just didn't really care what would–not like I didn't care–but what would the world be after I die. I didn't particularly give a shit if anyone remembered that I existed, and more recently, especially with art I do, I realize that it is kind of nice to know that something I made will continue to exist afterwards. I'm not super sure. I need to interrogate those feelings more, because I still very much like identify with the notion, well, I'm dead. I won't care because I'll be dead. And... I'm not sure.RR: But you care now.
ANONYMOUS: Yeah.
RR: That matters, I think.
ANONYMOUS: Yeah. Hopefully someone got something out of that ramble.
EE: No, I think that's a fairly common experience of wanting that. Yeah, and I
know you need to go, Rose. Sorry, you're like on the edge of your seat.RR: I do have to go. I wish I could stay longer.
EE: Thank you for being here for the start.
RR: If you can come to the march tomorrow, 2:30, Kerr Hall, we would love your presence.
TI: Right on.
EE: Thank you.
RR: Welcome.
EE: I guess speaking of the march, we can like not take it this direction if
this is not what we want to talk about, but I guess I was making that connection of the current political climate for trans folks and all of that about the very intentional erasure of our identities, our legacies, our stories, our presence and, I guess, if people have thoughts on that and on resisting that. Oh, that was Eli.QM: Yes.
IA: From Indigo. I'm always like, I find myself often in this struggle where I'm
thinking about resistance versus safety. You could stay in a small town. You could more to a more red state, you know, and be that trans idol and that role model that, you know, you feel like there needs to be and make a difference and all this kind of stuff. Then you're like, oh, shit. I actually think that's cool, but I like living sometimes. Also living happily and thriving and I'm just living in this barrage of hate every day, so then you-I think about migrating to redder cities, migrating safety states and stuff like that. Something about that, I don't know, it just reminds me about different oppressed people migrating that we hear about in history and stuff like that, and it's always like a whoa moment to think of me and all the trans people I know moving to safety states and stuff like that and being like shit, that's what migrating is. That's what it was in history. It was just someone going, you know, do I want to? Do I want to end up dying or do I want to be safe? It's kind of trip. But, yeah, I think about resistance versus safety.EE: Yeah. I recently had a conversation with a professor who was recommending
law schools, and I was like University of Idaho's a deal. I was like, I'm not going to Idaho as a trans person [laughs].QM: Not safe.
EE: It's not the worse state, maybe, but it's not like Pacific Northwest Oregon.
QM: Going off of that, and this is Quincy, you talking about law schools, next
steps, and how the current political climate maybe is impacting the way that you're thinking about your decisions about that. I'm having a similar experience when it comes to being on the job market, academic job market. Often when you are an academic, especially early on, you don't get a lot of choice with where your life. A lot of it is determined by who will take you. I had a few interviews in Florida of all places that I took because, well, I have to apply everywhere and this person is in my subfield, which is super specific. I met them at this conference and they asked if I would apply, and I said, yeah, because what else am I going to say? And being like, well, if I must. I must. Luckily, one of those positions was a visiting position, so very temporary anyway. I was like ugh. I have to say I was not crying when the rejection emails came after those interviews. I was like, okay. No Florida.EE: You don't have to go to Florida.
