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SMNTY In Conversation with Margaret Killjoy · Stuff Mom Never Told You

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha. I'm not going to
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: Stephane never told your protection of I Heart Radio, and
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: today we are so excited because we get to have
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: a true friend of the show. Like I've already claimed
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: her as one of my best friends. I said this
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: a while ago. Margaret killed Joy to the show. Yeah,
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: thanks for having me. I'm trying to do like songs
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: and such, and people don't like it, but I still
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: do it. It's okay people don't like it. So then
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: I got something like, you're actually a musician, so I
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: feel like this is better coming from you. But yes,
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: we do have the wonderful Margaret killed Joy on our show.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Can you introduce yourself for our listeners? Sure? My name
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: is Margaret Killjoy. I use sheet or they pronounced, and
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: I am a podcaster and an author and I guess
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: the aforementioned musician. I have another I Heart Radio podcast
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: called Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff, where you might
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: have heard Samantha talking in uh back in the Utopian
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: past before the Fall of Roe V. Wade about what
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: might happen after the fall of Roe V. Wade. Yes,
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: it was one of those that we had to come
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: back very quickly. To be like, all right, we have
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: to redo somethings. Yeah, And we knew it going into it.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: We were like, this might sound utopian and outdated by
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: the time you hear it, and it was. It was.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: But I loved what you had brought because it was
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: such a hopeful turn and even though it was really
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: sad to come back to revisit it, but at the
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: same time, I was like, at least there's a spotlight,
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: like a nice light at the end of that conversation. Yeah, yeah,
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: that's true. There is a lot of hope to accidentally
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: dive into that. There's a lot of hope for what
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: people can do even when things aren't strictly legal. Um,
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: there's and we have a lot we've come a long
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: way in terms of like what we can do in
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: a post Roe v. Wade world than what we had
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: access to in a pre Roe v. Wade world. So right, Um,
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: And for the listeners who may not know because I've
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: mentioned it before, but yes, I got to be a
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: guest with Margaret when we talked about the Jain Collective
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: and the many people behind I guess the rebelliousness of
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: going against the anti abortion people. Um, and what it
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: looked like before abortion was legal at that time, which
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: we were back to square one. But it was some
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: amazing stories and I learned a lot. So if you
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: haven't checked that out, you really should go and check
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: it out. But we're not necessarily here talking about that, No,
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: we're talking about the media. Yeah, you have so many
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: titles under your belt, Margaret, and I looked you up
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: on the interwebs, which you're everywhere you're ever. I'm like,
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: oh my gosh, you's so famous. But it has so
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: many titles between the writer, musician, are narcas, activist, podcaster.
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: You are out there doing some things and right now
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: you're actually not near your home. Correct, that's true. I'm
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: on book tour while I'm on pre book tour, and
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: I decided to start my book tour on the West coast.
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: I live on the East coast, so I drove out
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: to the West coast and in a couple of weeks.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: I don't know when this will drop, but I will
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: be on book tour starting in September twentye talking about
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: my new short story collection book. Can you tell us
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: about that? Yeah, I have a book out coming out
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: called we Won't be here Tomorrow. And other stories that
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: comes out from a K Press, And it's a collection
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: of while I've been writing short fiction for a long time,
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: and I've been writing it at I guess I would
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: say a professional level for a little while now. And
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: so this is my first collection of the stories that
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: have been published in various magazines and science fiction anthologies
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: and things like that, and also some stories that were
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: previously only available too. I used to have a personal
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: Patreon and I had stories that were only available to
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: my patrons. Um, but now they will be available to everyone.
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: And I write a lot of queer punk, radical protagonists
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: who run around and feed men to mermaids and squat
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: buildings and try to stop bad things and and all
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: of that living the apocalypse. I don't know. Um, And
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: so yeah, so that comes out soon. That sounds great.
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: Future book club pick. I know, so we do book clubs,
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: So now we're your books. And I know you also
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: did horror as well. Am I wrong? Did? I just
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: picked that outs aware because we we're a huge fan
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: and it's coming to the season. Okay, yeah, No, it's
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: funny because I, um, it's kind of by accident that
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: I started writing horror because I basically I was like,
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: I wrote these novellas. I have this series of two novellas,
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: the Daniel Kane series, and basically I was like, oh, okay,
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: I'll do this thing set in basically now, but there
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: will be demons or magic you And then I'm like, oh,
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: and if there's magic, it's it's harror. Because you know,
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: most of the time, I think urban fantasy often way
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: too much is like and then the elevators are just
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: run by magic instead of you know, electricity or whatever,
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: and that's not very interesting. I think magic is a
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: lot to do with power, and I think that when
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: you introduce incredibly skewed power dynamics into the real world,
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: you end up with things that are horrific. And so
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: I didn't set out to write the first book is
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: called The Lambole Slaughter of the Lion, which I suppose
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: does sound like a title of a horror thing, but
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: I actually just set it out to be like kind
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: of adventure. And then I was like and the publisher
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: was like, this is this is hard, and I was like, okay,
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: I guess that makes sense. I'm very um squeamish, so
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: and uh, you know, I I used to live alone
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: in a van, and then before that, and then after that,
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: I lived alone in a cabin in the woods, and
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: all of this stuff. So I avoided hard for a
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: very long time because it didn't fit my lifestyle. And
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: so I can read it and I can write it,
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: although I've also given myself nightmares with my own right before.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: Oh that's a testament right there. If you can give
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: yourself nightmares with your writing in a good way, even
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: you know you're doing it right. Yeah, yes, well that's awesome. Congratulations,
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: because writing a book is no no small thing. Yes,
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: that's true, Thank you, thank You've done it multiple times,
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: and sometimes they get slightly longer than the other ones.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: Actually the longest books I've ever written. I can't I'm
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: legally not allowed to say that I wrote. Because there
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: are romance novels I ghost wrote for a while. I
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: made my living ghostwriting trashy heterosexual romance novels um And
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: it was like, right after I came out, they were like,
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: can you write this male protagonist stuff? That is fascinating.
