Episode 55 - I am the Enemy Within

Summary

In this candid conversation, Vanessa Joy discusses the current political climate and its implications for marginalized communities, particularly the trans community. She emphasizes the need for personal safety, the importance of allyship, and the necessity of community support in navigating these unprecedented times. Vanessa shares her personal experiences and the challenges she faces, urging listeners to take action and be proactive in supporting those in need.

Takeaways

• Protect yourselves and cut out toxicity.
• It's okay to be scared and angry.
• The two-party system is broken.
• We are entering a fascist state.
• Don't let anyone talk over you.
• Being trans is not a choice.
• We cannot let the government control our bodies.
• Allies need to show up and take action.
• Community support is crucial for survival.
• Be true to yourself and your friends.

Chapters

00:00 Navigating Unprecedented Times
06:06 The Role of Allies
12:03 The Impact of Political Climate
17:45 Facing the Future with Uncertainty
23:50 The Fight for Rights and Recognition
30:05 Final Thoughts and Call to Action

As of September 2024, Transcending Humanity is now known as Vanesstradiol! Episodes will be much more sparse from here on out, but I hope to continue bringing you quality content!

Transcript

0:21

Hey everyone, this is gonna be kind of a rambling video. I know it's been quite a while since I've recorded. Just haven't had the spoons, honestly. So it is now Thursday, two days after the election, and I just wanted to just address some things for some people. People ask me my thoughts, and I type things out, and yada yada yada, I post, I delete, I post, I delete. whatever, so just want to get this out there for people to hopefully be able to find some help in the advice I'm going to give you. It's very clear that myself and many others in this country are now considered the enemy within. We have the Matt Walshes and the Nick Fuentes of the world that are full-on gloating about it. yeah, Project 2025 was real. Well duh, we've known that the whole time. Number one for everybody, protect yourselves. Cut out toxicity. Reduce your footprint where you can. I personally am going to start shutting down my social media presence and I am removing those that support hate from my life, from my presence, whatever. It's not easy, but it's okay to be scared. It's okay to cry. It's okay to be fucking pissed because I know I am. both surprised and not about the results of this election. If you want to know who to point at, to blame, whatever, there are other creators that can give you better concept of that. Alex Cascio has some good things to on it, Chasing Oz, Danielle, she has some good things to say, Tizzyent. You're not going to get that from me other than extreme disappointment in the Democratic Party. The two party system in this country is just broken. And if I've learned anything about the Democrats, especially having run for office as a Democrat and how little help they were in the process, they're disorganized and they don't have drive to get shit done all the time. We, we could have had so many things passed in the past to protect us from the situation, but we didn't. So. We are going into, as you keep on hearing, unprecedented times. And it really is. I keep hearing, you know, the average length of an empire is 250 years, and here we are at 248. Do I think America is going to, or the United States of America is going to be the same country in four years? No, I don't think it's going be the same, it's not the same country now. We are so sharply divided by hatred. I've had people try to essentially talk over me saying, you know, you can't blame people for voting for Trump, this, that, and the other, because they, they're just, they didn't know what else to do. I, I'm not excusing ignorance. I'm sorry. This, this man put everything out there. And while half the population of the country may not actively hate me, they're complicit. They're complicit. in each and every person who was hurt by what's going to happen here in the future. going to address marginalized communities first. If you have a uterus. Be careful. Get an IUD if you can. There are resources out there to help you find places to get that done. My first recommendation would be to reach out to Planned Parenthood and see who they recommend if they can't do it themselves. The right has been empowered and yes, I realize that the really militant and violent ones are a minority, but those are the people that are going to be put in charge. We are entering a fascist state of this country. We are repeating what happened in Germany in the 30s. We are repeating the fascist situation in Italy. It's not time to say, to try to explain to these people anymore. It's time to protect yourself and protect your loved ones. We tried, we tried asking, we tried begging, we tried everything to stop this from happening. But it didn't, by a huge amount. People didn't show it. So now we have to protect ourselves. So as I said, if you have a uterus, take care. For minorities, for the queer community, be vigilant. Do not be afraid to ask for help. Do not let anybody talk over you. I can speak on behalf of what it's like to be a trans person. I cannot speak on behalf of what it's like to be an immigrant or a racial minority. I only know my own life experience. Check yourself to make sure that you are not talking over someone with a different life experience that would know better about situation than you. Anything that comes to race, I... I will tell you, talk to someone in that particular, in that group. Because it's not my lived experience. My lived experience is as a transgender person, transgender women specifically, whites in this country. Being white, I still have privileges that many other trans people don't. And it's, it's an entire cacophony of just utter complete bullshit. And what we need to do is stop