{ "id": "p16022coll97:47", "object": "https://cdm16022.contentdm.oclc.org/utils/getthumbnail/collection/p16022coll97/id/47", "set_spec": "p16022coll97", "collection_name": "Tretter Transgender Oral History Project", "collection_name_s": "Tretter Transgender Oral History Project", "collection_description": "
The Tretter Transgender Oral History Project (TTOHP) collects, preserves, and makes accessible oral histories of gender transgression, especially as theyintersect with race, age, sexuality, citizenship, class, and ability. The project seeks to document the power and vision of trans movements for justice through the stories of activists working to imagine another world.
\n\nThe first phase of the Tretter Transgender Oral History Project was led by poet and activist Andrea Jenkins—who became the first Black transgender woman to serve in office in the US after she was elected, in 2017, to the Minneapolis City Council. This phase of the project sought to document the life stories and experiences of transgender and gender non-conforming people, with a focus on people living in the upper Midwest as well as those often excluded from the historical record, including trans people of color and trans elders.
\n\nThe second phase of the Tretter Transgender Oral History Project is led by trans studies scholar Myrl Beam. This phase of work seeks to document histories of trans activist movements and politics in the US, and is grounded in the belief that trans movements for justice are about more than rights: they are about survival, and about creating a new, more fabulous, more livable, and more expansive world––one not structured by racialized gender norms. The oral histories collected during this phase document the transformative power of trans movements, and the stories of trans activists who are building them.
\n\nFor more about the project, visit: https://www.lib.umn.edu/tretter/transgender-oral-history-project.
", "title": "Interview with Lawrence Tanner Richardson", "title_s": "Interview with Lawrence Tanner Richardson", "title_t": "Interview with Lawrence Tanner Richardson", "title_search": "Interview with Lawrence Tanner Richardson", "title_sort": "interviewwithlawrencetannerrichardson", "description": "Lawrence Tanner Richardson is a Black trans man from St. Paul, Minnesota. He talks about his childhood, including being raised by his grandmother and being very involved in the Southern Baptist church. He talks about how his transition affected his relationships. At the time of the interview, he was a United Church of Christ pastor, doing digital evangelism at Linden Hills UUC, and heading two online churches for trans and gender non-conforming people. He explains his journey from seeing God as hating him to seeing God as a loving God. He touches upon his encounters with the police, as well as his experience of community at the Black Trans Man’s Conference.", "date_created": [ "2016-06-10" ], "date_created_ss": [ "2016-06-10" ], "date_created_sort": "2016", "creator": [ "Richardson, Lawrence Tanner" ], "creator_ss": [ "Richardson, Lawrence Tanner" ], "creator_sort": "richardsonlawrencetanner", "contributor": [ "Jenkins, Andrea (Interviewer)" ], "contributor_ss": [ "Jenkins, Andrea (Interviewer)" ], "notes": "Forms part of the Tretter Transgender Oral History Project, Phase 1.", "types": [ "Moving Image" ], "format": [ "Oral histories | http://vocab.getty.edu/aat/300202595" ], "format_name": [ "Oral histories" ], "dimensions": "1:18:45", "subject": [ "Midwest (United States)", "Family Relationships", "Spirituality, Spiritual Life, Religion", "Sex and Love", "Policing and Prisons", "Friendship and Community", "Black", "Race", "Racism", "Gender Affirming Care", "Tretter Transgender Oral History Project Phase 1" ], "subject_ss": [ "Midwest (United States)", "Family Relationships", "Spirituality, Spiritual Life, Religion", "Sex and Love", "Policing and Prisons", "Friendship and Community", "Black", "Race", "Racism", "Gender Affirming Care", "Tretter Transgender Oral History Project Phase 1" ], "language": [ "English" ], "city": [ "St. Joseph" ], "state": [ "Minnesota" ], "country": [ "United States" ], "continent": [ "North America" ], "geonames": [ "http://sws.geonames.org/5044896/" ], "parent_collection": "Tretter Transgender Oral History Project", "parent_collection_name": "Tretter Transgender Oral History Project", "contributing_organization": "University of Minnesota Libraries, Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection in Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Studies.", "contributing_organization_name": "University of Minnesota Libraries, Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection in Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Studies.", "contributing_organization_name_s": "University of Minnesota Libraries, Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection in Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Studies.", "contact_information": "University of Minnesota Libraries, Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection in Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Studies. 111 Elmer L. Andersen Library, 222 - 21st Avenue South, Minneapolis, MN 55455; https://www.lib.umn.edu/tretter", "fiscal_sponsor": "This project is funded through the generous support of The TAWANI Foundation, Headwaters Foundation and many individual donors.", "local_identifier": [ "tretter414_tohp136" ], "dls_identifier": [ "tretter414_tohp136" ], "rights_statement_uri": "http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC-EDU/1.0/", "kaltura_audio": "1_2a7thui1", "kaltura_video": "1_2tsshi3r", "kaltura_combo_playlist": "0_dselzh1r", "page_count": 0, "record_type": "primary", "first_viewer_type": "kaltura_combo_playlist", "viewer_type": "kaltura_combo_playlist", "attachment": "131.pdf", "attachment_format": "pdf", "document_type": "item", "featured_collection_order": 999, "date_added": "2018-09-24T00:00:00Z", "date_added_sort": "2018-09-24T00:00:00Z", "date_modified": "2020-05-22T00:00:00Z", "transcription": "Lawrence Tanner Richardson\nNarrator\nAndrea Jenkins\nInterviewer\nThe Transgender Oral History Project\nTretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nJune 10, 2016\nThe Transgender Oral History Project of the Upper Midwest will empower individuals to tell their story,\nwhile providing students, historians, and the public with a more rich foundation of primary source\nmaterial about the transgender community. The project is part of the Tretter Collection at the\nUniversity of Minnesota. The archive provides a record of GLBT thought, knowledge and culture for\ncurrent and future generations and is available to students, researchers and members of the public.\nThe Transgender Oral History Project will collect up to 400 hours of oral histories involving 200 to 300\nindividuals over the next three years. Major efforts will be the recruitment of individuals of all ages and\nexperiences, and documenting the work of The Program in Human Sexuality. This project will be led by\nAndrea Jenkins, poet, writer, and trans-activist. Andrea brings years of experience working in\ngovernment, non-profits and LGBT organizations. If you are interested in being involved in this exciting\nproject, please contact Andrea.\nAndrea Jenkins\njenki120@umn.edu\n(612) 625-4379\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 3\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nAndrea 1 Jenkins -AJ\n2 Lawrence Tanner Richardson -LTR\n3\n4 AJ: So, hello.\n5 LTR: Hello.\n6 AJ: My name is Andrea Jenkins and I am the oral historian for the Transgender Oral History Project\n7 at the Tretter Collection at the University of Minnesota. Today is June 10, 2016. I am in St.\n8 Joseph, Minnesota, and I am here today with Lawrence Richardson, and sometimes you go by\n9 Lawrence Tanner Richardson, so you’ve got to talk to me a little bit about that. But, I’m here\n10 today with Lawrence Richardson. How you doing, Lawrence?\n11 LTR: I’m doing great, I’m doing great – and really happy to be a part of this. So, thank you.\n12 AJ: Oh, my God, thank you. I’m so happy that you said yes and you’re willing to participate. So,\n13 let’s just start with a few questions. State your name and how you spell it. Also, state your\n14 gender identity today, your gender assigned at birth, and your pronouns.\n15 LTR: OK. Well, my name is Lawrence Tanner Richardson.\n16 AJ: Haha, see – I told you.\n17 LTR: Tanner is my middle name and I use that entire name when I’m speaking specifically about my\n18 identities because that’s the name I got to choose for myself. My name is spelled L-a-w-r-e-n-c-19\ne T-a-n-n-e-r R-i-c-h-a-r-d-s-o-n. And I was born in St. Paul, Minnesota. I use male – he/him/his-20\noriented pronouns. I identify as a trans man and my identity as far as my sexual orientation\n21 goes, I identify as queer.\n22 AJ: OK. What was your gender assigned at birth?\n23 LTR: I was assigned female at birth.\n24 AJ: Really?\n25 LTR: Yes.