My friend is a trans woman, 26, living in small town Georgia. She’s been out for three years, got fired for it. She lives with her deeply religiou’ family who are going out of their ways to be as mean to her as they possibly can. Lots of brothers and sisters; I’m getting a “quiverfull family in a huge compound” vibe, without knowing for sure.
A couple examples: They refuse to use her chosen pronouns, and insist on using her dead name at all times, insisting that she is a man in drag, not a woman. This Christmas, at the table, her grandmother gave all the females, except her, makeup boxes. The conversation was all about what a rambunctious boy “he” was, mingled with throwing the worst parts of the Bible at her. She tried to flee the group, and her cousin chased her down to drive the nail in further. They make family gatherings where everyone has to listen to hourlong sermons of the most hateful preachers they can find online, two on Tuesdays.
Her own father has told her time and time again that their faith “can’t be compromised for [her] worldly desires.” And yet, she’s so deeply invested in making them accept her—and getting them to call her by her chosen name and use her correct pronouns—that she will not leave them. She has offers of people wanting to take her in, offers of people willing to give her gas money, Greyhound fare, whatever, hell, even drive the bleeping way from neighbouring states, yet still she will not accept help.
She’s talking suicide and how she can never leave, can never get a job, can never have friends, can’t get the help, hormones therapy and surgery or, hell, just the respect, care and affection she deserves and desperately needs. She knows about trans hotlines, talks to them regularly, she knows about organisations in Atlanta. She has trans online friends—the only friends it seems she really has are online. Yet all we seem to accomplish is make her anguish worse, not better, and solidify her decision to make it her life mission to try to convince people, who have proven every day for years that they are unworthy of her company, that she is worthy of theirs.
How can anyone get through to her? How can we best help her? She’s 4500 miles from me; I cannot get to her directly.
Anonymous Liberal Lecturing Youth
Let me guess: You’ve never met this friend, have you? In person? Face-to-face?
And you’ve never managed to get her on the phone either, ALLY, right? And you’ve never had a video chat via Skype, have you? I’m guessing this “friendship”exists only on social media platforms, in private email exchanges, and in message room. Maybe you’ve seen a few of pictures. But they’re blurry and you can’t really tell if they’re the same person, can you? And seeing as you’re aware of the exact mileage between the two of you, I’m guessing you met this woman on a dating app. (Those tend to tell you exactly how far you are from the person you wanna bang, even if you’re on the other side of the world.) I’m asking these particular questions and making these particular guesses, ALLY, because I think you’re being catfished.
Take it away, Urban Dictionary:
Catfish: Someone who pretends to be someone they’re not using Facebook or other social media to create false identities, particularly to pursue deceptive online romances.
Why would someone pretend to be a trans twentysomething who clearly needs help, spend hours online convincing good people to offer help, and then refuse all help? For attention. For kicks. To pass the time. To scam people. Because they feel entitled to sympathy and attention and don’t think their actual plight, whatever it might be, is interesting or sexy enough to attract much of either. Who the fuck knows?
But this much we do know, ALLY: If you’ve never met or spoken with this person—if it’s all been texting and social media and one or two blurry photographs (and an anime avatar, right?)—this person isn’t who she says she is.
Ask your friend to Skype or to talk via Snapchat. (The latter is less invasive, but you’ll still be able to verify she’s a real person). If she can’t or won’t Skype or Snap with you, ALLY, there’s your proof. If she does Skype/Snap with you, great. Doesn’t mean she isn’t catfishing you, of course, but at least then you can beg her—one last time—to accept the help and the resources already offered to her. If you know people who can help her in Atlanta, connect with them and create an escape plan. But the decision to accept or reject your help is ultimately hers, ALLY. If she decides to stay in Biblefuck, Georgia, surrounded by cruel makeup-case-withholding grannies and fleet-footed, nail-driving cousins, well, then she’s made her choice: She’s in a terrible situation but doesn’t want to be helped or she’s lying and doesn’t really need help. (People do lie about shit they shouldn’t lie about.)
Honestly, ALLY, I hope your friend is fake—because otherwise someone is out there, suffering terribly, all because she’s stupidly/self-destructively invested in winning over an idiotic/barely-credible collection of Southern Gothic grotesques. But even if she’s real, ALLY, you can’t force someone to accept your help. If you can’t help help her—for whatever reason—there are surely trans and gender-nonconforming people in your own community who could really use some help and might be willing to accept yours.
What an utter piece of trash. Savage clearly doesn’t understand the value of internet relationships as an integral piece of survival for isolated trans women. He also clearly has zero understanding of how emotional abuse impacts a person and the complex push and pull of familial ties. As a trans woman from a similar situation, I did manage to leave my religious conservative family and to this day I still miss them dearly and still get my hopes up about visiting and establishing ties again only to get burnt again each time. The . Savage should be offering suggestions for supporting this trans gal in her situation rather than passing judgement about what he thinks she’s doing wrong. What a troll.
Fuck you Dan Savage. The trans women I’ve taken in when houseless, helped raise money when they are out of meds, the countless nights I’ve gone sleepless talking trans women out of suicide, the girls I’ve helped escape abusive parents, and all the trans women of color we lose on a nearly weekly basis to murder are not ploys to date people on social media.