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1. klyrs+(OP)[view] [source] 2020-06-18 17:21:30
> And this is a trap! Getting absorbed in an identity is a trap.

As a white transwoman, I experience different micro/macroagressions from black people, and they suffer indignities that I can only understand second-hand. But lemme tell you, I've seen some shit.

I personally face a lot of harrassment from the general public, on the basis of the "identity" that you accuse me of getting absorbed in. But it's not me who chooses the verbal assaults, the clearly obvious avoidance behavior, the implicit assumption that I don't know anything relevant (hiiii, math doctorate with decades of high performance computing experience, here...), et cetera. It's our society, that gets stuck on our identities. And it's not just "general public" -- it's too many coworkers; it's any time I go to a conference; it's every time I apply for a job.

Unlike a black person, I didn't grow up with this. That gave me a significant advantage early in life, but I didn't develop the emotional skill to be resilient in the face of endless bullshit from people who are absorbed with my identity. I have decades of experience of privilege, and I know exactly what I've lost there.

And you and me have something in common: I experience depression and anxiety. Did before I came out as trans, too. Social isolation due to people deliberately or unconsciously avoiding went way up -- and with it, depression. Verbal assaults and sexual harrassment in public went way up, and with it, anxiety. Combine an invisible disability with a visible minority, and it ratchets up the bullshit.

Yeah, the author of this article has financial privilege I'll never attain... but the problem isn't that he's stuck on his identity, the problem is that everybody he meets is stuck on his identity.

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