Agents of change | The young trans adult leading the way in the region

They make the news. They are agents of change in their field. But we know little or nothing about them. The Press presents it to you throughout the summer season.

Caroline Touzin
The Press

“The only trans people I had seen in my life were serial killers in movies. »

To say that Séré Beauchesne Lévesque, 25, had an unhappy adolescence is an understatement. “I was sure I would die before I was 18,” recalls the non-binary trans young adult from Sherbrooke.

Séré Beauchesne Lévesque asks us to use the pronoun iel and the masculine agreements to designate him in the article. Iel as in a combination of “he” and “she”. Non-binary as in neither man nor woman, although Séré also identifies as a trans man.

“As a teenager, I knew I was different, but I didn’t understand who I was,” says Séré, who was educated at a private school for girls.

For five years, the student feels out of place and can’t figure out why. “I hit a wall. I am expected to be a girl because I was assigned a girl at birth and conform to stereotypes of femininity. »

The teenager begins to read The ABCs of girls to “learn” to meet the expectations of society. They don’t recognize themselves in it at all. “I started thinking I was weird; that I was crazy. When I finished high school, I was depressed and suicidal. »

Séré meets us at TransEstrie in a storefront location in the heart of downtown Sherbrooke on this beautiful Tuesday in July.

Séré founded the organization two years ago so that no other young trans in his region would experience a journey with as many pitfalls as his.

A bag full of binders – a compression tank top that serves to flatten the breasts of trans men – lies on the table.

At Cégep, Séré meets a first “real trans person”. Nothing to do with the “crazy serial killers” of the films of his childhood. “I found out who I was. It clicked in 24 hours. »

The beginning of a long fight

His quest for identity then turned into a hard fight for the respect of his rights. Séré changes his name halfway through college. Except everyone knew him as a girl, so knows his old name. Students use it to hurt him.

His new name appears on his student card, but the college says it’s too complicated to change it in the computer system. At the start of each term, Séré must do his coming out to each of his teachers since his first name on the official list is that of birth.

Despite this, some teachers persist in using his birth name since it is his “legal” name on the class list. One of them, learning that Séré is trans, even asks him what his genitals are. “You teach me French, you don’t need to know what’s in my panties. »

At the time at the Cégep de Sherbrooke, there were only a few non-gendered toilets. “In the library, all the individual toilets were gendered. We stuck stickers with a neutral symbol on top of the male and female acronyms, that made the librarians panic, ”says Séré who ended up getting the individual toilets to be degendered and the computer system to integrate the usual first name.

When they were admitted to the University of Sherbrooke in mathematics, “everything had to start over”. Séré changed his legal name after the start of the school year. The student was terrified that his classmates would learn his birth name because it still showed up when Séré logged on to a university computer. “I hid my screen with a notebook every time to prevent this from happening. »

After training at the gym, Séré has to take a shower at his father’s who lives not far from there. “I risked getting beat up in the guys’ locker room and I wasn’t fit in the girls’ locker room. »

Séré founded a trans action group within the university itself. It took three years, the length of his bachelor’s degree, for things to change.

All this while navigating the health system since Séré then continues his transition and takes hormones.

In 2019, the University announces that it allows its students and staff to choose their first name, last name and gender. Among the genders, you can tick “woman”, “man” or “other”. The establishment is also committed to fitting out a first universal, mixed changing room, accessible to people of all genders – men, women or others – at the sports centre.

Séré then practically finished his baccalaureate in mathematics: “This is the story of my life. I lead the fight and those who follow benefit. »

At the time, his student organization received many calls for help from all over the region. This is where Séré had the idea of ​​founding an organization “by and for trans people” in Estrie.

His hobbyhorse: create services for trans and non-binary people outside major urban centers. “I didn’t want to leave young people behind by saying: Montreal is the only destination to obtain services for a trans person. »

Very eloquent, Séré has become a strong voice in the media.

Séré even testified in a Superior Court trial at the request of the Center for the Fight against Gender Oppression to argue that several articles of the Civil Code of Quebec were discriminatory against the LGBTQ+ community.

Judge Gregory Moore agreed with the Center by ordering the Quebec government to offer options other than male or female in the certificates issued by the Direction de l’état civil.

“Our 9/11”

It was in January 2021. However, this victory was short-lived. Ten months later, Justice Minister Simon Jolin-Barrette tabled Bill 2 to modernize family law in Quebec.

It is that the legislative project required a surgical intervention before a change in the mention of the sex; a requirement that was repealed in 2015.

This represented a huge setback in the eyes of many, including LGBTQ+ community rights organizations, who did not hesitate to call the project “transphobic”. That’s not all. The legislation sought to add a distinct gender identity, which risked creating coming out forced” for people who had not gone under the knife, according to these same organizations. Indeed, Quebec proposed that the mention of sex be replaced by a mention of gender identity on the civil status documents of trans people, creating a distinction between their documents and those of a cisgender person.

Séré did not give up. The non-binary student went to testify, again, this time in a parliamentary committee. The Minister of Justice backed down. He withdrew the surgical precondition to the modification of the mention of sex.

Waging all these struggles at an age when most students are devoting themselves to their studies and enjoying university life made him mature quickly. During the interview, we often had the impression of having a much older person in front of us.

Séré boasts of the younger generation – the one currently studying in high school and CEGEP – to whom we don’t have to explain terms like non-binary person, trans man or trans woman (see glossary below).

Discrimination based on gender identity and expression has been prohibited since June 2016 under the Quebec Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The pronoun iel has been added to the dictionary Robert. “Attitudes are changing quickly,” rejoices Séré.

The student returns to university in the fall to begin a second bachelor’s degree, this time in psychology. Helping others, they have it in their skin.

“I didn’t get up one morning saying to myself: I’m going to become a trans activist,” says Séré. I just had to fight for my rights. »

With the new policy, Séré will no longer have to waste precious time showering at his dad’s house after a workout at the gym. And more importantly, the student is happy and comfortable in his own skin.