2-BSide
6B —Thursday, February 15, 2018
b-side
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Alex & Effee expand narratives
of LGBTQ+ in blog, love and life
To be trans and visible has
always been radical. Despite
the leaps and bounds made by
activists like Laverne Cox and
Janet Mock (their work being
proclaimed in 2014 as “The
Transgender Tipping Point” by
Time), transgender individuals
continue to be the victims of
violence
disproportionately.
And while more and more
transgender stories are being
brought to television and film,
stock characters and ideas, such
as the “tragic trans figure” or
the
“successful
transition,”
dominate the public’s idea of
trans life.
It
makes
sense,
then,
that the next step for trans
representation
in
media
is
finding a voice for the stories
that defy tragedy or explore
life beyond, or even without,
transition. Artists Alex Jenny
and Effee Nelly are a pair of
queer and trans people of color
who seek an outlet for these
stories. Jenny and Nelly are
poets and photographers, who
recently opened a blog that
chronicles their experiences in
life and love.
Jenny and Nelly met at the
University in 2012 and graduated
in 2014. The pair married later
that year. While they were not
as much the activists they are
now, Jenny was a member of
The Coalition for Queer People
of Color and volunteered at the
Sexual Assault Prevention and
Awareness Center. Last Friday,
SAPAC invited Jenny and Nelly
to speak on the intersection of
queer and trans identities and
healthy relationships.
“They invited me back a few
years ago to do the keynote
for
their
student
activist
conference, and once we started
the blog, they invited both of us
back,” Jenny said.
Their blog was born out of
their need to feel connected
to the creative aspects of their
lives as the pair was busy
maintaining and building their
professional lives. By day, Jenny
is a therapist and social worker
and Nelly works as a consultant.
But out of the
office, they are
poets and artists.
The blog, simply
titled
“Alex
&
Effee,”
consists
of
writing,
photography and
a journal where
they share life
updates
and
playlists.
The
pair’s
writing
deals with the
complete
trans
experience,
ranging
from
healing, current
and past trauma,
romance
and
family.
Despite meeting in 2012,
the pair didn’t bring their
relationship to social media
until Feb. 2017. Part of the
delay
stemmed
from
their
growing disconnect from the
creative part of their lives as
the pair worked on building and
maintaining their professional
lives. Other reasons are far
more personal.
“We didn’t identify as trans
when we were here at school,
but through the safety of our
relationship,
we
developed
together and discovered parts
of ourselves we thought were
unlovable,” Jenny said.
Through their process of
growth and healing, Jenny
and Nelly bring a different sort
of queer and trans narrative
to the fore. Instead of telling
a
traditional
coming-out
narrative,
like
Amazon’s
“Transparent,” or a tragedy
like “Prayers for Bobby” or
“Brokeback Mountain,” Jenny
and Nelly use their blog to
share what Jenny calls: “the
multiplicity
of
possibilities
and existence. There are so
many
different
storylines
for
queer and trans
people, not this
one
imagined
narrative.”
However,
opening up for
the entire world
was not an easy
process.
The
pair
worked
on
striking
a
delicate balance
between
raw
and
confident,
a struggle that
continues to play
out
for
many
queer and trans
individuals.
Nelly said that “as trans people,
we’re often reminiscing,” which
alludes to the push-and-pull
between internal pressures to
be true to oneself and external
pressures to follow the status
quo. So, if a person comes out
later in life, they question
whether their efforts to protect
themselves when they were
younger
inhibited
potential
growth. This question resonates
throughout many of Jenny and
Nelly’s poems.
While it has been a struggle
inviting so many people into
their creative process, Jenny
and Nelly find managing the
blog to be incredibly fulfilling.
As time has passed, Nelly said,
“(they’re) being a lot more
intentional now” and explained
how the couple is trying to
give readers and followers a
full picture of her and Jenny’s
love. She mentions how some of
the photography on their blog
helped a father find someone to
do senior pictures for his trans
daughter, which was incredibly
fulfilling. “These are gifts to my
younger self that she just didn’t
have,” she said.
Aside from new creative
pathways, Jenny and Nelly
find the blog to be a different
and exciting new outlet for
activism. For Nelly, starting
conversations
through
an
online platform — and being
visible in that way — is very
different.
“I was in direct action. I was
part of the group advocating for
a new Trotter,” Nelly said.
Jenny agreed and stated that
the blog allows them to explore
elements of their identity that
other forms of activism cannot:
“I don’t think we would have
been able to do this a few years
ago. Our most radical work is to
love ourselves.”
Romance
or
not,
Jenny
and Nelly’s blog reflects the
crescendoing calls for a new
sense of social rights and a
complete picture of the life of
marginalized individuals.
“As glamorous as we portray
ourselves, we are part of that
middle,” Nelly said.
