Across the globe, queer tattoo artists have been making noise and making space: carving inclusive spaces and working hard to change the industry’s culture.

When I lost my job, I hadn’t left the office before I thought struck me: what name do I put on my job applications? I’d been working at the same office for a bit over a year when I came out (read: said something vague on Facebook) and changed my name. I knew before I …

At the start of 2013, I went to Open Doors Youth Service and completed my intake. It included a homelessness waiver form as it’s quite common for young people to get kicked out of home for accessing an LGBTI support service, or they’re accessing it because they need crisis accommodation and/or general community support. Later …

My dear trans siblings, my gender diverse family,   Are you hurting right now, or sad, or lost, or confused, or tired? I know I am. Every day in our political and media spheres we see more and more attacks on us, and those like us, just for daring to live and exist as ourselves. …

When I started working in the youth homelessness sector five years ago, I was not prepared for all the ways that the homelessness system was, and still is, not built for folks like me. I’m a non-binary trans person, and for five years I have worked alongside young people without housing. I was definitely not …

Names. Labels. Decisions… We, as human beings, do love to put neat little labels on nearly anything. We have a deep-seated need to create well-balanced order out of the endless amounts of chaos that this universe tends to fling our way. Your name is there, sometimes even before you’re born, just waiting to slap a …

The election of Jair Bolsonaro as president of Brazil isn’t an isolated phenomenon. As a politically compromised transgender man, I can’t help but interpret it as part of a worrying reactionary backlash. I live in Argentina, the first country in the region to recognise trans people’s right to change our names legally and access gender …

When it comes to transitioning, the most well known approach is down the medical path. Hormones and surgery seem to be the “go to” options. But there are other paths as well. I came out as non-binary when I was 32, but my physical transition started when I was 28. At the time, I lived …

Carving out my non-binary identity felt like going through a second adolescence. I found myself experimenting with various styles, spaces, activities and relationships – I was trying everything on for size to see if it fit. Much like my first adolescence, sexual exploration was a formative rite of passage, full of nervousness and a bit …

On December 17, the popular blogging platform Tumblr enacted a ban on “adult content” uploaded to its site. What it means by adult content is images and videos of “real-life human genitals”, content that depicts sex acts, and nipples – but only, of course, ones that are “female-presenting.” Many have pointed out that the blanket …

How do you make a picture of something you can’t see? I’ve been commissioned to create an artwork about hidden queer histories, using the collections of local archives. At the State Library of Victoria, the search term transgender brings up zero results in the multimedia, images and scripts collections. The article and book results are …

As a non-binary person, I am constantly seeking films, television shows, music and online spaces where gender diversity is the norm, not the exception. They are still far too rare, and much needed in our current context. Misconceptions about transgender and gender diverse people continue to abound. In the United States, President Trump’s administration is considering defining …

Wading into the deep end of the pool as a trans woman athlete has been fraught with problems. I was only three years into my transition when I made the decision to return to sport in 2004. Prior to this, I had been a competitive athlete since my 5th grade of school. All I had …

Mama Alto is a gender transcendent diva, cabaret artiste, and community activist. She is a non-binary trans femme person of colour who works with the radical potential of storytelling, strength in softness & power in vulnerability. Bobuq Sayed sat down with them at Hares and Hyenas to talk queerness in the arts and the challenges …

Smug. That is how I felt in my marriage. I was almost 36 when Paul and I met randomly at a bar in Brisbane. I figured that I must have applied the right amount of patience and discernment, because the alchemy of my relationship with Paul had resulted in a near perfect mix of respect, …

It started early, and had little to do with sexuality. Maybe it was the fact that I hung around with more boys than girls, or that frocks never caught my fancy. But I fought to choose my own clothes, and my family eventually got tired of resisting resistance. My earliest memory was after a bath …

The words to Macklemore’s ‘Same Love’, being performed during the rugby league grand final telecast, resonated across Sydney Airport. They were cheered on with pride, joy and hope by Australians from all walks of life, united in defence of equality. En route back to Melbourne, I watched surrounded by other parents of transgender kids, tired yet …

My very first images of masculinity and femininity came from the pictures that hung in my family’s prayer area, inside a small hallway closet with doors that opened like an accordion. Inside I saw gods and goddesses, either balanced on one leg in a dance pose, or standing with their palms together in prayer. At six …

I had not walked into the barbershop for three months, but the barber remembered my face. He is a Turkish guy in his late sixties. His strength and agility dance in his hands. He is a quiet man with a wide smile that appears every so often. His grin is like a slice of light, …

The persistence of gendered terms in language can be complex for non-binary people, especially those with cross-cultural identities. When you study anatomy, one of the first things you learn is that the body is divided into planes: the transverse (horizontal: the way your belt sits), sagittal (left and right: imagine a line from your forehead to …

It took me five years to feel comfortable and respected in my gender. Five years of learning and unlearning, blog posts and academia, art, protest, music, grime, sweat and dancing. Five years of blood, scars, assault and forging ahead, despite a lack of understanding, even from the few trans friends I had. And it’s only in …

As a trans woman, I have a fairly different perspective on marriage equality than most people who are heard in this debate. You may not be aware of how Australian law regards trans people. I’ve spent a lot of time making sense of the bureaucracy and the absurd legal grey area I exist in. To …