2021 Trans Day of Visibility AMA
Published on: March 31, 2021
Alexis Krohn
Trans heart and headshot of Alexis
Alexis (co-Executive Director of the Unconscious Bias Project) wrote articles in response to UBP community members' (and her friends') questions, as an "AMA" or "Ask Me Anything." Alexis asked folks to ask her anything they wanted in the leadup to the Trans Day of Visibility and she’d be visible about it — and they could ask anything they wanted, even if it would be normally be invasive or disrespectful to ask, as long as it was in good faith. The questions asked were excellent.
Linet (the other Co-ED of UBP!) asks some of these questions of Alexis in an interview-style video.
You can find the full articles from Alexis's AMA below.
Part 1, the Simple Stuff
Part 2, the Bio Stuff
Part 3, the Complicated Stuff
Full Transcript
2021TDoVAMA UBP edited
Linet: [00:00:00] If this is your first time joining us, for a live, this is the Unconscious Bias Project live show today. And now I've just added our guest - really our Co-ED, Alexis Krohn. And so now that, now that we're both here I want to say, "hello, everybody. It's nice to see you again. It's been a while since we've done a live."
[00:00:46] So it's, it's lovely to see you all. My name is Linet if you haven't met me yet, I am the co-ED of the Unconscious Bias Project and my pronouns are she/ hers. And I have our lovely co-ED right next to me.
[00:01:03] Alexis: Yes. That's Linet yes. Okay.
[00:01:15] Hello, I'm Alexis, pronouns she/her and I recently asked a whole bunch of folks to submit your questions to an anonymous form and said, “submit them judgment free, as long as they're in good faith.” And there were only two questions which were not in good faith, but they were good natured. So they weren't mean questions,
[00:01:46] Linet: Context to that. So today is Trans Day of Visibility, and Alexis has done this amazing thing, which is to really put herself out there to answer questions of everybody that is not trans to, or people that are trans, and want to ask somebody about - what is Alexis's trans experience?
[00:02:14] And this is all part of the kickoff for our broader outreach campaign called Breaking Bread and Bias. We're going to have a series of conversations these. They will be on our Facebook or Instagram or a Zoom event where we'll be talking with folks in our community about the -isms that are affecting our community.
[00:02:35] And this is one of the ones that we're going to tackle this year. Transgender visibility, really getting to know more about the trans experience and how we can better support our trans friends. So Alexis, can you tell us...
[00:02:54] Alexis: - a trans experience today -
[00:02:57] Linet: and, uh, for us to learn how we can better support our trans friends, family, and loved ones. So again, Alexis please share a little bit about the form and what inspired you to put yourself out there.
[00:03:16] Alexis: The very short answer is just, I'm already pretty visibly trans. I talk about it. I say things to people like... it's just a thing that my friends know about me. And so every Trans Day of Visibility always comes and goes and I'm yes, I'm visible still. And I was well, maybe this would be a way to be a little bit more visible and offer people the opportunity to ask questions that might not necessarily normally be appropriate. Given people's differing levels of intimacy because of course, there are things that, if you already have an emotionally intimate relationship with a trans person, then asking a lot of questions can be perfectly acceptable. But if you don't have as intimate a relationship, there are a lot of questions that might not be as askable so - and intimate here, just any time that you are emotionally close to somebody, this does not necessarily mean romantically or anything that, just having a close relationship with someone.
[00:04:32] Linet: Great. That's really lovely.
[00:04:33] Alexis: This is an opportunity to find out a little bit more.
[00:04:37] Linet: Right. And is it once, because as Alexis mentioned earlier, we opened up an anonymous survey for anybody to submit questions, and so we're going through the questions that have already been submitted. If you have more questions, save them up for next Trans Day of Visibility. Or submit them to ubp@unconsciousbiasproject.org directed towards Linet. Okay. So we're gonna start off with some of our questions, drum roll. Our first question is about names. So how did you go about changing your name? What were your considerations? Was it hard to decide and was it really challenging to get people to be okay, it's Alexis, it's not previous name.
