Almost every day, I see a question or comment saying, "Hey Jerry, are you still black?" Absolutely! Absolutely, I'm still black! It's been 127 days since I identified as transracial. I even put on my black shirt for the occasion, as I like to think of it — my famous "I'm black now" shirt. And yes, I am 100 percent serious, and I said that 127 days ago.
I came out on a live stream on Facebook, YouTube, Twitch, and Twitter saying, hey, it's Black History Month, and I'm really inspired by the transgender movement. I've wanted to be black for a long time, and I just realized that day that if I wanted to be a woman, I could just say I'm a woman, and everybody now has to treat me as a woman. Even though I have a penis, and an Adam's apple, and a Y chromosome — never mind all that. I can be a woman right now if I want to be a woman. I can ask you to call me she, and then I can go report any of those comments for hate speech — the ones saying "you're not really a woman, he's a man." Hate speech, hate speech. That's the current society we live in today, where your biology doesn't matter anymore — and I support that. I think it's important to break down these fixed ideas we have of "well, this is a man, and this is a woman." Let's break that down, and get past the idea that men have short hair, women have long hair, and all these stereotypes. I think it's good we start blurring the lines, come together, and just be divine beings.
I'm interested, as I said in my livestream four months ago, in seeing a Star Trek future where we can interact here with aliens on Earth. And we can't be squabbling and having fights between genders, and races, and religions, if we want to interact with beings from other planets and other galaxies. Come on now. Four months ago, I said that I was inspired by the transgender movement, and I realized I could just say I'm a woman — and therefore, since I've wanted to be black for a long time, I can just say I'm black, and I mean it. And I've meant it. I said I wasn't joking, and I'm serious.
Transracial and Transgender Are Really, Really Close
Now, I realize you can see what skin I'm working with — though I'm not going to show you what genitals I'm working with. People have said, "Well, transgender and transracial aren't the same thing." Well, I realize that. They're two different words. Yes, they're different words. But they're really, really close. If anything, race is a less fixed concept than gender. Race differs greatly from country to country and around the world. Somebody who would be thought of as black in the USA could go to another country like Brazil, and they would often be thought of as white there. Race is not such a simple concept as gender. If anything, to me, it makes more sense to have people changing races than changing genders. And I think it's good that we blur these racial boundaries and stereotypes, just like we blur the gender boundaries. If you want me to call you a woman, I don't care what kind of genitals you have — I'll call you a woman. I don't care what history you have. If you want me to call you black, I don't care where your ancestors came from or what your skin looks like — I'll think of you as black, because I have respect for other people. Now, I know this is a new idea to a lot of people, but I've seen this going out in the human consciousness. And this is important for tearing down stereotypes.
What It Cost Me on Facebook
People ask, "Well, why did you do this? You just wanted more views?" Oh no, I already had a lot of views. I was already making $10,000 plus a month on Facebook, and I was getting millions of views every month there. I was doing great as a Facebook partner. Identifying as a transracial white-to-black man erased all of what was going well for me on Facebook. All that I'd worked hard to build over a year and a half got destroyed because other people didn't like it. Not because it was wrong, or because I was mean, or because I was hateful — but because other people didn't like it, complained like crazy about it, and made up stories.
People said that I must hate transgender people, which I clearly don't. I love transgender people. It's a brave thing in this world today, if you've been a man, to change over and be a woman. That's a brave thing. It's a brave thing if you've been a woman to change over and be a man. And I think it's valuable. I've come to believe every one of us should take at least a day, if not a year, to change some major thing about our identity — whether it's your race, your gender, your religion, your sexuality, some major thing. I think all of us would benefit from a major change.
I also identify as bisexual, and that is fairly new. About a year ago, I realized I'm pretty straight, but I'm also a little bit gay, which means I'm bisexual. Now, I've never been with a man before, and I'm in a monogamous relationship with a woman, so it doesn't matter that much. That said, I might be in the future — who knows? And somebody who's transgender might be particularly interesting to be with.
Instant Skin Color Discrimination
Given everything I've said — and I've said all of it out of love, all of it toward making a future where each of us is in control of our identity, and where we really understand each other — here's what happened. To my knowledge, I had never faced any negative discrimination based on my skin color in my life. Some would call that white privilege: I've never been negatively affected because of my skin color, at least in a way that I recognized. And as soon as I came out and identified — "Hey guys! I'm black now!" — instant hordes, tons, of skin color discrimination came my way. And the underlying thing almost nobody wanted to say — Facebook certainly didn't say it when they sent me the email saying you're not a partner anymore — but what they really meant to say is: you're too white to say you're black. And that's skin color discrimination. You're telling me I can't identify my race as black? According to the law, you have a right to identify your race however you want to.
