Khanh Le Le and Aliza Katzman
May, 2025
May, 2025
Khanh starts our conversation by talking about their desire to pursue voice training: Trans vulnerability is a perpetual “outness” > every word, every sound, every look becomes a form of exposure - we constantly re-out ourselves through our voices, outfits, pronouns, etc.> want to exist in a space without gender necessarily being the first or loudest thingÂ
Aliza yet we also don’t want to deny ourselves expression of gender - and we know that there is no default or neutral expression that does not erase another “normal” - the solution is one of pluralityÂ
Khanh My voice, my body, the way I move—all of that becomes part of how others perceive me > always being decoded, needing to keep guard up and forgo openness, warmth, vulnerability, without establishing safety
Aliza And vulnerability is a privilege in many ways - sometimes our need to survive means we cannot be the first to soften up and lower our guard. How can we hold on to both our vulnerability and our strength?
We come to: the idea of bravery, overcoming trans vulnerability, finding ways to survive & thrive in these public situations
Khanh feels like their own visibility becomes such a double blade knife > constantly second guessing intentions/ reading the subtexts > being seen can feel like being hunted and celebrated at the same timeÂ
Aliza What is the difference between inclusion and safety, and asking for vulnerability in order to create an awareness of diversity? Is there a way to create a safe space without requiring vulnerability at the outset, or does any kind of community require a level of vulnerability? > Is the onus on specific people to create a space of safety first? >Creating a space requires a certain outing, either as an ally or as a member of that community<
Khanh There’s a kind of power in being partly visible, in knowing that I contain more than what anyone can guess > it’s a form of protection, yes—but also a way of having control, holding some parts sacred > taking hormones and wearing binders > balancing between self-indulgence and self-suppression learning to speak in a way that feels like myself, not just palatable to others > sometimes even finding joy in confusing people > using ambiguity as a tool > but also the exhaustion of having to explain, defend, or just exist on other people’s terms > the labor of being legible enough to be safe but not so legible that I’m boxed in > realizing that the need to constantly perform "authenticity" is its own kind of burden > voice as both a tool of resistance and a site of pain
Aliza To hold on to our unintelligibility is what allows us to keep exploring our identity as ourselves, but>refusing to fit in with certain labels and boundaries can also prohibit our access to community> “Authenticity” is a subjective standard, can be used to protect and also harm> ultimately community is a matter of mutual recognition - cannot force anyone to accept you> experience with that as mixed race, white presenting person, and also shared experience of being nonbinary > the way you look or sound might change the way people see and accept you>these are external, superficial qualities (pronoun, voice, appearance) - but they still matter: these factors of how we present change our vulnerability in a world where appearance is politicized > thus become an important part of forming community as well (identifying another as kin, shared experience, expresses an aspect of who we are)
Khanh and Aliza discuss Being Out: protecting our families from our identities vs. being out to our intimate communities > The difference between having a stake in someone’s life, wellbeing, and treatment by society on basis of shared community, vs. having a position of distance, privilege, and even oppression > difference of in-group vs out-group conversation (postnote: thinking about how white/class privilege allows “in-group” conversations to literally be protected through limited access: country clubs, private fundraisings and galas, secret/concealed communications, etc. vs the very public and accessible “in-group” conversations for actual minorities - also, the power disparity in participating in a conversation vs being affected by the issues discussed)
- > how public vulnerability becomes a spectacle for others to consume > having to explain your pain for the education or entertainment of those who will never share your experienceÂ
- > the pressure to be "representative" while knowing no one person can speak for everyone > even within queer and trans spaces, navigating dynamics of access, language, and safetyÂ
- > code-switching within your own community > the exhaustion of managing multiple selves depending on who’s in the room > the difference between visibility and solidarityÂ
- > feeling like even “support” can come with its own expectations or erasure > when people say “I see you” but still don’t actually hear you > the difference that personal investment makes in turning passive acceptance into genuine care > that forms community
Brief anecdote on the New York Landscape:
Aliza on layers: of the sediment we live on (and the history it contains) The layers of the world we exist in, past and present - the trends of pollution, development, displacement, gentrification, development - forgetting and remembering our past layers (the history of a place)>The landscape of NYC and Brooklyn, their history as Lenapehoking - homelands of the native Lenape people>the way this landscape has changed and been changed
Underneath Chinatown used to exist Collect Pond, where Lenape lived at the southwestern shore. Eventually the pond was polluted heavily by factories on its shore>the valley it existed in was leveled in 1811 and the polluted pond was turned into a landfill>The landfill was poorly done, and the white flight of rich residents left the polluted land open to an influx of poor immigrants>Now the site has accumulated new histories, like those that converged to create NYC Chinatown, a neighborhood which is iconic to NYC, now threatened by gentrification and real estate speculation, forcing out the people and businesses that transformed a once abandoned place into a vibrant community.
