A reader writes: “As a cis-gendered man who tries to be an ally, I wonder what your take on the situation is and if there is something more I can follow up with or if there are suggestions for how to handle this in a better way in the future.
“I am a graduate student and I regularly spend time before class in a coffee shop across the street from where my classes meet. One day, I overheard the worker behind the counter and a customer talking in some derogatory and insensitive ways about trans women.
“As I was trying to decide how exactly to ‘turn this into a teaching moment,’ they started laughing over the customer’s suggestion that the solution to their problem would be to ‘examine them from a distance with a stick.’ At this point I decided to screw teaching and just end this nightmare.
“I approached them and explained that their conversation was incredibly offensive and unacceptable. When the customer apologized ‘that I was offended,’ I explained that this wasn’t about me being offended but about the conversation being offensive. I then wrote a comment on one of those review websites and decided I had lost the use of a coffee shop.
“A day later I got a note from the owner asking for more information with a profound apology and a request to identify the people involved. After I responded with the information she requested, I received a followup e-mail stating that the employee involved was severely reprimanded and that the customer involved was spoken to as well.
“I returned to the coffee shop a few times after this e-mail exchange and have been warmly received and haven’t felt or heard any hostility. My question is: Should I have waited and considered how to use this as a teaching moment? What is the appropriate way for an ally to respond in these situations that empower our trans friends? I don’t think in this instance there were any trans folks around, but I worry that my speaking up on behalf of someone could in fact disempower rather than empower.”
This was a difficult situation that you encountered, and I think that it takes a lot of guts to speak out when you hear derogatory language being used or offensive jokes being told about any group of people, so I commend you for your actions. I also commend the coffee shop for responding to your complaint and taking it seriously.
As long as there is one other person in the coffee shop besides those partaking in the offensive jokes, there might be a trans person in the coffee shop. There also might be a parent, child, partner, relative, or friend of trans person in the coffee shop. And even if there was nobody else in the coffee shop, you were there and you were offended, and that’s all that matters.
As far as I’m concerned, I don’t have to be a member of a particular marginalized group to be offended by jokes and slurs used against that group. In my mind, I separate being offended on behalf of someone else (which can sometimes be considered patronizing) from being offended on behalf of myself. So while I understand your concern about disempowering someone by speaking up on that person’s behalf, I also believe that you can be upset and offended in your own right, based on your own beliefs about what is acceptable and unacceptable for you.
It’s true that some members of marginalized groups might feel disempowered or patronized by a member of a more privileged group speaking up for them. But many will appreciate it – especially if they are silenced themselves by fear for their personal safety or for other reasons. At least I would certainly appreciate someone speaking up for me if I wasn’t in a position to do so, for whatever reason.
I think the only time that this might have been disempowering or patronizing is if there were trans people in the room and you said, “Don’t you know that there are trans people here?” At that point, it becomes about the specific people in the room instead of about the offensive nature of the conversation in general. But I sense that you would not have done that, because you were aware, and pointed out, that it wasn’t about any one person being offended – it was about that fact that the conversation was offensive, regardless of who was present.
So I believe that you should follow your own inner compass and your sense of what’s right, both for you and in general. I learned this many years ago when I failed to speak up at an injustice. The person who was targeted spoke up for himself, and was fully capable of doing so, but I realized later that he was alone in the situation – and that he likely felt that no one had his back. So I think it’s better to err on the side of what you know in your heart is right.
As far as a “teaching moment,” I think there are many of these that are presented to us – but I also think that sometimes a situation goes beyond such a moment, and you identified the point at which you felt the teaching moment was lost and some intervention had to happen. I think teaching moments are great for accidental slips of the tongue or for those who really don’t mean any harm, but are simply ignorant of the facts. Those talking about examining people at a distance with a stick are probably beyond that. You strike me as someone who can identify the difference.