QM: Yes. I was like, okay. Thank God, and also thinking this person who is in my
very specific subfield, I was like, why do you have to be there? Why can't you be somewhere else? I'm feeling a lot of pressure for interviews that are in safety states, like Connecticut and being like, oh, please. Please. Yeah, and the stress of that, and how it sucks that this is something that I need to think about. It'd be great if I could just go anywhere without having to think about this. It'd be great if I could go to whatever law school and not have to worry, but we also need to stay alive and, again, I can see, you know the argument, like when Indigo was talking about being the person who makes that move going to these places, making a difference. I commend those people who can do that. I don't want to, and that is fair. Also, the people who usually are successful at that are people who already were there, are people who have a network to go to. So, if anybody is going to do that, having that network I think is probably key. If I knew folks, for instance, in Florida, then it'd be different, but I don't. Just thinking what a difference that makes, too, in the geography affects this process as well, how much it's playing into the current situation. I was thinking about that when Indigo was sharing.TI: I'm interested in-this is Tali-I'm interested in what folks think about,
pertaining to the political climate that's going on and a lot of it targets all trans people and adults, but a lot of it targets trans kids specifically. I can already think of from my own experience growing up how little resources there was around me and how challenging it was navigating internet spaces, like you and Rose were talking about, and how there's so much toxicity there and finding the right resources. I'm curious what people think of what you want to pass down to trans kids right now, or what you wanted to have passed down to yourself when you were a kid and stuff like that.ANONYMOUS: I really wish that I had at some point heard a trans person just talk
about what it, like, just the emotions behind it, because that would have let me figure it out years sooner. I just didn't have context for what I was feeling and I wish I had to know for look for that, and I wish that I had not had to look for that, but it had appeared somewhere in an educational space.QC: I have a little bit of an anecdote. This is Quinn. I am currently a server
at a restaurant, and there was one day that a mother and her daughter came in. They regularly come to the restaurant I work at. Today they happened to bring a picture book with them. It was about a unicorn who wanted to go sea diving to be with the narwals. While I wasn't staring over their shoulder reading this book or listening to the mom read this book, I heard enough of it that generally it's a story about changing your identity to what your mind says it is, as opposed to your body. Obviously, that can apply to many things, but for me as a trans person that spoke very kindly to the inner gender dysmorphia, essentially, and wanting to surround myself with people that better fit with where my mind is as opposed to where my body is. I think those kinds of resources for kids, where it doesn't have to be trans coded, it doesn't have to be, you know, it doesn't have to have gay flags all over it, just kind of promoting the idea that diversity is okay, that you can change who you are, how you present yourself. You can surround yourself with different people who accept you and love you for who you are and even if–this gets a little bit out of kids' book territory–but even if that's talking about found family rather than blood family. I think those are all really good ideas to support for children so that it almost can point them, as well, you were saying, towards this is another thing that you can consider. This is another thing you can look into and that's okay to question those things. I thought that was a... it was just really nice to see this mother with her daughter exploring those ideas. She even asked her, the mother asked the daughter at one point if she felt she was a unicorn or a narwal, and I think she said something about being a unicorn, but I also might be misremembering which character went where. But just kind of supporting those questions, even if they don't, even if they don't lead anywhere, it can help define a sense of self for the child better.IA: I've got a lot of thoughts for this one. This is Indigo. As someone who
works in childcare and as a teacher now, I have a lot of thoughts of the ways that we can serve children and growing minds and bodies to just teach them about themselves and have a more welcoming environment. I want to start off by saying all the breeder talk would have been cool to take that out. I as a 6-year-old didn't need to be asked about who I was going to marry and how many kids I was going to have and what their names were going to be. That would probably be step number one for letting me be a boy or whatever I wanted to be. Yeah, just all of that. That'd be great. More any kid can do anything kind of talk. Any kid can like sport ball. Any kid can like painting, stuff like that. Just kind of encouraging the kids with whatever they're liking. That's one thing I really enjoy doing now. Just like, one thing I really enjoy doing now is any kid enjoying any activity, even if their dog looks nothing like a dog when they're drawing, going like: wow! My gosh, you're such an artist! Look at you! They go, oh, did you hear that teacher says I'm such an artist? It's so empowering, especially the kids who are more closed off and just wouldn't be praised normally. So, I think that's really important, just being a good educator.Then I think... I mean I had this really good... right, I think taking kids both
more seriously and less seriously. Kids, all the time as a child I was asking to be called by different names, any other name in the book I could possibly think of and also asking to cut my hair all the time. Every time, like every month I was asking, asking, asking to cut my hair, just shave it off. It was always taken as a joke. She would be like, oh yeah, ha, ha. You're so funny, as if, oh yeah whatever name change. It cost like zero dollars and zero cents to call a kid Stanford or to just call a kid just like whatever, you know, Unicorn-Butterfly for a day, you know? It does not take a whole lot, and it can be so helpful for them. Because one of those times, or any of those times, they're going to go, cool. I can choose my own name, because my own name, like my birth name, makes me uncomfortable so I get to choose whatever I want and that's step one, like having that power. Whenever I'm working with my kids, they'll come up with-they think that I have a very fun and exciting and silly name. I'll go, yes I do. I chose it. I chose it to be that way. They go, oh. Okay. Well, can my name be like-I'm not very creative right now-but can my name be Butterfly? I go, for sure, Butterfly. How are you? It's like taking them very seriously, but also it's not this huge, earth-ending deal. It's just like, yeah. I'll call you Butterfly today and I'll check back in tomorrow. Maybe tomorrow you're going to be Lightening McQueen or something, but take it just day by day and giving you that power, because that's my job, to show you that you have that power. That's what I think of.TI: Excuse me just a sec.
