They Called Him No-Bra Bobo

In 2005, I moved out of my mom’s house in small town Arkansas to attend the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences, and the Arts.  ASMSA is an academically advanced public boarding high school in Hot Springs, Arkansas.  Coming from a predominately white and conservative environment, I was overjoyed to meet a new, more diverse group of friends, to challenge my academic potential, and to come out as homosexual.  I relished in the comparatively liberal and accepting milieu of ASMSA, literally singing in the halls with the other openly gay student.  We modified the song lyrics of “YMCA” to reflect our lived experiences:  “ASMSA! It’s fun to live at the ASMSA!  They have everything that a homo can enjoy.  You can hang out with all the boys! Or girls!”

“We worked very hard what with the ‘not wanting to wear a bra incident.'" Diana's characterization of my expression of gender dysphoria as the "not wanting to wear a bra incident" hurts.  It feels like she doesn't understand that my transgender identity is more than just an incident of rule breaking or an instance of "not wanting" to conform to assigned gender roles.  To want something, you must be able to choose it over something else.  One cannot choose his/her/their own gender identity; however, one can repress their gender expression in the face of duress.

Even though she recognized and knew how to give support to people who displayed these types of diversity, her understanding of diversity of gender identity was self-identified as lacking.  She says, "You were a new breed of animal. We didn’t know what to do with you!" regarding my anormative gender expression and her scarce experience with gender non-conforming youth.

Diana hypothesizes that “Maybe [the Dean of Academics] figured since she was a little bit older, I would have a better rapport with you.”  I lean back in disagreement then interrupt her to confirm that I had heard correctly the potentially ageist and illogical reasons she was designated to talk to me. If this were the case, I would have strongly preferred that my Residential Mentor had been the initiator of a respectful, productive discourse about my decision to go braless.  She was much younger than both deans, and we interacted on a daily basis; so by the Dean’s reasons, she would have been a much more suitable choice.  Additionally,the power difference between my Residential Mentor and me was much smaller than the steep power gradient between “Dean Hampo” and me.  

One of the most painful moments for me in this interview is when Diana unconsciously compares trans people to a new, exotic “breed of animal.” My gender nonconformity and loud, aggressive behavior as a female are described as scary and disconcerting.  Diana acknowledges that her administration’s lack of knowledge, presumably on how to handle gender non-conforming youth, is also scary. 

When I ask if “wife beater” shirts are appropriate public attire for students, Diana says “It depends on …if you are a boy or a girl because there is a different set of standards…You’re a girl, different rules."  In this excerpt, she admits that her personal values and ASMSA’s institutional norms reify the gender binary.  If differential treatment of youth based on binary assignment of sex at birth is warranted, where and how do gender non-conforming youth fit in this conception of appropriately gendered behavior?  What are the detrimental impacts of discouraging the gender expressions of trans youth? 

Whereas in high school I was objectified by teachers' unwanted gaze, today I revert that gaze by choosing to navigate the discomfort of the memory and reclaim my narrative. CHOICE

“It seemed absolutely absurd and ridiculous that I was demanding that you wear a bra” (Diana Hampo, personal communication, October 19, 2013).  Diana vocalizes the absurdity of policing a student’s use of undergarments, thus making a crack in the hegemonic pedagogy of normative gender expressions that her former position as Dean of Students is charged with preserving.  

Additionally, one reason I was discouraged from some forms of gender non-conforming behavior was the potential for inhibiting my academic success and the success of my peers.  By presenting as a woman with a bald head and winning the state science fair while performing "distracting" gender cues, I am a counterexample to this conjecture.

As evidenced by her choice to handle the situation in the same way she did years ago, Diana separates the part she took as Dean of Students in repressing my gender expression as a youth from her contemporary support of my transgender male identity.  Perhaps she doesn’t recognize my refusal to wear a bra as a symptom of gender dysphoria. “Dean Hampo” is strongly impelled by habit, enculturation, and institutional pressures to preserve societal formulations of appropriate gender expression.  Diana is at the intersection of avowed support and lack of knowledge of the ways to be supportive.  Social justice solidarity, more trans-specific knowledge, and networks of support and discourse among ASMSA educators could have resulted in a more just treatment of me as a student.

Also enforcing the use of gendered clothing like brassieres on a precociously self-identifying trans youth does not provide a safe space for gender diversity.  This is a both an institutional and personal conflict of values and norms that situates the student with gender dysphoria at odds with the school and some faculty.

While parts of this student’s experience are only relevant to university settings, respect for a student’s preferred name is universally applicable.