BIBRO DEAN!GIRL
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READING: ANGELS AND DEMONS: AN ANTHOLOGYCOMMUNICATE
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SEND ME A MESSAGEOkay, guys, we’re gonna get real for a second.
The real world doesn’t owe you any automatic awareness of your identity or your label. Controversial? Yes. True? Yes. The truth is that unless individuals are affected by your experiences, they don’t understand. It’s your duty to educate and explain. It would be wonderful to imagine that everyone can educate themselves on a whole range of issues including gender, sexuality and disability, but in the wake of their personal lives, it simply doesn’t register on their radar. For the best people, they believe that as long as they’re decent to everyone that they come across, kind and polite, then that’s it. They’re then jarred when someone snaps, “You misgendered me!” or “That’s insensitive to my disability!”
Whoa. Stop.
Is it unfair to burden you with the responsibility of education? Yes. That doesn’t make it any less crucial. If people without these issues try to educate themselves without guidance, then there’s every chance that they could accidentally zone in on the wrong information and end up hurting others.
Take me, for example. I’m visually impaired, but my disability means that I’m also photosensitive, I lack the ability to see the difference between shades and have no depth perception. I also can’t tell the difference between dark, wet or icy patches on the ground. I have to use a magnifer, enlarged text and a white cane to move around, as well as wraparound sunglasses to stop light hurting my eyes as badly as it would normally. I have near-constant headaches. Because of internalised worries and shame, I rarely allow myself to be photographed with my glasses — with one lens blacked out — or my wraparounds. The shot hurts when it’s taken, but it makes me feel better than showing the world that I have problems.
What does this have to do with anything? Well, when the general public thinks ‘visual impairment,’ they’ll think that I can’t see very well. Individuals without my problems won’t even consider how dangerous it is for me to climb into a bath — showers only! — or why I should be concerned when using a glass instead of a non-breakable cup. They won’t think about how hard it is to put things away, or take things out of, a cupboard. The extra care that it takes to wash the dishes, or worse, dry them. How the stairs at home can be scary if, for some reason, if the wind turns, I’m off-balance. The general public would see that in my home, I don’t use my cane or my sunglasses, and that I can move around as well as they do when I’m accustomed to an unchanged space. They might ask me to pass something to them, or they might have a lapse and try to throw something towards me. Those things make me panic, because they’re difficult to accomplish and when I do have to pass something, it takes me a longer period of time to do it, all to make sure I don’t knock anything, break anything or accidentally hurt myself.
Now, I could demand that it’s the general public’s responsibility to take an in-depth look at how to handle someone with visual impairments instead of answering a polite question with the reason that the disability isn’t my fault. It isn’t, obviously, but if the public then reads about how either I should be left to fend completely for myself even when in distress to ‘encourage’ me, or take away at least most of my burdens to ‘help’ when I could have offered a gentle talk and an explanation from the point of view of someone with my condition, well, that’s my fault. Strangers will not be able to look at me and understand my personal, complex needs at a glance. It’s unfair to expect that of anyone.
It’s true that the world still needs to grow up and not expect ‘non-disabled’ or ‘white’ or ‘heterosexual’ or ‘cis’ as some kind of ‘norm,’ because they aren’t. There’s a wide variety of genders, races, sexualities and abilities. However, when people have been brought up to see those things as what to expect, it isn’t their fault that they don’t automatically picture more than their current horizon. It’s the fault of the society in which they live.
Naturally, there are those that refuse to be educated. They’re bigoted, racist, ableist, transphobic and cissexist. The fact remains that not everyone is like that. Some may have ideas lodged that are sexist or ableist, but because of their background and experiences, they’ve never had a chance to see it from another perspective. They need help, a kind word. That will change their perception and that’s what’s important.
A little while ago I tried to go on my own to research different trans issues, being cis-gendered myself. Maybe it was a poorly worded search or I clicked the wrong links, but I read and thought and was convinced that ‘trans*’ was a good, quick identifier for trans individuals and everyone else not covered by the LGBTQIA acronym. I saw what seemed to be logical arguments from people who identified as trans and I didn’t think too much about it. I was trying to be a good person, trying to be more sensitive to others. I thought that what I was doing was a good thing and that I wasn’t hurting anyone. Because I don’t have any experience as a trans individual, I have no idea how different issues hurt others. The idea was to educate myself and help with awareness. It wasn’t from a bad place and my mistake wasn’t down to be being a deliberately bad person. However, after a message that said something like, ‘you’re disgusting for using trans*’ I thought, well, there’s always going to be someone that takes offence and ignored it. It was hate. It didn’t mean anything to me, just another anonymous user that thought they’d have a bite. Why would I need to think anything else? My research had said otherwise. A ‘you’re disgusting’ didn’t mean anything. Anonymous messages always read like anger, and without a personal touch and name, it was easy to forget.
What made me realise my mistake was a conversation with a trans individual who said, calmly and politely, ‘Hey, you probably didn’t realise it, but ‘trans*’ can be really offensive. I can show you the reasons why, if you’re interested.’ That’s what made me think, ‘Hang on. That really is offensive? Why?’ so I apologised and said yes, please, if you could help, that would be really kind. The individual then sent a few links and offered an explanation. I read them and they were completely at odds with my earlier reading. There was a lot more information and I understood why I had been wrong, and why the term can be offensive, so I thanked the individual and stopped using the phrase. That’s what opened my eyes. Not hate, but a real perspective.
In that vein, there is no quick way to tell what sexuality or gender someone identifies as. Maybe in the future, the world will be sensitive enough to ask every new person, ‘Which pronouns should I use?’ but today is not that day. Today, when someone calls someone else ‘she’ and it makes them uncomfortable, it’s the individual’s responsibility to politely say, ‘Actually, it’s ‘he’ or ‘they,” for example. It’s a completely imperfect world where there are bigots who don’t, and will refuse to, understand, but entire cultural shifts are impossible in the very short term. It’s often not a deliberate offence, and sometimes, even on Tumblr, people don’t think about checking ‘about mes’ to look for pronouns. It’s easy habit, a mistake, not a deliberate act of cissexism. When the mistake isn’t a deliberate snipe or barb, it needs reeducation, not contempt.
Anger solves nothing, but a gentle correction in private does. When individuals snap at others for not taking into account their pronouns or sexuality automatically, the other person is left with nothing but the, ‘that person was rude, wow, I’m not going to be spoken to like that,’ and won’t consider future actions. In contrast, a message that says, ‘Hi, I don’t think you did this on purpose, but my pronouns are ‘they’/I’m trans/etc and it upsets me when that incorrect pronoun/label/etc is used,’ then the other person sits and thinks.
It’s a long road. If others don’t share experiences of what isn’t considered the incorrect ‘norm,’ they just won’t register why something would hurt. Right now, it’s the individuals’ responsibility to politely change the world, one person at a time. Screams don’t educate. Anger doesn’t make someone ready to learn.
There’s a real culture of entitlement that needs to be unpicked. Hatred doesn’t open minds, it closes them. Honey works better than vinegar. So, the next time you think that a snap at someone for making a mistake about you personally would be a good idea, stop. Think again. Offer them another way to understand.
You’ll be surprised with the results.