TED Talk: Ending Gender by Scott Turner Schofield

Thank you.

Would you believe I was almost Homecoming Queen

in High School?

Picture it:

Football fields, fluorescent lights.

Miss Congeniality on one side,

Miss Best-Dressed on the other,

and me.

I'm not talking about what's happened in the last six months

where the first ever transgender Homecoming Queen was

elected by a group of her peers

and a Homecoming King to-be could not become

because his Driver's License said he was female

and so the school district stopped it.

I'm talking about 1997

where all I knew was that I was gay because

Ellen Degeneres was also gay, and that

made sense to me.

I did not know the word "Transgender."

I had no idea what I would become

or what I could become.

And these words, they matter.

So let's look at some words.

I call this Social Algebra

We do this equation all the time.

For instance. Me, I'm standing here,

my gender, in this transitive property,

this transitive equation.

I'm standing here looking like a dude,

right?

So we imagine that what's in my pants is what's in my pants.

What hormones I have are what hormones I have.

I have Xs and Ys floating all through my blood.

And that because we live in a world where everything

is heterosexual until proven innocent, that

I must be a straight guy.

Although I don't get many people thinking

I'm a straight guy,

which is fine with me.

All of these terms have a lot of values

associated with them. They are predicated

on our opinions of disability, ethnicity,

environment, religion, moment in time,

culture, age, educational access,

body size, place, race, economic class.

There are as many definitions of sex,

gender, and sexuality as there are people

in this room, I'm willing to bet.

Woops. Next one. There we go.

Me? I identify as a female to male transsexual

with a transgender queer identity. Hi!

We'll get to the story in a second.

When I'm talking about sex, I'm talking

about biology: Chromosomes, hormones,

genitals, secondary sex characteristics.

Right? Simple.

These are some words that you

may have word that describe sex:

Female, Male, Intersex.

"Intersex" is a word that you may have also

heard referred to as "hermaphrodite."

This is not an okay term to use.

People who are intersex call themselves intersex,

and that is what we respect, right?

It is a condition where your chromosomes,

your hormones, or your physical sex

characteristics are different from

males and females.

And then there's transsexuals.

Some people tell me that I am oppressing

myself by calling me "transsexual."

"I just like the precision of it."

I'm telling you that I am a female-to-male.

I have gone from female to male, changing

my sex characteristics with hormones

and surgery.

There are male to female, female to male,

one way or the other.

But, you don't have to have surgery.

You don't have to use hormones to be trans.

Because "trans" is about gender.

And gender is about culture, society,

and personhood. Right?

In the culture, it's an expectation

of a role you are going to take.

Socially, it's a presentation or

a performance.

Remember, I showed up.

Look, I'm a white guy.

So you're either really into what

I'm saying, or you're kind of suspicious

of what I'm saying, or you're not really sure.

It's your perception and my performance.

Does that make sense.

The deal is: I know what my identity is,

whether or not you see it.

So, I'm going to give you an idea of what I'm

talking about, here.

There's "transgender" like me

and "cisgender" like many of you.

"cis" meaning same.

Meaning that your sex and your gender match up.

Cisgender are not normal people,

they are just common people.

Here are some other words that we've

heard to describe gender.

Man, woman, boy, girl,

androgenous, metrosexual, butch,

fem, tomboy, sissy.

I'll give you another word that showed up

about eight years ago.

"Genderqueer"

This is an oppositional term.

Right? It's a term that says

"I'm not going to go into

any box you've made for me,

thank you very much,

enjoy the spectacle."

Okay?

Here are some more words to describe gender.

I'm not going to go through them all.

You can look later.

This term came around in the last couple of years.

It's "trans" with an asterisk.

I love this.

You're reading along and you see a word

with an asterisk after it.

You look for the footnote.

Guess what? This means I can write

my own definition of what my journey

has been. I love it.

Let's go to sexuality.

We're talking about attraction and behavior,

which are not always the same thing.

