I'm Fox Fisher, and I live in the UK.
I was assigned female at birth and for many years, like when my first puberty hit
I felt like my body was betraying me.
There was such a lack of information around trans issues and I didn't have the vocabulary
let alone the support, and that resulted in poor mental health and suicidal thoughts.
But this documentary isn't about struggle or hardship, even though we do touch upon that.
It's a story about two people in love trying to navigate their way through a world that largely doesn't believe
in their fundamental sense of self.
I'm Owl. I grew up on a remote in rural Iceland.
I was assigned male at birth, but I've never fitted nor identified with being a man.
Despite desperate attempts for years of being one.
I was always very reserved as a kid and I liked to spend a lot of time on my own.
I submersed myself into video games to escape from the reality around me. A world that saw me as a boy.
All anyone ever really wants is to be themselves and to be recognised for it.
But was non-binary people it becomes so difficult when most people have never even heard of non-binary people
and those that have are often very hostile.
Arriving at a non-binary gender identity has been a journey through finding what feels most comfortable
and the words that can best describe how I feel about myself.
I spent quite a lot of time when I was younger trying to fit into different boxes
and to be what I thought people expected me to be.
Yeah, being non-binary just enables me to live my life as I am and as I feel most comfortable.
We don't have language for ways to talk about non-binary people in the mainstream press or beyond press.
There's not been enough normalisation of us.
Identifying as non-binary means that I don't identify as the gender I was assigned at birth.
And I understand gender beyond what men and women socially are seen to be.
Non-binary for me means authenticity.
It means being masculine, feminine, both, none, being between the two.
Being liberated from the categories of genderness.
That can be a mixture of masculine and feminine traits or it can be neither.
And it just allows me to exist as myself in the world.
To me being non-binary is about knowing what I'm not by trying on things that didn't suit.
Whether that was clothing or people's expectations of me.
I can't imagine myself growing old as a woman.
I don't want to fit into the narrow expectations of what it is to be a man.
I'm much more than that, with all my experiences, all my empathy.
I'm genderqueer, androgynous, masculine. I am non-binary.
To me being non-binary is finding a sense of self in a world that is inherently binary.
It's about more than just denouncing gender stereotypes because it is in itself an identity.
Just like being a man or a woman.
It's an intrinstic part of who I am and it's about self-worth and it's about defiance.
It's about learning to celebrate and accept yourself outside of the binary.
Good morning beautiful people, it is the morning of Good Morning Britain.
So in about twenty minutes we're going to be picked up from the bottom of this hotel
We're on the 11th floor right now.
Good morning Owl.
- Hi!
And, are we excited?
- Yeah, but I hate mornings.
Yeah we hate mornings so we don't want to go on Good Morning Britain.
We wish GMB was actually in the afternoon, that would be better for us.
We'd go on Good Afternoon Britain, I'd love that.
Yeah, we'd like that better.
But anyway, it wasn't created for us and I don't think I've ever even watched the show.
We watched a tiny clip yesterday of Piers Morgan just losing the plot and acting like a baby about stuff.
It's seems like he's got two different personalities, he's got a serious one
and then when he doesn't get what he wants he goes: Rharahrahgahghhah!
So we are looking forward to that, hopefully we'll see that side of him too.
I brought my kid's book along as well, so I will be giving him 'Are You A Boy Or Are You A Girl' live on TV
So hopefully he'll accept it.
We are a bit nervous, but we've psyched ourselves up for this, everything we've been doing has led up to this point
It's four minutes, we can get a lot of information across in four minutes. Right?
Or we could be destroyed in four minutes.
- Or we could be destroyed in four minutes.
We just have to make sure we behave ourselves, don't lose the plot, stay focused, be loving
and use it as a teaching moment for people who don't quite get it.
It's like we're always having to prove who we are, always having to prove our identity.
We live this day in and day out, and it's just become this big news story about what non binary is
and how threatening that is to society or whatever. What a joke.
Anyway, we got to go. Talk to you soon. Bye-bye. Gaaah!
Before we event went on GMB they shared a photo of us on social media and already we were facing abuse.
Well it's wonderful to have all these different identifications...
Is it?
- I think it muddies the water a little bit.
Or is just a bunch of gobbledegook?
You've got to respect what people want to be called.
- Why? Why to I have to?
Because you live in the world
- It's about respect...
If I turned around right now and I said to you: I am a black woman.
You have said that. You said you were black and non-binary, haven't you?
Well I made a joke yesterday, but I'm actually being partly serious.
If I just decided to identify myself as a completely different skin colour to the one that I am
that would clearly be ridiculous, right?
The difference is that you don't.
But if I did, would you respect my right to identify myself how I choose?
We're not here to talk about race, we're here to talk about gender.
I'm asking you about race.
I'm taking your logic...
The problem is that this is a hypothetical intellectual discussion for you, but this is about our actual identity.
Yours is hypothetical, too.
- This is our every day, not just a 4 minute segment.
So basically you want the right to identify as you choose
- As non-binary.
Can I call myself a black woman?
Can I identify as that?
Can I say I am now a black woman?
Or is race different to gender?
I would say it's a completely different discussion.
A friend of mine has a girl at school and eight girls in her year and now non-binary.
So schools are now running riot with kids who-
- They're not running riot.
Yes, they are running riot, it's eight kids in one year in one school in this country.