inviting. We need to listen to each other. We need to act. I'm going to address allies here. Do not be the person that says, I'm rooting for you or hang in there or the worst thing ever, which will flat out get a go fuck yourself for me. I'm praying for you. That shit doesn't do anything, especially prayers, prayers. It's such an empty fucking promise. I know I have religious people that that listen to me as well and follow me. And I respect your religion for you. But those words are so empty when you're talking to somebody who is facing such danger that we are. And it's the same words that we hear over and over again with people saying, we're praying for Trump, we're praying for this, we're praying for that. No, we don't want your prayers. We don't want your best wishes. We don't want your phone to be ringing like mine just did. I need to silence it, because who is in Alabama? I don't know anyone in Alabama. Anyways, we don't want that shit. I'm not cutting things in this video. I'm just, I'm just posting it. I'm just stream of consciousness. What we need is action. If you really want to be an ally, you need to show up. First and foremost, Cishet white men, you are our most powerful and influential allies. And there's not a whole lot of you that are on our side. you are going to actually face your own sort of discrimination that you are probably seeing already in that. by, I've heard this even from, amab, NB people that look like a normal white dude. People are going to expect you to be the enemy because you look like the enemy. And I'm sorry for that. That fucking sucks. the best way around it is, is actions and being there for us, helping us. A lot of us are too proud, myself included usually, to ask for help. Don't wait for us to tell us, tell you what we need. Just show up. mean, be there when you know we're crying. Take us out to dinner. I think the most influential thing, the most powerful thing that's going to be happening to help us coming up here is money and assistance in moving. I'm currently in Ohio. For the next couple months, I'm safe enough, but I won't be forever. And ultimately, I'm probably going to have to leave the country to ensure my safety. My first step is to get to a trans sanctuary state. There are a number of states in this country that have laws protecting trans people and their healthcare. Currently Washington state is my number one pick for a number of reasons. I have friends there. I think that I could transfer my photography, but since they're quite well, I've always wanted to live in the Pacific Northwest and as a border state. So there's a number of reasons, but. If there's one thing that almost all queer people have in common is that we don't have money. So I'm addressing the queer people. Don't be afraid to ask. Don't be afraid to make it go fun. Me. I don't like asking for money, but I'm going to. I need lots of it. I need to uproot my life, pack up whatever I can and get out within probably the next few months. Once. Once the new administration takes power, things are going to happen pretty quickly. If I can count on them then to do anything, it's that they're not going to fuck around. They've been telling us all along what they're going to be doing, and they're going to do it. I know like my average Republican neighbor around here is still going to be fine with me being around, but I am definitely afraid of violence. I pass well enough, but not well enough to be safe. And there are a lot of people like me. Remember, being trans is not about passing. This is my own personal experience. For me, passing is important. For me, getting facial feminization surgery is extremely important. I'm trying to figure out how to do it because I know that will also increase my safety. But Ohio doesn't have protections for my health care. And my body no longer produces hormones naturally. So without access to them, I will wither away, possibly die. I had an experience earlier this year where Rite Aid Pharmacy fucked up big time and they were giving me the wrong prescription for my estrogen injections. That was only 20 % of polyp in CETA was supposed to be. And so I was running on almost no hormones in my body. Since I've had both an orchiectomy and then a full depth vaginoplasty, my body does not produce hormones naturally. I have to take artificial hormones in order to live. So I was running for about six months with with hardly any hormones and it quite literally drove me nuts. wound up, if you listen to former episodes, I had a suicide attempt and I wanted to possible lies for it. And I'm pissed about that. I don't want to go through that again. It was, I couldn't think straight and no one could. get me to think straight because my body was working against me. I know this is a rambling message and that's why this is going to be a YouTube video and a podcast. So this is you. If you're interested enough in me to, for what I have to say, you're just listening to me yammer and give advice and tell my own stories. Cause it's all about, you know, I know my own lived experience anyways, don't be afraid to ask for help. Ask people what you need. And if you're an ally, ask people what they need. Because we don't always know what we need, but at least knowing that someone cares enough to actually want to help. I ask anyone in marginalized communities to be honest as what you need. It'll be hard at first to say it. If what you need is some time and space, just say, need some space. A lot of us are processing the implications of this absolute clusterfuck that we have found ourselves in. a lot of us still don't know what to do. My plans keep changing over and over again myself. If you have the means, sponsor a queer person, sponsor anybody. If you have the power to do so and the privilege to do so, please do. We are now. This isn't about politics anymore. What is, is. We are now in the face of showing each other our humanity, that we care, that, I'm just coming