So in my opinion, you did the right thing, the coffee shop did the right thing, and hopefully some good came out of this whole situation. Had you done nothing, there would come a time when someone would be in the coffee shop who would be devastated by these types of remarks, and you have likely prevented that from happening.
The only other thing I would suggest to this coffee shop, and to any company who does business with the public, is mandatory employee training on transgender issues (disclosure: this is what I do). With an increasing number of trans people, family, friends, and allies being out and visible, and speaking with their wallets and pocketbooks, no company can afford to alienate this segment of the community. So you did a favor for the coffee shop as well – they kept your business, and their refusal to accept this kind of behavior will keep them from losing other customers as well.
Those are my thoughts. Now it’s time to hear from the readers.
I would not have found it offensive, nor disempowering. If anything, witnessing someone correcting an offensive slur such as those that were made would have momentarily restored my faith in humanity. And frankly, I probably would have gone up to the gentleman and thanked him profusely for his actions. Mainly because I know the guts it takes to do something like that. Wouldn’t it be great if all cis gendered folks thought and felt as he does?
This can be a difficult position to find yourself in and I am grateful to someone cis for doing it.
This is the sort of situation where I myself would often love to speak out, to point out that the persons involved are being offensive, but feel I can not for fear of outing myself (I’m sure I’m not the only one here to find myself in this position).
So thank you, I feel a lot better knowing that our cis friends are so brave; we often hear that we are but I would say that you are the ones who have the true courage in this community.
Ah, but it seems to me it turned out to be a teaching moment after all – hopefully those cretins learned to think twice before spewing hateful words. Not every lesson is softly spoken – sometimes you have to carry the big stick and sometimes you have to swing it. Thank you, Mr. Cis-guy.
Thanks for speaking up and for wanting to learn to be a good ally. We need more people like you.
I don’t understand the idea of not speaking up for fear of outing oneself, though (I’ve heard this before). I’ll speak up for any group that’s being insulted, regardless of whether I identify with that group. Hate is hate – speak up when you see it.
I find I can speak up for things I believe in – the mocking of the disabled is one that I have had to pull quite a few people up on over the years – but people tend to take you less seriously if they know you identify with the issue at hand (for example how white people will often mock a black person who is trying to tell them not to be racist, and vice versa, but they are more likely to listen if told by another person of the same skin tone as themselves).
People will always question someone’s motives in defending something that doesn’t appear, to them, to affect the other. It’s in their questioning of this that the fear of being outed comes from.
I am a trans man and if the OP is reading, I want to thank you for speaking up. Thank you.
Good on this guy for speaking up! Much like white folks speaking up against racist comments/actions, the dominant group needs to hear from its own that this sort of thing doesn’t fly. As for the desire for a “teaching moment,” well, it’s nice when that happens, but *only* speaking out when one feels that’s possible makes the whole thing about oneself rather than offering a counter to the bigotry. When something is wrong we need to point that out.
Just reminded me of this:
http://mdzlog.alcor.net/2009/05/02/do-not-stand-by/
The direct focus is different, but the core message holds true in any community.
On one of my blindness lists, a person was told to leave their guide dog outside and it wasn’t to come into the restaurant. A cop happened to be in that restaurant and he came over and told the manager that if they didn’t stop discriminating against the guide dog, a citation was going to be written up right then and there! That blind person was very happy for the supportive actions of that cop. I, too have been denied service because of my guide dog and once because of me being blind. There was nobody to speak up to back me up in regards to the law – Americans with Disabilities Act.
Thank you to that cis guy in his support of Trans people and that horrible discussion in that coffee shop. As Matt has said – it is ALWAYS the correct thing to do to stop crap like that in its tracks and say something. The worker and customer had no idea that we have cis allies. When all people stand against marginalization and dehumanizing behavior towards any group, life will much nicer. Thanks, Bro!
as a cis woman it makes me feel really good knowing that another cis person stood up for trans women and the trans community. sometimes i feel like i’m one of the only cis people i know who does that on a regular basis. i, too, try to turn discriminatory actions/conversations into learning situations, but sometimes all you can do is call the person/people out and make your point.
bravo to this gentleman. i hope more people can learn from your actions.