So some words that you've heard:

Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Queer.

Notice that "transgender" is not here,

even though we talk about the gay, lesbian,

bisexual, transgender, and queer community,

GLBTQ, right?

A transgender person can be gay,

lesbian, bisexual or queer.

But it's different from their

attraction and behavior.

Here are a bunch of other words that

describe sexuality.

And I know I'm missing some, here.

I hate missing words.

If I miss a word, what I'm telling you

is that I don't value who you are.

What I'm telling you is that who you

are doesn't deserve a word.

What I'm telling you is that you're

invisible, that you don't get a community,

that you don't get to be who you are, in print.

I know I'm missing a word.

I hate missing words.

What's the word I'm missing?

Oh, right, "heterosexual."

I always forget that one. [joking]

Let's go to my identity.

Let's talk about me.

As I told you, I am a female

to male transsexual.

I have changed my sex characteristics

through the use of hormones and surgery.

I have the gender experience of a transgender man

Because, no matter how much of a man I become,

I will always be a man who was on the homecoming

court in High School and went to three

balls in a dress. Alright?

Let's say, though, let's just imagine

that I'm hopelessly, madly, deeply in love

with a cisgender woman. That's a woman

who is female.

When we get jiggy with it, are we lesbians?

Are we straight? Are we queer?

This equation doesn't work.

It just leaves us with question

upon question upon question.

But as a transgender person, I'm pretty used to questoins.

I started with a question that I'm pretty sure,

I hope, that every single person in this room

has asked. "Who am I?"

But when your answer to who you are

shows that you are different in a way as fundamental

as what gender is in our society.

"Will my family disown me?"

"Will my friends accept me?"

"Will I be fired from my job?"

"Will I be able to get a job?"

"Will my marriage still be legal?"

"Will I be able to parent my kids?"

"What will this cost me?"

Will I take hormones?"

"Will I have surgeries?"

"Which surgeries?"

"How do you change everything?"

"Your birth certificate, your social security

card, your passport, your credit cards,

your diplomas. Which bathrooms can I use?

Will my faith community expel me?

What do I say in the airport?

Will I be sent home for how I'm dressed?

What will this cost me? Can I be all of myself?

Will this affect my Visa?

Am I crazy?

Do I pass?

Who is going to love me?

And then there's the questions that

other people ask.

There's only a few of them.

"Are you finished?

Have you had the surgery?

What's your real name?

Are you fully transitioned?

Should you be in this bathroom?

What are you legally?

What is it?"

These questions, they just make us "other."

But I take solace in all of those words.

I love this representation of our equation,

because I think it more-accurately reflects

the way that we all probably experience

our sex, our gender, and our sexuality.

And I also think of it as like a crowd.

If you all wore little definitions over your

heads and I looked down from above. Right?

It gives us so many opportunities to check the "other" box.

And if we're all "other," can any of us be "othered"?

My moonshot is to end gender.

See, I've already been to the moon and back,

and so have all of the people in this little

slideshow. We're living proof of how

"What you see doesn't have to be what you get."

How sex does not have to equal destiny.

How you can change and change and change again

and that is a rich life history, not something

to be feared or marginalized.

I think about the way that in our culture, we

tisk and tut over other cultures where women

have to pray in other spaces or eat in other rooms

and I think to myself, in our Western, Colonial, Secular

culture, we just do that in our minds to one another.

We create these invisible walls to slam up against,

to keep people out, to box ourselves in.

So ending gender would mean tearing all of those down.

But I'm not necessarily advocating for revolution, here.

It could just be as simple as painting your toes, guys.

You know?

Ending gender would look like...

Well, it would look like getting to the root

of what gender is. Isn't gender just a cry for beauty?

What if we just let everyone be as

beautiful as they want to be?

What if we respected and celebrated whatever

beauty is? What if let go of our expectations,

our limitations?

Have you ever seen a man wearing high-heels

and men's clothing?

I mean, a power shoe is a power shoe.

Okay?

