Keep Rocking, I’m With You - Emily Martinez, 2/1 Response

While reading Evin Taylor’s Cisgender Privilege, I had a very heavy realization drop on me. Being cisgender myself, it has never really hit me just how much energy and patience non-binary conforming people need in order to go through the day. Being well acquainted with the LGBT+ community, I always knew of the struggles they face. However, it was not until I saw the list on pages 94-95 that it was really put into perspective. Fifty questions-- and you know that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Fifty questions of simple tasks: going to the bathroom, minor doctor visits that have nothing to do with your nethers, dressing rooms, swimsuits, meeting people. Hell, speaking seems like a situation waiting to happen. Between the intrusive questions and repetitive explanations, I realize just how exhausting it is for them to just exist as themselves on a day-to-day basis. In their passage, Taylor says “Privilege is the stability society affords us when we don’t rock the boat” (94). I realize now the privilege given to me due to my conformity to my assigned gender. Meanwhile I know people figuratively heading up river in a society that demands constant justification for their right to be who they are. They go through life with the world believing their privacy is a matter of public record. I’m happy I read this passage, and passages like this. We know discrimination is happening and that it’s bad, it’s just common sense. But, unfortunately for a lot of us, it’s not until someone facing discrimination explains the specifics that we really know how just bad. I’ve made my mind up. I’m going to educate myself and actually do something. I’m not just going to stand here in my stability while my friends fight the current. As of right now I’m not quite sure what I can do, but I’ll figure it out. Until then, count on me for support.