New York is full of similar cases. Gowanus Canal is now a Superfund Site: one of many polluted locations in the United States “requiring a long-term response to clean up hazardous material contaminations”>Originally, settlers called the canal Gowanus after “Gouwane” the sachem (an elected chief) of the local Lenape tribe (the Canarsee) who lived and farmed along the shores of the creek>The creek was enjoyed for its bountiful oysters and fertile shorelines>centuries later, in 1849, the New York State Legislature authorized the construction of the Gowanus Canal, and factories and residential communities sprang up along the canal> Now, industrial pollution has turned the canal into a superfund site, and cleanup is underway> Now, arts communities, breweries, and music venues populate Gowanus, next to the affluent neighborhood of Park Slope>Now, luxury apartment buildings are being constructed along the canal and marketed as high-end waterfront housing>It is always important, above all else, to know our history
Aliza For reference, most of these buildings ask 40x rent to qualify, and the lowest rent I could find was around 3k. That means the only people who even qualify to live in these buildings have to be making over 120,000 dollars a year. Even if you can afford rent, do you qualify as a tenant?
We return to a question: Is it ok for rich people to move into apartments right next to a toxic waste dump, essentially? Maybe the money they put in will fuel cleanup efforts? But also arguments for gentrification are usually pretty similar - the neighborhood will get nicer, more expensive - while ignoring the long term consequences of gentrification: people will get pushed out. This cycle of harm continues: People with money (money to build factories, money to hire contractors) come and destroy the land> poorer people move in and transform it into an area that is lived in - that develops its own culture and life> wealthy people come back, push them out, and make the neighborhood their own > How far does this go?
Talking about Community, Marriage, and Government
Khanh: current marriage equality movement in Vietnam > comparison with the US anti-trans movement > questioning the need to be validated by the state > if the state cannot accept the existence of trans people, how does their acceptance of marriages between trans people make sense?Â
Aliza: Part of this quest for recognition by the government may be a result of the way our relationships to government have changed>the spread of a national government structure that has a certain relationship with marriage (institutionally)> the implications of a legally recognized marriage for the function of a household (or a couple) I.E. healthcare, financial, housing benefits or something like visitation rights (matters of dignity/humanity)
>This as a result of western government structures + their foundation in christian values, which have certain legal frameworks and aesthetic priorities, installed around the world through imperialism>imposition of western frameworks and values through wartime, occupation, conditional aid, threat/blackmail/etc.
Aliza: why do we need our marriage recognized by the “state”? Why is the state the most legitimate body, moreso than our local community?
>people are forced to care about what the state thinks when the state has the power
Khanh: the dissonance between being defined by the state and being defined by the self > it shows how conditional “progress” can be > marriage, as an institution, is a state-sanctioned contract—it’s not inherently liberating > it starts to feel less like true recognition and more like a political compromise > something symbolic, but hollow underneath, like being handed a trophy for surviving a system that was designed to erase you > visibility without protection > rights that are easily given can be just as easily taken away > and the danger of mistaking representation for justice.
____sidenote corner:
This wikipedia entry for Collect Pond captures so much, and feels almost comically emblematic to me:
We took what used to be a source of water and food, turned it into a toxic landfill, and then built a jail on top of it.
Random images from gowanus luxury apartment sites:
We can compare that to the canal of the site as a superfund site: