We Need Better Narratives About Gender
It\u2019s a time of contrast and contradiction for gender queerness in America: At the same time that about 5 percent of Americans under 30 identify as transgender or nonbinary, over 20 states have passed some sort of restriction on gender-affirming care for children. In 2023 alone, over 550 anti-trans bills have been introduced across the country.\n\nThe political push and pull can overshadow a broad spectrum of rich questions and possibilities that queer culture opens up \u2014 about how we think about identity and social categories, how we structure our communities and support networks, our anxieties about having children who are different from ourselves, how gender norms shape all bodies and how difficult it can be to make big life decisions.\n\nMasha Gessen is a staff writer at The New Yorker who has thought deeply about many of these questions. \u201cGender is something that happens between me and other people,\u201d they say. In this conversation, the guest host Lydia Polgreen asks Gessen, who identifies as trans and nonbinary, what the social and political shift around gender has looked like to them in the past few decades.\n\nThey discuss why gender has captured the conservative imagination, how L.G.B.T.Q. activists have fallen into the \u201cregret trap,\u201d what it means to understand gender expression as a choice rather than something biologically determined, why Gessen prefers a liberatory framework focused on protecting freedoms-to rather than freedoms-from when thinking about L.G.B.T.Q. issues, how gender-affirming care is not just for trans people, how the making of the 1999 movie \u201cThe Matrix\u201d reflects the rapid social change around trans visibility in the United States, the anti-L.G.B.T.Q. sentiments that made Gessen decide to leave their home in Russia,how gender conformity is social contagion and more.\n\nThis episode was hosted by Lydia Polgreen, a New York Times Opinion columnist and a co-host on the weekly Opinion podcast \u201cMatter of Opinion.\u201d She previously served as the managing director of Gimlet, a podcast studio at Spotify, and as the editor in chief of HuffPost.\n\nMentioned:\n\nThe Argonauts by Maggie Nelson\n\nBook Recommendations:\n\nThe Myth of the Wrong Body by Miquel Misse\n\nConundrum by Jan Morris\n\nWho\u2019s Afraid of Gender by Judith Butler\n\nThoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at ezrakleinshow@nytimes.com.\n\nYou can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of \u201cThe Ezra Klein Show\u201d at nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast, and you can find Ezra on Twitter @ezraklein. Book recommendations from all our guests are listed at https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs.\n\nThis episode of \u201cThe Ezra Klein Show\u201d was produced by Kristin Lin. Fact-checking by Michelle Harris, with Mary Marge Locker and Kate Sinclair. Mixing by Efim Shapiro. Our senior editor is Annie-Rose Strasser. The show\u2019s production team also includes Emefa Agawu, Jeff Geld and Rollin Hu. Original music by Isaac Jones. Audience strategy by Kristina Samulewski and Shannon Busta. The executive producer of New York Times Opinion Audio is Annie-Rose Strasser. Special thanks to Isaac Jones.