please join me in welcoming to

the stage schuyler bailar. cool. all all right. am i supposed to use this one or so? see this one? do you think you zoom? can you hear me? all right, cool. i was. i was, like, fighting back tears as as everybody's doing the intro. just i was i was born in new york city and to be able to be here with all of you, all i see so many friends. i see so much community. it means a lot to me to be here. so i just want to thank you for

you all coming. this book has been a labor of love. it's been an exhausting labor. i've been saying, i've been working on it for the past year and a half or so. but i think really i've been working on it my whole life. so i'm going to start by reading a about it, about it from it. and i'm somebody who likes go in order. so i'm going to start at the beginning and then i'm going to bring it up and have a phone conversation and then we'll have you all ask questions. so stay tuned for when you ask your questions like i said, i would start with the introduction. it's titled i am just who i am. sorry, i'm like i said, i said, what do we think? stand up. okay. we had vote. okay, standing it is. thank you. all right. i'm a source. i'd rather be like, you know, so going on all, i'm just who i am. we walk out one at a time in alphabetical order.

my last name begins with be i'm first, i can feel my heart in my ears. the sound held inside my cap by my silicone cap a little echo from washington, d.c. freshman schuyler bailar the announcer booms. i know everyone is watching me. i've known i know i've done this a thousand times before, but this time different underneath my crimson warmups, there is no longer a one piece swimsuit that women usually. instead, i'm a tiny little speedo. i'm now on the men's team. hundreds of articles have been about my switching from the women's to the men's team. transgender swimmer all wrote, some attacked me for my history, saying i'll never be a real. others say my history of an of an eating disorder just means i'm a deluded woman with body issues. many claim there is no i could keep up with much less beat other men from beautiful competitive woman to, mediocre ugly man, one commenter wrote on

a national profile about me as i stand by the edge of the pool, waiting for the rest of my. teammates to join me. i'm 15 again. standing my women's swimsuit behind the blocks with three girls for my relay. i remember the confidence, the feeling of knowing i could do exactly what i had set out to do. i remember the rush of the natatorium going silent as i put my hand over my heart, my pre-meeting ritual, my fingers thumb straddling my swimsuit, strap on my shoulder, i had this at the start of every single summit during the singing of the national anthem. i remember staring out at the pool. the music ended and i took a deep breath, imagining my final stroke with, my race. i take a deep breath now, staring out at the pool as a d-1 college swimmer, everything feels so different. i've never stood alongside 38 college guys before. i'm a pool i've never raced in, and it feels like all eyes on

me. but as always, the water resembles beautiful blue glass and i breathe a sigh of relief. this is different, but it is also the same. the same 25 yard pool, the 100 yard breaststroke race, the same breaststroke i've done since before i could remember the same echoing acoustics make hearing so difficult, the same chlorinated air that makes everyone cough the same take your mark before we launch off the blocks. i've heard it once or twice. it's all the same when the team is gathered along the edge of the pool, the natatorium silences. we stand in identical clothing and the anticipation dances my fingertips. when i'm this nervous. the most nervous i imagine my blood is rushing through veins like whitewater, rapids when the star-spangled banner to play, i instinctively begin to my pre-made ritual. but this time my finger seeking my shoulder find nothing. in that moment, i realize while

everything is the same, it's also brand new. for the first time in my life, i'm competing as just myself without the baggage of who everybody told me to be, who everybody said i was, who i thought i was supposed to be today. i'm just who i am. i'm skyler. my eyes. well, tears. more than 19 years of stumbling to get here. just few months ago, i was ready to quit swimming. a year ago, i was ready to quit the world life altogether. but today i'm standing tall, a proud korean american, queer, transgender swimmer at harvard men's swimming at the first openly transgender athlete to compete for any d-1 men's team. the ncaa. thank. thank you. of course. surviving my first meet and not getting last. true i didn't get last. i got thin. did not mean that everything was easy then on it would take my teammates the rest of the years to consistently gender me correctly. it would take me nearly three years to feel comfortable around

them. and all the years since i came out are still not enough to dispel the hatred and bigotry about transgender people, especially in athletics, over the next four years, i not only became the first and at the time only trans to have competed for the team. that alliance with their gender identity for all four seasons. but i also became a well respected educator on trans inclusion. i never knew where this journey would take me when i began the, first speech i gave was at my own high school the night before i was a week until two or three in the morning, attempting to write the speech itself. dozens of draft drafts. bold in the trash. i had no idea what other people would want from me. why should i tell them? what could they from me? that speech was better received than i experienced expected. so as word spread, one speech led to another. i spent my sophomore year speaking was the primary way. i spent my free time and by graduation 102 speeches were in the books. despite regular assurances. but what i had to say was

valuable to others. i often found myself perplexed over why people wanted to listen. i was just a college kid who wanted to swim when news outlets would call me an advocate or an activist, i used to tell them, you only think i'm an activist? i insisted because i'm a transgender swimmer and i'm talking about it before every single speech, i wondered to myself, why are they here? why do they care? only rarely the answer was clear. i was talking to a group of swimmers or trans folks like me. we were. congrats. but most of the time i spoke to people with whom i had little to nothing in common, or so it appeared. i tried to imagine the perspectives of the audience members, the students, coaches, administrators, teachers, mental health professionals, voters, cyclists, medical providers, or employees at a bank. how could i connect with them? because in the end, the inability to connect is what breeds hatred and bigotry. that is connection is the