IA: Do you have anything?
XO: Yeah, this is Xander. So, I'm graduating next month and I'm going into a
profession where there's not enough queer or trans people, that are in veterinary medicine. So, I know it's one of those careers that a lot of kids are really interested in. Everyone, I think, at some point wants to be a vet in their childhood, and I think if when I was a kid I'd see queer and trans vets being successful, being normal, being bad but still being good people, bad at their jobs but still good people, I think that would have been really helpful just to see that you can do whatever job you want to do or whatever profession whatever life work and be yourself. You don't have to change yourself to do what you want to do. I think that would have been really helpful.[Brief silence]
EE: I didn't really figure out that I was trans until I was halfway through high
school, so I kind of feel like I don't know what I would pass on to my younger self, you know? Because like they weren't even thinking about that [laughs].IA: Could you think of things that, because I think– I'm Indigo– that coming out
in the middle of high school is pretty early.EE: Oh, I didn't come out [laughs].
IA: Sorry, I mean to yourself. Knowing that you're trans in the middle of high
school seems pretty early, honestly. What are things that you appreciated and that helped you early in your childhood?EE: I think the main thing that helped me figure it out once I was in high
school was just being around other queer and trans people and the visibility of it and talking with people about their identities and stuff and being eventually like, maybe I kind of feel like that. Maybe I kind of, even if I don't have really, really intense body dysphoria or something, or dysmorphia. Even if I don't have those feelings, maybe it's okay to just want to seek to be like that because that's where I'm comfortable at, not because where I was before I was exceedingly uncomfortable existing like that, but just because I liked it better one way than the other. It wasn't really more than that for me. Yeah. I don't know. But yeah I didn't... I figured it out halfway through high school, and I didn't come out until I moved halfway across, entirely across the country [laughs]. Completely new people, new name, new pronouns.[Door opens and closes]
Hello. Are you here for Trans Story Circles?
BONES: Yeah. Is it okay if I sit next to you?
EE: Please.
BONES: I had to finish some OSU stuff first.
EE: That's fair.
QM: Yes. Fair.
EE: So, we've currently got a recorder going. This is going to be recorded for
the archives.BONES: I'm cool with that.
EE: Yeah, just wanted to make sure. Later on...
QM: And also, we do have the consent form at some point as well, and I can talk
you through that.BONES: I've signed a couple for the university before.
QM: So, you know the drill.
BONES: Yeah.
QM: Yeah.
EE: Do you want us to reread you the prompt we've been discussing?
BONES: Yes. That would be helpful.
QM: Yeah, and, of course, you should introduce yourself with name and pronouns
as well.EE: Oh yeah. Okay. I'll read the prompt and then you can introduce yourself. If
you have any immediate thoughts, you can feel free to share them. If not, you can mull it over. So, the prompt we're discussing is-how do we retain resources and knowledge that strengthen our community both inside and outside of institutions? How do we preserve our stories and ongoing legacies? Do you have a personal example of resources, stories, or knowledge being passed down to you or passing these things down to others?BONES: My name is, I mostly go by Bones with those who are in the community or
I'm close to. My pronouns are it/its, mostly. I also use they/them and he/him, but prefer it/its. As far as the prompt goes, what comes to mind is hearing stories passed on through the mouths of people I'm close to, my family members. Like finding out about queer relatives through my mom talking about it after I came out, which wasn't as helpful as if I knew beforehand [chuckles]. That's what I have so far for a prompt.EE: That makes sense that's, kind of, come up, the sort of communal
word-of-mouth aspect of our identities. If you have more thoughts, feel free to jump in and add them. We're kind of in an open discussion-type part of the story circle at the moment.ANONYMOUS: You actually gave me a great lead-in. Oh, this is [Anonymous]
talking, in that I was also thinking about in terms of queer legacy, like I'm not the first queer person in my family. I'm the first trans person, but one of my aunts is gay and I feel like that having already happened before I was born. Then that there was like, and the amount of maybe this kid is less-so, oh maybe they're trans, more like maybe they're gay or something, but for all that growing up you get a lot of social messaging from society being your assigned gender. There was less of that, at least to begin with, when I was growing up and when I was in preschool I had a dress and rainbow sandals. Then I just got too terrified to acknowledge that I wanted that to continue. I don't know. Having that freedom early on was something I probably shouldn't ignore. It is a form of queer legacy, so.EE: I guess part of what I'm getting from that to reiterate is that those
previous family members being in your family and being queer kind of like made it so your family was a bit more tolerant and accepting and just safer?ANONYMOUS: I feel like more than just tolerant and accepting, like aware that
it's a possibility.EE: Yeah.