Hi, ash-a-frash, I’m Julie and I’m an ally too. There. Now you know me. You can safely say that you know at least one other cis woman who stands up for the trans community.
Letter Writer, way to go! And excellent follow-through with the coffee shop folks too.
Thanks Matt, for sharing this one. I wear my ally hat poudly, but as I’ve told you before, it’s about human rights, not just any specific group. NO ONE should be demeaned or made fun of. Ever.
My mother is Mexican, but I take after my father, with hazel eyes and fairly light skin. You can’t tell just by looking at me that I’m a “minority” -you can’t tell my looking at me a lot of damn things. So when any type of judgement is made, I speak up. And even if it’s just my tiny corner of the world, that’s how progress is made, one little step at time.
hi julie! nice to meet you, too. glad to know there’s more of us out there. keep up the fight.
cheers!
Sorry for the length here but…
In the fighting-racism and fighting-sexism blogs I read (because I want to learn to be a better ally too), a point that’s come up several times is how to measure how good of an ally one is… is by how much that person is willing to address racism and sexism with their not-minority friends.
Like, it doesn’t matter how much a man says “I’m a feminist! I think women are equals to men!” to his female friends nearly as much as how willing he is to call his male friends (or strangers ahah) out on slut shaming, objectification of women, and so on.
Reading this made me feel warm and happy. I know my experience has been shaped a lot by horrible bullying I endured as a kid for being gender nonconforming, and nobody once ever spoke out for me that I know of. So if I’d been in that coffee shop and witnessed this, even if I hadn’t been the direct target of those horrible people I would have felt so relieved and less unsafe to hear that there are people who don’t just look the other way.
If the folks who want to say those hateful transphobic (or sexist or racist or rapey or whatever) things had to think twice before speaking because they were worried someone might call them out on it and MAKE THEM UNCOMFORTABLE OH NO, I think a lot less of them would be so vocal. The discomfort shouldn’t be all on our end for having to hear those things.
So letter-writer, if you read this, you have my appreciation and approval for whatever that’s worth.
Everyone has already said it better than I was going to so I will just add my thanks to Mr. Cis-guy for being an awesome ally
I think that this cis guy did great
Speaking up in a good way can be very helpful. It can be hard for many trans people to speak up for ourselves out of fear, desire not to be outed, or simple exhaustion from having to deal with it all the time.
One of the best cis allies I know who isn’t a partner or activist is a friend I met at an LBGT group. He is not afraid to call people out on their shit and does not appreciate it when they try to excuse themselves. I heard one day that one of his (ex-)boyfriends had misgendered me behind my back, and he had called him out on it. When his boyfriend claimed that he was “trying,” my friend said,
“YOU need to TRY HARDER.”
Love cis allies.
Jack, I was very happy to read your remarks about cis allies and their willingness to talk to their other cis friends about how NOT to be transphobic or homophobic.
I am CONSTANTLY telling my cis straight, christian friends that they NEED to tell their fellow straight, cis christian friends to stop slamming LGBT folks. I particularly tell them this when they whine about our christian bashing. I tell them that it is simple – stop bashing and slandering our LGBT community and we won’t have anything bad to say abouot them (christians). I also tell them that we have many great christian friends who are cis and straight!
I love it when I see or hear about all the truely wonderful allies that we have. You are cherished in our LGBT community!
It WAS a teaching moment, and your reader did the teaching, but he also recruited more students into his classroom, and enlisted some of them as teaching assistants.
The store owner learned that she had employees who needed a lesson in appropriate behavior on the job. The employees learned that further such behavior would have consequences. The customer learned that speech like that might meet censure. Everyone at the store learned that a customer felt strongly enough to complain, AND that the customer was a member of the group describing a majority of their customers, not a member of the derogated minority.
Lessons all around, and a job well done by your reader.
Grace