essence of humanity itself. at a small school in, northern vermont, i gave a speech to a room filled with student athletes. it was a standard event. i shared my story and provided training on trans literacy before opening for questions. after the event, a group of students gathered in a line waiting to talk to me. a young man, and explained he was on the wrestling team. he said, you know, before i came here today and met you. he paused. i nodded and waited patiently before i met you. he began. i was nervous about people like you my best friend is bisexual, and that used to make me uncomfortable. i'm not homophobic or anything but i didn't want to hang out with her. he stared at the floor and then glanced back at me as he admitted this. i didn't say anything and i wasn't sure where this was going. but now i've met you and. you're just like me. we're both just athletes. we're just guys.

he looked directly at me now. so now i understand. i began to smile, relieved at another speech at a high school in pittsburgh, the audience was mostly students from local public schools. gsa is gender and sexuality alliance clubs, with the exception of a few athletes. at the end, two football players accompany, the gsa officers to the stage to give a small gift. when asked if could say something to the audience not knowing what he would say, i nervously agreed. listen, before i came in, i was uncomfortable, he said to the mic, you know, i can't do i can't speak. i just want to sit over there and stay quiet. but when i came in, it was a very inviting environment. i was like, i can this. there ain't no difference. you we're all the same. he then turned to me and continued, and i want to say thank you to you for opening up my eyes to a brighter future. the audience is applause, almost drowned out his voice as he finished this reality. this is life, he said.

i just about cried. really. i had to try very hard not to fall on stage. and while this is still one of the most touching moments i've experienced at a speech, such unexpected empathy has not been unique in my moments like this happened over and over again. people thinking, they would find themselves uncomfortable around me, a transgender person, but then meeting me and learning and also just someone living my life like that. these moments serve as resounding reminders of the power, empathy and shared humanity. and there is so much more love than we might imagine for us queer folks and trans folks, or for anyone really. i'm going to skip a little bit for time in 2021 and 2020 as well. record breaking numbers anti-trans legislation were introduced in. state governments around the us most of these bills focus on two arenas. first, banning trans athletes from competing in sports teams aligned with their gender identity and second, banning children from accessing gender

for me and lifesaving care. states also introduced bills forcing teachers to out trans students, bills banning lgbtq plus educational content in schools, and bills banning students from using bathrooms aligned with their gender identity. the following two years, 2022 and 2023 have only seen worse with each editing pass this book. the legislative bans are increasing exponentially and in severity, including a comprehensive overview of every area of attack simply impossible. at the final stage of editing over 491 anti-trans pieces of legislation across 40 states have been introduced just this year. it's now 501. they won't me keep editing it. you bans on gender affirming care expanded to include trans adults in addition to minors, countless bans to criminalize the presence of trans or otherwise gender diverse people in public bans threaten the legality of drag performances, anti-trans rhetoric and violence have reached an all time fueled

by the media and politicians to demonizing trans people and transness every year has been more savage than the last with 2020 and 2021 being the deadliest year on record for anti-trans violence. although anti-trans rhetoric has this legislation to be protecting or protecting women, the transphobia has grown increasingly and conspicuous shutting disguise of alleged protection. in 2023, daily wire commentator michael knowles. he him said it loud and clear transgenderism must be eradicated from public life. the whole preposterous ideology at every level. after i graduated from, i went on a speaking tour. it was a busy few weeks. i gave 43 speeches and 39 days in 26 cities around the u.s. and the majority of these events were in red cities and red states. i wanted to bring trans awareness to places that would not otherwise have access. while i was excited to meet new people and continue this work, i

was very nervous. i spent most of my life living in very cities d.c., new york, seattle and boston, traveling to remote and rural areas in kansas or illinois or western pennsylvania was daunting. i wasn't sure if i would be to connect with people in such unfamiliar settings at one such speech. i was with a small group of athletes and community members at a university in a small town in kansas. when it came time for questions, an older lady in a purple shawl asked. what do you what do people like me? she hesitated clearly nervous. i don't know what the right words are. i don't want to mess it up. that's okay. i encouraged. let's walk through it together. okay. she took a breath. what do people like me? she tried again do to help people like you? she finally finished. i smiled. this is a wonderful question. i said, what? you're is how to be the best

ally. and ally is someone who is not gay or lesbian or transgender, not lgbtq plus, but who supports us and wants to help. the lady beamed. and before i could continue to answer her question. she interrupt it. thank you so much. oh, isn't wonderful. you've given me a new word, ally. yeah. this one doesn't play as well in this audience. there's a lines where they're like, oh, yeah, me too. give me a new word, ally. i want to be an ally now. woman in purple and so many more like her is exactly why i am a firm believer that most people are good people. some just need a little help finding the right words. trans or not. of course, finding those right words is no panacea for the horrible, often violent discrimination. trans people face. but it is most certainly a step in the right direction. the first step toward connection. so whether you're trans like me or not, i hope this book helps. i hope this book helps you find

ways to connect with yourself and then with others. after all, connection. the essence of our humanity. through through. okay, please. it's great to take a tech post. i know that we had some new additions. there's some room up here. yeah, you can come sit here. i want to come, like, sit some, you know, i won't be. i know you are based on their outcome. hi, baby. hi. how are you. very comfy. high tech c-span. high tech c-span. c-span. wait, one second. one second.

