Author: Maëlys McArdle

  • Sparing the ugliness

    Bill C-4, the legislation that bans conversion therapy, is now law.

    It happened very quickly. The bill was introduced on November 29, 2021 by the Liberal government. On December 1st, a Conservative MP asked for unanimous consent for the proposed legislation to pass the House of Commons. They got it. On December 7th, a Conservative senator asked for unanimous approval to pass the Senate. They got it. On December 8, the bill received royal assent.

    This is a very different outcome than what I anticipated. A majority of Conservative MPs opposed the previous effort to ban conversion therapy months ago, and it was a Conservative Senator that ultimately killed it. Legacy media has continued to be hostile to trans people in the intervening time, with CTV running an episode of their investigative show W5 alleging that transition related care is too accessible and a danger to impressionable cisgender youth, and the National Post running this front page centering the same regret narrative:

    Given the inroads made by anti-trans advocates, I fully expected another year of toxic parliamentary debate about trans people, and for that process leading to venues and legacy media throughout Canada to host transphobes. I’m so grateful that we will be spared this extra hostility.

    I don’t know what the political calculus was for the Conservatives’ about face. Given the flip by Ontario conservatives the other direction, this development crystallizes for me that support for rights legislation has everything to do with the party leader.

    In spite of the good news, I believe the wording of the new legislation opens it up for a constitutional challenge on similar grounds to the Canada (AG) v Bedford case.

    Update

    The conservatives have ousted their leader, Erin O’Toole, in part because he was responsible for getting the party to support the ban on conversion therapy.

  • Maldives

    Maldives

    I’ve spent the last week in the Maldives. I was mostly in Malé with my partner, but also visited Villingili.

    (more…)
  • Trauma made me small

    Trauma made me small

    And that smallness became my prison.

    As I sit here looking to the ocean, I think of how I haven’t travelled as much as I wanted to. Not because of finances or any material constraints, but because I thought I didn’t have it in me to do it.

    It’s the same about how I only got my first car in my mid-thirties. It was unfamiliar, so I thought I couldn’t. Or how I thought I couldn’t move away from Ottawa. Or how in relationships my smallness extended to my own self, my worth, and how much I left it to others to do the emotional heavy lifting.

    The limits were real, but entirely psychological. The product of complicated formative years, with well-meaning but emotionally stunted parents. They gave me a lot and supported the hobbies that would become my livelihood. But in many ways they made me small; where others grew to learn how to navigate difficult feelings, I learned to self-harm to avoid the threats of violence that came with expressing them before my parents. Where others learned how to share their inner thoughts, I learned that doing so would be used against me. Where others learned to engage in difficult conversations, I learned only avoiding led to safety. Where others learned to explore their body, I was left with only a desire to be hit like my step-dad would. Where others had friends or family to confide in, I had no one. I had no emotionally intimate friendship, my big sister couldn’t stand me and my only grandparent wanted nothing to do with me. Never having had an environment where vulnerability was safe, I feared any jumps into the unknown that would make me so.

    I entered adulthood not thinking anything about this, but, entirely controlled by its effects. I was able to take care of my affairs – get a job, get a place, enjoy friendships – but was lacking intimacy. When that closeness was eventually found, I was toxic. I was deeply jealous of their freedom, and punished them for it. I put down a partner that moved to Vancouver, and a friend that travelled the world. I reduced them to these singular things. A friend got a nice car and I only had thoughts of envy. I was bitter and mean. The smallness that was necessary in adolescence became a trap in adulthood that I didn’t even know I was in.

    I lost so many good people to my hurtful behaviour. While I’m glad I’ve learned to do better, at 36, a lot of time has gone by. There is no undoing what I’ve done, only moving forward with a freedom I’ve always had but never known, and a regret for those I’ve hurt. I am not burdened by this regret as they’ve moved on, and so should I, as we all deserve happiness. It’s not a neatly packaged ending. So be it.

    Where once I felt I couldn’t, now I can.

  • 36

    I’m 36. If I had had a kid when I turned 18, they’d now be an adult themselves. I’m older than my mom when she had me. This puts things in a different perspective.

    So much of my adulthood has been defined by my being emotionally stunted and making my issues other people’s problem. With that finally behind me, plus money and good health, I find myself with a freedom I never really had before.

  • This blog is 18 years old

    18 years ago, I wrote:

    Okay, just completed the blog part of my website. I was planning to add the previous entries of my “real” blog, and am still considering it. However, it would require alot of editing, so I think I’ll just start with this dual blog thing.

    One for me and my personal thoughts, and the other, and edited version, for this website. No offense potential readers, but I don’t want to offend anyone!

    At the time I had a journal that I had on my computer as a text file that I’d edit in Notepad. It was a place where I’d write about the difficulties I had with my mom and step-dad, among daily going ons. I assume that this is what I’m referring to here as my “real” blog. To my middle-aged chagrin, the file was lost not too long after. Of my website, I said of the time:

    This website actually has no design purpose or motive. It just is. It is a product of my imagination at 3AM, whilst worrying for a math midterm. It has no commercial goals. You should find some interesting stuff in the links to the left, with a live webcam of my flat [well, not really my flat], some links to course material [wohoo! you might sarcastically think], and the newest addition of my online blog.

    I don’t have many photos of myself from that time, but here’s a few. These photos were taken when I was 17 to 19:

    It’s wild to me that the time elapsed between then and now, is the same amount of time between when I was born and when I started this blog. This does feel like long ago, but not a lifetime long. Time is weird.