Have you ever seen a debutante with

a shaved head?

A classic cut is a classic cut.

If we let go of our expectations,

if we let go of our limitations,

that's what I'm talking about in

ending gender.

I'm not advocating for us all shaving

our heads and wearing baggy clothing.

I want us to be beautiful and I want us to

be celebrated using all of the tools

of gender, all of the tools of beauty that we have.

It's not rocket science.

Ending gender would mean advancing the use

of a third pronoun.

A gender-neutral pronoun in English.

"ze" and "hir"

Ze went to the store and bought

hir mom some shoes.

Or if you like, for ze so loved the world,

ze sent hir only child.

It's so powerful, and it includes so many

more people in it.

Ending gender would mean ending these

words, these limiting words, that never

quite fit. These limiting labels.

I mean, if it doesn't matter for the presidency,

if it doesn't matter for the federal reserve,

if it doesn't even matter for health insurance,

anymore, would it kill you to go into a bathroom

that's just like your bathroom at home, that's

not segregated?

Would it grind society to a halt if my

driver's license did not telling the cop

pulling me over for speeding that I am

a man or a woman.

Ending gender means leaving us all with stories.

So I will leave you with a story.

That last picture was of Royce.

I've known Royce for a very long time.

In fact, Royce has known me so long,

He knew me when I was Katie.

The best girl babysitter ever.

His parents explained, "Katie

is a man now. And he wants us

to call him Scott. Do you have any questions?"

Royce replied, "No, because we already have

secret agent names for one another,

and anyway, it makes perfect sense

that he's always really been a boy.

Kind of like how at the end of Scooby Doo,

you know, how they pull off the mask?

But he's brought his friend Elsbeth.

Elsbeth doesn't know me from anybody.

She's just here for dinner and a movie.

So right in the middle of building one

last fort before dinner, Royce turns

to Elsbeth and says, "Scott used to be a

woman, but now he's a man. A man!"

Then something occurs to him.

He looks at me and says, "How did

you do that?" Elsbeth looks horrified.

It's not the gender confusion. I can

read that very clearly.

It's that at this point in her young southern life,

she's been trained not to point, not to

stare, not to ask prying questions.

Meanwhile I'm confronted with the delightful

opportunity of explaining transsexualism and

gender identity to 4-year olds.

Uh, how did I do it?

Well, Royce, you see, I just really really

really wanted it.

I figured that was an age-appropriate repsonse.

You do really really really have to want it.

But I really really really want to be a girl,

a woman, a woman, a woman!

He says un-self-conscious and totally sure.

So I take this moment to end gender.

I just affirm the child. "You want to

be a girl. That's great."

Believe the child. "You know, you are

perfect just the way you are.

Love the child."

"What's a woman?"

"Look, I don't really want to be having

this conversation, okay?

A lot of people have a lot of opinions

about transgender people being around

children in general, and those things all went in."

So I'm freaking out.

I just want to put the kids inside the fort.

I just want to go make dinner.

I don't want to be having this conversation.

But they're both staring at me so intently.

So I say, "What's a woman?"

"Amazing you would ask me that, Elsbeth."

"A woman is..."

This is the first time this child has ever been

taught gender. What am I going to say?

A woman can be anything, and

anyone can be a woman as long as

she is smart and strong. Therefor, you Royce,

and you Elsbeth, could each become women

if that's what you choose because you're

both both of those things.

And you know what Elsbeth, I think a lot of

women would really like your shoes.

"What about my shoes," cries Royce.

He's got these sneakers that light up at the back.

I say, Royce, when I was a kid, when I

was a woman, I had the exact same shoes.

You see, women are all different, and so are all men

and there are even people who are

different from women and men, and

you can become whatever you choose.

Let's think about it for a second.

What could you be?

A baseball player, crane operator.

They overlap. Exactly.

Like I said, ending gender means starting stories.

And that's all I'm asking.

Is that so revolutionary?

Thank you.

[Applause]