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: I know. At first I was like, it's kind of annoyed.
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: I just came out, But then I was like, well,
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: it kind of makes sense. Because male protagonist romance novels
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: are still written for a woman audience, you know. And
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: so I'm like, Okay, I think I can straddle this
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: divide better than some other people. Yeah. Absolutely, you it's
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: very obvious. And we've talked about this before and we're
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: going off subject, but before we go back to the subject.
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: But how often times when you see romance and it
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: has specific language, you're like, this is definitely a woman
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: who wrote this, or someone who are understands that gender
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: level of this is a male gaze, this is a
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: female gaze. Especially when it comes to a head of
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: normative conversations, there's very big differences, and so it seems
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: very obvious, like someone understands. Someone really understands what we're
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: talking about here, and it's not your sismel dude doing Yeah,
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: Which is why I think that the like the Nicholas
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: Sparks is of the world and stuff are so successful
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: is because if you if you kind of figure out
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: how to do that while still being like a man
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: or presenting as a man or I don't know anything,
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: but Nicholas Sparks as a person, you know, Um, I
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: don't know whether he's goes written or not, Um, I
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: have my sister, but controversy. But but you know, if
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: you can, if you can tap into that, it's a
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: it's a powerful mark. I mean that's why I got
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: all right, it was right. I didn't go straight in
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: Nicolas Sparks saying you heard it here first, just kidding,
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: but yeah, coming back to what we're talking about, and honestly,
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: this kind of all links because this is kind of
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: how we look at different entertainment that seems just so blase.
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: And we've talked about romance and how it does, how
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: it is affected by gender stereotypes or those who have
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: a bias, what is placed by misogyny, Like our understanding
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: of romance is laid down by a foundation of misogynistic
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: ideals based by the patriarchy. Like this is about the power.
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: And I know again people can back you're reaching, but
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: we talked about how this really does affect uh, the
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: society at large, and this is kind of your forte.
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: You've come under this conversation. You have identified as a
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: feminist for a long time now, Um, I believe before
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: you came out you were already Yeah, feminism is real,
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: is effective. Can you kind of talk about your journey
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: with feminism. Okay, but can I tangent to talk about
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: romance a little bit more and I'll tie it back together. Yeah,
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: when you're talking about the tropes and the stereotypes that
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: bleed into it. Um, Since I wrote for someone else,
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: they told me these rules, and so I can And
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: I don't know whether they're like secret or not. I
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: mean I can. I know they're not in my n DA.
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: I know I can say them. Um. But one, the
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: protagonist has to be over six ft tall. I was
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: told to write an average sized professional football player, so
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: he was five ft ten and they were like, no,
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: he has to be at least six ft tall. Um.
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: He has to be dominant in every sexual situation. And
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: he also um, which was awkward and one of the
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: ones I wrote because he was injured, which actually was
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: kind of fun to write. Did he calls himself more
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: injury because he had to be dominant no matter, because
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: I don't know the age of your all his usual audience,
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: but he managed to become dominant verbally. And but uh,
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: and there were just like so many of these weird
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: rules and like, and some of them actually really annoyed me, right,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: because you know, I wrote, um, you know, in one
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: of these books, he's he's dating um a mom, right,
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: And I wrote that he was like into her stretch
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: marks and they were like no, no, no, no, she
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: doesn't have stretch marks. And I'm like, audience, right. I
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: thought the point of this was to make these like
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: middle aged moms feel really good, you know, And so
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: so that got edited out, and there's all these things
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: like that, and then it gets into like real specific
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: stuff around like the way that you described like the
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: bad woman as the following sexual acts and the good
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: woman is the following guy. It's it's real. It's in
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: some ways, I feel dirtier about having written that than
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: like anything else I've done. Um, but I needed the money, um,
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: and I like tried my hardest to make them passively
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: feminist and possibly you know, like um like right, And
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: they were like, weren't gay characters in the outlines they
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: give me? And I'd be like, whatever, you can have
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: a gay best friend, I don't care, you know, And
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: I'm like, oh my god, I'm at the point where
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, gay best friend. That's edgy of me.
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: And I'm like, I think I understand nineties writers better now.
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: You know, is the best that they were like allowed
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: to do. Okay, your question was about my journey into Yeah,
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry. Um, I was really excited because I don't
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: get to talked about romance novels much. We can do
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: a whole second because, like I said, we did. I
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: think we did a two parter because we were so
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: I want to go back and listen to that because
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: I might have also just told you all things you
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: already know. Well, you went to a whole different we
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: went down a whole different route. Okay. Sometimes I think
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: about trying to write some really intentionally now, but life
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: is very short. So uh, you know, I grew up
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: being told I was a boy, right, And I have
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: these early memories of I wish I was a girl.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: But all of the early presentations I saw I grew
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: up in the eighties and nineties, and all of the
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: early presentations of trans women I saw were very monstrous, right. Um.
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: They were the butt of jokes, or they were to
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: be pitied, or they were like they had destroyed themselves
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: or you know, and I just I have these very
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: early memories of being like I wish I was a girl,
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: but I cannot become a girl, I cannot become a
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: trans woman, that is not is better to be a
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: boy than to be one of these pitable creatures. And
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: you know, and I held onto that for a very
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: long time time, and it was very confusing, right because
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: I kept um dating gay girls and we would all
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: be confused, you know, we'd be like, why am I
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: attracted to you and be like, I don't know. I
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: honestly couldn't tell you. And you know, and it's kind
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: of this like thing I've talked to other trans women
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: and other trans folks about this, where like kind of
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: like on some subconscious level, people know this when they
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: even don't know this, you know, and it's not just
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: about like who I would date or whatever, although it
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: also be you go the other way. And I did
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: very confused straight girls who are like, what, this doesn't
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: work right? And but I got and I also got
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: really into LGBT stuff as my first politics. You know.