It means that it's now like a contagion.
Why problem with everyone just being free to identify themselves in any way they choose
is where does that end?
Are there any boundaries?
For kids for instance at school?
If you can basically come in and say I'm not a boy or a girl anymore, what else can you say you're not?
If I identify now as anything?
Is anything fine? Can I be anything I want? Can I be an elephant?
Can I literally say I am now an elephant? Do I get afforded elephant rights?
Can I go to London zoo?
- This is silly, sorry Piers.
I'm taking your argument. Can I go to London zoo and demand to be put in an elephant compound
because I have decided I am an elephant?
The real question should be, why is it that 48% of trans youth are attempting suicide?
We should just respect and acknowledge that that's the way it is?
Isn't everything subject to change?
Maybe, you might be right.
That's exactly what we are trying to say, you need to respect gender and their identity and their right.
We're going to have to hugely change this programme unless I bring this to an end
Fox and Owl, thank you very much.
- Fox and Owl, great to see you.
It is good to see, I really appreciate it.
- It's a fascinating subject.
Read the book, it's for three year olds and plus so it should be good for you, Piers.
Are You A Boy Or Are You A Girl.
- It's a very binary title, but...
It's an introduction.
I have to leave this discussion to continue because that's the end of the conversation.
Hey everybody, we're just here at the studios of ITV as you can see from the stuff behind us.
I don't know if you managed to watch it but we were just on GMB with Piers Morgan and Susanna...
I don't know her last name actually.
- Reid.
Even though he was always derailing the argument, he started talking about race
and then he started talking about being an elephant
- And we kept trying to bring it back.
I think now we are going to go to the hotel and die.
Our four minute segment because a fifteen minute feature
making it one of the longest discussions on mainstream television about non-binary issues to date.
The press afterwards became so intense that we weren't even able to keep track of it all.
It's widely believed that there are only two genders and that you can either be a man or a woman.
People believe that this is governed by the genitals we're born with.
If you're born with a penis, you're a man.
If you're born with a vagina, you're a woman.
We place certain expectations upon men and women based on this such as traits, behaviour, hobbies
and even colours.
In other words, we categorise people based on their outer genitalia and socialise them differently
according to our own definitions of men and women.
With increased awareness of trans people we've become a literal and visible proof
that this system doesn't neccessarily work.
And the meaning we place behind sex and gender are socially constructed.
In countries such as the UK trans people have received increased social and legal recognition
and access to health care allowing us to be ourselves socially, physically and legally.
But non-binary people are being left behind.
Most people probably understand what it is to be a trans men or a trans woman.
But what about trans people that don't identify with the rigid categories of being a man or a woman?
This is where non-binary people come in, or trans people that don't exclusively identify as men or women.
Non-binary gender identities are increasingly vast and consist of people who feel that
their gender is fluid, as both a man and a woman, somewhere in between
or completely outside of the binary system.
In a world that is so obsessed with this binary gender system, non-binary people face many challenges.
Non-binary people are largely not socially nor legally recognised and we lack the terms and language
to describe our experiences and identities properly.
Our culture and language are embedded with binaries and even such simple things as
describing a romantic partner can be tricky.
We wanted to give people a human reference point so they could see beyond the superficial
media coverage or comment section idea of what it is to be non-binary.
I'm sure that anyone watching this documentary can think of moments in their life
when something you did or something you said wasn't seen as appropriate for your assigned gender.
When you challenge the system, even in a small way, you will immediately experience
people policing your expression.
It's in the tone of someone's voice and it can create a very hostile atmosphere for people like us.
But let's rewind a little.
Our story beings in Iceland.
Guess what?
- What?
You are on the list of the top ten sexiest women in Iceland.
Top ten sexist women in Iceland... And I'm on this list?
Number two is Heiða Rún which means... 
- Oh my God!
That I'm number one.
Wow, look at that.
It's a nice photo.
So how does it feel to be the sexist woman in Iceland?
It feels a bit strange, and a bit weird because I've been very public about being non-binary.
That's right, there's no list for non-binary people.
- No.
But it's funny that I am on the top of a list of the ten sexist women in Iceland.
Yesterday we were on a list of the most extravagant queer couples in Iceland.
Just below the Prime Minister and her wife.
Which is quite funny. It wasn't a ranking though, but it was still funny.
That they thought of us as number two at the top of the queer couples.
And you've been here for a week!
How does it feel to date the sexiest woman of Iceland?
Pretty amazing, it's gonna be a fun day.
So the post went up how long ago?
- Twenty-three hours ago.
It's about our video about us being non-binary and words to call each other.
Part of the problem is also because people expect non-binary people to be androgynous in the way they express
So that a non-binary person identifying in a very feminine way and presenting very feminine
people sometimes don't see their identity as as valid in a way.
Or vice versa like I do, because I present as quite masculine.
Our vlog about non-binary lovers and partner names was posted on a hate page on facebook
resulting in over 7000 abusive comments in less than twenty-four hours.
'Maybe they should shut the fuck up and start acting normal and realise that there are only two genders'
Wow, such empirical knowledge right there.
It's called the Cringe Channel, it's like the pool of hate on facebook.
Can you show it to me?
'The world I prefer is nuclear holocaust'
- 'They should call themselves fucking faggots'.
Um, that's nice.
- 'A pair of dumbasses'.
'White people'
- I'm not white!
