Becoming a Better Ally

Hi, everyone. I'm Miles Barrero, and you are here with me on Yoga Anytime. We are so thrilled to be chatting with you. Today's conversation is going to center around how to be the best ally that you can be for trans, non-binary, and queer people. Just a little note, the road might be rocky. You might fail. We all fail a thousand times in this landscape, but the challenge is to be up for the learning and to not be so concerned with the little hiccups along the way. Humans, we're messy. You know what I mean? And we're going to hit that mess, and we're going to find our way out of it, and we're going to keep trekking, and it's going to be beautiful. So we really appreciate you taking the journey with us. I'm going to hand it over to my sweetheart so that she can introduce herself. Thanks. Hi, I'm Sarah, and I use she, her pronouns. Besides being Miles' sweetheart, I also am the parent of a transgender teenager who came out to us when he was 12, and I also work at WJCS Center Lane, which is the only LGBTQ center for youth in Westchester. And my work there is mainly supporting families and parents as they are sort of starting off on their journey with their child, coming out, trying to determine kind of that gender journey in its early phases. So I support and listen and sort of give some easy advice. So that is why I'm also here today to talk about gender with you guys. I'm very excited to be here. And I'm Miles. We may have met on Yoga Anytime. I'm trans. I use he, him, his pronouns. And I am a yoga teacher, musician and writer. And one of the reasons why I asked Sarah to join us on this conversation is because these topics can be very loaded emotionally for me. And it's nice to have someone who has their feet firmly on the ground, a cable to earth, if you know what I'm saying, who can bring some practicality and some real clarity to what we're going to talk about today. Our conversation is going to start with a little bit of laying the land out with some terms and terminology that you may or may not be familiar with. And then we're going to give you very clear, concise action points that you can start today. You can start right now to make the world more inclusive, sweeter and feel safer for our trans and non-binary siblings. Okay. Are you up for that? Let's

Gender Identifying Terms

Yeah. And I also just want to say about cisgender, that the reason why it's an important term is because it's sort of the, it's in relation to the term transgender. And if we didn't have cisgender, then it would sort of be like, well, everyone else, everyone who's normal, and then there are those transgender people, you know, which is like just not, that's not, that's not where we're going. That's not the energy of this conversation. That is not cool. And also normal is, is, is whatever, whatever we're used to at the time that we live in, right? And then the culture that we live in, and trans people have, have existed throughout all of time. There are records of them in all sorts of ancient societies. There are societies that had six genders. The native Americans have two spirits and have had two spirits consistently. So these are the things that have existed. And because of the way history has turned out and the way books have been written, erasure has happened. So that information is no longer or has been erased to some degree. So that's, that's, we're not, we are, the word normal in this conversation is not really that useful to us. Yeah, not at all. We want to strike that one out of our vocabulary altogether as far as I'm concerned. Totally. So we're going to talk about what is the gender binary. So again, the gender binary and really all of gender is, is, is a construct. So the way that society has told us there's like male and there's female, right? There's only two options. That's the gender binary. Binary means two. It is sort of culture's way of sorting us into one of two boxes. What we know though, from as Miles was saying, like throughout all of human history, there have been people with all sorts and colors and flavors and different ways to express their gender, which do not fall in that gender binary. So when we talk about gender identity being a very vast and wide spectrum or landscape, there are thousands of genders, right? That we're not going to talk about each and every one because we would be here all day. And the language is always, always evolving. So that's also something to note. But, you know, we're talking mainly about gender that falls outside of the gender binary. Although sometimes trans folks who are assigned one gender at birth may decide that they really relate to the other gender, the opposite gender, so to speak, which would be, you know, if it was female at birth, male or the opposite. Maybe both genders. Sometimes people, people feel too spirit that they have both genders and they can relate to both genders or anything in between. And the thing about our thought process is that in the yogic terms, the sort of most basic part of the mind is the part of the catalogs. And we love cataloging. We love labeling and putting it in the file. But what we're talking about is inviting and loving a little bit nuance. And nuance is tricky. It doesn't have a yes, no answer. It's not clear. It's not black and white.