okay. all right. ready? ready. hello? am i ready? present hotel screen. okay. green screen for. can you hear us? yes. okay. oh, my gosh. congratulations. thank you so much for being here with me. happy national pronouns day. you national pronouns. did you know you were going to launch this book? that this was national pronouns? i did, yeah. it's been on my calendar. okay. is that what inspired the name. no. you know what? so both were like a pseudo accident. i will tell you, i love my publisher and i love all the people who have worked very hard on this book. but publishing a book is a nightmare. and anybody i feel like, who's been involved? you publish your own. so finding the pub day was definitely a juggling act, and it was actually at one point we were going to move it later, then we moved it back and then i was going to three months later and then we moved it earlier. so it's been a fun juggling act

and this was awesome cause i was a great. pregnancy is like the next day, so that works. love it. well, as you mentioned publishing a book can be a challenging process. this is also not your first book. so you knew what you were signing up for and i mean, we're all so mesmerize by everything you've done as an advocate, as an educator. but i'm curious, what inspired you to this book? like why a book? do people read any more like? you know, that's what i'm curious about. yes, we all do. but like what made you were like, this is? the time to write a book. and this is the book that i'm going to write. yeah. yeah. well, so my first book is called obi is man enough. and agent. actually, many of those here who helped me publish that book, that book was was, i think, a deep, deeply personal, sort of like ode to the boyhood. i never had it was me diving into a history that i wanted to rewrite or rather sort of expand. and i think even when i wrote that this book, he she there it was always in the back my mind. i just wasn't ready yet.

and i actually thought about writing. i even pitched it to a couple of people in my sophomore year in college before i worked on obi, but it just wasn't the time because i there was a part of me was like, i just haven't lived enough at this point. and i think, you know, in many ways i'm really sad that this is the moment that has to it has to it has to be published because part of the reason so perfect is because the world is in shambles. part of the reason this is an urgent guide to gender identity is because we are urgently fighting 501 anti-trans bills, soon to be more in. so i'm sad that this is the moment but at the same time i have i've had i've given over 500 speeches on the bills my speeches and that's taught me a lot about how to have these conversations and how to combat a lot of the hatred and bigotry, the misinformation. so i feel like it was sort of a little bit of happenstance, a little bit of patience and a little bit of a very little bit of wisdom and then a lot of guidance to make sure that this was the right time. yeah, i really been enjoying listening to the book. i'm a big really because i can listen to it on 1.5 x speed.

what's really helps but you are adhd adhd, you hack. you enunciate very well by the way i work very hard. yes, very, very well. so thank you. but one of the things that i loved when you were setting kind of the beginning of the book was, just kind of reiterating that you are always learning and we are always learning. and it's so important to have that mindset, especially when talking about something like gender or social construct, also always changing, changing with times. and i would just love to know, you know, you did a bunch of research, a bunch of interviews for this book. what were some of the things that surprised you? the new that you learned? yeah, well, you know, i had i had learned about the history of sort of how gender was construct it. and so we throw around the sentence gender is a social construct, but we don't actually ever i think most of us don't think about what those words if gender is a social construct, some buddy constructed it. right. it didn't just become a construct. humans constructed it.

and i think it's really it was so fascinating to learn about the different systems that produced this construct of gender as we know it today. and largely, it was produced by of oppression is how can we get people to be fitting in these boxes so that they can be pitted against each other, so that we can break society, mostly indigenous societies, right? we break them from within and we can conquer them right through colonization. easy peasy. sally but i really that was such a eye opening thing and to imagine that world before gender as we know it today, right? we think of sexuality and trying to be inclusive of sexuality as as i think liberal and progressive. but if we go back to gender, we wouldn't even need to to have sexuality be so rigidly named if we didn't have gender so rigidly named. and so in a lot of indigenous societies, that's why there is this sort of confluence between gender and sexuality, because you don't name one community if you if you don't need the other. clearly it doesn't make sense. so we only label sexuality in relationship to. well, i think your personal story is i mean, so fascinating

because you come out very publicly as trans early on in that experience. right. immediately, a lot of attention because you were doing something very like a historical landmark in sports history and you're then thrown into the experience of being a d1 athlete at harvard in men's locker rooms. what is that like like? yes, i think everything that you might have imagined some degree. so if you think about all those things right, d-1 men's team as a trans person, as a queer trans person, it was scary. it was really scary. and i think one of the reasons i needed to write the book now, more than four years after graduating and after the team versus then was needed distance from that moment because a lot of me during that time was surviving. right. and i think i thrived in some ways, but i also was i mean, i was trying to be a trans person on a men's team that had never had any trans people there

before, which was so deeply lonely. and i think that that's what i really reflected on as i wrote as i wrote this book was i went back and i read a lot of my old journal entries. i was like a very avid journal at the. so you can see like every single thought i ever had. and at the time i think i was just like getting it out in any mean. but when i read it back, i was like, oh my god, is this is like, this is painful. this was so much of this kid, this 19 year old kid for especially that year, just like stumbling through, trying to figure out how to be present. and i shamed myself a lot for not being able to be as present as i wanted to. i felt like i didn't fit in enough. i felt like i wasn't man enough. i felt a lot of different things that i think i have a whole lot more compassion for now. but i didn't then, yeah. how do you think that own understanding of gender or like what it means to be a or manhood in general in general? how has that changed from your days on the swim team now a few years removed. so when i was on the team and i felt like i didn't belong, one of the things i would constantly

