Kyle's Story

Copyright © 2007, by Kyle Scanlon

Trans Programmes Co-coordinator

519 Community Centre, Toronto, Canada

Kyle's story  -  Photos  -  Biosketch

My Story

My story? I'm not sure that I even have a story. Not an interesting one at least. :-)

I began considering my identity as an FTM in about 1998. Before thought I thought of myself as a dyke, or in a more general way "transgendered" but I didn't know that transmen existed. I had recently moved to Toronto to start a new job as a media monitor. While working there, I had a dykey roommate who showed me the video "You Don't Know Dick", and my new life began. As soon as I knew that this thing called Transition was possible, I knew it was exactly what I needed to do.

There weren't a ton of supports for FTMs in Toronto at that time, so I was attending two groups. The FTM Support Group, but also Meal Trans, a meal programme for lower-income, homeless, street-active trans people. The more women I met at Meal Trans the more I learned about the kinds of hardships they experienced and the discrimination they faced.

At the same time, I was finally deciding to come out to my family and at my workplace and start taking testosterone. In 1999 I started T and in 2000 I legally changed my name. At that point I went to my employers and told them I was transitioning. Within two weeks I had to quit because of the intense transphobia and harassment I was experiencing. Then I realized I had to beg Employment Insurance for them to pay back to me some of the money I'd been paying into the system for years. When you quit a job, you don't normally get to access that money. And then I started having problems with my landlord.

All those things together meant that suddenly I wasn't just sympathizing with the trans women I knew at Meal Trans, but also empathizing with them.

While I was off work, the facilitator at Meal Trans at that time - Tina Strang - asked me if I would help her do some trainings on trans issues. After starting that process, we then began compiling a book of information for service providers.

I guess I should point out that in my history as a lesbian, I had been the president of the Gay Lesbian Bisexual Association of McMaster and had done lots of trainings with them. I'd also been trained by the Rape Crisis Centre in Hamilton and was very familiar with issues of anti-oppression, harm reduction, etc. I'd also facilitated support groups for queer people in both Hamilton and Toronto.

The next job I applied for involved all of these "social service/queer service" interests, as well as my experience with media, and fundraising. It sort of sounds of context here when I name it, but it actually made perfect sense that I applied to become the Executive Director of the Gay Lesbian Bi Youthline, an Ontario wide phone support for queer youth. (thanks to efforts by self and others, the name has recently been changed to the Gay Lesbian Bi Trans Youthline.)

While working there, I continued to do "consulting" work here at 519, and also began facilitating the FTM support group. At that time, I was also writing an online column called Trans-Scribe for Queer Television, and I had been contacted by the Planned Parenthood Federation of Canada to create a series of documents on trans issues to be accessed on their website. I was also writing the occasional article for Trans-Health, the trans health website.

And then one day Tina told me in passing that she was leaving the 519. At first it didn't even occur to me that I might want the job myself. I was doing well at the Youth Line. And when I did mention it to friends as an option, they all pointed out that it would actually mean a step DOWN - down in pay, down in hours, down in "status of title". But the more I thought about it, the more I thought it was something I wanted to do. So I applied. And I got it! And that was in 2002.

 

Since then, I've never gotten bored. We now call ourselves "Trans Programmes at the 519", and we have/are involved in....

> Meal Trans, the meal programme for lower income folks.

> Aids Prevention Outreach by a trans sex worker FOR trans sex workers to provide them with condoms and lube.

> Trans Youth Toronto, a recreational space for youth 26 and under.

> Trans Access - a series of trainings for shelter staff and residents to create trans accessibility. (primarily focused on MTF issues and needs)

> Trans Inclusion Project - similar trainings but aimed at anti-violence service agencies around trans access. (primarily focused on MTF issues and needs)

> The FTM Safer Shelter Project - a research project looking at the needs of FTMs in the shelter system.

> The Gay Bi Queer Transmen's Working Group - a research project which has just created a safer sex resource guide for transmen who sex with other men. You can visit www.queertransmen.org to view this resource.

> The Pulse Project, a health research project, intended to be the biggest of its kind in Canada looking at health issues in trans communities in Ontario.

 

And of course in all of our projects, our staff members are trans. And none of any of this would be possible without the dedication, insight, and stamina of my other team members who provide leadership to these various projects: Jake, Yasmeen, Monica, Alec, Jazzmine, Shannon, Zack, Rebecca, Spy, Rain and Jordan.