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: I joined the Gay Straight Alliance UH of Maryland when
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: I when I grew up. And and actually, one thing
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: I think that people don't realize is that the gay
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: straight Alliances of the nineties, the reason they were gay
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: straight alliances was plausible deniability. Because if you don't want
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: to come out, you can still you know, join organization.
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: And the way that we started our Gay Straight Alliance
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: and my school was really funny. I had these two
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: there were these two teachers who in retrospect were very
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: obviously lesbians, um, not dating each other, but you know,
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: one of them had a hyphenated last name, and one
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: of them was the super butch gym teacher. And they
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: just kind of cornered me in the hallway one day
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: before school started, and they were like, did you know
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: that teachers aren't allowed to start student groups? And I
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: was like huh. And they were like, here's a clipboard
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: with a forum that's already filled out to start a
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: gay straight alliance. Do you want to start a gay
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: straight Alliance? And I was like I do, I do
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: want to start a gay straight alliance because they knew
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: that I was involved in regional Gay Straight Alliance politics
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: and and no one was out in our gay Straight Alliance,
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: and in retrospect, we were all almost all queer and
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: the random straight guys very actively politically engaged in leftist politics. Now, um,
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: so so yeah, I kind of you know, I was like, Okay, well,
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: I'm really interested in, and as my oldest sister is
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: a very active feminist who currently does clinic escorting, um,
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: and you know, it's kind of a hero around a
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: lot of that stuff still, and so it was always
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: something I was interested in, and and I always has
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: this very ally position, even on some level, I was like, well,
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: what is what's going on here? Like why why do
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: all I care about is like women's issues and gay issues?
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: You know. And then slowly the category of what counts
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: as trans started to expand, um in that people who
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: don't necessarily medically transition, or if they do, like quote
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: medically transition, it's you know, not to necessarily the same degree.
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: It's like it's no longer like you become a woman
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: when you like undergo surgery, right, you know, Um, I
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: rarely see people talk about being like, oh I'm pre
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: op M to F or whatever. That is terminology that
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: I'm not trying to shame anyone who uses any terminology.
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: I don't care, but it is like terminology that no
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: longer seems to be the dominant discourse around it. And
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: you know, and and the more I came to understand this,
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: this work that that feminism, feminism has done, for a
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: very long time to draw the distinction between sex and
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: gender and use that to understand both sex and gender
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: based oppression. That lens allowed people to to kind of
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: realize that, I mean, basically, if I am a trans woman,
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: I'm a trans woman already rather than like waiting to
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: become a trans woman. Um. And I don't personally experience
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: much in the way of body dysphoria dysmorphia, and so
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: I don't have a strong desire to quote unquote like
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: medically transition or surgically transition or whatever language you know
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: people want to use. But I have a very strong
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: desire to socially transition. And so when that became available
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: to me, when that was included under the umbrella of
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: trans it's like the umbrella of trans expanded to include me.
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: For a while, I identified as like a transvestite, um,
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: you know, which is not a word that people tend
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: to use right now. But I was like, oh, I'm
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: just a cross dresser, you know, it's like all of this.
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: When I'm like, oh, I was Assis boy, I was
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: like Assis boy where I took the name Margaret and
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: published books under the name Margaret, and like war Women's
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: clothing almost exclusively. Um, But but yeah, it kind of
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: expanded to include me, and I think that there's a
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: lot of people who that happened to. And any other
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: really big important thing is that it stopped being perceived
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: as monstrous by um a large trunk of society, and
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: now things have swung back the other way. And um,
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: you know, I feel a little bit like I'm waiting
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: in my castle for the pitchforks and torches to show
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: up outside these days, um, especially living rural like I do.
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: But you know, I don't know. That's how I you know,
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: and it's and it it leaves me in this funny
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: situation where I like, do I look back and perceive
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: my childhood as a girlhood, you know, or do I
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: perceive it perceive it as a boyhood or do I
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: just perceive it as a childhood. And the ways I
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: feel about that change different times. It helps that, you know. Um.
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: Sometimes I like, by the end of high school, like
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: my closest group of friends was just like the girls,
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: and it was like the girls and then me, I'm here,
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: you know, and I wasn't dating any of them. When
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: we'd sit around and paint her nails and like skip
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: Jim class to sit in the corner and talk about
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: goth bands or whatever, you know. And I'm still friends
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: with some of those people. One of my best friends
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: is still from that time. It was one of the
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: people who really encouraged me to come out. I remember
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: I was like thirty and I was like, oh, it
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: was too late. And someone I had known since I
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: was like thirteen was like, why is it too late?
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: And I'm like, I don't know, because no one would
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: believe me. And she's like does that matter? And I'm like,
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: I guess it doesn't, you know, And and now I'm
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: kind of rambling, um, but some people will believe me
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: and some people won't. And you know, it's like I
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: don't pass right, but I don't try to. You. Um,
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: it's possible that if I transition when I was younger,
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: I would have put more work into that. But as
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: it is, and then and then that's the the beautiful,
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: the horrible thing, right as you realize it's like no
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: one passes for under this feminine standards. You know, it's like, um,
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: this is feminine beauty standards hurt everybody, and so so
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: now it's just like, well, you know, I I walked
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: through the world and people perceive me largely as a
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: man in address UM. And that's fine. I mean it's
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: it's fine when it's fine, it's not fine when it's
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: not fine. But fortunately I'm also UM a scary punk,
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: so for the most part, people don't mess with me.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: A lot of people say things behind my back, but
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: not to my face because I also often walk around
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: with a very large knife. That'll do it, so I'll
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: do it. I like it. I think that's a lesson
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: to be told. Yeah, yeah, I mean where it's legal, UM,
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: it is a useful visual indicator of like, hey, it's
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: not worth it. It's just not worth let's not start UM.
