Always a supporter of LGBTQ rights and acceptance, I never saw much of an issue in my liberal suburb near Madison, Wisconsin. When I moved to the South, I received a rude awakening. The rest of the world was not as accepting as the one that I had grown up in.
After the Caitlyn Jenner story came to light, I started to hear a lot of buzz about transgenders and transgender acceptance. Were the tides actually turning or was it just being discussed more often?
To answer that question, I interviewed someone very close to the struggle of transgender acceptance, Ken Wedge, a college freshman. His answers help to provide insight into the journey to find personal and social acceptance, and what the public can do to help make the road a little easier.
What impact do you think that the publicity of Caitlyn Jenner has had on transgender awareness?
Caitlyn Jenner coming out has impacted transgender awareness immensely. A ton of people are now semi-educated on what it means to be transgender. This is one of the first big celebrities to come out, thus leading to more people knowing.
On acceptance?
I think it has affected transgender acceptance slightly. We have to start somewhere, I suppose. I believe that knowledge is the gateway to empathy, and empathy is the gateway to compassion and acceptance. More people have knowledge, which in time, will lead to acceptance.
What do you think leads to people being more accepting?
I believe people begin to be more accepting when they are personally touched by something, or have some kind of personal attachment to something. My family, for example, wouldn't have ever cared about Caitlyn Jenner coming out, but because of my transition, my family is loving and extremely compassionate towards the transgender community.
Do you think that acceptance is generational?
Yes, for many reasons. Older generations are typically more religious, and religion is typically opposed to anyone in the LGBTQ+ community. People in my generation have grown up in the midst of the civil rights movement, marriage equality. By growing up during this time, we see gay and lesbian relationships. So by the time we're adults, it's not something new to us. I think the idea of being transgender is completely new to older generations, which causes them to be shut off to it and baffled by it. Kids growing up in this generation will see celebrities like Caitlyn Jenner and Laverne Cox and will be used to seeing it and have an understanding for it. I believe teaching children about LGBTQ+ subjects in school curriculums can "normalize" these topics and make it a more casual thing.
Do you find there to be an increased acceptance of transgenders?
Yes, I think just because in my world I'm very accepted. Everyone I've come out to has accepted me. I now live full male, the public perceives me as a male. So I'm not faced with opposition in the public eye because people don't see me as a transgender person, they see me as a man. I've been taking testosterone for three months now, so my voice has dropped, my muscles have gotten bigger, I have facial hair, and everything about my physical appearance is more masculine. This is why the public sees me as a man. But even without all of those physical attributes, I am still a man. This is something I wish people could understand. Your physicality and your gender are two different things. That's why transgender people often face opposition in public.
Do you think people understand what being transgender means?
For the most part they don’t. There are so many different things that go into being transgender, and every transgender person's experience is different. It's hard to generalize what being transgender is. To my knowledge, most people think it's a man "dressing up" like a woman or vice versa. Or it's just a person getting surgery on their body parts. That couldn't be further from what it is. Being transgender is an internal struggle. It's getting cripplingly nervous before doing anything in public. It's speaking a certain way so people perceive you as your identified gender. It is having to tell all of your family and your friends and hope they love and accept you. It's wearing extremely uncomfortable, tight garments to flatten your chest. Or concealing body parts in extremely painful ways. It's a constant struggle. There is so much more to it than what people think.
What would help people understand?
Transgender visibility. Now that Caitlyn came out, I think more people will come out as well. And like I said earlier, when people are personally affected by something, they're more inclined to be accepting.
Are there certain demographics (ages, ethnicities, sexual orientations) that you have found to be more accepting?
Any large group of people that have faced opposition are more likely to be accepting because people who have faced opposition understand what that feels like. I also feel like most teenagers to young adults are a lot more accepting.
What has been the biggest struggle for you?
Being okay with myself. Every day I am becoming more comfortable with myself because I am starting to physically reflect the way I feel on the inside. But, I can't control what body I was born in. And that haunts me every day, and I believe it will for the rest of my life. Every day I wake up, and my dysphoria is in the front of my mind. And it stays there throughout the rest of my day in until I go to sleep. I get so much social anxiety that I almost forget how to function in social situations. My dysphoria is crippling. My dysphoria decides what clothes I wear, if I talk to people, and if I leave the house. It's exhausting and demanding. Transgender people not only have to worry about being accepted by others, but we also have to accept ourselves, which can very easily be the harder aspect of transition.
What can, or should, be done at the political/social/media level to increase awareness and acceptance?
More transgender visibility in the media, and public schooling systems should have transgender awareness taught.
What have you found to be people’s greatest barrier to acceptance?
There are so many things that go into people not excepting others. I feel like most of it is pride. As people, especially Americans, we always feel the need to be above someone. We feel entitled. We feel that if we make more money than this person, we are above them. If we are more attractive than this person, we are above them. If we have a better job, car, house, clothes, we are above them. If we have a larger following on social media, we are above other people. If this man is gay and I'm a straight man, I am above him. If this man is transgender, I am above him. Pride gets in the way of so many different things. We always want to feel greater than but ultimately, we are all human beings with the same skeletal structure, same hearts, lungs, and brains. No one is better than. We are all equal, and we all deserve to love and be loved.
So, are the tides really turning? If Ken can see the road to acceptance becoming easier, then I can see the tides beginning to turn.
