Cutting 14 inches from her waist-length hair and adopting a pixie cut in 2017 began as an act of charity, but for Jordan Ricks, it would quickly become an act of resistance.
When she walked into church wearing a graphic tee with “self-rescuing princess” and her new short cut with Emma Watson-inspired baby bird bangs, a misguided greeter turned to her grandmother and said, “You have such a wonderful grandson.”
“I was really mad,” said Jordan, 14.
“Every time she passed by that church, she felt furious,” said her mother, Katie Ricks.
In retrospect, it was a turning point for the young girl. “That is the first time I really heard (her) saying, ‘Why don’t they ask about your preferred pronouns?’” Ricks said.
Earlier this month, Jordan, now a freshman at Druid Hills High School, received affirmation that her school, at least, is starting to see things her way.
At the orientation for freshmen and sophomores, school staff instructed students to write their names and gender pronouns on their name tags as they were organized into groups.
“I was really excited,” said Jordan, who uses she/her pronouns. “I think it is really important when you are meeting new people for the first time. It can make everyone feel comfortable.”
Credit: Jenni Girtman
Credit: Jenni Girtman
We’ve reached that moment when young people — as in those born any time after 2000 who have grown up with an understanding of gender identity that is far more expansive than previous generations — are pushing for change.
Almost 2% of high school students, a much greater number than researchers previously estimated, identify as transgender, according to a 2019 report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
But at less than 1% of the population, Georgia residents who identify as transgender, along with those who identify as nonbinary (an all-encompassing term for any gender other than male or female, as well as a gender itself), remain largely unseen.
Some K-12 schools in the City of Atlanta and DeKalb County have made it a practice to formally ask students or parents, in person or via surveys, to provide students’ pronouns at the beginning of the school year, but LGBTQ advocates said the efforts are not moving as quickly in Georgia as in other parts of the country.
As the number of transgender and nonbinary students in K-12 continues to grow, schools will have to adapt or find themselves increasingly embroiled in legal actions centered on the clash between an evolving culture and the traditional values and approaches that permeate the educational landscape.
Local LGBTQ advocates say it makes sense to introduce the range of gender pronouns — she/her, he/him, they/them, etc.— to students as early as possible.
“Once you launch your identity, it is important that you do that rather than being singled out. It is about being seen and being treated as equal,” said Chanel Haley, gender policy manager for the advocacy group Georgia Equality. “It has become a life-or-death situation for so many youth.”
With schools locked in confusion over whether and how to implement new policies, parents find themselves in the position of making individual pleas to administrators to support students as they launch their identities, said Haley. And it is usually one liberal or open-minded staffer who convinces everyone to make those accommodations, she said.
“It needs to be more than recognizing that one person in the corner is different and you are asking them their pronouns and asking them questions because now you are singling them out. Every person in society should be like, ‘Hi, my name is Chanel and my pronouns are she/her/hers,’” Haley said.
Credit: Jenni Girtman
Credit: Jenni Girtman
Jordan Ricks said it has become common among many of her friends to automatically offer up pronouns — at youth group outings for church, on social media accounts like Instagram, which in May launched a pronoun feature, and now, as an entire student body at her new high school.
“I think it can validate people,” Jordan said. “It can end the awkwardness that comes with asking people their pronouns.”
This summer, she pushed her mom to pay more attention to the importance of pronouns when she suggested the topic for her mom’s “Holy (Expletive) Podcast.”
“I have friends who are nonbinary, but Jordan is constantly reminding me of things I don’t know,” said Ricks, 51, who said it is hard to escape lessons of her past. “She is not thinking about it whereas I have to use my brain all the time.”
Widely known as the first openly lesbian candidate ordained in the Presbyterian Church (USA), Ricks said though her mother was a radical feminist and also a Presbyterian minister who was ordained in the mid-1980s, they didn’t talk a lot about gender. When she was a child, people sometimes mistook Ricks for a boy just as they had with Jordan, but those experiences never led to conversations about gender fluidity, being nonbinary or the different gender expressions, she said.
Ricks recalled once having said “Thank you, sir” to a friend who was transitioning from male to female and feeling horrible afterward. The friend was surprised but accepting of an apology. “I just wasn’t thinking and for me that brings awareness to the need to be intentional,” Ricks said.
Haley said we should all be more gentle with ourselves ... to a point.
“At its core, every human being who has any type of education whatsoever had the same basic core education around sex. I don’t think it is rude or that a person is being facetious by assuming that a person who looks like the social norm for one gender is that gender,” Haley said. “As a society, we have started moving to try to rip that away. Both sides need to be patient with each other and understand that change takes time and everyone is not like you and doesn’t see things the same way.”
Ricks said she was pleased to hear from her daughter that the school was encouraging widespread recognition of pronouns.
“I feel abundantly more hopeful about the place that she is in,” said Ricks. “It sounded from Jordan like it was a really welcoming environment. This experience blew out of the water my anxiety of what school was going to look like.”
Read more on the Real Life blog (www.ajc.com/opinion/real-life-blog/) and find Nedra on Facebook (www.facebook.com/AJCRealLifeColumn) and Twitter (@nrhoneajc) or email her at nedra.rhone@ajc.com
About the Author