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: I love that. I love that conversation about being on
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: a spectrum. I think we talked about that a lot
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: on the show. When it comes to gender, it's not binary,
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: it is. It is a spectrum, and it is fluid,
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: and it should be. It doesn't make sense that it's
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: not UM, and the idea that it has to be
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: in order to fit a standard it's absurd. It is UM.
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: When you really kind of come down on the same
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: thing with love and relationships UM and understanding that this
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: is as fluid, And why wouldn't it be if it's emotion,
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: if it's uh not gender, but necessarily but like about
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: feelings and who you love who, why wouldn't it be
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: the person that you connect to? That makes the most
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: sense because at the very least it's honest, and then
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: the very most, it's happiness and that's something that we
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: should strive for an individual individual lives and just for happiness. Again, Yeah,
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: it has nothing to do with everybody else. Has everything
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: to do with who you are and coming out, uh
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: to whether it's with your gender, what whatever what it is,
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: or coming out being independent in their political stance. Like
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: that's even a big conversation. Um understanding that it's for
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: you and that at any point in time, things change,
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: circumstances change, events change, and whatever that might be, it
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: doesn't affect anyone else, So why should you be bothered
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: by That's such a bigger conversation. And again, yeah, this
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: goes back to what we were talking about with romance novels.
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: This is like this layout that's existed for years and
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: years and years, and it's not really helpful and though
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: people have accepted it, there's no reason to remain in
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: that habit I love because when you talk about what
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: you're going through and you're coming out and even what
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: that looks like for you coming out as trance, but
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: not only that, realizing the inner person of who you
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: are has always been there. So whether it's your political stance,
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: whether understanding feminism, whether it's calling yourself an anarchist, which
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: I want to come back to because I still need
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: an understanding of that for myself. Who understands the binary
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: liberal and conservative? Like that's what I know because my
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: parents throw it in my face often. But all this
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: is a platform for you like this. The reasons that
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: you are writing books, the reason that you were in
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: a band, the reason that you are in a podcast
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: kind of has everything to do with these foundations. Yes,
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: there was a question that I didn't reference as a question.
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: Can you kind of expound upon that? Yeah? When I
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: was younger and I was like, I want to do art,
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: and I was like what kind of art? And I
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: was like I don't know, And I was like, are
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: you any good at an? Even? No? And I'm like
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: what am I gonna do? You know? And I I tried.
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: I was like, I'm gonna learn how to paint and
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: I'm okay painting, but no one's gonna m that's not
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: my career path. And you know, and and writing more
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: than anything else, writing fiction was was something that was
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: more interested and I actually, when I was youngest roy
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: poetry and I aspired to become good enough to go
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: back to writing poetry. But um, I don't write much
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: of it right now. But and so I started kind of, Yeah,
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: I like sorted doing all of these things and slowly
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: expanding the list of things that I do, the number
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: of plates I have spend in unfortunately, and usually what
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: I do is if I have something I want to say,
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: I think about what the best medium to say that is,
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: and then go out and try and say it in
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: that way. You know, there's certain things, certain ideas that
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: come across in different ways better. And for example, I
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: think that music is a really good way to put
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: someone in an emotional space or put yourself in an
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: emotional space. It's not a particularly good way to be pedantic.
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: It's not a very good way to teach someone something.
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: It's not a very good way to um express complex
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: political ideas or interpersonal ideas. However, it's not terrible at
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: those things. I think that Riot Girl has shown us,
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: and anarcho punk and uh and hip hop and a
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: lot of different very direct forms of communication have come
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: through from music, right. But but overall, I tend to
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: use it when I have something sort of more emotional
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: to say, um, And then if I have something cult
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: cultural to say, I often write it in fiction about
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: like how can people interact with each other? Right, because
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: a lot of my political ideas they are a little
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: bit less about, like and here's how the legislative branch
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: or in my case, it would be like, here's how
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: the anarchist federation, you know, disseminates goods across the different
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: collectives that control the work around cooperatives of you know,
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: these areas or whatever. Right, Um, we should be like
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: the political or economic structure of anarchism, as is sort
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: of understood in the twentieth century at least context. But
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: I'm much more interested in for me to to use
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: anarchism as the example, because this is what I'm more
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: familiar with. Ways of relating to each other, ways of
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: creating cultures of consent and consensus is what's interesting to me.
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: So I like writing characters interacting with each other more
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: than I like writing nonfiction, because if I was writing nonfiction,
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: it would just be like, we should, um be consensual
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: in our relationships with each other, you know, And it's
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: much easier to just like draw that right and and
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: you can, and then you can get into the fun stuff,
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: like like what is a romance novel look like in
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: a you know, culture of consent? Where like, even if
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: it's a monogamous relationship, it's monogamous in the context of
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: polyamory as available to these characters, but they choose monogamy,
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: What does that look like? What does it look like
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: to consent to that? You know? Um? And in this case,
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: I'm actually literally quoting Ursula Lagwin is my probably my
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: main role model of an author, and actually wrote specifically
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: about that in this book called The Dispossessed about like,
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: you know, these characters who could absolutely it's even the
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: norm to be polyamorous, they choose to be committed to
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: each other and it it creates this type of romance
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: that you're not going to run across even though it's
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: a monogamous relationship, it doesn't it doesn't look like what
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: the monogamous relationships we get presented with are. So that's
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: why I like writing fiction, and then with podcasts, you know,
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: I mean it was different. I have one podcast called
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: Live Like the World's Dying, which is a preparedness podcast.
