Stephanie

Every unsolicited interaction with law enforcement rests on one simple principle.  It is the singular foundation for all law enforcement officer (LEO) training and field work.  It is the deciding factor in whether a person will live or die.  It is an amazingly complex and intricate concept to master, and yet unbelievably simple to put into words.  For some LEOs, it can be a daily struggle, and for others, an intuitive understanding without a conscious recognition. 

The principle is human free will, and the purpose and intention of a LEO is to break it.  Submit.  Comply.  Behave.

It begins with the recognition of authority.  A LEO’s authority is recognized in law, and represented by a uniform and a weapon.  We are all indoctrinated from a very early age to understand this taxpayer-funded authority.  “Policeman” is one of the first occupations a child is taught to recognize.  80% of all TV shows and movies feature LEOs prominently and that is indeed a figure I just made up, but it sounds so believable you might not have even questioned it at first.  Beverly Hills Cop, Lethal Weapon, Police Academy, Hill Street Blues, NYPD Blue, Cagney and Lacey, Brooklyn 99, the various Law and Order shows… it’s a lot.  There was one TV show in particular that stripped away the glitz and glamour of Hollywood to show viewers the reality of law enforcement. 

Cops was first broadcast to the world on the Fox network in 1989 and has run continuously since then for 36 seasons.  I know, I didn’t realize it has been on this whole time either.  It has bounced around from network to network over the years, but, in addition to syndication, currently airs new episodes on Fox Nation, which is exactly what you think it is - a channel for people that love Fox News so much they need a channel to flip during commercial breaks that will still give them their grievance politics-induced high without interruption.  Cops is so incredibly cheap to produce that even with a tiny viewership, it is still relatively profitable.  It’s still the number one rated show among auto shop waiting rooms and bars that forget to change the channel after a game ends.  Cops is presented in a reality show format and follows real LEOs as they patrol and make arrests.  The ethics involved get really murky because they often show victims and criminals without their consent, blurring faces to avoid legal problems.  Even when the producers do get consent from the unwilling participants, they are still unwilling participants due to the nature of being detained by LEOs.  Look, it's a terrible show and the people that make it are exploitative.  We should be better than this.  

On October 11, 2003, Cops first introduced the world to Stephanie Yellowhair.  The segment played out as follows.  Police officers, on patrol in Albuquerque, New Mexico, responded to a call reporting a public nuisance.  When they arrived at the scene of the nuisance, the officers confronted a trio of Native American people, a shirtless man and two young women, standing calmly in the bright New Mexico sunshine.  The man stepped forward and provided identification to the officers while one of the women held helium-filled balloons and the other woman paced back and forth from frustration.  One of the officers asked the frustrated woman to provide identification, but she stated she did not have any identification with her.  Her demeanor was calm and rational.  Her accent was a mix of Latina and valley girl.  Her tone was pure sarcasm.  The officers asked more questions, as they often do, and the woman answered in short, direct replies, increasing the intensity of both her sarcasm and clearly exaggerated accent.  The officer changed the nature of his questions from informational to provocative.  The woman did not waver in her tone, never escalating the tension but never allowing her responses to proceed without consistent sass.  The officer, clearly feeling the presence of the Cops camera crew and small audience on hand, resorted to making derogatory comments about the woman's appearance, but the woman responded in kind with an even heavier dose of sarcasm, whipping her hair away from her face and adjusting her posture to be in frame of the camera pointed at her. "Shut. Uuuuuuppppp," she replied as the officer made a comment about her eyebrow makeup.  The officer then put the woman in handcuffs and led her to the back seat of the squad car.  There, the officers continued with provocative, unnecessary questions and loudly and intentionally using the name Stephen to refer to the woman.  The woman, still undaunted, unbroken, and seemingly unfazed by the officer's bullying responded with "I'm sorryyyyyyy.  I won't do it no morrrrrrrrrrre.  Will you please release meeeeeeee."  The officer then agrees to release her on the condition that she return to Arizona where she was a legal resident, punctuated with one last use of the name Stephen, which he delivered with extra force.  The woman then said the words that would eventually lead to an early internet meme and later queer hero.  

"Excuse my beautyyyyyy."

She was brave.  She was defiant.  She did not allow the officer to take her free will.  With three simple, obnoxious words, the woman took a stand in front of this police officer who had attempted to belittle and mock her.  Stephanie Yellowhair deserved so much more from the world in which she found herself, but displayed courage and grace that would leave an example for others.  She was a proud Navajo woman.