'We call them mentally handicapped'.
There is so much ableism in this as well.
What was that comment from a trans person?
It says: 'they give transgenders a bad name and we already have it rough with people'.
'Slutbag and faggot', that's nice.
'My homie Adolf wouldn't have any of this shit'.
Oh wow.
'Ass-ticklers faggot fanclub'.
'Trick question. Non-binary people don't have lovers'.
'Butt buddies'.
'Cancer, that's a perfect name'.
How do you feel about getting so much hate?
Are you used to it?
I'm very used to it, actually.
On this scale? I mean this is like 600 pages of hate and growing.
Anybody who has anything to do with social justice or human rights get alot of shit like this.
Yeah, I guess so. I'm just not used to reading the comments. I should probably stop this.
I'm just going to carry on chopping vegetables.
I just honestly want to make a video right now, where I can just scroll down and people can read the comments.
Oh, yeah. No, do that. I'm relaly not used to this amount of hate.
Just feel like it's really weird. I think I have a very idealistic view of the world.
And this is the pit of hell I've just been looking at.
What I'm mostly concerned about with this whole thing is that people feel the need to actually say this.
And they feel the need to go out of their way and comment those hateful things and share it...
and I just wonder what do these people do in their lives?
Why do they feel the need to do it?
Why are they so threatened?
Yeah, and what's the gain? What's the gain out of this?
I just feel like these people must be really sad.
And they just must be really going through something terrible.
And they aren't happy with themselves and that's why they try to put other people down.
I've got like a really crappy eye because I think I'm like stressed out and stuff.
So I'm just putting a hot compress on my eye at the moment.
I'm leaving this one.
Honestly, most of the things people say on those comments or whatever are comments that we...
Have heard before?
Have heard before and some of them are even in our video, that we are releasing [today].
Literally some of those things are in there.
How are you?
- Fabulous, fabulous.
I've been really annoyed about trans this, trans that...
It's just a trend, darling.
It's just a trend! A some sort of fad, isn't it?
All they are doing is just trying to deceive people.
Can't man up? Can't be a man? Decide to be a woman? Disgusting!
Why go through all this and be trans when you can just-
- Be gay?
Why've they got to be trans? It's sexual!
I think they are taking the easy way out.
It's like the fall of morals in society, you know?
First Conchita wins Eurovision, and then Caitlyn Jenner comes...
I know darling. It's just not normal!
And all they want is to get a tiny bit of attention.
Attention-seekers!
Trying to get attention?
Really?
If by attention you mean getting disowned, not getting proper health care, being harassed, being berated...
All that stuff.
Then yes, I am trying to get attention.
Goodness gracious me.
- They live amongst us!
Social media can go to such extremes where one moment you're voted the sexiest woman of Iceland...
... and the next you're receiving 7000 comments of hate.
At the time we weren't even living in the same country and Fox had to head back to the UK.
So we didn't really have the time to deal with it or process the whole thing.
After Fox left I went to visit my parents.
They live on a remote farm in rural Iceland and they spoke for the first time on camera
about me being a non-binary trans person.
I'm very proud of Ugla. And you too Fox.
I am very proud too, for both of you.
For both of you.
Because you two have a good life.
Out of all the different challenges that non-binary people face the fact that we aren't legally recognised
and can't get our ID documents changed remains as one of the most obvious ones.
Owl and I wondered how this might affect people's right to get married
We are here to meet Shannon who is a non-binary person of the cloth
and hopefully they are going to explain to us whether we can get married as non-binary.
My name is Shannon. I have always been non-binary, although I've only had that label for the last 6-7 years.
I am nearly 61 years of age, and a lot of people think that non-binary is this new concept
and it's something that all these teenagers are jumping on the bandwagon with.
But that is not the case. I am not the only person who later in life identifies as non-binary.
We didn't have the vocabulary before to be able to speak about ourselves in that way.
But we've always known that we didn't fit into the categories that society was offering us
of being either male or female.
Being able to identify in this way, to actually have a label to attach to how I understood myself...
It was only when I discovered that there was such a thing as non-binary that I suddenly found:
Oof. Yeah. I'm at home.
Hi!
- Hello!
Good to see you!
Oh, lovely. We have a question for you.
- Mhm.
We would like to know if it's possible for us to get married as non-binary.
I wish I could say yes, but unfortunately not in the UK.
The UK only recognises the two genders: male and female.
And the law stipulates that you either have to be male-female couple, or male-male couple or female-female
in order to enter into marriage.
You can't even have a civil partnership because that also requires people to identify as the same gender
and within the binary structure.
So as things stand at the moment as non-binary people, you can't actually enter into that.
Okay, well that's a disappointment.'
There are churches that would be very happy to bless your relationship
but of course that won't offer any legal protection or be legally binding in any way.
And of course the fight for same-sex marriage was all about trying to ensure
that same sex couples had the same legal protections as heterosexual couples
and obviously at some point this really needs to change so that non-binary couples
can also share in those same protections and legal rights and responsibilities.
Thank you for clarifying that for us. Thank you so much, what a pleasure.
Let's hope that we can change that in the years to come.
Yeah, too right. Thank you.
Thank you for coming, lovely to see you again.
From church to state, religion to politics, the next step on our journey was parliament.
Now that we know that we can't get married, we wanted to speak with the law makers.