QC: This is Quinn. But to kind of almost show the opposite side of that, since I
come from a background who didn't have anyone prior LGBT, at least out or self-aware in either regard. I have theories. [Group laughter] Anyway, I as a child I very similarly was allowed to dress how I wanted to dress: just graphic t-shirt and shorts baby all the way. That really continued. My parents never... they would maybe give comments, like, oh you should wear dresses more often or you should wear skirts or anything like that. But I think it was just really empowering to me that I was always able to pick out what clothes I wanted. I think even though it was most likely always from the girls' section, I could still pick the shorts in the girls' section. I could still pick the Minecraft or Jurassic Park t-shirts in the girls' section, right? So, even if it was limited my parents still supported that. I think that's another almost legacy thing that we should continue to embrace, is if you have a child and they want to wear a dress, let them wear a dress. If they want to wear cargo shorts, maybe have a talk, but let them wear cargo shorts. [Group laughs].EE: Understandable.
QC: Right, just taking away the importance that certain types of clothes are
gendered and that it's okay to explore personal taste in fashion, even from a young age.QM: Just going off that, even communicating that while clothes themselves are
not automatically gendered, it's okay to get some pleasure out of how they are seen, too. If it's giving you gender euphoria, that's a thing.QC: Like go for it, yeah.
QM: Yeah. And that is lovely. Now, of course, do not say to other people they
should be feeling for themselves or that only a certain, well, only a certain gender can wear certain things. But, hey, if this person's getting gender dysphoria-I mean, not dysphoria, euphoria, embrace it. That's cool, too. Also, about the cargo shorts [chuckles]. As someone who never got a chance to wear those as a teenager, I'm doing it now.[Group laughs].
QM: At least for now, just because. Oh, and that was Quincy by the way.
ANONYMOUS: How can you resist the allure of so many pockets?
QM: I know, right? The thing you've been deprived.
BONES: I just realized what I was going to say was supporting crime, which I
do–not support. I do support petty crime, but pockets make it easier to take stuff [laughs]. Yeah.[Gasp]
TI: That's personally were I keep all my genders.
BONES: Oh.
QC: In your cargo shorts pockets.
BONES: How many have you collected so far?
TI: I can't disclose that on record.
[Group laughs].
ANONYMOUS: [Unintelligble]
EE: How many genders you have?
QC: That's just a secret of the trade.
EE: Uh-huh.
ANONYMOUS: Oh, okay. No experimental genders that you're under NDA?
[Group laughs].
QM: Experimental genders [chuckles].
BONES: I mean...
QM: The best kind.
BONES: This is Bones speaking, on like experimental genders. For me, it's really
interesting being on the spectrum, autistic speaking, and gender, because gender is such a societal construct. I don't really have this grasp of what gender is supposed to be? A lot of the rules seem very arbitrary, very pick-and-choose. So, for me growing up I only started to experience dysphoria when my body started to develop, but I also just didn't recognize that was dysphoria until meeting other trans people who were like that's not a normal thought process, that's not what cisgender people think about their bodies. That later developed into me being more comfortable with neopronouns and this idea of being genderqueer versus being binary.IA: Yeah, Indigo. I was going to say it's really hard for me to describe my
gender experiences growing up without describing my autism experiences growing up, because I'm thinking about my mom, not forcing me but forcing me to wear certain types of clothings and stuff like that. She wanted a daughter daughter, like a girly girl Barbie daughter. Which was great for me, but, no, and so she always wanted these, all these dresses and skirts and these sandals and stuff like that, but it's like they would give me the ick in a gender way but also it's just like those things are usually made out of cheap and weird, awful material. It feels terrible on your skin, so I would have like a literal, it's like it was it a gender meltdown, it was an autism meltdown. I'm just like not wanting, because it feels so terrible to be in these clothes and also sandals, it's like, southern California. You're sweating and you're getting grimy all over your feet, so it's like it gets in your toes and so, I was like, no. Tennis shoes every day, please and thank you. It's so hard to know which is which, both in that way where you're like this is, that Bones said, this is a social construct, so it's like, you know what does gender even mean? Then also it's just there's so much about these weird roles being put onto you that you're like physically and emotionally just like, uck, I don't like this. This is not what I want to do. I can't wear this skirt because I want to go running. You're telling me I can't run and play soccer when I'm in this skirt, so get me out of this skirt. What are you talking about? [Chuckles]. It's a bunch of stuff like that where it's so hard to start, you know, take these two things apart.QM: This is Quincy speaking. Why it's even necessary to pull them apart to begin with.
