WEBVTT kind: captions lang: en 1 00:00:07.980 --> 00:00:19.350 So now, everything's everything's recording and so for the, for the record, because I know that's the sort of thing lead to talk about here we are today. June 4 this time, just after one o'clock in Vancouver. 2 00:00:20.040 --> 00:00:28.050 Pacific Daylight Time. I think we're on right now. So I'm Evan Taylor. I'm here interviewing Barbara Finley and where are you today. 3 00:00:29.850 --> 00:00:38.460 I'm also in Vancouver. It's 2020 and it's a year. That seems like it's entirely out of time. 4 00:00:39.060 --> 00:00:40.140 So I am 5 00:00:40.230 --> 00:00:45.210 speaking to you from home, as I'm assuming you are speaking to me and 6 00:00:46.320 --> 00:00:48.780 The world is weird. That's all I can say. 7 00:00:50.730 --> 00:00:55.710 Great, great overview introduction. I'm finding myself because we've been doing these interviews a little bit before 8 00:00:56.070 --> 00:01:03.000 The time and then now there's some happening after. And it's very interesting, I find myself sometimes doing exactly what you just did stopping and saying, 9 00:01:03.480 --> 00:01:12.630 So for those of you at home who might not be aware, we are in this time of the great pandemic of code 19 and I ended up sort of doing that, that context. So thank you for 10 00:01:13.680 --> 00:01:14.160 The beginning 11 00:01:14.490 --> 00:01:24.960 Yeah. Um, so usually how I start is I do have some sort of quick graphic pieces just, you know, the stuff that the snacks can type form and then we get into the more of a conversational stuff. 12 00:01:25.950 --> 00:01:35.160 You know, I sent you the the list of questions we probably won't get to all of them. And if we go off on tangents or tracks that you don't usually actually very good thing we end up in some very interesting conversation. So 13 00:01:35.340 --> 00:01:40.470 You know it's meant to be more of a conversation. It's not, you know, a black and white ABC sort of thing. 14 00:01:41.580 --> 00:01:48.120 And so at first. First question, and I think I know this one but but you go by, by a sheet in hers. 15 00:01:48.480 --> 00:01:48.960 I do 16 00:01:49.290 --> 00:01:55.920 Your pronouns. And how old are you, today 7171 and you just retired didn't know 17 00:01:56.190 --> 00:01:56.640 Yeah. 18 00:01:57.450 --> 00:01:59.850 So you say I feels like a loose retirement. 19 00:02:00.390 --> 00:02:03.450 Yeah, it's a loosely speaking, shall we say. 20 00:02:05.370 --> 00:02:06.600 And where were you born 21 00:02:07.320 --> 00:02:08.730 I was born in Medina. 22 00:02:10.440 --> 00:02:11.640 And where do you live now. 23 00:02:12.210 --> 00:02:12.870 Vancouver. 24 00:02:13.920 --> 00:02:15.390 And how long have you been in Vancouver. 25 00:02:16.140 --> 00:02:17.550 Since 1970 26 00:02:19.560 --> 00:02:20.220 And 27 00:02:21.600 --> 00:02:28.260 I just talked to us, but you're retired and your work, especially as a lawyer, did you have other training or occupational work that you did. 28 00:02:28.350 --> 00:02:39.840 I did, I did a master's degree in sociology before I went to law school. And so, and that trained me as a sociologist, but when I went down to what was then called I 29 00:02:41.220 --> 00:02:45.720 Look on the job board, oddly enough, there were no listings for sociologists 30 00:02:46.140 --> 00:02:52.740 So I realized that my degree while interesting and certainly has shaped my the rest of my perspective. 31 00:02:53.370 --> 00:03:20.220 Is not going to be all that practical, not to mention all that effective. So I picked I picked a career that I figured would enable me to continue to continue my then feminist activism with some with some clothes. So I was looking for the cloak that being in the legal profession offered 32 00:03:21.270 --> 00:03:23.100 Yeah, the professional letters, right, you 33 00:03:23.100 --> 00:03:23.850 Got to be 34 00:03:24.090 --> 00:03:24.990 Credibility right 35 00:03:25.290 --> 00:03:26.940 Yeah, that's sociology just 36 00:03:27.270 --> 00:03:28.230 Like credible that's 37 00:03:32.250 --> 00:03:33.540 Really the first words that were used. 38 00:03:33.630 --> 00:03:33.960 Yeah. 39 00:03:36.030 --> 00:03:44.100 And what about your in terms of race, ethnicity, religious, cultural background. What, what, what are those important contracts for you. 40 00:03:44.580 --> 00:03:53.880 I was raised working class and Christian small see well big see at the time, but I'm in Regina and 41 00:03:58.800 --> 00:03:59.460 The 42 00:04:01.290 --> 00:04:01.830 Fans 43 00:04:02.160 --> 00:04:23.190 My ancestors are British I'm like okay I as a teenager, I was significant life event for me was being locked up in a in not host because I was a lesbian. When I was a teenager. So that was what they did with less they what they charge to gay men. 44 00:04:23.760 --> 00:04:29.160 But they tended to institutionalize as crazy the lesbians and, of whom I was one 45 00:04:29.730 --> 00:04:36.240 Right. So that was a piece and I met I'm I ran into 46 00:04:38.190 --> 00:04:47.550 Feminism and Dorothy Smith Marxist Sociology at the same moment in 1970 47 00:04:48.210 --> 00:04:55.560 And from there, my that shaped my intellectual life and my my activist life. 48 00:04:55.890 --> 00:04:57.000 Here in Vancouver. 