It's definitely true that a lot of the roots of marriage are based on these stereotypical gendered roles
of a man owning a woman, women only having rights to property through a man...
And it seems quite silly that in the 21st century that we've come so far
and we fought for the right to be married in the LGB community at least, and yet there's not even recognition
of the fact that some people want to choose to identify in different ways
and marriage should have adapted to allow that as well.
There are still many areas that we need to look into and we're looking at that from a Scottish perspective
and best practice, and we're undertaking a review at the moment to look specifically how
we can change the law so that it recognises everybody in whatever way they identify.
And I think that's really important.
I think there's a lot to be positive about, as Angela says, particularly in Scotland
because we don't have power over all aspects, but what we do have power over
we're going to do our best to change.
That's very positive, it's been really wonderful chatting with you both. Thank you so much.
Pleasure. Thank you.
- We really appreciate it.
So that was a very interesting chat.
Yeah, it was. There seems to be a lot going on, they actually revealed a lot of cool things that's going on.
But still it's such a slow...
- It's a slow process.
And it's such a shame because we need things to move forward quite quickly
and to them it seems like nothing is going to really happen in the next few years.
Which is very disappointing considering that there are other countries that are miles ahead.
Why can't we be leading the way?
The quest continues!
- The quest continues.
Feeling a bit hopeless we decided to head home and think about what would be our next step.
So I've been thinking about this whole marriage thing and the fact that we couldn't get married
even if we wanted to.
I'm thinking maybe we could do a protest wedding.
And just host a wedding and raise awareness that not everybody can actually get married in the UK.
Yeah, that's a good idea.
Is this where I propose to you?
I guess it is.
Want to get protest married?
Yeah, yeah I do!
Obviously marriage isn't for everyone and is controversial for a multitude of reasons
and there are so many other issues facing non-binary people other than our inability to get married.
But the fact remains that everyone should have the same right and a protest wedding
would raise awareness of the wider issue of lack of gender recognition for non-binary people.
To get a wider perspective decided to visit two young non-binary people that currently support other enbies
in their local area and to hear their thoughts on being non-binary in the UK today.
♪ Not today, maybe soon ♪
♪ There'll be enough of us ♪
♪ To show our truth ♪
♪ We're not one, not the other ♪
♪ I'm not a sister, and I'm not your brother ♪
♪ I'm something more, I'mma something in between ♪
♪ Whatever you wanna be ♪
What would you say is the the shittiest part of being non-binary?
The fact that it just technically doesn't exist in a lot of people's brains.
Because whether you look at toilets... It's just not a thing.
You can be female and that's the one you go to, or you're male and you go there.
So yeah, you're just picking whether or not you want to get in a disabled person's way
Yeah, jump in a box that you know you're not supposed to be in.
And have the weird looks regardless.
It's the same with marriage, you can't be married as non-binary.
You've got to choose.
My concerns of marriage have changed drastically from: 'Will I be loved as a non-binary person?'
To: 'will I be able to marry in a way that makes me comfortable?'
And I just don't know if I can right now.
I don't know if it's going to be a thing for a long time because I think it's something that's slipped
under the radar.
Obviously it's like: 'gay marriage, let's legalise gay marriage'.
But maybe we just need to legalise marriage.
The job I have at the moment is the first job where I've actually been able to come out
and...
- How is that?
It's been pretty cool actually. Half the management is gay.
So they were all quite accepting and have trans friends.
- Oh, that's so cool.
I've only had like two jobs and I attempted to come out at one.
But when you're a teenager, people do not respect it and I learned quite quickly
that the lesson is that it's much better to keep your mouth shut
because in certain situations people are not going to respect you.
I'm learning to navigate those situations and refrain from telling people things for your own safety.
I came out five and a half years ago now, so I was thinking that society's changed so much
over the past five years, I'm so much more accepted now, and people go: oh yeah, that actually makes sense.
But I think I just stopped being a teenager and people actually respect my opinion as an adult.
When I came out at 16 people were like: 'Oh, you're 16, you don't know who you are, what you want...'
Now I'm 22 and people are like: 'Well, if that's the way you feel, that's the way you are...'
Like, you've been on about it for this long now!
This has been the past six years of my life, it hasn't just started now.
♪ Show your truth ♪
♪ Show it true ♪
♪ We're not one, not the other ♪
♪ I'm not a sister, and I'm not your brother ♪
♪ I'm something more, I'mma something in between ♪
♪ Whatever you want to be ♪
♪ Not one, not the other ♪
♪ Call your sisters and call your brothers ♪
♪ There's more of us that you're gonna see ♪
♪ And more of us to be ♪
♪ The only way that we can be ♪
♪ Oh-do-do-roo, you and me ♪
♪ We just wanna be ♪
♪ And be seen on TV ♪
♪ Not one, not the other ♪
♪ Not one, not the other ♪
♪ Not one, not the other ♪
Father Michael was kind enough to invite us over to tea to talk about things
and we had a chat with him about non-binary issues  from a theological perspective.
Faith is a gift, so it's that which you know, and in the book of Hebrew it says that is which is it's own evidence.
So somebody who is trans models what it is to live in faith.
Because you're living with this identity that nobody else affirms.
But you know, or they know, whole-heartedly who they are.
But also, it's really interesting that in the the Jewish tradition in the Talmud and the Mishnah
you have four gender states.
So you have male and female, you have androgynous and you have tum-tum.