tell myself as an affirmation, you know, i learned cbt. i was like, i have to do these affirmations for myself. i mean, i feel that i'll feel better. and so i feel like i'm man enough. i'm a man. there's nothing different between me and them i'm a man. i'd be like, i'm just a man. and i would really try to affirm. and i thought i was doing myself a favor. i thought i was being like, okay, i'm just like that. i'm like, i shouldn't sack myself, might segment myself away. i am the one. the reason that i don't belong here, i feel like i don't. and they're welcoming me. so i should just think i'm a man right? you can hear the loop already. and so i did this and i continue to do this. in my senior year, there was something that shifted. i realized, wait, hold on a second. i'm not a social man. and this this trick of like i'm just like them is me trying to be just like them. and i'm not. and there's this beautiful history that i have that isn't cis manhood. right? i didn't come to this point. living my life, being assigned male at birth. i didn't grow up having all the same experiences that the other boys did. right. and i think that was actually a deeply powerful moment that, was also riddled with grief because it was a painful realization.

i'm never going to be like that, but also i'm never going to be like that. right. and i think that right. i meant that less is a natural instinct to toxic masculinity later. but i think it was really important like sort of for myself to come into this. i'm not sex. i know that sounds kind of funny maybe, but it was it was a departure from trying to be and i think that that was an important moment for me and something that i've been really trying to lean into as much as possible, having value and validation for my manhood while also bringing my transness with me. yeah, you mentioned in the introduction, there's the sentence that i absolutely love of not kind of affirming like i am not an activist. you think i'm activist because i am trans and i talk about it right now very publicly, an activist. i'm curious, when did that happen? yeah. and how would you define being an activist now?

oh, gosh. okay. second one, i feel like it's hard in the first. yeah, i so an ally is who fights for a community for whom they're there. they don't share an identity right. i think an activist, somebody who fights for a community regardless of whether or not they share the identity. so i would consider myself an but i the reason i did it was because it really didn't feel like i was getting out there changing policy. i wasn't advocate with you know, speeches in a in a company and that doesn't make sense in a company way. i wasn't like getting into the corporate world, being like, you need to be inclusive of trans people. all i was doing was showing up and saying, this is who i am, and all i did was people my story and then answer questions about it. and to me that didn't feel like i was being an advocate. all i was doing was talking about something that people found contentious. so i think that was where i started, but i realized i think somewhere in my my third or fourth year of speaking that it didn't matter if i believed that i was an activist. i was that was a responsibility that i had essentially decided i was going to be responsible for.

and so actually for it came down to responsibility. once i gained platform, once people began to listen to, me and i realized they had an impact. people i realized i could not shirk the responsibility of being an activist. yeah. and as we tell by your pen and some of stories here as well, we love you you're an activist for the trans community, for so many marginalized communities. but one of the issues you care deeply about is athletes and you and i have talked about this just as friends, but i think it's really complicated. complicated thing because we're talking about gender being a social construct and who create these ideas of gender and separate biological sex, biological parts to gender. right. but in the context of sports so much of the argument and categorization exists in looking directly at physical abilities, right. and so i'm curious, what do you see as the ideal situation for

trans athletes and what do you hope for in terms of what these sports leagues do, what the ncaa can do be more gender and trans inclusive? yeah. for any folks here who are not, the ncaa is the national collegiate athletic association, the governing body, sports in college. i think people always throw around like nfl and villanova. i don't know mean some kids who don't want to see what it means. yeah what is ideal. so you said what's the ideal for trans athletes? i would i would like to expand that to what's ideal for humanity and really athletes. because what happens is, first of all, sports are a microcosm of society. all the systems of oppression that we see in society amplified in sport. and we need to that because people always say, oh, sports will level the playing field. no, they don't. and sports do not have a level playing this concept of a in sports is elusive at best. and i'll give you a quick example. i'm a swimmer. you already know that in swimming, people say, okay, it's a fair sport because all you're

doing is trying to get to their side at the same time, there's not that many while there are lots of rules, but it's fairly simple, right? and i think the goal is to get to the other side first in swimming, right. there's a massive racial divide. so 4% of black kids can't. right. compared to 40% of white kids. why is that? is it because black people can't swim? no, it's because of segregation rooted in slavery. because there aren't pools in black neighborhoods, predominantly black neighborhoods. all right. and because my parents were kids, they were still segregated pools with white only signs on them. like, really think about that in the 1960s, there were still pools that said white only on them. and when began to integrate, they threw acid in the pools instead of letting black folks be in those pools. that is not that long ago. we really have to reckon with that. and then we think, oh, we had thomas is can make sports unfair what great let's think about how sports really are and the reason that which is systemic oppression rooted in patriarchy and white supremacy. so i think when you ask that question there is so much that we miss when we think about

