Passing - Is it a Privilege?

[Heart]

Okay, we agree that passing in and of itself isn't a privilege.

I don't think I suggested anywhere that one should "soak up privilege and then put the blame on another group." Not sure how you got that out of what I have been saying. Or maybe you're just making a different point.

What I did say was that if a person of color is granted white skin privilege (for example), they may choose to confront the racism behind that each and every time it happens, or they may not. It is not, however their responsibility/job to confront it. It may not even be safe to do that.

Not sure we are communicating clearly here so don't want to appear to be having an argument we aren't really even having. Know what I mean?

Heart

[JustJo]

Originally Posted by mirandabrave

No, I would refine the argument: Attractive (not fat) apparently-gender confirming queer people are less threatening to the established order. We can choose in those moments of tacit acceptance to champion our trans brothers and sisters or we can leave them behind. Of course, when any of us is left behind, so are we all.

What I find interesting here is that with all of the argument on either side about how trans folks have been included or left behind, how femmes can pass or not, how racial appearance matters....we are all apparently willing to let such a messed up fat-phobic statement just slide on by.

Mirandavbrave...I don't know you, and I see that you're new to the site. So...I'll say this gently. Fat does not equal unattractive, or threatening. So...as you are championing your trans brothers and sisters so that they aren't left behind...you might want to think about including your brothers and sisters who are "fat" by your definition as well.

[Dylan]

Originally Posted by Heart

Okay, we agree that passing in and of itself isn't a privilege.

I don't think I suggested anywhere that one should "soak up privilege and then put the blame on another group." Not sure how you got that out of what I have been saying. Or maybe you're just making a different point.

What I did say was that if a person of color is granted white skin privilege (for example), they may choose to confront the racism behind that each and every time it happens, or they may not. It is not, however their responsibility/job to confront it. It may not even be safe to do that.

Not sure we are communicating clearly here so don't want to appear to be having an argument we aren't really even having. Know what I mean?

Heart

Yeah, I get what you mean. I wasn't having an argument. I thought we were discussing.

I'm not saying anything about POC. I was talking more in terms of general power/privilege dynamics while adding from my own (queer, trans, female-bodied, butch) perspective. I think how anyone confronts the ism is upon the individual. I get that it may not be safe to do that...hence the reason I don't run through the streets announcing my trans status.

I do think though that if One receives the privilege, they DO have a responsibility to be aware of how their received privilege affects others. If I'm in the company of men who are reading me as straight and cis, and a sexist/homophobic/transphobic/racist/ism-ist comment is made, I think I have a responsibility to say something about that comment (if it's safe). Otherwise, it's condoning/perpetuating the ism. I'm a firm believer that complacency perpetuates.


Dylan

[Dylan]

Originally Posted by JustJo

What I find interesting here is that with all of the argument on either side about how trans folks have been included or left behind, how femmes can pass or not, how racial appearance matters....we are all apparently willing to let such a messed up fat-phobic statement just slide on by.

Mirandavbrave...I don't know you, and I see that you're new to the site. So...I'll say this gently. Fat does not equal unattractive, or threatening. So...as you are championing your trans brothers and sisters so that they aren't left behind...you might want to think about including your brothers and sisters who are "fat" by your definition as well.

I had a hard time understanding the entire post, but I read that part a different way. I read it as acknowledging fat phobia.


But Like I Said, I Had A Hard Time Understanding The Whole Post,
Dylan

[JustJo]

Originally Posted by Dylan

I had a hard time understanding the entire post, but I read that part a different way. I read it as acknowledging fat phobia.


But Like I Said, I Had A Hard Time Understanding The Whole Post,
Dylan

In the interests of fairness, I went back and attempted to read the statement as an acknowledgement of fat phobia. Unfortunately, I can't. I think it's the paranthetical nature of the "attractive (not fat)" comment. To me it reads as if there is an assumption that for a person to be attractive, then they must not be fat.

It would be different for me if the post read "slim, attractive, apparently-gender conforming"...but it doesn't.

