[image description: a series of tweets made by Jen Richards @SmartAssJen on twitter on 28 August 2016.
text of the tweets reads:
“Dear @MarkRuffalo & @MattBomer: if you release this move, it will directly lead to violence against already at risk trans women.
I auditioned for this. I told them they shouldn’t have a cis man play a trans woman. They didn’t care.
I’ve made this point in a few interviews, but never on Twitter, so let me lay it out. Reasons not to have cis men play trans women:
First, there’s the practical/economic one. It denies actual trans women opportunities, jobs, resources, which hurts entire community.
Then there’s an aesthetic. Now, I agree, in principle, that anyone can play anyone. As an artist, I want that kind of freedom myself, but… Having trans people play trans people allows for more informed, subtle, authentic performance. It makes for BETTER ART, which is the point.
Cis audiences reward them because they see being trans itself as a performance. Trans actors rather perform THE STORY, not our gender.
But all of this pales to the main reason not to have cis men play trans women. This is the reason that is making me cry as I type this… It will result in violence against trans women. And that is not hyperbole, I mean it literally. Cis men playing trans women leads to death.
Here’s why. I’ve spent years looking at violence against trans women, particularly who does it & why. I talk to survivors. There’s a pattern.
Straight men are attracted to trans women. They always have been, always will be. We are some of the most popular sex workers. It’s a fact.
BUT they are afraid that being with trans women makes them gay/less masculine. They seek us out, enjoy us, then punish us for their anxiety.
Let’s be more direct: They have sex with us, worry that makes them gay, then reassert their masculinity through violence aimed at us.
Back to the point. WHY do men, who aren’t attracted to men, who only date women, think being with trans women makes them gay/less masculine?
Because culture as a whole still thinks trans women are “really” men. Decades of showing us that way in shows. It’s been internalized.
Again & again cis men play trans women in media with the furthest reach, are rewarded for it, & tell the world trans women are “really” men.
When Jared Leto plays Rayon and accepts his Oscar with a full beard, the world sees that being a trans woman is just a man performing.
When @MattBomer plays a trans sex worker, he is telling the world that underneath it all, trans women like me are still really just men.
And that is going to lead to violence. Not to me, likely, but to girls already most at risk. Any cis men who do this have bloody hands.
I’m not some screechy activist. I mean all this literally. It’s happening all the time. The stakes are life & death. Our women are dying.
I’m a film maker. I hope the freedom of art sacred, but I also recognize its power as a responsibility. We shape perception, we are culpable.”
