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Frequently Asked Transgender Questions

As part of a transgender and non-binary panel discussion I recently participated in, we received some challenging comments/questions about transgender individuals in sports, feminism & youth transition. They seem to reflect popular topics in news and social media, and may be questions a lot of non-trans people have, so I’m sharing a distilled version of the questions, along with my complete responses here. See also related media links at the end. Questions:

  1. Should transgender athletes be allowed in gender-separated sports?
  2. Maybe transgender should be its own sports category?
  3. Is it “unfair” (due to biology or hormones) for transgender athletes to compete?
  4. When should transgender youth start hormones or surgery?
  5. Do transgender individuals fit in with feminism and the feminist movement?
  6. Don’t “biological women” experience unique challenges & trauma in patriarchal societies, due to their physiology?
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Our Humanity Is Not Up For Debate

Plenty of human behaviors and government policies can be reasonably argued about (for example, budgeting); however, what is not up for debate is our fundamental humanity. It’s not politics to understand that all humans deserve Dignity, Autonomy and Safety; we just do.

Anyone who seeks to create, maintain or control a lower class for any group of humans desires (consciously or subconsciously) power imbalance in their favor via institutional bigotry. This is not justifiable.

Transgender people (including trans-women of color) are human beings. It does not matter what your politics are, your sincerely held beliefs or religious doctrine. If you think that crossing traditional lines of gender makes them “wrong,” it is actually you who is wrong. LGBTQ+ folks do not have to hide their relationships nor who they are to avoid causing discomfort; we can be proud of who we are (as per the intent of Pride month celebrations).

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Remote Work is No Panacea

As we all know, remote work has exploded during the pandemic, becoming much more widely practiced than ever before. In the wake of pandemic (receding or becoming “new normal” in more areas, especially throughout USA in March/April of this year), there’s a lot of discussion of whether/how to bring workers back to the office.

On the worker side, I’m seeing lots of posts (on LinkedIn) by workers extolling the benefits of remote work, including eliminated commute (saving time), easier childcare (?!?), increased comfort and better for marginalized communities (e.g., no need for code-switching). To my mind, the most compelling argument in favor of remote work is the benefit for workers with mobility or sensory issues, as traveling to -or being in- the office can be onerous at best and unsustainable (meaning they can’t keep the job) at worst.

However, I feel like many downsides to office workers switching to remote work are being overlooked, such as offloaded infrastructure, space/network limitations, and health consequences.

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Racism in America: Values & Myths

As Americans, we cherish the values of equality and opportunity (which are enshrined directly and indirectly, respectively, in the U.S. Declaration of Independence ). Thus, we have a responsibility to create and maintain policies and culture which ensure equal opportunities and freedom for all who inhabit this great country.

However, based on consistently disparate outcomes, we have some problems with these values in practice. Some racial groups (e.g., Black Americans), when compared to White Americans, are disproportionately affected by: low graduation rates; high arrest/incarceration rates; low representation in senior leadership; high poverty; & low household wealth.

The explanation for these ongoing racial disparities can be found either in the idea that it’s something inherent to each racial group, such as culture or biology, or, in the idea that our policies and culture have created a system of disadvantages for some racial groups versus systematic advantages for other racial groups. These 2 potential explanations represent “racism” and “antiracism” respectively.

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Diversity & Inclusion for Hiring

In the wake of the 2020 Movement for Black Lives, and continued attention in 2021, many companies and organizations are championing racial diversity. Those taking it seriously (and not just paying lip service) are evaluating diversity and inclusion within their employee base, and considering changes to recruitment and hiring.

Some background on me: I have a professional interest in hiring (20 years as Quality Engineer for a popular Hiring Software) and personal passion for empathy and diversity. Following the racially charged events of spring 2020, thousands of work colleagues (including me) became engaged with diversity/antiracism discussions and events at my very large company. At work, I co-facilitated an anti-racist book club (through 7 books) and was a panelist in several livestream events discussing race relations in America.

Therefore, I consider myself to have an elevated perception into diversity hiring. Following are 6 recommended areas for improving diversity throughput in your hiring process (see also references at the end):

Increase Outreach, Reform Background Check Process, Focus on Skills (Over Means or Fit), Limit Salary Consideration, Anonymize Candidate Data, Build Culture of Inclusion

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Antiracist Letter Template

Having participating in 4 different antiracist book clubs (so far), I created the following template in response to, “what can I do?” questions that inevitably come up when people’s eyes are opened to the long history and pervasive present of racism & white supremacy. The template is intended for contacting companies that you do regular business with (e.g., bank, phone company, cable company, subscription services) in order to A. let them know customers care, B. push them to be transparent about their practices and C. push them to be better in countering racism.

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Meaningful Police Reform

In 2020, it’s become pretty clear to many people that police departments across the country, as they’ve been operating for the past 30+ years, have significant problems and these problems cannot simply be attributed to “a few bad apples.” The problems we have are endemic and systemic, including racist policies regarding “The War on Drugs” enforcement (& to be fair, the problems extend through all levels of criminal justice, not just police).

I’ve been racking my brains for how to approach police reform in a way that is meaningful without resorting to “Defund” or “Abolish” the police ideas, which I think are politically infeasible (too little public support) and, moreover, would be pointless to raise to police leadership.

The police are, to some extent, agents of chaos (see my last post), with common use of excessive: force, arrests, stops, seizures, escalation of conflict; most often focused on racial minorities & vulnerable populations. This is true despite the prevalence of well-meaning individuals (aka “good people”) within the police force.

How to transform the police into superheroes for good (in the immediate future)? Here’s my outline (and prototype of suggestions that could be shared with city/state and police leadership):

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Law & Chaos: it’s what’s for dinner

When I hear the catchphrase, “Law and Order,” I can’t help but think of the news stories of 2020, including:

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Rocky Road of Spring 2020

The spring of 2020 has been a crazy time; this isn’t my usual one topic/essay post, but I thought it was worth mentioning some important events from this unusual spring: covid-19 first wave, black lives matter protests and an historic Supreme Court ruling for gender equality.

For starters, happy Juneteenth! I look forward to a day when our racist war on drugs ends and our racist justice system (including policing, trials, sentencing, imprisonment) is restructured for equality and emancipation can be more fully realized.

I support the Anti-Racism & Black Lives Matter movements, including (but not limited to) the recent protests sparked by the police killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor & Ahmaud Arbery, as well as the weaponization of police by white woman Amy Cooper against Christopher Cooper. These problems, along with so many others are caused by structural racism (aka institutional racism or systemic racism), which many white people are unaware of, but for which a great deal of statistical evidence and personal stories by people of color demonstrate as a significant societal problem. See also: unconscious bias (i.e., implicit bias or implicit association).

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