Dear Prudence: Struggling With Authenticity

[minoanmiss]

Struggling with authenticity: My dream is to write for television. In one of my college classes, I’ve been assigned a personal branding assignment where we try to sell ourselves as professionals. Our instructor wants us to focus on authenticity and use our personal experiences to make us memorable.

I’m transgender. I’m stealth and don’t tell people unless I have to. I’ve also struggled with mental health issues, suicide attempts, etc. While brainstorming this assignment, I mentioned resilience as one of my best traits. My professor encouraged me to talk about my past and the journey I’ve been on.

I’m struggling with this. I know that in order to make it in the industry, it helps to stand out from the crowd. I know being out as a “trans writer” could open a lot of doors for me. And I know that authenticity is key, but there’s very little I can say about my journey without labeling myself or basically marketing my trauma. Is there a way to market myself authentically and “prove” that I have a unique voice and stories worth telling while not talking about these parts of my life? Is it possible to be a successful writer without being willing to share so much of what has shaped who I am? Could refusing to be open about being trans damage my chances for success?

A: I’m incredibly skeptical of anyone who tells you that you need to be hugely vulnerable and disclose intimate details of past trauma in order to succeed in your chosen field, even if that chosen field is a creative one that sometimes (or often) calls upon personal experience. Nor do I think we live in a world where trans people are so celebrated that simply coming out will significantly increase the odds you’ll land a job in a writers’ room. How many TV shows (besides those explicitly about trans people) have full-time trans writers? The WGAW Inclusion Report for 2020 has some more breakdowns about television writers here, but aside from a quick line about achieving relative parity with the national LGBTQ population at around 6 percent, there’s not much information (and there’s often a significant difference between the LGBTQ community broadly and trans people in particular). “Standing out from the crowd” is one thing, but it’s a mistake to believe the only way you can stand out is by coming out, or that it’s impossible to discuss your resilience without going into detail about your mental health history. Most writers are not hired on the basis of perceived “resilience”; even if I thought it were likely to get you a job, I’d advise against it, but the fact that I don’t think it would even help you achieve your goal is another mark against disclosing during the hiring process.

None of this is to say that you have to remain closeted, or that there’s no good reason to come out. But your professor is giving you terrible advice in suggesting that you have to furnish intimate, personal details about suicidality, trauma, or your transition in order to “stand out” from the crowd of job applicants. You should come out if and when you feel safe doing so and believe it would improve your life, your relationships, or your general well-being.