The Cis Ally
Trans women are women, trans men are men, and non-binary people are valid. The last slogan is probably because “non-binary people are non-binary” sounds more like a lolcats meme than a statement about human life, but speaking as a non-bino, our designated validity feels condescending. Sometimes it comes across a bit like “your kooky gender is ok by me!” with a thumbs-up. The more enthusiastic the thumbs-up, the more comfortable the cis ally will feel.
All the gender-affirming mantras have started to feel condescending, a 101 class that feels like it’s stretching into infinity. At some point we have to take the next step, to demand a higher baseline of trans solidarity. And I hate to say it when outright transphobia is off the leash more than ever, but we need to talk about cis allies.
To be very clear, no social movement has ever succeeded without solid allies, and a lot of cis people out there are genuinely great. A supportive cis person who’s willing to speak up for us and who also loves us exactly how we are can make a world of difference to trans life, safety and happiness. I’m also not generally talking about the cis allies who are new to the whole thing or don’t think about it much, and are worried about getting yelled at. A lot of those people are more or less fine.
More importantly, and I say this with genuine love, we need to extend our support to self-described allies who you might spot saying things like “Of course I’ll never fully understand transness but I will always stand with trans people and support their struggles, but only as an ally so I don’t take up space cos I’m just keen to listen, I’m totally cis but there’s something really compelling about trans people and they’re so brave and kind of easier to relate to than other people, you know? They make me rethink our social paradigms and they’re really hot too and I wish I could be like them but that’s probably fetishising because I’m cis and I can’t do that, oh well.” Catch these people a couple years later buying Lou Sullivan’s diaries or trying to enjoy 100 gecs, if you know what I mean. This might be latent transness that was in them all along, or it might represent a change in their gender. The idea that people are becoming trans because of social contagion is not something to deny or disprove, because being trans is cool!
All these people differ from the professional cis ally, who is perhaps easiest described as the cis counterpart to Male Feminists. Rather than just chilling out with their trans friends and speaking up when it’s needed, the cis ally is vocal and passionate about trans acceptance, and thinks about trans rights a great deal. But behind that enthusiasm often lies deep-seated issues with transness, an unexamined neurosis that is fucking up our movements from the inside.
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The cis ally would never admit this; they love trans people. Love them. Especially the ones with huge media platforms. They’ve learned so much from those influencers’ posts. If the influencers behave badly, the cis ally must deny it because there’s no one else to provide their daily dose of Trans Facts. The influencers—both trans ones and the cis allies—might not be beloved by other trans people or involved in on-the-ground organising, but they’re on the front lines of clapping back at the TERFs and conspiracists constantly flooding their mentions, mythbusting the same far-right talking points again and again because if quote-tweeting 4-follower conservatives can reach just one person…it’ll be worth it. This clarifies the ally’s standpoint because, after all, the two sides are TERF and anti-TERF, and the ally knows which one they’re on, thank you. Ugh. Who’d be a TERF??
The cis ally knows that trans women are women. They know it, they do…know it. But sometimes it feels a bit unfair to have to fully share womanhood with them. To have a trans woman accuse them, a lowly woman, of transmisogyny. That word doesn’t describe an overarching system, not a long-running institution like patriarchy; it’s just people being mean to trans women—and sometimes trans women are mean back, so who’s to say what’s really happening? Their anger isn’t legitimate or based in an individual personality flaw; it must be some hangover of male socialisation. That’s a TERF talking point through and through, but the cis ally thinks there’s probably some truth in it.
The cis ally loves to attend “women and gender minorities” club nights. It’s got that wonderful femme energy and it’s inclusive! An AFAB non-bino like me is kind of just a Spicy Woman, so she, I mean they, is safe. All gender minorities are more afraid of cis men than cis women, because cis women aren’t a threat! Unfortunately, when deciding who’s allowed in the club, there’s no way of telling by sight the difference between a cis man, a trans man who’s viewed as cis, and a trans woman or AMAB non-bino who either isn’t out yet or doesn’t fit cis standards of womanhood. But if trans women want other women to feel comfortable, the cis ally thinks that maybe they should put on a skirt, and a bit more makeup, and get rid of any facial hair; just show they’re really making an effort. Meanwhile, as Devon Price said, cis women can finally get a taste of being the most powerful gender in the room.
Polls show that the cis ally thinks transphobia is bad, but thinks some of its manifestations—transphobic changing rooms and sports teams, denial of hormones for teenagers—are at least kind of good. Yet trans concepts of trans healthcare are far more radical than they or the current system can dream of. How would they feel to know that some of us think every teen should be offered the option of puberty blockers by default? Or that doctors are so often, as a friend said, just cops for the body, and that the history of trans healthcare will always involve some DIY because, as David Cronenberg said in one of the most loving public statements about us from a famous cis person, “this is an artist giving their all to their art”? Has the trans movement finally gone too far?