As you read through Jenny
and Nelly’s blog, you start to
understand the inner workings
of their lives. They like pop
music. They reminisce about
the past. They love to see their
family and travel. From their
journal, you would think that
life is simple and easy now —
but the road to being visible has
been everything but.
Courtesy of Alex & Effee
Alexis Rankin / Daily
It’s no secret that historically
mainstream
hip-hop
culture
has been saturated by straight
men making misogynistic and
homophobic remarks in their
music and in the media. Hip
hop was dubbed a male and
masculine genre that had no
room for women or those with
a queer identity. However, time
changes things, as does talent.
Queer hip hop got its start as
an underground movement in the
early ’90s. Labeled “homo hop,”
the movement wasn’t aiming to
create a subgenre of music but to
serve as a community building
tool
for
LGBTQ+
rappers.
Primarily
based in Calif.,
the
movement
included
the
likes
of
rap
group
Deep
Dickollective
and
rappers
Caushun
and
Cazwell. Yet, the
idea of a queer-
identifying
famous
rapper
still
seemed
strange.
An
unspoken
rule
still permeated
hip
hop,
that
even if you were
queer, you didn’t
talk about it.
While
not
necessarily
a
rapper,
Frank
Ocean is still a
part of hip hop’s
culture. He was
a
member
of
the
California-
based rap collective Odd Future
and is friends with legendary
hip-hop artists like André 3000,
Jay-Z and Kanye West. On July
4, 2012, Ocean posted an open
letter on his Tumblr account
in which he stated that the first
person he ever fell in love with
was a man. His next album,
released a week after his Tumblr
post,
would
be
filled
with
beautiful lyrics referencing his
first love. Channel Orange went
on to sell 131,000 copies in its
first week, debuting at number
two on the Billboard Top 200. A
queer identifying man became a
reserved superstar.
Ocean’s
success
set
a
precedent.
Queer
hip-hop
artists who may have felt they
couldn’t express their sexual
identities through their music
now had a shining example to
look up to. Tyler, the Creator,
the Odd Future frontman with
an eccentric personality and a
brand defined by his comical
approach to music and social
media, took a different approach
to
his
most
recent
album,
Flower Boy. Seen as a “coming
out” album by critics and fans
alike, the candid Flower Boy is
splattered with direct references
to Tyler’s sexuality. In the track
“I Ain’t Got Time,” Tyler raps —
almost under his breath — “Next
line, I’ll have em’ like woah / I’ve
been kissing white boys since
2004.”
While Tyler, The Creator is a
part of the culture Frank Ocean
helped popularize, artists like
Kevin Abstract are a result of
it. His 2016 album American
Boyfriend: A Suburban Love
Story paints a vivid picture of
two men completely taken with
one another. Abstract doesn’t
try to hide his identity with
suggestive
or
impressionistic
lyrics. He is direct and open
about his feelings for the man
he loves. On the second verse of
the album’s title track Abstract
sings, “My parents
wanna kill them
/ Let them kill
me.”
An
aura
of
indifference
towards
others’
opinions
of
his
sexual
identity
permeates
throughout
American
Boyfriend.
Hip
hop’s
attitude towards
queerness
is
evolving
rapidly.
The
culture
is
beginning
to
lose
the
toxic
masculinity
that plagued the
early years of the
genre’s
history.
Atlanta-based
rapper
Young
Thug wore a dress
for the cover of
his 2016 mixtape
Jeffrey, and when
asked about his decision to do
so, he stated: “When it comes
to swag, there is no gender
involved.” Jay-Z raps about his
mother coming out in “Smile” —
“Cried tears of joy when you fell
in love / Don’t matter to me if it’s a
him or her.” Old- and new-school
rappers alike are beginning to
embrace the cultural shift of
popular rap.
Despite
the
strides
that
have been made, it would be
misleading to say that hip hop
has become a safe space for the
LGBTQ+ community. A few bad
apples still stain the improving
reputation of hip hop’s culture.
The members of rap group
Migos have recently made the
news multiple times for making
homophobic
remarks.
From
Offset’s
blatantly
ignorant
lyric “I don’t vibe with queers”
to
the
members
expressing
public
disappointment
at
discovering their fellow rapper
iLoveMakonnen came out as
gay. Yet the ignorance of a few
shouldn’t minimize the clear
shift currently taking place in
hip hop. The young genre has
come a long way from its socially
problematic beginnings.
The homophobia
of hip hop & the
rise of queer rap
MUISIC NOTEBOOK
JOSEPH FRALEY
Daily Blog Editor
JACK BRANDON
Daily Film Editor
ARTISTS
PROFILE
IN
Jenny and Nelly
use their blog
to share what
Jenny calls: “the
multiplicity of
possibilities and
existence”
Hip hop’s
attitude towards
queerness is
evolving rapidly.
The culture is
beginning to
lose the toxic
masculinity
that plagued the
early years of the
genre’s history