Hello everyone! I am here with my first ever Editor’s Notes, because I have just hit publish on the last piece in my first ever package. It’s both fitting and not fitting that my first foray into leading a package was Trans Awareness Week — not fitting because I struggle with these sorts of gay themed holidays, fitting because I love a challenge.

Transgender Day of Remembrance was created in 1999 by Gwendolyn Ann Smith to honor the memory of Rita Hester, who was killed the year before. Trans Awareness Week was created in the mid-2000s to lead up to this day. Of course, a lot has changed in the past two decades. The last few years have shown an increase in violence against trans people, so, unfortunately, Trans Day of Remembrance is still relevant. But Awareness? Isn’t the increase in Awareness (and its sister Visibility) part of what has led to the increase in violence? There is an immense over-saturation of discussions by cis people about trans people — including by politicians using our lives for fear-mongering — and personally I’m just not sure awareness is the thing we need to be encouraging.

The question for me became: During the week where cis people are centering us even more, what can a publication do that tries to center trans people all-year-round?

I started thinking about when the week was first created and what gaps in awareness still exist. I started thinking about the 2000s and recent trans history. Sure, cis people are talking a lot about us in the most boring ways, but one conservative talking point is that we’re new. On the liberal side, there is an acknowledgment of our history, but sometimes in a way that lifts a handful of figures (Marsha P Johnson, Sylvia Rivera, Stormé DeLarverie) to a sort of icon status that’s dehumanizing in its own way. That’s how I landed on the in-between. What does recent trans history look like from after Stonewall (1970) to pre-Tipping Point (2013)?

I worked with both team writers and external freelancers, and I feel really proud of the package itself. Stef did a deep-dive on the complicated legacy of Reed Erickson, For Them Social Media and Comms Lead Motti compared trans actors in cis roles of the past and present, Daven McQueen wrote about the history of the word genderqueer, and Eva Reign looked at trans characters in video games during the 80’s and 90’s. I also did a very meta look at Autostraddle’s own pre-Tipping Point coverage. That’s such a range of work! With so much fascinating history!

I’d never worked with outside freelancers before, so the biggest challenges for me were just logistical. Like, oh right, I need to get this new author to write a bio! Simple stuff like that. Thankfully, the writers were all patient with me. It is really interesting being on the other side after half a decade of working for Autostraddle as a writer. There are a lot of little things that go into publishing a piece and, especially, a package beyond just the writing and editing.

One thing, for sure, is next time I’ll start planning further in advance. I would’ve loved to have a more consistent visual aesthetic for the package but due to limited time I just kind of went with… desaturated. I mean, it made sense to me. If black and white or sepia communicate distant history, lightly desaturated images felt fitting for recent history. Then again, vibrant colors are maybe more attractive when it comes to getting people to read articles so while it made sense intellectually, I’m not sure it was the best move. Something to consider for next time!

There was also one other piece that just didn’t get finished in time, because it started to expand into something bigger. This is where planning earlier would’ve helped, but I also don’t mind the piece publishing later. As I told the writer, the great thing about working for Autostraddle is our trans writers aren’t limited to one special week. Any one of these pieces could’ve published at any time of the year.

I hope you enjoyed reading these pieces and learned something about trans history. (I know I did!) And thank you so much for being A+ members. Going back through the Autostraddle archive really emphasized how rare it is in the modern media landscape to have that kind of publication history. I love Autostraddle’s history and I love our present even more. Here’s to getting even more trans in the future!

This piece is part of our 2023 Trans Awareness Week coverage. Our Senior Editor, Drew Burnett Gregory, felt like cis people were plenty aware of trans people in 2023 thank you very much, so this week trans writers will be taking us back into recent history — specially post-Stonewall (1970) to pre-Tipping Point (2013).

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