WEBVTT 00:00:06.560 --> 00:00:10.356 Hello, everyone. My name is Joanne Lockwood and I'm your host for the 00:00:10.378 --> 00:00:13.856 Inclusion Bites podcast. In this series, I've 00:00:13.888 --> 00:00:17.552 interviewed a number of amazing people and simply had a conversation 00:00:17.616 --> 00:00:21.092 about the subject of inclusion, belonging and 00:00:21.146 --> 00:00:24.580 generally making the world a better place for everyone to thrive. 00:00:25.640 --> 00:00:28.196 To join me in the future, then, please do drop me a line to 00:00:28.218 --> 00:00:31.692 jo.lockwood@seechangehappen.co.uk 00:00:31.746 --> 00:00:35.500 that's S-E-E Change Happen dot co dot uk. You 00:00:36.800 --> 00:00:40.216 can catch up with all of the previous shows on itunes, Spotify and 00:00:40.328 --> 00:00:43.916 the usual places. So plug in your headphones, grab 00:00:44.108 --> 00:00:46.930 a decaf and let's get going. Today 00:00:47.540 --> 00:00:51.328 it's Episode 85 with the title 00:00:51.334 --> 00:00:54.976 Mirrors and Doorways, and I have the 00:00:54.998 --> 00:00:58.064 absolute honour and privilege to welcome Nonir Amicitia. 00:00:58.102 --> 00:01:01.444 Nonir describes themselves as 00:01:01.642 --> 00:01:05.424 the bottom half of a trench coat double act, and I can't wait 00:01:05.472 --> 00:01:09.176 to find out what that means. When I asked Nonir to describe their 00:01:09.198 --> 00:01:12.984 superpower, they said juggling. They are 00:01:13.022 --> 00:01:16.010 able to keep a ridiculous number of balls in the air. 00:01:16.620 --> 00:01:20.156 I have it on good authority that's more than ten, so definitely 00:01:20.258 --> 00:01:23.688 a ridiculous amount. Hello, Nonia. 00:01:23.784 --> 00:01:27.404 Welcome to the show. Joanne, thank you so much for having 00:01:27.442 --> 00:01:31.208 me today. Absolute pleasure. And you've intrigued 00:01:31.224 --> 00:01:33.870 me and I really can't wait to find out some of the 00:01:34.800 --> 00:01:37.776 well, what is the tunic of double act? So I can't wait to find out 00:01:37.798 --> 00:01:41.616 about that. So, mirrors and doorways. What's that 00:01:41.638 --> 00:01:45.268 about? Yeah, as part of the 00:01:45.274 --> 00:01:48.964 trench coat double act, I co write 00:01:49.082 --> 00:01:52.340 under the author name, O E Tierman, 00:01:53.000 --> 00:01:56.728 and we write a book series that is 00:01:56.894 --> 00:01:59.240 a hopeful queer dystopian. 00:02:00.300 --> 00:02:03.690 And one of our goals with this series is 00:02:04.620 --> 00:02:08.344 Mirrors, to show people who 00:02:08.382 --> 00:02:10.760 aren't generally represented in fiction 00:02:11.500 --> 00:02:14.860 that they can exist in fun, 00:02:14.930 --> 00:02:18.572 interesting fiction stories that 00:02:18.626 --> 00:02:22.396 don't centre around a marginalised identity 00:02:22.588 --> 00:02:24.930 as their main plot point. 00:02:27.140 --> 00:02:30.956 Because as queer, mentally ill people, we don't 00:02:30.988 --> 00:02:34.724 see ourselves in fiction a lot, in stories that 00:02:34.762 --> 00:02:38.390 aren't coming out stories or, 00:02:39.000 --> 00:02:42.644 oh, my gosh, overcoming depression stories or 00:02:42.682 --> 00:02:45.830 things of that nature. So we really wanted to provide 00:02:46.380 --> 00:02:49.940 that mirror for marginalised folks 00:02:50.020 --> 00:02:50.650 to 00:02:53.900 --> 00:02:57.160 see themselves in their communities, in new and different lights. 00:02:58.140 --> 00:03:01.948 And along those lines is the doorways of we wanted to 00:03:01.954 --> 00:03:05.756 open the door to conversation and open the 00:03:05.778 --> 00:03:09.596 door to non marginalised people, to see what 00:03:09.618 --> 00:03:13.280 it's like to live with a marginalised identity, 00:03:14.020 --> 00:03:17.632 and also to open those doors to conversations of, 00:03:17.686 --> 00:03:21.536 how can we make the world a better place? And doing all 00:03:21.558 --> 00:03:24.916 of that through fiction and through 00:03:25.018 --> 00:03:26.470 discussions like these. 