What We Can Learn from Trans Joy
Protest in the UK | Photo by Oriel Frankie Ashcroft via Pexels
This Pride Month, I really want to centre Trans Joy. Over the course of 2024 and well into 2025, we’ve collectively witnessed a targeted attack on Transgender people. Their very right to exist is regularly called into question by politicians, lawmakers, and community members. For me, the biggest question that emerges is: why?
Perhaps a simple question, but the depth of the inquiry goes to the root of the rejection of trans people and what they represent in many cases. Transgender people fundamentally disrupt the power dynamics upheld by the patriarchal gender binary, creating possibilities for meaningful change for everyone constrained by imposed gender norms and rules.
My name is Mara, and I’m Fora’s Communications Coordinator. I’m also cisgender, queer, and a staunch ally to the trans community. I’ve had the lived experience of witnessing and actively supporting two different people in my life through the journey of self-acceptance and transitioning their gender expression, and those experiences taught me an incredible amount about the strength it takes to be who you are in a world that makes you feel like you shouldn't exist. These experiences also taught me about joy and euphoria. Seeing someone love themselves when they look in the mirror or put on an article of clothing and have it fall the right way—these are the moments that fill me with an incredible amount of emotion because trans joy is incredibly transformative when we recognize what it really represents.
So, let’s talk about Trans Joy and what it has to teach us as we work toward the collective goal of gender equity.
First off, it is important to recognize the ways in which trans existence points out how fragile gender norms and expectations are to begin with. If people have the capacity to decide how they want to show up in the world, and express their gender authentically and joyously, it invites cisgender people to then reconsider the ways the gender binary has also been holding them back. This recognition is a slippery slope that reminds us that the rules of gender norms don’t actually hold up when you give people the freedom to choose and explore their identities. It challenges the idea that we must conform to what and who we’re told we should be.
First things first: gender equity means equity for all genders.
When talking about gender equity, it is never a conversation exclusively about men and women—but instead addressing all people who exist along the spectrum of gender, including non-binary, gender-fluid, genderqueer, and other identities. As a community, we understand women aren’t the only group marginalized by gender. Importantly, the presence and inclusion of people of different gender identities and expressions within a given space, organization, or society opens us up to more opportunities for solidarity, learning, and compassion, all of which help in driving the gender equity movement forward.
And let’s be real: binary gender norms harm everyone.
Whether you’re cis or trans, the binary limits all of us, and transphobic rhetoric “often perpetuates the idea that there is only one correct way for a person to express their gender [reinforcing] harmful stereotypes about what it means to be a woman or a man in society” says Right to Equity in their 2023 blog post. It creates rigid expectations around gendered performance, maintains harmful hierarchies such as the gendered wage gap, and upholds shared experiences of shame.
When asked about their perspective on the diversity of the lived experience of trans people, Cal Campos, a Fora community member, shared: “The thing about trans joy for me is that it reminds me that despite the heaviness of everything, I deserve also to be happy. I deserve to enjoy the beauty of life. There is still beauty even though my community is told that we shouldn't exist.”
Their remarks are a staunch reminder that the freedom to exist as you are, among people who understand and accept you, is incredibly freeing — and the reality is that we could all revel in this kind of joy — if only we abandoned binary thinking and embraced the broad spectrum of human experience and identities.
What trans joy can teach us:
Typically, narratives around transgender people and their experiences in a heteronormative and binary world aren’t particularly uplifting or generative. Stories that centre suffering, discrimination, and violence are often used as tools to signal boost and garner sympathy and support for folks in the trans community.
In their article Transgender Joy: Flipping the Script of Marginality, Westbrook and Shuster explain that, unfortunately, “these stories can contribute to transnormativity—the belief that there is one correct way to be transgender—positioning misery and oppression as central to a true experience of transness. Rather than helping, spotlighting the negative aspects of the lives of marginalized people causes harm when that becomes the only way we understand those groups.”
They go on to explain that contrary to the dominant discourse that “equates being trans with misery,” there are many trans people who revel in their identities, celebrating the expansiveness that comes with “being outside the social norm [and how it’s] helped them see themselves and the world around them in new ways.” Worldviews that are shaped by personal transgender experience are often infused with more compassion and empathy due to the complexity of their lived experiences and their unique journeys to self-acceptance and self-love. There is courage and depth that is required to define yourself outside the normative state—and that deserves respect and celebration.
