Transphobia Speaks in the Voice of Surveillance Capitalism

<p>Around the year 2000, after my gender transition, when I was in college, I was put in touch with an older woman who was pursuing her graduate degree in social work. She was cis, though I didn&rsquo;t know that word at the time and she probably didn&rsquo;t either. Her thesis topic was &ldquo;how transgender people use the internet to find support.&rdquo; At this time,&nbsp;<em>How will the internet change everything, and by the way, what is the internet?</em>&nbsp;was a hot topic that inflected academic and popular discourse.</p> <p>She interviewed me for her research, and I remember telling her: &ldquo;Well, there are these things called chat rooms and message boards, and if you like the conversation you&rsquo;re having with someone, you can move to this thing called email.&rdquo; I suspected her other interviewees had responded similarly and that my response was thus disappointing to her, in no small part because it would yield a very boring thesis for her advisors. This, incidentally, was long before the tropes of&nbsp;<em>Explain transsexualism&nbsp;</em>and&nbsp;<em>Explain the internet</em>&nbsp;were replaced by the trope of&nbsp;<em>Trans people are finding support online &mdash; should they?!?!</em></p> <p><a href="https://tuckerlieberman.medium.com/transphobia-voice-surveillance-capitalism-357dcae607d3"><strong>Read More</strong></a></p>