from an autistic girl that can't process emotions, but. showing each other who we can trust and who we can't. Again, you look back to the thirties in Nazi Germany. Yeah, there were a lot of people that might not have necessarily directly supported the Nazi party, but they were still Nazis. Just like, and it's the same with MAGA. If you voted that way, that's what you are. And you can make amends for that, but it's going to be really hard for people to trust you. And you're going to have to prove that you fucked up and actively work to correct things. personally, I have nothing to do with you personally. You're dead to me. most of the people I know that, would have voted that way are educated people and they don't have an excuse in my eyes. they watched the news. They chose money over. over life and that's going to bite them in the ass too because we won't even get into that. All I can say is the policies that you think are going to be so great, it's not going to turn out that way. And even if they did, is it worth your humanity to have betrayed so many people, to have hurt so many people? My biggest fear right now in two days from the election, there are so many people in marginalized communities, queer community, trans community. that have just barely been hanging on. And I know we lost people. I don't know who we lost. I am in her reports, but I just know, and... It fucking chills me. even know what to say to their families, to the people that love them. All I can say is anyone that knew them that pushed them away that didn't support them, you can go fuck yourselves. You're gonna hear that from me a lot is go fuck yourself. I don't even know where I'm going with this. just, I needed to record something. My advice again to everybody is be careful, be safe. I am not a person that should own a gun. I am a person who used to own a gun and sat with that gun in her mouth. So don't tell people that they need to get guns because there's a lot of people out there like me who purposely choose not to. There's trauma around that. That's not a way for us to live safely. If you choose to stay where you are, do it. But don't shame people that want to leave. I'm afraid of kind of seeing whispers here and there of, you know, well, if you leave, then maybe you're part of problem. don't know. I want to leave to protect myself so I can still be here in the future. I want to say the implications of me leaving, which are hard. One, I have a son that I haven't seen three months. I'm actually, shortly after I'm done recording this, I'm to be talking to a lawyer about what I need to do to at least get visitation. I've been cut out of his life. It's a whole other story that I don't want to get into. I'm sure people that know that there are two sides to every story, and let me just leave it with that. But by moving... I'm going to have to leave my son behind. And that breaks my heart. I'm not a good parent. I admit that. I'm horrible. I'm not a good mother. am a level two, I'm level two autistic, level one slash level two. It's with ADHD, CPTSD, major stress disorder and anxiety. I cannot handle being in a room with a child that's melting down. And I flat out was about to give up all parental rights on my son, but I decided that's no, that's not what I should do. I feel that I was coaxed into that. Besides the point, people like me that are leaving are leaving behind things that major. I'm behind my son. I am leaving behind the woman that I love. I just, it's too much, you know? So don't shame me for it, don't shame other people for it. Because it's hard enough, it's scary, I'm so scared. I have lived here, I'm 43, I've lived here all 43 years of my life in Ohio, it's what I know, I've traveled. And places I'm looking at going, particularly the Olympic of Washington area, because I know some people there. Or possibly Illinois. They're both safe states, quote unquote. still, Washington's my preference, but it's terrifying because I don't know what I'm getting into. I'm getting up and I'm leaving. Because I have to. And I'm scared. A lot of people are. Be true to yourself. Be true to your friends. Remember that blood does not make family. Period. You make your own family. Keep the people who love and respect and support you close to you. Know who your enemies are. Keep your head on a fucking swivel. Don't let people tell you that you're overreacting. by wanting to leave by being scared. Let me see if I can just bring up some quick points about. the, what Trump wants to do with our community. I mean, the platform he wants to completely outlaw gender affirming care for minors at the federal level. I want to make something abundantly fucking clear. Being trans is not a choice. The only choice in the matter when it comes to being trans is whether or not to come out or whether or not to continue living. By not allowing kids to transition, you're going to wind up with a bunch of dead kids. Being trans is genetic. We're born this way. I don't want to live. I never signed up to live life in hard mode, but it was either this or not be alive because I would not be able to live in the body that I used to be in. I was born with a female brain. My body was male. doing my best to correct that. And everybody with trans experience has a different experience. There's no right or wrong way to transition. You don't have to do medical transitions because there are so many different ways. The number one thing is that there is a disconnect that is not our choice. I have known since I was four or five years old, it has been persistent my entire fucking life. I didn't come out until I was 40 because it was not safe to, my dad likely would have killed me. Don't stop kids from transitioning. It's not the government's decision to have any say in any healthcare period that's between the kid, their parent, and the doctor. For parents, I have plenty of episodes on this show earlier on about how to be a good parent to trans