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: And and my stated goal here is to take preparedness
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: culture away from the right wing because this individualistic everyone
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: hiding their bunker and stockpile AMMO and food things is nonsensical.
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: It will get everyone killed, it won't stop the crisis
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: of the world, and it won't even help those individuals
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: live very long because unless all of them are surgeons
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: and have another one around, they're not going to be
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: able to do anything when their pent experts. And what
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: I want to be able to communicate to people is
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: that society is what creates safety. Uh. And society is
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: what allows us to live full and happy and free lives.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: Right Because freedom, as I understand it, is not something
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: that exists in a vacuum. Freedom is a relationship between people.
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: Freedom is something that we give one another. Uh. And
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: So to be totally alone, I'm not free because I
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: can't do everything I want to do. All I can
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: do is try not to die if I'm just totally alone.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: The only way in which freedom becomes a liberty is
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: if your rich as hell, because then you can hire
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: everyone to do everything for you, so you're still not
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: actually alone doing things. You're just making all the decisions
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: yourself anyway. Okay, so that's so if I want to
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: get across that idea, apparently what I do is come
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: out of your podcast and say it. But but in
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: general what I do is, you know, I run this
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: podcast where I interview people about compost or I interview
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: people about you know, community gardens or you know, activist
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: modes that are working for them or whatever. And then
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: the other one that I do is called cool People
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: Who Did Cool Stuff. And it's how I try to
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: show people that we can have agency and that we can,
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: you know, because we keep getting told by society that
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: we don't have agency, that we can't do what we want.
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: We have to appeal to other people in power to
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: get things done. And and that is my work um
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: as an anarchist, but even in responsibility and freedom as
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: the two sort of core concepts, and so my work
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: is to try to help people understand we can have agency.
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: And here all these people in the past who have
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: taken agency over bad situations and they don't always win,
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: right Unfortunately, they often don't win. But but winning and
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: losing is a really weird concept when we're mortal, because like,
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: I don't know the difference between dying trying to make
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: things better or dying in a world that didn't make
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: things better. I'm still dying, you know, Like, like we
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: can't have dying be a massive negative in our lives
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: because we're stuck with it. You know that's going to happen.
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: And and so I just I wanna so if I
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: want to try and get across this concept of agency,
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: that is the other format I use for it. And
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: I don't know, I just love all of the different
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: way all of these different formats work, and I don't
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: do all of them right. There's so many good ideas
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: that are just not you know, I I probably won't
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: write a like I do write nonfiction. Actually, now that
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: I say that, I like, as soon as I started
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: saying that, I'm like, no, but I want to do
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: everything I was gonna say, you do a lot of things.
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: I get released. I was watching I was rewatching The Hobbit,
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: which I like more than almost anyone I know, and
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: and I was just like thinking about the elves being
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: like man if I was an elf. I'd be like,
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: for twenty years, I'm just gonna be a blacksmith. I'm
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: just gonna make swords for twenty years. Okay, that's done,
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: all right. Now I'm gonna write poetry for twenty years,
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: and like now I'm gonna go and like do childcare
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: for my friends for twenty you know, just specializing all
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: these different things. Anyway, that's okay. Yeah, I love it.
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: I get it. Maantha has already mentioned it, You've alluded
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: to it a lot. Can you explain what being an
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: anarchist is and uh, what you think that has to
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: do with feminism? Sure? Um, so I understand. Anarchism is
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: two separate things that are related, and one is a
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: sort of ideological movement that came out of European socialism. Um,
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: and it it actually predates Marxism and a lot of
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: the other very specific is ms within socialism. It was
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: basically people who were like, well, the state and capitalism
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: are bad. They're both oppressive forces, and we should do
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: without them and we should do things as communities. And
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: then the sort of argue the like sub sects that
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: come up within that ideological position that was originally kind
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: of mid nineteenth century eighteen forties or so, there's like
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: mutualist anarchism, which still uses markets and banks, but they're
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: like people's banks and there's no ability to maintain capital
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: and wield it against other people versus like a communalist
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: or a communist anarchism, which are not the same but
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: are like much more what people imagine of like leftism,
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: where we all that kind of get together and share um.
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: And it was positioned within the sort of ideological framework
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: of socialism, which is the general overall capitalist shouldn't run
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: everything and overall like society should run things instead, right,
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: like the who owns the means of production is the
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: big thing, Like who owns the factories is that the
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: people who own the factories? Is that the workers who
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: own the factories, et cetera. UM. And so that is
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: the anarchist sort of tradition that I come from, and
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: anarchists have are kind of the most I would I
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: would claim probably the most misunderstood of these different positions,
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: because originally we kind of had this the stereotype of
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: where the people who like throw bombs and kill kings. UM.