ANONYMOUS: I feel like-oh, this is [Anonymous] speaking-there's a distinction
between something being uncomfy for reasons of internal, like it just feels gross and it would be uncomfy in a vacuum and uncomfy because of things that society ties to it. Like, gross clothes, sure, don't feel awful, like even if you're in like a place where, even if you don't, are unaware of any notions of gender or lack thereof associated with clothing, or you can have something that feels fine but makes you sad because it means you're being perceived in a way that you don't like and that internal, external dynamic is a useful distinction.QM: Right. Again, when I say maybe they don't need to be taken apart, that's an
important distinction, yes, in a general sense. But I've also seen the conversation where people who are not autistic and not trans keep demanding that autistic trans people explain themselves a certain way and they take it all apart or just be autistic now or just be trans now. It has to be explained as one or the other. So, when I say it doesn't need to be necessarily taken apart, I'm talking about more like on that level. But, yes, on a general level probably asking like why something might feel uncomfortable and making the distinction's probably useful for other kinds of questions. You know, as [Anonymous] was saying. So, I just wanted to make that clear.EE: Does any folks have any other thoughts?
BONES: This is Bones again. Something that made me think of is I've had to
explain why I use it/its pronouns to so many different people, and it's hard, because it's just what I feel comfortable with. There's not really much more than an explanation than it gives me gender euphoria, but they always seem to expect some in-depth explanation of, like, trial and error or overcoming something. It's like, it literally just makes me more happy than they/them. Yeah, sure, there's maybe some other reasons, too, but at the end of the day it just provides me that gender euphoria that I need. I don't know if anyone else has struggled with that who use neopronouns, but, just the constant having to, even to people who are already trans and in the community who are asking you why you use these pronouns. It's like hard to conceptualize, because it is literally just, it causes me euphoria. That's it.IA: To tag on that, I talk about this every day. It's one of the most radical
things I feel like I do in my work with children. I work in K-1, and I dress all types of gender. I dress big. I dress low. All these kind of things, colors. I come to work in just all black, like, you know, emo. Just all this kind of stuff. Stuff that teachers don't look like. Whatever. Especially not a Corvallis teacher [laughs]. That's not how they look. So, I go to class and all my K-1s are very interested (that stands for kindergarten and first-graders), and they ask me. Every day they ask me about something else. Today the question was why is my hair so crazy. Other days it's like why am I wearing a dress? Why am I wearing a tie-dye skirt. Why am I doing this? Why am I doing that? My answer every time is, oh, because I like it that way. Every time I go, oh, I like it that way. Sometimes they'll ask more and they're go like, well, I don't like it that way. I go, oh. Well, hold on. Is it on your body? They go, no. I go, well, that's good. Is it on my body? They go, yeah. I go, do you think I like it? They go, yeah. I will, it's great it worked out that way. But, just like, and then asking them more feels really radical. Whenever they're trying something that's new, a lot of my kids, you know, boys and girls alike, I've noticed in my classrooms will start to wear different makeups. They'll come to class in color ChapSticks and they'll have it all over their cheeks and stuff like that. I go, like, oh my goodness. Are you serving a look? Look at you. How do you feel? They go like, I'm glad you noticed. You know, like, I'm trying something. I'm like, yeah. One of their classmates, will go, like, oh, I think just the other day, last week, I saw where their classmate was like, oh, why do you have lipstick on your eyebrows? They were like, because I like it. I was like, hell yeah you do. Hell yeah, you do. No, I think it's really radical. It's so empowering not to have to explain yourself, and just go because I like it. Period. What are you going to do? You can't tell me that I don't like it, because I know that I do [chuckles]. Like, what? But, no, I really feel that. I don't feel that for neopronouns, obviously that's not my experience, but having a different agenda that people aren't used to.ANONYMOUS: I mean, not even– oh, this is [Anonymous] speaking– not even for
neopronouns. Most of my directions with my parents are in Hebrew, which is very much a language that does not support pronouns other than he and she, because you need to conjugate verbs and adjectives to gender people. So, the fact is having to explain that yes I'm a girl, but I also like they/them pronouns and it's just, it's not they/them in a girl way. It's just they/them and I'm also a girl. Yeah, that took a while for them to understand. I feel like that's also something that happens with other gendered languages, too. The notion of having something other than binary pronouns is comparative, is on the same level of radical in neopronouns in English and so forth.XO: I'm sorry, I have to leave, but thank you.