It's not binary. And so we are talking about things that are complex. We are talking about things that have a scope, much like sexuality has a spectrum. Gender has a spectrum. Gender expression has a spectrum. So gender identity might be who I, how I identify in my gender, but my gender expression, for example, might be the opposite. I might, I might identify as a man, but I might wear dresses. There's this great guy in Texas. I don't know if you've seen the article, but he likes to wear dresses and he's a dude. And he wears these awesome dresses with like stilettos and all this stuff. And that's what we're talking about. We're talking about actually seeing the, that there's a vast landscape and, and the joy of exploring all of the colors and all of the rays and in however they manifest. Absolutely. I love that. So alongside the, the gender binary, you know, we also talk about what does it mean to be non-binary. So you can imagine if there's a construct of the gender binary, non-binary means that that does not reflect who you are. The gender binary is not, is not in your vocabulary. So that could mean, you know, identifying as, as anything in between or a mixture of both are kind of what we were, you know, just saying. Non-binary itself can be an umbrella term. There are different terminologies or identifiers that people can choose that are sort of under the non-binary umbrella. Also non-binary can sometimes be underneath the transgender umbrella, meaning that folks who identify as trans also identify as non-binary, but that is not always the case. So again, there's a lot of nuance. There's a lot of variety and understanding what a term means for one person does not necessarily mean that another person will have the same even definition or understanding of that term for themselves. Yeah. These terms are placeholders for a starting point in the conversation. But for example, I, I'm not exactly non-binary and I'm not exactly binary, but I do know that once I started to transition and once I was able to sit in my masculinity a little bit more steadily and with a more grounded sense, my femininity all of a sudden started going haywire and being like, Oh, Hey, I'm right here. And so, and, and that was fun for me to be able to have my femininity without the strain of having to have my femininity if that makes sense.

Yeah. It's really all about sort of coming from within, you know, like whatever that thing is that, that makes the most sense and the most resonance for you. It's a place of abundance, not a place of scarcity. And I also, I just want to also mention and shout out our, our intersex community, which often in discussions of LGBTQ or trans, you know, discussions get, they get left out and there's a lot of intersex erasure that goes on. So intersex people are born with a variety of differences in their sex traits and their reproductive anatomy. So there's like, there's a million, a million different variations of how bodies can form. And sometimes the chromosomes, the internal sex organs, the secondary sex traits can be, it can look all kinds of different ways and can behave in all kinds of different ways. So you know, intersex folks are included in the LGBTQIA spectrum. The I stands for intersex if you didn't already know. And you know, they also are a valid and, and important part of our community. And you know, in, in most cases, you know, gender that has been placed on an intersex person at birth, because doctors and parents sometimes want to funnel them in one direction or the other.

It's clear, it's cleaner, right? In their minds. Right. For the, for their, for, you know, but for the person themselves, that doesn't always work out that way. So, you know, we give as much leeway and expression to them as we do to anyone else. If you're confused about this, someone who is very clear, if you're confused about, wait a minute, biology is just biology, how can that be? There's an amazing OBGYN, her name is Karen Chang, Karen Tang, Karen Tang, we'll put her in the notes. But she's amazing. And she does little snippets where she discusses the science behind, behind, behind how exactly non-binary biology is. And so she's really someone, no, but, but just by like general biology, how, how non-binary it is and how not clear it is. And, and so she goes more into depth about that. One last thing that really gets conflated, conflated is the difference between gender identity and sexual orientation. Who I feel inside is not the same as who I go to bed with. They're two different things. So I am a trans man and I am queer. One of them has nothing to do with the other, but oftentimes I hear people speak about them as if they were inter like easily replaced things interchangeable and they're not at all. They're a completely different thing. Like who you love is not who you are.

Right. Right. Yeah, exactly. So sexual orientation speaks to attraction and, you know, romantic sexual attraction to other people who you, yeah, who you are attracted to in the world is different than who you identify as in inside yourself. So those are the things.

Action Steps Toward Allyship

You're not always going to get it right. You might think some people are cisgender and they're not. So asking is a really great way to, um, set the tone. And you know, on the other hand, just introducing yourself with your pronouns is also a way to make people feel like, Oh, I see you. I can introduce myself with my pronouns as well. Yeah. Like so as a cisgender person, you know, my practice is to try to say, Hey, I'm Sarah. I use she, her pronouns. How about you? Um, so that, that leaves space for anybody else to use their pronouns when they introduce themselves to me. So then I know. Um, and I love Miles, what you said about, you know, also, if you don't know, and if you, we literally we don't ever know, right? By looking at somebody, what their internal sense of their own gender is. So, um, if there is some confusion and if you're not sure, you know, she, he, and you don't feel comfortable asking using they is, is, is a great way because that is a gender neutral pronoun. Um, and, um, that also brings us to the next sort of thing on the list, which is to try not to use so many, uh, gendered terms in our, in the way that we speak, you know, instead of saying, um, ladies and gentlemen, you know, not guys. Hey everybody. Yeah, exactly. Like using, um, much more sort of like, uh, anything that, that doesn't denote male and female. Hi folks. Hi family. Hi team. There are so many other words that you can use. And you know, honestly, um, I imagine that for women, it's also not so great to always feel like they're being called guys, you know, kind of, we're kind of at a day and age where we're sort of trying to be a little bit more articulate and using our words. So being, you know, as in a yogic standpoint, uh, a himsa being trying to produce the least harming.