00:03:28.280 --> 00:03:31.972 Fabulous. Because as a queer person 00:03:32.026 --> 00:03:35.190 myself, there's a lot of queer joy and 00:03:36.060 --> 00:03:39.384 we get associated with queer negativity rather than 00:03:39.422 --> 00:03:42.868 euphoria and empowerment we feel as well, don't 00:03:42.884 --> 00:03:44.410 we? Yeah, 00:03:46.700 --> 00:03:50.216 I have been kind of following queer 00:03:50.248 --> 00:03:53.944 publishing for quite a while and we're 00:03:53.992 --> 00:03:57.676 starting to get away from coming out stories and 00:03:57.698 --> 00:04:01.016 tragic stories, but there's still this overwhelming number 00:04:01.138 --> 00:04:04.736 of when queer people are 00:04:04.758 --> 00:04:07.856 represented in books. It's a book about their 00:04:07.878 --> 00:04:11.010 queerness and not about them 00:04:11.460 --> 00:04:15.168 being a person experiencing 00:04:15.264 --> 00:04:18.790 things, and their queerness is just part of that. 00:04:19.720 --> 00:04:23.060 And so we wanted to write 00:04:23.130 --> 00:04:26.936 stories where that was the case where Aiden, our 00:04:26.958 --> 00:04:30.490 main character, is a gay trans man 00:04:31.580 --> 00:04:34.360 inspired by some of my own experiences. 00:04:34.940 --> 00:04:35.690 And 00:04:38.560 --> 00:04:42.396 that's a very important part of his identity. And part of the story 00:04:42.498 --> 00:04:46.110 does revolve around him transitioning and 00:04:46.480 --> 00:04:49.916 dealing with people who 00:04:50.018 --> 00:04:52.992 don't respect him, et cetera. But that's not the main 00:04:53.046 --> 00:04:56.716 storyline. The main storyline is he's 00:04:56.748 --> 00:04:59.936 leading this group of misfits to try and bring 00:05:00.118 --> 00:05:03.280 democracy back to a corporate owned America. 00:05:04.900 --> 00:05:08.676 And it was really important to both 00:05:08.858 --> 00:05:11.430 Olivia, my co writer, and I, that 00:05:12.440 --> 00:05:15.670 we present these people as real people 00:05:17.100 --> 00:05:20.884 and they're going on adventures 00:05:20.932 --> 00:05:24.456 and they're finding love and they're making found family. And 00:05:24.638 --> 00:05:27.764 the fact that they're queer or have various 00:05:27.812 --> 00:05:31.516 neurodivergencies is an important part of who they 00:05:31.538 --> 00:05:34.750 are, but it's not the entirety of who they are. 00:05:36.320 --> 00:05:40.156 I've seen that. I've observed that in the media. When I 00:05:40.178 --> 00:05:43.144 talk about the media, I mean films, TV, 00:05:43.272 --> 00:05:47.064 netflix. I think I was watching Alice 00:05:47.112 --> 00:05:50.352 in don't know if you've seen 00:05:50.406 --> 00:05:54.050 that. It's a bit kind of was it Korean kind of 00:05:54.900 --> 00:05:58.704 Death games for a better way of describing it. And one of the characters 00:05:58.752 --> 00:05:59.590 in that 00:06:02.280 --> 00:06:05.732 just so happened to be a queer trans 00:06:05.786 --> 00:06:09.464 woman, but you didn't realise that until 00:06:09.582 --> 00:06:13.224 she needed to tell you that. But it wasn't her 00:06:13.262 --> 00:06:16.392 reason for existing. It added an extra 00:06:16.446 --> 00:06:20.148 dimension and depth to her character as a by 00:06:20.174 --> 00:06:23.836 the way. And I thought, wow, of course you 00:06:23.858 --> 00:06:27.644 are. Of course you are. Why wouldn't you be? It was amazing. 