Originally Posted by mirandabrave

No, I would refine the argument: Attractive (not fat) apparently-gender confirming queer people are less threatening to the established order. We can choose in those moments of tacit acceptance to champion our trans brothers and sisters or we can leave them behind. Of course, when any of us is left behind, so are we all.

[AtLast]

Originally Posted by iamkeri1

[SIZE="3"]When I was femme in lesbian/gay society, I did not feel privileged for passing (as a straight woman). I felt both invisible and estranged, as the community I was involved with was very andro. I was femme with the additional negative (in their eyes) of being attracted to butch women (mmm-mmm-mmm.) This led to frequent taunting and dismissal of my reality as a lesbian acivist.

I was at all times aware, however, that I had the privlege of revealing or not revealing my orientation when in a work or straight social situation. I was aware that I could choose safety if I felt I needed to, or that I could choose to avoid confrontation if was having a weak moment.

This was a privilege my butch friends and partners did not have. On the other hand, they did not have to deal with invisibility because people ASSUMED they were gay.

When my darling revealed his trans status to me, (I had known him for nine years at that time, and been in a relationship with him for two years.), I felt like the bottom had fallen out of my world. We had just moved to Cali (Long Beach) and found ourselves welcomed into a gay community which included many b-f people. I felt like I belonged for the first time in my life. I sobbed like a crazy woman when he told me.

I knew right from the first, however, that I would not leave him. I was his, he was mine, there was no separating us. As he eventually transitioned, I was surprised and shocked to see the difference in the way we were treated by the general public. We had never been mistreated in our preceeding orientation, but when seen as husband and wife we were welcomed into "the club".... the "normie" club. We were astonished at the difference ... and dismayed that this treatment was not given to people that had been identified as queerfolk.

1. A short list of privileges
   • Joint tax returns (actually we always filed joint, but as husband and wife were less likely to face hassles)
   • Shared work benefits - health insurance, life insurance, funeral leave for your partners relatives.
   • Able to apply for and be issued a marriage license (whether or not the state would have recognised the marriage were our status revealed
   • Able to adopt kids with both names on the birth certificate
   • Collect social security widows benefit
   • Hospital visitation with no hassle
   • Endless "family" memberships[/SIZE]

ALL of these privileges should be "normal" for everyone.
Smooches,
Keri

Absolutely and I smooch ya' back! One can experience some form of some kinds of privilege via passing. Yet, when it comes to legal status like what you list... forget it! Now if one lives in a country or state in which transpeople can legally transition as female or male, and do pass as that gender (transitioning is a long process with many options that one may or may not want to do- and not all transpeople are ever fully recognized as the gender of transition), they do gain access to privilege. IE., legal marriage, being treated as male in this society from society at large. However, what one internally does with privilege and behaves with it, is what is important to me.

I most certainly know het straight couples and cis men that do not use their privilege to oppress others. never have and never will. I have long-term close het couple friends and one FtM + straight woman that will not legally marry until same-sex marriage is the law of the land in the US. They have been together 35 years and 8 years, respectively. They have chosen as a matter of belief in civil liberties for all not to exercise their right to a legal privilege that I and others cannot. No, I am not knocking other people for their own personal choices about this, but, do appreciate the stand that these folks make and their personal sacrifice.

[Heart]

Originally Posted by Dylan

I do think though that if One receives the privilege, they DO have a responsibility to be aware of how their received privilege affects others. If I'm in the company of men who are reading me as straight and cis, and a sexist/homophobic/transphobic/racist/ism-ist comment is made, I think I have a responsibility to say something about that comment (if it's safe). Otherwise, it's condoning/perpetuating the ism. I'm a firm believer that complacency perpetuates.


Dylan

Yeah... my ex used to feel damned if she did and damned if she didn't. If she did she was faced with defensiveness, excuses, embarrassment minimizing, or outright anger. If she didn't she felt she was colluding. It was emotionally and socially exhausting.

[mirandabrave]

Thanks for taking this up. I absolutely meant this as an acknowledgement of fat phobia and I am sorry it did not come clearly across. I've been quite obese and slim (roughly half my life spent in each category) and I will tell you it is as tough being fat (maybe tougher) that being an out dyke. (I use "fat" assertively, as I do "dyke' in this context.) I really was trying to say - and the parens did not communicate it as I had intended - that it is being "socially" attractive (not the eye of the beholder but the eye of social conformity) provides a significant social advantage. People with these advantages have a special chance to act politically and for justice.

