So, the headline is a question I’ve been asking myself lately, and I can hear you now, saying, “Of course Canada’s safer for the trans community, Avery! There are no Republicans in Canada,” and to that, I would have to concede that you are correct. As of the time I write this, there are currently 556 anti-trans pieces of legislation in 49 States1. There are currently 0 anti-trans bills before Canada’s House of Commons, and 0 anti-trans bills in provincial and territorial assemblies. The differences are so stark as to not merit mentioning. I do point out, however, that Canada, and Canadians, are quite adept at their passive-aggression, and at lying to themselves about their own self-imagined superiority. The recent discoveries of mass graves created by the nation’s Residential Schools from its colonial age came as a rude awakening to an entire country so wrapped up in its own self-denial of its violent and shameful past.
It’s important to remember, though that hate does not isolate itself; it is pandemic, not epidemic, in its nature. While social imperatives relating to trans* people and the wider trans community have improved vastly in only a few years, this growth does not come without pain: the anti-trans sentiments in both the United States and the United Kingdom seem to have found footholds in recent years, and in all instances, are only interested in ratcheting up their rhetoric and continuing to use ignorance-based fear as their primary weapon against the trans* community.
Sadly, establishment media outlets feed into this fear, by publishing stories like this article from CTV’s investigative journalism unit, W5, this opinion piece from the Toronto Star, and this op-ed from the CBC — all of which misinterpret the situation by misrepresenting the daily threat to trans* people while pushing transphobic ideas. Among the concerning messages in these articles are the assertions that trans people who have not undergone transition-related surgery are not “real” men or women or that falsely paint trans women as dangerous men. As can be seen in this article by Xtra Magazine, these ideas have been circulating in the UK for quite some time.
Infamous TERF and author J.K. Rowling often makes comments that show her ignorance of the trans* experience by blurring sex (biological characteristics) and gender (personal identity) to push back against inclusive terms such as “people who menstruate,” which Rowling sees as an erosion of women’s rights.
In October of 2021, American comedian Dave Chappelle in his Netflix special defended Rowling’s comments, prompting a walkout by the streaming company’s transgender staff and their allies. In the special, Chappelle declares, “I’m team TERF,” referring to the term trans-exclusionary radical feminists, which is used to describe people who see trans rights as not aligned with women’s rights.
There have always been feminists who support trans inclusion, and there’s been a very loud, very vocal minority of people who identify as feminists who view trans inclusion as a step backward for feminist movements. I find this very puzzling; the hatefulness of their message is disconcerting.
In a CBC opinion piece from late 2021, Jessica Triff, a trans woman, shared her view that activism around trans rights was becoming “toxic.” In that column, she claimed instances of trans women who haven’t medically transitioned using women’s spaces, such as gender-specific bathrooms or women’s prisons and shelters, have “proven problematic,” a view that unnecessarily draws a “Us vs. Them” line in the trans community, questions and undermines many trans* identities, and paints trans women as being an inherent danger or threat to cisgendered women using the same spaces.
To me, dear reader, this is heartbreaking. I recognize the importance of positive, substantive representation in media and so many other areas in living, and what we are seeing in the Canadian media, or seeing that message or seeing that narrative, does to those kids who are just trying to go out and be welcomed and safe and accepted in the world, as all of us do, on some level, or have done at one point in our lives.
Progress takes time, but it should not result in us going back in time.
It’s exhausting, I know. It’s exhausting to constantly have to debate our very existence. We’re exhausted by constantly having to self-advocate in the face of ignorance.
Maybe Canadians were justified, at least partially, in feeling so smug. Maybe the feeling that trans* rights and trans* visibility in Canada were improving was actually true. Not so much anymore. Maybe the community was naive to think that in the first place.
The W5 story I mentioned above included the perspective of an Ontario man, 20, who had transitioned and found it life-saving, but also featured two individuals from the U.K. expressing regret over transitioning.
A popular tactic of anti-trans rhetoric, it seems, is to talk heavily about detransition and point to a very, very small, limited sample of detransitioners to invalidate trans identities in a very alarmist, sort of canary-in-the-coal-mine manner.
Enter Kinnon MacKinnon, an assistant professor in the school of social work at York University in Toronto, who is currently leading research on the topic, said an analysis of the available data suggests that only around one per cent of people who undergo gender-affirming surgery express regret. MacKinnon says that for some, detransitioning is part of a journey to better understand their gender identity.
An analysis recently published in the peer-reviewed journal LGBT Health of more than 17,000 individuals who reported they had transitioned — which may or may not include surgery — found that around 13 per cent had detransitioned at some point.
The authors noted that, in the majority of cases, approximately 83 per cent, respondents identified external sources for their decision to detransition, including pressure from family and social stigma. Nearly 16 per cent of respondents reported at least one internal driving factor, such as fluctuations in or uncertainty in their gender identity.
When you are told, ‘People want to sterilize your children,‘ you get concern, you get fear, you understandably see anger in that, but it’s not a representation of the truth — again, we return to that old anti-trans chestnut of ignorance-based fear.
Beyond the media, some anti-trans activists also claim that aspects of gender-affirming health-care practices are damaging to young people. For example, the website of one Canadian group claims puberty-blocking drugs, which some young patients may be prescribed to halt puberty-related development, will lead to “sterilization and loss of sexual function and pleasure.”
According to Trans Care B.C., there are no known irreversible side-effects of puberty blockers. The St. Louis Children’s Hospital in Missouri, for example, notes on its information page about puberty blockers that because they are meant to be temporary, they alone should not harm a child’s future fertility, but it’s possible that hormone therapy may affect fertility.
The consequence of misinformation and anti-trans narratives, says MacKinnon, is that access to gender-affirming health care, including hormones and surgeries that could benefit the well-being of those experiencing gender dysphoria, risks being limited or cut.
In addition to the fear of losing one’s right to medical care, there are also shifts on the political landscape that has members of trans communities on edge.
The Quebec government passed Bill 2 in the summer of 2022, which amended the province’s family law and created separate designations for sex and gender identity on official documentation. The bill would also limit changing sex identifiers to those who have medically transitioned, thereby outing trans people, prompting an organized protest from students at McGill University.
Separate gender identity markers typically apply only to those who are trans, which not only outs the individual, it insinuates that the individual is not really the sex that they say they are. This is not without its own twist of irony, though; this proposed legislation comes in the wake of a Quebec Superior Court decision forcing the province to reword parts of its Civil Code that discriminate against transgender and nonbinary individuals.
With a government so out-of-touch with the lived realities of trans* people, how can they be trusted to protect trans* rights?
Let’s refocus on the topic at hand: Canada’s safety for trans* people. I must admit that my personal opinions colour this article very deeply.
For example, I hold that anti-trans voices have an outsized impact on the transgender community.
Also, I believe the problem is the people who are inclusive of trans people, who generate phrases like “people who menstruate” and mostly, in practice, have a neutral impact on the lives of trans people.
The absolute best that this group can do is not be transphobic, not interfere with the well-being of trans people, whereas the people who are against trans people are very negatively impacting them.
I believe that the freedom of expression is vitally, critically important, but it’s also vitally, critically important that we corporately hold people accountable for spreading harmful ideas.
Trans women are women; trans men are men. Nonbinary people are nonbinary.
If people can just keep that in their minds and go forward with that thought, then, you know, we might get somewhere. Progress takes time, but it should not end with us going back in time.
So, a final verdict: Is Canada the trans* safehouse it positions itself as? Will it stay that way? For now, perhaps. But the winds of our journey blow, dear reader, taking us to who knows where.