“We are one. Stories of a transgender boy” (Forja, 2023) by Pascual André (Valdivia, 1994), is the autobiographical story that crosses experience, parenting models, conflicts, self-help messages, and religion of a Valdivian girl who, from an early age, realizes that she does not fit into the sex assigned at birth.
This discomfort keeps her silent for many years without understanding what is happening. Along with the feminine body and image, she has tastes traditionally associated with the masculine, such as playing ball and the type of clothing. The narration states that: “It is strange, because I have always felt that voice inside me and I have always wanted to be like him, but it does not fit with who I am” (44). This emergence of a second consciousness called Andrés appears in moments of crisis where he supports her and gives her advice on the challenges of identity acceptance and cultural adaptation.
These reflections on “what to do” and “what is happening to me” are decisive in adulthood, never in the school stage in which there are personal concerns; nor do the perceptions come from something foreign to the person but rather, from the most intimate part of the author: “Andrés was always me, Andrea never existed, she was only a mask that biologically nature had given me, a woman’s body, when really my mind and my heart were those of a man” (47), explains the volume.
Thus, the tone is that of a life diary or personal memoir, and it has a nagging ideological character in many passages, and that, at times, such presence interferes with the protagonist himself. That is to say, he has a positive view on emotional problems such as parental divorce, the forbidden sentimental relationships of conservative parents and those concerns in adolescence that cause him to take refuge in God. Which causes him to directly preach devotion in some parts of the book.
One of the key points, which is told during the days of dramatic activities at the university, is that she has to play the man in a hypothetical wedding. This simulation allows the question of “being transsexual” to appear. In collaboration with her closest friend and after watching the film The Danish Girl (2015), she begins to investigate on the Internet about this situation and from the novelty. So she will discover that there is a solution to this question and she will move towards sex change always accompanied by medicine.
The place of the community is relevant to situate this transition, because, on the one hand, the author points out that when he lives in the city: “people look at you as if judging you and make you feel like you are in the ‘wrong’ place” (35), but when he lives outside of it he highlights “the kindness of the people” (57), which seems to me to be an unrequited and incomplete idea, since the voice builds an atmosphere of fear and rejection in the silence in which he finds himself immersed.
Likewise, in a place where there are as many churches as liquor stores in the lakeside city, the parishioners who attend the congregation do not approve of the new member: “after a conversation with someone from my church, who insistently told me that my transition was not from God” (84). This shows that faith is extremely particular and the prevailing ideology is often opaque in the receptions of different personalities to what is indicated in the only book they cite in Christian meetings.
Of the thirty-one chapters in 118 pages, there are sections that answer frequently asked questions about this transition, such as: “how do I start this process?”, “which health system in Chile is best?”, “how do I tell those closest to me?”, “the presence of a psychologist and/or endocrinologist,” among others. This undoubtedly makes it easier to understand medical and social situations that are unknown to most people.
Some considerations of this testimony are those about gender roles and the culture embedded in patriarchal education, but the author does not present an argument or definition of what it means to be each one of what he wants: “I decided to become a real man (…) I want to be that man who is a gentleman and who, knowing what it means to be a woman, can protect those who are around me” (68). Which seems curious to me, because we all know what characteristics a gentleman has, but there is no established and rigid definition of being a man and a woman in the 21st century at this time.
Beyond the caricatured statement “the gay dictatorship” that is repeated like a mantra and that makes some Chilean far-right political leaders nervous, digital, visual and reading resources allow them to manifest other realities that were denied in the last century. For this reason, this testimony of life by Pascual André, “We are one. The story of a transsexual boy”, a southerner who participates in this society, is extremely devoted to the gospel and shares this journey about the decision to change sex/identity; from woman to man, has a notion of social teaching and constitutes the right to freedom and to live in peace.
Datasheet:
We are one. The story of a transgender boy
Pascual Andre
Forja Publishing, 2023
118 pages.-
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