[00:05:27] Alexis: Short answer is, well, it's never going to be a short answer. It's not - I'm not a short answer person. Let's be real. So when I was choosing my own name, I... you know, it's funny because we talk about gender as a binary, oftentimes, and of course we know that there are people who are non binary, agender, who are gender fluid, any number of things. But even within the traditional genders of male and female, men and women, there's so much difference in even those categories, right? let's be real. The different person comes to mind if you think of Gertrude or Tiffany, you thought of two very different people. I feel confident in that.
[00:06:27] And and one of those two is probably much more Barbie-esque than the other, let's say. And so when I was thinking about this, I was well, where do I want to land? Right, I've got a friend named Barb, who's "Barb." She is not Barbie. And if you went over "Hey Barbie!" - death stare.
[00:07:04] So you know, I was all right, I'm not a Tiffany. I love my friend, Tiffany. She is wonderful. That's not me. And so I was yeah, all right. I'm you know, where am I? And I, I felt Alexis was a good one in terms of the variety that depending on where I landed with regards to how I felt about my relationship with my femininity, I could be Alexis. I could be Lex. I could be Lexi. I could be Allie. I could be Alex. There's so much variation in there. As most people know, I've settled into Alexis or Lex.
[00:07:49] Linet: Cool. So you sort of picked something that had the most flexibility to where you, you could feel that you were.
[00:07:56] Alexis: And so then I gave it a test shot with a few people. They tried it out and, and then eventually I started telling people on New Year's Eve of 2015 into 2016, "please use this name now," and it felt really normal and natural from there. So, and then I asked my mom to help me with my middle name.
[00:08:23] Linet: Oh, cool. Oh, that's really nice. Oh yes, your mom is actually awesome. Yeah. Bee-tee-dubs, shout out. The next question I have is about pronouns. This is another soft one, but it really comes up a lot. And I know our clients have definitely asked about that. You know, how do you deal with pronouns as in if you're somebody who is cis-gender and you're not usually introducing yourself with your pronouns. Should we be using pronouns more often? If you introduce yourself with pronouns, do you expect an assistant or person to respond with pronouns? And I think there was another question that was sort of in there. How normalized should we go in talking about pronouns? Should everybody be giving pronouns all the time?
[00:09:18] Alexis: So my suggestion is always, I suggest that you give pronouns. And when we're talking with clients, I often say, “promote, but don't mandate the sharing of pronouns.” Just because if you get aggressive with somebody or you're what are your pronouns? Then you could be asking them to potentially lie about something that they're not comfortable divulging, right? let's say they're in the closet, and you're “what are your pronouns?” And they're “Whoa, I don't want to answer that right now.” Or maybe they're still figuring it out, or maybe they don't want to lie, maybe they're non binary and they don't want to declare that in that space, but to say that they're man or woman, she or he would also feel disingenuous, but at the same time, it might feel unsafe to be really assertive about their pronouns. There's all sorts of reasons why even trans people might not necessarily want to state their pronouns. But if you are cisgender, especially if somebody gives you their pronouns, you can respond in kind to just say, like,” I see you and I see that this is a normal thing.” I think that's great. And I'm also leading with them just to normalize to the other person. Don't just use them with your trans friends, but with your cis friends too, because otherwise it's a very weird dynamic to be “Ah, I see you and I am uncertain and therefore I’m going to state mine.” It's this very weird, dynamic that gets set up then. So just yeah, normalize it, do it regardless of whether or not you think that the person you're talking to is queer, and if somebody uses them, respond back in kind and don't ever force someone.
[00:11:20] Linet: That's true. And also there are some folks that don't to use pronouns and they prefer to just use their names. So by leaving it, then it's open. So that's cool. It makes it much less awkward. Okay. Talking about awkward turtles, this question is about mis-gendering. So say we’re in a group setting and I accidentally mis-gender you. And then I correct myself later. Should I be drawing attention to that and saying Oh, sorry about that. Misgendered you there, sorry, and then continue. Do I not say anything? how, how should I navigate that?
