Trans Day of Visibility
What does visibility mean?
For a long time, I was trapped. Trapped inside a body that felt wrong, without knowing why, like being in quicksand, where struggling without direction only makes things worse. I spent years pushing down thoughts and feelings that could have led me to living life as Alex a lot sooner. Maybe if there had been more meaningful trans representation in my childhood, I wouldn't have felt so alone.
Representation means two completely different things when it’s shaped by those who want to control the narrative. Those in power benefit from trans people being portrayed as confused, confusing, dangerous, unfaithful, and unhappy. When representation is shaped by those who seek control, it stops being about truth, and instead becomes a tool of power. When the media portrays trans people through a distorted lens, it strips away the beauty that coexists alongside struggle. The media weaponizes stories of trans people that don’t fit the norm, and frames transness as the quicksand that traps vulnerable kids, pulling them toward something dangerous and unnatural. But the real quicksand isn’t transness; it’s the constraints that society places on us. They insist that restriction doesn’t hold people down, but provides a safe space free of quick movements and dangerous change. In reality, it's designed to keep us still, silent, and afraid.
This constant rhetoric—that being trans is dangerous, miserable, a curse—breeds a fundamental sense of shame. Even if you make it through without internalizing deep self-hatred - or if you fight hard enough to unlearn it - being out can still bring guilt. As if living authentically, speaking honestly, is an intrusion. This shame doesn’t exist in a vacuum - it’s useful to those in power. The right-wing media doesn’t push this rhetoric to protect anyone - it’s about control through fear.
The lie this perpetuates, an idea that everybody has a responsibility to conform to what is biologically correct, societally dictated, so that everyone is the same and therefore SAFE, is the weakest of fallacies. There is no “correct” biology; just look at the millions of intersex people who exist naturally, despite what rigid definitions try to impose. Societal values vary vastly across cultures and time periods; see the many indigenous cultures that have long recognized Two-Spirit identities, like the Muxes, a recognized third gender population of the Zapotec people in Oaxaca, Mexico. The biggest gambit is that the people trying to perpetuate this fallacy know this. None of the fascist politicians trying to pass laws against queer and trans people actually believe in sameness; they believe in control. And shame is one of their most effective tools. What they want is to distract the masses. What they know is that if the working class, the vast majority of society, is educated, happy, and united, they will have the means to rebel. How do you escape quicksand if you don’t know it’s there?
I still carry that shame, but fight to not stay silent. The way I fight back is by being publicly trans, publicly mad at the current administration, and embracing the parts of me that were told to shrink. Even now, at 26, and publicly out to everyone who knows me, I still struggle to correct people who misgender me. That part pops up, and feels guilty for not being what those people they think they see. I hope to replace that guilt with a small seed of pride, and happily say “it’s he or they, actually” without feeling like a burden. All I want now is to be the example I needed growing up - the example that many people don’t want to exist, because visibility shatters their illusion of control.
This is what visibility means. This is why visibility is so powerful.
Sources and Further Reading
https://nhm.org/stories/beyond-gender-indigenous-perspectives-muxe
https://isna.org/faq/what_is_intersex/