GROUP: Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for joining. Thanks for coming.
QC: Thanks for having us.
GROUP: And congratulations on graduating. Congrats!
ANONYMOUS: The couches are unbalanced.
EE: Thank you for bringing people into the circle. I don't know. Oh, were you
going to say something at some point?TI: Uh, I don't know. My brain's a little fried. It's week 9.
QM: It is week 9.
GROUP: Yeah. It is week 9.
EE: After I, oh, this is Eli. After I graduated, came out and everything I was
also working with kids, fifth-graders and seventh-graders. I never really got to explain things to my seventh-graders, but the fifth-graders who I was with at the start of the school year, I kind of like drew a little gender spectrum on the white board and it was like this is what you think of as girl. This is what you think of as boy. I'm kind of like the purple in the middle. At the time I was really figuring myself out and kind of like experimenting with gender fluidity. I think there's maybe still an element of fluidity a bit, but like I'd kind of like, after a year of waking up and trying to be like, okay, what gender do I feel today so I can respond when people ask me what gender do you feel today, I was like it's too much work. It's too much energy. It doesn't come intuitively every morning and so I just use they/them pronouns for most of the time, because it's easiest. However, one of the best things to come out of that was there was this one fifth-grader, and I cannot for the life of me remember his name, but he for the entire rest of the school year, every time he saw me, he was like: Miss Eli what are you right now? He would ask me what I'm feeling, what are my pronouns. I was just like this is so pure and good and I love this child.QM: I love that.
EE: Yeah. I don't know, you were talking about kids and that reminded me of
(sigh) the pre-pandemic days in Boston.IA: Yeah. No, I could talk about kids all day long but we've got other people here.
QM: Definitely kids, and less adults, have made a big deal about gender. They
definitely on their own seem to be more receptive most of the time. Honestly, thinking about what I did as a child was just to have that just continue for as long as possible. Also, for someone to tell me as well as a teenager that it is going to be okay. Also, as an intersex person it would have been great to know that puberty does not happen in these very straightforward binary ways like we usually explain it to kids. That would have been wonderful, and to also have had conversations with my doctor about how I was feeling as well. It would have been great to have had somebody just explain to me that things can be fluid. Like that kid seems to understand and that that is okay and have somebody just ask, like, where ya' at right now? You know? Who knows? Maybe my medical decision still would have been similar, maybe not. I'm trying to suss that out. I don't know, but it would have been good. Yeah.EE: I guess that's something that I hope I did for those kids, you know, even
though I wasn't in their lives for very long. I was an example of a person just being out and figuring out gender and being very straightforward about that, and so I don't know. Maybe if any of them are ever having those thoughts or feelings they'll think of me and they'll be like, okay, there are people out there who are like that. So.QM: Yeah.
IA: Lately I've been getting some joy-I don't know why I'm getting this joy.
It's something I'm going to suss out in therapy, but I'm getting joy because I have different kids that come to me lately and they tell me about how mad their parents are. I'm like, yeah. I bet they are.GROUP: [Laughs].
EE: Yeah. Kindergarteners.
IA: You know? That's fair. It's not fair, but it's like I'm glad they're talking
about it. I'm like, cool. It doesn't always come out directly, either, because K-1 have like a really distinct way of talking, and it's not direct. But, no, and so I've been embroidering these shorts that I've just gotten because the sun's coming out and stuff like that. I've been embroidering these.GROUP: Ooo. So pretty.