[00:12:11] Alexis: I mean, when the answer is shorter is always better. So, “Oh yeah, I was talking to Alexis. He… - she, sorry...” And then you continue on with the conversation, right? Because if you say something and then you make a bigger deal out of it... Hey, I'm more likely to remember, which you probably don't want. So I'm guessing that on your end, the awkward would be “Oh no, she's going to remember this for the rest of our friendship and hold it against me.” That's what people freak out about. But just correct and move on - the less likely I am to remember. But if you make a big deal out of it, then I'm more likely to remember. And if you make a big deal out of it, “Oh no, but I need you to know that I'm not transphobic. I I see who you are…” I’m now in the position of having to take care of you when theoretically I'm the one who's been offended.
Don't make the person who you're trying to apologize to be the one to have to do the emotional labor. And this goes for any number of identities, right? This goes for whether you say something that's mildly problematic with regards to race or something that.
Probably if it's something deeply problematic, you should probably take the time to have a conversation with that person later perhaps, and be “Hey, can we talk about that thing? I'm really sorry that I said it,” and the other person might be “no, I don't want to talk about it.”
But don't force them to talk about it on the spot. Right. And if you say something that's a problem, and somebody says “that was a problem,” be “Sorry,” and move on. Don't make the person you offended take care of your feelings at that moment.
[00:14:13] Linet: Snaps for that. All the snaps are that answer for sure. So good question there. We're going to shift your slightly harder question. But maybe it's a soft one. So this person asks “how do I interrupt gendering, gender binaries with kids that isn't necessarily stopping for a huge conversation. How do you make this more normal? How do you sort of introduce your kids to queerness without making it a huge sermon.
[00:14:53] Alexis: Yeah. And I think this comes back to a lot of the strategies that we talk about in the Unconscious Bias Project about how do we interrupt those stereotypes, right?
This fed almost directly into exactly what we do. Right. Which is you know, there's things - you can just ask a question, right? We call it “transferring the work.” You can just say to the child, if the child says “that's a boy's playhouse,” Then you can be what makes it a boys’ play house?
And then that'll cause them to question it. You can, simply make a counter observation. If you are a woman and you see a child who says, “that's the boys’ playhouse, you can be “no, no, my sister and I played in a playhouse that when we were growing up” and just challenge it, right.
Just challenge it, just point out that that thing is not necessarily correct. You can also just observe things “I think that's limiting.” Do you never want to play in a play house that? You know, and you can just start.
So it doesn't have to be a giant lecture. It can just be this gentle questioning.
[00:16:24] Linet: Great. That's a really great use of the first strategies, Alexis. All right. We're going to shift into a little bit of a different gear. So several folks had questions specifically about the body and genitals and the process of transitioning. And how do you deal with your body? One of the ones that came up specifically, I'm sort of reading off screen now is - how do you sort of navigate expectations about your body with somebody you're dating, or somebody that you hope to date, or maybe somebody that you're hoping to maybe have sex with in the future?
[00:17:06] Alexis: I mean, so the reality is, for me... and this is a vulnerable thing. This is definitely, whew, okay. Time to be visible. I thought I was going to be visible. This is where I have a certain insecurity. Right. This is my story. This is not every trans person's story. This might not even be the majority. I might be in a minority. I don't know. I haven't polled people on this and I haven't seen a lot written about it, but I almost exclusively have dated bi- or pan- people just because then I don't have to worry about it because then I'm... yeah, don't really have to worry about them getting weird about what they find, just because of the range that they've already declared that they're comfortable with. So I don't have to worry about “Oh, are they okay with my body being what it is, are they okay with my body having these qualities or not having these other qualities?” And if they already declared, “yeah, I'm attracted to a range of qualities, then it just takes that out of the equation.”
[00:18:38] Linet: That makes a lot of sense. And for folks that maybe aren't as familiar with terminology, what do you mean me talking about bi- and pan- and how is that different from talking about transgender?
[00:18:50] Alexis: So bisexual and pansexual - bisexual means, according to some definitions, it's means attracted to own and the other gender. According to most modern current definitions, it means attracted to own and to other genders. And pan means all. You can find people on the internet who will quibble with this and say that there are two distinct positions. I have seen those that argued. But to me, it has always appeared to be a bit of a straw man, as neither I, nor anyone I think I know has run into bi- people who do not look at the definition of pan- and also say “Feels it applies to me too, even if I don't use that word.”