And tum-tum is somebody who's gender cannot be defined.
And biblically I've always understood gender as being on a continuum anyway.
And Jesus says that when people die they become like angels and we have no gender.
Neither married, or given in marriage. Our spiritual identity is one that encompasses both genders and none
Quite soon after the proposal, we decided to host our non-binary protest wedding.
We just needed someone to perform the ceremony.
So we are here to visit our friend Olli, who has actually done a protest wedding with you in the past.
Yeah, I think Olli is the perfect person to ask.
And also Olli defines as...
- As non-binary as well.
So we thought Olli would be the person to do it.
- Nice to see you.
- Hi!
We were wondering if you'd do me the honor, do us the honor
of being the vicar for our protest wedding? Because we're going to have a non-binary protest wedding.
I'd be honored. Oh, congratulations!
Thank you so much.
I feel kind of nervous. Do you feel nervous?
I don't know, I think it's because it doesn't feel like it's a real thing because we can't actually get married.
I suppose it would feel different if we were actually able to get married.
I think it will feel quite powerful though.
I always cry at weddings, hope I don't cry at my own wedding.
Everyone should have the right and freedom to be recognised for who they are.
A marriage ceremony is a celebration of how far a couple have come.
Hopefully one day all non-binary people will be able to officially get married.
Today we are gathered here to celebrate your lives, as you join as one you are both partners in crime and love.
Owl, do you take Fox to be your partner in life and your one true love?
Will you cherish the moments you work together, the moments you laugh together
love them faithfully through good times and bad
regardless of the obstacles and the hateful youtube comments you may face together?
Do you give your hand, your heart and your love from this day foward for as long as you both shall live?
I do.
And Fox, do you promise all that I said too, and to keep Owl entertained for as long as you both shall live?
I do.
May we have the rings, please?
Please place this ring on their finger and repeat after me.
Fox, I give you this ring because that seems to be what I am supposed to be doing right now.
Fox, I give you this ring because that seems to be what I am supposed to be doing right now.
By the power vested in me, which actually isn't any at all I'm sad to say
I pronounce you partners in life and invite you to kiss one another, while we all watch.
After the protest wedding we saw down with my parents
and we talked about me being non-binary for the first time.
It's been a great day.
- Yeah?
All your friends around, celebrating and enjoying ourselves despite the dreadful weather.
I know, I know. It didn't rain during our ceremony but just afterwards.
While I got you here, I was going to ask you if there was any moment that you recognised
that I was different to the gender that I was assigned at birth, when I was growing up?
The amount of time you spent in shorts... We thought it was just a tomboy-type thing.
And I don't think there was any inkling of anything else, because we didn't know any different.
I think that would be the truth.
I think when you got to be a teenager you seemed to be... full of angst.
Very unhappy...
- Well, not very unusual for a teenager.
And I really thought it was because you were gay.
And that you really didn't want to tell us about it.
I think we may have broached that with you and it still didn't make you very happy to
realise that we were accepting of the fact that you may be gay.
Yes, I see. So it didn't really solve the problem.
- No, no.
Do you fully understand non-binary issues?
- No, I'm afraid I don't!
I get so confused when we're talking about they/them...
- Yeah.
So let me ask you. You are now a trans man... yes?
- I'm trans masculine, I would say.
Okay, you're trans feminine. So why are you not happy with that?
When I came out as trans I noticed that people were very quick to push on me the woman or the feminine role.
And I felt that people took me from one box and put me in another and I didn't feel comfortable with people
trying to put me somewhere and people telling me how I should look or how I should dress
or how I should identify.
To look at you, you look a typical man and you look like a beautiful woman...
And you could've carried on and got by in society,  people would say you're a lovely couple...
But you've chosen to, out of the fact that you...
- It sounds like we're being very rebellious, but...
It's more that it doesn't fully suit, you know?
It kind of erases both our history, and I'm very proud of where I've come from and who I am
and that's a huge part of me as well.
Yeah, I'm very proud of being trans so for me to hide that it wouldn't feel right.
But there are lots of people out there who are trans who are binary, as in male to female, female to male
who just want to get on in life, and I completely respect that as well.
But I think in order to make change people need to stand up for who they are and what they believe in.
I would like to see more people just being themselves because I think that ultimately makes a better society
and we're not just all the same types of people, that's a very boring world to live in.
It would be.
So yeah, thank you for your support, I really really appreciate it.
It means everything.
We're just so happy that you've found Owl to put you on the straight and narrow!
There's a joke in there somewhere, mum!
We're not straight or narrow.
The most common stereotype of a non-binary person that people have
is that they are androgynous, thin, white and non-disabled.
And as a person of colour, I am painfully aware of the lack of representation within the trans community.
And this is why we wanted to hear thoughts from a wide range of non-binary people.
To get a realistic view of the community and the challenges that we all face.
I can't generalise or speak for everybody of colour, but definitely my family...
It's such a difference coming out as trans or non-binary, it's a really hard thing to explain as it is.
They can understand being gay. You know, just about.
But being trans? It's like: 'Why are you choosing to be a boy?'
I've had it where I went to a funeral in Trinidad and I had somebody come up to me
just before we were cremating my uncle and infront of 150 members of my family
they decided this was the time to pat me down and figure out why they couldn't see...
My bra and why I didn't have breasts.
And in that moment I was so emotional because of the funeral, but also just so surprised that...
