Trans people do not need to justify ourselves
You find yourself in that awkward moment just after you have met someone. Should you tell them, should you wait, or should you fudge the unvarnished version of your transition and give them the potted history. Trans people the world over perpetually face this dilemma, having to come out to people for a wide variety of reasons, often due to society’s need to enforce certain sex and gender-based roles and assumptions. Yet, through this all is the underlying fact that trans folk do not need to justify themselves or their existences to anyone. Coming out is not an attempt at justifying who we are, it is simply an acknowledgement that not coming out carries the risks of blackmail, abuse, and denying a core part of who we are. For the most part coming out has limited friction, yet sharing this fundamental part of identities is freighted with risk, forcing trans people to risk assess every environment they are in.
Right wing media has always demanded that trans people justify their existences, ranging from denying female husbands were men through to denying trans women’s right to any form of public womanhood to calling all who align with trans inclusion groomers and paedophiles. There is little room in that discourse for allowing trans people to simply be, it is a constant drum beat of forcing all trans folk to state that their lives are affirmed and worthwhile. Indeed…
