110423 The Importance of Pronouns with Ted X Speaker Mea Chiasson (Part 1)

but he will be back soon. Trust and believe, but have no fear of this week have a good friend of the show who is stopping by to have a very important conversation and a long overdue conversation with us today about pronouns now Again, it's a long overdue conversation, and we're well aware that pronouns rather have taken center stage over the past few years, and we wanted to give this topic the right amount of attention, the right kind of attention, and have someone who could contribute what

we would consider like lived experience so that we can understand where it comes from and how to be better brothers in our case, Q and I, brothers to our siblings out there who are trans, and to become more aligned with the transcommunity. So stay tuned because we are going to be talking with a good friend of the show, her name is Maya, about what that means to be acknowledged authentically and in the light that you choose for yourself.

In addition to that, we are going to discuss sort of some of the implications of kind of letting some of the air out of the ball, letting people live their truth, walk the path that they feel is appropriate for them, and what it feels like from that perspective to be supported by the people around you, the people

in your community, and so forth. In addition, we're going to touch on maybe the opposite end of that, which is what it feels like to be attacked for living your truth, which is obviously another part of the reality of our trans siblings. And so stay tuned for all that and more. But first and foremost, let's discuss some ebony excellence. So to be fair, this ebony excellence is long overdue. This is something that we've had in the coffers,

I suppose, waiting to shine some light on it. But this reading comes from New Central Africa and we're talking about the young lady named Faith Autosuni. She's a Nigerian student who won a global mac tournament, beating China, United Kingdom and the United States and others and cementing her place in history. Odasuni or Odoon. See sorry, this is what I'm saying is the winner of the Global Open

Mathematics Competition. She excelled in all stages of the competition and didn't expect that she'd be declared the winner until the last round when she answered more questions than her competitors. And this is important. She attended secondary school at the Ambassador School in Ota Ogoon State, Southwest Nigeria, so she was a student of the Urian school system. A couple

of cool things about her. She saw nineteen mathematical questions in sixty seconds, becoming the best candidate in the twenty twenty one mathematics competition, beating her next competitor who only answered him. She took part in the Global Mathematics Tournament, which is an international competition with participants from Europe, Africa, America,

Asia and Australia, where she scored top marks. In twenty eighteen, she received a record Holder award with the highest number of questions answered on cow bill Pedia Secondary School's Mathematics TV Quiz Show, which is a Nigerian national mathematics television quiz show, where she answered nineteen questions in sixty seconds, and I promised this list goes on. She's a fantastic young lady, and she's still going right now. She's attending

MIT studying computer science and electrical engineering. Again. Be sure to check out her story again. Her name is Faith Odomsey, and I think that you will see, like we do, that she is a shining example of ebony excellence. Okay, So I have a dear friend, someone that I love with my whole heart, and this individual is a flower in bloom. This individual is dynamic. We all are, but I've been able to observe some specific changes, adaptations. Whatever the language is, I'm about to learn it with you

in real time on this show. I think it's important. I will always say that it's important that we learn how to love people and we teach people how to love us. And recently, in recent years, I should say, in this country, we've been having conversations about how people wish to be identified, specifically with respect to their pronouns.

And I consider myself to be a woke individual, rather be woke than asleep, but in the like the true meaning of wokeism, very progressive in my thinking, very accommodating of my brothers and sisters that I share this planet with, trying to live at peace and have the best, most fulfilling experience with this life, but also advocate for the best experience on this life for people who may not have the same access as I do. And it's in that spirit that I wanted to have today's conversation. So Maya,