49 00:04:58.350 --> 00:05:10.050 And I recall you saying, I don't know if I've read this in a different publication or something had online, but I remember something about when you were institutionalized that that they were using shock therapy at that time was that 50 00:05:10.290 --> 00:05:16.980 They were i i was i did not get Chuck their pre my partner did, but I did not happily. 51 00:05:18.060 --> 00:05:20.910 But that was, that was the sort of standardized treatments that were happening. 52 00:05:21.000 --> 00:05:22.800 It was certainly one of them, for sure. Hey, 53 00:05:24.180 --> 00:05:30.600 What, in terms of a visible or invisible disability. So what sort of health, what's, what's your health, like 54 00:05:31.560 --> 00:05:48.570 Well, I usually begin introductions in this context by saying, I'm an old white sis gender lesbian lawyer with disabilities raised working class and Christian on the prairies and my my my 55 00:05:48.990 --> 00:05:56.520 You're talking to me as I like flat on my back because I have sponsored gnosis. And that actually means literally did I 56 00:05:57.540 --> 00:06:19.020 That I I spent 23 and a half hours a day on my back at the moment. So that's, I hope that that's going to change. And that has certainly not been. I mean that's been for the last couple of months. Beyond that, I have autoimmune disease. And so, um, that's that's chronic 57 00:06:21.420 --> 00:06:27.120 And that's what, that's one of those things that is one of those invisible disabilities that has been like a lifelong thing. The, the autumn, you 58 00:06:27.210 --> 00:06:29.250 Know that's been for about the last five years. 59 00:06:29.670 --> 00:06:35.610 Okay, okay, are part of part of the the accumulation of health issues that happened with the aging process. 60 00:06:38.460 --> 00:06:39.210 Who knows. 61 00:06:39.390 --> 00:06:48.480 Okay. And, and I have, I have always had health issues and one kind or another. Know all my life. Okay. 62 00:06:48.960 --> 00:06:56.880 That's, that's something that's important to me to make sure that we have on record to understand it, folks, because for some people do they date they live with. 63 00:06:57.360 --> 00:07:04.320 Some sort of chronic illness or disability or whatever that no one ever asks about but yeah launch how they do their activism, or why it's important. 64 00:07:05.010 --> 00:07:09.180 Well, it certainly informs how I'm doing it, my activism at the moment, that's for sure. 65 00:07:09.690 --> 00:07:16.710 Right, happily, I mean, if you have to be flat on your back. This is not a bad time for that to be the case. You know what I'm saying. 66 00:07:17.790 --> 00:07:18.120 Is I 67 00:07:18.150 --> 00:07:21.210 Think the playing field is somewhat even been that way for everybody right now. 68 00:07:21.600 --> 00:07:25.740 Somewhat. Um, what about relationship or a family status. 69 00:07:26.550 --> 00:07:31.950 I am my partner. She lived with Leah and I have been together for 29 years 70 00:07:33.060 --> 00:07:39.150 I came out as a lesbian. When I was in university and 71 00:07:47.640 --> 00:07:51.180 So it was a very early days of 72 00:07:52.260 --> 00:08:01.650 And we've we've found feminism together and really activism together so that that relationship last 10 years or so, and I 73 00:08:02.670 --> 00:08:08.550 So those I've had some other couple of other relationships, but those are the significant ones. 74 00:08:09.870 --> 00:08:12.030 And what about any kids or grandkids. 75 00:08:12.510 --> 00:08:13.260 Okay, it's 76 00:08:13.380 --> 00:08:14.370 I'm saying see 77 00:08:14.850 --> 00:08:19.110 Any, any other chosen family folks that are important to to know about. 78 00:08:21.510 --> 00:08:23.460 For the pretty pretty day I think not. 79 00:08:24.030 --> 00:08:28.290 Okay. Um, and I'm assuming that your sex assigned at birth with female 80 00:08:28.800 --> 00:08:37.470 Yes. And so what about your, your current your gender identity. How do you relate to, to, to that. Is it just simply just gender wars or something more complicated there. 81 00:08:44.070 --> 00:08:49.020 It's well I'll answer that question in a, in a, maybe a little bit different way and that is 82 00:08:50.280 --> 00:09:08.940 One of the things that I've concluded after decades of working on sexual orientation or gender identity issues is that we collectively no physical about either sex or gender identity or sexual orientation and that 83 00:09:11.010 --> 00:09:13.500 Those are categories of 84 00:09:17.310 --> 00:09:23.610 Organizing ideas and in some ways organizing experiences or being ways to identify 85 00:09:26.280 --> 00:09:27.090 I 86 00:09:29.160 --> 00:09:31.920 What I would say, now I guess is that I 87 00:09:33.060 --> 00:09:37.980 Am quite not anywhere near as attached to 88 00:09:40.410 --> 00:09:42.150 Those descriptors. 89 00:09:44.700 --> 00:09:55.980 Then once was important. So, for example, being, being a lesbian was really important to me in my early org and being a woman in my early 90 00:10:14.940 --> 00:10:16.770 In my early organizing years 91 00:10:18.060 --> 00:10:30.360 feminism was of course premised on being a woman and being lesbian in the context of the women's movement was not a popular identity because 92 00:10:30.960 --> 00:10:46.470 The straight women says if they know you're a lesbian. They'll think we're all lesbians and they'll think we hate men. So we were not out. I want to see. We my partner and I were in fact not out in our feminist organization or 93 00:10:50.550 --> 00:10:52.740 And those were the days when 94 00:10:55.830 --> 00:10:58.890 One of the first of all you found out whether some 95 00:10:59.970 --> 00:11:04.620 Who did inquiries. Like, have you ever read Jane rule. 96 00:11:04.860 --> 00:11:26.400 Or that kind of that kind of thing. And the very first thing you did was you traded coming out stories and the list of who else in your life knew or did not know that you were out and it was we we held those secrets closely and honorably with each other. 