And uh, the yogi has a Satya truthfulness and part of truthfulness is really being in touch or in tune with our words. It's how we use our words and how we, our thoughts move from our heads out into the world and the ripples that that, that causes. So I think it's, it's a really sweet practice to try to be clearer with what we're saying. Absolutely. And using, you know, things that, that just aren't going to like send someone into a tailspin of gender dysphoria. If you call them, you know, ladies or gentlemen or whatever it is, um, you know, for example, if you say breasts in a, in a yoga class, like if, if you have to like, that's a weird, a weird term to use out of nowhere. But for example, if I'm teaching a peacock pose and, um, there, there's a way where sometimes your chest can kind of get in the way. So depending on your chest, you might have to move some of the chests out of the way. You can maybe try to find different ways to talk about certain body parts. Uh, you could say a friend of mine says lift your privates, uh, when he's talking about the, the perineum, uh, lifting, and then that's really, I love it because I think it's very non-committal to what privates you have, which is nice. You know, it just gives a little bit more opening. So it's not that you're going to be able to do this all the time and get it right all the time, but it's cultivating a language that is just more inclusive and allows for more space for people to have a better experience. You know, the pronouns and then, uh, we haven't talked about names yet. We should probably talk about names. One of the things that, that along with pronouns, it's really meaningful is listen to people, believe them when they say their name is Katie, call them Katie and not Catherine. When they, and even if you've known them by a different name, if they changed their name and they introduced themselves by another name, I have a friend who, um, all of a sudden started going by, uh, I forget something like lion's breath and I'm like, okay, cool. You know, I have no idea that it was attached to their gender, but you know, I, I called him what he wanted to be called. Actually, I know now I'm getting all, I actually know that he is, uh, prefers the male gender. So that's why I'm, I'm saying the pronoun he, and these things are confusing, but when we listen to people and when we take them in, it's the biggest sign of respect. Pronouns and names have been the hardest transition for my friends and family. And it's been very painful. I have to say when it's painful, when I don't feel like people are making an effort, when they make mistakes, it's not painful. It's just painful when they're not, when they're clearly not trying. And sometimes, you know, I would say the resistance is a really tricky thing and she rears her head and she can be very stubborn. And I think we have to be attentive to that with the people around us when our transition rears its head and it's okay to have resistance, but, and if we want to be more inclusive and if we want to be kinder, better people in general, it's important for us to work with that resistance and find ways to move through and beyond so that we can see the clearing and so that we can see each other, you know? Yeah. That's so good to hear. All of that is really important to hear. And something that I know a lot of parents struggle with when their child first comes out is that switch of pronoun and name. And so what we talk about often together is, you know, you don't necessarily have to understand. You don't even really have to agree. You might be internally struggling with what this all means, but as a parent or as a cis person, you know, all you need to do is really just try. It's all about just like the actual act, taking the action and working out your own, you know, confusion or your resistance sort of privately, you know, or with a therapist or with a trusted friend, but not with the person who you're trying to support by using the correct pronoun and name because that person is just trying to get through their day and survive. So, you know, any of the internal emotional sort of congestion that might come up is also important to take a look at and to try to work through in private. Part of what becomes a part of all of this is grief. There's a feeling that you might be losing that person or an aspect of that person that you really loved. And it's totally fine to feel that grief. I felt that grief with my name change and with my pronoun change as well. But grief is a part of our lives. And how we move through the grief is important. And I think the thing to think about is that again, in terms of yogic terms, there's a stay, you know, this offering of non stealing.