fairness in sports as it pertains to trans. and in reality, the conversation trans athletes is not about trans people athletes or sports. it's control, right? it's about removing autonomy because the same politicians that are all those anti-trans laws banning trans from playing sports in those 23 states, they're also encroaching on reproductive justice right. also banning crt, critical race theory. they're also encroaching on voting rights, specifically for black populations. right. all of this is about bodily autonomy and self-determination. so i can talk about sports until the on time and why trans athletes should be allowed specifically because of trans athletes. but i want us all zoom out because my assumption is if you're here, you're somewhat of an ally. if you want all the points, wherever the book is, what you the book lost the book. goodness gracious, you can read a whole lot more. why exactly trans athletes should be included. what i really want people to understand and this also in the book is that this is actually not about trans athletes. it's a far and terrifying conversation that all these politicians are distracting. right. they're saying, oh, look over

there. or leah thomas, trans athletes, women, you know, trans women dominating. can any of you name a single other trans woman athlete who who's ever. well, actually, can you name a single other trans an athlete who can name more than two? seriously, look, okay. we got one day before school. all right. all right. so literally person this time, if trans one were dominating sports, don't you think? you'd be able to name more than two, right? i would actually challenge people to name even two non trans women just. women athletes. okay. so do we care about women's sports and we care about controlling women. but so let me bring it to the other point, though, which is so what do we do. i read the book read the book. women could what do we do? so i genuinely believe that education is a big part of. this because it had so many conversations, even good friends and we'll sit down, especially year and not this past year, but the one before that, leah thomas, a swimmer at university

of pennsylvania. she swam for three years on the men's team and one year on the women's team. and during that one year, she won the 500 freestyle at the 2022 national championships. the world blew up in. everybody died. it was horrible. the all right. it was a very everybody had a panic attack. right. and what happened was there was no domination that occurred. 27 records were broken at that meet. 18 by one person. guess what? that person was not leah thomas. it was another person who cisgender anybody was fine with that. but i think i think what what i what i have seen right. so i came out as trans everyone was like, okay, great pat on the back you're going to lose. that's why we support you. right? and then leah came out, everybody had a panic attack and people came to me and they were like, what do we do this is this is this is wrong. and i was like, no, no, no, back up. let's have a conversation. right. and i sat down, i talked with so many people about this, and i watched them change their minds because they just had the wrong facts. people thought, you've broken all these records. people thought she had, you know, just walked onto a women's team and never taken testosterone suppressants. people that, you know, she was i

don't she was taking advantage of all these things. i mean if you actually sat down and listen i really watch people change their minds. and so what i what i think and there's going to be people were never going to get it right there over there and we just have to wait okay the rest the people in the middle, they're getting tricked. they're getting manipulated. and it's your job now that you have this to take it to those people and bring them here, because there are actual science supports trans people and. the problem is we're capitalizing on this, right? people are fearful about. women's sports like, okay, we need to protect women's sports. that's great. let's protect women's sports. but the we do that is not through banning trans people. so we have to not get tricked into this rhetoric that's using the fear that's very valid, but it's giving us this fake propaganda that's stoking us to want to ban trans women of actually address all the barriers to women's sports. yeah, you kind of should. yes. you should obviously this your goals with it are getting to

talk about gender this being a toolkit and sharing your story and you know the importance of representation as well. i'm curious when you were writing book, who are you writing it for? when were you envisioning like i'm talking a reader? who is that reader? it cis readers who want to be allies and learn more. a young trans people who want to feel seen curious kind of how you thought about that. yeah i struggle with that it was i think one of the biggest like writing blocks, if you will, because i wanted to write it for everybody. and you can't write a book, as you know, for everybody. you have to have some sort of reader in mind and what i what i ended up trying to do was write most of it, i think for allies with the mind that a trans person can their own ally and that many of us need guides to be our own allies. i sure as heck wish i had that when i was coming so would say allies with with again that. and then there are specific parts where i write to trans readers and i really wanted to make sure that i called us all in and i made sure that that

people like me felt seen and i think also my hope is that for cisgender readers, for readers who are not that you can kind of see us through that, right? that you can see what we might need, that you can then be an ally to a trans by reading these parts that are for trans to get a little bit more closer to our humanity. yeah you kind talked about as well the landscape that we're in is pretty terrifying and. a lot of i think the paranoia around transness and visible especially on the other side or just opposition is really the sphere of the effect on kids, right? there's this obsession with like how does surgery hormones play into this with people? but something you write about in your book and a huge part of your work is working with kids and. you know, at my company august, we make -- and pads. scott was one of our advisers. we your lane changer training,

right? and lane changer, basically companies the tools to be able to have this education around gender how it exists in the workplace, how to talk about it and you share this anecdote that stood out so much to our team just about kind of the difference of how adults and kids react. these sorts of things that i think is so profound and i don't want to ruin it, but i would love for you to share if you're open to it. yeah yeah. so i give speeches to a lot of kinds of people and one of my favorite audiences is kindergartners. and, and this is, this is what noddy is referencing. so when i talk to kindergartners is they're they're lovely. the speeches are usually actually similar length because the kids ask a lot of questions. we're actually straight and to the point we get right to it. the kids don't need a lot of buffering. they don't need a lot of actual all these like lead and breakdowns and whatever. they're just like, yeah, yeah. okay. and i kind of imagine as, as the population gets older, the bell around the questions gets higher and higher on just trans things, right? the older the population, people

