One thing I noticed, and you can check this for yourself too, is that American media outlets constantly refer to her as ‘Elon Musks transgender daughter’, and it really bothers me it’s not just ‘Elon Musks Daughter.’
So I checked, and the BBC, CTV News (canadian), CBC (also canadian) all just refer to her as his daughter.
I absolutely love that she’s bringing the lumber, but I could really do with news organizations not using that as her identifier. She’s not ‘Elon Musk’s transgender daughter.’ She’s Vivian Jenna Wilson, she doesn’t even consider Elon her father. I’ll let her speak for herself here:
(From her name change):
“I no longer live with or wish to be related to my biological father in any way, shape or form,” she wrote on the petition.
“I would like to emphasize one thing: I am an adult,” she said, according to NBC. “I am 20 years old. I am not a child. My life should be defined by my own choices.”
I agree it’s not to intentionally target her maliciously, but it is malicious: how does the story change if you just say ‘daughter’? If she was a Catholic convert would it be ‘Elon Musks Transgender Catholic Daughter’? I understand part of his hatred towards her is that she’s transgendered, but we don’t have to allow that. And as I said, other news agencies aren’t (all) doing that.
I do by best to try to refer to her as his ex daughter. Maybe it’s just my own relationship with my own disowning but it’s definitely a valuable distinction imo
Yeah I think by calling her his ex daughter it’s an acknowledgment that the father shaped wound on her is an aching scar not something that’s going to heal nice and fine. A lot of people like to respond to disowning like it’s definitely going to be temporary and everything will be fine again. It does tend to be temporary, but sometimes it isn’t and it’s healthy to deal with it as if it probably won’t be but might be. It’s not comforting to hear it probably will be anyways. And even if the connection is reestablished it’s always going to bear that damage. The baseline level of trust that parents are supposed to have of being your first and most secure source of support and love is gone.
I do not expect Ms. Wilson and Mr. Musk to ever reconcile. His behavior towards her has been atrocious as was his behavior towards her mother. Furthermore Mr. Musk seems to be completely incapable of accepting responsibility for his bad behavior.
I resonate with your sentiment and applaud you bringing it up, but in this case I feel it’s pretty relevant to the story. It’s the trans aspect that caused Musk to say a bunch of shitty stuff about her to begin with. If the story was about her winning the lottery or something else unrelated, I’d be 100% with you.
My point is their legitimizing his reasoning. They’re saying this is the reason he did it. Let him say that. Never let him try to shy away from it, make it so if he’s going to misgender/deadname/etc he’s openly doing it.
Think about it, the story title should go:
“Elon Musks daughter speaks out about her fathers homophobia, bigotry, etc”
Let him try to legitimize it and fail, don’t give him the step up first. Make him look like the lunatic he is for raving about his ‘dead son’ or whatever, let him hang himself with his own rope. She even says:
“I would like to emphasize one thing: I am an adult,” she said, according to NBC. “I am 20 years old. I am not a child. My life should be defined by my own choices.”
She had no choice in this at all, she is who she is, so we need to stop helping make a minor part of her identity her identifying characteristic.
I agree with what you’re saying to a point. As a trans person, the media doesn’t care about us, we’re nothing more than a headline to them. But saying she’s trans doesn’t legitimize anything. The sad truth is that this is the reason he did it. Highlighting the fact that his daughter is trans just shows the hypocrisy of saying you’re all about family values while spewing hateful rhetoric about your own family.
I don’t personally feel it legitimizes it at all, but regardless, journalists should report all the relevant facts, not withhold some to make a point. Her being trans is relevant to the story. If I read a news article on it that didn’t report that, and then I found out later, if probably stop reading that publication because it would have been shown to be withholding facts to make some point.
One thing I noticed, and you can check this for yourself too, is that American media outlets constantly refer to her as ‘Elon Musks transgender daughter’, and it really bothers me it’s not just ‘Elon Musks Daughter.’
So I checked, and the BBC, CTV News (canadian), CBC (also canadian) all just refer to her as his daughter.
I absolutely love that she’s bringing the lumber, but I could really do with news organizations not using that as her identifier. She’s not ‘Elon Musk’s transgender daughter.’ She’s Vivian Jenna Wilson, she doesn’t even consider Elon her father. I’ll let her speak for herself here:
(From her name change):
I suspect that it’s more for “engagement” and clickbait than malice from the headline writer.
that is if you don’t think that this kind of communication isn’t harmful to the human race at least. Which it is. Obviously.
I agree it’s not to intentionally target her maliciously, but it is malicious: how does the story change if you just say ‘daughter’? If she was a Catholic convert would it be ‘Elon Musks Transgender Catholic Daughter’? I understand part of his hatred towards her is that she’s transgendered, but we don’t have to allow that. And as I said, other news agencies aren’t (all) doing that.
Elon Musks Estranged Black Jewish Transgendered Daughter.
I do by best to try to refer to her as his ex daughter. Maybe it’s just my own relationship with my own disowning but it’s definitely a valuable distinction imo
That’s a great point, she does even say she doesn’t want any association with him.
Yeah I think by calling her his ex daughter it’s an acknowledgment that the father shaped wound on her is an aching scar not something that’s going to heal nice and fine. A lot of people like to respond to disowning like it’s definitely going to be temporary and everything will be fine again. It does tend to be temporary, but sometimes it isn’t and it’s healthy to deal with it as if it probably won’t be but might be. It’s not comforting to hear it probably will be anyways. And even if the connection is reestablished it’s always going to bear that damage. The baseline level of trust that parents are supposed to have of being your first and most secure source of support and love is gone.
I do not expect Ms. Wilson and Mr. Musk to ever reconcile. His behavior towards her has been atrocious as was his behavior towards her mother. Furthermore Mr. Musk seems to be completely incapable of accepting responsibility for his bad behavior.
I resonate with your sentiment and applaud you bringing it up, but in this case I feel it’s pretty relevant to the story. It’s the trans aspect that caused Musk to say a bunch of shitty stuff about her to begin with. If the story was about her winning the lottery or something else unrelated, I’d be 100% with you.
My point is their legitimizing his reasoning. They’re saying this is the reason he did it. Let him say that. Never let him try to shy away from it, make it so if he’s going to misgender/deadname/etc he’s openly doing it.
Think about it, the story title should go:
“Elon Musks daughter speaks out about her fathers homophobia, bigotry, etc”
Let him try to legitimize it and fail, don’t give him the step up first. Make him look like the lunatic he is for raving about his ‘dead son’ or whatever, let him hang himself with his own rope. She even says:
She had no choice in this at all, she is who she is, so we need to stop helping make a minor part of her identity her identifying characteristic.
I agree with what you’re saying to a point. As a trans person, the media doesn’t care about us, we’re nothing more than a headline to them. But saying she’s trans doesn’t legitimize anything. The sad truth is that this is the reason he did it. Highlighting the fact that his daughter is trans just shows the hypocrisy of saying you’re all about family values while spewing hateful rhetoric about your own family.
He’s got 11 other kids. Just saying his daughter doesn’t identify any of them.
I don’t personally feel it legitimizes it at all, but regardless, journalists should report all the relevant facts, not withhold some to make a point. Her being trans is relevant to the story. If I read a news article on it that didn’t report that, and then I found out later, if probably stop reading that publication because it would have been shown to be withholding facts to make some point.