\n26 AJ: OK, all right. Lawrence, please . . . I just want to get us in a reflective mode. What is the first\n27 thing you remember in life? What’s your earliest memory?\n28 LTR: My earliest memory is when . . . oh, my gosh. My earliest memory is when I was playing at my\n29 home with my cousin, my older cousin, and she had to leave. I remember being really\n30 devastated and that was the first time I remember being devastated.\n31 AJ: Wow, OK. Devastation.\n32 LTR: It’s a fleeting memory, it’s not anything . . . but, I remember the color of the carpet and I\n33 remember her walking out the door and I remember just being left and feeling . . .\n34 AJ: Sadness.\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 4\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\n1 LTR: Sad.\n2 AJ: Yeah. Wow, it’s an emotion – sadness is an emotion that all humans feel. So, that’s your first\n3 memory, huh?\n4 LTR: And I was like four.\n5 AJ: OK. And this was in St. Paul?\n6 LTR: It was.\n7 AJ: You grew up in St. Paul, what was that like?\n8 LTR: It was . . . I had a difficult childhood, to be honest. I’m the oldest of three and my mother was\n9 convinced that I was a boy when she was pregnant with me, and was very shocked when I was\n10 born and never hid that. There was some disappointment on her part, but also I look exactly\n11 like my father. They had a really difficult relationship and he was very abusive, and so when\n12 their relationship ended then her disappointment for me changed from how I was born to I\n13 looked just like my dad. And so, just kind of being that reminder of her pain. She suffered with\n14 a lot of mental illness, so in addition to the physical abuse, she was now suffering in a lot of\n15 ways and wasn’t really receiving treatment because now as a single mom she’s working and\n16 trying to do all this stuff. And here is this reminder of why she’s suffering. She took a lot of that\n17 kind of pain out on me and it was just a really difficult time for a few years and she, basically\n18 when I was nine, threw me out. I think it was kind of a favor though. She knew that, honestly,\n19 she had the ability to kill me and she probably would have had I stayed longer.\n20 AJ: So, it was an act of love, almost.\n21 LTR: Really, I think it was. Both my parents are deceased but I feel like with my mom, especially, she\n22 was afraid of what she might have interrupted because she knew that as much as I had all of\n23 these reminders for her, that I really was capable of doing so much in the world and she knew\n24 that if I had a chance, that I could do better than her. I feel like she wanted me to do better\n25 than her.\n26 AJ: That’s powerful.\n27 LTR: Yeah.\n28 AJ: So, you had three other siblings . . . two other siblings.\n29 LTR: Two, two younger sisters. One of my sisters is bisexual and she is married to a woman and they\n30 have . . . well, two boys, and what’s so great is that they’ve essentially grown up in a really queer\n31 family. So, their normal is two moms, a trans uncle . . . that’s their normal.\n32 AJ: And all the friends.\n33 LTR: All the friends, all the outfits.\n34 AJ: Family that comes along with that.\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 5\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nLTR: And going to Pride and face painting and . . . like they love rainbows. One 1 of my nephews is\n2 really masculine, but he’ll wear a rainbow anything because he grew up with rainbows in the\n3 house.\n4 AJ: Right, rainbows are cool.\n5 LTR: Right. So, he has his basketball shorts on and his hair cut, and he just loves rainbows.\n6 AJ: Wow.\n7 LTR: So, that’s pretty cool.\n8 AJ: That is, that’s amazing. But you had this rough childhood. So, you left home at nine. Where did\n9 you go? What happened?\n10 LTR: So, I went to live with my grandmother and I lived there from nine until 17. The healing and all\n11 of that happened in the first few years of me living with her, kind of overcoming some of the\n12 abuse that I endured and finding my identity as far as I’m a human being and I have value and I\n13 have worth and I’m not just some burden on society. But, the interesting thing is that as I was\n14 figuring that out, I was still wrestling with the questions of gender identity – like I thought I was\n15 a boy, and then my mom was like, “No, you’re not.” I was like, “Well, what am I?” But I didn’t\n16 know I was a girl.\n17 AJ: Right.\n18 LTR: So, I didn’t have language for what I was experiencing, I just knew that I wasn’t either.\n19 AJ: So, your mom wanted a boy, thought you were going to be a boy – all of this stuff, and then you\n20 . . . you were.\n21 LTR: Yeah, and I thought I was until . . .\n22 AJ: And you are.\n23 LTR: I thought I was until she said I wasn’t and I was like, “What do you mean, I’m not?” And then I\n24 go live with my grandmother and I got to be . . . I got to be a little boy living with my\n25 grandmother.\n26 AJ: Really?\n27 LTR: Until it was time for church. At church, I had to wear dresses and the shiny shoes and all that.\n28 But, at home . . .\n29 AJ: Hmmm, the ruffled socks.\n30 LTR: So, you know, at home, I went shirtless in the summer and just had shorts, played around with\n31 all my little friends that were boys in the neighborhood, climbing trees and all that kind of stuff.\n32 That was just normal. And then, puberty started.\n33 AJ: Yeah.\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 6\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nLTR: That started at 10 and I’m like . . . I’m dying, there’s something happening – like, 1 I’m bleeding to\n2 death. And my grandma is like, “No, you’re a woman now.” I’m like, “What do you mean I’m a\n3 woman now?” But that’s when it shifted for me, because before I wasn’t really anything. And\n4 then, at 10 I was told I was a woman. I was like, “OK, so I guess I have to become a woman.”\n5 And so, I worked really hard from 10 until about . . . I would say 17, to really be a woman. I did\n6 everything that women did, or what I thought. And my grandmother ate it up. When she got\n7 closer to the end of her life, she said, “I knew something was different about you.” And that’s\n8 why she was so supportive with me taking modeling and etiquette classes and how do you walk\n9 as a lady and how do you sit . . . she ate all that up because she wanted me to be a very feminine\n10 person and she had . . . like my family had a really, really big place in our national denomination,\n11 she had a lot of power – so image was really important to her, like, “When you’re in the church,\n12 this is how women are, this is how men are.” So, I did a lot of that.\n13 AJ: So, you grew up in a religious household.\n14 LTR: Very, very, very religious.\n15 AJ: What denomination?\n16 LTR: Baptist, Southern Baptist.\n17 AJ: Southern Baptist, wow. So, the prestige and the big hats and all day at church on Sunday.\n18 LTR: And, because of my family, I rose to positions of leadership very quickly.\n19 AJ: Really?\n20 LTR: Very quickly, and I got to do a lot of traveling, speaking engagements as a young person doing\n21 these things. I got a lot of speaking engagements because kids weren’t doing that.\n22 AJ: Right, exactly.\n23 LTR: So, the fact that I wanted to do that, they were like, “Oh, we’ll pay to send you here, there,\n24 wherever – because you’re 13, 14, 16 and you want to do this.”\n25 AJ: As a young lady.\n26 LTR: As a young lady – as a young lady that wanted to serve God. But, I had a secret life. So, at\n27 school I was an overachiever and I excelled, but I also knew that I was attracted to women and\n28 men.\n29 AJ: Wow, OK.\n30 LTR: So, I dated women and men in school without thinking that St. Paul is still the same city as . . .\n31 AJ: And all the first mothers of the church.\n32 LTR: And some of their kids went to the same school as me so all of those . . . I look back now and I’m\n33 going, “How did I think that nobody would ever find out?” But my grandma found out my junior\n34 year. She saw me holding hands with an androgynous person and she was waiting at home for\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 7\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nme. She was like, “Who was that thing? Was that a boy or a girl and what’s 1 wrong with you and\n2 what are you? I knew something was wrong with you.” All of that, and I got kicked out.\n3 AJ: Really? Again?\n4 LTR: Yes.\n5 AJ: Wow.\n6 LTR: This time, though, I had nowhere to go. So, the family piece has always been kind of awkward\n7 because I was a straight A student, I graduated with above a 4.0, I got into every college that I\n8 applied for, I’ve excelled in every major area of my life, but I got lumped in with the crackheads\n9 and the deadbeat dads and the demons. I had exorcisms performed on me, I’ve been\n10 threatened by family members, I’ve been physically assaulted by family members trying to\n11 wrestle the demons of homosexuality out of my spirit – all of that. And so, family and childhood\n12 . . . once I got to be like 18 and started college, it was like I got to create my own life, my own\n13 world.