just want to ask me about trans and. if you go past a certain age, they only want to ask me about there's guy who told me that he was like 90 something years old and my one of my audience is ones and he just he probably took about 2 minutes to ask me the question, how do you have sex? but in a way he asks, it was like, i understand the anatomical physical differences. and i was like i was really like, usually i can figure out what the question is fairly quickly, but this time i was like, what are you asking? and at the end it was like, are you asking me how i have sex? and he's like, oh yes. so you get older, it gets more more specific, either on trans is or, then there's like a hump that goes after and then it's only sex. if we start younger though, they don't, they're like, there's no curve at all. they don't care what we're talking about. they have a question about everything, right? so they might ask a couple of questions about trans related things. they might say, oh, one of the most pure questions somebody asked me went to the kindergartner, who said, if you didn't like, because i had mentioned that going into the girls was stressful for me as a kid. i very gender non-conforming and

because i looked so much like a boy, people would yell at me, they'd throw me out, they'd harass me. so i explain this to the kids and then this kid was like, well, if you didn't like going into the boy the girl's bathroom, why did you do it? and it was like the most but it was such an earnest like it broke my heart. it was like if you didn't like it, why did you do? i was like, i don't know. that's a great question. thank you for asking that. so they asked those specific questions, but then they asked questions like there was this middle school kid and this is the one you're talking about. raised their hand at the back of this entire packed auditorium. this kid stands up when they stand up at the same height as everybody else. he's a little kid. and and they're like, i have a question. i said, what's your question? do you like cheese, dad? serious. like the whole room erupted in laughter. but this kid is so serious they were like, no, no, i'm serious. do you like cheese? and i was like, yes, of course, like cheese. all was, well, there's only one way to answer that question. they're like, what kind you i like monster. and i was like, man, this is a good choice. but there's there is equally interested as if i if i why did

i stop skateboarding. what stroke did i swim? and then questions about transness. but it's a flat line they want to know about everything. kids are not actually caught up about gender. we force them to be right. and so there's this freakout about kids being confused about gender is, a parental freak out that is projected onto children, and they might be confused. right. but let them be the problem. confusion isn't being confused. it's people saying confusion is bad when a kid falls down and they're between the ages of like two and five. there's research supports. if the kid falls and the parents goes, oh, the kid will immediately cry. if the kid falls down and the parent says, oh, honey, are you okay? because usually doesn't cry because they're usually not hurt. they're really they fall down their center. gravity is low, they're fine. but if you freak out, if you freak out, they reflect that freak out. so we actually have the power to appraise what those experiences can be like for young people. so if we say, hey, great, you don't know what your gender is like or you're confused about whether you should wear this or that, that's awesome. let's talk about it. that kid's going to be okay. and research also supports that.

and not going to sit on all the facts. but this one is really important, which is that kids who detransition or re transition are actually totally fine if they're supported by their parents. so this concept of demonizing is only problematic if. you think being trans is a problem? we have a. oh. so by the for all the parents, you know. well, we could talk forever. i want to open it up to questions and so we can then get to where everybody can meet you and get their books done. so yeah, i would love to open it up to a few questions. there's one here and let's start in the front. yes what are where are the research labs that like? because you said you did for it, but where were they and what were you study? labs so the question is what were the for research labs you

worked at? slash work at now and yeah, what are you studying. yeah. so i actually still do it because i'm crazy and do too many things. so i work in two public health labs and to cyclops, one's clinical psych one is not and all related to trans health. two of them are the public health ones. what i'm looking is looking at it's called images. it's looking at google images that it's looking at appearance. so its appearance is basically what what is the experience of trans and non-binary people on social media and how do the appearance ideals, what the images look like? how does impact of trans and non-binary people in our experience with eating disorder, risk and substance abuse essentially how -- the pictures you feel instagram and what do they make you do but specifically for trans and non-binary. so that was one of the ones i'm working on. i working at just a trans health experience, experiences with doctors and we're kind of done with that study. and then another one is my study from million years ago and i'm still working on on the differences based on hormones.

so like cognition, hormone based cognition. and then the last one, what is the last one i'm working on? oh, the impacts of traumatic brain injuries on intimate partner violence. that was a very, very difficult, dark study. but it's a very important one because most of the studies include trans people and this one's focused on women. so we want to make sure we're bringing in trans women to that. so i'm helping with that. yeah. skyler and i met when i was a freshman at harvard. and you were a sophomore and something i knew him then, and i continue to learn, is that he's really -- smart and and is a total nerd. and i mean, not in the most positive way, but the biggest. anyway, we love implants, but about academic research. he loves it. he wants to go back to school. i don't get it at all. so yeah, he loves talking about it? yeah, we yes. i want him to talk about

testosterone and that i was looking at some studies that say that testosterone doesn't change or doesn't dictate whether not you will and. i think you have to be all hormones 12 months we're competing at an level so is that are there more findings that say that to stop strong is not the prime indicator that other body abilities and where are with that being able to change the rules did you all hear that? i can vary. yeah. okay so question is about disaster and we know or there some studies that have supported that this option is not deciding factor to success in sports. but we also are currently delineating where we where we do allow trans people to compete in sports. we do so by testosterone thresholds and duration. testosterone suppression. yeah. just adjust the suppression. so the short to your question on