97 00:11:27.600 --> 00:11:30.030 It was. It was a time of 98 00:11:36.750 --> 00:11:39.270 Well danger shame. 99 00:11:40.500 --> 00:11:57.660 Shame but notching so shame enjoy in the same braided package and that was a weird package to unpack and the generation just ahead of me or half a generation headed me where the generation were scared stiff. 100 00:11:59.190 --> 00:11:59.820 Of 101 00:12:01.470 --> 00:12:02.010 Of 102 00:12:03.060 --> 00:12:19.980 Somebody identifying as a lesbian like right out loud there because they were really, really, really in the closet and had absolutely no intention to ever have coming out of the closet and so they live their lives in complete secrecy and we were not popular 103 00:12:21.000 --> 00:12:28.350 To suggest that it was important to be visible as fans. So there were lots of 104 00:12:29.910 --> 00:12:35.460 Like finding and asserting and 105 00:12:39.570 --> 00:12:55.230 Active being an activist around that identity was incredibly complex and contested, and of course involved a whole bunch of interior or internal figuring out how to how you related to that. 106 00:12:57.210 --> 00:12:58.020 And 107 00:13:00.270 --> 00:13:06.270 It was a big deal being called let you know being identified as lesbian was a big deal. I identified this lesson for 108 00:13:07.860 --> 00:13:11.010 A long time and I'm 109 00:13:12.900 --> 00:13:13.410 A temple. 110 00:13:15.420 --> 00:13:15.900 Together. 111 00:13:16.350 --> 00:13:17.130 How old were you when you 112 00:13:17.670 --> 00:13:21.090 Have identified as a lesbian or understood that about yourself, is that the 113 00:13:21.360 --> 00:13:23.520 Reason I was in university. So I was about 114 00:13:25.140 --> 00:13:30.270 Oh, so. So when you were on be institutionalized as a teenager, you, you weren't identifying as a lesbian. 115 00:13:30.270 --> 00:13:32.010 Whenever I was in, I was in 116 00:13:32.100 --> 00:13:33.720 University. When I was locked up. 117 00:13:34.050 --> 00:13:36.360 Oh, OK. OK, gotcha. Yeah. 118 00:13:37.740 --> 00:13:38.460 So, 119 00:13:39.780 --> 00:13:44.130 So that was another piece of, you know, this is the cost of being lesbian 120 00:13:44.640 --> 00:13:45.090 Kind of 121 00:13:45.540 --> 00:13:46.110 But 122 00:13:48.300 --> 00:13:55.650 So it was it was intense. And when I think about it. Now, if that identity was one that was 123 00:13:57.990 --> 00:14:00.450 Not obvious what the identity was 124 00:14:01.620 --> 00:14:02.760 Because 125 00:14:04.560 --> 00:14:09.720 The shape of that identity from the generation before me was not one that I was willing to 126 00:14:14.190 --> 00:14:30.000 Account. I wasn't, I wasn't. Then I was an out lesbian activist in Vancouver, while I was a lawyer, but I knew with certainty that I could be. I could do both. And those would never overlap. 127 00:14:30.720 --> 00:14:46.440 Because lawyers didn't even imagine lesbians and lesbians hated lawyers. So it was a non overlapping piece and I could do both. However, at some point I realized that that was actually splitting me in half. 128 00:14:46.920 --> 00:14:51.600 Right. And at that point I decided I was then going to be a lesbian lawyer. 129 00:14:52.230 --> 00:15:05.640 Me a previously unthinkable literally unthinkable concept. And so I then said about announcing it sort of in the hallways of the courthouse. 130 00:15:07.320 --> 00:15:11.190 In the way I attracted clients in the I just made it 131 00:15:12.600 --> 00:15:15.990 Made it a new literally a new identity. 132 00:15:16.440 --> 00:15:19.380 Hmm, and I cannot. I actually can't 133 00:15:29.850 --> 00:15:32.550 Oh, what a what a 134 00:15:34.050 --> 00:15:38.430 What a what a project that was what a what that meant. 135 00:15:39.450 --> 00:15:42.780 Anyway, that's not what we're talking about today. But that's about 136 00:15:44.250 --> 00:15:49.800 The question you asked was what do I, how do I feel about sexually 137 00:15:51.540 --> 00:16:04.170 Along comes, you know, 10 or 15 or 20 years past, and all of a sudden the word lesbian and the word feminist and all of those words that I grew up with in love dearly have suddenly have become soiled 138 00:16:04.740 --> 00:16:12.870 In the mouths of tourists and they and that's not that began with a Nixon case in my life. 139 00:16:14.310 --> 00:16:14.970 And 140 00:16:16.860 --> 00:16:17.760 I 141 00:16:18.960 --> 00:16:23.520 don't very often I more often call myself clear now than I call myself in those few 142 00:16:23.910 --> 00:16:25.710 Me and 143 00:16:29.430 --> 00:16:32.910 So there's all those all those political currents 144 00:16:32.940 --> 00:16:51.990 Yes, but and intellectual currents the intellectual currents about, you know, when I started doing work about trans issues there was exactly one book in the Canadian library system about trans folk, and it was. Yeah. 145 00:16:52.440 --> 00:16:53.250 Do you know what you remember. Oh. 146 00:16:53.550 --> 00:16:54.540 Yeah, was by 147 00:16:57.000 --> 00:16:58.890 Their first name is Nemo stay 148 00:16:59.280 --> 00:17:00.510 Fenian yeah 149 00:17:02.310 --> 00:17:03.480 And that was it. 150 00:17:05.100 --> 00:17:11.370 So once again, so that that was really interesting for me because 151 00:17:12.750 --> 00:17:14.100 There I was, again, 152 00:17:16.170 --> 00:17:18.870 With a contested secret identity. 