[00:20:02] Linet: I see. Okay. Thank you for that. The next question is also about the body and more deeply personal it's about sex. This person was wondering, does transitioning.. and hear I'm extrapolating for them… you know, dose hormone treatments or getting surgery affect your experience with sex and sexual relations.
[00:20:33] Alexis: That is slightly different from the question that was asked. You're blending and that makes it a slightly different answer than would have been in the AMA. You can split it.
So the two questions that were asked, I believe, were one: how do hormones affect the body and two, how does surgery affect sex? And I'll tackle the second one first, because that's actually a little bit easier. The answer is “I don't know, I don't know, first” which is being very transparent.
And, but that brings up another interesting point, which is that according to the figures that I've always seen, is that only about a third of trans women ever elect to get bottom surgery and only about a quarter of trans men elect to get bottom surgery. So there is this assumption by a lot of cisgender people that every single trans person winds up getting bottom surgery, and that that's part of what defines a trans person. And the reality is, it's really not. And that's for a lot of reasons. One, a lot of people might not feel dysphoria around their body in that particular way. Two, because every trans person experiences dysphoria in a different way. And some trans people don't even experience dysphoria, they just know they're trans. So that's the dominant narrative that's out there, but it's not the only narrative. It's not even necessarily the most common narrative. Third, some people may be too old when they come out. If somebody comes out at 80, having invasive surgery is not practical. If somebody is say, hemophiliac, has other complications, health complications, not practical, there are all sorts of reasons why - or somebody might not have economic access. So surgery, there are all sorts of reasons why people don't get surgery. So that's debunking that sort of assumption part of that question.
But, to answer the question, I have, from second-hand reporting… I can from secondhand reports, I can say that the answer is an emphatic “Yes.” It doesn't affect sex. Well, it affects it. I couldn't tell you exactly how, but I can tell you that it's still quite enjoyable.
[00:24:06] Linet: Perfect. Great. And sorry for throwing you a curve ball there by, by putting together two questions.
[00:24:10] Alexis: The other question about how hormones affect the body. The question that was asked was a bit more of “how does this impact, body hair, things like that?”
And the short answer is hormones can initiate puberty, but they can't undo puberty. So anything that happens with puberty will not be undone by additional hormone treatment. So for instance, I had to get a lot of laser hair removal and electrolysis on my beard because taking hormones wasn't going to ungrow that beard.
But for instance, for a trans man, they will be able to still grow a beard typically, once beginning hormones. And so you can... hormones can grow breasts, but they can't ungrow breasts. And so just, oftentimes trans men will, or other transmasculine people or sometimes non binary people, will choose to get top surgery for breast tissue because you can hormonally make sex secondary sex characteristics appear, but you can't hormonally disappear. You can only make them appear. So it's a one-way valve. And again, just as with bottom surgery, hormones - not a requirement of being trans. There are plenty of people, again - for all the same reasons as I listed before - plenty of trans people do not elect to go on hormone replacement.
[00:25:54] Linet: Great. Thanks for answering those. Again, sorry for the curve ball there. I didn't mean to send that. Okay. So we're close to time and we're going to give us a few extra minutes since we did start late due to technical difficulties - that okay with you Alexis? Sure. Awesome. Alright, so we have one really great question, which is what is one thing you wish every cis person who aspires to allyship knew. And then with that is what is one concrete practice that aspiring allies should adopt?
[00:26:29] Alexis: So let's see here, the first I would say is - I mean, actually it's really the same, the same answer for both of them is - when you use language around trans people, use language that affirms that they always have been who they have been. We're very comfortable with the idea… most, even straight people are very comfortable with the idea that a person does not become gay when they come out as gay. Right? It is understood, they have been gay their entire life. There's a very good debate to be had around fluidity of sexuality, but that's not - let's put that aside for a moment.
Likewise, a trans woman did not become a woman when they came out. They always have been. A trans man did not become a man when they came out, they always have been.