I would just never think...
My mind doesn't... I don't think about how other people have sex, I don't think about their body parts.
I don't want to generalise, but with a lot of people of colour... They're very vocal.
And it's part of the culture.
So you have to be ready if you're within the spectrum and you're proud of who you are
and you're showing certain sides of yourself...
You've got to be ready to be called out in some ways by people, like when I go back to the Caribbean.
I may notice things about people and never mention it.
But it's something I've had to learn to deal with.
But what are some of the challenges that non-binary people face in other parts of the world?
On our travels we met with a few non-binary people across Europe and learned about their experiences.
So what would you like to change in the future for non-binary people in Ireland and beyond?
In Ireland, if you want to access medical transition, it's very binary.
And so non-binary people tend to have to pretend that they're either a trans man or a trans woman.
So changing that would be massive.
There's always the need to remind that we exist.
That, hey, we might have our own needs that are different.
Or we need documents that reflect who we are.
In a country with a language that is very binary, that becomes also more complicated.
Because to explain who we are and what we need to the general public, it becomes more difficult
and more complex.
There is such a huge diversity of genders and there are many ways of experiencing them
and expressing them.
I remember when I first met the first Romanian non-binary person, and I thought:
'Oh my God, there is somebody else!'
'That's amazing!'
It was difficult to relate in a way and we were speaking a lot in English
because that was the only way we could express our identity.
If we are not able to use our own words to describe our identities then it's like they don't exist, in a way.
I come from Slovenia and I am the first out non-binary trans person in the country.
I came out through this really three page long interview in a very well read magazine.
And I knew everything about what would be written of course, but not the title.
And the title then was: 'Not a man, not a woman'.
I think it says a lot about what people think non-binary is.
We're just our own gender and we experience it very differently
but it doesn't necessarily need to be defined in relation to the two binary genders.
So a man, or a woman.
There's also the norm of what a non-binary person is supposed to look like.
Which is very much tied into being androgynous, and what is androgyny connected to?
It's connected to what is socially seen as male.
All the diverse bodies and gender expressions come along with non-binary people
they are just inconceivable to people, really.
And where they could really just accept diversity, many people really fail.
In Poland, non-binary issues aren't that visible.
Non-binary people by their very existance they intrude in a very well developed system
where you have men and women.
And even binary trans people don't interrupt that system in the same way because
they fall into the boxes, and that's fine.
It is threatening in a way for the general population to know that everything they've learned
from their very beginning, from the moment that they were born, their whole childhood...
Is honestly, it's not true.
It's not true that there's only two types of us.
On top of all the challenges we face in society, we also face issues of exclusion for within the trans community.
I brought you some tea.
- Thank you.
What are you doing?
I am actually looking at twitter.
There's just a lot of weird comments because Topshop just announced this gender-neutral changing rooms.
And there have been a lot of, not only cis people, but also trans people speaking out against it.
There is this one tweet where somebody says:
'I think gender neutrality is doing a real disservice to genuine trans women'.
'Transgender has been hijacked'.
And then somebody challenges this and they say: 'I love gender, you don't. We are not the same.'
It's not about hating gender, it's not about erasing gender.
And that's what they don't get.
Isn't it like saying you can only be straight or gay? And there's no bi or pan or whatever?
Nothing is black and white.
Why would a trans person speak out against a gender neutral space?
I don't really get it.
Gender neutral changing rooms aren't only good for non-binary people and gender non-conforming people
but also for trans women and trans men that don't pass.
A lot of trans people face harassment in gendered spaces like toilets, changing rooms or anything.
At the start of my transition I definitely felt really uncomfortable going into
the males toilets and changing rooms and if there had been a gender neutral option
that would have made it so much easier.
And to be honest, when I go into changing rooms now in loads of shops, it usually is gender neutral
or if I got a friend with me that's a girl, she just comes into the guys', it's not a big deal.
And then somebody said: 'the way I see it trans is what you call a dysphoric person who wants to
is currently or has already transitioned'.
Right. Well, what about people that can't medically transition for like medical reasons
or not having enough money or something? Does that make them less trans?
That doesn't make sense.
They basically say that if you don't identify as a man or a woman you can't be trans
where as the literal definition of being trans is that you don't identify with the gender you were assigned at birth.
There are no other requirements you need to fullfill to be trans.
And we shouldn't have to tick certain boxes to be trans.
I never even knew about non-binary, I never had even heard that term before.
Before meeting Fox and you and I've learned about it since then.
Back in the day when I didn't really know anything about being trans I just thought
trans was this black and white thing of like me where you feel...
Where you transition from one gender to the 'opposite', you know what I mean?
Not saying 'the opposite', but you know.
It's not like people that identify as non-binary or gender-neutral or whatever
it's not like that takes away from my identity, that I'm a guy.
So I just don't understand how it impacts me. These people that are...
These other trans people that are ranting about it, I don't understand how it impacts them.
'There should be emphasis put on the seriousness of being trans'.
'We wouldn't want a GNC person transitioning'.
What's that?
- Gender non-conforming.
What is the problem with a gender non-conforming person transitioning?
There are plenty of trans women and trans men who are gender non-conforming.
Like someone who is cisgender could be...
Well, someone that doesn't...
Someone who is cisgender can be gender non-conforming.
Exactly, that is what I was going to say.
