‘Trans people aren’t all larger than life – we can be ordinary and boring too’

Trans people are a lot of things, according to Jake Graf, a trans man living in London. They’re also pretty boring.

Jake has lived quite the life. Born under Section 28, a 1980s policy banning the promotion of gay lives in schools, he’s since become a trans actor and filmmaker who married the trans award-winning campaigner Hannah Graf.

But he’s also a father of two who gets spit-up on his shoulder, buys groceries from Sainsbury’s, and, as so many people do, goes to the toilet.

‘Trans people aren’t all singers and dancers and larger than life,’ Jake, who lives with Hannah and their daughters Millie and Teddy, tells Metro.

‘We are very run-of-the-mill people, just a little boring, a little ordinary, and that’s fine. We’re happy.’

This is one of the messages that Jake hopes people take away from him and Hannah’s new exhibition, Trans is Human.

The free display at Outernet, the UK’s most visited cultural attraction in Soho, runs until Sunday to mark Trans Awareness Week.

It features portraits of 13 trans people taken by photographer Mariano Vivanco, while Hello, Heaven, Hello by Yungblud soundtracks the display.

Public representation is vital right now, Scott Neal, the creative director of culture and lifestyle at Outernet, tells Metro.

‘With Trans Is Human, we wanted to create a moment of visibility and empathy in one of the most public spaces in London,’ he says.

‘My hope is that people leave feeling more connected, more open, and more aware of the beauty and strength in diversity.’

‘We’ve got 13 beautiful portraits of trans people’

Jake created the exhibit with Hannah, formerly the highest-ranking trans officer in the British Army, to combat misinformation.

‘You know, 89% of people haven’t met a trans person,’ says Graf, pointing to census results that just 0.5% of people in England and Wales are trans.

‘We put out a casting call and got 250 applicants. We’ve got 13 beautiful portraits of trans people whose stories are ordinary and inspirational.’

Among them is Sarah, who lost her sight at 42 and has since run 52 marathons and upsells buildings to raise money for other blind adults.

Then there’s the aspiring drummer Milo, Ugandan refugee Amanda and Leo, who has dyskinetic cerebral palsy that limits the use of his limbs.

Trans people aren’t typically shown this way – the Independent Press Standards Organisation found that coverage has become more hostile in recent years.

The community’s rights, meanwhile, are going backwards, with the Supreme Court ruling in April that the word ‘woman’ refers to biological sex under anti-discrimination law.

Transphobic hate crimes rocketed by 1,426% between 2012 and 2023, decreasing by just 2% last year, to 4,780 recorded offences.

Overall, since 2015, the UK has gone from being one of the most LGBTQ+-friendly countries in Europe to 22nd.

‘We’ve really felt the culture in the UK change for the worse over the last 10 years,’ says Jake.

‘In 2015, everyone was talking about the “trans tipping point”. Everything seemed positive, we had Laverne Cox on TIME and Caitlyn Jenner on Vanity Fair.

‘It’s not been a great 10 years. Hannah and I, and a lot of our trans friends, feel dehumanised, you only hear negative stories about trans people.’

Things changed when the government announced plans to reform the Gender Recognition Act, which governs legal gender change processes.

‘It opened the floodgates for people who weren’t happy with trans people to vent that anger under the guise of the GRA reform,’ Jake says.

Trans people bay become ‘second-class citizens’ in the UK one day

What worries the Grafs today is the upcoming guidance from the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC).

Leaks suggest the watchdog will advise single-sex service operators to ban trans people, such as from public bathrooms or changing rooms.

To do so would all but make trans people ‘second-class citizens’, Jake says.

‘Hannah is scared to take our daughters to the loo when they’re out just in case someone hears her voice, which is slightly deeper,’ he adds.

‘As a trans woman, what if someone were to attack her verbally or physically in front of our children?’

The EHRC guidance has yet to be rubber-stamped by the government, with a spokesperson telling Metro the watchdog takes its obligation to protect equality ‘extremely seriously, including those with the protected characteristic of gender reassignment’.

‘We do not make the law – it’s our job to accurately explain how it works in practice – as we have done at every opportunity since the Supreme Court’s judgment on the definition of “sex” in the Equality Act,’ they add

Jake, however, is optimistic about how things may look in 10 years.

‘We need to realise that we are just one tiny, little island and we are seeing progress across the world,’ Jake says.

‘Trans people will look back on this and think, “How did we get there? Thank goodness people stood next to us, the world is now a better place”.’

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