\n14 AJ: What’s it like with family today?\n15 LTR: Well, most of the people that gave me most of the issues are dead so I don’t have to deal with\n16 as much. But being an adult and also having the agency that I have and being able to really . . . I\n17 have a lot of resources and I have a lot of connections and I work really, really hard, and I’ve\n18 excelled a lot.\n19 AJ: Yes, you have.\n20 LTR: For some of my family members, they are still in the same space as they were in when they\n21 were criticizing me and they were convinced that I was going to hell. So, now some of them are\n22 looking like, “Well, your life is really great – you’ve come a long ways, and we’re still struggling\n23 with this over here.” It’s like, “Yeah.” But they also look in my eyes and they see that I am\n24 happy and happiness can only come from one place and that’s the soul – you can’t make up\n25 happiness. And so, for the ones that are super, super religious, they haven’t been able to\n26 reconcile my happiness because it is proof that God, or their understanding of God, is blessing\n27 me. And you can’t deny that kind of presence when you see it in somebody.\n28 AJ: Wow.\n29 LTR: And that shakes up their faith foundation.\n30 AJ: Yeah, because you’re supposed to be . . .\n31 LTR: Broke down and miserable. I did everything I did in my life without them, I have a support\n32 network – so it wasn’t all me, but it wasn’t them. And I think that that’s the part that . . . I want\n33 trans people, especially, to know a lot of my story because they feel like, “Oh, if I lose\n34 everything, then everything is done – life is over.” No, it’s not. You have to re-build, and I’ve\n35 had to re-build a few times – a few times.\n36 AJ: Yeah, that’s a lot of resilience. When did you first realize that you were not the gender you\n37 were assigned at birth?\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 8\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nLTR: I’ve always struggled with that because I never related with any gender until 1 I heard the word\n2 trans. So, throughout childhood, when my mom was like, “Oh, I thought you were a boy and\n3 you’re not,” and I was like, “Well, OK, then what am I? Because I am a boy.” And my grandma\n4 was like, “Oh, you’re a woman.” I’m like, “Not really.” It wasn’t until I was 28 . . .\n5 AJ: Wow.\n6 LTR: And I was talking to a friend of mine and I was just explaining all of my questions about identity.\n7 My mother had just passed away; I was married and my marriage was not . . . I knew that\n8 happiness was a thing that I wanted, and I wasn’t happy there – and not because of anything\n9 that my ex-spouse had done, but just me.\n10 AJ: Do you mind saying if you were married to a male or female?\n11 LTR: I was married to a woman.\n12 AJ: To a woman, OK.\n13 LTR: She was wonderful, but I was not where I needed to be, and so obviously, we had several\n14 problems that stemmed from that. But I was talking about just . . . like, “I don’t fit anywhere.\n15 Am I a boy or a girl and why don’t I feel like a girl?” All of that, and I’m talking to my friend, and\n16 she’s about 20 years older than me – close to 20 years older than me. So, she’s kind of looking\n17 at me with that wisdom thing – like, “Child?” And she just said something so simple, she said,\n18 “Have you ever thought you were transgender?” I’m like, “What does that mean?”\n19 AJ: Oh, wow.\n20 LTR: She was like, “You’ve been advocating for LGBT people throughout college and seminary, you\n21 don’t know what the T stands for?”\n22 AJ: Oh, wow.\n23 LTR: And I was like, “No, I thought that the T . . .” I had gone to Gay 90s a couple of times and I had\n24 seen a couple of drag shows at The Town House, so I thought the T were drag queens and drag\n25 kings.\n26 AJ: Yeah.\n27 LTR: That’s what I thought it was.\n28 AJ: Somebody wrote a book called The T is Not Silent – I’m just saying. Go ahead, I’m sorry.\n29 LTR: Right, education is so necessary. I Googled it though, I Googled the word transgender and my\n30 whole everything changed.\n31 AJ: Wow.\n32 LTR: Because that was the first time in my whole life that I actually knew that other people felt the\n33 way that I feel, but that it wasn’t something that was wrong – that they didn’t have something\n34 wrong with them. They had similar feelings and here are the things that they did to live a whole\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 9\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nlife – that was amazing. I’d never lived a whole life, I’d struggled my whole 1 life. So, to have this\n2 opportunity to just find a sense of being congruent and settled and satisfied – I jumped on that.\n3 AJ: So, you knew you were queer.\n4 LTR: Yes – yes.\n5 AJ: And you were married to a woman but you had no concept or realization of this word\n6 transgender or this identity, transgender, until Google?\n7 LTR: And at that point, like when I was a little kid, I started stuffing socks in my underwear because I\n8 thought my penis was going to grow in and I needed to . . .\n9 AJ: Protect it.\n10 LTR: Right. I thought that, and I still didn’t know . . .\n11 AJ: So, yeah, you had feelings but no language and no way to describe those feelings – is what I hear\n12 you saying.\n13 LTR: Right, exactly. And in the Evangelical Church World that I grew up in, everything is gay or\n14 straight. And gay means everything that’s not straight, and so I’m like, “Well, then . . .”\n15 AJ: And everything that’s bad.\n16 LTR: I was like, “Maybe I’m gay?” “No, this has nothing to do with who I’m attracted to, this has to\n17 do with me and how I feel about me.” And there was no other words for that because I didn’t\n18 have them at that time. So, it was like, “OK, I’m not gay, so maybe I am just queer.” I’ve had\n19 that label, actually, since about 9th grade.\n20 AJ: OK.\n21 LTR: Because I knew I wasn’t gay and I knew I wasn’t straight, and I knew it didn’t have anything to\n22 do with just attraction, it had something to do with my identity as a person, but I had no\n23 language.\n24 AJ: So, you’ve been using queer as an identity for a long time. And, you still claim that identity?\n25 LTR: I do. The difference is that when I claimed it as a youth, it was about sexuality, it was about\n26 everything – I just knew I was different. But now, it’s specifically about my sexual orientation\n27 and my gender identity, I have a different term for that.\n28 AJ: So, you’re identifying as queer . . . did you ever have labels around . . . like I’m a dyke, a butch\n29 dyke or diesel femme or all of these sort of gradations of lesbian . . .\n30 LTR: Never heard of any of them.\n31 AJ: Did you even identify as a lesbian? Not really, huh?\n32 LTR: No. And most of my friends thought I was straight because I dated guys and girls. So, then if\n33 you date a guy then that trumps the fact that you date girls, right?\n34 AJ: Right.\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 10\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nLTR: You’re just experimenting or you like to have fun. There’s no real value that 1 you can have with a\n2 woman so you’re just straight and you like to have these . . . and that’s what a lot of people\n3 thought. But I was a very . . .\n4 AJ: Because people place value on male/female relationships and less value on every other kind of\n5 relationship.\n6 LTR: Exactly. Able-bodied heterosexual relationships get a lot . . . but I was a very feminine woman –\n7 long hair, nails, always in either dresses or skirts – dress suits and things like that.\n8 AJ: Wow.\n9 LTR: Manicures, facials, everything.\n10 AJ: This vision just does not compute.\n11 LTR: I could spend at least four to six hours in the salon every two weeks getting hair, make-up, nails,\n12 facial – everything. And that just was . . . I needed to do that because this is how a woman is\n13 and this is what a woman does. I trained myself, but almost kind of like brainwashed myself, to\n14 try to be this ultra-feminine woman so that I could . . . I was trying to convince myself, I was\n15 trying to do everything that I could so that I just fit and felt comfortable one day and I just never\n16 did. I felt always like I was wearing someone else’s identity and at home, I would literally come\n17 home and take it off at the end of the day – and get in my boxer shorts and my basketball shorts\n18 and be like, “Ahhhh.”\n19 AJ: Phew. And then you married a woman.\n20 LTR: At 21 – on my 21st birthday, my friends in college were like, “You need to go out . . .” and they\n21 took me to a bar. She walked in and was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. We talked\n22 every day after that and within three months we were living together, within nine months we\n23 had our commitment ceremony, and we stayed together for seven years.\n24 AJ: When did the U-Haul truck come in?