I’m a man today, I was born a man, and have never felt as anything but a man (who loves women).
And I don’t know why other than reading the same message everyone read and I frankly don’t care. I will readily admit that I don’t have a frame of reference for how that would feel and I’m neither avoidant nor curious about it.
But I do care that you call him Elliot, because I do know it takes a lot of guts to live authentically in the face of today’s judgements, particularly in any industry that makes someone famous worldwide, but this would be true even if it wasn’t the case and he was simply your acquaintance with the same situation, and you should be respecting that even if you don’t understand it.
We see and respect a million human situations we don’t understand a day. This is no different.
And this is especially true given not only that it makes really no difference to you one way or the other (other than: you used to say Ellen/she, now you say Elliot/he), and yet it makes all the difference to them to normalize it, so people stop being horrible to others for just being different than the rest and so trans people (or any group you don’t understand, really) stop being murdered and hurt for simply existing.
As far as I’m concerned, Elliot is a fantastic actor and a great performer and I enjoyed his work while named Ellen, and zero of that has changed other than now I’ll say “I saw Elliot in X show”, should his future work be interesting enough for me to watch (which I’m pretty confident it will be).
It’s his life, his rules.
My guess, from my living in the SF Bay Area where this happens and is talked about a lot more “in the open” and having seen this kind of thing before, is that he didn’t “become” so much as this has been a journey of understanding that has been going on for quite a while, and the announcement is a way to say “I really do know where I stand now, and I realize this is where I’ve really always stood”, or “It’s actually always been like this but my (family/work/society/etc) didn’t let me be myself and I feel now I can”.
Again, I’m not curious. I only know Elliot in his professional capacity by watching content and if I’m not overly concerned what the barista does in their personal life even when I greatly enjoy their coffee, I’m also not going to be overly concerned with what an actor does in their personal life even if I’m a big fan of their acting. I find that human obsession with the personal lives of famous people tremendously unhealthy not just for the famous people but for those obsessing, frankly.
So, one of my favorite actors is now a he. When he’s ready to write about that journey, I may or may not find myself interested enough to read it, and I won’t get bent out of shape if the explanation of what’s obviously a very private journey never comes.
But I can respect it and say: right on, looking forward to future work, Elliot.
Picture Source Wikipedia
Thanks for Reading
0 Comments