Identity

Historically, trans people and disabled people have had vocal training to change the way their voices sound; sometimes by choice and sometimes by way of strong culture pressure of what a gender and the voice of a person whose gender that is “should” sound like. Scarleteen volunteer Val was thrilled to sit down with a teacher who approaches the voice completely differently; not in the pursuit of “normal” or with an attitude of “fixing” but rather in the pursuit of uplifting self-expression and showing people the power of the tools their body has to express themselves.

Hi Sam! This is a great question. I love it for two reasons: first, because learning about feminism seems like a pretty great use for the internet, but far more importantly because you're questioning the things you are reading and looking for additional perspectives so you can make your own mind up...

Relationships, like gender and sexuality, don’t fit into a binary. The phrase queer platonic, which comes from the asexual community, means a deep and meaningful intimate relationship which isn’t based on sex. You can have this with anyone – no matter their gender or sexuality. Perhaps if the term were more normalised (I hadn’t heard of it before researching this article), more people would be comfortable with such a relationship.

I’d like to have a frank discussion with you about where these anti-trans bills come from, what you can do to be informed about the rhetoric surrounding them, and how you can affirm yourself and practice self-care while you may hear and feel so many people being non-supportive or outright hateful about trans and gender-nonconforming people.

As you probably already know, there is a wave of horrible legislation that's been moving through the United States with the aim of banning trans youth and trans folks of all ages from accessing everything from sports to life saving, gender affirming care. To all the trans and nonbinary young people...

One of the weirder things about being on the internet for a while is that you see the same arguments happening over and over again. I looked at your question, thought, "Didn't this discussion just happen?" and then remembered that the round of discourse I had in mind took place a decade ago. Which...

Even when you're with a supportive partner, coming out as a bisexual guy to a girlfriend or another kind of woman partner isn't always easy and might feel awfully intimidating. Adam England has some support, help and solidarity to spare.

There’s this feeling of smallness - that your world is confined to secrets you tell in your diary, or to the few people you know in real life that are brave (or perhaps foolish) enough to come out - that I identify as a part of my theory on queer orphanhood. You spend so much time contemplating your identity that you don’t have time to wonder about people out there. There’s a kind of spiritual displacement in being queer and young.

I want to start by answering your question about whether it's normal or common for bisexual people to doubt their orientation, because it's something I've seen often, both in my experience as a volunteer here at Scarleteen and as a person with a lot of bisexual friends and acquaintances. I'm not...

Hi Parvati, It's great to hear that you're trying to be a good ally, and doing some of the self-examination and learning that comes with that! Since you helpfully broke your question down into three parts, I'll go through them one by one. 1. Is gender really only a social construct? The short answer...