SpeakOUT's Statement on Boston Pride

SpeakOUT Boston wishes a Happy Pride Month to the entire LGBTQIA+ community. We know it has been a very difficult year (and more) for our community and, in many ways, even more so for people of color and trans people within the community.

As an organization dedicated to “...ending homo/bi/transphobia and other forms of prejudice,” SpeakOUT Boston is in solidarity this year with other organizations boycotting official Boston Pride events. More importantly, and in the spirit of being actively anti-racist, especially regarding systems and structures, we join the calls for Boston Pride to commit to much greater diversity, equity, and accountability within their board and operations.

While we are thankful for the work done on behalf of the LGBTQIA+ community by Boston Pride in the past, we recognize and affirm that the time has come for meaningful change. Black Lives Matter. Black Trans Lives Matter. And an LGBTQIA+ organization committed to true social and legal equity for all of its members should be able to say so -- and act accordingly. Similarly, trans people and their voices and ideas deserve to be in leadership positions in any broad-based LGBTQIA+ organization.

Queer, Trans, and Bi People of Color (QTBIPOC) have always been leaders in the fight for equity and liberation, and yet, sadly, in the last several years Boston Pride has turned away from that legacy, even in the face of today’s increased understanding of the need to be actively anti-racist. As a result, they have lost 80% of their volunteer force as well as the trust and support of many other members of the Boston-area LGBTQIA+ community and our would-be allies. Many of the volunteers are organizing as Pride 4 the People and we encourage you to become informed about their experiences and demands for a future Pride organization for Boston.

We understand that Boston Pride's board president has agreed to step down and we want to encourage more changes to the board and organizational structure to ensure that Boston Pride evolves into an anti-racist community organization. SpeakOUT Boston will not be participating in Boston Pride activities until the QTBIPOC community is satisfied with the changes that are made.

From SpeakOUT's Executive Director and Board of Directors

There Is No One Way

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By Tai Tran

I recently sat on an online SpeakOUT panel in a high school health class. Between the students in the classroom with the teacher and the other students on zoom we had a small audience. Even in a pandemic, our teachers and students are continuing their education and meaningful work together. I shared my story about how I taught middle school math and science in California for the past two years and had made it a point to be an openly out queer educator. We live in a world that stigmatizes and erases queer identities in the institution of education; I was not going to recreate that in my classroom. I always introduce myself as “Mx. Tran, not Mr., not Ms., and I’m happily independent, so not Mrs. either.” After sharing our stories, a young male student asked me, “Mx. Tran, you say you identify as nonbinary, but the pronouns on your zoom say she and her, what does that mean?” 

I thanked the young man for his question and quickly added, “Good question!” Afterall, young people nowadays need more encouragement than ever. And to ask questions is a sign of intelligence, or so I tell my own students. We had only reached the halfway point of the panel  and even if we had more time it would not have been enough to explain the intricacies of gender and sexuality to the students. Why do I subscribe to a binary pronoun when I claim nonbinary as well? Are the two mutually exclusive? Should I, perhaps more accurately, use they/them as pronouns instead? Or hir? Or ze? 

For me, these were of course questions I asked myself long ago. And ones that I continue to ask myself. But in the moment, I replied “It just feels more me. More like me. Don’t get me wrong, I have tried he, him, his pronouns. I have tried and used them for years and I certainly know those are not what I want to be referred to as when I am talked about.” And trans/nonbinary people are definitely talked about, especially so when we are not in the room. I didn’t need a whole seminar to tell these young bright minds that there is no one way to be nonbinary. Just like there is no one way to be a good person. I told my story about when I started to experiment with other pronouns I found out this was the pronoun for me. When my trusted friends and colleagues started calling me by she and her pronouns I felt seen and respected. I felt seen the way I wanted to be seen and respected. The way I see myself; not the way the world said I should be. 

Whether principals, districts, lawmakers, or governments are willing to admit it or not, we live in a world that scripts out the life of our youth before they are even born. To be a “boy” or to be a “girl” means something. We all have an inkling, large or small, of what it means. Yet, what would it mean to be nonbinary? I am grateful that I am alive to continue exploring what it means to me. I am grateful to be involved with an organization that lets students hear the stories behind the statistics of people who are so different from them, who are likely very different from their family as well. And I am also grateful for that student’s question. 

Tai recently finished her service with Teach For America in Richmond, California as part of the 2018 corps, teaching middle school math and science. She is a bright, bold, and brave queer educator who goes by Mx. Tran in the classroom. Her passions include dismantling the anti-queer patriarchy in the institution of education, empowering students with comprehensive sex ed, and being the change she has always wanted to see in the world.