Protect the Trans-cestors

Youth is a universal dominating force, especially in the trans+community.

But why are we obsessed with youth? It seems that life gets better as we rack up our mileage around the sun. Yet youth is continually promoted over any other feature, time and time again.

Within the trans+ community, the wisdom and knowledge of our elders - or our living trans-cestors as I like to call them - is something that I think we overlook at our peril, yet overlooked it is. In much the same way that specific characteristics are favoured in the community, youth is praised when perhaps it doesn’t represent the best of the community.

When I was at Trans+ Pride Manchester, I spoke about the need for allies to be expansive in their view of the trans community, to protect all of us, including the dolls. At the end of my panel, I spoke to a glorious human, who had done more than I could ever hope to achieve, and at 60, carried herself with a sense of pride we should be in awe of.

Yet where is that icon’s generation mentioned or remembered when we perpetuate a conversation focused on youth and traditional beauty?

We are in a unique position - that more of our trans+ elders have managed to survive the hostility faced by the community for centuries - and they are the faces we should be looking to. They grew up in a world that was more hostile than even 2025 has been, and they had far fewer elders to look to for advice, yet they persisted.

These are the very people we should be celebrating.

To prioritise youth instead of our trans-cestors’ lived experience seems like a woeful misstep. We often say that ‘we have been here the whole time’ because it is a fact. Yet where are our trans-cestors mentioned in the conversations seeking to create and protect trans+ lives?

Where is the respect these icons deserve?

2025, for all its low points, has seen a rise in allyship, which is a brilliant thing. Yet, when we are engaging with allies, I urge you to remember that trans people can be any age, and so our allyship needs to be expansive and inclusive.

I hope, like me, you will work to protect our trans-cestors.