The fact is, trans people make the world a better place

It was five years ago today that something horrible happened, the start of a chain of events, that completely changed my life and I'm still living in random, uncertain times. Yet in all the subsequent chaos, it's my trans and gay friends who have been the most supportive, despite - or maybe because of - the fact that society often treats them badly.

A trans person: a danger to society! Brrr! Shudder! Run away!

 

To explain, very briefly, how it began. I used to live in an area of homes built uniformly in the 1950s. Some had balconies and on 17 June 2016 one of those balconies collapsed. To cut a long story very short, that balcony had been built with almost no steel in the concrete, yet had still survived 60 years. Unfortunately, that property was let, and the letting agents tried to cover the mistreatment and overloading it had had by making out that all similar properties were faulty and they would act to have our homes condemned. We might lose our homes if they had their way. This was all a lie, of course. They were crooks trying to cover up their neglect. 

The following week the UK referendum on leaving the EU left my industry in the doldrums for five months, and it has never properly recovered. The prospect of losing my home and my livelihood unexpectedly in the space of less than a week put me in a tailspin of anguish. 

Few of my vanilla friends cared, and even dismissed my concerns. But my trans friends rallied round. One who was a surveyor drove 130 miles to advise me and my neighbours on what to do about ensuring that our properties were safe from collapse. Her advice was taken up in the four streets affected and, after suitable structural surveys, we found that everything was fine. The one faulty balcony had simply been badly made on the day it was built - a one-off - and the letting agents who'd whipped up this panic were clearly dishonest crooks. 

As for the post-Brexit British so-called governments under psycho Theresa May and mendacious, corrupt narcissist Boris Johnson, I'd much rather deal with the mafia.

Many trans friends rang me, messaged me and consoled me in 2016, even those I hadn't heard from in a while, sending me no end of loving support. One sent me a hand-made gift that I consider priceless. 

When I was later hit by a bicycle whilst doing home removals, which wrecked one of my legs so I couldn't walk properly for two years and is still causing some problems, it was my 'alternative' friends who helped me with my last days of moving. Then the surveyor TGirl took me into her home for a fortnight to recuperate and learn to walk on crutches before I could move to a new home offered to me by a gay friend of mine. 

Covid has hardly helped with earning and socialising, not for me or for anyone. But, again, I have gay and trans friends contacting me all the time as I get by alone, as well as friends who have more alternative lifestyles and unusual beliefs. 

So it's my trans and gay and 'different' friends who have always stepped up. That's right, the ones society tries to discriminate against. Whereas my smug, hetero, rich, supremacist, transphobic or trans-indifferent 'friends' and family care much less.

So thank you, LGBT+ community. My friends know who they are and I have saved any embarrassment by not naming them here. And yet it is we LGBT+ people who have to claim rights from callous, incompetent governments!

 

Sunday saw my local regional Liguria Pride in the port of Genoa, Italy (see photo), which was the first pride event and the first major national event after lockdown. 8000 people turned up in the city centre, which was a good turnout under the circumstances. There's a new anti-discrimination law going through the Italian parliament that should afford good protections against the various phobias around. Intelligently, they've coupled LGBT rights with protections for women and disabled people, which gives a better chance of the bill becoming law.

Why should there be this need to beg for protection from the callousness of hetero or religious or extremist or ultrafeminist or other bigoted and ignorant people? 

If you're a Christian or a Muslim, didn't your saviour/prophet point out that the outsiders like tax-collectors and prostitutes, foreigners like Romans or Samaritans, were the folk who were really doing things right rather than the religiously correct? Yet my religious family, like so many others, hates people like me.

You're straight or masculine. Cool. Some people aren't. If you were as strong as you claim, as confident, you wouldn't be bothered that others weren't like you. You'd happily defend the fact the some people are different because it wouldn't actually diminish your life or confidence in any way.

My trans and gay friends have helped me unhesitatingly in these last few awful years. They're the good ones. Be proud of LGBT+ folk in this pride month. I am.

A warm hug to all you humane and loving people. You have helped me survive the worst years of my life. I think and hope I reciprocate. It's maybe a sign of emotional maturity that those who struggle most look out for others who also struggle.

A dip in the archives

 In 1972, a conference was held in Sanremo, NW Italy, a town best known for its music festivals. The conference was dedicated to "deviant behaviour in human sexuality". It wasn't exactly a gay or trans friendly event! There was a protest by gay activists, the first such demonstration in Italy.

Next April sees the first Sanremo Pride in commemoration of the 50 years since this protest, and the huge progress that has been made since then. I hope to attend. 

Sue x

Cari lettori italiani

Il successo di Liguria Pride ci da speranza per il successo della legge Zan e la lotta contro l'omotransfobia.

In questa data cinque anni fa è successo un disastro che ha iniziato una serie di disastri per me che non sono finiti: il crollo di un balcone che ha suscitato polemiche e paure dove abitavo a Londra, seguito dal voto inglese per lasciate la communità europea che mi ha tolto il lavoro, poi il razzismo e la corruzione che hanno accompagnato quel voto, il danno fisico che ho sofferto quando mi ha investito un ciclista e il disastro del Covid che ci coinvolge tutti. In questi cinque anni i miei amici transgender e omosessuali sono stati dei amici veri e sinceri e mi hanno aiutato senza esitazione. Ne sono fiera.

Sue x