Catching Up with Influential Early Michigan Trans Advocate André Wilson
André Wilson helped make the University of Michigan one of the first institutions in America to cover gender-affirming care (GAC) in 2005 as lead negotiator for the Graduate Employees Organization (GEO). Today, André is thriving in semi-retirement in the Pacific Northwest, experiencing the positive well-being that comes from living authentically.
Pride Source recently caught up with Wilson in an interview, which has been edited for length and clarity.
When you first went to the U of M administration on behalf of the Graduate Employees Union (Local 3550 AFT AFL-CIO) in 2004 to get trans healthcare put into place there, what was going through your mind about how you would convince them to make gender-affirming care a normal thing to provide?
In spring 2004 I went to an all-member union meeting to decide on the provisional bargaining platform for the new contract. I suggested we include nondiscrimination on “Gender Identity or Expression” and that we make it meaningful by eliminating the discriminatory “trans exclusion” in our health plan. My first task was convincing union members that this was both an important area of discrimination AND that it was winnable. Several cisgender GEO people got it onto the provisional platform that night by brilliantly bundling it into an “Equity” platform.
U of M had a long history of providing GAC: UMHHS had one of the early gender programs, so the institution had a long involvement in helping facilitate medical transitions, and there were dedicated health care providers who knew the difference this care made.
GEO had fought for lesbian and gay members in their first contract, and was among the first unions in the USA to win sexual orientation nondiscrimination language, back in 1975. I told GEO members that history: how GEO had started life by taking on an issue that many thought wasn’t winnable, that they struck, shut down campus for 29 days, and won sexual orientation protections on Day 14 of that strike. It was inspiring.
I felt one way to convince the administration that this was a “normal” thing to do, was for a transgender person to be the face of GEO bargaining. The lead negotiator speaks on every proposal, not just “the trans issue,” and has a lot of interaction with the administration team. This demonstrated how effective a transitioned trans person could be and also convey the union’s resolve to eliminate the trans exclusions.
What did you learn from that Bush-era fight for healthcare equity?
I learned the true power of solidarity. When we stop thinking that “the pie is small” or if one minority group gets something there won’t be enough for others, then we can succeed for everyone. That year GEO bargained for substantive change on every “minority issue”. We gave up absolutely nothing to win “gender identity or expression” nondiscrimination or to eliminate the barriers to GAC. Instead, on a broader platform of equity, we made substantial gains on every issue, including many that people had thought intractable.
I learned the difference that one person can make. When we won in 2005 no national organizations prioritized eliminating trans exclusions in health insurance. I couldn’t exactly draw a roadmap for succeeding, but I knew if we didn’t start, we never would.
How is trans life different if you can or can’t get the funding to make the transition, surgical or not?
Not every trans or gender nonbinary person requires medical services for transition. But many do. When I began medical transition in my 40’s, it was like night and day. Suddenly I had access to a full self, someone who could think and dream, instead of feeling crushed by feeling “wrong with the world.”
Honestly, before telling my family that I was trans, I had no idea that they might help me access the medical services my health plan excluded. They had never imagined I was trans. I spent four decades thinking I would never be able to make “a sex change” happen, and thought it pointless to say anything. So I was deeply moved when immediately they asked what I needed to move forward.
Before I went to the union I had also started talking to people in the community about their experiences, and I haven’t ever stopped. Two decades ago nearly all health plans in the US had “trans exclusions” explicitly excluding GAC. Back then so many trans people told me that they just couldn’t afford medical services. Unable to envisage a future, they just squashed that part of themselves. It hurt, contributing to despair and depression, suicidal ideation, suicide attempts, substance abuse, and other health conditions. It affected their ability to do well at school or at work, to get a job, or in some cases even to leave the house.
Since 2004 many plans removed discriminatory exclusions, and now trans and gender nonbinary people can begin assessing their medical needs earlier. When people have meaningful choice – when they know that medical options will be there — they can think more clearly and carefully about what is right for them.
Structural inequalities in the US meant that change did not come first to trans people at the intersection of multiple minority statuses –people with low income or on public assistance, and people of color. Eliminating exclusions in publicly funded health plans could only be leveraged if we eliminated exclusions in employer plans first, to show it cost almost nothing. It seemed terribly backwards to me. I wanted everyone, especially people who didn’t look like me, to have access to the care they needed. But starting with big employers was what ultimately worked.
Homophobic and transphobic politics are obviously nothing new, but the homophobes have targeted trans people more and more intensely over the last few years. Why do you think that has happened?
People should make no mistake: the folks attacking trans people are hoping that many gays and lesbians will back away from trans people, and make their job easier. But as you say, our attackers are homophobes and they will target lesbian and gay rights next: nondiscrimination protections in every sphere and same sex marriage.
