Still Learning

This morning I was on the 3 train from 148th st, an African American man sitting next to his teen daughter and across from his late-teens son, looked down the subway car and commented in rather insulting term on the outfit and demeanor of a trans boy standing at the other end of the subway car holding (I guess) his GF’s hands. His exact words were ” that girl boy tomboy fag freak needs a real man to set her straight! Look at that, disgusting what this society lets kids do. Next you know they on drugs or having AIDS and all. Got to keep those freaks away from normal kids.” He said it loud enough that the boy heard him and looked away, but held on to his GF’s hand. The guy kept on ranting it made me uncomfortable, so, as I was about to tell him to leave the kid alone, his son stood up, walked to the trans boy, said ” excuse me. I am really sorry brother for what my father said. I apologize for these hurtful things, he is ignorant. I hope you know brother, you’re none of those things, you’re who you are, stay that way, it gets better brother, it gets better!” he calmly walked back to his seat, to a father furious and enraged. As the father was about to take the kid apart and even made threats to ‘take care of things when we home’ the daughter looked at him and said “dad, would you be happier if HE was in another (subway car)?” the dad nodded yes than added ” it’s not a man, those kind of trash should be away from normal people” The daughter then said something like “white people use to feel the same way about being in the subway with black people, not a long time ago, dad.”

This made my day, sad as it is, there was also courage and love, these kids give me hope: it gets better!:-)