But people often use this language around “Oh, they changed from being a man to a woman, et cetera, et cetera.” And that is not affirming language. And we want to use affirming language, such as “they came out as a woman. They came out as a man. They started telling people that they are who they are. So not “became”, but “informed,” “came out.”
[00:28:37] Linet: So to say “transitioned” is that still “became” because they could have transitioned but not come out yet.
[00:28:47] Alexis: Sort of, I mean, it’s sticky. You can also find disagreement on the internet about that particular phrase, even.
I use the phrase “transition” and when I use that, it is shorthand for the process of coming out and undergoing affirmational changes to my wardrobe, changes to my body, et cetera, et cetera, changes to my name. And I lump all of those affirmational changes along with “coming out” into that umbrella.
And you know, if you asked me, “when did you start transitioning?” these are real sticky questions that don't even really have a beginning or even middle and a really effective end. Cause it's a process we often think about... there are a lot of articles that have been coming out recently about coming out in general, that we envision it as a single grand gesture. We, as in our society, tend to portray coming out as a single grand gesture that is done. You do it and you're done.
And that's just not how most queer people experience it. For the most part as that there is an ongoing series of coming out, right? I still have to come out every time I'm on the phone with customer service, unless it's a company that I have a long standing relationship with, my bank, where they have a note in my profile that says “PS, she/her.” I have to be, “hi. Yeah. I'd to order a large pizza. Yeah. Ma'am. Nope. It's ma'am. Nope, I'm not sir. It's ma'am.” That’s ordering pizza. Right? So it's a constant, ongoing thing. When I meet new people, there may be a moment where I'm “Oh yeah, I'm trans” or they might pick up on it from a pin that I have on my bag or something that.
There are a lot of ways. But it is an ongoing process. Whereas transitioning is, can be a more ongoing process for me personally. It was, it is, it feels a done process of making, that switch over. But at the same time, we're always all growing and changing, moving and transitioning from something to something else.
[00:31:58] Linet: And just, you said earlier, it sounds for each trans person, what they define as transitioning or transitioned or what that process is, can be really different.
[00:32:14] Alexis: Yeah, by the way somebody also asked, are there any questions that you wish had been asked and that I thought of that didn't make it into the article.
Do you still giggle either on the inside or on the outside, whenever somebody says the word transition? And the answer: Yes, because every single time that somebody says the word transition, they're... “the company is going through a big transition right now.” I'm always like, oh my camera, “the company's going big transition right now. Big change in leadership. Yep. That’s a transition.”
[00:33:18] Linet: Cause I love, I love laughing. That's great. I do have one bad faith question.
[00:33:25] Alexis: Yeah. Yes. Yes. I am from Boston, born in Monterey. California-born.
[00:33:45] Linet: There you go. Now you're going to have so far from there. I think, let's give the last minute or so to, “was there a question that I didn't ask that you wanted to answer during this live?”
[00:34:00] Alexis: I don't think so. And also I would say if anyone has a question that they want to direct to Linet in these last few moments, PM her and she'll probably screen it. But you know, I don't anticipate any bad questions out there, so yeah.
[00:34:32] Linet: Yeah. If you want to submit a question right now, while we give you some details about upcoming Breaking Bread and Bias events and ways you can support the trans community and trans folks you're welcome to DM us through the Unconscious Bias Project messenger or direct message me Linet Mera through my Facebook messenger. Let me just pull that up right now.
[00:35:02] Alexis: Okay. And tell us about Breaking Bread and Bias.
[00:35:11] Linet: So yeah, so let's start off with other ways that you can support trans folk. I mean, Alexis gave really great concrete specific action items. You can do ways you can interact with others, giving your pronouns really simple things that all you have to do is just open.
[00:35:33] Alexis: Tell Alexis that she's pretty.
[00:35:35] Linet: Oh, she's very pretty. She's pretty there are other ways that you can support wonderful organizations out there unconscious bias, but that specifically work with queer and trans kids, and people. And I'm going to put two of those into the chat under this specific live, and that's the Trevor Project and transstudent.org. These are both really great projects that support trans trans kids and trans people. They have lots of really great resources on there that are free for anybody to use
[00:36:19] Alexis: Gender unicorn, for instance.