153 00:17:20.040 --> 00:17:28.500 And described on analyzed with no place in no no conceptual space, no nothing. 154 00:17:29.610 --> 00:17:35.400 I had the good fortune. When I was sociology being trained as a sociologist, I read 155 00:17:36.630 --> 00:17:47.400 During the summit is and so methodology just enter and institutional ethnography one in the books we read was a collection of essays by her Harold Garfinkel 156 00:17:49.200 --> 00:18:02.580 Who is nothing with it all it is. And one of his essays was about the assignment of sex at birth, and he wrote it as an illustration of 157 00:18:04.050 --> 00:18:11.010 The, the social practices of creating cognizant will 158 00:18:13.320 --> 00:18:29.670 I'm probably fucking up his analysis but causal categories of thought and and that at the very most basic level, that is to say the, the question of whether a child is male or female. 159 00:18:32.100 --> 00:18:44.100 Absolutely. Every accepted piece of information then available was a socially constructed category. So I had that 160 00:18:45.060 --> 00:19:00.420 Understand that was I remember the lightbulb moment of reading that essay and that was long before I ever met any transfer like that. What is that was 1970 I was 20 years before I met any transfer, but 161 00:19:00.690 --> 00:19:05.280 Wow, but it did so it came as no surprise to me that 162 00:19:07.230 --> 00:19:11.100 That we were dealing with something that was not an immutable. 163 00:19:12.270 --> 00:19:14.460 Kind of know physical whatever whatever 164 00:19:14.730 --> 00:19:19.290 Mm hmm. Over the period of working with transform 165 00:19:20.790 --> 00:19:22.350 And, you know, 166 00:19:23.400 --> 00:19:38.010 Remembering that my experience has been kind of weird, in the sense that it's people who come to me looking for legal advice, mostly. So I've certainly come to be. I'm really honored to the 167 00:19:39.300 --> 00:19:55.350 Have gazillions of trans friends now. And so I am part of that community, but it's a weird connection that of course trans people don't have. So I so my knowledge is therefore 168 00:19:56.940 --> 00:20:01.080 Limited in in in those kinds of ways. 169 00:20:02.850 --> 00:20:03.240 But 170 00:20:05.130 --> 00:20:10.380 The people who first began to come and seek help from me were 171 00:20:11.640 --> 00:20:16.770 Largely male to female identified as male to female transsexual 172 00:20:18.330 --> 00:20:29.370 And the very first call I got was a call from somebody who had an appointment for surgery in Montreal and was supposed to have their 173 00:20:30.090 --> 00:20:50.880 Travel paid by the Ministry and the the arrangement had not materialized. Okay. And it was urgent, you know, they were supposed to leave in two days or whatever it was, and I would have got that call, because at the time, I would have been 174 00:20:51.960 --> 00:20:54.480 Literally, the only lawyer that was 175 00:20:55.770 --> 00:20:58.320 Really visibly queer 176 00:20:58.770 --> 00:21:00.510 Hmm, I'm 177 00:21:00.900 --> 00:21:02.370 Wandering around was this 178 00:21:02.580 --> 00:21:06.870 That 9093 maybe 179 00:21:07.560 --> 00:21:08.580 Everything is like three 180 00:21:08.640 --> 00:21:10.230 terabytes. Okay. 181 00:21:10.500 --> 00:21:24.570 And, and, you know, I was equal to solve the problem entirely because the ministry is actually. I mean, it was only the check was in the mail. So I phoned up and lo and behold, it happened and 182 00:21:26.190 --> 00:21:36.810 No all really, I think, literally, no thanks to me, perhaps I had something to do with it, but not much. Okay. And, but that was my first connection. 183 00:21:37.290 --> 00:21:54.480 And so it came to be that other other full male to female transsexual people would come to see me about various problems that they were having and as a consequence of that I got connected to some of the folks at the 184 00:21:55.980 --> 00:22:01.470 Then gender clinic and I was involved in the 185 00:22:02.520 --> 00:22:10.170 Harry Benjamin conference that was in Vancouver in you might know the year, I'm guessing 96 186 00:22:10.620 --> 00:22:11.040 There. 187 00:22:11.100 --> 00:22:15.060 Find out because a few a few folks have mentioned, I mentioned it to where they are so 188 00:22:15.120 --> 00:22:28.530 Yeah, so, and I remember that conference, partly because it was really exciting because it was the first time that I had been in a room I honest to God was making it up. 189 00:22:31.440 --> 00:22:31.800 Like 190 00:22:33.330 --> 00:22:40.620 So it was my first opportunity to be around other people who were thinking and working in those areas. 191 00:22:40.890 --> 00:22:43.650 And they were almost entirely medical people. Yeah. 192 00:22:44.940 --> 00:22:46.020 And I 193 00:22:47.340 --> 00:22:50.670 I maybe I was leading workshop. I can't remember. I think I must have been 194 00:22:51.690 --> 00:22:57.300 Doing a human rights for trans people workshop or something at which I invited people to 195 00:22:58.800 --> 00:23:14.970 pass a resolution that trans people should be protected by human rights legislation by such as and I made the suggestion expecting that the reaction would be whole like that. I would have no I never occurred to me that there would be any resistance. 