When Being Seen Becomes Being Targeted
(Initially I posted a video shortly after this incident, and I don’t think I was in the best frame of mind to really communicate about what had then just transpired.)
I walked into a convenience store like anyone else.
I was visibly tattooed, and someone struck up a conversation with me about them. It seemed friendly. Normal. Just two people talking for a moment about something that caught their attention.
A few minutes later, that same person threw stale, cold coffee on me in the parking lot.
Amazing how quickly that interaction changed.
They had just spoken to me face-to-face. They had looked at my tattoos, asked questions, and interacted with me like a human being.
Then, apparently because I am transgender, that humanity suddenly became optional.
That is what stays with me. The fact that someone could recognize me as a person one moment and decide I deserved humiliation the next. I wasn’t bothering anyone. I wasn’t confronting anyone. I wasn’t making a political statement.
Minutes earlier, I was simply another person in a convenience store. I was someone interesting enough to ask about my tattoos. Then something changed. Once I was apparently perceived as transgender, ordinary curiosity became hostility, and a casual interaction became harassment. That is what visibility can mean for trans people: being seen can suddenly become being targeted.
I was simply existing in public as myself.
People are free to have opinions about transgender people. They are free to not understand us. They are even free to dislike us.
But throwing something at someone because of who they are is not “disagreement.”
It is cruelty.
And moments like this are exactly why I keep talking about visibility, dignity, and basic human respect. Because I should not have to wonder whether a casual conversation with a stranger is going to turn into hostility the moment they decide what I am.
I refuse to become hateful because someone else chose hate. But I also refuse to ignore what happened. Sure, I’ve faced worse. But no one should have to deal with this.
Being visibly transgender should never be treated as an invitation for harassment. I am still here, and I am still myself. And I will not allow someone else’s ugliness to make me disappear.
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