And I think that's not a great translation. It's very severe. But what that implies to me is taking the amount of room that's yours and not taking the amount of room that's not yours, taking the amount of stuff that is yours, not taking the stuff that isn't yours, taking on your problems, not other people's problems. And something that I've had to sort of navigate with my family and friends is that this particular item, my transition is not about them. It's actually about me. And if I can help them remember that and take the emphasis off of their fear or their grief, then I feel like it kind of brings them into a clearing where it's a little bit easier to take me in and to sort of help me thrive in the world. And as a person who if you are more comfortable being sort of your your most kind and generous ally self. Another thing to think about is kind of being that that person who can intercede between your trans friend, loved one, family member, and the rest of the family or group of friends, a pronoun bouncer or a name bouncer. Those are so good. I you know, early on actually when we started dating, because I think Sarah had such a different relationship to transitioning because you know, her kiddo transitioned much younger than I did. And so for me, oftentimes, I look more like the pronoun that I that I'm kind of going by now. But when we met, it wasn't that clear. And I would get misgendered a lot. And and one day, I, I had to ask her if she would help me in those moments. Vi for me, because it's exhausting. Yeah. It is exhausting. And it shouldn't always be on on your shoulders, you know, it should not always be on your shoulders in relation to be on any anybody's shoulders. But but I can be that person who isn't so emotionally affected by those moments of misgendering. I mean, doesn't have anything to do with me at all. But I can be the one to be like, No, I'm sorry, it's not ladies, you know, that's not the right term to use. How about folks? Yeah, and you have to pick your battles. You know what I mean? It's not like I'm also, you know, I'm Latin, so I get emotional. But it's not like I walk around the world like a like a wounded heart, you know, trying to find every time the people misgender me. If I did, I'd go nuts. But it is that that sometimes the load, the fatigue, it's to be Yeah, it piles up. It piles up. Yeah, yeah. So that's the first item. Pronouns and name, you can do this. And, and gender neutral language. Oh, and gender neutral language. Yeah. Right. And that's some that's something that you can practice with everyone. They don't need to be transgender. They don't need to be non binary. You can, you can practice that with cisgender people all the time. And you'll be amazed at how many gendered words we use in our in our vocabulary thinking about it. Yeah, for sure. It's crazy. Yeah.

Yes, we do live in a very gender non gender binary world. So that's kind of, you know, what our language reflects. So it's, it's really if we just take that on, that's like one of the most freeing things that we can do to sort of step outside of the bounds of this gender binary that we're all sort of stuck in and siloed into from the minute we're born to, you know, start to see where that shows up in our daily life all the time and to kind of like push back against that in our in the ways that we can. One more thing that I learned from my nephew, who's a genius, he's 20, is that if you're getting caught up with pronouns, and you're having a hard time, just use the person's name. So easy. And then you don't even have to say a pronoun at all. I've noticed that a lot of my friends have started doing that in order not to make a mistake, because they've they've known me for so much longer as a different gender, and as a different pronoun. So sometimes just using the name is like a really nice trick toward you for you. Yeah, yeah. So all of this kind of goes along with, you know, the the other goal that we have, which is to really educate ourselves. You know, there's so many resources out there, there are so many Google global terms. I mean, you can Google to tell your hearts content and like learn so many things all on your own, which is kind of very empowering, right? We don't have to always rely on the trans people in our lives to educate us. In fact, we shouldn't because it's not their it's not their work to do. It's really our work to do to take that on. So, you know, reading articles, books, following different folks on social media, maybe who are, you know, who identify in all kinds of different ways. And that's like a really easy way to diversify your social media feed and learn some things just by like, scrolling the scrolling that we all do, right? It's easy, but it may be uncomfortable. Again, A Brown talks about this ad nauseam how how in order to grow, we have to move into our areas of discomfort. And if we are in which in a bubble, which we all are that taking that stride to just try something different, you know, to follow a trans person on your Instagram feed to actually go to a trans person's yoga class, what is all the hype about to, you know, so that you can get some other perspectives into your into your your bubble and you can start to paint with different colors and have a sense of what else is out there. These are really good ways to start to expand and to start to learn in a way that's not asking your one trans friend of a friend, all of the questions in one sitting for sure. Yeah. And you know, podcasts, films, like I just want to shout out a couple of things that you can find on streaming sites. So like, National Geographic channel has Katie Couric's Gender Revolution, which is a very, very good, like kind of one on one level documentary where she herself had misspoken or like in some interview with somebody like asked some really like, you know, not cool questions, not great question, not great questions. And without knowing without having any idea, right. So she was like asking all kinds of personal questions to a trans person and they were like, yeah, that's not what we do. So she decided to, you know, kind of like go on a whole journey of educating herself and filming it all. So that's a great way to get sort of get your feet wet is to watch that. But what is it called? Gender Revolution, Gender Revolution. And it's this, I think everybody should watch this. It's awesome because you get to see her take the trajectory as well. And she's learning. And one of the things that you that you know, about educating ourselves and also about being an allies, maybe I know that this documentary is on that geo, I think. And it was, they have a whole pamphlet that goes that you can show it in schools. The whole idea of the documentary was to be shown in schools. So things like getting your school to show it to your kids is like a great way to, you know, get in there and start to at least move some of the dust and, you know, yeah, yeah. And find out, find out kind of like what's happening in your extended communities as well, because most schools will have some sort of like a GSA or an LGBTQ, you know, group that that either students or faculty members are already doing some really cool things. So that's a great thing to be able to support as well. There's a bunch of great books out there. People to follow on Instagram, you know, there's TV shows like Pose and Tales of the City, which are also great, more fictionalized versions of queer communities and trans communities. But they do a great job. They do a great job of introducing the things, the challenges that are in trans people's lives. Because we are the most murdered minority in the world, mostly trans women of color. But already this year, 25 people have died being killed. So that's, that's something to consider. But even even just getting fictional accounts that are written and made by trans people like Pose is, Janet Mock is an amazing producer and director and writer and she's a powerhouse.

