numinous-queer:

the-sunflower-fae:

Leslie Feinberg

Transsisters: The Journal Of Transexual Feminism Volume 1, Issue 7. Spring 1995

a note on pronoun usage

Feinberg stated in a 2006 interview that hir experience with pronouns varied depending on context:

“For me, pronouns are always placed within context. I am female-bodied, I am a butch lesbian, a transgender lesbian—referring to me as “she/her” is appropriate, particularly in a non-trans setting in which referring to me as “he” would appear to resolve the social contradiction between my birth sex and gender expression and render my transgender expression invisible. I like the gender neutral pronoun “ze/hir” because it makes it impossible to hold on to gender/sex/sexuality assumptions about a person you’re about to meet or you’ve just met. And in an all trans setting, referring to me as “he/him” honors my gender expression in the same way that referring to my sister drag queens as “she/her” does.”

Feinberg’s widow wrote in her statement regarding Feinberg’s death that Feinberg did not really care which pronouns a person used to address her:

“She preferred to use the pronouns she/zie and her/hir for herself, but also said: ‘I care which pronoun is used, but people have been respectful to me with the wrong pronoun and disrespectful with the right one. It matters whether someone is using the pronoun as a bigot, or if they are trying to demonstrate respect.’”