They obviously feel comfortable with their body, you could get someone that is gender non conforming
that doesn't feel comfortable with their body and needs to take the steps to...
Do you know what I mean?
It seems that there is such a misunderstanding between gender identity and gender expression.
So people don't realise that non-binary, or trans woman or a cis woman, or cis man are all gender identities
and it doesn't matter how you dress or what physical traits you have.
That is who you are.
I mean if you would wear a dress, you wouldn't stop being a man.
Exactly, yeah.
What sparked the debate about gender-neutral changing rooms in the media was when Travis Alabanza
a non-binary performance artist
was refused access to a women's changing room in Topshop.
As any trans person has discovered, the media in the UK often twists stories about trans people.
So we went to visit Travis to hear what actually happened.
I'm only really just now processing what happened.
Back in November 2017 I was invited to shop at Topshop for the opening press night
of a show that I was in, in Manchester.
And I was refused access because of my perceived gender.
They told me to go down to Topman, and I said to them:
'Oh, I won't be safe down in Topman, I'm in make-up, and I'm in a dress'
'And this is where I'd rather try on a dress'.
My other two friends were women and I would rather we all got changed together.
The person continued to say no, and then I knew that Topshop had recently changed their policy
four or five months before this, so this couldn't happen.
So I mentioned that to her, I said: 'I think actually you'll find that your policy has changed'.
'You have to let me in'.
And she said no, please go down to Topman.
And I just walked out, I wasn't going to deal with it today.
We were having a really nice day and I didn't want that to ruin the day.
I left and I tweeted about it, went to bed, thought nothing about it.
Woke up and it was in all the headlines that I had changed the policy.
Because Topshop had clumsily tweeted back to people saying the policy has changed now.
They didn't really know what to do when all the people were tweeting them
it meant that the press really didn't understand what was happening.
I then was in most major news stories, I had coverage on most TV programmes and news outlets.
They kind of created this debate around me as a body.
As someone that was visibly not passing as either gender.
And as someone that was wanting to use women's spaces, but wasn't identifying as a woman
but also wasn't looking like other trans feminine people we'd seen recently in the press.
It started to create a really dangerous conversation about what bodies are having what spaces.
I think for me it was the first time maybe people had seen this public debate.
Around a gender non-conforming person, but not knowing what language to use.
I switched off, I didn't look at anything. I was receiving thousands of death threats.
People were actually heckling me at the street in Manchester.
People came to the show that I was starring in at the Royal Exchange and threatened to boycott the theatre.
Luckily Royal Exchange Theatre completely stood by me and all the aggressive tweets they got
telling me to quit my job, bearing in mind that I was a lead trans person in one of the biggest theatres
and they were calling for the theatre to sack me.
Whilst this was happening in my present life, online this debate was forming abou
who can acess these spaces.
Often in those articles they were picking up old photos of me.
There were lots of photos that were being circulated where a bulge was showing of mine
in one of my dresses and they would circle the bulge.
On mainstream news even they were picking up specifically old photos from my instagram
maybe ones without me wearing make-up, ones of me in trousers.
None of these making me less non-binary, but obvioiusly to a public discourse
it confuses people on why I would be needing to use the space.
When obviously when they would ask me what spaces I use, often when I'm presenting in a certain way
that I feel safe, I actually go into male spaces because why would I want to cause myself more fuss
than it's worth?
No one thought to think of the detail that actually that day it wouldn't be safe for me
to walk into a changing room like this.
What my scraping through the press and still my visibility challenges people to think about
is that unfortunately it's not just causing conflict with cis people
I think it's really pushing certain trans people about what they view trans is.
What they feel and who can say they're trans.
We saw prominent trans figures saying that I shouldn't be allowed in the changing room.
They were really debating whether or not I could call myself trans because I hadn't had x, y, z done.
It's wild that we create this gatekeeping onto a community that's already been consistently
gatekept throughout time.
It's weirdly dangerous that we start to create these binary ways of being trans
in an experience that in it's essence isn't binary.
It's often that we forget that gender non-conforming feminine people face the most of this brunt of violence.
It wouldn't have happened if I looked a different way.
That's been really hard to deal with, that no one's talking about the specifics.
This was because I was non-binary, this was because I was gender non-conforming.
People thought I was a trans man in the press, people thought I was a trans woman.
People thought I was a gay boy.
No one knew what to talk about me with, so therefore weren't having valid discussions.
Despite all the challenges that we face, good things are also happening.
For example, just after the GMB interview, we fired out a tweet, asking people
for their selifes to show the world what non-binary people look like.
Just going to have a nice day today hopefully, and be able to try and...
Yeah we need to have a look at social media and see whatever the hell is going on.
It was about midnight and we were just on the phone and I was like:
'Fox, let's just go to bed and sleep now, and then in the morning we will come back to it'.
So yeah, we're going to take a look.
Let's see what's happening.
So got 99+ notifications, which is a lot.
Alright, wow.
So got lots of pictures coming through.
Oh my god, there's so much.
That was an hour ago and I've already scrolled quite a lot.
So let's just try and get back to, what was it, 10 hours ago?
Let's just see what we got going on and just trawl through.
Oh my god, there's so much. It's unbelievable.
This is what happens when things go viral!
So cool. So this is two hours already in and we're just... And these are just my notifications.
This isn't even me looking into the #ThisIsWhatNonBinaryLooksLike, the actual hashtag.