\n25 LTR: She was more of the soft butch lesbian, so she had her own ways of moving things around – so\n26 we had friends trucks show up and within the first three months, all moved in. But, yeah. Our\n27 relationship . . . I mean, we had many . . . I had a lot of things that I needed to sort through and\n28 so there is . . . I don’t feel like one person is responsible for why our relationship ended, it was\n29 just a season of life that ended, but a large part of that was my transition.\n30 AJ: Really? Was she opposed to it?\n31 LTR: She wasn’t opposed to it. She, at one point, did state that, “If I wanted to be with a man I would\n32 have married one.”\n33 AJ: Yeah, yeah.\n34 LTR: That makes sense, you’re a lesbian.\n35 AJ: Right, exactly – I get it.\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 11\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nLTR: I totally get it. But she very much loved and affirmed me through figuring out 1 what that meant,\n2 what does transition mean for you. And, I was like, “I think it means everything. I want surgery,\n3 I want hormones, I want a name change – I want all of it.” And so, that’s when she was like,\n4 “Well, I need to pursue something that is right for me while you pursue this thing that’s right for\n5 you.” So, we kind of parted ways at that point. But then, again, the homeless thing happened\n6 again and I had to start over again.\n7 AJ: Then rebuild.\n8 LTR: And rebuild.\n9 AJ: Wow.\n10 LTR: And that was six years ago.\n11 AJ: OK, how has things been since that moment?\n12 LTR: Well, I have been rebuilding. The same friend that gave me the language of transgender, I\n13 ended up moving in with her and started renting a room and just kind of working my way back\n14 into whatever it meant life was for me. And it took about . . . I would say a year. It took about a\n15 year for me to go from, “OK, I have nothing and I need to re-assess everything,” to, “I am\n16 Lawrence, I have had surgery, I am on hormones, I have meaningful relationships.” But it took\n17 about a year for me to feel like I wasn’t in survival mode anymore. And then I started a\n18 company and then I started a ministry and then I started all these different organizations where\n19 I could have more freedom to then start to be creative and dream and look at life. Now that I’m\n20 whole, I can do all this other stuff. But everything else was always on hold because I was always\n21 trying to figure out who I was.\n22 AJ: Yeah, that makes total sense. Can I ask what . . . and you brought this up, but to the extent that\n23 you feel comfortable, what medical interventions have you done related to your gender\n24 identity?\n25 LTR: I have had top surgery; I’ve had a hysterectomy and an oophorectomy. I’ve had hormone\n26 replacement therapy, or I have and I’m still undergoing. I’ve had the first stages of phalloplasty,\n27 so metoidioplasty is what . . . they’re two separate surgeries and often times if you end up\n28 wanting to get a phalloplasty you have to start with a metoidioplasty, but some people stay at\n29 the metoidioplasty, which is the . . . basically a hood release, clitoral hood release, and then\n30 removal of excess skin. I’m going back and forth – I think I might stay there, but I’m not totally\n31 closed off. But as far as the medical interventions, those are the surgical and medical things.\n32 And then obviously therapy and coaching and things like that.\n33 AJ: What’s an oophorectomy?\n34 LTR: An oophorectomy is when you get your fallopian tubes and your ovaries removed.\n35 AJ: OK. And so, I imagine that’s probably a fairly common term that you could easily Google. Do\n36 you know how to spell it?\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 12\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nLTR: O-o-p-h and then something that ends with y. The hysterectomy is what’s 1 more common for\n2 trans people, trans man or masculine people, because it’s the removal of your uterus. But you\n3 still have your eggs so you can still have children, but I got all of that taken out.\n4 AJ: No kids, or at least not biologically from your body.\n5 LTR: Which is good for me.\n6 AJ: Yes, yes. Do you see children in your future?\n7 LTR: Lots of children, just not necessarily perhaps in my care. I have a dream of . . . like some sort of\n8 home or school where kids of color, and especially gender non-conforming kids of color, can\n9 come and just learn and be and thrive and grow and have a platform to be launched from. I\n10 would love to be in that space, and kind of be the director of that school. So, in that sense, I see\n11 lots of children in my future. And I mentor kids, but I travel way too much and I love my job way\n12 too much to have children because I want to be a parent that’s 100% invested – not, whenever I\n13 see you is whenever I see you.\n14 AJ: Yeah. What’s your work?\n15 LTR: I am a minister and a digital media strategist.\n16 AJ: Yeah, those two don’t necessarily always . . . you don’t always hear those combined together.\n17 LTR: No, and I’ve created a really good position for myself.\n18 AJ: A minister, as in a spiritual leader, right?\n19 LTR: Yes, I’m a United Church of Christ pastor authorized in the Minnesota Conference. I’ve been\n20 able to use my ministry and my digital communications background to kind of create a position\n21 called digital evangelism.\n22 AJ: Wow.\n23 LTR: And so, what I do is I use the social media and communications platforms to curate and\n24 generate content that specifically builds and nurtures communities and promotes faith\n25 formation. Obviously, in the business world that’s marketing – marketing and advertising.\n26 You’re taking the message of your community or your organization and you’re creating products\n27 and trying to get people to establish relationships with you and your products. It’s the same\n28 exact thing, it’s just non-profit, it’s spiritual.\n29 AJ: It’s not profit driven, per se.\n30 LTR: It’s value driven.\n31 AJ: Because you called it your work, so I mean there’s some remuneration, I suspect, somewhere\n32 down the line.\n33 LTR: Absolutely. Part of it is that when you’re promoting a church or an organization or\n34 denomination, you’re building relationships with people but you’re also trying to leverage those\n35 connections to look at how you can utilize each other’s resources. And so, that’s . . . there’s a\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 13\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nmarket for networking and community building, and that’s kind of really what 1 I love to do is\n2 connect people to the things and other people that they need.\n3 AJ: That’s fascinating. Are you involved in a physical church? Are you a minister in a physical\n4 church?\n5 LTR: So, I am a minister at Linden Hills UCC. I’m contracted to do evangelism and discipleship. I\n6 pastor an online church, actually two, and that’s just out of my love for trans people, gender\n7 non-conforming people, people that I meet when I travel and wanting to kind of stay connected\n8 to them and help walk alongside them in ways and pastor them from afar, but also connect\n9 them to local churches and ministers in their areas where they can have relationships with them\n10 in a more personal way. I can pastor somebody in a different state, but I can’t show up to the\n11 hospital if they are having surgery or pray for them if their mom gets sick. But, if I can connect\n12 them with a community where they are received and they have that connection, then it expands\n13 their network as well.\n14 AJ: You were ostracized by very religious people, you self-disclosed that exorcism . . . I don’t know if\n15 you were absolutely serious about that but . . .\n16 LTR: I was.\n17 AJ: That people have really done you harm in the name of religion.\n18 LTR: Yes.\n19 AJ: How are you able to reconcile that past sort of abuse and come out on the other side, remaining\n20 faithful and not just as, “I go to church every once in a while or on Sundays,” but you are a\n21 minister and you’re helping other people to heal. How did that come about? How did you get\n22 to that place, Lawrence?\n23 LTR: I encountered God for myself. I actually had a transformative spiritual encounter with God.\n24 Before that, I had only known God through other people’s eyes, so then whatever people said\n25 about God, that’s what I thought about God.\n26 AJ: Sure.\n27 LTR: And then, a year after I was homeless in high school, and I had started college, my plan, in my\n28 mind – because your mind is your strongest asset, right?\n29 AJ: Absolutely.