C.N. Lester > C.N.'s Quotes

“Part of being trans, of being queer—not all of it, not for all people, but part—is in the re-imagining of what it is to be human. These are categories forged from the failure or refusal to acquiesce to majority rule.”
― C.N. Lester, Trans Like Me

“We cannot afford to be seduced by the sophistry of single-issue movements. As Audre Lorde so rightly said, we do not live single-issue lives.”
― C.N. Lester, Trans Like Me

“Those looking to know how it feels, to have a chance at life in a congruent body, free of dysphoria? Just listen to trans people and what we know of our own lives. We have been speaking this truth for a long time.”
― C.N. Lester, Trans Like Me

“This is the reason why it's insufficient to respond with accusations of being 'offended,' to say that anyone who disagrees with these pieces is not obliged to read them and can take their support elsewhere. Trans people may choose not to consume transphobic media; we have no choice about living in a world shaped by the misinformation.”
― C.N. Lester, Trans Like Me

“Some of our modern history is extraordinary in what it shows us of cooperation and compassion, and some of it is a master class in excluding the most marginalized "for the greater good" of the most privileged.”
― C.N. Lester, Trans Like Me

“A vital point, when considering sex, is one that has been made over and over again by scientists, by philosophers of science, by sociologists and historians of science: that we cannot divorce a singular, unified “Science” from the broader cultures that create and sustain it. What we observe, what we think about what we observe, how we analyze our thoughts, what we pass on to others are all shaped by cultural forces beyond our personal control.”
― C.N. Lester, Trans Like Me: Conversations for All of Us

“Focusing on the needs of those with a lighter burden to bear is not "objective" or "pragmatic", but it is a confirmation of historic societal prejudices that say that some lives matter more than others, some lives are too "complicated" to be worth caring for, some oppression are just too entrenched to change.”
― C.N. Lester, Trans Like Me