Jari Jones and Munroe Bergdorf Share Their Firsts

The first time that I met Jari was actually in New York.

We were shooting for Them and Teen Vogue.

[buzzer]

What's that?

My apartment bell.

Ah!

Do you wanna see?

Sorry, living in New York.

[Munroe laughs]

[upbeat music]

Hey Teen Vogue, this is Jari Jones and...

It's Munroe Bergdorf.

And this is some of our firsts.

First person I came out to...

Probably my parents and I didn't even realize

that I was coming out.

I just told my parents that I liked the person in my class

who was also my bully but...

[Munroe laughs]

So that wasn't great but I had a big crush on him

and I just told my parents and I didn't think

that there was anything wrong with liking

someone who was the same gender as you

or same perceived gender as you

and then I was very quickly told, you know,

this isn't a thing, you're confused,

boys don't like other boys.

So Jari, who was the first person that you came out to?

I think I was always coming out to the world.

[Jari laughs]

I think when I was younger,

I was telling everybody that I was a girl.

I would be like, I'm a girl or I'm pretty

or you know, I would just use words that would obviously be

describing femininity and you know, I think,

like you were saying Munroe,

everybody was telling me I wasn't.

That's when the policing started

but I think I was coming out very young.

Like, I wanna say like, toddler up.

So Jari, what was your first queer awakening?

Oh my god, I've had so many.

[Jari laughs]

I feel like I've had so many

and firsts throughout different identities, right?

My first, we'll say gender queer awakening,

when I was a kid, right?

I used to have sleepovers.

Everybody would be, the boys would wear pajamas

and I would wear a big T-shirt, you know?

'Cause I thought it was pretty,

I thought it was like I'm wearing a dress.

So Munroe, what was your first queer awakening?

I don't think I've ever really had a queer awakening.

I think I've always just been very very very queer.

So the first time that I posted

my authentic self on the internet was when I was about 23.

I thought at that point that I had to be sexy all the time,

I just thought you know, that I had to you know,

be sexy and attractive and traditionally beautiful

if I was going to be taken seriously

as a woman

and that's such an awful thing that I'm so glad is

now being called out.

I'm glad that I'm who I wanna be now but at that point,

it was very who I thought I had to be.

Yeah.

In that regard of making it personal,

I actually really never came out to the internet

or came out publicly.

I think I kind of just transitioned it non-verbally,

whether that was just adding

more feminine things in my wardrobe

or calling myself she/her in my posts

but it was never like, a formal come out.

I thought that if I put that out there

and made this huge statement, then people would try

and take it away from me, right?

And it was the one thing in my life

that I was so sure about.

The first time that I saw myself onscreen

in a way that was

accurate and authentic was probably Paris Is Burning.

Seeing Octavia St Laurent just be

herself, unashamedly.

I don't know, you could just see it in her eyes

that this wasn't a game

and she allowed me to dream as a person

and I've always just felt a real connection with her

and I'm so lucky, I think we're so lucky as well

with what we're doing now is what she dreamed of then

and I get goosebumps all the time thinking about that.

That's totally like, absolutely like my same sentiment.

I think, you know, that cast in general, right?

Was really the introduction

to trans-ness that a lot of us had.

I know it mimicked the life that I was living,

young, New York, doing everything, in and out of ball scene

or trying to get into this fab life.

I just loved the way that these girls navigate it.

The first thing that made me wanna be an activist,

ooh I don't really know.

I think it was just a build up of tension within my body.

I just felt really really really pissed off

and I couldn't tell why.

I just didn't have anywhere to put it.

I just realized that I could use my platform in a way

that was beneficial to my community.

It wasn't really until everything blew up

after the Charlottesville riots, for me, in 2017

that I realized, oh actually I'm breaking out

of the echo chamber now and I can reach a bigger audience

that actually is where the change needs to take place.

The catalyst of my activism when I was like,

oh this is what I am, I think it had to be

the

the countless, I think, trans murders that were happening

and

it became a point

where my activism

was being brought out because I needed to survive this,

I needed to survive what was happening, right?

So it wasn't even like, oh I'm gonna like, you know,

this is a cause I'm gonna like, to be fighting for,

it was like, these girls look just like me,

what's the difference?

I need to be doing work so I can keep myself,

my sisters, my wife alive, you know.

That's where it really started.

Especially when Islan Nettles was killed,

it shook me to my core how close it was,

what she looked like.