Owl, this is seriously powerful and I think this is a really great example of how social media
can completely help, we can still manage to make an impact and together we're obviously way stronger.
And it's so cool being able to see people's faces.
That's great: 'non-binary QTIPOC here, this hashtag is just so beautiful.'
That's so nice.
To me this feels like we're at a point in our understanding, or the world's understanding
of non-binary issues that we haven't been at before.
We just haven't been having these conversations.
This is so great, it's so nice to see people that I recognise and people that I don't know at all.
And from all over the world as well.
Yeah look we got Wiktor from from Poland.
Looking fabulous.
There also seems to be a lot of haters that are trying to take over the hashtag.
But they are just being very unsuccessful because there are just so many people posting.
It's just so extreme. It's a reply to someone's photo.
Right.
And it's ridiculous because we are totally dominating this hashtag.
And I think because the whole interview just exploded the media, because it was such an aggressive interview.
Piers was so intense and he just wasn't there to listen or be educated at all
but we kept our cool and I think that really showed, you know...
Him losing his shit and us keeping it together and just trying our best to explain to this person
that didn't want to listen.
Yeah, exactly.
And I think that's why people were upset about it, and that's why people are like:
'Let's show everyone what it's actually like to be non-binary'.
He had really weird ideas, he was like:
'Well, if Fox and Owl are non-binary, then why are they dressed like a man and a woman?'
Exactly and we immediately thought, wow this is a really teachable moment because...
That is the question that people ask all the time.
'Well, if you're non-binary then why do you look like that'.
And there are obviously so many preconceived ideas about what non-binary looks like.
And we are not just like you said before, we're not just all androgynous blobs.
We actually do have the right to express ourselves because gender identity and gender expression
are two different things.
I mean already we have women who present as masculine and we have men who present as feminine
so why do we think that non-binary people have to be androgynous?
It doesn't make any sense to me.
Yeah, that's true. Of course, because women can wear masculine clothing
and it doesn't take away from them identifying as a woman
and vice versa as well.
I'm just so overwhelmed, all of these comments... I look forward to trawling through it.
But I think it's going to probably take a few hours.
You kind of have to be just: 'Like, retweet, comment'.
- 'Like, like like'.
It's amazing, it's so cool.
So yeah, how wonderful is that?
High five?
Just around the time we finished filming for this documentary the government announced
that they would be refoming the GRA, or the Gender Recognition Act.
This has lead to a vile and an horrendous media onslaught around trans people.
Where day after day we see demonising articles that misrepresent and trivialise our lives.
Even trans people are under attack, where bigots try to mask their transphobia with fear-mongering tactics
and disingenuous concern.
But it goes beyond just the media and we truly are living in an epidemic of violence against trans people
with increased hate crimes and violence, particularly against trans feminine people
and trans people of colour.
We're living in pivotal times and this is one of the many tipping points for trans people in the UK.
The GRA centres around allowing people to get a new birth certificate.
And if the proposed changes go through the process will be made much more humane.
It would create a legal process where people sign a statutory declaration
as opposed to needing a diagnosis from a health care professional.
Following on from the government's announcement to reform the GRA, they released data from an LGBT survey
alongside opening a public consultation about the GRA.
The survey is one of the biggest database of the experiences of of LGBT people in the UK and beyond.
So we just came from a meeting with some people who worked on the LGBT survey that's just been released.
Out of the 14.500 trans people that responded, over half or about 52 percent were non-binary.
And I think when we talk about trans issues, non-binary issues sometimes get forgotten or not talked about
Non-binary as a category has really blossomed into the public visibility in the last five years.
Maybe a little longer.
But with that visibility comes risk, comes discrimination and stigma.
And one third of non-binary people have experienced verbal harassment according to these survey results.
Harassment affects people's lives in different ways so...
Three quarters of non-binary people feel that they can't be open about their gender identity
in their day to day lives, whether it's employment or school.
When they are actually open about it, they also face opposition
I think about three quarters of everybody who said they were open to their teachers at school
experienced that they didn't understand them, there was a lack of understanding of what non-binary is
and how to cater to their needs.
It underlines a clear need for non-binary recognition and recognise that they have specific needs
which might be slightly different to other trans people, such as trans men and trans women
even though they do intersect in many ways.
And although the conversation is about non-binary recognition right now
that means thinking about, do we really need gender on this piece of information?
Is gender really necessary here?
Who is this for? Why are we collecting this information?
So with the potential for the law to be degendered, to some extent.
There was a recent court case championed by Christine Elan-Cane
where the judge recognised that not being able to identify as non-binary
was a violation of one's human rights.
Under article 8 of the European Convention of Human Rights.
So in some ways, we can look at non-binary recognition in this country as inevitable.
And it's just a case of when as opposed to if, at this point.
... that we are the gift.
We are valid.
We are beautiful.
There is nothing wrong with us. Quite the opposite, everything is right with us.
Non-binary people being accepted as who they are won't affect anyone in a negative way.
But it will make our lives better and we can truly be ourselves.
We're hopeful for the future and we know that change will come.
Non-binary people are not going away.
And we hope that soon we will be recognised both socially and legally.
Only time can tell what comes to pass, but we are certain that we can and will overcome this.
But in order to do that, we need help and solidarity from our allies, our friends and family.
In the future, we are going to look back on this time.
Which side of history do you want to be on?