IA: Every time I embroider something on them I just think about how mad it's
going to make these parents [chuckles]. I've got the rainbow. I want to put the inclusion colors on here, too.BONES: Are the parents mad because of you?
IA: Oh, yeah.
GROUP: [Laughs].
BONES: I'm not surprised. I'm not surprised, but.
EE: My kid is being taught by this, what even is this person's gender? They
can't even, it's blowing their minds.IA: I know, because I go by Teacher Indigo, which is explicitly not Mr. or Mrs.
Like, sometimes parents meet me, and they go like, oh, cool what's your name?You look different. What's your name? I go, like, oh yeah, I'm Teacher Indigo.
Or, I go, I'm Indigo. They go... because a lot of the kids just call me Indigo, which is also informal. I love how it breaks the barriers. The parents will go, like oh, cool. So, what do the kids call you? I go, they call me Teacher Indigo. They go, just like, they're just mad. They're like, uh-huh. I'm like, I know you want to ask a pronoun question or something but you don't know how, but I'm not going to do it for you because it's not my job. But, no, and so then kids ask me all the time, less so because I've been there all year, but they ask me all the time, they go-oh are you a boy or a girl? I go, it's both. That's all. It's just K-1. They go, oh, are you a boy or a girl? I go, both. Some kids go, oh. Well, of course. Some kids go, no. I don't think you heard me. So, what I said was... and I go, yeah. No, I said what I said. Just whatever. A couple of times, kids would come back the next day and they go, so, my mom said you're not.GROUP: [Laughs].
IA: I go, oh, interesting. Tell me more.
EE: Tell me more about what your mom thinks of me.
IA: Tell me more about what your mom thinks, yeah. They go, well, my mom said
that you're born as one or the other. I go, oh, well. They go, so, which one are you. I go, well, I'm still both [laughs]. You know. Good luck. I'm exactly where I want to be as far as my body and transitioning and stuff like that, where you just cannot tell which way I come from unless, like, you know me or you're trans or something. Just like, this cis cannot figure me. So, I'm like, yeah. No. I will never tell you. I'm just both.BONES: I wish I had an adult like you in my life when I was younger, because I
didn't meet another trans adult until I, too, was an adult. So, it would have been so nice to even just get to meet one as a kid, because it would have left a lot less doubt in my mind that what I'm doing is okay.IA: That's what I hope. I recently started telling a few kids, because like, I
usually just say I'm both, and that's fine. Sometimes kids like in first grade especially we talk about it more. They go like, oh, well, what does that mean for you? I go, well, you know, here are some things that are boy things. Here are some things that are girl things. Well, I like all of them. I'm just too big to put in a box. I like doing this and I like doing this. Yada, yada. They go like, that makes sense. Is that how... and some of my favorite kids, you know, honestly, they go like, wow. Is that like how I'm a girl but I like soccer? Sometimes I think I can't play soccer but I like to. I go, yes. It's exactly like that. You can be anything you want to me. You just talk about it and explore that in a gender way. Oh, and there was something else I was going to say. But, yeah, no I love being an adult, an adult for kids. I also just love in this little small community I make parents so mad. It's also shocking to me how many parents, like, I met them at the protest that happened recently for, the pro-education protest. All these parents who I have never met in my life all knew me by my first name. They all knew me. I was like, who are you? They're like, oh, Indigo. I'm like, hey. Yeah. Hey what's up? How are you?EE: I don't know who you are [laughs]. My teacher kid–my teacher kid's friend.
IA: But yeah, no. I'm Dr. John Smith. Doctor or parent of this kid. I go, oh,
great. You know me [laughs].EE: [Laughs].
QM: Kids will make sure of that [laughs].
BONES: Then you have kids you don't even teach whose parents know who you are.
IA: That's what I'm saying, yeah.
BONES: Because their friends go home and talk to their other friends who talk to
their parents and their parents are like, Indigo?QC: All the kids are being like, my teacher's the coolest.
IA: Honestly. Apparently, I've heard it from parents and a few kids, I've
started talks at home about these kids, there's a couple of fifth graders who are somewhere in the queer spectrum. I don't know exactly what's changing for them, but their mom came to me at morning drop-off and was like, yeah, you know, my kid's deciding that they're going to be a different way. I was like, what are you talking about? You're being so ambiguous. They were like, she's like, some people in our family aren't quite on board, but I think that they can be how... I was like, okay, great. I'm glad we had this talk, but...EE: I need to teach my class now.