Thanks for the chance to clarify.

[mirandabrave]

Hope you see my explanation - I am new here and I am not sure my clarification posted in the right place. I was being fat positive - I meant to be, but can understand how it wasn't clear. Hope my explanatory post pops up on the thread. I am sorry that my 100% alignment with your feelings instead caused you consternation (apparently due to a badly placed parenthesis). But I appreciate the chance to explain.

[JustJo]

Originally Posted by mirandabrave

Hope you see my explanation - I am new here and I am not sure my clarification posted in the right place. I was being fat positive - I meant to be, but can understand how it wasn't clear. Hope my explanatory post pops up on the thread. I am sorry that my 100% alignment with your feelings instead caused you consternation (apparently due to a badly placed parenthesis). But I appreciate the chance to explain.

Thanks mirandabrave...I appreciate your coming back to clarify. I know that the written word can be easily misunderstood despite all of our best efforts on both ends of the communication.

[iamkeri1]

Heart,
I disagree with you on this point, at least from how I have experienced it. In and earlier post I made this point.

I was at all times aware, however, that I had the privlege of revealing or not revealing my orientation when in a work or straight social situation. I was aware that I could choose safety if I felt I needed to, or that I could choose to avoid confrontation if was having a weak moment.

This was a privilege my butch friends and partners did not have.

Mrs. Strutt made a similar point in her post

So was the fact I "passed" as a straight woman a privilege in terms of "safety" for me and my child? Yes, it was. It also reminded me I can turn my "passing" on and off at will, for the reasons and situations I choose, while Mr. Strutt cannot.

I believe that at least the freedom to make this choice is a privilege.

Smooches,
Keri

Originally Posted by Heart

Great post Dylan - though what we were talking about originally wasn't whose responsibility it is to deal with bias -- it was whether or not passing is a privilege. In fact, this discussion of responsibility is one of the ways in which passing is distinctly not a privilege, since true privilege requires no explanations or disclaimers.

Passing is a reality that exists due to the power pardigmn. It may be a choice someone makes as a strategy for survival, a by-product of their presentation, or something they actively try to confront. It may grant temporary comfort and ease or it may get someone killed. But what passing is not, in my book, is a privilege. Privilege doesn't put you at risk for bashing, lynching, or rape. I get that passing can feel like a privilege in comparison to the direct harassment that a person without the ability to pass might face, but feeling like a privilege is not the same as actual privilege. I think the difference is relevant.

Heart

ETA: In fact, for it to make sense to me, I need to uncouple the words "passing," and "privilege." We are not granted "passing privilege." Yes, my ex was sometimes granted white-skin privilege, (until she wasn't), I am sometimes granted straight privilege (until I'm not), a butch might be granted male privilege (until s/he isn't). It is a privilege to be white, straight, or male. It is not a privilige to pass as those things.

[Heart]

Yes, Keri I see the point that you and Mrs. Strutt have made -- which is the very point that I take issue with. Yes, I see that you may be granted straight privilege, that you may get to make a choice about whether or not to reveal your queer-ness in certain situations, but I don't define that choice (to pass) as a privilege. I define it as a strategy you are using to avoid conflict or danger or confrontation (or whatever in the given situation). If you really had straight privilege, there would be no need to employ the strategy of passing.

I am not denying that passing exists and can be used to one's advantage, what I am suggesting is that we not call that "privilege." Privilege, IMO, has a very specific context and meaning and to use it to define passing just feels problematic to me. For one thing, what would happen if, for example, someone found out something about you being queer and decided to out you. The inherent danger in passing is the risk of being outed -- and the passer has no control over that.

Calling passing a privilege makes it sound like an empowered thing, something that the passer has complete control over -- but that is not the case. The very nature of passing includes an aspect of stealth, subterfuge, (or stealing as I said before), and that puts the passer at risk.

