Break Away From The Binary: From Women To Folx
Well, hello there. I am coming to you from the same closet full of clothes as usual. Unfortunately, though, I am having a pretty major microphone issue. And rather than not have a podcast episode for you this week, I am going without a mic. And just hoping that the sound quality is going to be good enough through all the tweaking that I can do because I have some important news that I want to share. This is actually what this episode is going to be about.
Normally, I know that my little intro with the tinkly music starts first, but that also has the name of the podcast in it. And because the name of the podcast is changing. Well, one word is changing. I felt like I just wanted to come right on and talk about it. And then I'll go ahead and cue the music and get the intro going. So when I decided to start this podcast, it was because I've had all this wonderful experience working with women in transition.
And while I work with folx of all genders because so much of my work has been with people who identify as women, that's why I used the word "women" in the title; a podcast for women breaking away. But as time has gone on, I noticed I was feeling some discomfort with this and it's because it felt exclusionary. And if there's one thing I don't want to be, and there's many things I don't want to be, in addition to a lot of things I want to be. And in the middle of that is who I am, which is always a work in progress.
What I'm wanting to say here is that I never want to be an exclusionary feminist. You might be familiar with the term TERF, which is a trans-exclusionary radical feminist. That is a feminist, generally cishet women, but not always, who believe that transgender women are not women. You might've heard also about the big, horrible, bullying, fighting, I don't even know what to call it, defending herself that JK Rowling has been doing over the past couple of years, claiming that she is not a TERF when actually she is a TERF, sadly.
I will always love those books. I will. I won't throw the baby out with the bathwater, but I am going to throw JK Rowling out with the bathwater. Unless she comes to her senses and decides that she wants to do something different. Which she can. She could, and she can, and she might, and I hope she will.
Being a TERF has never been an issue for me. I've had many, many trans women clients, as well as trans women friends who, oh my goodness, they've all enriched my life in so many ways. Some of them may even be listening. And if so, "Hey girl". So just wanting to say that that was not particularly a learning curve for me.
But as you know, I've come clean from the beginning, I guess that's not really coming clean. I guess just saying from the beginning that I'm always on a learning curve. I'm always growing into my ever-growing edges. This is something that I both really love about myself. And it's also something that's really hard and there's some pain around it sometimes because growth hurts, you know. There's growing pains. And when I started this podcast, I knew that something wasn't sitting right in my belly and wasn't really landing well in my nervous system. And what I realized was that I was being exclusionary around non-binary folks by using the word women. And I don't want to do that. I'm not going to do that. So, I'm changing the name. The new name of this podcast is cue music...
Hi there. Welcome to One Day You Finally Knew: A Podcast For Folx Breaking Away. I'm your host, Jessica Chasnoff. And I am thrilled to be here with you as we stretch into our growing edges and discover how we can break free from what no longer serves us. I am so delighted to be here with you, walking together. Let's see where our walk leads us today.
Awww, that was nice. Wasn't it? That felt nice. That felt so nice to me. Folx, folx, folx, folx. And by the way, F O L X. I sat with this for a while. I thought about whether I wanted to change the spelling of women to womxn with an X, W O M X N. I got some great help from a really amazing human who is a new friend. Their name is E. Super hilarious. Fun. To the point. Groovy. Cool. Really kind of helps me with my neurosis and also shows me theirs, which to me is true friendship, and I'm excited about getting to know them better.
Just giving a shout-out to them. I had a great conversation with them about which direction to go. I through my research and talking to them, I learned about how there are folx that find women with an X to still be exclusionary. And so, none of that, none of that. We're doing none of that.
But what I want to talk about here is the clunkiness of learning. Okay. I've talked a little bit about it before in terms of my anti-racist work. You know, it's in everything. It would be so great if our learning could be linear and if it could feel graceful. You know, we could be these swans gliding through the planet and feeling all graceful and shit about how we learn. And, that is just not how it goes. And I am confronted by this over and over again. It doesn't necessarily get easier. And the fact that it's clunky. The fact that it's awkward. The fact that we, you know, screw up, is something that keeps us from stretching into those edges.
I'm going to show you the clunk. I'm going to show you the so cringe because that's how it goes. Oh, did you hear my stomach growl? I'm probably going to leave that in just because that's my parasympathetic nervous system being like, "yeah, we are digging this, this lands well." (Makes stomach grumbling sounds.).
Hey, do you know that the actual name for stomach growling is borborygmus? Don't ask me to spell it right now. I used to know how to spell this. I don't right now. Stomach rumbling. I'll put it in the show notes. Yes. Uh, stomach rumbling, stomach grumbling, growling, whatever you want to call it is a sign that our parasympathetic nervous system is going full steam.
Yeah. So it's clunky. And part of the issue with gendering and the way that gender-they folx are, wow, bravely, beautifully, boldly coming out and saying, this is who I am. It's gorgeous. And we're still working on the languaging around it. And there's a way that, because we're still figuring it out, we're working it out, it's easy to be lazy.
I was working with a client. Remember, I'm always going to do my disclaimer. Okay. I composite and amalgamate my peeps. So no one will know what's them. Okay. Disclaimer over. They had a gender-they person in their life. I'm going to, just to make it easier as I go in between these two people, I'm going to say that my client identified as a woman. And so I'm going to use the pronouns, she and her, and I'm going to talk about the gender-they person as they/them.