[00:36:26] Linet: Oh, that sounds awesome. I haven't checked that one out, I’ll have to check it out. What is it?
[00:36:29] Alexis: It explains various axes of sexuality, of gender roles versus gender identity versus gender presentation, et cetera, et cetera. It's very good.
[00:36:42] Linet: I think I've seen that on social media, but I didn't know that's where it came from. That's super cool. So definitely check out these two websites. If you have the bandwidth, please donate. If you like this trans AMA today please donate to us. You can check out our donations page through our Facebook profile.
[00:37:04] Alexis: Okay. Well, so check out the full text of the AMA coming up in three parts on my medium, which is medium.com/@alexis.l.krohn.
[00:37:17] Linet: Yeah, and definitely check out Alexis's medium for other awesome articles about. Queer stuff. It's really great. So now that we've concluded our AMA, I don't see any questions coming in. If they do, we might add a little extra bit to the series of articles that are coming out. If you haven't joined our newsletter. So if you haven't joined any of these later we encourage you to do so. That should also be in our link or on our website, which you can find on our profile page.
[00:37:59] Alexis: Can I interrupt really quickly? Because I see one of my college friends on here and I have to take a moment to say one of the very first times that I felt seen. Because I knew on some level, even in college, about being trans when one of the first times that I felt really truly seen and it was wonderful was when a handful of my college buddies one night, they were “we're going to have girl night tonight watching a movie.” And I was “Oh, okay. I'll go then.” And they were “no, you stay, you're one of the girls.” And I was “okay, and my college friends didn’t know it at the time, but on the inside, I was loving it. That's a great example. Exciting.
[00:38:51] Linet: Oh, that's beautiful. So Katie asked, “what was the website Alexis mentioned?” Alexis mentioned medium.com. It's a, essentially a, a place where people write different articles. So Alexis has her own profile there, and she has several articles there. You can search her as Alexis, L Krohn there. Also you will see that if you join our mailing list as well, and we'll also put the links to that on our Facebook page. Beautiful. Thanks, Susannah, Nice to see you.
So Breaking Bread and Bias. So we kicked it off with the amazing Alexis Krohn here doing Trans Day of Visibility, AMA way to go, Aexis, for putting yourself out there and answering all our uncomfortable questions that we couldn't really ask anybody else. And upcoming, we have some conversations around identity and privilege that we'll talk about.
We'll talk a little bit, a little bit about Latinidad. And spoiler alert, being a Latino, Latina, Latinx is not a race. We'll do that, with some of our community partners out there. Really exciting. We have the Be a Better Imposter panel event coming up. This is a collaboration with Tamarindo podcast.
We have wonderful panelists, there, uh, the cohost of the Bag Ladies Podcast and Queen Victoria, which is a fantastic trans Latina activist. And this is gonna be a really great event. It's April 22nd. The other events we have coming up we'll have BIPOC stories featuring BIPOC kids, for kids that will be reading, with Mama Let's Read.
And then we also have an upcoming plan hopefully in June - “Stop Asian Hate and Activate.” So we'll talk about healing resources. Sort of what's going on, as well as make it a group action item, so much like a hackathon, it'll be an activation-athon if you will, so that we can all come together to support the AAPI community friends, family, and loved ones that need our support right now.
So thanks again so much, Alexis. Sorry, I'm not on camera. Do you want to say bye to everybody?
[00:41:29] Alexis: Yeah, bye everyone. Thanks for coming. And this has been great.
[00:41:38] Linet: Yeah, thank you. Everybody look forward to the recording of this video that we will post up on our Facebook and our YouTube soon and see you.
Okay. Yeah. @UBP_STEM on Twitter, @UBP_STEM on Instagram, you found us on our Facebook. We're also on LinkedIn. BTW. We have openings for clients later in the summer and this year. So if you know anybody, tell them that we're here to support folks with all their DEI problems and DEI plans.
So thanks again, Alexis. Thank you everybody for coming and we'll see you soon.
[00:42:26] Alexis: Bye-bye.