Okay, I think I've now said what I'm trying to say nine ways to Sunday, so if I haven't made it clear by now I should just shut up.

Heart

[firie]

Originally Posted by Heart

Calling passing a privilege makes it sound like an empowered thing, something that the passer has complete control over -- but that is not the case. The very nature of passing includes an aspect of stealth, subterfuge, (or stealing as I said before), and that puts the passer at risk.

Okay, I think I've now said what I'm trying to say nine ways to Sunday, so if I haven't made it clear by now I should just shut up.

Heart

No! Don't shut up! I have really been interested in your thoughts here. I hate that you feel you are banging your head on the proverbial wall, as I am with you, and have to say thanks for expressing so well a dilemma that I have had a hard time of really honing in on within myself and my experience as a queer and someone who is read as straight--grappling with the fact that I know I certainly feel safer in my skin than so many others might. So what do we call that? Because I totally get you when you say that someone who passes can't own that privilege and that it can be taken from that person at any point. I hear you there.

[AtLast]

Originally Posted by Heart

Yes, Keri I see the point that you and Mrs. Strutt have made -- which is the very point that I take issue with. Yes, I see that you may be granted straight privilege, that you may get to make a choice about whether or not to reveal your queer-ness in certain situations, but I don't define that choice (to pass) as a privilege. I define it as a strategy you are using to avoid conflict or danger or confrontation (or whatever in the given situation). If you really had straight privilege, there would be no need to employ the strategy of passing.

I am not denying that passing exists and can be used to one's advantage, what I am suggesting is that we not call that "privilege." Privilege, IMO, has a very specific context and meaning and to use it to define passing just feels problematic to me. For one thing, what would happen if, for example, someone found out something about you being queer and decided to out you. The inherent danger in passing is the risk of being outed -- and the passer has no control over that.

Calling passing a privilege makes it sound like an empowered thing, something that the passer has complete control over -- but that is not the case. The very nature of passing includes an aspect of stealth, subterfuge, (or stealing as I said before), and that puts the passer at risk.

Okay, I think I've now said what I'm trying to say nine ways to Sunday, so if I haven't made it clear by now I should just shut up.

Heart

Has been quite clear to me!

What you bring up about control is critical, I believe. Absolutely, the inherent danger in passing is the risk of being outed. I honestly think that within our own community this risk is not well understood and at times, not guarded as it should be.

Perhaps this is due to our having more information about transgenderism surrounding us that some take it for granted that.. of course people understand, its no big deal to out a transgendered person. It is a great big deal outside of queerdom and very dangerous. Think about how many transwomen femmes, fully transitioned, do not tell tell butch dates for a very long time and steer clear of intimacy until they feel safe. Very safe. The fact remains that MtF's are at the top of the list for hate crimes, physical as well as emotional violence and abuse.

I absolutely do not out trans friends to anyone. Even if asked if they are. And even to people I am certain are not transphobic. It is not my place. I learned a lot about this from my late partner's children as they have a trans co-parent that was/is very much in their lives. They both went through a lot of negative stuff growing up in a trans/queer family and it was entirely up to them to offer any information about their Dad to anyone they met via me.

No, passing just does not fit with privilege to me at all in this context.

[Heart]

Originally Posted by firie

No! Don't shut up! I have really been interested in your thoughts here. I hate that you feel you are banging your head on the proverbial wall, as I am with you, and have to say thanks for expressing so well a dilemma that I have had a hard time of really honing in on within myself and my experience as a queer and someone who is read as straight--grappling with the fact that I know I certainly feel safer in my skin than so many others might. So what do we call that? Because I totally get you when you say that someone who passes can't own that privilege and that it can be taken from that person at any point. I hear you there.

Firie -- I might call passing a strategy or, at times, an advantage rather than a privilege. Or I might just call it... passing. Passing isn't something you are necessarily doing in an active sense. It's something that is done towards you based upon dominant assumptions and biases. You are passed. This brings things back around to Dylan's assertion of responsibility. Do you proclaim every time you are passed, that you are in fact queer, NOT straight?
This is the tension and dilemma of passing/being passed. This is what can cause feelings of collusion, guilt, and exhaustion.