Anything I do, whether it's my online platform

or whether it's a fashion campaign, I'm going to tie in

that activism in a way that's going to

humanize trans women, especially black trans women.

So the first protest that I attended,

it was after a woman called Lucy Meadows,

who was a primary school teacher,

she actually took her own life

after a national newspaper in the UK outed her

and

it basically sent the mob her way

and all of the teachers were up in arms

that a trans woman was allowed

to be a teacher in a primary school

and she took her own life

and this was one of the big newspapers in the UK,

one of the most read unfortunately

and

we marched

and we protested and held a vigil

outside the offices of the newspaper

and I feel really emotional even talking about it

because I think it was just a moment

for me,

personally, but also it was a moment for the community

because it made me realize

that society just really doesn't want us here,

yet I'll always be able to draw power from that moment,

as heartbreaking as it was, it really woke me up,

it made me realize that lives are at stake,

it's not just about people not wanting you

to look a certain way or to be involved,

it's about people genuinely not caring if you live or die.

That, I 100% agree, wow.

My first protest, I think it was Islan Nettles

and

it was such

a

complex

experience for me because of me being a dark skinned girl,

me being a plus sized woman, me being a trans girl.

When you are protesting with that identity,

those intersections, you're most likely to be targeted.

Yep.

You know, I could be in the center

and there's 100 people around me

and somehow, somebody was gonna

physically cross my boundary, right?

That was enforcement, so I stopped going

and I realized that I could protest other ways,

whether that was trying to find funding

or whether that was trying to make aware of

these situations or these murders that were happening,

the best I can using my platform.

I completely agree with you,

I mean personally I don't like protests for myself.

I don't think that that's part of necessarily my activism.

My activism isn't hinged on protests.

I see protests as what people that have

the most privilege should be doing.

Absolutely.

They're least likely to be attacked,

so when you say that, I completely understand

and I know that a lot of girls feel that way.

It's a big deal for a lot of girls to even be in public.

Absolutely.

Especially in the early stages of a transition,

it's so overwhelming to have all of these eyes at you

and to also be thinking that eyes are on you,

even when they're not, so when they literally are,

it's extremely overwhelming.

My first billboard was definitely Calvin Klein

which just happened recently

and

it was fantastic to see a marginalized body

loved and celebrated and

put on the biggest, most expensive real estate in New York

and really have that moment of like, this is

what the future can look like in fashion

and just in general.

So my first brand deal was

actually my first billboard as well, was with Uniqlo

and it was the first time that I actually got

to talk about my identity, rather than just be

a visible trans body, got to talk about

my experiences living in London

and being a black trans woman and

being queer as well

and I think a lot of people didn't realize

that there's straight trans people,

there's queer trans people,

that gender and sexuality are different,

so it was amazing

just seeing myself all over Oxford Street,

which is kind of like Times Square.

I'm so glad that you got to feel that as well,

just to see your moment and see you up on that billboard was

just, it's such an important moment

for so many black trans women

and seeing you shine, honestly I'm so happy for you.

You deserve it so much.

You're just an incredible person and so beautiful, so.

Thank you!

[Jari laughs]

So my first like, viral post thing that I written

was for Essence

and it was an open letter

to Victoria's Secret

about some of their comments regarding plus size women

and trans women.

It was, I think it was one of the first times

where my voice wasn't

edited to interview style

or edited in a way where another journalist was

kind of like,

creating my words and meshing them into something.

It was like, just me and they put it out there

and it was incredible

and it got the response that I wanted to get.

Yeah, it really started a conversation,

big conversation around Victoria's Secret.

I think the first time that I went viral was

the situation with L'Oreal in 2017

and up until that point, I don't think a lot of people had

really heard about white privilege

or white supremacy seemed like a very extreme concept

that people, white society didn't necessarily think

that they participated in.

So to have the conversations that we've been speaking about,

as black people, as trans people, as black trans people,

you know, within our echo chamber

and that break out into the mainstream,

I think it was a moment

for us to really have

these conversations and I don't necessarily think that

people were ready for them three years ago

but then cut into the future,

three years into the future from that moment

and we're now seeing what I said back then,

everybody's saying it now

and I'm so happy.

Amen to that!

Thank you so much, Teen Vogue, for listening to

and being part of our firsts.

I'm Munroe Bergdorf and...

I'm Jari Jones and it's been such a pleasure!

[upbeat music]