Growing up as a white kid in the southern United States, I did not have contact with Native American people.  My mom claimed, as most white people in the south do, that our family had native ancestry and that we had a connection to the people from whom our actual, European ancestors stole all this land.  I assume that claim comes from a sense of white guilt, but it's hard to say for sure.  The advent of mass market DNA testing has proven my mom wrong since then, but I am sad to admit that when I was a child we dabbled in Native American cultural appropriation.  We also subscribed to the Childcraft Annual, a yearly subscription service that would deliver a compilation book for children based on a different theme each year.  The 1984 Childcraft Annual was my favorite, titled Great Myths and Legends.  I loved every story from around the world, as it featured mythology from a wide variety of cultures and historical settings.  One story in particular resonated with me, even as a child, in a way that I couldn't fully comprehend.  The story was titled The Brave Coward.  

The story is this.  The Dakota people were living in fear of an evil sorcerer named Red Head who led an opposing nation.  All the Dakota warriors who had tried to fight Red Head were never seen again.  One Dakota warrior had a son who was afraid of many things and was shamed by his father such that he left the tribe out of embarrassment.  As he wandered through the woods, he met a witch who offered to help him become a brave warrior by giving him a way to slay Red Head.  The witch used her magic comb in the young man's hair and he magically turned into a young woman.  The witch told the newly transitioned young woman to go to Red Head's village and offer to marry him, which would cause him to let his guard down and give the young woman an opportunity to kill him.  The young woman is able to find her courage in this new gender identity and slays Red Head, taking his now even more red head home to her village, becoming a hero.  

This is a kid's story book from the 80s, so of course the witch turns the brave coward back into a man before he reaches his village, but he does tell everyone in the village exactly what happened and they make him the next chief and never seem to have an issue with the whole trans thing.  There's also a lot of misgendering and improper pronoun use in the Childcraft text, and there's a questionable subplot with Red Head's mother being a Rowling-esque transvestigator who tries to convince Red Head that the brave coward is actually a dude but Red Head is such a massive chaser that he threatens to just have his mother killed if she continues to make a scene, but taken as a whole, this story was wildly progressive for its time and place.  And I loved it.  I read the story over and over before bed at night and stared at the illustrations of the witch combing the brave coward's hair as he transitioned so easily and flawlessly.  When I finally accepted my transgenderness and began the process of putting the pieces together from moments in my life when things seemed to make sense to me, this story stood out.  

Let's talk about Two Spirit people.  Carefully.  

I want to be very clear that I am not the best person to write this blog post.  At the very least, I should be directly consulting people from First Nations, but I don't have the resources for that, so I will do my best present this information from my perspective as a descendant of colonizers who wishes to honor the ideas and history of a colonized people without appropriating that history.  There's a very real and destructive potential for me, from my ethnic history as a white American of European descent and generational Christian ideology that is intolerant to LGBTQIA+ people, to swaddle myself in the emotional comfort and protection of Two Spirit ideology simply because it suits my needs as a person of transgender experience.  White people have already stolen so much from the First Nations, I do not wish to steal the beauty and joy of Two Spirit people as well.  I sincerely hope to acknowledge that beauty and joy, as well as learn new ways to view myself and the world in which we all inhabit.  

The term Two Spirit was created in 1990 over the course of five conferences of gay and lesbian First Nations people in Winnipeg, Canada.  The intention was to create a new singular term to encompass the vast array of individual terminology and concepts among First Nations people of what is now commonly considered LGBTQIA+ experience.  Another goal was to claim the ability to define First Nations people from within, as opposed to the terms in use that had derived from European origins, like berdache, which carried a negative connotation since its colonial imposition, as it derived from a concept of enslaved male prostitutes in Asia.  The term Two Spirit is meant to serve as an accessible doorway across languages into the individual First Nations terminology and concepts for First Nations people of varying gender expression or sexual orientation.  It also serves to distinguish those concepts from the modern western concepts of LGBTQIA+.  To be clear, a white transgender woman of European descent who writes blog posts about LGBTQIA+ issues is not a Two Spirit person simply because of the overlap in the Venn diagram of the two concepts.  

Stephanie Yellowhair was a Two Spirit person, but she was treated like a berdache.  

So what's the point of this post?  I admit, I've sort of wandered into this topic without a clear statement of purpose.  Colonialism is bad.  Transphobia is bad.  Those should go without saying in 2024, but here we are.  I think what I have in my heart right now is something a little more hopeful.  There's a lot of joy in this world and there are people who find it.  There is a lot of bitterness and hatred here too and likewise people who wrap themselves in it like an angry, disgusting Chipotle burrito filled with too much liquid from being prepared too hastily without properly straining the beans or salsas.  However, I can spend a weekend watching documentaries about Two Spirit people and their history and cry my eyes out for no particular reason other than feeling joy from knowing that I'm not really alone in this world for being something different.  

Stephanie Yellowhair, I honor you and thank you for your life and the joy you put in this world.