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Découverte de la non-binarité : le témoignage de Cami

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    Even if you don't understand,
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    You can always support and stand with us.
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    Our identity is still real
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    and exists.
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    My name is Cami, I am 22 years old,
    I am non-binary
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    and I am here to talk about it.
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    Non-binary is an umbrella term
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    which emcompasses all gender identities
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    who are neither exclusively masculine
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    nor feminine.
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    It can be agender, 'a' being an absence
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    of gender, which means neutral
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    or it can be genderfluid,
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    like if we imagined gender
    being on a spectrum with two polarities,
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    masculine and feminine.
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    We can have a slider that moves for
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    everyone that is genderfluid,
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    demigender, pangender, etc.
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    I never really identified as feminine.
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    At 18 years old, I already started
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    questioning my gender identity
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    and I met a trans man,
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    whom I was with for some time,
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    and we were able to come up
    with a group of words on my identity,
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    which was non-binary.
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    I think that it was because of him
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    asking many questions about me,
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    that he knew how to help find the words
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    surrounding my identity.
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    Gender identity is what defines us.
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    It is the gender we feel,
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    the way we live,
    the way we experiment.
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    Gender expression
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    is what we show to others.
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    It's the way we will express our identity.
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    We can have a gender identity,
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    for example, masculine:
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    we are a man,
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    and we will have a gender expression
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    like feminine, with many indicators
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    that society would consider as feminine.
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    For example, Bilal Hassani,
    who is a man
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    with a gender expression as feminine.
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    I told my parents I was non-binary
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    and I wanted to change my first name
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    at the same time.
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    I was 20 years old, it has been 2 years.
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    My mother took it very well.
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    She was already knowledgeable
    on questions of gender.
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    She had already broken it down
    and was safe.
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    I felt like I was safe.
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    My father was a little more delicate.
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    I had to take more time talking about it
    with him
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    and I did not end up doing it
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    in the end.
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    I sent him a message,
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    because it was easier for me
    to manage.
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    He reacted kind of well.
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    He said he didn't understand it all,
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    but in all scenarios,
    he would be there to support me
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    and that it changes nothing for him,
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    that he loves me the same.
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    For my grandmother, it was
    a little less obvious,
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    because it was a strange thing for her.
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    She grew up on the countryside.
    Then she moved to Paris.
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    She lived with my grandfather for 50 years.
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    She existed in a place that
    was very cis heteronormative
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    where she never had to question her identity
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    or the identity of otheres.
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    When I talked to her about it,
    she was dumbfounded,
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    but she always stayed by me
    and kept
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    her composure
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    in the best way she could with me.
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    She made huge efforts,
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    almost never making mistakes
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    in the use of my preferred name.
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    I filed a request for a first name change
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    in 2019.
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    I made the request
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    next to city hall in the place I lived.
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    I pulled out a file that I filled
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    with the witness of my loved ones
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    to say I was using the preferred name,
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    Cami,
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    to address myself.
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    I asked my school to draw up
    a support letter.
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    After, I dropped off my file.
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    I waited a few months.
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    It depends on the city hall,
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    but I got my approval to change
    my first name.
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    The fact of misgendering someone,
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    it's to address someone
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    using the wrong pronouns,
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    so to identify someone as
    non-binary
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    who has already explicitly said
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    to use neutral pronouns like,
    they/them,
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    and to instead use feminine or masculine.
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    Me, I personally use the pronouns that are
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    said to be feminine orally,
    but written neutrally.
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    But it is true in general,
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    I typically say right away,
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    that I preferrred to be addressed as
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    feminine orally.
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    After, if the person doesn't do the same
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    and you want to identify someone right,
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    you can ask them their pronouns
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    or wait for them to identify themselves
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    to follow their usage.
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    In the videos I made previously,
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    there were a lot of comments
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    that invalidates our identity,
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    that deny our gender expressions
    and identities.
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    After, I'm taken aback on these comments,
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    because I know for the most part,
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    they are malevolent or very insensitive,
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    and they just want to hurt me.
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    I already took part in a report
    in which we heard
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    that it was a fad,
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    that it only appeared
    in the past few years
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    in the U.S., it's been 10 years,
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    that it was very related to fashion,
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    unisex fashion, etc.
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    That is completely false.
    I also believe that
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    it is a super white and euro-centric
    point of view,
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    because in many cultures,
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    we find many gender identities
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    that were completely erased
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    during colonisation basically.
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    Often, we hear that it is problematic,
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    it's awkward to recreate cases
    and more cases on
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    identifying oneself or to reidentify, etc.
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    But I think it's also super important
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    to be able to identify
    in the first place
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    to get rid of an identity
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    that was arbitrarily assigned to us.
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    I think it is necessary
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    to find ourselves a community
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    to create relationships,
    to know we are not alone,
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    that there is support,
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    that there are other people like us,
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    that understand and hear us.
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    If I had one point to make,
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    it would be that
    even if you don't understand,
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    you can always support and stand with us.
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    You can learn and
    deconstruct
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    old ideologies.
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    You can inform yourself and
    help your loved ones,
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    even if you don't understand it,
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    what matters is their gender identity.
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    Another point, is that
    all non-binary people
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    have a different way of
    expressing their identity,
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    where some would
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    undergo medical procedures,
    take hormones,
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    have a surgery,
    others not,
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    and that despite the way
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    that we transition or not,
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    socially, medically, etc.
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    our identity is still real, it exists,
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    we are numerous.
Title:
Découverte de la non-binarité : le témoignage de Cami
Description:

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Video Language:
French
Duration:
05:55

American Sign Language subtitles

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