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: I am not embarrassed the fact that we used to
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: kill kings. Someone says that they're in charge of everyone else,
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: and someone says, no, you're not. Um. That's okay by me, right,
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: But you know that if that is people have this
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: perception of anarchists as only the people who are trying
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: to destroy the exist instant rather than create a society
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: based on equality, based on non hierarchy. And so the
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: largest example of an anarchist society that is the most
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: that we have the most information about, at least as
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: a consciously anarchist society was during the Spanish Civil War
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: in the nineteen thirties, when anarchists were the majority, I
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: believe of the labor movement in Spain. And so when
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: this war broke out, when Franco invaded and tried to
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: declare fascism within um and had tried to do a coup,
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: basically anarchists were on the front lines and prevented that
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: from happening. And then in that lack of the republic
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: having state power, the anarchists started running everything and they
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: had a lot of organizations in places. The other misconception
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: that people have about anarchism, so anarchism is not anti organization,
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: and anarchism is purely anti authoritarian organization where someone tells
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: you what to do in a way that you don't
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: have a say over UM. And they still create structures
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: that that, but their bottom up structures instead of top
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: down structures. So a lot of anarchists talk about federations
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: and so goods can still be transported everywhere, and you know,
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: things can be made and things can be done in
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: society can function UM. I believe within this type of
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: framework UM. And one of the other main distinctions of
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: it is that anarchists don't tend to separate the means
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: from the ends. So they so theoretically a state communist
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: or a communist Marxist communist and Marxist Leninist, etcetera, believe
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: in the creation of communism, which is a society without
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: a state, but they create a state or take the
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: state in order to do that. Anarchists believe that the
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: means and the ends are inseparable, and this is where
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: it ties into feminism. For me well one, anarchist feminism
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: has been a large part of the feminist movement throughout history,
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: and feminism has been a large part of the anarchist movement.
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: But this idea that means in the ends are inseparable. Uh,
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: you know the idea of like. Our goal is to
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: give more people more agency over their own lives. Our
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: goal is to teach consent and teach ways of relating
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: to each other as equals um whether or not even
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: like we win and we get an anarchist society. Our
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: goal is to infuse our interpersonal relationships with this sense
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: of equality. Uh. And agency and so and and so
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: direct action is often a major focus of anarchism and
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: so and actually a thing that came up in my research.
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: I researched the Jain Collective, who are amazing and they
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: mostly come from a socialist position, and that allowed them
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: to think, we don't care about legality, We're going to
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: get this done. And you know, Jaine Collective, I presume
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: most people are aware, but as a as an underground
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: abortion provider in Chicago, that did an amazing work. I
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: later discovered that anarchists in Germany in the nineteen twenties
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: and thirties ran three hundred different illegal abortion providers um
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: all across Germany. And they didn't do it in the
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: name of anarchism. It's just that this feminist movement that
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: was providing abortion came out of the anarchist organizing tradition.
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: Um And because they had that we're good at illegal stuff,
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: we care about agency, we care about all of these things.
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: They set up three hundred clinics. I'm going to have
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: my numbers fuzzy when I say this stuff. I don't
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: have my notes in front of me. Please don't quote
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: me direct what you all. But I mean, like anyone
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: listening at home, you know, don't be like exactly three,
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: you know. Um And and I read that, and I
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: was just so excited, and I want to know more
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: about that, you know. And I only know the like
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: cliffs nose versions because well because there's a lot of
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: really old books that I have to read in order
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: I can order to really understand it. Yeah. So and
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: so that's what it is for me. You know, there's
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: it's a thing that means a lot of different things
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: to different people. Oh but at the very beginning said
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: it's two things. And one it's this specific ideaological trade
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: Asian and then to it's its own concept, which has
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: existed long before it's had a name. Um. And there's
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: a lot of people doing work, especially from non European backgrounds,
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: about Antarctic organizing that has very similar like means and ends,
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: but doesn't come from well this old dead white guy
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: with a beard said this, and instead are like our
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: traditions that are coming from North America or our traditions
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: that are coming from you know, West Africa or whatever,
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: like tie in very well to this, and this is
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: how we see things. You know. Yeah, that's I don't
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: know if that was a good one on one or not,
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: but that's that's where I'm coming from politically. Very good.
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: I love that because yeah, I don't, like I said,
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: the history is very fuzzy for me, because, like I said,
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: I grew up in North Georgia, where everything's very bonary anyway,
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: and when it comes to politics, either you're with us
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: or you aren't. Kind of conversations and having this level
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: of like, oh, anarchist has always been not a bad
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: word necessarily, but not necessarily good one either. So it's
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: kind of like it's it's you know, it's with the foreigners.
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: You just you gotta put it out there. It's not
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: it's not part of the US culture and especially Mountain culture.
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: That's from me. But like that's a lot of like
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: learning lessons of like, Okay, this is exactly where I
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: am in my standpoint. I didn't know what it was necessarily,
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: not necessarily like bombing kings, I'm not talking about that,
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: but in general, just like uh, finding out what it
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: is to be autonomous in understanding that as a group
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: we do things better the societal aspect of everything. Of course,
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: you know we're not gonna talk about communism and how
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: that does lie within the patriarchal ideals, but like what
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: I'm talking about in an understanding, I became a social
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: worker because I wanted to work for the collective. I
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: wanted to want to be one who did a macro
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: practice over a micro ideal. And that's a big debate
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: within social work when I was in social work. I
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: don't know if it's changed because it's been a minute
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: since I've been in school, but that was a big
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: debate about the macro micro of helping a community in
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: society and what does that look like and what did
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: social work began to be. It came out of a
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: macro practice in helping communities, That's where it came to,
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: and then it got you know, dissected into while I'll
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: be a therapist, which is not a bad thing, please understand.
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: I believe that helps as well a community when it's
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: done correctly. Um. But yeah, this like understanding, Like, oh okay,
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: I've been practicing this, this makes sense. Oh okay. When
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: we talk about feminism, especially when we talk about intersectional feminism,
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: which is where we are today, and it's shifted a lot.
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: When we talk about feminism, feminism from the origins of
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: the word to today has shifted greatly in a good way.
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: I hope, um as we are. You're right where we
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: have tracked backwards. As now we can at least differentiate
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: those who are bad, bad players when it comes to feminism,
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: such as terse uh circuits such as the Rawlings fan
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: base that sticks with her, um with her stupidity. I
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: like that outlet that. But I think there's a whole
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: level of conversation when we talk about politics and understanding
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: our platforms and growing together and what does feminism look like.