00:06:27.842 --> 00:06:31.676 My wife and I just finished watching a short series on 00:06:31.698 --> 00:06:35.356 Netflix called Glamorous. It's all about the beauty 00:06:35.388 --> 00:06:39.152 industry. And one of the characters there, Marco, yes, it is centred around 00:06:39.206 --> 00:06:42.476 queerness because all the main characters are queer in a beauty 00:06:42.508 --> 00:06:45.716 industry. So being queer is part of that 00:06:45.738 --> 00:06:49.312 culture. But in the last 30 seconds 00:06:49.376 --> 00:06:52.900 of episode ten, the main character, Marco, 00:06:53.800 --> 00:06:57.592 you see him or her outside 00:06:57.726 --> 00:07:01.096 of a clinic with transgender services under the 00:07:01.118 --> 00:07:04.936 title, and that was signified the 00:07:04.958 --> 00:07:08.600 journey this person went on as a femme, 00:07:10.380 --> 00:07:14.204 identifying, if you like, queer man, to going through 00:07:14.242 --> 00:07:17.660 that journey of discovery, to say, I've now understand who I am. 00:07:17.730 --> 00:07:21.516 I'm trans, and I want to do something about this. And my wife and 00:07:21.538 --> 00:07:25.264 I were in tears at this point here, because this 00:07:25.382 --> 00:07:29.084 evolution of character where trans became this wonderful 00:07:29.212 --> 00:07:32.620 evolution of this character. And we thought, wow, that is so powerful. 00:07:32.780 --> 00:07:36.116 And you look back at the episode and you think, of course they are. Of 00:07:36.138 --> 00:07:39.430 course they are. But they didn't realise. They didn't dimit it themselves. I think 00:07:40.280 --> 00:07:44.000 what you're saying there about someone's transiness, someone's queerness, 00:07:44.160 --> 00:07:48.008 it enriches their character rather than being the whole purpose of their character. And I 00:07:48.014 --> 00:07:51.336 think we've seen that too much. You look at 00:07:51.518 --> 00:07:54.840 Niverne Cox and her disclosure documentary 00:07:55.260 --> 00:07:59.016 on Netflix around how queer people, trans people, have been 00:07:59.038 --> 00:08:02.668 portrayed in the media for years. We're always the butt of the joke, we're always 00:08:02.834 --> 00:08:05.470 the exception, we're always the baddie, always 00:08:06.560 --> 00:08:10.348 the person, corrupting men, or whatever it may be, however you 00:08:10.354 --> 00:08:13.616 describe it. And I think what you're saying there is it's extremely important for the 00:08:13.638 --> 00:08:17.440 evolution of queer culture to be see as 00:08:17.510 --> 00:08:21.228 a person first, and their queerness is just part of their identity. 00:08:21.404 --> 00:08:25.124 It is. I mean, I'm a little biassed because 00:08:25.162 --> 00:08:28.470 I'm a fiction writer, obviously, but I 00:08:29.080 --> 00:08:32.292 firmly believe that change begins in 00:08:32.346 --> 00:08:35.296 media. And whether that's 00:08:35.328 --> 00:08:38.852 storytelling or movies or video games 00:08:38.916 --> 00:08:42.504 or music, whatever media you 00:08:42.542 --> 00:08:45.944 prefer, the more representation and the 00:08:45.982 --> 00:08:49.612 more openness that we can provide 00:08:49.746 --> 00:08:53.436 in our media, the easier it 00:08:53.458 --> 00:08:56.750 is to affect real change in real life. 00:08:57.760 --> 00:09:01.424 Because A, you've empowered the people who 00:09:01.462 --> 00:09:04.704 need to see themselves, and 00:09:04.902 --> 00:09:08.210 B, you've given 00:09:08.980 --> 00:09:12.210 the other people things to think about, of, 00:09:12.740 --> 00:09:16.304 oh, hey, maybe that trans lady I saw on the street 00:09:16.432 --> 00:09:20.112 isn't there just to corrupt men like the media has portrayed. 00:09:20.256 --> 00:09:23.780 Maybe she's just living her life like a normal human 00:09:23.850 --> 00:09:27.208 being and maybe she deserves rights like everybody 00:09:27.294 --> 00:09:30.936 else. I 00:09:30.958 --> 00:09:32.730 know. Mind blowing, right? 