IA: No, apparently, I'm starting conver-sometimes. I don't want to put so much
on me, but I guess I'm starting some conversations, too, about gender and stuff like that.EE: Just by being there.
IA: Just by existing.
EE: That's so cool.
IA: What can I say?
QM: Just seeing another person makes a big difference. This is Quincy speaking.
I can think about what a difference it was when my grandpa finally did come out to me and my brother and what a difference that made. Also, it made me realize just how big of a deal it was to see how others responded. Like, that could have been a more empowering moment if I wasn't around a bunch of cis people.GROUP: Yeah.
QM: Who talk like cis people talk when they think they're alone, like, hearing
all this stuff about like, oh it's a kind of death and grief and oh, my goodness and crying. I'm like, okay. Um... so, this is what this means? Like? No. I think sometimes that can be where people get tripped up, is other people's reactions. I think it took getting a fully developed brain and being an adult to be like, oh Mom and Dad, that was their deal, their thing. That wasn't me. I get to have my own feelings about this now, and my own relationship to what is happening with my grandparent and I don't have to pay attention to that anymore. Like, what am I going to do about the fact that they're struggling? Nothing. So, they hear all these kids. They're seeing an adult, which is powerful, but it seems like at least some of them are getting positive reactions enough where hopefully anything negative that they're hearing will be okay. Also, it, yeah, parents being angry. Parents are going to parent, I guess. It sounds like you're handling that alright. Yeah. Sometimes it's good to laugh at that.EE: Something that's kind of a bit of a topic shift, unless other people have
stuff to add, I wanted, since we've got less than 15 minutes left, I wanted to go a little deeper into this thing that when we were writing the prompt we talked about a lot, kind of like specifically institutional memory, and trans people within institutional memory at OSU or any other kind of institutions and people's thoughts on that, if people need a little definition of institutional memory, that's also valid, because it's kind of not a term that gets thrown around a whole lot, I think.ANONYMOUS: Where exactly are we drawing the line between institutional memory
and community memory, given that so much...EE: See, that's the thing we got to talk about.
ANONYMOUS: So much of like, especially the queer community that's accessible to
people in college at OSU is through this institution, but it's also, there's also parts of it that are community. Like, if I tell another person on Discord, like, oh, hey, you can... Fred Meyer is a decent place to buy makeup if you're still thinking about it. Like, pretty much no one's in that aisle ever, and you can self-checkout so you don't have to deal with that. Is that institutional? Is that not institutional?EE: I would say that specific example is definitely more community-based. I
guess, like, part of, oh, this is Eli talking responding to [Anonymous].ANONYMOUS: Yeah, sorry.
EE: No. It's all good. I guess part of what we need to grapple with is how do we
continue to try and exist and ideally thrive as a community within this institution, because with your example that's kind of like on the Pride Center Discord. That is technically within an OSU space, but it's like a queer space first.ANONYMOUS: Yeah.
EE: Yeah. I guess the issue is that sometimes the institution takes issue with
our queerness and butt in, or like any other kind of identities that we may hold. The university's going to university, I guess. So, it's like, okay, when the institution infringes on the community we've built within it, what do we do? I don't know. These are half-formed thoughts that I have.BONES: This is Bones speaking. One thing I think about with institutional memory
is who has access to these memories and in general the public doesn't have a lot of access to academic records in general, research studies work. So, how are we both educating those in the community who don't have access to these academic resources? Because academic resources are often behind the barrier of academia, which is financial, intellectual barriers to accessing these information because in order to access institutional information, you usually have to be tied to the university in some capacity, whether that is as student or staff.EE: We are at 7:00. Does anyone have final thoughts for this discussion?
QM: Yes, my thoughts are I'm glad that we can be in this space, have it
recorded, and contribute to that communal memory, institutional memory (as fraught as it is).BONES: It's important to be a part of memories because if you're honest, there's
less ways you can misconstrue, hopefully. I still see institutions and people misconstrue what people say, even with the most blatantness of intents, but as long as a record exists, we exist.GROUP: Uh hmm. Yeah.
EE: Thank you to everyone for contributing to this record of our community at OSU.
[Indistinct chatter].
EE: How do we turn it off?
QM: Um, that's what I'm... oh, is it this?
EE: Probably.
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