I am most likely mistaken for straight frequently. I don't proclaim my queerness all day every day. Passing in this manner is not something I feel responsible for. If homophobia/heterosexism is enacted in front of me, I confront it - often by revealing that I am queer, (but not always). Do I have an advantage over someone who cannot disappear into being straight-looking? Yes, I do. I have the advantage of passing. But I am aware that this advantage can turn on a dime and be the very thing that harms me. Passing itself has been the cause of queer-bashing.

Heart

[AtLast]

Originally Posted by Dylan

So, whether it's given freely or 'stolen', One still has the privilege. And it's 'given' in the first place, because One didn't bother to say anything about it/One didn't correct the assumption.


Dylan

Just thinking about this in terms of being a FIB that at times is viewed as a man/male. In most cases, I state I object to being called sir, etc. to make the point that I am a woman... a masculine woman. I don't want to pass for male. It is important to me that female masculinity be recognized. There are times when this happens in situations in which another is treating me from a place (theirs) male privilege. Usually this is when I am with a femme, actually. If I allow this, I personally feel I am accepting traditional patriarchal male privilege which I detest.

Now, in situations in which there is possible violence, I don't do this. Although, I have to say that there is that part of me that continually scans for possible danger in most places. Here, it is all about homophobia (and/or transphobia as that can be another perception coming my way).

Yanno.... we just can't win for losing... A complex set of equations no matter how one looks at it. And a stressful equation all around.

[Enigma]

Thank you so much for starting this thread, Nat. The topics of passing and privilege are fascinating and fill my mind with questions about the phenomenon of discrimination, in whatever form it comes. It occurs to me that none of us are immune from prejudice, whether guilty of it ourselves or indicting others.

Jean Cocteau said that "all privilege leads directly to the guillotine". Like a mask, no matter how beautiful, the privilege of passing for something "other" obscures the true self. I think about that a lot. Passing may confer privileges but the beneficiary invariably pays, the amount dependent on the degree to which that passing aligns or is at odds with one's identity and the expectations of others. Whether the self is camouflaged by circumstance, perception or design, all the accolades, critiques and condemnation are based on a fiction. Attribution is given to the alter ego. If privilege is then "presumed" by either those in power or by those who are discriminated against, death of the self comes twice. Once because one is unknown and again when condemned for what one is not.

I recall a story about a man from the islands who was sold to a family for slave labor when he was an infant. He was never given a name, told his age nor spoken to. He recounted that the worst part of his struggle was not his servitude but his utter lack of an identity. His story of being unnamed and unknown reminds me of those who live invisible lives on the margins of acceptability. They are the blank slates upon which others' prejudices and projected self references are writ.

What of the complexities of passing and presumed extreme privilege bestowed upon one by nothing other than an accident of birth? How does one quiet the clamoring of the social climbers that surround those who remain hidden precisely because they want to be truly known? Those who want to be accepted for who they are outside the cliched conclusions about derivative power and protected from those who want it?

I know a girl whose appearance is at once both her truth and her disguise. She hides behind long flowing blonde hair, delicate features and a painfully shy demeanor from those, who if the truth of her birth were known, would be inauthentic themselves. Ironically, it is by passing for what she is not that she is able to truly be herself and discern the truth in others. Her blonde hair and fair skin hide the fact that her mother is a black celebrity. By hiding, she has a voyueristic view into the psyches and unadulterated prejudices of those around her. Her radiance and beauty is a disguise of sorts, too. It masks the loneliness she feels and she is glad for that.

Whether revered or reviled, the self is at least a foundation from which to interact with the world. But some are never seen or worse, denied legitimacy. Sometimes, members of the very communities that are trying to dismantle identity discrimination fall into defensive traps; policing perimeters based on a person's appearance and presumptions about their histories and character. This kind of 'profiling' risks belying not just the individual's truth but reinforces visible and stereotypical markers of all groups' conformities. The marginalized become perpetrators of that which they despise. How often the cruelest cuts come from those about whom one cares the most. So for some, passing can render them orphan of sorts, even when born to castes that are considered untouchable.