00:09:35.660 --> 00:09:39.192 Yeah. We even had a trans Barbie, didn't we? And 00:09:39.326 --> 00:09:43.128 the trans Barbie was not transitions were not centred on it 00:09:43.134 --> 00:09:44.680 wasn't even marked upon. 00:09:46.620 --> 00:09:49.996 Yeah, it was only if you had a bit of a trans radar sort of 00:09:50.098 --> 00:09:53.836 tuned in, you go, yeah, wow, fair play. You 00:09:53.858 --> 00:09:57.232 snuck her in there without making a big deal of it. Absolutely amazing. Thank you. 00:09:57.366 --> 00:10:01.024 The Barbie movie did a lot of yeah, a 00:10:01.062 --> 00:10:04.756 plus movie, not going to lie, but, 00:10:04.778 --> 00:10:07.940 yeah, just showing marginalised people existing 00:10:08.360 --> 00:10:12.116 in media is so incredibly important and 00:10:12.138 --> 00:10:15.932 I feel like it gets, I don't want to say ignored, 00:10:16.016 --> 00:10:17.130 but kind of 00:10:18.860 --> 00:10:22.584 downplayed a lot. And 00:10:22.622 --> 00:10:26.010 I know that traditional publishing is still kind of trying to find 00:10:26.460 --> 00:10:29.948 its place with that because there's a 00:10:29.954 --> 00:10:33.532 lot of pushback of if we have 00:10:33.586 --> 00:10:37.180 diverse characters, especially as a protagonist, 00:10:37.680 --> 00:10:41.504 then we're going to turn off this other 00:10:41.622 --> 00:10:45.424 group of people who, for some 00:10:45.462 --> 00:10:48.450 reason, don't want to read about people other than themselves. 00:10:50.740 --> 00:10:54.164 Which I could go on a rant about 00:10:54.202 --> 00:10:57.156 how stupid that is for quite some time, 00:10:57.338 --> 00:11:00.790 but, yeah, 00:11:01.640 --> 00:11:05.030 my train of thought just completely derailed. Sorry. Yeah, 00:11:05.800 --> 00:11:09.576 well, the media that the movies, that kind 00:11:09.598 --> 00:11:13.416 of entertainment media, they've created these stereotypes over the 00:11:13.438 --> 00:11:17.224 years about to define what good is and what bad is 00:11:17.262 --> 00:11:20.584 and what sinister is. And I always use James 00:11:20.632 --> 00:11:23.772 Bond as a franchise. It 00:11:23.826 --> 00:11:27.628 portrays the white guy, the British white guy, 00:11:27.714 --> 00:11:31.468 as the hero. Perfectly formed, fit, 00:11:31.554 --> 00:11:35.312 attractive, all these kind of things. And the baddie often 00:11:35.366 --> 00:11:38.530 has a foreign accent or a non British accent, often has 00:11:39.060 --> 00:11:42.784 a disability, a facial disfigurement or something strange about them, 00:11:42.822 --> 00:11:46.020 exploding eye or big golfing teeth or something. 00:11:46.170 --> 00:11:49.504 So we're trying to demonise people based on their physical 00:11:49.552 --> 00:11:53.344 characteristics. And queer people, outside of some Marvel 00:11:53.392 --> 00:11:57.236 and some other forward thinking franchises, have 00:11:57.258 --> 00:12:01.064 always tended to be portrayed as the outliers, as the 00:12:01.102 --> 00:12:04.344 people who are not the good guys. And I think we got to start 00:12:04.382 --> 00:12:07.876 showing queer people in their own space for queer 00:12:07.908 --> 00:12:11.588 people exemplifying that we're 00:12:11.604 --> 00:12:15.356 just heroes as well. We are heroes. Yeah. And 00:12:15.378 --> 00:12:19.196 we deserve to be heroes. I think everybody deserves to be a hero of 00:12:19.218 --> 00:12:21.810 their own story, regardless of 00:12:22.660 --> 00:12:26.428 identity or attraction or disability 00:12:26.524 --> 00:12:30.290 status or race or religion or anything. 00:12:31.220 --> 00:12:34.624 Everybody deserves the dignity of being the hero of their own 00:12:34.662 --> 00:12:38.396 story. Yeah. Amen. Amen. Definitely. 