So she was talking about how this person was in her life and she kept calling them she and her, and I kept correcting her and she got really flustered about it and said, "you know, I'm just talking about it with you. So like, I don't really need to do that here". Big error, because respect is in the same room with that person and it's out of the same room with that person. If that person is a, they, you know, their pronouns, are they/them when she's with them, then they need to be they/ them when she's not. And again, it's new, it's new for this person. You know, this person is older. You know, this person is 73 and I get it.
So yes, basically. She refused to do that. And so I just kept coming in with they and them not as, um, "you need to call this person they/ them, but that's how I would refer to them with the hope that the penny was going to drop at some point and my client would start doing this. I don't know if that happened. What I'm trying to say here is it's really easy to be lazy. I want to be lazy sometimes. I mean, there's some times when I'm like, do I really need to fucking grow today? Can't I just be my little self who like, maybe isn't being a better human today.
Do I have to be a better human today? Really, really do I have to be? Yes, I have to be. I mean, no, sometimes I'm not. I mean, let me be honest. Sometimes I, I try to not be my best human when I'm at home and it's just me. And then I'm a judgy fucker around everything and everyone, but nobody hears it but me.
Yeah. That's my secret. Yeah. I said this on an Instagram Reel, but I don't think I've said it here. I'm a judgy fucker. Yeah. So. Again, doing this together with you. Always working on my judgy fucker-ness. Always working with loving the human that I am, the flawed human that I am, and working to be the best human that I can be.
So it's easy to be lazy. Right. But let's try not to be. Okay. Like I could have, I could have not changed the name of this podcast, but it felt lazy and it felt unkind and it was exclusionary. Okay. And so yeah, changed it in the podcast information, changed it on the cover art, changed it everywhere the cover art was. Yeah, that's what we do. We do it to say," guess what? I'm here for you." Okay.
Here's the next thing. We've all been brought up in a binary world. Just like with our anti-racist work, for those of us who are white, we are fish that do not know that we are wet. I think I heard that for the first time on a podcast where Ibram X Kendi said that. You know, white folks, we've been bathing in the water, swimming in the oceans of the white body being considered supreme.
And we've been swimming in the waters of, there are two genders, male and female, and there's not. There are more than two genders. We are not in a gender binary world and whether someone changes the language or not, and works to understand the pronouns, this is the way that it is. This is the way it's going to be. So how wonderful would it be to work on yourself and get with the program? Okay.
In different Aboriginal traditions, there have been multi-gendered people and non-gendered people. The Berdache, which actually I learned about when I was in grad school, which is great. I'm glad that I learned about that 20 years ago. When was it, more than 20 years? Jesus. Uhhh, Yeah, I'm just going to keep the numbers out of it. Not because I am concerned about how long it's been or that I'm feeling old, but just because I just can't do the math right now. I'm in right brain.
Thank you. Where was I going with this? Yes, the Berdache. Ok, these people are no longer referred to as the Berdache, they are referred to as two-spirit. These were people that were, you know, an indigenous people. I believe I said Aboriginal before. Forgive me. I meant indigenous. Folx indigenous to these lands. Some of whom are Aboriginal, depending on what part of the planet you're on.
These people were considered shamans. These were the knowers. These were the intuitives. These were the people you went to for wisdom and guidance. But in this binary world, that white folx, who stole it from indigenous peoples, who stole land, stamped out traditions, stamped out people, out people, stamped out animals.
We have to remember, we are a nation that gave people Smallpox on blankets. We are a nation that gave people Syphilis and then did not give them the cure. We are people who killed all the white buffalo, right. So, we are fish who don't know that we are wet and we have this great opportunity right now to see the wisdom that comes from people who are non-binary and what they have to offer.
And, um, we're missing it if we don't step up and stretch into those edges. And I don't want to miss it. I don't want to miss it, my friends. I don't want to miss the beautiful gifts and wisdom that people who have the courage to come out and say, they, they know they're not binary. They know they are fluid, right?
They have so much to teach us. And I am here for it. And I am really happy that you're here for it too. So right. Let's take these lessons with us. Remember, I'm in it with you. That, okay. We are still figuring out the language. It's easy to be awkward and clunky and that's okay. It's better than being lazy.
The risk is ours to take. To be clunky. I am actually quoting Roxy Manning, who is a very cool anti-racist educator and nonviolent communication educator. I took a course with her. Gosh, I think it was the spring, now. I really should take it again. There are really great tools in there. It was a course on working with racial microaggressions. And I asked her a question at one point about saying the wrong thing to a person of color. And Roxy said, I mean, she was clear as a bell and it just rang right through my soul. And she said," the risk is yours to take."
The risk is ours to take. Right. We, and when I say we, not everybody listening to this, is in that "we". When I say we, I mean, we, as people who identify as women.
The risk is ours to take, to work with our languaging, to show up and be clunky. Right? I want to thank E so much for being cool with my clunkiness. I mean, I was like, I was nervous and neurotic. I was like, this person is cool. And I feel like I'm the psychologist and I should know better. And they were like, what? Oh, thank you. Okay. So. Let's keep doing this work together.
Now, last piece and super important piece is. . . gentleness, gentleness, gentleness. Be gentle with yourself, with the clunkiness. Be gentle with yourself as you are. And all of us are learning and we don't know the answers, because there may not be answers yet, but we can sit in the questions together.
That was a nice breath. Sit in the questions together. That's what I want us to do here. Yes. I hope that this has been of benefit to you today, or has at least gotten you to think or think differently or get curious or has helped you feel welcomed when maybe you didn't feel welcomed here before. If that's the case, then welcome. Thank you. Welcome to One Day You Finally Knew: A Podcast For Folx Breaking Away. Okay, lovelies.