\n30 LTR: My plan in my mind was I was going to finish school, I’m going to prove everybody wrong, I’m\n31 going to have this successful life and I’m going to do all this stuff and no one is going to be able\n32 to touch me. But I didn’t have anyone or anything to care for my soul and the abuse and the\n33 pain that I did experience really started to eat me alive and I couldn’t overcome my mind at that\n34 point because the pain was just too much. And no matter what I thought or tried to look at\n35 down the line as being my goalposts for life, the pain was just still there and I started to feel\n36 isolated and alone and lonely, and then I started getting really depressed. I was like, “Why am I\n37 doing all this? I don’t have family, these people at this school aren’t really my friends because\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 14\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nI’m just meeting them for the first time – they don’t know me.” I don’t h 1 ave anybody, all the\n2 people that I grew up with in my church that were my friends, they don’t speak to me – so, all of\n3 this loneliness really started to eat away at my mind and I started to do a lot of really destructive\n4 things. I tried to commit suicide and I ended up overdosing on a combination of 60 pills and one\n5 of the school officials at my college actually drove me to the ER when she realized that I was\n6 acting a little different. I was really convinced that I was going to die because I was convinced\n7 that God hated me, that my punishment was the isolation that my family and everyone who had\n8 rejected me – they were powerful and they were doing well. They had homes, they had cars,\n9 they had resources and so if they had all of that and were rejecting me, then maybe they were\n10 right – maybe God does hate me. Maybe this lifestyle or whatever the feelings I have, because\n11 there was no lifestyle at that point, right? They were just all feelings and questions. And I was\n12 like maybe they’re right and I’m just going to hell. I said, “God, if you’re real, because I’ve been\n13 praying to you all these years, I have all these Bible verses memorized, and I’ve been going to\n14 church faithfully, but if you’re actually real and not just this thing that we do and talk about,\n15 then just let me go because this sucks.” I remember saying if I’m going to live in hell and I’m\n16 going to die and go to hell, why am I alive then? There’s no reason for it. And so, I wrote all the\n17 notes to everyone letting them know my feelings, my thoughts, I separated all my belongings, I\n18 planned my funeral. I thought I was going to die because I was so convinced that the image of\n19 God as being judgmental and hateful and angry and all of that, I bought hook, line and sinker\n20 and I thought I’m going to hell so I might as well just save y’all the time and money. And then I\n21 woke up in the hospital and I was like, “Wow, I’m still here.” And then I heard this voice and it\n22 wasn’t like someone in the room voice, but it was like this deeper, knowing kind of voice that\n23 said, “I love you just as you are.” I knew that was God’s voice because I had never heard that\n24 from anybody before – ever. At that point, I was like, “OK, show me how to love myself then,\n25 show me how to be alive, show me how to be OK, and show me how to do this because I don’t\n26 want to do this anymore. I’m tired of being alone and I’m tired of feeling like I’m a terrible\n27 person because I don’t fit anywhere.” I was 20 when that happened and I started to go into\n28 really deep prayer and really deep discernment and I came out with this . . . in a few months, a\n29 plan – like 7 years. I’m all biblical and I won’t go into that, but the number 7 – seven years and\n30 how something can really change in seven-years time, but it would take that time for me to\n31 really learn and grow. So, I started studying psychology, relationships, communication,\n32 spirituality, religion, God, Theology – everything I could study about life – philosophy, everything\n33 I did for seven years. And not just I want to learn about philosophy, but I want to study the rules\n34 of life – universal laws and principals that people who have lived, and all this stuff. And then I\n35 started to find the common thread throughout everything and that’s what I call God, because if\n36 all throughout history all these people and all these circumstances achieve all this stuff and\n37 underneath it all is this sense of awareness that we are a part of this thing but we’re not the\n38 only thing – that’s when it was like, “OK, God, I know that what you are is different from what a\n39 lot of people think you are and what that church taught me about you. Now I need to go and\n40 use what I have gained to help set other people free because I was convinced that I wasn’t loved\n41 and this love has transformed me and if it has done this for me, what can it do for other people.\n42 And so, I feel like God has called me to use my experiences to help set other people free, but\n43 more than anything – to just love people because now I know what it feels like. It kills me to\n44 think that there are people, especially children, who don’t know what love feels like.\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 15\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nAJ: Wow, that’s 1 a powerful story.\n2 LTR: Thank you. And God, in my interpretation of God, God is love and that’s what the Bible that I\n3 read says and that’s how I interpret God to be in my life and so I feel like if anybody preaches\n4 anything other than love, they’re not preaching God.\n5 AJ: Come on, preach it. So, Linden Hills UCC.\n6 LTR: I’m under contract there for another year and after that, I don’t know . . .\n7 AJ: Is that a good spiritual home for you right now?\n8 LTR: Absolutely. I have a few things kind of in the pipeline but I don’t really want to speak too soon,\n9 but right now it’s great where I’m at.\n10 AJ: Wow. So, when did you make this decision to pursue living your true self? I know . . . you sort\n11 of alluded to it, but you haven’t given me . . . you know, you had this marriage, and having\n12 thought about being transgender, and that ended. Is that when you really pursued medical\n13 transition.\n14 LTR: Right around that time it is. So, in 2009, my mother passed away and . . .\n15 AJ: I’m sorry.\n16 LTR: Thanks. And the year before that, it’s interesting – because that was the seven-year mark – the\n17 year before that.\n18 AJ: Right, so you had hit the seven-year mark.\n19 LTR: I had hit the seven-year mark, so I knew all of the things – so the equivalent of an advanced\n20 degree. I graduated with a couple of masters and I knew all of this stuff that I needed to know\n21 and then I said, “OK, God, now I’m ready to be who you are calling me to be.” And then my\n22 mom died and I was like, “Huh, this is important because in order for me to be who I need to be,\n23 I can’t be connected to people or situations that require me to be diminished or something\n24 other than who I am.” And when she died, that was kind of the final release, because at that\n25 point my grandmother had passed away, my dad had passed away, and now my mother was\n26 gone, and I felt like, “OK, now I’m free to be.”\n27 AJ: Sure.\n28 LTR: And then, shortly after that – shortly after my mother’s passing, that friend said the thing about\n29 transgender. And then, within a month, I had come out to everybody that I had known, as\n30 transgender. And then, February of the following year – so like three months later, I started\n31 seeing a therapist; that June I was on hormones; the following March I had surgeries. And so . . .\n32 AJ: How has being transgender impacted your professional life?\n33 LTR: It’s been great.\n34 AJ: Really?\n35 LTR: It’s been great. I mean . . .\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 16\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nAJ: I’m not quite sure if I’ve heard that before. I’m not saying it’s not true, I absolutely 1 believe you,\n2 but . . .\n3 LTR: This is the piece that’s difficult to hear and so I’m going to say it because I feel like it needs to be\n4 said. I live in a state that has a lot of racial dynamics that aren’t really . . . we don’t even know a\n5 lot of what is happening because we haven’t really created a culture in Minnesota where we can\n6 dialogue at length about the deep impact of racism in our society. So, I would not have thrived\n7 otherwise as a Black man in the same ways, but I’m less threatening as a trans Black man.\n8 AJ: Hmmm.\n9 LTR: And so, I can walk into some of the spaces because of the knowledge that I have and the\n10 experience that I have, but then I can sit down at the table because I check off enough boxes\n11 and I’m nice and I’m kind and I’m a polite Black man. And, all of those things essentially\n12 communicates to me is that because I have this spirit that I do and I am as approachable as I am,\n13 I can walk into some of these spaces that my skin color would not allow me entry into\n14 otherwise. So, being trans has been the entry point for many conversations that if I just walked\n15 in as a Black man . . .\n16 AJ: That is an extremely astute observation. But, not everybody knows you’re a trans man. You\n17 encounter . . . I noticed in your personal information form, you live in . . .\n18 LTR: Lakeville.