Transness Does Not Mean Death: On the Erasure of Nonbinary People

“I don’t want to take up space.” These are the words that I hear so often and so devastatingly by nonbinary people and people outside of the binary within shared trans spaces, and outside of them.

How can you take space from another person if space is abundant? If Blackness is abundant? If transness is abundant? How can you take what is already yours infinitely and divinely?

Some nonbinary folks that I’ve asked say that they are cis-passing and that they should limit their space-taking. Some of them say that they are not violated “as much” as binary trans people. Some say that they haven’t experienced transphobia “enough” to take space.

There is no requirement to be trans and to take space. We can honor the realities of the violence our communities suffer specifically and intently without needing to move in scarcity. We can challenge cis-hetero patriarchy to demolish binaries that seek to limit the expansiveness of trans identity and experience. Transness being seen as a hierarchy of violence before it is seen as a boundless identity of powerful being is something that is fueled by antiblackness.

The underlying reality is that many people of all gender identities believe that transness means death. If you don’t die enough, you’re not really trans. If you…