And so getting to know her, Laverne Cox on Orange is the New Black is one of the smartest people you'll ever hear speak and she she comes. She has her own podcast, I think and she also speaks to a bunch of people on their podcasts. I believe there's a Brené Brown version or episode with her. And those are just some of the more famous people. But we'll also we'll also put in the notes a bunch of a bunch of other ways that you can get to or other resources. And also, you know, you're all yogis. Take trans teachers yoga classes. We are underemployed. And for that reason, we are also underpaid. And in this during the pandemic, I've learned that there are so many of us out there, trans yoga teachers, and a lot of really cool people doing very beautiful work. So support them take their class those $15 or whatever of taking their class are really going to go a long way, you know, which is a great segue actually into our final point of action, which is to redistribute resources, actually pay people, right? Uplift purchase from higher trans people and non binary people, you know, go find trans owned businesses and support them and hire people to do what they do best. And it's not always going to be sort of the diversity and inclusion training that that you might expect. I mean, there's a lot of that out there. But you know, trans people are whole people to who have all kinds of other beautiful gifts, and things to offer the world. We'd like to talk to you about something other than our transness. Trust me. Exactly. We would love one aspect of a person. So you can you know, if you own a yoga studio, hire them for your front desk, hire them as teachers hire them not just to do your, your one diversity thing in your teacher training, which please hire them for that as well. But but reallocating resources, you know how bookshops, I don't know about you, but I'm now shopping all my books at black bookstores, because with the Black Lives Matter movement, I feel it's important. The disparity in in just economy is is astonishing with our black siblings. So so finding those if there is a business, if you're looking for soap, and there's a trans business that makes amazing soap, which there is, get the butters. There you go. Oh my gosh, get the butters is amazing. You have to check this person's website out. They're incredible. I'm not going to say anything more about it. I'm going to let you explore that. But get the butters is awesome. So yeah, we're going to put a bunch of different things together also for resources, which includes some trends and businesses that we love. Also, trans people are so fun. I mean, get the butters if you get on this person's website is so funny and just amazing that you're going to want to love this person and support them in their endeavor of making soap. That's right. So that's that's it, right? We have all of our those are our points. So just to repass, respect pronouns and names, eradicate gender terms from your vocabulary, from your language, educate yourself and redistribute your resources. That seems pretty simple, right? I mean, that's something there's something in there that we can all do. You can start today. All right, so we have been so thrilled to be with you here today. And we so appreciate your willingness to learn to be in the mire with us. You know, it's good for all of us to create spaces that are more inclusive, not just for the trans non binary and queer communities. In this world, respect goes a long way. And as yogis really, what are we doing if we're not creating sweeter, better, safer spaces to the extent that we can. So I applaud you and your efforts. And I really, really it moves me to know that you're out there. And thank you, Sarah, for joining me. So fun to get to do something with you. Yeah. And that's it. We love you.

And we hope that you have a beautiful, beautiful rest of your day. Thank you so much. Do you

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