\n19 AJ: If somebody pulls you over for blowing through a stop sign, they don’t know you’re a trans man.\n20 So, what is your interactions with institutions and other medical industry, educational industry,\n21 police . . .?\n22 LTR: So, I’ll talk about police first, just because that’s so pressing.\n23 AJ: Yeah, it is.\n24 LTR: I’m terrified of the police. I know that all cops are not the same, just like all Black people or all\n25 trans people are not the same. But, all cops are trained by the same system and they receive\n26 the same information about people that they are paid to encounter. I live in a state that is very\n27 segregated and I haven’t been . . . like racism in Minnesota is very subtle, so I haven’t had\n28 anybody burning crosses in my yard, but I did get letters and concern when my two African\n29 American nephews, who are under the age of 10, were at my home because neighbors were\n30 scared that Black men were running loose in the neighborhood and were threatening to call the\n31 cops and get the police involved. And that immediately sent me into fear . . .\n32 AJ: Wait a minute – how old did you say these kids were?\n33 LTR: Seven and nine now, but at the time they were six and eight. And so, the threat of . . . the fact\n34 that the police station is less than a mile from my house, my nephews and I could be sitting on\n35 my deck and get shot because we’re threatening.\n36 AJ: Right.\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 17\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nLTR: So, that’s a reality that I live with every day. So, I’m not saying that the police 1 specifically have\n2 given me a reason to feel that way, but the dynamics in the neighborhood, the dynamics in our\n3 state, in our country, all give me reason to feel that way.\n4 AJ: Make you very aware, right.\n5 LTR: So, that’s how I feel about the police.\n6 AJ: Oh, OK.\n7 LTR: I’ve had to call the police – my nephew had an asthma attack and I called 9-1-1 and the cops got\n8 there before the ambulance did and as the cop is trying to assess the situation . . .\n9 AJ: Figure out the relationship.\n10 LTR: He has his hand on his gun the whole time.\n11 AJ: Wow.\n12 LTR: I’m frantic. My nephew can’t breathe and he’s standing there asking questions with his hand on\n13 his gun.\n14 AJ: Hmmm.\n15 LTR: So, that’s how I feel about the police – the same way they feel about me, suspicious.\n16 AJ: Suspicious.\n17 LTR: Other institutions, I feel like I had a really great time in college and in high school and things like\n18 that, so as far as the education system is concerned, I feel like there needs to be, obviously, a lot\n19 of work in every institution regarding identities and regarding people and relationships and all of\n20 that. But, I have not . . . I didn’t transition in school so I never had to navigate that.\n21 AJ: You identified as queer in those situations, but that never really came up in terms of . . .\n22 LTR: No, because at that time I was still labeled as a Black woman and Black women are basically\n23 invisible or really not as visible in major institutions of our society.\n24 AJ: Sure, yeah.\n25 LTR: So, I was able to fly under the radar as a perceived queer Black woman and then gain entry to\n26 spaces that wanted to have a feminist voice because queer and Black and female automatically\n27 means feminist.\n28 AJ: Feminism, right.\n29 LTR: That stopped, though, when I wrote a poem in college that ended up getting published called\n30 My Face of Feminism and talked about how I was constantly being invited to all of these\n31 predominantly white spaces but I was never really allowed to be there. They invited me to be\n32 there, but none of the issues ever spoke to my issues. That’s when I stopped getting invitations.\n33 AJ: What was the title of this piece?\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 18\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nLTR: My 1 Face of Feminism.\n2 AJ: My Face of Feminism.\n3 LTR: And, I say all that to say that we dress up a lot of the problems in our institutions by diverting\n4 our attention to other things. That is . . . you learn that art, it’s kind of a skill as a survival\n5 mechanism that I use for my advantage. So, I navigate the systems very well because I know\n6 that that’s their intention – their intention isn’t to care deeply about me, but their intention isn’t\n7 to harm me either. The intention is to kind of make sure that everything is OK and if that means\n8 that we just pretend that everything isn’t as bad as it is, then we will. But we see how that . . .\n9 AJ: But that’s harmful.\n10 LTR: It is.\n11 AJ: Yes.\n12 LTR: It is.\n13 AJ: It’s not your intention but it’s still very damaging – yeah.\n14 LTR: It’s like I know that I could talk about and name these things, but I have to assess whether or not\n15 this group of people really cares enough about that, or do I need to advocate for those things in\n16 another way because to spend any energy in this particular area is . . . not necessarily a waste of\n17 time, but a waste of energy. And that’s how I look at navigating in institutions – knowing when\n18 to make a big deal out of something, knowing when to push the envelope, knowing when to\n19 fight or advocate/push back or to just kind of remain. Survival is my goal with everything and it\n20 always has been, my whole life. And so, anytime it feels like my survival is in jeopardy, then I\n21 have to re-assess how things are going. But otherwise, staying alive, prospering, thriving – that’s\n22 where I’m at.\n23 AJ: Yeah, that’s your goal. Medical community? Have you experienced challenges or has that been\n24 sort of a good process for you, as a trans person accessing trans-specific medical health care?\n25 LTR: I’ve had no problems in Minnesota with that. Part of why I feel like I travel so much for work,\n26 but it’s like I have to keep my home base in Minnesota because I’ve had such success.\n27 AJ: Wow, OK.\n28 LTR: With the medical fields – access to medicine, access to insurance, all of that. I’ve had no\n29 problems.\n30 AJ: That’s awesome, I’m happy to hear that.\n31 LTR: I am too. Like surgeries – everything paid for. Hormones, everything – all of it, paid for. I was\n32 homeless at the time that I got all of this started, and I had no money. I had savings for rent and\n33 food so it was like I’m paying rent for this room, or whatever room I’m staying in, but I don’t\n34 have money for surgery.\n35 AJ: Yeah.\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 19\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nLTR: And all of it, I managed to . . . again, navigate the systems to the point where 1 I got everything\n2 paid for.\n3 AJ: Oh, wow. What do you think the relationship is between the L, the G, the B, and the T?\n4 LTR: Communities who suffer are strengthened when they unite together. Sex and sexuality have\n5 been lumped together for a long time because in this country, especially we were founded by\n6 these pilgrims – these very pure people, all of it’s been lumped together because they don’t\n7 want to really dig into talking about all of that because we, pure people, we don’t talk about sex\n8 and sexuality but we are sexual beings and there are some people who just can’t hide who they\n9 are and there are some people who would rather hide who they are because it’s easier. But, the\n10 out-LGBT people, or the LGB people, I think banded together because they had to. Sex and\n11 sexuality, whether it’s your orientation or your physical identity, all of those things – we didn’t\n12 go into those details, you just knew that you were . . . something.\n13 AJ: Yeah, something . . . something other than straight.\n14 LTR: And you had to be that something with other people who were also in that space because\n15 society did not care for people enough to ensure that out LGB people could still have housing,\n16 could still have families, could still have church homes, could still have jobs. So, we had to kind\n17 of become community together, but I feel like we’re past that point because I feel like it’s one\n18 thing for society to lump us all together and for us to find each other . . . kind of like when Black\n19 slaves were brought to America, all of them spoke different languages and came from different\n20 places, but they’re all put on this boat at the same time and they’re all dropped to all these\n21 places where their identity has now become who they’re with.\n22 AJ: Yes.\n23 LTR: But then when you separate beyond their skin color, they still have separate issues, they still\n24 have separate lives, they still have things that impact them differently, and it’s though they\n25 decided, “We’re not going to separate and care for ourselves, we’re just going to still remain\n26 one unit.” Families would not have formed, all of these different organizations that were\n27 started and initiatives/efforts/movements can’t start from people that have just one identity.\n28 AJ: Right.