[Arianne Persaud] I realized how much of my life was a gender performance
a performance of like femininity.
[Andrew Chang] I mean, can you just start by telling me about yourself?
I mean, who is Arianne Persaud?
I was born and raised in Guyana.
I lived there until I was fourteen.
I think as a non-binary person
it doesn't always become this thing where it's like and that was the day
that I knew that I was this or that.
For me, it's a series of different things that stand out.
So, one of those things is me getting my hair cut when I was really young
and all of a sudden it was like kind of chopped short.
And my mom insisted that I wear earrings.
I understood it was more important for me to wear the earrings
so my mom didn't have to say 'this is a girl'
when someone was like 'oh your little boy is so cute'
but it was very much like I don't understand.
I don't understand why it needs to be clear to someone else
that I'm this thing when I very much don't feel the same.
[Chang] I sort of felt like the only honest way I could do an interview like this
was to ask a lot of these important questions of myself.
Why do I so readily accept the idea that I am male?
I honestly couldn't come up with a very satisfying answer
beyond the obvious, which is I was born with male parts
but I'd be at a loss to explain to you what sort of inside me
intrinsically makes me feel male.
[Persaud] Yeah. I love that because I feel like there is still
I sometimes feel compelled to describe non-binary almost the same way.
And I feel like that is what I want for myself
and for like other non-binary people is to feel
that you don't have to necessarily question like
why am I OK with with this, right?
Because if you feel the way you feel up until you don't, awesome.
[Faith Fundal] If you imagine like an iceberg
and every time someone uses the wrong pronoun there's like a little chip.
It's just a little nick.
You know, I struggle because there are still people who don't understand.
[Chang] Hey, Faith, can you start just by introducing yourself?
My name is Faith Fundal.
I use they and them pronouns
and I'm privileged to work as the afternoon radio host here in Winnipeg, the heart of the country.
Who is Faith Fundal has changed so much I mean
I was born Wilfred Faith Ramalo Fundal
and then not long ago realized that my gender identity
what I had known about myself just didn't feel right.
I figured out that non-binary was a gender identity that worked for me because it felt right
and now I'm just Faith Fundal.
When I first heard this term was
is this sort of a recognition that gender is a spectrum
where you have male and female on either end
and that people exist, can exist on multiple parts of that spectrum?
Or is it a rejection of that spectrum all together, right?
I'm not sure if we'll actually ever have an answer to that question, right?
Because it is, I think, all of those things.
I've met, online, folks who don't believe, don't identify within anywhere in that spectrum.
So, I think it's all of that.
Now, there are more layers to it.
There is your sex or the body parts that you have when you were born.
One or the other, or both, and then there's the gender identity, how I feel.
So that could include non-binary which is something, for me, that's what feels right
and that is for me.
Then of course there's the gender expression, you know.
I'm sitting here in this beautiful weather here in in Winnipeg
and I'm wearing this, whatever this colour is.
You know, my gender expression in this moment is very feminine.
So yeah it changes.
I add all those layers because it is such a layered thing.
My name is Ivan Coyote.
I'm a writer and a storyteller.
I was born and raised in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory.
What else can I tell you about myself?
Well, I'm a really good cook.
Nothing fancy like just really good at comfort food.
You can ask my neighbour, I just brought her some stew.
And I'm a non-binary trans person.
Yeah, I pretty much feel like most days it's the one of the least interesting things I have to talk about.
So, I basically spent like my childhood being pretty fundamentally convinced
that I was a unicorn.
And feeling pretty fundamentally, sort of alone in the world as a kid.
I guess maybe nine years ago, I first heard that term non-binary.
I wasn't drawn to it at first because it felt to me like
it wasn't really an identity.
It was like a non-identity.
Like I wasn't saying I am this.
It was saying I am not that.
I am non-binary.
So I sort of bent the corners of it to fit I guess, you know?
But now I'm OK with that word non-binary.
It's not perfect but until we invent a better one yeah, it'll do.
What is it that you want or expect from people?
Because a lot of folks out there who genuinely want to understand
what it means to be non-binary
but they also don't know how to then react to it.
I expect respect.
I expect to be treated with respect just like I guess we all hope for, you know?
I constantly get questioned when I'm getting on airplanes because my gender, whatever that is
doesn't match my presentation, whatever that is.
And think about all the times that you have to check M or F on a box
and then ask yourself
how many of the times that information or that data is actually necessary
because most of the time it's not.
[Chang] Are there people that you don't have this conversation with?
I honestly haven't talked to my parents that raised me about it.
Do you think they would understand?
I think they would, yeah, I know that they would.
Even though I'm terrified because I'm like oh, what are they gonna say?
I think they will accept it.
[Fundal] I'm non-binary but what exactly does that mean?
We'll answer some of the gender questions you've always wanted to ask
in our new podcast, They and Us.
How difficult is it for you to try to come to some coherent understanding
about yourself and how you feel
but to do it in such a public way with so many people watching you do it.
I care very much about helping people understand using 'they pronouns'
and got stuck in this vicious spiral of
this is not gonna end well but somehow I wanted to keep having the conversation.
It's hard.
[Coyote] We can't change the world overnight.
For our children, we can't change transphobic minds overnight.
Like, I don't think that the gender binary just hurts non-binary people or trans people.
I think it hurts all of us.
Let's just all just be our authentic selves.
I just can't wait for a world where we can just all be exactly who we are
without this threat of like constantly having to police our own genders.
And I mean, that's I think the gift that trans and non-binary people bring to the world.
[Chang] That's great.
OK, thanks Andrew, peace out.
I guess yeah, I better go back on air.
Thank you, take care.
Cheers.
Thank you for having me and yeah, it was lovely.
Thank you.