No Regrets
It's been amazing. I have no regrets. Lots of people ask, "Do you have any regrets?" Absolutely not. I would do everything the same way I did it again. I am proud that I had the courage to publicly change my race, instead of just keeping it to myself — thinking, I look like a white guy, but inside I'm black, and I'm just going to keep that to myself because I don't want to cause any trouble. No! I'm proud of myself that I got out there and said, hey everybody, I'm black now. And if you would oblige me, please think of me as a black man.
Now, I realize I will inevitably still get treated white. And I realize I could cover myself from head to toe and try to prevent my skin color from being seen. If I was to change to a woman, I would need similar strategies in order to actually get perceived as a woman. And this is just the nature of it — if you want to change your gender, this is just the reality. If I want people to think of me as a woman, my Adam's apple is a problem; I'd need to wear a scarf to cover that up. And I might need to change my voice a little bit too, because with the way I talk, nobody's going to think I'm a woman. So people have said, "Well, transgender is different. You have no choice but to be perceived as white. People are going to still see you as white. When the cop stops you, you're white, according to the cop."
What I Learned as a Police Officer
Well, I was a police officer before, and if I pulled you over, in my experience it was better to be a minority. If you were a white man, I felt most comfortable applying the law as fully as I could to you. Whereas if you were anything besides a white man, I always tried harder to find a reason to give a warning instead of a ticket, and to not take you to jail if at all possible. And you're like, why would you do that? Well, because I was so against minorities being discriminated against by the police. I was so much against that, that I overcorrected to the point where I discriminated in reverse — where I actually treated white people unfairly, where white people were more likely to get legal consequences when I interacted with them compared to anybody else.
I pulled over one driver who was not white. One time, they violated so many traffic laws it was ridiculous. And as soon as I pulled them over, I'm like, all right — you're not from here, are you? You don't really know about the traffic laws and the driving around here. So I'm just going to give you a warning instead of giving you six tickets. Now, if I had pulled a white person over in that same situation, I'd have been thinking, come on, you should be driving better than this. I'm going to give you a ticket, because clearly you're just not making an effort here. And that seems to be what our whole society is doing right now: we've overcorrected into "let's treat white people worse" in many instances, while at the same time minorities are still getting discriminated against in other instances. Come on now — this whole system has gotten stupid.
Where I Want Us to Go
And that leads me to where should we go? I want to go to a place where your skin color never, ever, ever matters. I want to go to a place where your perceived gender never, ever matters. Or your religion. Can't we all just be equal? That's what I want. I want a future where it doesn't matter if I say I'm white or I'm black, and I'm proud of everybody. All kinds of black creators, and creators from everywhere all over the world, have been incredibly loving and supportive. They've made dedicated videos that have gone out to a lot of people — like The Breakfast Club, like Murder Show — dedicated videos saying, hey, I support you, my brother.
I love the journey I've been on in the last four months. I've learned so much by changing my race that I think everybody would greatly benefit from doing something like it. I understand more about being black now than I ever have. I understand how much it sucks to get treated differently based on your skin color. To lose $10,000 a month, and to have an incredible amount of hate speech directed at me, just because of my skin color, seems utterly insane. I'm not sure about the concept of white privilege, because there are also things that suck about being white. And just like that, there's black privilege — there are things that are awesome about being black, as Charlamagne Tha God wrote in his book called Black Privilege. There are things that are great about being black, and there are things that suck.
Meeting in the Middle
And that's where I think we come into the middle and say, look, no matter what color you are, it sucks sometimes. And no matter what color you are, it's good sometimes. And that's where the goal is: let's come together. And say, look, hey man, you're black. Does it suck to be black sometimes? Yeah, it does. Is it awesome to be black sometimes? Yeah, it is. Hey, you're white. Does it suck to be white sometimes? Yeah, I hate being white sometimes. Is it awesome to be white sometimes? Yeah, sometimes it's great to be white. Alright, how can we stop making it matter? How can we just eliminate all that? Let's make a world where it never matters what color your skin is. That's what we're inevitably going towards anyway, and to me, being transracial helps us take a step there. I'm proud of all of y'all. I've seen lots of people coming out saying, "Hey Jerry, I'm changing my race now too." Good! People have explored this discussion, and I'm proud of each of us for moving towards a future we actually want to have. I want to have a gray future — where it doesn't matter, white, black, doesn't matter.