\n29 LTR: And I feel like the LGB community banded together because we need safe spaces. Well, we’re\n30 beyond safe spaces now, we’re beyond legislation for access to marriage or access to equal\n31 opportunities for employment – we’re beyond that. Not that those things have been secured for\n32 everyone, but it’s only been about gay and lesbian people.\n33 AJ: Yeah.\n34 LTR: And, the B gets drug along but how many out bisexual people are represented in mainstream\n35 society that aren’t stigmatized? How many out trans people? It’s the same thing, but we have\n36 gay and lesbian people that lead in many areas of our country. And yes, they still, obviously still\n37 have some difficulties, but they can still have families, they can still get jobs, they can still go to\n38 the bathroom legally. And they don’t have to defend who they are. But if a bi- person says, “I’m\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 20\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nbisexual,” they have to now defend who they are. Or if a trans person 1 says, “I’m trans,” they\n2 have to wonder, “Can I go to the bathroom here?” So, I feel like we need to now separate from\n3 being one community that . . . one rainbow flag with all these letters, but nobody really knows\n4 how each of those letters are impacted every day and what the needs are specific to those\n5 communities. I feel like we lost our identities because we stayed one identity for far too long.\n6 That’s just my opinion, but I feel like there is a lot of trans activists that are making that very\n7 known and taking the T out of that and saying, “Here are the things specific to our community\n8 that we need to look at.”\n9 AJ: Sure. And you think that is important?\n10 LTR: Absolutely, because no one is going to do it for us. That’s like saying women waiting around for\n11 men to change the laws that advocate for their best interests. No man is going to, just on his\n12 own, wake up one day and say, “You know, I really want to make sure that every woman gets\n13 paid the same amount as men.”\n14 AJ: Right. Yeah, there’s no incentive for that – particularly since men are the primary owners of\n15 corporations and all the things that generate money in our society.\n16 LTR: And that’s why it’s important for us to be our own advocates and not really . . . I feel like for the\n17 LGBT community, we expected everyone to advocate for us because we’re all in this community,\n18 but when the most powerful people in the community were the gay and lesbian people and they\n19 only advocated for their best interest, then we learned really quickly that the B and the T were\n20 not really necessarily a part of the community, we’re just tacked on. But our issues were never\n21 prioritized the same way that the issues for the L and the G were prioritized.\n22 AJ: How does race play a role in LGBT communities?\n23 LTR: This entire country was founded on the idea that Black people were sub-human, and that\n24 message permeated every facet of our society. Everyone who has been born in this country\n25 grew up with that same understanding and conditioning. Now however they perpetuate it, is\n26 very different, but we all started from the same place and even Black people started from the\n27 same place of, “We’re not valuable, we don’t have value.” If Black churches up until the 1980s\n28 and 1990s had pictures of white Jesus, and Black people still using skin bleaching cream because\n29 they feel like they have to be lighter in order to survive and the jobs and the opportunities go to\n30 lighter skinned people, I don’t care if you’re gay or straight, you still have that same conditioning\n31 where you believe or were taught that the lighter your skin is the better, the smarter, the\n32 prettier, the further, etc., etc. And I feel like a lot of gay people, a lot of lesbian people, bi and\n33 trans people, feel like well because we have shared oppression then we’re beyond the racist\n34 part, and it’s like, “But, we haven’t even reconciled the racism and the pain and devastation that\n35 racism has perpetuated, so how can we just skip past that and then talk about being trans\n36 together?” We can’t.\n37 AJ: Wow, what an analysis. Yeah. Have you ever worked for or volunteered at an LGBT-specific\n38 organization? If so, which ones?\n39 LTR: Yes. I volunteer for the Minnesota Trans Health Coalition.\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 21\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\n1 AJ: Cool.\n2 LTR: I did some work with OutFront Minnesota.\n3 AJ: Were you a shot caller?\n4 LTR: Yes, I was a shot caller – and some other things. I’ve built shelves and help decorate things.\n5 OutFront Minnesota, I did some stuff with faith organizing, especially around the time of the\n6 marriage amendment.\n7 AJ: Marriage equality and all of that stuff, yeah.\n8 LTR: And those are the two . . . oh, Black Trans Men, Incorporated.\n9 AJ: Oh, really?\n10 LTR: Yup. I did some work in the beginning years, doing a lot of workshops and trainings and we had\n11 some partnerships with kind of getting products and stuff to trans people, transition supplies.\n12 AJ: Sure. Yeah.\n13 LTR: And then, I mean church – faith-based LGBT work, I’ve been doing for a while.\n14 AJ: I know you invited me to the Black Trans Man’s Conference and I wasn’t able to go. Were you\n15 able to go?\n16 LTR: I ended up not going.\n17 AJ: No?\n18 LTR: Yeah. I felt like . . .\n19 AJ: Have you been in the past?\n20 LTR: Yes.\n21 AJ: What is that environment? I mean, to see . . . I mean, we’ve come a long way from no trans\n22 visibility whatsoever to now a specific Black Trans Man Conference that I think has been going\n23 on for maybe five years now, at least – or for some time.\n24 LTR: At least four or five years. Carter and Espy Brown, who are the organizers . . . I didn’t think I’d\n25 cry so much throughout this conversation, they’ve basically created a family of several hundred\n26 people that get together every year and it seems simple, right? Family reunion.\n27 AJ: Right.\n28 LTR: But none of the people there could go to their family reunions and be the fullness of who they\n29 are.\n30 AJ: OK, now I’m going about to cry.\n31 LTR: And so, for a whole week we have workshops - workshops that talk about financial planning,\n32 workshops that talk about family planning, workshops that talk about spirituality, wellness,\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 22\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nfitness, health, end-of-life planning, estate planning, all this stuff that you could 1 get anywhere.\n2 But not as a Black trans person. And so, then you have all those workshops and they’re taught\n3 mostly by trans people, almost exclusively Black people, but there are some white presenters\n4 and some non-trans folks, but predominantly trans. And, you walk around and you see these\n5 beautiful chocolate trans people – all different shades and shapes and identities. One year,\n6 there was a pool party and it didn’t matter if you had surgery or not, you could just be out in the\n7 pool having a good time, right? And guys with their shorts on, their swim trunks, they don’t\n8 have to be in this hot binder and uncomfortable – they get to just be, man, out in the pool\n9 having a good time.\n10 AJ: Oh, my goodness.\n11 LTR: They get to bring their wives or their girlfriends or their husbands or boyfriends, they get to\n12 have family picnics and they get to bring their kids and have three-legged races and, you know,\n13 barbeques. We don’t get that. And so then, the last night or two there is an award ceremony\n14 where everyone who has done anything to advocate on behalf of us as a whole, is nominated\n15 for something or wins something. There’s tons of categories and we recognize each other. It’s\n16 one thing when somebody else recognizes what you do, but it’s another thing when you’re\n17 recognized by your own people.\n18 AJ: Your own people, your own community.\n19 LTR: And so, we’re recognizing each other, lifting each other up. And then also that empowers us to\n20 go back to the spaces where we come from, where we don’t have as much support, and get\n21 back on that grind – because you know that these people are watching, affected, and they care.\n22 And then there’s a ball – now I’m not big into the whole ball scene just because I have never\n23 been connected, but there’s a pageant, there are people that perform, that are celebrated for\n24 who they are – their gifts, their beauty, their strength. They get to walk, they get to show who\n25 they are, and then they get a chance to compete for prizes and money and travel and all this\n26 stuff.\n27 AJ: And prestige.\n28 LTR: And prestige. And they’re up against some really amazing people that do this for a living, so it’s\n29 not like, “Oh, this is just some . . .” Like in college, I threw a drag show and that was like people\n30 that had never even seen drag, doing drag, but this is a ball scene where professionals who . . .\n31 AJ: Do it every night.