Cal Campos speaking on a panel at Fora’s 2024 Leadership Forum | Photo by Jenny Jay
They go on to explain that contrary to the dominant discourse that “equates being trans with misery,” there are many trans people who revel in their identities, celebrating the expansiveness that comes with “being outside the social norm [and how it’s] helped them see themselves and the world around them in new ways.” Worldviews that are shaped by personal transgender experience are often infused with more compassion and empathy due to the complexity of their lived experiences and their unique journeys to self-acceptance and self-love. There is courage and depth that is required to define yourself outside the normative state—and that deserves respect and celebration.
“If I were cisgender and straight, it would be so much easier to judge trans people because the system would work for me, but because the system doesn’t work for me, I have learned to have much more capacity to hold space for others, offering compassion and empathy when they experience their own barriers to entry.”
As a result of the level of self-reflection and identity work required to be authentically themselves, transgender people have a capacity to be much more deeply connected to who they are in a way that more of us could benefit from. Knowing and honouring your truth and taking steps to embrace it reflects a powerful commitment that fosters self-love and understanding from within.
Trans joy is also a visceral form of resistance. Despite being told they will face rejection, alienation, and pain, amongst the systemic barriers that continue to be at play, trans folks still find love, community, and belonging outside the normative group that rejects them.
“Our existence. Our very existence is glorious and scintillating. Such that they attempt to pass hundreds of laws to extinguish our flame. It took me a long time to realize it, but I’m finally here. They hunt us precisely because of our joy. Our joy is world‑making,” writes Alok Vaid-Menon, gender non-conforming writer and comedian.
When we center Trans Joy rather than their plight or their suffering, we can also recognize the beauty and expansiveness that trans people model for all of us.
“Highlighting joy helps dismantle the dominant narrative that says members of marginalized groups are miserable and shunned by others. Narratives of joy reduce stigma, discrimination, and violence by showing how marginalized groups are valid, valuable, and worthy of celebration. Moreover, joy fuels activism against oppression by energizing people and offering alternative possibilities for what life can be like as a member of a marginalized group” (Westbrook & Shuster, 2023).
When we embrace the vastness of identity and experience that many trans people model for us, we can transform how we engage with the world, people around us, and the systems we collectively navigate and uphold.
Being trans isn’t new.
Protester (Unsplash)
A popular conservative argument is that the concept of being transgender is new. That’s not only ignorant, but just untrue. “It is true that awareness and visibility of [transgender and] nonbinary identities are increasing, and we are always finding new ways to conceptualize and verbalize how we experience gender; however, genders outside the binary have existed throughout human history” explains Out & Equal in their short guide, Nonbinary Gender Identities: A Diverse Global History. People existing beyond the binary have been documented all over the world, across generations and cultures. The reality is that the gender binary and patriarchy were used as tools to exert colonial power on a large variety of Indigenous peoples around the world*.
By enforcing a specific and limited concept of gender, colonial powers sought to challenge different approaches to social organization, decentering women in particular, and intentionally removing them from positions of power and influence. Colonialism wasn’t just about seizing land and controlling resources; it was also about reconfiguring social dynamics. A 2025 paper on the impacts of colonization by Cadence Desmarais explores just this: “The displacement of Indigenous matriarchy by colonial patriarchy is significant because it reframed the social structure of these communities, particularly in how gender roles were valued.” This demonstrates a parallel to the way that trans people are targeted in our contemporary context—this erasure and quest for power was incredibly violent.
As we reflect on pride this year, I challenge my peers to reflect on the statement that Fora has made many times: this is all interconnected.
Colonialism, violence against and exclusion of trans people, and oppressive gender norms have and will continue to be deeply interconnected. When we examine the connections between these phenomena and hold them in comparison to concepts such as transnormativity, it’s difficult to ignore their relationships to each other.
Ultimately, as systemic barriers continue to evolve, it’s on all of us to centre trans joy. Any system that polices people’s bodies and identities is the antithesis of collective justice. Consider one of the core understandings of equity, diversity and inclusion initiatives: when we respond to the most marginalized groups, it benefits everyone. In the fight for gender justice, that must always include the trans community.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Mara Mahmud (she/her) is an interdisciplinary digital communicator. With a diverse educational background and a deep interest in human-centred stories, she takes a visual approach to helping people understand complex ideas. Through photo, video, and graphic design, Mara seeks to bring stories to life, encouraging audiences to more deeply connect with them.
A budding documentary filmmaker, avid traveler, and creative thinker, Mara brings a unique vision and a lot of joy to her work.
