Thomas Beatie and
his wife, Nancy, have made national headlines for
something very ordinary: starting a family. Thomas is a
transgender man who has chosen to carry the
couple's child because Nancy isn't able to.
From where I sit -- safely inside an urban bubble and well
ensconced in the transgender movement both personally
and professionally -- what Thomas is doing isn't
shocking in the least. He is far from the first
transman to carry a child, and he certainly won't be the
last. What is different about Thomas and Nancy is that
they were proactive in garnering media coverage -- and
in a big way. With joint exclusive interviews with
both the Oprah Show and People magazine, the
Beaties have reached a national audience with their
story of family -- the story of queer family.
Now I'm not the
kid-loving or -bearing kind. I've just never had the
instinct or the drive to bring, adopt, conceive, foster, or
otherwise beget any kin of any kind. But I've got to
give kudos to the Beaties. It's a brave thing
to commit to loving and supporting another human being
for the rest of their lives -- no matter what.
As a trans
advocate -- as an LGBT advocate -- what concerns me about
the Beaties' story is: 1) the beyond-the-pale
defamation that I've seen on national cable
news, Letterman's Top 10 and now in the
Boston Globe, and 2) the relative silence
of our community in public response. The Beaties are doing
what we communications professionals write into nearly
every PR plan that's put to paper. That is,
"we must tell our personal stories." The only
way that "mainstream" America is going
to come to terms with our existence is to read it in
People magazine, watch it on Oprah, and
recognize a bit of common humanity between us.
The pregnant man
is both a PR crisis and an opportunity for the LGBT
community. We can stand behind the Beaties and publicly
support their right to form a family in the way that
they choose. Or we can remain hushed because we fear
that no good can come from engaging in this particular
LGBT media moment. While easier in the short-term to let the
Beaties stand in the spotlight alone as an unusual human
interest story, passing on this public education
opportunity will come back to bite us down the line.
Sure, the optics of a pregnant transman are shocking, and
perhaps the Beaties are publicly begging questions we don't
want to answer, but not solidly and publicly backing
this couple's family as a movement threatens to
undermine all of our rights to family formation (if we
should chose to exercise them).
So, is it bad PR
to have a pregnant man on Oprah? Or is the old adage,
''there's no such thing as bad press'' true? It
this case, reporters and producers are looking for
''our side of the story,'' and they're having a tough time
finding pro-LGBT spokespeople to speak on the record in
support of the Beatie's family. And it's that
silence, I think, not the pregnant man, that fosters
bad press.
Let's not remain
quiet during an opportunity to educate national
audiences on queer families, the realities of transmen's
bodies, the ability of an individual to identify as
male and to give birth, the inhumane obstacles to
basic health/prenatal care that Thomas has faced, and
the need for a safe school environment when the little
Beattie goes to kindergarten. There is a media vacuum
waiting to be filled, and if pro-LGBT voices
don't step up to fill it, we will be left with
Letterman's "androgynous freak show"
comments and the Globe's comparisons to incest
and forced polygamy with nothing to balance the
story. And that will hurt us all long after this labor
of love is welcomed into the world.