196 00:23:15.060 --> 00:23:19.260 Um, but it, it didn't go. It wouldn't go 197 00:23:20.370 --> 00:23:32.460 It didn't go anywhere. And that was because of the conservatism of the dead medical practitioners and their suspicions of something that, you know, some kind of 198 00:23:33.360 --> 00:23:46.920 Name shows up and says vote here and they're supposed to put their professional reputations on the line, you know, right. So I skipped ahead a little bit in before that. 199 00:23:52.170 --> 00:23:53.070 The 200 00:23:56.850 --> 00:24:00.180 Sandy set, you know, Sandy. Sandy do law firm was 201 00:24:00.300 --> 00:24:03.240 Yes, yeah. So Sandy. 202 00:24:05.010 --> 00:24:06.870 came to me and said, 203 00:24:08.970 --> 00:24:11.610 That she wanted to 204 00:24:16.740 --> 00:24:19.620 I think originally what she wanted me to do was 205 00:24:21.240 --> 00:24:25.170 A book, which was the laws that affects trends. 206 00:24:26.760 --> 00:24:37.230 Canadian laws and how the law effects. I said, well, that actually that was a bit more than I more ambitious than. But how about 207 00:24:38.610 --> 00:24:48.570 Human rights for trans people. So we made an application to the law foundation and allows foundation gave us funding to do to do such a 208 00:24:49.920 --> 00:24:50.310 Book 209 00:24:51.600 --> 00:25:10.770 Publication and it was really interesting because sandy organized. This is this for me from my point of view this is early trans organizing in Vancouver sandy went down to San Francisco with devery and came back with the word transgender 210 00:25:12.870 --> 00:25:16.170 It was the first to mine up to my knowledge. 211 00:25:18.300 --> 00:25:26.130 That was the first kind of importation of that words as opposed to the word transsexual 212 00:25:26.610 --> 00:25:34.140 Right and Sandy organized an advisory group and she organized 213 00:25:35.190 --> 00:25:37.290 Cross dressers drag queens. 214 00:25:39.120 --> 00:25:41.640 male to female transsexuals 215 00:25:42.750 --> 00:25:43.140 I 216 00:25:44.610 --> 00:25:46.200 Listed he talks and 217 00:25:47.070 --> 00:25:54.810 I asked me to be interviewed and she sent me some material, but I that she wasn't she wasn't into the interview. 218 00:25:55.860 --> 00:25:58.620 Oh, too bad. Well, maybe I'll talk to her. 219 00:25:59.520 --> 00:26:02.820 Yeah, yeah. Because did she say why. 220 00:26:03.540 --> 00:26:07.950 Yeah yeah we am I'll talk, I'll talk a little bit but not on 221 00:26:07.980 --> 00:26:10.920 Not on record. Yeah, yeah. Okay, fine. Okay. 222 00:26:12.450 --> 00:26:14.190 Well, what if we can make arrangements offline. 223 00:26:14.850 --> 00:26:17.820 Yeah. And because I think 224 00:26:20.100 --> 00:26:21.270 That well for 225 00:26:22.710 --> 00:26:38.130 Her vision was huge revision was that those parts of the let's just call them non stereotypical gendered folks should come together with a view to 226 00:26:39.360 --> 00:26:43.980 Saying what it was that they wanted to see in the human race code. 227 00:26:44.790 --> 00:26:53.130 Okay, and I had, I said to Sandy, that it was my opinion that it was then my opinion that 228 00:27:02.580 --> 00:27:10.980 The ground of sex and or the ground of disability, most of which were then in the Human Rights Code. 229 00:27:11.730 --> 00:27:17.970 Really cover the experience of certainly transsexual people 230 00:27:18.420 --> 00:27:18.870 Mm hmm. 231 00:27:20.070 --> 00:27:21.930 And and 232 00:27:25.590 --> 00:27:26.310 The 233 00:27:27.390 --> 00:27:32.280 There was it the time in this in this particular day that I see. 234 00:27:34.080 --> 00:27:51.960 A controversy about whether or not claim should be advanced under the God of disability. And the advantage of doing that, of course, was that you could get that insurance coverage for surgery. So, on the other hand, people didn't want to see didn't want to construct 235 00:27:52.260 --> 00:27:52.800 The 236 00:27:54.090 --> 00:27:56.610 Trends relief as 237 00:27:57.990 --> 00:28:02.070 Or trends experience as a disability, which 238 00:28:02.190 --> 00:28:03.300 Apparent theoretically 239 00:28:03.750 --> 00:28:08.640 says something about how people see what it means to have a disability. 240 00:28:11.580 --> 00:28:12.150 But 241 00:28:16.170 --> 00:28:28.170 We produce a. So, you know, the interesting thing about that process was sandy pull together all those parts of the community, and I did not participate 242 00:28:29.610 --> 00:28:36.450 As explicitly and on purpose in the meanings of that group, because we all agreed that 243 00:28:38.310 --> 00:28:39.720 My voice was too big. 244 00:28:41.490 --> 00:28:45.360 And that those conversations should happen among 245 00:28:46.950 --> 00:28:49.860 Trend trans folk and honestly I remember 246 00:28:52.020 --> 00:28:56.580 I don't think at the time that the term trends was ever used 247 00:28:57.270 --> 00:28:59.160 It was so 248 00:29:00.930 --> 00:29:03.480 If it would have been transgender 249 00:29:03.840 --> 00:29:05.160 Regular you know 250 00:29:06.840 --> 00:29:18.630 So retrospectively that that transaction figure that out for themselves. Tell me, and we should follow that we should write it up according to their instructions, which is what we did. 251 00:29:19.500 --> 00:29:34.650 And I think that that was entirely appropriate as a way of that piece of activism happening in it so happened that the then Human Rights Commission was headed by Mary Lucien 252 00:29:35.580 --> 00:29:45.360 And he held hearings around the province about what changes should be made to the human rights legislation and we 253 00:29:48.090 --> 00:29:50.070 Piece of work at that point. 