What comes to mind when you read the term “Pro Trans”? You may think that I’m a person that supports transgender people; and of course you would be totally right. You may also think that I support going forward through transition for people that identify as transgender, and you would also be correct. But in this post, though it is about the support I’ve had as a trans person, I dive into some personal thoughts about being a professional that also happens to be transgender.
The Setup
First a little bit of background. I’ve always been trans but most of my life I kept it to myself. In the meantime I grew up as normal as most people, just keeping my transgender feelings and interests to myself, like many trans people. Went to some of the best schools, got my engineering degree from a top university, continued on to receive my MBA and later a certificate of recommendation in Multimedia Production. Since the mid 90s and to these days I’ve been involved professionally in digital media production and education.
What does this have to do with being trans? Nothing, really. But I truly believe it has lots to do with being accepted and embraced as a trans person.
The Argument
My theory goes like this: everybody that knew me from before I opened up knew me as a professional, including my family and friends. I believe the majority of those people thought of me as a respectable, dependable and honorable person. Then I opened up and went ahead through my process (I still don’t like to call it “my transition”). I think that people’s perspective of me prior to opening up helped them see or at least consider that I was being serious and that this was something I believed to be in my best interest. People can’t really argue much against that!
I’m truly convinced that being known as a professional helped me to be accepted after opening up. Looking at it from the opposite side, if I had been a fluke or a liar all my life, I get the sense that people would have had a harder time accepting and taken me seriously.
People Around Me
Another thing that I also believe contributed to being accepted with relative ease is that most people I relate to are also professionals. If they don’t have in depth formal professional training they certainly have lots of professional experience, though in most cases they have both. I am of the strong opinion that people with these characteristics have a much higher chance of accepting diversity* by the simple fact that they’ve been exposed to all sorts of situations and people from so many different backgrounds and experiences.
So…
When I made the decision to open up and move forward I really didn’t consider this much. It’s just recently that I’ve put these thoughts together. And probably I didn’t give it much thought back in 2015 when I started because I kinda knew that other professionals would most likely* have an open mind.
In simple terms, I am of the opinion that having being a professional has had a positive impact on how people that knew me accepted me.
* Please note that I say “have a much higher chance of accepting” and “most likely” because some people even with these educational and professional characteristics have rejected me.
P.S. The header image is a photo of the windows of an office building where lots of professionals that don’t know me work, I guess.
The professional angle, being surrounded by professionals, makes a lot of sense. Educated
people are less likely to be ignorant, I’d figure.
I don’t know if it’s luck or what, but either I seem to be surrounded by more open minded people or I don’t see when people have a negative view of myself. Who knows?
It’s also our attitude to the world – when we’re proud, and not showing fear, then
people are more comfortable. My friend Julie always puts it in terms of showing
the “light within you”. Your light is strong and good, so people take than on, and
are more comfortable and happy around you.
You’re absolutely right. Another part of that view is that if you’re good with yourself, even if there’s rejection, it simply doesn’t affect as much because you know they have no ground to stand on.