K Dollahz says black trans women need representation the most

JAMAL GROOTBOOM

ONE of South Africa’s pioneer DJs, Kalo “K Dollahz” Canterbury, is a popular fixture on the local entertainment scene. From playing overseas to local music festivals such as Afropunk and Rocking the Daisies. There’s never a dull moment when K Dollahz is spinning the deck.

Furthermore, he’s also the first openly transgender man to get local notoriety having been featured recently in GQ South Africa’s music issue. We chatted to him about his experience in the entertainment industry as a trans man.

Speaking about his experience as a trans man in the entertainment he said that it’s been interesting with many ups and downs since he started before coming out as transgender. “People had already kind of started to get to know me and then coming out, as a performer are the people who know me and book me still going to accept me? I think, at first, I’m a very confident person even though I had insecurity about it I had to push past it. And it was challenging at first to wrap your own head around being trans and coming to terms with your identity and you’re doing it in front of people watching, so it really was a ‘fake it till you make it’ kind of thing. Eventually, I figured out who were the right people to work with based on the relationships I built.”

A couple of years ago K Dollahz spoke out about a bad experience at a music festival where he was misgendered, and talking about why he thinks cisgender people misgender trans and non-binary people he said it’s because “they’re f*****g idiots”.

“It’s like seriously internalised homophobia, it’s internalised transphobia. People like to perform. The say queer like to perform, but cis(het) people like to perform way more than us. This toxic thing that some cis(het) people have, which is like a really deep hatred for themselves or hatred for the fact that they feel they cannot be themselves or perform their gender. And I honestly think it’s that internalised hate coming out. It’s a hate for someone actually being themselves and who has the confidence to be themselves.”

When it comes to respecting people and their pronouns the use of them/they pronouns has become a hot topic with celebrities such as Sam Smith and Indya Moore being some of the most prominent figures to identify as non-binary and have said their pronouns as they/ them.

Speaking about the importance of using correct pronouns the DJ said it’s about respect and that “the end of the day everyone on a human level, everyone on Earth values respect and the most amount respect you can offer someone you do not know is just getting their pronouns right and not misgendering them”.

Over the last couple of years, transwomen have been at the forefront of queer representation in media. Pose has become one of the most talked-about shows with a lead cast of predominately black/ POC trans women. However, on the flip side, we’ve seen many trans men getting the same level of attention. Talking about why this

might be Kalo said it is because “trans men are problematic AF”.

He added: “At the end of the day, trans women... when you look at the queer community and you look at who are the most marginalised, at the bottom of the food chain is specifically black trans women. And that why we need a lot of representation, it’s because they need protection. People need to be aware of their issues and they need to be represented and fought for. And at the end of the day, they started the queer movement to fight for rights and we need to return the favour. First and foremost, we represent them in our community.”

Furthermore, he said that trans men, for the most part, have a lot of male privilege and it’s something that needs to be addressed and they dissociate with their transness suffering from internalised misogyny as result. Which is something that needs to be addressed within the queer community.

Talking about one of his career highlights, he said it was when he was starting out and had the opportunity to travel with Dope Saint Jude to Austria to play a show.

And while he loves his job there is a difference when it comes to playing straight clubs/events compared to queer ones. “There’s definitely a different feeling when playing in a queer space. There is a sense of community, there’s a different energy, the dancing is certainly better. And there’s a kind of support you get from the queer community you don’t get somewhere else.”

Speaking about how more queer people will feel comfortable in the local entertainment industry he said it’s not with queer people as they exist between the realm of confidence and talent.

However, “the cis(het) world is yet to accept us and there are queer people and women who will talk about the boys club. And there needs to be a queer club where we are the promoters, we are the people that are at the top of the food chain and we need to find a way to challenge that club and we need to do it as a collective”.