TransBodiesTransChoices: Outfest Los Angeles Q&A feat. Cazembe

#TransBodiesTransChoices

Outfest Los Angeles Q&A feat. Cazembe Murphy Jackson and Jack Quíemi GutiÈrrez

JACK QU’EMI GUTIÉRREZ CAZEMBE MURPHY JACKSON

USE THIS QR CODE TO WATCH THE IG LIVE REPLAY AND ACCESS THE FULL TRANSCRIPT! At the 6th annual Outfest Los Angeles Trans, Nonbinary & Intersex Summit in West Hollywood, CA, attendees shared an afternoon of storytelling, dialogue and laughter.

The fest showcased short films from emerging trans, nonbinary, & intersex filmmakers. Each screening was followed by a moderated conversation with the filmmakers and offered a glimpse into a particular theme. Filmmaker Perspective #2 | Our Bodies, Our Choice featured two of our #TransBodiesTransChoices films: My Abortion Saved My Life and Trans Bodies, Trans Choices. Our collaborators Cazembe Murphy Jackson and Jack Qu’emi Gutiérrez participated in a Q&A after the screenings.

Team TransLash was in attendance at this event to share the video and transcript with our community. Below are highlights from the conversation.

----JADEN FIELDS Check check, mic two, one. Okay.

JACK QU’EMI GUTIÉRREZ We on, hi.

CAZEMBE MURPHY JACKSON Hello.

FIELDS I wanna invite everybody to take a quick breath, you know, find your breath,

take it at whatever pace feels good for you. It’s a lot to receive stories. You good? You got your mics on? I just wanna give y’all a second too, to get settled, get comfortable. Thank you both so much for sharing your stories. And I just wanna start off first—I wanna just thank you for joining the legacy of trans and non-binary and genderqueer and gender nonconforming and intersex storytellers, ’cause that’s how we find ourselves. That’s how we find each other. So I’m so grateful to you both for sharing your stories. And I’d love to know why was it important for you, in this particular moment, to share your stories this particular way?

JACKSON So, hey y’all. It’s an honor to be here, first of all. That’s a good question. I think it’s important to tell my story in particular because I don’t all hear a lot of trans men talking about abortion, and I know that they’re, you know, we out here and we are getting abortions. And I think it would’ve done a lot more for me, when it was time to get an abortion, had I seen that representation. Just knowing that I wasn’t like a fish out of water.

But I also just wanna say that, also I think telling abortion stories helps to normalize the stigma around abortion, and even in situations not as egregious as mine, folks should still have access to abortion.

FIELDS Absolutely. Absolutely, too often there’s a focus, or some people who are antiabortion, sometimes allow for the exception around survivors of rape or incest, but often they don’t include trans and non-binary survivors in that conversation. So thank you so much for naming them. Jack, what about you? Why was it important for you in particular to tell your story in this way?

GUTIÉRREZ Well, Cazembe and I have been talking about our abortion stories for years. Like we’ve had abortion stories with We Testify, the organization that we worked with, and just doing abortion speak ups forever. But I started talking about it about a year after I had it, because I kept seeing such really sad stories about how people regretted their abortions. And it was always cis women talking about it and it bummed me out. I laugh at my abortion story. Yeah, it was heavy, but you can’t tell me it’s funny. The condom broke and I took plan B and that shit still didn’t work for me. Like that’s funny that I somehow fell upwards like that into that situation. I can’t help but laugh at it.

And ever since I started talking about it, I get emails, DMs, messages from other trans people that are going through the same things and didn’t know that it was something that was survivable, didn’t know that it was something that there was, you know, a light at the end of the tunnel for, and they’re scared. But they’ve seen something I’ve written, or they’ve listened to a podcast I was on, or they saw this documentary, and they see folks like me and Cazembe just living.

You know, we’re out here. Half of y’all, I’ve seen you on Tinder, so. We’re living our best lives, you know? There’s life after it.

JACKSON Me too.

GUTIÉRREZ So I wanted to make sure that I use the privilege that I have, as someone who feels comfortable telling their story, to be that person to say, you know, there is life after this. I could’ve used that at that time.

FIELDS Absolutely, thank you both for sharing that part. Y’all gonna get some gems from them. Okay. There is a life after your abortion.

That really leads me to my next question: both of you touched on, in your stories, the impact of poverty. And how that impacted even being able to access an abortion. So could you both share a little bit more about just what that was like navigating for you, and what you see in the work that you’re doing? How living through poverty impacts people’s access to overall reproductive care.

GUTIÉRREZ I explicitly chose a medication abortion over a surgical procedure, even though the surgical procedure probably would’ve, it would’ve been like a shorter bounce back time. I may not have had to leave the job that I had at the time, ’cause I was a full-time student. But a lot of it was gender related… At the time I was like, a bunch of strangers in my garage? Not so much. In my thirties, maybe. May be fun, but different. FIELDS Clarity, once again.

GUTIÉRREZ You live and you learn. But it was a hundred dollars cheaper of a procedure, too. And I could go home, be by myself, take two pills and handle it. The partner that I had at the time, not great. But I was privileged enough, even though I didn’t have any money. Like I had nothing to spare for it.