kids. Those shows are co-hosted by actual parents of trans kids, sometimes trans parents of trans kids. Defer to those that know. The same goes with abortion rights. We cannot let the government have control over our bodies. And the two are actually connected very tightly. Let's see what else we have here. We have a quote from Trump saying, my inauguration, I will direct the FDA to convene an independent outside panel to investigate whether transgender hormone treatments and ideology increase the risk of extreme depression, aggression, and even violence. That right there is the terrifying part for myself and other trans people, because this is not about kids anymore. They said it was about kids, but it's not. This is for everybody. This is a nationwide ban on trans health care based on absolute bogus science made up statistics where they're just using it to other us and to exterminate us. The Nazis did the same thing. We were the first people to go. they want to, the goal, the overall goal, you can look up this article that I have in front of me. It's the GLAD, G-L-A-A-D, the fact sheet, Donald Trump on LGBT issues, transgender Americans. I'm not going to go through all of it because frankly, it just pisses me off too much. All I can say is that campaign spent millions and millions and millions of dollars directly targeting people like me. And we are at risk of great harm. Hate crimes were already up. Now his supporters, the radical side of his supporters, are going to be emboldened to hurt us. And you know next will be protections for them for hurting us. So that's why I have to leave. Because I cannot be a good parent in the future, which is a goal that I had. I wanted to eventually try to get back to the point of having shared custody of my son. I can't be a good parent if I'm dead. I can't be a good girlfriend to my girlfriend if I'm dead. I can't be a good dog mom to my dog if I'm dead. And where I live right now is an actively dangerous area for me. Ohio has shown to be very red and I live in the reddest of red areas of Ohio. Before all this, I've been afraid to leave home. So people in Washington state are like, well, you know, there's Trump people here too. I'm like, you don't understand. I am surrounded by Confederate and Trump flags pretty much anywhere I go. And I have no healthcare protections. So. Don't belittle, don't talk over people when they say that they're scared. To sum all this up, I don't want to make this episode too long, it's just me rambling. Allies, show up for us, please. Being told, hang in there, we're rooting for you, we're praying for you, it's like punching us in the face. Because we're doing everything we but if we are still alive, we're doing everything we can to... stay that way. Many of us are neurodivergent. Many of us have different disabilities in one way or another. Many of us are marginalized in other ways. I personally have a great amount of difficulty processing information, especially when it gets to be too much. Anyone that's been around me knows that I struggle in crowds and struggle. I shut down really quickly. just this process of planning on what I need to do to move. I can only do it for a little bit before I just, I can't anymore. So there's gonna be a lot of people like that and ask them what they need, but if they don't respond, find out ways to help. And I can guarantee you the number one thing that everyone's going to need is money. For all marginalized communities, for everybody, save your money. This is coming from a girl who is absolutely fucking horrible with money. My business was doing good for a couple months over the summer, so I spent, I racked up about $9,000 in credit card debt to upgrade all my equipment and then business died. And now I've lost a bunch of clients. Frankly, I'm not going to work for somebody that voted to kill me, period. I just can't. I can't do that. So that's another reason I probably need to move is because I don't have much of a client pool. anymore because most of my work is in real estate photography and most of the realtors around here are Trump supporters so I have a few that aren't that are loyal that need to go to PlaySworders. not in constant fear. Do I think the trans sanctuary states are going to be safe forever? No. I think that's going to be temporary as well. By moving there, I'm buying myself time. Anyone that says, you know, this place is any better than where you are, you're not being helpful. If you're in Canada, you're in Australia, you're in New Zealand, you're whatever, don't tell people that it's also bad up there. Trust me, it's not as bad as it is here. We are refugees and we're looking to be immigrants. We're not expats. We are people that are fleeing persecution. best thing to do, like if you're in another country and you know information on how to help people immigrate, tell them, flat out. Tell them what to expect, but don't beat us over the head with it saying, it's just as bad. Like I hear a lot in Canada. Yeah, I understand that Canada is also turning pretty conservative. It's not as bad as it is here. And I am hoping that... other people in the world, Canada, wherever, see what's going to start happening here in the States and be like, fuck, I don't want that. Okay, there's people all over the world that are terrified of what's going to happen here. And rightfully so. And if you're terrified of what's happening here, imagine what it's like to be in here in a community that is being directly targeted for eradication. Hi, I'm trans. So... Just be helpful. And if you can't be helpful, just shut the fuck up, please. As for social media presences and stuff like that, be loud when you feel it's safe to. Remember, we're putting a bigger and bigger target on our backs the more the louder we are. I already know I have a big one on my back, which is another reason I need to get to a place that's safer. As a trans person that made national, international fucking