00:12:38.438 --> 00:12:41.844 For sure. It's the old adage, isn't it? You can't be what you can't see. 00:12:41.882 --> 00:12:45.508 So if you don't see the representation, we're going to talk a bit in a 00:12:45.514 --> 00:12:49.240 minute about mental health dysphoria, presumably 00:12:49.660 --> 00:12:53.348 feeling lost, feeling unseen, those sort of things. So it's 00:12:53.364 --> 00:12:56.970 really, really important to amplify and to show people 00:12:57.660 --> 00:13:01.276 an aspiration a possibility, a 00:13:01.298 --> 00:13:04.764 belief that they can succeed, isn't it? It is. And 00:13:04.802 --> 00:13:08.504 just acknowledging 00:13:08.552 --> 00:13:12.288 that people exist in all shapes and sizes and 00:13:12.374 --> 00:13:16.224 differences. Because, 00:13:16.262 --> 00:13:19.376 again, the media tends towards very specific 00:13:19.478 --> 00:13:23.010 storytelling tropes and very specific 00:13:23.560 --> 00:13:27.168 coding for villains. Oftentimes it's 00:13:27.184 --> 00:13:30.848 queer coding and Jewish coding. And as a queer 00:13:30.864 --> 00:13:34.676 person of Jewish descent, I'm just like, why? I mean, 00:13:34.858 --> 00:13:38.644 don't get me wrong, being a villain can be empowering 00:13:38.692 --> 00:13:41.850 in certain circumstances, but 00:13:42.460 --> 00:13:44.570 when that's all you see, 00:13:46.860 --> 00:13:50.332 it's really hard not to internalise that message of, 00:13:50.466 --> 00:13:54.316 well, society is always going to see me as a bad guy, so what's the 00:13:54.338 --> 00:13:57.964 point? And I 00:13:58.002 --> 00:14:01.696 hope that our books as OE Tierman can provide at 00:14:01.718 --> 00:14:05.216 least a slightly different well, not slightly, a 00:14:05.238 --> 00:14:08.850 radically different point of view of, 00:14:09.460 --> 00:14:12.930 no, you're okay, you're fine, because 00:14:13.880 --> 00:14:17.552 our main group of characters are incredibly diverse 00:14:17.616 --> 00:14:21.248 between physical ability and mental 00:14:21.344 --> 00:14:24.532 illnesses and gender identities and 00:14:24.666 --> 00:14:27.320 racial identities, ethnic identities. 00:14:29.180 --> 00:14:32.840 We have so many different types of characters, 00:14:33.500 --> 00:14:36.872 all in this organisation of the good 00:14:36.926 --> 00:14:37.530 guys. 00:14:41.130 --> 00:14:44.914 What sort of genre do you write about, you say is fiction? 00:14:44.962 --> 00:14:48.098 Is it modern Romance? Sci-fi. 00:14:48.194 --> 00:14:51.670 Well, this particular series is a 00:14:51.820 --> 00:14:55.610 hopeful queer dystopian. It's, see, 00:14:55.760 --> 00:14:59.420 100 and 5200 years ish in the future 00:15:00.030 --> 00:15:03.670 and America has been taken over by seven corporations 00:15:03.830 --> 00:15:05.600 that now run everything. 00:15:07.410 --> 00:15:11.006 I often have to joke that we didn't intend this to 00:15:11.028 --> 00:15:14.846 be prophetic because we 00:15:14.868 --> 00:15:18.260 started writing in like 2015, 00:15:18.790 --> 00:15:22.580 2016. As a response to Google 00:15:23.670 --> 00:15:25.970 Musk and his cohorts 00:15:26.870 --> 00:15:30.294 Oracle Allison. Yeah, we now 00:15:30.332 --> 00:15:33.942 have some pretty powerful organisations running 00:15:34.076 --> 00:15:36.920 the world, almost. Yeah. 00:15:37.610 --> 00:15:41.254 So we have to joke that we 00:15:41.292 --> 00:15:44.780 promise we didn't write this expecting this to happen. 