254 00:29:53.070 --> 00:29:53.880 The 255 00:30:02.640 --> 00:30:02.760 I 256 00:30:08.010 --> 00:30:25.560 Do the report that resulted was called finding our place, and I think it was published in. I can't remember 9496, something like that. I have a copy. If you don't, and so does the trance history archives now has a copy 257 00:30:31.620 --> 00:30:34.140 And it was a Canadian first 258 00:30:34.500 --> 00:30:37.590 Mm hmm. And the 259 00:30:40.440 --> 00:30:47.130 I'm not able to speak to whether the Alliance's across the different communities of transport. 260 00:30:48.210 --> 00:30:52.710 Held or did not hold, they certainly were not natural. 261 00:30:58.140 --> 00:31:03.420 Allies with each other. Those communities did not see themselves as natural allies. 262 00:31:03.480 --> 00:31:05.040 And then we say, Look, can you just do you mean 263 00:31:05.160 --> 00:31:07.380 The like drag kings and queens. 264 00:31:09.240 --> 00:31:12.570 male to female transsexuals etc. 265 00:31:13.170 --> 00:31:14.130 Right, okay. 266 00:31:14.400 --> 00:31:14.790 So, 267 00:31:19.140 --> 00:31:20.040 The 268 00:31:21.330 --> 00:31:24.060 We know we created a 269 00:31:26.010 --> 00:31:28.350 An activist group called 270 00:31:37.560 --> 00:31:42.630 God, I don't remember trans activism society or something of that some weird like that. 271 00:31:43.800 --> 00:31:46.050 And so this was 272 00:31:46.140 --> 00:31:47.280 An alliance society. 273 00:31:47.820 --> 00:31:53.220 No Jen's alliance society was translated society was 274 00:31:55.020 --> 00:31:59.010 Who is the woman who wrote novels is now dead. 275 00:32:00.090 --> 00:32:00.750 And 276 00:32:01.890 --> 00:32:03.000 Stephanie. 277 00:32:03.180 --> 00:32:04.500 Castle. Yeah. 278 00:32:04.710 --> 00:32:12.000 Yes. So, Stephanie castle was kind of the moving force behind the trends aligned society. 279 00:32:12.630 --> 00:32:16.200 Trends alliance society was largely a social and 280 00:32:16.200 --> 00:32:19.500 Support Group and they were 281 00:32:20.880 --> 00:32:22.800 Politically speaking, nervous. 282 00:32:24.360 --> 00:32:25.170 About 283 00:32:27.060 --> 00:32:32.340 Political work something in, in, in ways that I recognized from the in the closet lesbians. 284 00:32:33.120 --> 00:32:40.440 Right. You all did. On the other hand, Stephanie was a remarkable woman and 285 00:32:44.100 --> 00:32:46.170 You know, was connected with 286 00:32:47.580 --> 00:32:52.530 There was a trans woman in in prison that she was really closely connected with 287 00:32:53.580 --> 00:32:54.180 Who 288 00:32:55.710 --> 00:32:58.680 Who died. I think after 289 00:33:00.360 --> 00:33:02.850 Self castration either 290 00:33:05.640 --> 00:33:07.770 So and Stephanie and I had 291 00:33:09.540 --> 00:33:11.160 Know how we were connected 292 00:33:13.740 --> 00:33:22.770 We certainly knew each other and had mutual that maybe because of the Cynthia cabinet. One of the early court cases. 293 00:33:22.890 --> 00:33:32.340 He had I did was for Cynthia, Kevin, who is was in federal prison and 294 00:33:35.040 --> 00:33:38.340 She as it happened because she had 295 00:33:40.500 --> 00:33:54.540 Damages from a car accident or something. She had adequate money to pay for her own sex reassignment surgery but the prison was refusing to either permission. They had her in 296 00:33:55.020 --> 00:34:16.080 They had her in maximum security in a male prison because that was the only place they could keep her safe and I mean I could, I cannot tell you what maximum security in a federal prison looks like it's it's horrendous. And so I took it did a human rights complaint on her behalf. 297 00:34:18.090 --> 00:34:18.720 To 298 00:34:21.090 --> 00:34:31.410 compel them to recognize her as female, and to grantor the permission to have the surgery and ultimately the question was whether she would be 299 00:34:31.860 --> 00:34:49.530 Then house in a women's prison and that that last piece was done, not by me, but by the Federal Human Rights Commission. And so I think it was through Cynthia that I got connected to Stephanie because 300 00:34:51.240 --> 00:34:59.790 Definitely was able to talk about the conditions for trans women in prison. Right. So at this point. 301 00:35:04.290 --> 00:35:21.270 When I'm looking for experts for any court cases there are few and far between. So there was mostly the the the docs at the gender clinic and the gender clinic, as you know, was shut down and I think 302 00:35:22.440 --> 00:35:23.400 I'm not mistaken. 303 00:35:23.970 --> 00:35:24.240 Yeah. 304 00:35:24.300 --> 00:35:29.100 Thanks me for that. So the folks there were 305 00:35:30.960 --> 00:35:51.990 pretty conservative in their idea of what counted as female, and it was back in the horrible days when folks had to live for two years in their affirm gender before they were entitled to be to receive treatment. I mean, it's really hard to imagine a more 306 00:35:53.730 --> 00:35:55.740 draconian and 307 00:35:57.450 --> 00:36:02.850 Cruel requirements for medical treatment. Yeah. 308 00:36:04.380 --> 00:36:14.130 That was, that was still the case when when I had my case in 2009 that was still in place. The two years, then it was shortly changed. Yeah, but I was on I was required to do two years. 