A PLEA for people to watch a TV documentary that gives “a little human insight” into the trans community has been made by an award-winning Scots filmmaker.
Hannah Currie believes the story, which airs tomorrow, could help take some heat out of the polarised debate that has sprung up around the Scottish Government’s attempts to make it easier for people to change their legal gender.
Not Your Average Family follows the tribulations of a transgender male and his cis partner who want to have a baby.
Tomorrow night’s episode touches on the Gender Reform Recognition (GRR) Bill which Westminster is threatening to block in a move that weakens devolution as well as restricts trans rights.
“It really could help with the GRR debate because right now it just seems like two opposing sides that are dead set on just shouting,” said Currie.
“It is such a difficult situation and it has been massively antagonised by the press and become something that it is not even about. We are hearing the same old tired arguments that we heard in the debate about gay rights. This is just another form of scapegoating as far as I can see.”
The documentary focuses on online influencers and LGBT couple, Charlie Allan and Lauren Faulkner, who exploded onto the social media scene in 2019, inspiring thousands to open up about mental health and trans issues.
Last year, Allan, who was brought up in Fife, was nominated for Influencer of the Year in the UK-wide LGBT awards.
Currie previously made a documentary about Allan and Faulkner, from Edinburgh, called Not Your Average Influencers and the new series follows on from there, documenting their efforts to have a family together at the same time as start an inclusive business for people like themselves.
In order to have a baby, Allan has agreed to stop taking testosterone in the hope that he will ovulate again and his eggs can be fertilised and implanted into Lauren.
Currie describes the documentary as a love story, with the pair supporting each other through Charlie’s transition from female to male, Lauren’s OCD and emetophobia (fear of vomiting).
It is not easy, especially as they are also opening an inclusive beauty salon business using money gained by online influencing, in what is a tough economic climate.
Allan’s continuing personal transition journey also comes at a time when trans rights have become the centre of a culture war in the UK and beyond. During the filming of the documentary they experienced a hate crime and Currie believes the debate around the GRR is emboldening bigots.
“There has been horrendous attacking online and it seems to have made people think there is an acceptability in having these extreme hateful or hurtful views,” she said. “I definitely think trans people and their loved ones are suffering more now.
“There is a woman in the documentary whose daughter is trans and had just worked up the confidence to go out of the house but now all this stuff in the media has made them feel they can’t because they are terrified someone is going to shout abuse at them.”
Currie said that as a “fierce feminist” the polarisation of the debate made her “very sad”.
“I’m fully on board with protecting hard-fought and won women’s rights but the threat to them comes from abusive men, not the trans community who are just trying to live their lives and have access to the same rights everybody else is,” she said.
She added that she also wanted to open the up debate around transgender people and the problems they can have if they want to start a family.
“Their experiences of fertility can be quite fraught and individually Charlie and Lauren have big mountains to climb, but they are very supportive of each other and their families are hugely supportive,” said Currie.
“Sometimes funny, sometimes sad, but always honest, insightful and unique – this is a cross-generational look at what really makes a family in 2023.
“It is a little human insight and it is something from the trans community rather than people from outwith the community commenting on something that they don’t really have direct personal experience of.
“A lot of people don’t have friends in the community to speak to and are just basing their opinions on what they read in the papers and that is not the full story.
“At the very least I would ask that people watch it and take it into consideration when forming their views about human rights.”
Not Your Average Family airs on BBC Scotland tomorrow night at 10.30pm and is also available on iPlayer.
