We have two beautiful features out this week, both tied to the notion of how language displays and allows us to own our identities.
First, columnist Emily Hauser writes about how motherhood is supposed to be both a full-time avocation and a life-defining role, and yet, paradoxically, how mothers are taught to elide or discard it in order to perform as individuals in the workplace and the world.
“In a culture rooted in and built on misogyny, it serves those in power to tell you that motherhood is both a woman’s highest calling and not up to her. Both parts of that are a lie,” Hauser writes.
And, as Dianna Anderson writes in their piece this week, transphobic discourse isn’t harmless, nor is it an ‘opinion’: trans lives are not up for debate. As Anderson points out, “Having language that feels right to describe who you are has long been the project of the queer community as we seek recognition and civil rights.” Language for identity is the floor, not the ceiling. “I’m a human being who is tired of being considered a divisive issue simply for existing.”
During a record-breaking year for anti-trans legislation, elevating trans changemakers is more important than ever.
Read more on language:
How the prison system fails to acknowledge incarcerated trans identities
America is literally warring over words
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