00:15:47.790 --> 00:15:51.526 But the series follows 00:15:51.558 --> 00:15:55.014 this group of outcasts and this found family that are 00:15:55.152 --> 00:15:58.858 fighting to bring democracy and general human decency 00:15:58.954 --> 00:16:02.654 back and fighting to make the world a better 00:16:02.692 --> 00:16:06.350 place. See, I'm curious now in this 00:16:06.420 --> 00:16:10.126 dystopian future, tell me this is true, that straight 00:16:10.158 --> 00:16:13.890 people have to start coming out now. Is this really good. If 00:16:13.960 --> 00:16:17.426 this dystopian future, if straight people had to come out and 00:16:17.608 --> 00:16:19.060 people had to come out. 00:16:21.370 --> 00:16:24.962 We didn't want to get too far away from reality. 00:16:25.106 --> 00:16:28.520 So depending on 00:16:29.290 --> 00:16:32.694 which corporation area you're 00:16:32.742 --> 00:16:36.554 in, kind of depends on the moral or 00:16:36.592 --> 00:16:39.660 not. Depends on creates the morals and 00:16:40.110 --> 00:16:43.210 social attitudes. So some 00:16:43.280 --> 00:16:46.814 corporations don't care at all and some 00:16:46.852 --> 00:16:50.442 are very CIS, het, 00:16:50.586 --> 00:16:54.000 normative enforcing prescriptive. Yeah. 00:16:56.770 --> 00:17:00.606 Because we did want to express the reality that queer 00:17:00.638 --> 00:17:03.860 people are currently living. 00:17:04.710 --> 00:17:08.222 We just didn't want it to be the hopeless 00:17:08.286 --> 00:17:11.160 version of that, if that makes sense. 00:17:11.530 --> 00:17:14.918 Yeah. Is it as bad as you see in the 00:17:14.924 --> 00:17:18.566 media from the UK side, looking in at the 00:17:18.588 --> 00:17:22.226 US? Is queer rights, queer oppression, trans 00:17:22.268 --> 00:17:25.830 rights? I mean, we see many states winding back protection 00:17:25.910 --> 00:17:29.366 even, obviously, Roe versus Wade, abortion 00:17:29.398 --> 00:17:32.986 rights, but don't say gay. Is it really that 00:17:33.168 --> 00:17:36.958 mean as a. Queer versus where you're at in the States? 00:17:37.044 --> 00:17:40.590 But, yeah, it's honestly 00:17:41.090 --> 00:17:44.640 freaking terrifying if I think about it too much. 00:17:49.770 --> 00:17:52.840 Yeah. Sorry 00:17:53.370 --> 00:17:57.078 for the listeners. We have our cameras on, so I can see your expression. So 00:17:57.164 --> 00:18:00.758 yeah, I can see that was a real intake of 00:18:00.764 --> 00:18:04.426 breath there. Okay, gather your thoughts. One of those 00:18:04.448 --> 00:18:07.514 things that I both have to be aware of 00:18:07.712 --> 00:18:11.180 because I'm in the community and all of my friends are, 00:18:11.550 --> 00:18:15.034 but also have to ignore for my own mental 00:18:15.082 --> 00:18:18.590 health. And it's a really weird 00:18:19.410 --> 00:18:23.086 line to walk. Yeah, we see a bit of 00:18:23.108 --> 00:18:26.240 it emerging in the UK. We're seeing 00:18:27.250 --> 00:18:30.982 a real anti trans rhetoric, a transcritical, 00:18:31.066 --> 00:18:34.782 trans hostile movement developing. It's a minority 00:18:34.846 --> 00:18:38.594 with a loud voice, well funded, well organised, with the ear 00:18:38.632 --> 00:18:42.230 of politicians. And it's worrying that 00:18:42.380 --> 00:18:46.040 trans people, mainly trans people, mainly trans women, 00:18:47.290 --> 00:18:50.790 are being used as political pawns, as footballs, as 00:18:50.860 --> 00:18:54.218 wedge issues to gain votes. And 00:18:54.384 --> 00:18:58.042 it's frightening and that you watch 00:18:58.176 --> 00:19:01.542 or read Handmaid's Tale and you suddenly realise 00:19:01.606 --> 00:19:05.230 that yes, all of a sudden, you could wake up in the morning and someone 00:19:05.300 --> 00:19:09.134 can suddenly nullify your existence, your rights, your 00:19:09.172 --> 00:19:12.686 marriage, your property ownership. And you think you see it. 00:19:12.708 --> 00:19:16.446 As you talk about your dystopian view of the 00:19:16.468 --> 00:19:20.274 world when one of your 00:19:20.312 --> 00:19:23.938 previous presidents was in place, you suddenly believe that The 00:19:23.944 --> 00:19:27.518 Handmaid's Tale could be a reality. And if this person is reelected, 00:19:27.614 --> 00:19:31.254 it could still be a reality, couldn't it? Even if he's not, 00:19:31.292 --> 00:19:35.000 it could still be a reality, just based on 00:19:36.810 --> 00:19:40.360 the way that the conservative American 00:19:41.310 --> 00:19:42.810 contingent thinks. 