It's been really rewarding to be involved with all these wonderful people as one twelfth of a team that is making a difference in lots of lives. We each have a specific role in creating, and operating all of these varied projects, and we each bring our ideas and objectives to the table in considering our next steps. I like to think that my gift is to provide a healthy dose of compassion to all the work that I do.

Kyle Scanlon
Trans Programmes Coordinator
The 519 Church Street Community Centre
416-392-6878 x104

E-mail Kyle

Kyle with some the trans staff of The 519

[Left to right: Shannon, Yasmeen, Kyle, Alec, Jazzmine and Jake]

Photos

I love these photos, mostly taken at Safari Zoo Camp in Orono, Ontario. For more of them see http://www.nerdgrrl.org/gallery2/v/fiends/tronnagang/kylezoo/.

Some may wonder why I'm including all these pictures of myself with wild animals. (Lemurs and anacondas and monkeys, oh my!) It's because I wanted to take the chance to showcase the universe that my warmth of spirit doesn't just extend to fellow human beings, but also to the furry and scaly creatures as well. Though I don't have pictures on the web to prove it (damn you, old fashioned camera!) I also have spent 45 minutes in a pool with dolphins (You haven't really lived until you've held onto two fins and let them speed you along across the water), got a hug from a sea lion, and snorkeled with sharks and sting rays! The goal I've set for myself in life is to have (safe) physical contact with as many kinds of animals as possible. To help achieve this, I've currently got a trip to Australia in the works. Koalas, kangaroos, wallabies, fur seals, sea lions, and dolphins are all in the plan. Wild animals, all of them. I'm also going to be petting a tiger in a zoo. Not wild, obviously, but that's still pretty damn cool. :-)

With a little baby monkey

Me and my very own kitty, Kira

There's another more compelling reason for including these animal-focused shots: because they have nothing to do with my being trans.

It's so easy as a transitioning person to think that everything in life is related to transition, to surgeries, to hormones, and to passing. We divide our lives into "before and after". We spend all our time telling friends and relatives about why we want to transition, what it was like to transition, and what the differences are between living as men versus women. We're viewed as social experiments, the creations of science and medicine. We're the topics of gossip, and the guests of tacky talk shows. We're objects. People easily forget we're human.

And we mustn't let them. We must show them, at every opportunity, that we have talents, and dreams, and lives.

Kyle

Biosketch from the Canadian Lesbian & Gay Archives:

http://www.clga.ca/About/NPC/ScanlonK-2005088.htm

A native of Hamilton, Kyle Scanlon was a member of the queer students’ organization at McMaster University. A move to Toronto led Kyle into the Lesbian Gay Bi Youth Line, where he became the first openly transsexual man to be the Executive Director of a queer agency in Canada. Kyle was led to his current position at the 519 Community Centre, where he serves as the Centre’s Trans Programmes Co-coordinator. Finding emergency housing, securing funding for the programmes he oversees, providing a supportive ear and a safe space for distressed clients, and engaging in the process with Toronto’s homeless shelters to implement trans-positive policies are all in a day’s work. With the program’s’ weekly drop-in centre, Kyle also ensures his clients can look forward to a hot, nourishing meal, can access a housing worker and a legal clinic.

After hours, he can be found working as a member of Toronto’s LGBT Police Consultative Committee, with the Sherbourne Health Centre, where he works to improve access to medical services for the trans, two-spirited, and intersexed communities, or in an advisory role to a number of research projects related to trans issues. He was a key player in the Youth Migration Project, a large-scale research study undertaken to evaluate issues in HIV vulnerability in youth who have migrated to Toronto, the AIDS Committee of Toronto’s Trans Needs Assessment, and Fred Victor Centre’s document “Where We Are All Welcome”, highlighting the unique issues of homeless trans people trying to access space in hostels and shelters. Additionally, Kyle has supported many other community organizations in their quest to become trans-positive/trans-accessible, including the Children’s Aid Society of Toronto, The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, the Planned Parenthood Federation of Canada, and the Law Society of Upper Canada, to name only a few.

His publications have appeared in such diverse media outlets as local newspapers, feminist essay collections, health advocacy websites, and academic journals. Kyle has been invited to speak at conferences across North America, and was recognized for his extensive community involvement with the 2001 Grassroots Trans Community Activist of the Year from SOY.