I can’t help but think that the world doesn’t actually want me to be me no matter how good it feels being me
I was having a really great fortnight and then some dude got fired from a job he was never qualified to have and it made me spiral into existential dread because the world is a bad place most days.
So today’s pop culture exploration into the heart of the never-ending culture war that started with something called gamergate and just never, ever stopped has to do with a really bland boring white cishet comic named Shane Gillis and how he was fired from SNL before he ever appeared on SNL.
Bear with me, I promise this has to do with gender feelings. It is just going to take a little while to get there. If you don’t want to read a lot of words about how everything is really bad these days feel free to close out and come back during a happier newsletter. I don’t begrudge you in the slightest. In fact, I encourage it.
Anyway. Shane Gillis is from Philadelphia and he was hired to be a new cast member on Saturday Night Live. He was hired along with two other super talented comics that had to work probably thrice as hard to get to this point, but what is SNL without a bunch of mediocre white guys, anyway?
It quickly emerged that Gillis was super racist on his own podcasts as recent as the middle of 2018 and SNL obviously didn’t vet him at all. None of this was found by deep investigative journalism, by the way. Just one or two culture reporters sharing clips that were easily accessible online.
Gillis attempted what loosely can be defined as an “apology” late last week after the clips made the rounds, and then SNL did the right thing and fired the overt racist so he wouldn’t mingle with a cast of people who are not all cishet white dudes. He then released another statement that starts off with the line “I’m a comedian who was funny enough to get SNL. That can’t be taken away.”
Despite the fact it was obviously taken away before Gillis was able to get on SNL, I couldn’t help but think this entire back and forth is likely going to make him only more famous with the ongoing reactionary movements of the world.
This sentiment was shared by many online (as its not really a novel opinion), but it just serves as a stark reminder that for a white guy like him, chances are going to come aplenty.
And I hate to say this, but I know all too well what that is like.
I am only in the beginning stages of figuring out how I want to present to the world as a woman, and every step feels new and fresh and exciting in ways I don’t even have the language for because I haven’t fully lived it yet. Many days, when I’m not feeling comfortable (which I feel super guilty about, but that’s a different post) I’m reminded just how I am in this world which to most people is a white man.
I’ve written about how work at times can be demoralizing because I am living as my deadname and the person that I am trying to shed to get by every day. I’m all the more aware of how people talk to me as him and how they treat me. I’m given extra rope many times as I’ve changed careers essentially to be at this job, and the expectation is I’ll easily grow into it. Would that same latitude be given to me if I was authentically presenting as a woman? I cannot say.
That questioning of how things will be when the world knows me gnaws at me some, well, let’s be honest, most days. This feeling of perpetual fear of how that authenticity is treated is not uncommon, and naturally a trans writer who I adore posted much better thoughts on this than I could come up in the moment:
What’s going to happen when I come out? Am I still going to get freelance writing jobs? Will people still consider me an authoritative source on the subject material I spent over half a decade reporting on? Will I still have the respect of my colleagues?
My first inclination is to say yes because I want to believe that in the year 2019 a media figure, no matter how minor and niche, coming out would be celebrated and not belittled, but the world is a reactionary place that loves to punch down. It is inevitable that people are going to drift out of my life because of this:
But I am hoping that they are just the tangential friendships that eventually losing will not be the end of my emotional wellbeing.
Being trans in 2019 is hard. Your very existence is fodder for a never ending culture war that just wants to preserve the status quo of a mythical past time so hard that they are willing to hypocritically adopt reactionary tendencies to bully people out of the public discourse then cry foul when people have the nerve to push back. Its supporting the institutional codification of discrimination on LGBT individuals, then launching into attacking a trans barista who unprofessionally tried to toss a bigot out of the coffee shop where she works.
Its calling racist tirades about Asian communities in America, riffing on a podcast, and saying you’re funny enough to be on SNL when people have the gall to call you out on it.
It is knowing that said racist is going to have a career making the neo-reactionaries laugh at provocative statements, which are actually just racist while they work to undermine your right to exist because for some reason you living a day to day life threatens them.
On Oct. 8, the Supreme Court of the United States will hear oral arguments in a case centered around whether gender identity is protected under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which “prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex and national origin”.
It will, by all accounts, be a landmark case that will shape employment rights in the United States in a profound way. If the court rules that gender identity is not included under discrimination based on sex, the effects will be felt harshly by transgender individuals and cisgender individuals. This will undo many federal protections for employment discrimination in ways many feel it is worth risking at the expense of transgender individuals.
As we get closer to Oct. 8, I can’t help but think about myself and many of my trans brothers and sisters who are not out at work. Will will be able to come out in a safe environment if the court rules in the way that would undo these federal protections?
There is a belief that this case will not undo many of the Title VII protections for transgender individuals because of the way that it is being argued, but this is far from certain given the court’s conservative majority. It is truly a landmark case with no foreseeable outcome making it all the scarier and the existential threat on so many being so real.
This is what it feels like to come out in this version of America. Every new opportunity is a chance to flourish and feel alive, but at the same time it must be done under the backdrop of a systematic effort to undermine your happiness as you don’t deserve to exist because some people with political power say gender is immutable after birth.
The biggest lesson I’ve learned since coming out is just how at peace I could truly be with myself. I lived with unrelenting anxiety for the last 20 years of my life. It was so bad, I couldn’t get through a therapy session without disassociating every few minutes. That was just how I lived. Since coming out and starting anti-anxiety medication that has just evaporated and it is beautiful. Most days I sit around just wishing I had the language to express it, so that everyone could try to understand what it feels like.
It is the best feeling on earth, and I wish everyone on earth got to experience it. But nearly everyone on earth is born cisgendered and does not get this beautiful journey. They will miss out for the rest of their lives, and my heart genuinely aches for them.
I just hope that in that vacuum they don’t succeed in taking away our beauty just because they can.