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: We had to revisit that often, um Andy, and I
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: honestly probably every year. So come back and have a
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: conversation of Okay, this is the things that we've learned,
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: This is what we can see in society, This is
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: what we know that is changing vastly with the Black
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: Lives Matter, uh, massagren nooir. You know, you have to
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: revamp that conversation about feminism. And I think as we
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: are going back to seeing the negativity towards the queer community,
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: the negativity towards the trans community, we have to come
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: back and revisit this conversation. What does feminism look like today?
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: So in your opinion, and this is a big question,
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: and I'm sorry for this, and this is how I do.
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: Do you think when you came out you're perspective of
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: feminism changed in a positive negative manner? As Part one B,
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: what do you see uh as a positive in feminism
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: today and as a negative in feminism today? So I'm
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: gonna answer the second part first, I think I think
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: that intersectionality is the main beautiful thing that is happening
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: to feminism, uh, you know, and having people understand the
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: way that well just literally how intersections work, and how
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: the issues that affect rich white women are very different
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: than the issues that affect rich black women, that are
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: very different from the issues that affect you know, poor
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: people of color, and and and it allows us to
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: hopefully be better to one another and to understand that
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: like instead of this, like that we're all fighting in
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: solidarity with each other rather than as a united mass, right,
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: because we are all coming into feminism with our own
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: own needs and our owns uh priorities. Um, but we
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: can stand together because we understand what we do have
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: in common and what we don't and how we can
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: you know, and how I can assume that we're like Okay,
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: for example, rov wait affects me, but it does not
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: affect me bodily, right, Um, I mean if it destroys
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: the right to privacy and it gets used to prevent
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: people from medically transitioning, yes, but like I I'm not
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: having an abortion anytime soon unless medical you know, unless
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: medical technology advances. Uh. And there's always that joke about
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: like wanting to be the first trans woman to get
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: an abortion, you know, just to to fist off everyone.
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: But and while abortion is more than a woman's issue
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: because it affects people who are not women bodily. You know,
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: it affects trans people's, certain intersects people, certain non binary people.
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: You know, it affects a lot of people right who
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: are not women. It also is gender based discrimination, and
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: that gender discrimination looks real similar to the people who
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: are telling me what I can do with my body,
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: and even if it wasn't something that affects most women,
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: affects me, right, And so being able to say, like
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: this matters to me, and like, I don't know, it's
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: just like finding these points of solidarity. I think that
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: this is like what intersectionality is is really good for
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: I think that especially now, and I think this is
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: a newer addition, we're starting to see class introduced to
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: it into this intersectionality as well, and I think that
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: that's vital. Um. I think one of the problems of
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: the old left is they reduced everything into class, right.
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: But but one of the problems with the sort of
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: essentially liberal feminism is that it cuts class out of
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: intersectionality sometimes. Um. I don't actually believe the average person
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: who identifies as a liberal does, but the sort of like, yeah,
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: the the larger, you know, there's such a difference between
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: like liberal politicians and liberals, right, um. And so I
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: think that the introduction of class is very important because
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: it's all related to power. It all comes back to
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: power as far as I'm concerned, and class is a
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: very strong indicator of power. But so is race, so
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: is ethnicity, so is gender, so is the sexual orientation.
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: So that there's so many other things that also relate
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: to power in terms of what I think feminism or
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: feminism is like misstepped or the things that are going badly. Fortunately,
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: I think the U S has like largely avoided this
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: because well because the right wing has a monopoly on
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: hating trans people in the United States, you know it,
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: because it became a culture war thing to not allow
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: anyone being I'm non binary, not allow anyone to be
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: trans or whatever within the United States, um along right
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: left lines. So by and large, I don't run across
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: feminis US who are like they them that's awful or whatever,
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: you know, or like you're not a real woman, You're
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: a you know, man in drag or whatever. I'm like,
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: I honestly don't whatever. I'm actually me my my pronounser
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: i um, you know, like, but in terms of how
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: society views me, like I'm finding the best possible, the
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: most useful description to provide for other people, you know.
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: But it is a problem I think with feminism internationally
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: and specifically in thew K right now. Uh, and it
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: it could creep in in the United States, and so
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: I really, um, I feel like I I try to,
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: you know, I think we'll kind of have to, but
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: we all try to kind of like keep that from
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: creeping in. Is is the turf thing. Is the idea
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: that feminism excludes trans people, which is just historically myopic.
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: You know, all of these things have all been related.
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: Even if you look at the history of understanding homosexuality,
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: you know, transness was not a distinct category for a
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: very long time. Um. Of course, the people who started
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: to distinguish it were some Germans who then the Nazis
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: game and burned all their books and killed the first
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: woman to medically transition. The famous book burning photos. Whenever
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: you see that famous photo of Nazis burning books, it
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: was the Institute for Sexual I don't have it off
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: the top of my head. Is Hirschfeld's institute where he
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: studied homosexuality and trans Nissin, you know, was one of
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: the first medical practitioners to say, like, hey, if you
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: allow trans people to live as their shows and identity,
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: everything is better and they are medically healthier, you know. Anyway,
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: I don't know, I'm rambling about that, but so so
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: I guess I would say that's like the advantages and disadvantages.
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: I think feminism is mostly just doing well and has it.
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: It has more it needs to do, It has more,
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: especially I think continuing especially along race lines. Um, there's
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: like way more of the feminism needs to do. But
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: what was the first of the two questions. I was
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: asking that since you transition came out, has anything changed
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: in your perspective of feminism? Yeah. It took me a
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: really long time to feel comfortable eyeing myself in conversations
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: about feminism. I spent a very long time and put
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: a lot of work into being like an ally right,
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: Like I used to write scenes and stuff that were
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: like feminism for men, you know, um, and and not
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: taking up conversational space was very important to me, and
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: so I like very much all of my attention was
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: focused outward towards like non feminism or towards particularly towards men,
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: to be like, hey, here's ways to be more feminist.
