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Hi, and welcome back to the Carol Markowitz show on IHeartRadio.

My guest today is Ben Appel.

Ben is the author of Sis White Gay, The Making of a Gender Heretic, a New

Memoir about his experience in Social Justice activism and the Ivy League. Ben has

also written for The Wall Street Journal, The New York Post, Newsweek, the Free Press

Unheard, and many others. Hi, Ben, so nice to have you. Great to be here. Thanks for having me.

So I have to start with that title. How did you become

a gender heretic? Oh, gosh. It was a, it was an evolution. You know, I back in 2012 is when I

began my work in, I guess you could say, LGBT activism. I worked on Maryland's marriage equality campaign.

I volunteered for that campaign and then a subsequent trans rights legislation campaign in 2013

in Maryland.

And those two experiences were kind of the impetus that led me back to school.

You know, I had been a hairstylist for a number of years in the D.C. area.

And, you know, after a couple years, I just wanted to do more with my life. And after I got married,

you know, my husband and I, I said, I want to be an activist. I want to be a journalist. I want to do

more in this world. And he encouraged me,

and that led me to community college to eventually us moving to New York so that I could attend

Columbia. And so I got my undergraduate degree at Columbia. And that was in 2017, January, when my first

semester began. So I was like ready to hit the road with, you know, just fully on board, you know,

hashtag resisting.

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