00:19:46.910 --> 00:19:50.586 Yeah. So basically, with the books, we 00:19:50.608 --> 00:19:53.834 took all of our own personal fear as 00:19:54.032 --> 00:19:57.434 queer folks who were born 00:19:57.562 --> 00:20:00.190 female or assigned female at birth. 00:20:01.970 --> 00:20:05.262 We took all of that fear and put it into the books and said, 00:20:05.316 --> 00:20:09.074 okay, this is where we're at. How 00:20:09.112 --> 00:20:12.882 can we make ourselves feel better? How can we change this 00:20:12.936 --> 00:20:16.642 fictional world to be better and less 00:20:16.696 --> 00:20:20.322 terrifying for people who are outside of the quote unquote 00:20:20.386 --> 00:20:23.640 norm? And then 00:20:24.090 --> 00:20:27.926 maybe if we put it in fiction, we can kind of 00:20:27.948 --> 00:20:31.378 help nudge the real world in that direction as 00:20:31.404 --> 00:20:34.986 well, is kind of the hope, 00:20:35.088 --> 00:20:38.314 because, yeah, the world we're living in is 00:20:38.352 --> 00:20:41.830 terrifying if you are not a straight, 00:20:41.910 --> 00:20:45.626 cisgender white guy with quite a bit 00:20:45.648 --> 00:20:49.486 of money. Yeah. For my own 00:20:49.508 --> 00:20:53.278 mental health here. I think one of the problems I find is that and I 00:20:53.284 --> 00:20:57.118 don't want to use the word or the phrase trans community, meaning that we 00:20:57.124 --> 00:21:00.370 are organised into some sort of power structure, 00:21:01.030 --> 00:21:04.466 the trans communities, if you like, are agreement people trying to get over their 00:21:04.488 --> 00:21:08.066 lives or the grave communities. We 00:21:08.088 --> 00:21:11.090 are sometimes our own worst enemy. We reshare 00:21:11.750 --> 00:21:15.366 and amplify hate sometimes by going, have you seen this? Have you seen 00:21:15.388 --> 00:21:19.142 that? I go onto Facebook, I see more anti trans rhetoric from 00:21:19.196 --> 00:21:22.806 trans people sharing the antitrans rhetoric than I do if I 00:21:22.828 --> 00:21:26.122 just turned on the news. And I think sometimes we've got to be careful around 00:21:26.176 --> 00:21:29.610 our own mental health, that we get a bit obsessed 00:21:30.030 --> 00:21:33.766 with the danger and we keep wanting to be like mere cancer 00:21:33.958 --> 00:21:37.662 danger, danger, danger, danger, and tell everybody about it. It's that weird line 00:21:37.716 --> 00:21:41.486 of we have to be aware and so we want to make sure that 00:21:41.508 --> 00:21:45.102 everyone we know and love is aware, but 00:21:45.156 --> 00:21:48.994 also we can't just keep focusing on the 00:21:49.032 --> 00:21:52.674 danger and the terror because that's not good 00:21:52.712 --> 00:21:54.900 for any of us. And the queer community. 00:21:55.990 --> 00:21:58.420 Communities in general have 00:21:59.130 --> 00:22:02.946 generally higher incidences of depression 00:22:02.978 --> 00:22:06.550 and anxiety and varying other mental 00:22:06.970 --> 00:22:09.670 illnesses, disorders, nerd emergencies 00:22:10.650 --> 00:22:14.370 and just flooding 00:22:14.530 --> 00:22:18.298 social media and our discussions with oh, my God, did you 00:22:18.304 --> 00:22:21.098 hear? So and so is now on the anti gay train. And this is what 00:22:21.104 --> 00:22:24.480 they said and this is what we have to rally against. 