the the rules, so for for all levels of our sport, all organized that allow trans women to compete at an elite level and i mean specifically in oliver we're not talking about children because children should be just allowed to play but at elite level they have testosterone mitigation, which means you have to reduce your testosterone levels to an average since women's level in order to play in the women's category. and you can't just waltz on. you can't just be like, i'm doing and then you're there. you have to do that for at least 12 months, usually up to three years. now there's no research that supports the three years. it's important. the one year is that is what research that after one year that you're at a rate of sort of diminishing that's where you're going to kind of sit. so the one year was what the policy required for actually years until the atomics competed last year and they were like, we suddenly need to change our policy has nothing to do with the dominance. okay so that's that. now the question is, will this testosterone actually impact sports? so we do see categories of differences and i'm saying categorical differences based on category, not based on sex,

because sex is a very complicated topic that people don't want to get into. but it's not binary. we can't segmented into these people of just male and just female. all right. so it's not sex. i mean, category differences. so we do see category differences between, performance in the men's category and performance the women's category. right. we know that because we can see that in most activities and of them, who knows? there are some that difference is very small. my question is is misogyny the primary to that think about in many sports they were girls that have to drive 2 to 3 hours to get to an elite team, whereas boys they've got tons options nearby, right where. many, many girls are being bullied in sports and not even playing where there are very few women role models in sports. so kids don't have people to look up to. so we have to think about these. these like discrepant things between the men's and women's categories expansively. it's not just about biology. what the factors that are stopping people from even playing. right, because there are a lot of them. so the question about what is

it? right. there's actually really interesting research that supports testosterone, does not success in a study. olympic male athletes. right. all athletes, all male cisgender men. they found that testosterone had relationship with their performance in sport. no. when i learned that, that blew my mind. i was like, what? that's the lie we've all been told is that it is biological sex. and of course, we should sports that way. but let's think about it more expansively. what's a world in which are actually segmented by what actually matters in that sport? and maybe what actually matters in that sport is not testosterone is not someone's biological sex make up that can't be put into any little bucket. what would it be? i don't know. but in some sports, like wrestling, we've got weight classes, right? why isn't basketball segmented? i don't know how far you can jump or how tall you are or something. right in basket. most of the nba is taller. six foot three. right. does that mean. it's unfair and therefore disqualify able. if people are tall, they can't play. no, we love when they're taller like whoa, we're going to use is for basketball incredible.

right. but what about the five foot six person who could be amazing, a basketball you just lowered the whole basket thing, right? i'm a summer nerd so my point is what, if we thought about sports more expansively, right? what if we didn't what if we weren't married to this idea that biological sex was at line? right. because i don't think it is. but we don't have research that supports that because all of the people researching are very stuck in this binary writing. we are stuck in the binary. we're going to produce binary research. so we have to have shift in that research, which is also of the reasons i want to go into research. yeah, i think we can do like one more question. so this on the guy. yes. hey, jesse. hi, skyler. um, um, so i know you a lot of advocacy on instagram in person and all that stuff, but i just wanted to say, i think this important right now in a time where we're being attacked, if you could say something to trans youth right now to give them

hope, what would you say if you could say something to trans youth right now to give them hope? what would you say? oh. i always want to start. and this might sound counterintuitive. let me go through it with saying it does right now and a lot of people are going to try to say, oh, it's going to be fine you're going to be fine. everything's going to be fine. and i do think it will be fine. i have that faith. but right now, it sucks. right? right now there kids that are approaching the age for puberty blockers and can't have puberty blockers. kids are being bullied at school. they're that have to move. there are kids that can't play their sport and won't ever be able to play because of the time that it takes to input now. so it does suck for a lot of kids right now and i want to validate that because otherwise we're going to gaslight you. and the last i'm going to do to these trans kids who are struggling now is gaslight them into thinking that this is not it is hard and i think trans people are the most group of people. we are the people that stand up even from young and all times in our lives and we we're not who

you say we are. this very base identity that somebody assigned us from before we could even talk. we know that's not right. and think of the amount of power and self-assuredness you have to have to go against the one identity that everybody has assumed is constant. trans kids are magic and that will never, ever leave me. and what i want to tell any trans kid who's here or any of you who are around trans kids, you need to tell those kids i believe you who you are. i believe you and i will continue believing you until world does. amazing. do you want to end a little reading? yeah. i'm going to tell a quick little story. thank you all for saying past time. i know you were supposed to say who till 830, so thank you. i want to close that with a quick story that i think is a good example of somebody saying,

i believe you. so this story is i'm going to give it away a bit, the end of my book. so you are going to have to read it for the full sort of picture. but i want to summarize a piece of it for you for you here. so i'm half korean. we haven't talked much about race. there's too much there's too much to talk about. but i'm half korean. my mom is korean her family moved the united states in the late 1960s. and my grandmother, my is north korean and actually right before the korean war broke out, she walked from north korea to south korea with her family was 13 years old. her mother led that walk and got them to south korea when so many other north koreans do not survive. i share that because there's this deep history, strong womanhood that i come that birthed me and am actually the first of my family born in this country from that side of the family as well. my grandmother is very catholic. she is an immigrant, as i just said. and if we could just i know we bust stereotypes a lot, but