\n32 LTR: Right. And then the week ends with a spiritual, interfaith worship service led by . . . the last time\n33 I was with there was a non-denominational person, a Christian person, a Jewish person, and\n34 then a person . . . Hindu. And we each led from our own spaces and, at that particular time –\n35 you know, everybody is not Christian so everybody is not going to come up to me and ask for\n36 prayer.\n37 AJ: Right.\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 23\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nLTR: But, some people might go to this guy and chant with him or this woman 1 and hold a space of\n2 silence. And so, just recognizing that we all have different faith traditions as Black people. But\n3 that week, or that organization, has changed my life because I didn’t grow up around a lot of\n4 Black people outside of the Black church. So, my context for relating to Black people has only\n5 been through the Black church.\n6 AJ: Sure, religious sort of connections.\n7 LTR: And all of the Black people in the Black church said these things and did these things to me, and\n8 then I had some Black friends at school, but as far as deep relationships . . . I mean, I only dated .\n9 . . I think I’ve only been with one Black woman.\n10 AJ: Really? OK.\n11 LTR: And now I’m about to marry one. So, that’s great.\n12 AJ: Oh, my goodness. OK.\n13 LTR: Yeah.\n14 AJ: You’re in a relationship now.\n15 LTR: I am, and it’s the one I feel like.\n16 AJ: This is the one. “I’m about to marry her now.” You just said that.\n17 LTR: And she knows that I’m trans and she grew up in the same kind of environment that I did. We\n18 speak the same language.\n19 AJ: In the Black church?\n20 LTR: Yes.\n21 AJ: Is she involved in the church now?\n22 LTR: No, but she does religious and interfaith work and she graduated from seminary with the ability\n23 to do some work outside of the church but within the structures of how people gather in\n24 spiritual community. So, I feel like it is still church, but it’s beyond what we know of as church.\n25 AJ: Sure.\n26 LTR: It’s intentional communities and faith forming that isn’t tied to one institutional marker.\n27 AJ: Right.\n28 LTR: And so, in that way, she’s brilliant and her work complements mine because, as much as I am a\n29 minister, she’s the daughter of a minister. But she does work to bring people to a deeper space\n30 and knowing of spirituality and God, but not necessarily this particular denomination.\n31 AJ: Oh, wow. I’m so happy for you.\n32 LTR: Thank you.\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 24\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nAJ: 1 That’s incredible.\n2 LTR: Yeah, thank you. It’s funny, I met her at the Creating Change Conference . . .\n3 AJ: Really? Which one?\n4 LTR: January. We saw each other before that at a work conference.\n5 AJ: So, in Chicago?\n6 LTR: Yes. We saw each other at a work conference last fall and talking about work, I meet a lot of\n7 people at work conferences. So, it’s like, “Oh, yeah, we should connect and do this project, do\n8 that – great.”\n9 AJ: And then nothing ever happens.\n10 LTR: Nothing happens. And then I saw her at Creating Change and I’m like, “Hmmm, I really do want\n11 to work with you, we’ve got to figure something out.” And then we ended up kind of having an\n12 impromptu date, we didn’t call it a date but that’s really what it was. We were having dinner\n13 and drinks and talking for four hours – that’s a date. And God, I haven’t stopped thinking about\n14 her ever since. It was like . . . that was the first time, as a man, I was sitting across from a\n15 woman and we were just . . .\n16 AJ: Dining.\n17 LTR: That was awesome, and I’ve never been that comfortable with a woman before, in that sense –\n18 as me. And I’m like if she can receive all me and I can be all of me, I need to make sure that this\n19 is a thing. And so, I started to slowly pursue her without her really knowing that that’s what was\n20 happening. She was finishing up her internship in her masters. She lives in Chicago.\n21 AJ: Oh, wow.\n22 LTR: And so, she’s like, “I’ve just got so much on my plate.” She was talking about coming out to her\n23 family as queer and all this stuff going on. So, I was like, “OK, I don’t want to add any more\n24 pressure, so I won’t . . .” She doesn’t remember saying this, but she said it, “I don’t have time to\n25 be thinking about dating anybody and all that, I’ve got to do this, this, and this.” I was like, “OK,\n26 well I’ll wait until these things are done and then . . .” Seriously, the day after her graduation, I\n27 was like, “So, now that that’s over, what about this?”\n28 AJ: Wow.\n29 LTR: She’s awesome.\n30 AJ: Well, good luck with everything. I hope that really works out.\n31 LTR: I do too.\n32 AJ: Have you guys been able to connect with each other? Chicago is not that far away.\n33 LTR: No. She graduated in May and we had been talking now and then, but the day after she\n34 graduated and I started to tell her about my feelings, then at the end of May, I got in the car and\n35 I drove to Chicago and I asked her to be my girlfriend, talked to her dad and told her dad . . .\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 25\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\n1 AJ: Really?\n2 LTR: Yes.\n3 AJ: Wow.\n4 LTR: Yes, and . . .\n5 AJ: Lawrence, this is a thing.\n6 LTR: It is a thing and we’re planning what that thing looks like for the future. But, she loves me and\n7 it’s a God kind of love.\n8 AJ: Love is so beautiful.\n9 LTR: It empowers me because I feel like in this season, God is calling me to love at a greater level and\n10 I can’t love at that level if I don’t have love at that level. So, I feel like this is a gift because I’m\n11 ready to go out and do so much in the world, but I need to be able to also express that energy in\n12 a personal way. So, it’s a great feeling.\n13 AJ: Wow. Where do you see the trans community in the next 50 years, Lawrence?\n14 LTR: Oh, my goodness. Before that, I see trans presidents . . .\n15 AJ: Oh!\n16 LTR: Heads of state.\n17 AJ: Alrighty then.\n18 LTR: I see book projects and movies and not just featuring trans people but written by trans people.\n19 And, so well-integrated in society that the way we talk about, “Oh, this woman XYZ,” we’ll say,\n20 “This trans person XYZ,” and it’s not going to be a negative thing for people. And in some cases,\n21 it might not even be necessary, but as we continue to try to find language, I think our language\n22 even for trans people in the next 50 years will change. I don’t think that we will have the same\n23 words that we use right now. I think that we’ll be such an advanced society, only because of the\n24 activism of trans people.\n25 AJ: Right.\n26 LTR: But I think that trans people in the last five years have accomplished more than any other group\n27 of people in the same amount of time. You talk about when I first came out, Googling the word\n28 – some resources came up. Now you Google the word, books come up, people come up,\n29 pictures of people with the President come up. That’s all been in the last five years.\n30 AJ: Yeah.\n31 LTR: Fifty years? We’re going to have . . . I’m telling you, heads of state, presidents in our own\n32 countries and islands and resort companies. We have a trans camp right now, we have a couple\n33 of organizations that host camps for trans people, but we’re going to have resorts, we’re going\n34 to have organizations that aren’t just for trans medical care but spiritual care, athletes, sports\n35 care. I just see the trans community really blossoming because now that we know we can\nLawrence Tanner Richardson 26\nThe Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies\nUniversity of Minnesota\nthrive, we will. Before we thought we had to hide and many did, and they 1 lived wonderful lives\n2 – some of them.\n3 AJ: Some.\n4 LTR: And many of them didn’t though because you can’t thrive in isolation.\n5 AJ: Right.\n6 LTR: And now that we see all of these trans people around the world doing all this stuff in all these\n7 countries and legislators and stuff, I’m like . . . social media gives us a window that we didn’t\n8 have before and that window inspires so much hope. So, in 50 years, glass ceilings are going to\n9 disappear.\n10 AJ: Wow. I am just so honored, so delighted, so inspired by this conversation.\n11 LTR: Thank you very much. Likewise. Thank you for everything that you do, but also understanding\n12 that the fight isn’t a choice, it’s just what we do because it’s who we are.\n13 AJ: It’s because of who we are. Lawrence, thank you.\n14 LTR: Thank you.\n15 AJ: Until we meet again.", "_version_": 1710339105387184128, "type": "Moving Image", "collection": "p16022coll97", "is_compound": false, "parent_id": "47", "thumb_url": "https://cdnapisec.kaltura.com/p/1369852/thumbnail/entry_id/0_dselzh1r", "thumb_cdn_url": "https://dkp5i0hinw9br.cloudfront.net/2508885c0842103934642a4733ffc22f2e03bde2.png", "children": [ ] }