309 00:36:15.420 --> 00:36:15.660 Yeah. 310 00:36:15.720 --> 00:36:25.200 That wasn't my end. Yeah. And our, our, our interaction of that case my surgery was 2009 so so it wouldn't have been changed until 2010 or later. 311 00:36:25.560 --> 00:36:25.890 Yes. 312 00:36:26.430 --> 00:36:32.910 That was one of the things we we talked about should be challenged and we said, Just go, just get the coverage so 313 00:36:32.970 --> 00:36:44.970 Yeah, yeah. But yeah, I remember that. Remember that when that changed and and just all the arguments we're all having at the time saying people are not literally able to live in that in that gender. 314 00:36:45.060 --> 00:36:45.540 The thought 315 00:36:48.180 --> 00:36:51.000 I mean, it was bizarre. And I'm I 316 00:36:51.420 --> 00:36:54.180 I had forgotten that it was that late 317 00:36:54.510 --> 00:36:55.080 Mm hmm. 318 00:36:55.230 --> 00:37:03.540 That that change occurred. It really was astonished is astonishing to think that that was so and 319 00:37:06.990 --> 00:37:07.410 So, 320 00:37:07.890 --> 00:37:13.530 Having those last 10 years is probably more than you for trans folks, probably more than you saw in the 50 years before though. 321 00:37:13.530 --> 00:37:14.520 Yes. Oh yeah, you 322 00:37:15.690 --> 00:37:21.600 Know that this 10 years is flown by and it's amazing to me to look past and think about, oh, well that was only in to 323 00:37:21.630 --> 00:37:22.020 I know 324 00:37:22.440 --> 00:37:23.370 I know, I know. 325 00:37:24.600 --> 00:37:25.050 I know 326 00:37:25.230 --> 00:37:30.810 So you at this time and you're also saying you had that there's a bit of an activist group that was sort of different from the 327 00:37:30.930 --> 00:37:32.280 Way it turns out the size of it. 328 00:37:33.060 --> 00:37:36.960 So, so now. Have you heard anything about Christine Burnham 329 00:37:37.800 --> 00:37:39.810 Precision Burnham was 330 00:37:39.900 --> 00:37:41.400 a trans woman who 331 00:37:42.450 --> 00:37:54.030 Who transition. She, she had been a reporter in Cranbrook or someplace and she moved to Vancouver when she transitioned and and really 332 00:37:55.260 --> 00:38:15.600 Left turf her for her. I guess her wife and kids and and was very deliberate about it came to Vancouver and decided to be an electrode just knowing that she would then be have lots of work in the trans community. 333 00:38:15.810 --> 00:38:20.040 a proctologist know attune and and electrolysis. 334 00:38:20.040 --> 00:38:21.630 Selection process. Okay, sounds like 335 00:38:22.350 --> 00:38:23.310 That's a lot of training. 336 00:38:27.870 --> 00:38:29.640 Not to mention a very funny. 337 00:38:30.270 --> 00:38:31.170 Occupation. 338 00:38:33.210 --> 00:38:35.820 Have a lot of transportation. So it's like, well, I guess I just did. 339 00:38:37.440 --> 00:38:37.890 Okay, so 340 00:38:39.660 --> 00:38:52.740 So, there she was in the middle, literally, in the middle of because everybody went to see her for electrolysis, and somehow or another, she found her way to me and 341 00:38:53.340 --> 00:39:05.130 Wanted to know, sort of, okay, now what can we do, we have to change these things. And I said, Okay, well we can we can have a group we could we could set a political action group. 342 00:39:07.980 --> 00:39:29.820 I mean, in that 10 year period between 92 and 2002 I was also involved in the December in setting up and running something called the December 9 coalition, which we described as I working coalition on issues of sexual orientation and gender identity and our kind of cutline was working 343 00:39:31.740 --> 00:39:33.450 For our welcome in 344 00:39:34.230 --> 00:39:36.330 To kind of cut out the tagline that's important to hear 345 00:39:36.570 --> 00:39:44.700 All these great lines. Okay, working together across our differences for our welcome in the world. 346 00:39:45.270 --> 00:39:48.030 Huh, and the revolutionary 347 00:39:48.030 --> 00:39:53.430 Part, there was the change from tolerance. 348 00:39:54.480 --> 00:40:01.260 To past acceptance and all the way to we are looking for. Welcome. 349 00:40:01.980 --> 00:40:02.460 Right. 350 00:40:02.520 --> 00:40:06.420 We want the world to be delighted when we show up. 351 00:40:07.650 --> 00:40:11.190 So that, and that was, as far as I know. 352 00:40:14.220 --> 00:40:23.040 That was well. In fact, I do know that was the first group in DC that included both sexual orientation and gender identity as part of its mandate. 353 00:40:23.760 --> 00:40:28.560 Right, that that everybody was in a coalition working towards both of these issues. 