Elliot, who attended Dayton’s Pride parade Saturday for the first time, identifies as non-binary, even though they feel “right in the middle.”
“I feel more aligned to being a human that I do aligned to being a person, if that makes sense. Personhood is so ego driven and I have fun with it,” they said. “On the inside, I don’t feel any one way or the other ... It’s very fluid for me.”
June is Pride Month and there’s an annual series of parades and other gatherings to celebrate LGBTQ+ culture and rights.
In the U.S. this year, for many these events include speaking out against a slew of government policies that impose restrictions on transgender people and try to end diversity, equity and inclusion programming in government, education and businesses.
In February, Elliot lost their government job because of an executive order that said transgender people were not long allowed to use the restroom aligning with their gender.
“The disability thing was already something that was causing some issues to begin with but this would have required me to walk more than half a mile every single time I wanted to use the bathroom,” they said. “I use an intersex bathroom. They only had one available on the premises.”
Since this executive order was signed, Elliot said they were discriminated against and no longer have a job because of “the administration’s view on transgenderism.”
Growing up in a family that said they were inclusive, then showed it was very different once someone close to them — Elliot — came out, they said there was sexualization and abuse towards them because of it, but that they are better for it now.
“It’s been a journey after that of coming out and then going back in the closet,” Elliot said. “As a transmasculine person, there’s a lot of invisibility for us. Then when we’re seen, we’re often infantilized and oversexualized. It makes it really difficult to sort of exist safely.”
Dayton Pride runs from June 5-8 in downtown Dayton. It features a variety of events across the city all weekend including a parade followed by a festival with live music, merchandise, vendors, a dedicated family area, an interfaith service, adoption event and afterparty at the Levitt Pavilion.
Dana and Jill Winters, who are both transgender, attended Saturday’s Pride festival for the first time as a married couple. They just got married last weekend.
Jill was married for 32 years and has two sons, but she hid her identity her whole life because of her upbringing of having an “overbearing father” and “anti-LGBTQ brother.”
“I hid it for years and when I did come out, my wife divorced me. I lived along and just slowly came out. Then about three years ago, I just came out,” Jill said.
Jill’s oldest son has disowned her and the younger one supports her transition, but is slowly adjusting to the new relationship.
For Dana, she said she knew about herself since age 16, but didn’t come out until she turned 21. However, Dana had a “super religious” family and stayed in the closet for some time because of it.
“I carried a mentality that if you don’t like the way I am, look the other way and walk away,” Dana said.
As for the government and its orders, that hasn’t changed anything for Jill, who is from Zanesville, as of yet.
“You think you’d run into a lot of problems (there), I don’t,” Jill said. “I work for a company where I’m in the public and I got to deal with the public every day and they treat me just fine. I don’t feel any kind of pressure or bigotry or nothing. Every once in a while I’ll get a customer that’s a little short with me, but 99% of the customers that I deal with are friendly and respectful.”
This month also marks the 10th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Obergefell v. Hodges ruling, which recognized same-sex marriage nationwide. It was a watershed event in establishing rights for LGBTQ+ people across the country.
Elliot has been married and divorced before in a same-sex marriage.
“It was very strange being able to consider that I was able able to do that,” they said. “It’s really stellar to know that I’m able to have the same freedoms as other people because that is something that affects me.”
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