00:22:27.570 --> 00:22:31.406 I understand where it comes from. We're trying to protect each other, but it 00:22:31.428 --> 00:22:35.050 doesn't serve us. It just kind of keeps us stuck 00:22:35.130 --> 00:22:38.770 in that reactive terror loop 00:22:40.390 --> 00:22:44.180 and I'm not really sure how to get out of it, 00:22:45.430 --> 00:22:48.910 but I think that we need to work on as a 00:22:48.920 --> 00:22:52.338 whole, and actually, this isn't just queer folk, 00:22:52.434 --> 00:22:56.006 but as a whole, marginalised communities. We need to 00:22:56.108 --> 00:22:59.894 work on finding that balance between keeping each other 00:22:59.932 --> 00:23:03.626 informed and safe and also celebrating each 00:23:03.648 --> 00:23:07.306 other and celebrating the 00:23:07.328 --> 00:23:10.618 fact that we exist and our lives 00:23:10.704 --> 00:23:14.286 are all sorts of varied and beautiful, 00:23:14.388 --> 00:23:16.400 even when it's hard. 00:23:18.450 --> 00:23:20.960 Yeah. My kind of take on it, I suppose, is 00:23:22.530 --> 00:23:26.310 I just sing my own song, play my own tune, to quote 00:23:26.410 --> 00:23:29.490 that song, which I think Paloma Faith did a version. 00:23:30.710 --> 00:23:34.434 I keep amplifying who I am. I think if I was 00:23:34.472 --> 00:23:38.318 to engage in those negative conversations, there's 00:23:38.334 --> 00:23:42.178 no, no, nothing happens. You talk about being a person with a 00:23:42.184 --> 00:23:45.894 Jewish history and background. What's going on in the Middle East is 00:23:45.932 --> 00:23:49.666 completely abhorrent to everybody, but it doesn't help to get into a discussion 00:23:49.698 --> 00:23:53.110 about who's right or wrong. I don't want to care if you've got anti trans 00:23:53.180 --> 00:23:56.886 viewpoints or you want to debate the supremacy 00:23:56.918 --> 00:24:00.746 of sex and biology over identity. I don't care if 00:24:00.768 --> 00:24:03.706 you want to have that conversation, I'm just going to keep doing what I want 00:24:03.728 --> 00:24:07.402 to do. I can be the best me, have the best conversations about me, 00:24:07.456 --> 00:24:11.246 exemplify what I can do as a person. And then if you 00:24:11.268 --> 00:24:14.366 want to go and do that in your little space, that's fine. I don't need 00:24:14.388 --> 00:24:18.198 to engage with you. And I think the more I attenuate 00:24:18.234 --> 00:24:21.966 and turn the volume down on this other stuff makes my life easier 00:24:21.998 --> 00:24:24.100 and makes my life more hassle free, 00:24:26.870 --> 00:24:30.458 that's a privilege. I can do that. I'm quite robust. 00:24:30.574 --> 00:24:34.006 I have good support network around me. But what we're saying before we went 00:24:34.028 --> 00:24:37.654 online and live was that you mentioned just now 00:24:37.692 --> 00:24:41.498 about mental health concerns around people in the 00:24:41.504 --> 00:24:44.922 queer community, whether it's dysphoria, whether 00:24:44.976 --> 00:24:47.610 it's the feeling of being under, attacked, 00:24:48.350 --> 00:24:51.740 erased, marginalised even further. So 00:24:52.110 --> 00:24:55.774 how can we, or you, through your media, through 00:24:55.812 --> 00:24:59.514 your books, through your writing, how can we create spaces 00:24:59.562 --> 00:25:02.894 for people to know they're loved for one of the better way of putting 00:25:02.932 --> 00:25:06.686 it? At risk of sounding like 00:25:06.708 --> 00:25:10.020 a broken record? Representation helps a lot, 00:25:11.270 --> 00:25:15.006 especially when we're talking about mental 00:25:15.038 --> 00:25:18.500 illness and neurodivergency. There is still 00:25:18.890 --> 00:25:22.120 such an incredible stigma around it, 00:25:22.570 --> 00:25:26.200