let's bring them back just for a second. hey, korean catholic immigrant and grandmother. okay, trans right. okay. queer trans person. i was terrified to come out to her. and i actually i out to everybody before i came out to my home, i made this big facebook post online. i was like, this is who i am. everybody called me here. pronouns in iran and blocked my grandmother on facebook. i was like, don't tell her everybody. like, please let me get there. like, i'm going to get. but just like don't tell how many. so i spent a long time writing her letter. i really wanted to tell her, but i was so afraid to do so and i was afraid that this would be the last time i ever with her. i thought maybe i would never see again. maybe she did this on me and in i thought that was going to be likely. like it wasn't just like a you know, i'm going to be optimistic and maybe something will happen. it was like, no, i'm going to be pessimistic. this this bad is going to happen and maybe something might happen. so my mom and, i went to go read read her this letter and it was my grandfather, my grandmother and mother, my great aunt as

well, all lived together. and i sat down and i read them this letter. i said, how many? i'm transgender. i'm telling you this, i love you because i respect, because i desperately hope you can stay in my life. and i ended. i said, i love you. i waited and my grandfather was sitting across the table from me. he began, clap. he had this like slow old man clap. and he goes, so u come out of the closet now? i was like, how about your grandfather? what? what have you been reading? you barely english. and you are coming out of the closet. he's like, oh congratulations, my great aunt gave me a squeeze on the hand. love communicated and got up to get us tea. and my grandmother is the one i'm worried about. so she's looking at me. she's got this stern look on her and she's like, i knew that.

i like, excuse me? what i know that. what do you mean you knew that? she said, i knew that. okay. i have two grandsons from your mother. that's fine. i have a younger brother. oh, my mom starts sobbing and i'm getting there. but i'm also like, whoa, hold on a second. this is a little too easy. something is going on. what's going on how many launches into this discussion of how it's normal that i'm transgender? these things made me transgender, says, oh, you have boy hormones. i mean, how many i have those. okay. so she was going through all this stuff that was all scientifically, but it didn't matter. it got her there. i mean, so she goes through all of that. she says okay, so you can be a boy, you can be a brother, you can be a husband, and i will slow down. i'm only 18. she you can be a doctor now. i was like, how many? we've addressed that. she actually meant that it was going to be easier me to be a doctor. she says you can be a man but in korean culture it is the

daughter's responsible to take care of the parents. and your mother has no daughters. it is still your responsible skyler to take care of your parents so i have words premature though it means mother father, piety or take care of your parents in her handwriting. beneath them is actually next to my heart and want to read you a little bit of what i wrote about too close. when i got the tattoo i sent home a photo of it, she replied, thanking me for. the eternal vow of quote, eternal vow to take care of my parents somehow remarkably. how many has been the most supportive family i've had? she switched pronouns, gendered epithets overnight, despite fact that her native tongue doesn't even gendered pronouns. she immediately began calling me handsome as well as her superman, or our handsome man returns from college. she'd say, the end of the semester, you are superman.

she took on the task of sharing my identity. her very large korean family back in korea. she is one of seven and my grandfather is one of six. when they returned next to korea to visit our extended family and my parents, brother and i accompanied them, i was nervous. what are they going to say about me being me? i asked tony. nothing, she said indignantly. what do you mean what if someone says mean they won't? she said. certain. but if they do, i yell at them. she nodded. she wasn't joking. the trip passed without struggle. how many even asked me if i wanted? had a big my grandfather to give me a new korean name. we were sitting at their kitchen table one day and i asked if my korean name was gendered. yes. how many? he had said. after a few moments, i think so, how damaging? had nodded. agreement girl's name. he but a boy can have if you want, he said but how damaging

was already standing getting it? peng had it, but you can give you new name you want in our korean family my grandfather names the children my grandfather had me the name me one meaning foundation a beauty the first character me is also the first character of the word for america gook, which means beautiful country out of beijing, had given this name because i was the first child of my korean family be born in the united states. i in the american foundation. my first character, mi, is also the second character of my mother's korean name, yomi, which means beautiful don, because she was born very early in the morning. no, i answered, her, me. i love my name. i don't. if it's a girl's name, it's about where i from. i want to keep it. how many smiled and how did she put his pen down? i wear my scar, my story, my history. i'm referring to my secretary, which came earlier. sorry. i wear my scar, my history, my story and my tattoo with great pride. both a promise to myself that i will never forget where or who i

come from, not my assigned or my korean culture, not my parents or my grandparents, not my own personal history, nor my body as it was and always is and will be. because these make me who i am i refuse to forget who i in these days see the old stories as often as i can. they are ties to my history and my culture and they are evidence of a love that transcends any boundaries. my grandparents and great aunt had, every excuse i can think of to reject me language, religion, age generation and culture. but they chose instead to lead with love. if korean catholic immigrant grandparents can do this, anyone can. does that mean anyone will? unfortunately, sometimes. tragically of course not. it is still a privilege that. i was received with open hearts by my family, walking, welcoming, acceptance and love should never be privilege in one's own family. kindness costs nothing and should be something and should

be commonly expected and freely given. i'm fighting for that day. i hope you will fight with me. until then, my family near and far serves as proof of this possibility, as examples of kind of love we all deserve. and the kind of love we can all provide to others. love can transcend all barriers if we let it. i get.