I love this journey I've been on because I've learned so much. I used to think, when I identified as white, that when people said there was discrimination based on skin color going on, I used to think, well, I sure hope that's not true. And that's kind of where my thinking stopped. Like seriously, it's 2022 — how are people still discriminating based on skin color? That's so 1800s! At what point does it end? To me, it ends when we end it. When we refuse: look, I'm not going to treat anybody differently because of skin color. I'm not going to treat anybody better or worse because of their skin color. I'm not going to give people different standards based on their skin color. What one skin color can say and another skin color can't say — that's got to go. We all are human beings. I've come to believe we all are divine souls incarnated in human bodies, that we've all been many different races and genders and even extraterrestrials, and that we've got long histories that many of us have forgotten and some of us are starting to remember. It's awesome being transracial. And I intend to be black until nobody cares. Until nobody is interested. And so what?
A Future of Flexible Identities
I see a future where our identities are much more flexible too. Maybe in the future I'll actually be able to make my skin look black. I look at this as a long-term commitment, and I'm hoping one day I can just have some kind of gadget where I'm going to set my skin color on it. I think we're going to pick a nice shade — whatever the hex code is, we're going to make it full black today, and we're going to just see how my day goes that way. And another day, I'll think, I'll be blue today. We'll try a blue skin color on, see how that feels. You wear different skin colors like you wear different shirts. And maybe we'll even be able to change our facial features. I'll try out being a woman, have some beautiful long hair one day, see how that feels.
I think it's great, because to me we often are stuck in our identities. Our identities become like a prison, and your identity becomes like a cell. Who you are: I'm a man. I'm a husband. I'm a straight guy. I'm a white guy. I make this much money. This is my religion. And this is who I am. And then anything besides that is the other. I think it's really important to step outside that and break it down. Because white issues are black issues, and black issues are white issues.
What Holding Anyone Back Costs All of Us
As a result of doing this, I've looked up a lot of research and I've been drawn to a lot of voices. I've been drawn to some black conservative voices who've been saying that this overprotective anti-racist movement is hurting the black community, and that we need to stop going around witch hunting for racists. I mean, if somebody's truly racist, it'll be pretty obvious — you won't have to go hunting for them, they'll be noticed.
One of the things I got out of that is that if any one race is being held back in any way, it negatively affects all of us. For example, you look back at times when black people were discriminated against and even held in slavery, and that screwed all of us over, because it stopped all of us from working together more effectively. When you've got black slaves that are stuck doing very limited work and have very limited potential, all of us suffer, because those black slaves could not give like the black community can give today. They couldn't give all the ideas and culture and all the unique forms of service and make companies, and all of us suffered. All of us had less because of that oppression. All of us had a worse standard of living. Can you picture being happy if you had someone else in your house that was a slave? I mean, can you picture really loving yourself? I've thought about that so much. We can't discriminate and hold each other down without it costing us too. When each of us has more, we all have more.
This is why it's important we make a world where nobody is oppressed, nobody gets shut down over any superficial characteristic, where nobody gets their post taken down for hate speech because they said they're changing their race, where we can have free discussions and explore ideas — because that's how we get an abundant world. This world is tough. This world is brutal. There are a lot of people starving to death today. Tens of thousands of people are going to starve to death today. What if those people had all kinds of food? Many of them are black. To me, Black Lives Matter should be about: let's go take care of these brothers and sisters in Africa that have nothing, that are in such poverty we can't even imagine it. Can't we get them — we have so much stuff here — can't we get them some of that? When we lift up other people on this planet, we're all going to benefit.
Tearing Down the Walls Between Us
Let's go help each other as much as possible, and let's get rid of these racial divisions. Let's get rid of these gender divisions. Let's get rid of these religious divisions. Let's get rid of these political divisions. White and black need to make love to each other. Democrats and Republicans need to make love to each other. Men and women, trans and non-trans, Christian and Islam, whoever — let's all make love to each other, make an awesome world together, and let's stop fighting and tearing each other down. How about that? Does that sound good? Can we do that? That's what I'm trying to do. If you enjoy hearing me talk through what I'm learning, I share a lot more of my honest thinking in my YouTube Coaching playlist.
Me changing my race is a part of me being me, doing what I feel is right inside, and also being of service to the collective — to say, look, let's tear down these walls between us. Let's all come together. Let's all go to the barbecue together, hang out, and get to know each other. So thank you. I'm proud of you. I'm honored you actually made it through this whole 20-minute soapbox.