354 00:40:28.620 --> 00:40:30.030 Together. Yes. 355 00:40:30.390 --> 00:40:43.590 Yeah, so we had that December night coalition had a very odd structure. The structure was anybody could do any anything in any time in any for any purpose in the name of the December 9 coalition 356 00:40:45.360 --> 00:40:46.230 And 357 00:40:47.250 --> 00:41:01.110 Including speaking to the media. Okay. And they, they might if the rule. The deal was you might be told when you came to the next meeting. Please don't do that again. But you would never be censored for having done it. 358 00:41:01.500 --> 00:41:02.460 Right, okay. 359 00:41:02.640 --> 00:41:05.730 The idea being that there was so much to be done. 360 00:41:06.510 --> 00:41:13.890 Right on so many friends so few people who are able to be out and out 361 00:41:14.610 --> 00:41:20.730 Mm hmm. That whatever you did was just 100% totally fine. 362 00:41:21.390 --> 00:41:29.250 So in the December 9 coalition. We had everybody from the Conservative Party of Canada to the anarchist league, politically speaking, 363 00:41:29.580 --> 00:41:43.110 Yeah. And we built into that because I also had I had already had a history of doing unlearning oppression work, which was something that I'd done from 1984 and I still do to this day. 364 00:41:43.710 --> 00:41:57.030 And that inform the way we work so that we built in to the December 9 coalition on learning sexism and learning racism and learning and so on and so on so that we 365 00:42:01.410 --> 00:42:04.650 It was really an amazing group actually without 366 00:42:07.500 --> 00:42:14.610 Then we wanted to focus specifically on some transitions. So we set up another group and 367 00:42:16.620 --> 00:42:29.040 I believe it was called the transact called transaction that would, but I'm not. I don't quite remember. And it has. And we wanted, we decided we wanted to have a conference. 368 00:42:31.170 --> 00:42:38.130 And we applied to the court to cope. Challenges Program, which then provided money for conferences of that kind, because 369 00:42:39.300 --> 00:42:54.150 We wanted to argue for the inclusion of gender identity and human rights in we were again focused on human rights school. And when we wrote to the when we applied to court. Challenges Program. 370 00:42:55.980 --> 00:43:10.560 The initial response that I got was that they didn't feel comfortable funding trends trends work because it was not clear how that would impact women's rights. 371 00:43:13.020 --> 00:43:19.140 And I wrote them. What I unfortunately had been prescribed 372 00:43:21.120 --> 00:43:29.820 Cortisone a couple of days before it. As you may know, cortisone is it's it's like a steroid, you know, I was like, 373 00:43:30.840 --> 00:43:41.040 I was already hyped up angry when I got this response and I wrote what is what stands out in my entire legal history as the most blistering 374 00:43:42.270 --> 00:43:44.130 Like what the in the 375 00:43:46.320 --> 00:43:47.610 salty language just work. 376 00:43:47.610 --> 00:43:51.600 Who do you think you are, and it was 377 00:43:53.220 --> 00:44:16.440 Is I'm not actually proud of that letter because I would not write that letter in the manner that I wrote it again right but i just tore strips off them and we eventually got funding to do a consultation was. It was so the so called and we 378 00:44:19.530 --> 00:44:29.550 That was a very that was I, as far as I know, that was the first TRANS Conference in Canada. Hmm. And that was, I believe, 1999 379 00:44:30.660 --> 00:44:45.480 And that and who was at that conference that you might also talk to this wrong Gallagher. Have you talked to yet okay so wrong might remember the name of that group because the group lasted past 380 00:44:46.920 --> 00:44:52.410 The conference and after the conference there developed a conflict. 381 00:44:53.700 --> 00:44:58.800 In the group and the conflict in the group was about whether or not I should be in the group. 382 00:44:59.610 --> 00:45:05.010 Because I was a not trends right and so I left the new 383 00:45:07.560 --> 00:45:22.920 Wide nobody asked me to leave. I left unsaid in leaving. It's really, really not. It's not right that the question of whether I was a member of that group should occupy the group and be divisive 384 00:45:23.520 --> 00:45:25.860 So I was taking myself out of that. 385 00:45:26.340 --> 00:45:27.240 Conversation. 386 00:45:27.630 --> 00:45:30.120 Now it's taking up the energy that they need to be putting elsewhere. 387 00:45:30.180 --> 00:45:31.980 Yeah, exactly. And 388 00:45:32.100 --> 00:45:32.850 And 389 00:45:35.370 --> 00:45:36.540 So, 390 00:45:41.580 --> 00:45:43.560 Around that time, 391 00:45:48.060 --> 00:45:54.810 There was a project. This is also around the time of the Kimberly Nixon case. 392 00:45:55.230 --> 00:45:57.390 So around that time. 393 00:46:01.740 --> 00:46:03.360 There was 394 00:46:04.650 --> 00:46:06.510 The publication of 395 00:46:09.570 --> 00:46:17.280 A document that had photographs and descriptions of the lives of maybe it doesn't transfer 396 00:46:17.970 --> 00:46:18.480 Yes. 397 00:46:19.590 --> 00:46:21.150 Yes, I've read this one. 398 00:46:21.450 --> 00:46:25.950 Okay yes stories from the lives of 11 people in DC. 399 00:46:26.250 --> 00:46:26.790 There you go. 400 00:46:26.940 --> 00:46:27.450 Yeah. Yes. 401 00:46:28.110 --> 00:46:29.670 I think I might be very as well. 402 00:46:30.240 --> 00:46:36.510 Okay, there you go. So I wasn't far off when I said it doesn't. Okay, so that that publication. 403 00:46:38.040 --> 00:46:43.470 Was also I mean all every one of these things is is groundbreaking 404 00:46:43.770 --> 00:46:47.370 Mm hmm. Every one of these things is the first one ever 405 00:46:47.880 --> 00:46:50.550 Yes, every one of these things is 406 00:46:51.960 --> 00:46:52.980 Seeing 407 00:46:54.540 --> 00:46:54.870 Is 408 00:46:56.490 --> 00:47:07.410 Is pulling together stories from the ground instead of through them, in particular, instead of through the medical lens. 409 00:47:08.250 --> 00:47:11.460 Yeah, and and so 410 00:47:14.610 --> 00:47:26.250