Sometimes I think about my old manager at work who, in order to prove that the organisation was safe for trans people, told me about a fellow trans employee—a woman who was passing! who wasn’t out to me or to anyone else!—and about how chill everyone in management had been about her needing to take time off TO GET VAGINOPLASTY. He was not her manager! He was not her friend! He did not work in HR! There was no way he could have come into this PRIVATE MEDICAL INFORMATION without being told by another manager who had gossiped. And even if there had been, why the fuck was it any of my business!
Likewise, a friend of mine was just told by a school principal about how a prospective school was safe for trans kids… because a trans girl whose parents don’t affirm her at home is able to be affirmed at school. This information about this child’s gender and home environment was relayed along with her FUCKING GRADE LEVEL. This incredibly vulnerable kid was wheeled out as a selling point by the school with way more than enough information to figure out who she was.
In order to make the argument that a place is safe for trans people, cis people are wayyyy too happy to give out private information about trans people. With allies like these, who needs enemies!!!
If you are the recipient of this kind of "and here is another trans person" information leak (ESPECIALLY when it outs a trans woman!!) it's imperative that you come down on it like the divine fist of God. We should shame these little weasels like trans lives depend on it (because they might). Might I suggest:
"I'm not sure I'm comfortable about having been told so much."
"I'm sorry, but that all sounded very private."
"And has she given approval for her medical history to be used as an example?"
"How do you know it's safe to tell me this?" (if the answer is 'because you are trans' then that is its own Massive Problem)
"Does (school) always share private information about trans students with prospective parents?"
"So, will you share my personal information like this?"