In the 70’s there was a saying: “the root of homophobia is sexism”. A trans woman I knew argued that the heart of sexism is transphobia: rules about what bodies are, how we are allowed to be in them, and what those bodies can or cannot do with each other. Transphobia enforces gender norms onto everyone’s body, regardless of whether we are cisgender or transgender.
TBLGQIA+ belongs together because at the core their bigotry and hate has a single source – and an injury to one is an injury to all.
You have obviously taken interest in social justice causes across the board, notably on efforts to reform the Ann Arbor Police Department after the fatal shooting of a civilian. Can you talk about your perspective on the intersectionality of social justice across gender identity, racial, sexuality, and economic lines?
Living for decades as a masculine gay woman shaped my sense of social justice. I inhabit this intersection as a white person with relative economic privilege. In myriad ways I have been protected from the barriers and hate that our culture delivers to people of other races or economic circumstance, skin colors or nationalities.
As someone on the autism spectrum, I experienced significant related barriers and have a heightened sense of justice. Injustice to others extremely painful; it is hard to live with myself if I don’t intervene somehow.
I served on Ann Arbor’s Human Rights Commission (A2HRC) for 8 years and worked on updating the Human Rights Ordinance.
When Aura Rosser, a Black cisgender woman in Ann Arbor, near naked and holding just a knife, was shot dead in her home by one of two police officers within two minutes of arriving on the scene, I was devastated. I felt that we had not pushed hard enough for example for more training for officers. I cannot know what was in the officer’s heart or mind, but I knew I had not done all I could have to ensure that officer might have taken a different course of action that night.
I felt like a murderer, and I think I always will. I cannot escape that I bear responsibility for having backed down when I could have spoken up or mobilized more forcefully. When I spoke that word, murder, the mayor removed me from the A2HRC, without asking what I meant. I stand by it.
What is your favorite Michigan memory?
Four decades is a lot of memories! . Here are two, about Ann Arbor organizing, separated by a quarter century.
October 1979, the eve of the first-ever March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights. My friends and I were so disappointed by the cancellation of the planned charter bus that we arranged our own bus. In under a week, with no internet or cellphones, we organized to fill every seat. Just hours before leaving for DC, we took my bedsheet and painted “Ann Arbor Says: Closets Are For Clothes”, the name of the gay radio show on WCBN, in huge letters. It was barely dry as we got on the bus. In DC the next day we held that banner high, joining a hundred thousand from Michigan and all over the country, Out and Proud.
Fast forward to March 2005, GEO members walk out to push for movement at the bargaining table. Kneeling on the sidewalk near Mason Hall, I made picket signs. As fast as I could draw, GEO members grabbed them and hit the picket line. Lots of different messages: Equal Pay for Librarians, Protect Domestic Partner Benefits, Equal Rights for Trans Workers. Every issue. I made a sign, obviously for myself I thought: “I am a trans grad student” and “Equal benefits for all” on the other side. Cisgender union members took every sign including that one. I made a sign that said “We are all trans in GEO” and “An injury to one is an injury to all.” Our organizing committee chair took that one. At our rally later that day, I looked out across all the signs. The support was overwhelming. Later, I saw the woman with my “We are all trans in GEO” sign, and asked to take her photo. She just beamed into the camera. She said, “I never told you but I wasn’t on board about the trans health care proposal at first; this year really changed me.” I still choke up when I look at that picture.
How are you feeling in the wake of anti-LGBTQ+ and specifically, anti-trans moves from Trump?
I am very worried – scared — as are a lot of trans and gender nonbinary people and cisgender BLGQIA+ people, and loved ones. I Policies that I and countless others worked tirelessly for, across decades, are being torn apart. Heartbreaking, knowing that people will suffer.
But I know the work of the last decades transformed the lives of TBLGQIA+ people. Access to medically necessary GAC, partner benefits, relationship recognition s, nondiscrimination protections – these didn’t make the world perfect, or eliminate other kinds of inequality or injustice, but they took us forward.
Those of us who marched in DC in 1979 and with GEO in 2005 know the power of organizing and solidarity. TBLGQIA+ visibility made and continues to make a difference. Cisgender and straight people know us: they know we’re part of their families, workplaces and unions. They have seen the difference it makes when trans people have access to medically necessary GAC and can live authentically. I know that when we stand up for ourselves, many will stand with us. Many will take that step even when we cannot.
Solidarity is what gives me hope every day.
Where are you now?
I moved to the Pacific Northwest because my spouse loves this area more than anyplace else. This state has strong protections for TBLGQIA+ people. But none of our policies can be taken for granted, so I remain active with advocacy.
I am a passionate gardener, growing food for my family and to give away. My plots here are a tiny fraction of what I grew in Ann Arbor. Last year I planted black raspberries and hope they do well.
I enjoy giving tomato starts, big tomatoes, and other produce away. The only “return” I ask is that recipients pay it forward and stand up for transgender rights in whatever way they can, small or large. I think of this as a “Trans Plants” initiative.
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