Welcome to the show. Kah. In brief, I want you to know a little bit about the person we're talking about, so i'll pay a picture. I met Maya when she was seventeen. She came to my house from out of town, and I am a grown man and you're older than that now, of course, But when I first met you came to my house and the idea was to learn to DJ. I've shared on the show many times that I'm a DJ, but you also told me something that was very profound. You said, I'm going to school to

become a civil rights attorney. And that moved me because Maya is white. Maya's mother and father are white. They are both doctors. So if you know like I know, you know that that means that Maya did not have to be a civil rights attorney. Maya could have did anything that she wanted to. But that's I think that kind of shows her heart. Being born with considerably less in the way of obstacles and problems that you would anticipate on your path to whatever it is you wanted

to be. You choose to take the hard route for the benefit of someone else, people that don't even look like you, some people who might even be angry with people who look like you for the position that they're in. It's a lot to reconcile if you've done that by age seventeen, what I said makes sense. What I said was anything you need now and forever you call me, I got you. And when Maya announced to me that she had changed her pronouns to better reflect so she

forgive me again, I'm learning right now. When Maya announced the changing of pronouns, i A naturally would accommodate anybody to the best I can. I make mistakes. There's other people I know who identify as they. They've changed the pronouns from she to he. You know, these sorts of things, And I feel really bad because I want to I want to make sure that everyone knows they're it. It's a safe space. I got you. I would protect you.

But it's language, and it's I guess it's wired into a different part of your brain.

adjusting pronouns. It will help us to be better brothers and sisters to those of us who are evolving. Okay, glory yours. You can edit this right, of course, of course.

the thought aside. And at that point I had already identified as queer like for my sexuality, but I had not thought about gender. And then the thought came up again. Then I had a friend come to visit and I was telling her about it, and I hadn't told anyone about it at that point, and we were laying on my floor and I was sobbing because it was hitting something and I didn't understand. I had no idea and

I hadn't really thought about it. So I started to use Sheeta to try it out to see how it felt, and it unlocked something that I didn't know needed to be unlocked. And when I think back on my relationship to gender, I didn't ever feel when I was younger,

I didn't feel tied to being girl. I always liked that I there are a lot of spaces which I could just be one of the boys, I could just be myself, and that gender wasn't a roadblock in that in terms of me having friends, and I didn't feel attached to the identity of being a woman, except for when it came to my experience of living under patriarchy, like I knew what it meant to connect to other women about the experience of like a glance on the

street that is like very sexualizing and feels deeply uncomfortable and sometimes violent, like that's an experience, or being discounted on being able to do whatever it was like being a DJ, for example, wanting to be DJ. I recognized that it was like, Okay, I understand that there are so few DJs that I see that look like me in the sense of the body type that I have

that I'm assigned female at birth. It was mostly sis men that I was seeing djaying, so I felt connected in that way, but it was not necessarily I feel like a woman, but I didn't think about it that much. I started using she, they, and then for a few years it became more comfortable and felt more right. I realized I only heard my friends using they them for me. I don't really hear many people refer to me as she,

except for my mom, who you know. She's known about this since I started using different pronouns, but it has taken a long It takes time for the language to adjust. I know that she loves me. I know that it's taking time for her to understand what this means in terms of identity change, and also that like it's hard for her to she, you know, had spent that point twenty one years only using she, and so for her

to use something else, it's taking time, right. And then I came home from a trip where I spent some time alone that last summer about a year ago, and I heard someone refer to me as she. I guess, okay, getting a little off track, but that's okay, I'll come back around. I heard someone use. I heard someone say like, oh she blah blah blah, and I had a moment of being like, what are you talking about? Fancy anyone else around, Like, oh, that's me, You're talking about me?

And it just did not it felt like they were talking about someone else. I think that since I've used them, since I started using them, and I think this whole sort of experience of using different pronouns. I was describing it to a friend last night. Actually it felt like I was in a room and I saw I was in this room. I saw that there was a door that said man, right, and I was like, that's not the door for me. I don't want to walk through that doesn't feel like the right door. And I saw

a door out of the corner of my eye. It's like, Okay, I didn't really think or you know, I just learned about the door. Because also I think using they them is relatively newer. Right, It's not that non binary people are new, but I think this change in like pronouns is relatively new within the past like several years and becoming more popular and whatnot. It was like I saw the door out of the corner of my eye. I hadn't really thought like do I want to walk to

that door? And then I was like, I'm looking at the door. Maybe you know, maybe I might peek through it, but I'm not sure do I really need to open this door? Like I know this room and maybe not doesn't feel like the best room, but it's a room that I know. And then I opened that door and I'm in a new room and I was like, oh my gosh, I didn't know. I had no idea what

could be waiting beside this door. And and then in that room in this analogy, that's like she they, I see this other door, right, I see they them, and I see more doors. Because also now that I'm starting to think about gender. I understand that there are different combinations of pronouns and that pronouns are also one thing around like gender, that doesn't necessarily determine your gender. And it also doesn't you know, I could have I see hee him there, I see he they. I say that