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: And so you know, there's like this outsider syndrome, right
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: that I have around it, and I actually really appreciate
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: the work that the folks like you do, I mean
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: even like inviting me here on this, you know, and um,
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: and the degree to which like so many you know,
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: SIS women and a fab people in general have this
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: this work they've done to be like no are you
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: talking about Like no, it's it's actually totally fine, you know.
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: And I remember the first time I was invited to
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: like in all women's full Moon circle, you know, and
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: and they were just like, hey, we're and I was
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: kind of their test case, right. They had like they
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: actually and actually I really respect them for this. They
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: had just split they were all SIS women like you know,
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: full Moon like ritual collective, right, and they they had
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: this hypothetical conversation about whether or not they should include
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: trans women, and it got so heated that it split
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: into two groups. And I really appreciate the people who
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: were like, this is so important to me that even
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: though it's a hypothetical, we will like stander a ground
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: around this, you know. And I felt a little bit
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: like recruited where they were like like come joined us,
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: you know, but like it was mostly just good, like yeah,
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: so yeah, I guess that's how my my my view
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: want to change this is literally like including myself in
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: it in a more direct way and then allow allowing
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: myself to because I think when you're an ally to
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: a movement, you can um promote the work of people
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: within that movement, but you generally don't try to like
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: shape it or direct it or whatever. You know. And
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: allowing myself to feel comfortable having a say is really
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: interesting and still something that I like, I still don't
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: totally know, and it helps that at the end of
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: the day, I'm like, well, I have to say about me,
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: right and my perspective. I'm really not trying and not.
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: Actually that's where it comes with intersectionality in a good way, right,
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: because I can't I can't speak to the experiences of
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: most women. I can speak to my experience, you know, um,
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: which is as a white trans woman, which is a
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: specific set of things. You know. Well, as we've been
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: discussing throughout this, you are so so busy. You're doing
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: so much, um just out of curiosity because we we
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: like to ask this, is there anything that you do
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: to kind of balance those things out, like self care wise,
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: how do you make sure that it's not too much? Well,
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: my idea of relaxing is doing projects. So mostly I
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: try to do projects that don't make any money. It's
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: one of the main ways I do it or like
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: I don't know, Like right now, I'm like trying to
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: help my friend is a single mom, like make their
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: watering system in their garden work so that they don't
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: have to work as much. And the gardening thing just
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: goes and it activates all the parts of my brain.
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: I like where I'm like puzzles and like playing. I
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: can't believe it's a part of my brain that loves plumbing.
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: But I lived in an off gride cabin for a
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: long time, so I you know, I like doing things
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: I'm vaguely good at. And so in terms of all
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: self care, I kind of gotta get drag kicking and
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: screaming into it. I like hiking. I like, you know,
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: my my truck is built out into a camper. My
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: dog is very needy because he's a puppy, and so
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: I gotta go on walks with him a lot. Yeah,
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: I don't know. I actually honestly need to get better
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: in self care. Um, I have too many plates spinning. Uh,
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: But sometimes the thing that seems fun is setting up
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: new plates to spin. So maybe my idea of self
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: care is is finishing projects right, because then they're done
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: and then you don't have them anymore. Um. And then
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: the other thing I did is I I require all
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: new hobbies to be physical instead of on the computer,
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: because everything I do for money is on a computer.
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: So all hobbies would working, gardening, anything like that. That
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: is a good tip. That's a good one. I like
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: it to unplug. Yes, we know you need to go
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: on and move on to the bigger and better projects
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: in the ten thousand places you've got going on. But
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: where can our listeners find you? Well, first of all,
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: this is not this is a bigger and better I
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: am so excited that you all have me on this show.
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: I'm like, I really think it's cool that what you
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: all do. But where can people find me? Can find
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: me on Twitter at Api kill Joy. You can find
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: me on Instagram at Margaret kill Joy. Instagram is like
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: mostly mean posting pictures of my dog or like instruments
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: I make, whereas Twitter as me pretending like I would
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: never fall into arguing about discourse on the internet, No, sir,
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: not me. And you can pre order my book from
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: a k Press. If you pre order it before September twenty,
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: you'll get an art print that is done by my
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: friend as the same person who did the cover art
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: and you can order that from a K Press or
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: a number of participating bookstores, including cooperatively run bookstores like
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: Firestorm Books in Asheville or Red Emma's Books in Baltimore.
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: Heading cooperatives are cool. Workers, worker cooperatives are awesome, and
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: you can find me on whatever you listen to this
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: podcast with. You can find me at cool people who
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: did cool stuff. And you can go back in time
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: and look up the Jane Collective episode in order to
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: listen to Samantha as well, and you can listen to
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: Live Like the World Is Dying, which is also on
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: your podcast app. Yes, thank you so much for being here.
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: It was such a delight. Please come back because there's
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: so I was like, oh, resonating with me my best
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: friend as well. I feel like we had three other
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: subjects that we need to tackle, Like I want to
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: talk about this, but I want to I can't talk
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: about the hobbit right now. Okay, oh, but but we
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: should sometimes. I would love to also prepared this. That
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: would be great. Okay, yes, well until that date. Thank
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: you so much for joining us. Come back anytime, listeners.
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: If you would like to contact us, you can. Our
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: email is Stuff in Your Mom Stuff and I Hurt
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: mea dot com. You can find us on Twitter at
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: mom Stuff Podcasts or on Instagram and Stuff I've Never
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: Told You. Thanks as always to our superroducer Christina, Thank you,
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: and thanks to you for listening so and never told
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: you Protection I Heart Radio from more podcast from my
• 52:39
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• 52:41
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