news for running for office, I'm sure there's a few that still remember me and remember things, criticisms that I've had. So if you can, lock down your prisons. This goes for everybody. Anybody that does not conform to the new norm, that does not conform to the ideals of Project 2025 slash Agenda 47 slash whatever it's going to be called now, it's all the same thing. It's all real and it's all going to effect. You can deny it all you want. The people creating them are flat out saying it's happening. Be careful. Stuck up on meds if you can. Stuck up on everything. Stuck up on birth control. I believe Plan B has a four year shelf life. Get as much as you can. Reach out to your doctors if you have a friendly doctor. And just hoard shit. keep things safe, keep things close, keep people safe, keep people close. And I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know if there's going be another presidential election in four years. Personally, if you want my prediction, if the Republicans win the House, because that's our last defense right now against all of this, is if the House can stay. can flip blue. And if it does, we need to fucking hold their feet to the fire to get shit done. Because if they don't, that's quite literally our last choice, our last chance to survive to have something come out of this. My prediction is Trump will take power. He'll enact a bunch of stuff right away. He will do the dictator day one thing. But I don't think he's going to be in office for long. I think that he's either going to be removed or he will step down to hand the power to someone else after he has done the damage that he's going to do. I do believe that he is currently in the throes of mental decline. It's pretty obvious to a lot of people. And there's going be a point where he's just not going to be able to lead. The others that follow him, they're just going to vulture up and just eat them alive and move on. So whether that means JD Vance becomes the president or I honestly think that he would step aside and let Mike Johnson take the reins and that would be even more terrifying. Whatever's going to happen, it's going to be ugly as fuck. It's going to have implications for decades to come. to say. So to sum up, trans people, protect yourselves. Don't be afraid to cut people out of your lives, the same goes for any marginalized group. Women, protect yourselves. much as you can. If you're in a dangerous situation and you think you can get out, get out. If you know someone that you believe is in a dangerous situation and you have the means to help them get out, help them No one can truly predict what's going to happen over the next months to years. All I know is it's not going to be good for a lot of people. It's time for you to show up. Remember that ally is a verb and it's a title that's given, not self-appointed. You're not being an ally if you are talking over us, as I said, if you are just exuding toxic positivity, which helps nobody. If you really want to help, have compassion. Just help us with whatever, with what we need. If you know that we need to move, help us pack. Help us get a U-Haul, whatever. Help us travel across the country. That's a big risk I'm gonna have, is traveling across the country as a trans woman, alone. Well, hopefully I'll have my dog. But it's still scary to places unknown. I'm just one of millions that are faced with the same kind of thing. As I said, if you choose to stay here, don't rub it in people's faces for wanting to leave. Let us go, help us go, and then protect yourself. Whatever you choose to do, just be a good human. As the saying goes... The man that I have come to adore named Jeff Kanata, he was on a YouTube show called The Dungeon Run, it's Dungeons and Dragons thing. He always closes off by saying, humankind be both, and it's So this is me signing off for now, I don't know when I'm gonna do another show. Don't know if I'm gonna do it, if I'm gonna do another show. But I'll try. I signed off for another month at Riverside, so I can record. at another couple if I want to. people in the trans community, if you are looking to get out and looking for some support, the Discord for this podcast, my personal Discord, I've opened it up to planning with each other and how to leave, where to go. I think in a lot of cases we need to band together. meets with trans people that we've never met before, but at least we have something in common. Because the one thing that all the safe states have in common is, or most of them at least, safest ones are they're expensive. So yeah, if you're interested, then contact me for a link. I'm not widely publicizing the information I'm accessing to Discord because I don't want a lot of people knowing about it unless they need to. It's pretty much just for people under the trans umbrella. Remember trans umbrella includes gender nonconforming and nonbinary and all that. It's an umbrella. And select allies that I feel that can be helpful. And we're small right now, but we are growing and it's a support system. this is Vanessa signing off. Thank you for listening. If you want to support me, keep an eye on my socials. I will be. I'll be putting your GoFundMe up sooner or later. You can support me directly on Venmo by sending it to Venestradial. The same name as this podcast, same name I use everywhere, so you can find me there. Any money I get, I'm just slapping into my savings account. I'm hoping to build up about $20,000, so I have a cushion wherever I wind up, because wherever I wind up, I'm also going have to find work. find a place to live. Yeah. So many unknown things. I appreciate if you've listened this long, thank you. If you've listened this long, send me a message that says spork or something so I know that people are hearing this. Protect yourselves. to say. Sage words beyond that. This is an unprecedented situation that we're in. And we are in danger. So my lawyer is going to call soon. So thank you.