I see they she, I see they them. But I see all of these doors. But I see the day them door like again in the corner of my eye, and I was like, okay, I see it. It doesn't really feel right. But then like over time, I'm like, okay, this room is feeling better. But then start the room starts to feel a little bit too small, and I see this door and it's again I think about the door because I thought about using them. It's like, do

I really need to walk through this door? Like I don't know, people are still gonna call me she you know, what's the But I think about this door and I start to move close to the door. I'm like, you know what, might as well try opening the door and let's see. And it's just like it's like you It's like I opened to the door and I'm no longer in a building. It's wow, like it it is so expansive and I have, and that's how it's felt. I think to use these pronouns, I continue to feel like

there's more and more space for me within it. I continue to learn more about myself. It gives me more freedom internally. I just can't. It feels free. That's how it feels.

know when someone is talking about me. And maybe if I didn't have that security of knowing those things around myself, then maybe I might explore the different rooms to borrow from your analogy to see if there's something that works a little bit better. One of the things that a lot of folks push back against is that many of the people who are changing their pronouns. They tend to be young. You mentioned that you kind of went through

this when you were about twenty one. But a big part of this country is concerned with I don't even know if I'm saying this right, but they're unnecessarily concerned with what I will describe here, at least as a trans and and they've lumped in the changing of pronouns by younger people into that narrative. Now, I want to say something because I this is I just know this part is true. I don't believe that that is a

real thing. I think that when people learn a very small piece about someone's sexuality, they then define them as one hundred percent sexual all the time. Right. If if I was to say I'm polyamorous, for instance, then people would think that I'm just that I'm a full, full, whole person. I go on boats, I cross bridges, and there's one part of my life that has that, you

know what I'm saying. So I think when when people think about trans people, they think that that's one who they are one hundred percent of the time is their sexual expression, and they're expressing that sexuality percent time, And that's not true. Another thing that I think is worth mentioning, and I want to get your thoughts is a lot of people come to terms with their sexuality at a young age. Granted, sexuality, from what I understand, it's fluid,

or it can be fluid. It can change different parts of your life, you know, to my understanding of the science of it. But for the most part, when people start awakening to their sexual self, it happens at a younger age typically. And I want to get your thoughts on I know you're not trans, okay, so then there

we go. So I learned that too. So what I want you to do is give us some insight into maybe how it feels to be to bear witness to that attempt at chronicling this narrative and kind of some of the things that I said about, you know, people coming to terms with their sexuality at a young age, and maybe there's the agenda being imagined. Just kind of give me some feedback on what I think at least.

And so I think that if we can see that with sexuality, then I think that there's it's surprising to then see. Also, I also think that can be true gender, right, it's just like an understanding of who you are. And also these things can change.

are afraid of? That it's not that people are afraid of gender queer people and people who are exploring gender or present in different ways, is that they're afraid of like what that means forever for all that folks have had to suppress themselves. I think that, like, while I don't think there's a transagenda, I think that what I find in like trans and non binary community is openings. It's like, okay, well what if we take away these boxes? Right?

What opens Like what does it mean to express yourself via dress in a way that feels the best for you? Yeah, and everyone should have access to color, to texture, to different pieces of garments, like it's not and what does it mean to be feminine? What does it mean to be masculine? I think it's a lot about like opening up that there are so many ways to be in this world and we don't have to just be what's

handed to us. And I think that that and you know, encourages I think a lot of imagination, a lot of creativity. It's like what's possible?