Even if you don’t understand,
you can still support and stand by us.

Our identity remains valid, 
and it exists.

[Non-binary Testimonials]

My name is Cami,
I’m 22,

And I’m here to talk about 
my non-binary identity.

Non-binarity is an umbrella term that
includes all gender identities

that are neither exclusively masculine 
nor exclusively feminine.

It can mean being agender,

“a” as in absence,
without gender,

which is neutral,

or it can refer to all fluid identities,

as if we imagined gender 
as a spectrum

with two poles:
masculine and feminine.

A cursor can move between the two.

These are people who are gender fluid,

demigender, pangender, etc.

I never really identified with femininity.

At 18, I was already
questioning my gender,

and I met a trans man I was with 
for some time,

and we were able to put words on 
my identity, which is non binary.

I think that since he had a lot 
more information than me,

he helped me find the words 
to describe my identity.

Gender identity is who we are.

It’s the gender we feel, 
live, and experience.

Gender expression is 
what we show to others.

It’s the way we express this identity.

For example, you could have
a masculine gender identity:

a man,

with a feminine gender expression,

with a lot of traits society 
considers feminine.

For example, Bilal Hassani is a man
with a feminine gender expression.

When I told my parents that
I am non-binary,

I also told them that
I wanted to change my name.

I was 20,
so it was 2 years ago.

My mom took it very well.

She was already well-informed
about gender identity.

She was very open minded and

made me feel safe.

Telling my dad was a bit trickier.

I took longer talking to him,
and I didn’t do it in person.

I sent him a message, 
since it felt easier to handle.

He reacted quite well.

He said he didn’t understand everything,
but that he’d be there to support me,

it wouldn’t change anything,
and he loved me the same.

It was a bit harder for my grandmother,
with it being a very foreign concept.

She grew up in the countryside
and later moved to Paris.

She lived with my grandfather
for 50 years.

She lived within very
cis-heteronormative frameworks,

where she never questioned her 
gender identity, or anyone else's.

When I told her,
she was quite shocked.

But she has always tried to act

as well as possible with me.

She makes a lot 
of effort,

and rarely gets my name
wrong anymore.

I filed for a legal name change
request in 2019,

at a city hall close to where I lived.

I sent in a file I filled with
statements from people close to me

confirming that they used the name Cami 
to refer to me.

I asked my school for a letter of support.

Then, I submitted my application

and waited for a few months.

Wait times depends on the 
city hall.

And, I got approval for the name change.

Misgendering someone

means referring to them using 
the wrong pronouns.

So, misgendering a non-binary person

who explicitly requested you to
use neutral, "they/them", pronouns,

would be to gender them,
to the masculine or feminine.

Personally, I use so-called 
feminine pronouns when speaking

and neutral pronouns when writing.

I usually say right away that

I prefer to be referred to 
with feminine pronouns when speaking.

If someone doesn’t say it unprompted,

and you’d rather make sure you’re
using the right pronouns,

you can ask them directly

or wait for them to gender 
themselves in front of you,

and follow their lead.

In previous videos I’ve made,

there were lots of comments 
that invalidated our identities,

that denied our gender expressions
and identities.

However, I don’t read many of 
those comments

because I know they’re often
hateful or very tactless,

and they’ll only hurt me.

I have participated in a previous report

where people were portraying it
as a trend,

that it only appeared in the US,
barely 10 years ago,

that it was just a passing unisex 
trend, ect.

That is completely false.

I think that it's also a very white 
and eurocentric perspective,

because we can find several gender
identities in many cultures,

that were completely erased
during colonization.

We often hear that creating more 
and more labels to identify

and re-identify ourselves 
is problematic.

But I think it's crucial to first have
something to identify with,

in order to separate ourselves

from an arbitrarily imposed identity.

I think it’s necessary to find 
ourselves within a community,

to build connections,
to know we’re not alone,

that there’s support

and that others like us exist,
who understand and hear us.

If I had just one thing to say, it

would be that even if you 
don’t really understand,

you can still offer support and 
stand by us.

You can learn,

and unlearn thought patterns,

educate yourself,
help your loved ones,

even if you don’t fully understand 
what their gender identity means.

Secondly, every non-binary person
expresses their identity differently.

Some go through medical transitions, 
take hormones, have surgeries,

while others won't.

And regardless of how someone
chooses to transition,

whether socially, medically,
or not at all,

our identity remains valid.
It exists. And there are many of us.