A TransGriot Post I wrote on April 25, 2009
Why do cisgender people feel they have the right to disrespect transgender people by refusing to use or acknowledge the names we have chosen for ourselves?
Would you disrespect Cherilyn Sarkisian that way despite the fact she’s gone by the name of Cher for several decades now? Cassius Clay changed his to Muhammad Ali, and only a right winger who hates on him will do so today.
Prince for a few years changed his to an unpronounceable symbol, and yet people didn’t refer to him as Prince Rogers Nelson, they called him The Artist.
You don’t call Sting by his given name of Gordon Sumner or bring up Ice Cube’s birth name of O’Shea Jackson. If you want an interview with Tina Turner better not call her by her birth name of Anna Mae Bullock, much less write “Tina Turner” in quotation marks as some media peeps have done with the names of transgender people.
A new name carries a lot of weight for a transgender person. It not only signifies to the world our desired gender identity, in many cases much thought went into the process of us selecting our new names.
Yes, we realize that sometimes it’s a major adjustment when you’ve known someone as Alexander, for example and now have to get used to Alexis standing in front of you in feminine attire and living her everyday life as the woman she was born to be.
We’re not going to get mad at you for the occasional stumble in that situation. But when you know the deal, and insist on calling a transwoman by her old name just to be mean, catty, or flex your cisgender privilege then it’s on like Donkey Kong.
It’s not only perceived as a major insult by that transperson, it says to us you don’t care about or respect us as people. It could also put us in serious danger of being the victim of a hate attack. If one of our haters is in earshot who didn’t know our business before you did that hears you, you’ve just outed us to the world as a transperson.
If he’s transphobic, you have just set the wheels in motion for a possible hate crime if that person decides to take some of his life frustrations out on the transperson you just outed.
So show some respect and use the new name. You’ll not only be showing us support by doing so, it’s greatly appreciated by the transperson in question as well.
Good post. Far too many people don’t realize or don’t care that respecting people’s names and pronouns can be a matter of life and death.
Interestingly, knowing how seriously important it is to respect the names trans people choose for themselves has made me a lot more supportive and respectful of self-naming in general. Once upon a time I didn’t think people had the right to come up with their own nicknames outside of a trans context–and then I realized I was setting up a weird double standard by treating trans people’s chosen names as more valid than cis people’s (better than a double standard in the other direction, since calling someone Ted instead of Teddy isn’t likely to put them at risk of violence, but still a pointless double standard). Being trans has taught me a lot of important things about respecting everyone’s autonomy and right to self identify.
If only more people saw who we are on the inside instead of treating us like transitioning is a choice and thinking that we are still men. I just received a voice mail the other day from my mum and her boyfriend and they were saying all sorts of hurtful, transphobic things. Feh, but they are ignorant Southern Baptists that never really cared anyways.
A question. How do you refer to works produced by the person before transition? One of my favorite musicians transitioned and is still performing. How do you talk about the things done before and respect both the past and the present?
Names…always use the name and pronoun the person in question is using. That’s just basic.
A cisperson outright REFUSING to use the name that a Transperson have given themselves is such a blatant, arrogant privilaged thing to. Its like saying, “No, I’LL tell you who you are. Deal with it.” Ugh.
Angelia,
Ask them. A lot of us have extremely strong dislikes for our old names.
Thee are a lot of standards on doing that — I generally use the model:
“Current name” (formerly old name) did x
When referring to older stuff.
An example: Paul Blatt (formerly Lousie Herndon) was a mall cop in his youth.
IN my case, if anyone were to dig up my old name and stuff, I would personally prefer that they not use the old name. For anything. Ever.
In other words, treat it like you would treat someone who get’s married and changes their last name. Or someone who used a pen name befoe being discovered for temselves (a la Andre Norton).
It really just about that hard.
[...] You Respect A Cisperson’s Right To Choose Their Name, Why Not A Transperson? [...]
Thank you for writing this. This is a good, basic intro to human decency and respect.
Dyssonance,
Thanks, that was how I had been doing it. I was just checking that it wasn’t offensive.