To actually exist to people other than oneself is the only way a person has even a hope of mutual regard. Without that, a connection may be intense but one-sided and like gravity, the influence profound but unseen. To what degree is one a slave to social mirrors? At what risk does one break them? What is the price of truth to oneself and others? Sometimes the truth has very grave consequences indeed and not just for the "passenger". I suspect the answer lies somewhere in the balance, on the scales upon which one measures cost and expresses or suppresses according to social perception, reflection and consequence. The answer lies in whether they and those around them can withstand the image shining back from the glass for the mirrors are held in not just their own but by so many other hands. If that mirror cracks and wounds are inflicted, whose hands bear the stains? What good is the chest-inflated pride of belonging if that membership is wielded in a way that causes collateral damage? Fire, whether friendly or not, can still destroy those with whom one shares the trenches.

One of my favorite stories of an insider's view of passing, privilege and the misdistribution of power is from the matriarch of a family who describes herself and her brood of thirteen children as "the league of nations of the hood". The parents have created a rainbow of colors and ethnic backgrounds for the children. Their mother says that separately they each pass for what they are not and are vulnerable in different ways. But together? She sighs with satisfaction and laughs. She says, "Together? When we walk down the street, everybody knows we are a FORCE".

I often think of her insight and words by which she truly lives. When we are together it is our differences that make us stronger.

[Kätzchen]

Dear Enigma,

I want to not let the opportunity pass to say that your words - the way your process complicated connections that intersect, intertwine and are deeply integrated in social settings as to identity, privilege, power, and a host of other processes - is beautifully stated and I feel enlightened and humbled and honored, as if all at once, to have partaken of the 'supper of manna' you have left for us to nourish our minds with.

*thank you so much*

~ALK

[chai~]

~bookmarking~

[TheresaD]

Originally Posted by Nat

A note about the word "Passing" and its problematic use with transfolks -

Although it does appear (from the article I quoted) that some transfolks are fine with using the word "passing" to describe the experience of being interpreted as the gender one is, I can imagine for others that using the term "passing" in this way may seem self-negating.

I met a wonderful and funny transwoman years ago at a Queer Conference down at UT Austin. She said somebody asked her once about how she felt about not passing. She said she asked that person, "Not passing as what?? I look just like a transwoman." Still, many transfolks want to be interpreted as a "man" or a "woman" without the qualifier of "trans." I'm not sure "passing" is the most accurate word for that, and I don't want to impose it on anybody who feels uncomfortable with applying that word to theirself. (<--I know this use of the word "their" is extremely awkward, but I'm experimenting with the singular, gender-neutral use of the word "they" as it's the most commonly used gender-neutral use to spring naturally from the English language (I think)).

If you feel like there are privilege differences between being seen and understood as the gender you are, and *not* being seen and understood as the gender you are, please don't hesitate to contribute to this thread using whatever language suits you best.

Though I am not trans and cannot speak from a trans perspective, I would imagine trans people who are interpreted 24/7 as their gender may run into more trouble at airports, at gyms, in deciding when (and if?) to come out with potential new relationships, when applying for jobs where anxieties may arise about whether your references will use your correct pronoun/name, in the event of arrest, in the event of medical emergency, and also in the event of one's death if the news gets a hold of the story and spins it in a transphobic way. I can also imagine a transperson with this experience would be privy to transphobic commentary from cisgender folks who have no clue, and that this would be insidious and damaging in its unique way.

These are just some of the things I can imagine *might* be issues for transfolks who are interpreted as cisgender, but like I said, I'm not trans (in that sense) and I cannot fully know what it's like to either pass or not pass as the gender I actually feel that I am. (In fact, I never feel as though I pass as the gender I am because I am bigender).

When I "pass" for straight or even cisgender, it is a case of passing as something I am not. In this way, "passing" is a very different thing for me than the "passing" described in the quote from the perspective of a transwoman.

There are so many wonderful, thoughtful and intelligent things you've said here and I won't bore you with addressing every one. Needless to say, you hit the nail on the hear about transfolk NOT wanting to be identified as trans, but just identified as there physical and emotional gender that they are or are becoming. Very well done.