Letter from an ally

As sent to TReasured by Laura Brown in response to the launch event for the site in Liverpool on 20th May 2023. For which thanks. At the start I suppose the most important thing to say is what a privilege it is to be an ally. The act, the choice, to use your voice in chorus with someone else’s, to become the alto to their soprano, to extend the metaphor, makes a richer and deeper sound for all. There’s a community in allyship. It is a deliberate choice in favour of rights, recognition of taking a step towards a more equitable state of being. How can that be anything other than a wonderful privilege? I think a lot about visibility. Especially in this digital age of individualism where we fight against everything from attention deficit to algorithms to be seen. Yet for some (for many) visibility is survival. If we stop talking about our identity it becomes much easier for us to disappear, to be washed away in a wave of hate, of control, of a desire to make us invisible. Visibility is not just about being seen, it is resistance against the very act of being made invisible. Because in the dark, in being not seen, the cloak of awful things will cover all manner of violent acts. Solidarity, allyship, is about seeing that struggle to be seen. And it is about helping someone up that step to help them be seen a little clearer, even by those at the back. We all want autonomy, of our bodies, of our lands, of our existence. We want to be free. It seems such a grandiose thing to say, we want to be free. But to live one’s life without someone else’s hands pulling you back is freedom. There are those who believe they have freedom. It is a spectrum, freedom. At one end there’s the sort of let me live my life and you live yours, freedom. It goes that as long as it doesn’t infringe on others, you are fairly able to do pretty much whatever you please. Hell, in our modern world that’s almost as good as you are going to get. If you are in that state, how do you not then work to ensure as many people as possible are in the same state as you? Instead of bellowing that someone might be infringing on the edges of your freedom, like a footstep on the corner of your lawn, why don’t you look at how both of you can be freer? Or the ways in which you might be able to help them to be where you are? Why would you push them away to build a fence? There are few people though, I would imagine, who would consider themselves to be truly free. There are many who fall into many brackets of minority status the impact of which is often to restrict or limit the freedoms open to them, whether politically or legally, physically or spiritually. Many have an awareness that, while they have a good fistful of freedoms, there are others outside of their grasp. It is the absence of those freedoms that impedes them from living their lives to the fullest. Of being their honest, truest selves where the inside version of oneself matches the side you present to the world. The absence of this freedom creates a wedge, and it is between the inside version of oneself, and the outside version. It is this that is most damaging. We can all live rich interior lives, but not giving people the option of a free exterior life is a removal of what feels like a basic freedom, not an add on. At the heart of the joy I feel when I see my trans friends happy is when I see the connect between the person they are in the inside with the person they are on the outside. That isn’t merely about presenting or gender or add ons. It is about when they are free to express, explore and inhabit the person they are on the inside with the person they present to the world. They are at peace, there is no struggle between the sides of themselves, their lenses are fully in sync and they can see the world, and be seen by it, in perfect clarity. Being seen, being visible, is not merely the act of other people seeing you. It is the freedom to be seen as yourself. Allyship comes in many forms and motivates many different people. It is political fights and identity fights. But it is also a friendship and a desire to see the very best for those we love, to help with that visibility to have 20/20 from every angle. And isn’t that what we want for our trans siblings? To be seen as they are, not out of focus or blurred, but in crystal clarity inside and out.