A Brief But Spectacular take on the power of a name

Geoff Bennett:

Elliot Wade is a trans advocate who co-founded The Louisiana Trans Name Change Fund. He was born and raised in Cecilia, Louisiana, where he didn't have much access to conversations about identity.

He says he's looking to change that for others.

Tonight, Wade shares his Brief But Spectacular take on the power of a name.

Elliot Wade, Founder, Louisiana Trans Name Change Fund:

I'm looking at these statistics, right, and I know that there are high rates of violence.

I know that Louisiana is one of the highest rates of murders in the country for trans people. I know that Black trans people, especially Black trans women, are subjected to that violence at a higher rate. I know that I have to maybe prepare myself to be homeless. But I would rather live as myself or not live at all.

I'm in Cecilia, Louisiana. People haven't really heard of trans people. It didn't really make sense to people. It wasn't something that they could conceptualize or wrap their head around. So I'm struggling with my gender identity and what that means for me. I'm agonizing over what feels like living a lie, because I have to interact at home in this kind of way or talk to my friends and have them call me Elliot and then, whenever my parents are there, make sure that they're not calling me Elliot.

There's like a weird split that happens. And it's hard to keep up. You spend nine months in a womb, and your parents are thinking about the sort of person that you're going to become. And choosing a name for you, that is the first gateway into forming yourself as a human being.

Whenever you choose your own name, you take the power to shape your destiny for yourself. The name change process is daunting, it's expensive, it's tiring, and it's intimidating. You have to go and interact in these courthouses with majority old white men that probably don't respect you.

And, on top of that, you have to spend, depending on what parish you're in, maybe half-a-grand. In pretty much all facets of everyday life, you're going to need documentation for something, whether that's going to school or going to work. If you want to go to a bar and even just get a drink, they have to look at your I.D.

A lot of the times, one of the first instances that folks have where they can be put in a dangerous situation is when those documents don't match their presentation, right?

So, starting the Name Change Fund, for me, was a necessity. I need other people to have the same access that I did. And I think about being the person that I needed when I was 17. In a sort of trans queer utopia in Louisiana, people would just mind their business. That's it. Folks would just have an awareness that trans people exist, that they're human beings, and they're just trying to live their lives like everyone else.

So, in a trans utopia, no one cares that I'm trans.

My name is Elliot Nicholas (ph) Wade, and this is my Brief But Spectacular take on the power of a name.

Geoff Bennett:

And you can watch more Brief But Spectacular videos online at PBS.org/NewsHour/Brief.