The cis ally is often more transphobic than apolitical cis people, precisely because they’re trying too hard to look like they’re on the right side. They know they can’t say things about male-coded behaviour or feeling grossed out unsafe around trans women, or that being transmasc is stupid and unserious and we should just go back to being women to avoid everyone’s confusion. But not working through those feelings means they retain a quiet resentment and carefully-curated disgust that bubbles below the surface, sometimes erupting in ways much worse than a simple slur because it’s been bottled up and had time to steep and become potent. And because it’s more of a betrayal and usually conveyed in language that sounds inclusive, it cuts deeper. It makes it harder to know who to trust, because the colleague who waxes lyrical about inclusivity could be the person who plagiarises your work tomorrow.
Most transphobia is just refracted transmisogyny, and pretty much everything I’ve written here stands upon the shoulders of trans women who have said it before; theorists, social media randoms, friends. When trans men are treated like silly little girls who don’t understand their own bodies and are being led astray by bad actors—those actors are trans women who must be exterminated to protect the fertility of white womenfolk. We give too much credit to transphobes that they’re concerned and afraid, when transmisogyny manifests in myriad ways including indifference. People talk over trans women, ignore them, explain subpar feminism to them, pass on their rental applications. Or they objectify them, laugh at them, stare at them with a prurient curiosity. Discomfort and fear sometimes only come to the fore when a trans woman challenges these behaviours. May Peterson wrote about the concept of ‘transfeminised debt’, the idea that trans women owe other people deference to make up for the supposed unsafety bestowed by their bodies.
The cis ally expects this deference. The cis ally is outraged that they’ve put all this effort into perceiving trans people as people, but the specific trans woman in their presence doesn’t seem to notice or care. The cis ally is quick to become a victim and threaten to withdraw their support because you’ve struck one of their many raw nerves. The cis ally believes that because trans visibility and transphobia is at a historical high, this means the trans movement is new and hasn’t developed its own strategies over time, so as a cis person they’re more informed on activism than those stupid trans people. Sorry, stupid white trans people, or stupid middle class trans people. After all, because TERFs are also sexist and racist and often middle class, that means they’re targeting everybody, which means everybody has an equal say on strategy, and those trans women who point out that the TERF’s primary target is always, always them need to stop taking up space in my movement. All in all, trans liberation would work better if trans people just shut up when I want them to.
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Some cis allies will hate this article because it’s dividing the movement while we’re in the middle of trans genocide, as if I’m not one of the many being asked about my genitals with increasing frequency. Some will repost it captioned something like “Wow. A challenging but important read.” Outside of my family and friends, their opinions either way don’t mean much to me. I wrote this for the gender minorities who know what it’s like to be misgendered more subtly than by simple pronoun fuckups, to watch cis people appoint themselves CEOs of our movements, to feel perpetually wary or let down.
I do also hope that a few cis allies will see themselves in parts of this article and start trying to change. We’re all born into structural transmisogyny and none of us are born knowing exactly how to undo it. A lot of that change should be quiet internal reflection, helped along by reading things like decolonizing trans/gender 101 or Hot Allostatic Load or Manhunt, or watching things like Disclosure and so on. (You can even watch trans art that’s just funny and dumb, like Bros Before.) But some of it does need to happen out loud through personal conversations; ones where you can voice your discomforts honestly and process them, rather than trying to act totally cool with transness. Despite articles like this, most of the time a real-life gender minority won’t blow up at you for asking clarifying questions; you’ll probably get a patient explanation from someone who is internally quite weary, but who also wants to help because they care about you and about our liberation.
Feeling transphobic discomfort doesn’t in itself make you a bad person. Feelings are value neutral; they just arise organically, shaped by the culture we live in. But you have choices about what to do with those feelings, and it’s better to sort them out properly than to try push them into the background, where they sit waiting to come out in ways you don’t expect. Although some cis allies are more or less grifters, seeking an easy route to political and social capital, some of them are genuinely are trying to improve and to show up more for trans people. Cis allies should try to be gentle when educating each other, because compounding others’ transphobic shame makes things worse for us. But if we can all make peace with being awkward and embarrassing and ignorant, with the clumsy ways we try and sometimes fail to cope with each other, it opens up more space for learning and growing together. From where I stand, I cannot see the full horizon of trans liberation. Lift me up onto your shoulders and I will take a look.
Ari Wilson is an activist and writer based in Aotearoa.