Skip to content

When A Teen Goes Green

About an eco-positive lifestyle

Menu
  • Home
    • What is an eco-positive lifestyle?
    • New? Start here!
  • How to guides
  • Reducing negative impact
    • Veganism
    • Minimalism
    • Zero Waste
    • Sustainable Traveling
    • Sustainable and Fair Fashion
    • Intersectional Feminism
    • Circular Economy
    • The 9 Planetary Boundaries
  • Increasing positive impact
  • Inspiration
    • Recipes
    • Hotspots
    • Organizations and apps
    • Books, documentaries, films, series and podcasts
    • Books, Films and Series List
  • Personal
    • My Ideal World
    • About me and this blog
Menu
Documentary: Disclosure banner

Documentary: Disclosure

Posted on March 6, 2023March 3, 2023

If I must believe up-to-date numbers, only a small percentage of people in society are transgender. Numbers vary, but the highest number I’ve seen is 4%. That’s a minority. Most people say they don’t know someone who is transgender. And as is usually the case for minorities, there are many misconceptions about that minority. And for transgender people these misconceptions are usually created in media (television, films, etc.). Today I want to share a documentary which highlights these misconceptions and show us how much we still need to change. I’m sharing the documentary: Disclosure.

Disclosure: representation comes with hate

The documentary Disclosure starts with a positive message. When we look back now, transgender people are represented much better and more than about 50 years ago. But because of this, a negative paradox is showing. The more representation of trans people there is, the more the violence against these people is growing. And that violence is horrific, to the point of murder. This makes this first positive message not so positive anymore. But what makes cisgender people hate transgender people?

There’s no simple answer to this question. However, the documentary Disclosure shows that representation in media (mostly film) plays a huge role in this. The documentary follows a chronological order. Once the introduction is over, the documentary shows the first films that show transgender people. Alongside, we see the negative way they’re portrayed. From showing transgender people as crazy, to criminalizing them, portraying them as people with a huge secret, cultural appropriation, outing them, etc. There’s even a whole group of films where the narrative is the same each time: transgender people are secretly killers.

Examples

Alongside with that chronological order of films showing the representation of transgender people, there are all sorts of famous transgender people telling their personal stories in the documentary. People like Laverne Cox and Elliot Fletcher. They tell us what all this negative representation has done to them and their lives. How they struggle to see theirselves represented at all on television and how that has caused so much confusion. It shows how hard their lives can be.

Slow Progress

The documentary ends with a more positive narrative. Representation of transgender people is getting better. Not as fast as it should, but there is progress. One great example of this is POSE, a series I personally loved so much that I shared it on this blog before. More great examples are stories of parents who are proud of their transgender children. I loved one scene in the documentary where a father talks about his daughter, calling her a unicorn, because she is so special. He said that because she is transgender, she is very close to herself and brave as well. I found that a beautiful example of what life should be like for transgender people.

Reality

But this documentary does not end with a happy message. It’s not like it used to be bad and now everything is good. No. Things are getting better, but we’re not there yet. Like the documentary showed in the beginning: with more and better representation comes more hate. And it’s us cisgendered people who need to do better. We should educate ourselves, our families, friends and kids better. Just today, a few a hours before I was writing this, I heard a transphobic message on the radio. We should fight that. We should fight for transgender people. For a future where everyone can be theirselves and live their lives happily.

Watch Disclosure

The first step is always to educate yourself. Watch the documentary Disclosure and learn from all the mistakes that were made by other people. And then do better. Also, vote for parties which recognize this issue and want to do something about it. And speak up when someone says something transphobic in your presence. There’s usually false information behind these comments people make. But eventually I think we should abolish all gender norms in general. Nail-polish or skirts should never be called girly anymore, nor should soccer and the color blue be consider boyish. Let’s break those gender norms. To make sure that all of us are safe and happy.

Watch Disclosure on Netflix.

Yours sincerely,
Romee

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Search for anything

Want to get an update every time I post something?

Enter your email address to subscribe to my blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 268 other subscribers.

ABOUT ME

 

Hi! My name is Romee Hoeksma and I am on a journey to an eco-positive life. An eco-positive lifestyle is a lifestyle in which I have a more positive than negative impact on the beautiful planet earth. On this blog you can follow my journey to a life with only positive impact. At this blog you can find all sorts of things, from tips to recipes to personal experiences, but most of all fun (I hope!). I write about how I want to change the world, but don’t look at it as if I’m judging you. If anything, I like responses from my dear readers the most, so don’t hesitate to contact me or respond to any of my posts!

Yours sincerely,
Romee

Here’s what I posted most recently

  • Femicide
  • Vegan food diary for a week – March 2023
  • Are charities the solution to our problems?
  • Documentary: Disclosure
  • Vegan restaurants in London

Translate this site

Follow me on Instagram

Eén van mijn favoriete vegan snacks, bij de Lidl tijdens de Griekse week 🇬🇷. Op dit moment is plantaardig eten nog niet de norm in Nederland, helaas. Daarom hebben veel mensen dan ook geen idee wat veganisten eten. Om die reden heb ik de afgelopen week weer eens een eetdagboek bijgehouden, want wat eet ik nou als veganist gedurende de week? Je leest het nu in mijn vegan food diary via de link in mijn bio 🥭. #plantaardig #veganfood #dagboek Verpakkingsvrij wasmiddel kopen, dat hoeft niet moeilijk te zijn! In deze reel laat ik je zien hoe ik dat doe 🧺. Volg mijn account voor meer duurzame tips. Elke maand doneer ik ongeveer 7% van mijn inkomen aan goede doelen, omdat ik dat zie als enorm belangrijk en het juiste ding om te doen 💸. Maar daarmee komt de vraag op: geloof ik dat goede doelen het antwoord zijn op alle grote problemen van onze tijd? Oftewel: is geld doneren de oplossing? Over die vraag én het antwoord schreef ik een uitgebreid artikel die vandaag online staat, de link vind je in mijn bio. #goeddoel #doneren #blog Vegan pizza tonno, hmmmm. Dacht je dat vegans geen tonijnpizza kunnen eten? Think again! 🐟 Een hele tijd geleden schreef ik een artikel over e-mail activisme: een vorm van activisme die je thuis op de bank kan doen. Vandaag deel ik graag een geslaagd voorbeeld daarvan met jullie ✨. Vandaag staat er een documentaire-tip op mijn blog. Disclosure, een documentaire over de representatie van transgender personen in de media 📽. Echt een must-see, want wat wij hebben als cis-gender personen nog een hoop te leren. Lees meer over de documentaire via de link in mijn bio. #disclosure #documentaire #transgender Vandaag deel 2 van de vegan hotspots in Londen 🧆. Wat heb ik lekker gegeten daar, niet te doen! Bubala was mijn absolute favoriet, dus als je iets moet kiezen, kies Bubala. Vorige week verscheen er een artikel over treinreizen naar Londen op mijn blog. Aanvullend daarop verscheen er vandaag een artikel over een ander aspect van duurzaam reizen: het eten. Lees nu het artikel met mijn favoriete veganistische restaurants in Londen nu via de link in mijn bio 🌮. #veganfood #veganlondon #veganrestaurants

Read my latest posts

  • Femicide
  • Vegan food diary for a week – March 2023
  • Are charities the solution to our problems?
  • Documentary: Disclosure
  • Vegan restaurants in London

Subscribe by e-mail

©2023 When A Teen Goes Green | WordPress Theme by Superbthemes.com