But his parents, ’cause he was the same age as me. His parents had given him a credit card for emergencies. And so we put it on that. And then when my financial aid came in I was able to pay for half. And I also didn’t have a car, and I had to depend on him, ’cause his parents gave him a car. I didn’t have any of that. That was basically food for the month. I had to just not eat for two weeks because I had to pay for that half.

So I can only imagine how much worse it would’ve been if I had actually, you know, had a child, because I can’t afford that at all. But it was definitely rough at the time. And I didn’t know what an abortion fund was. So I didn’t know that that was something I could have access to.

FIELDS Absolutely, thank you so much for sharing that. Cazembe?

JACKSON Yeah, I think it’s worth saying that poor people, particularly Black and brown folks, are disproportionately affected by poverty. And yeah, for me in 2001, $300 was a lot of money as a broke college student. I went home, my mother was not supportive, so I got a payday loan, with those like 300% interest rates, probably turned into a thousand, maybe more, that I ended up paying for that abortion.

And yeah, I know I had the privilege, if you can call it that, of being able to get my mom to come pick me up from Huntsville and bring me to Austin. But you know, I think that’s another way that abortion funds actually help folks now, is like getting from one place to the other to be able to access your abortion.

That’s why I say donate to ’em, volunteer, whatever you can because, especially now more than ever, folks are having to travel across state lines to be able to access abortion. I didn’t have to travel across the state line, but I definitely had to go three hours. FIELDS Well thank you both for sharing. I think it’s so important to highlight how being poor is such an expensive experience, and how all of these systems are set up to keep you in cycles of poverty. And even though you both were able to access an abortion, it still impacted how, like your overall wellness and your overall livelihood. And I know about them payday loans.

JACKSON Okay?

FIELDS Okay, the payday loans are, hoo, they’re evil as well. Capitalism, I tell you. Okay, so I have one last question for y’all, a little envisioning question, ’cause we’re manifesting futures here. And as people continue, ’cause this isn’t a new fight for access to reproductive care, access to abortions. This is a long fight. As we continue to fight, if you can envision, what would a gender affirming, trauma informed abortion look like for you now?

GUTIÉRREZ An abortion clinic run by trans people. I don’t wanna see or be seen by cis people anymore. I don’t wanna be perceived.

FIELDS You heard it here first, folks. Whoever got that coin, go ahead and open that trans abortion clinic.

JACKSON You know, one of our trans elders, Miss Major, always says right, shout her out. She always says, you’re not trans until you are. And I think when I think about what a trauma informed, gender gender affirming abortion would look like, it’s like everybody is getting treated the same. Everybody is getting treated like humans.

Like ask everybody their pronouns. Ask everybody what their body parts want to be called. Ask everybody what their preferred name is. And do it in a way where everybody feels respected and affirmed in their care. And you know, remember that trans people exist, but remember some of these folks don’t know that that’s where they’re going, and respect that. Respect it, just like respect the future. When we talk about manifesting our futures, respect that.

Because 10 years ago, I didn’t know that I would be in this seat talking about my own trans identity, and I still, or 20 years ago, still deserved that type of care.

FIELDS Thank you both for your honesty and openness in sharing your stories. I’m deeply grateful to be able to have this quick conversation with you, and to have seen your story up there. Give it up for them one more time. Thank you. Now check out the resources they mentioned.

USE THIS QR CODE TO ACCESS OUR PLAYLIST OF ALL #TRANSBODIESTRANSCHOICES FILMS AND OUR TRANS-AFFIRMING GUIDE TO ROE V. WADE. CONTRIBUTE YOUR BODILY AUTONOMY AND/ OR ABORTION STORY: Share your abortion and/or bodily autonomy story publicly or anonymously through our submission form. Anonymous stories will be shared on our social media channels, website, and in other media formats. If you provide your contact information, we will follow up to collaborate on the best way to share your story in 2023 and beyond. Scan the QR code to access the form.

On March 14, 2022, TransLash Media launched a video series and digital campaign called #TransBodiesTransChoices in which transgender people speak out about their abortion and bodily autonomy experiences. The videos not only highlight the variety of experiences trans people have, but the challenges they may face navigating a system set up largely for cisgender people. Learn more: translash.org Outfest, established in 1982, is a queer arts, media, and entertainment organization that empowers LGBTQIA+ storytellers and clears pathways to visibility of their work by all members of the public.

The 6TH annual Outfest Los Angeles Trans, Nonbinary & Intersex Summit showcased a multitude of trans, nonbinary & intersex experiences as a vision for the future. This year’s summit was a time-capsule titled Manifesting Our Future – a call to action to imagine ourselves 50 to 100 years into the future and to leave behind a record of our stories. While trans, nonbinary and intersex people have garnered varying levels of visibility, the goal of this year’s summit was to unpack how visibility can shape our collective future. Storytelling is a manifestation of our imagination and the futures we dream of as trans, nonbinary and intersex people. The future is ours, the future is here, and right now more than ever, we have the power to manifest it. Learn more at outfest.org