I went to see a documentary a couple of weeks ago and realised I'd let myself stop at an embarrassingly early stage in my solidarity with intersex people.

The documentary is Every Body, and is based around interviews with three intersex activists - River Gallo, Sean Saifa Wall and Alicia Roth Weigel.

Having known about the I in LGBTQIA+ for a while and having (knowingly) hung out with a couple of intersex people a bit, I'd allowed myself to think of myself as an 'ally'.

I was rudely awakened to how laughably passive my 'allyship' was when I watched a straightforward 90-min documentary and learned a LOT.

I think there's a stage people go through after we find out about a way that people are marginalised/oppressed where we feel generically neutral-to-positive about those people, and if we're not careful, we stay there.

Like friendly cows in a field, watching a train go by.

(I wonder this, by the way, when walking in the Pride parade. Thousands of people turn up to cheer and watch but I don't really know their politics or commitment. Just that if they've come along to stand and watch us walk by they probably don't actively want to kill us -- which is not NOTHING let's be clear. How actually educated they are about the needs of the LGBT+ coalitions, and how much they actually speak out and organise is another matter.)

There's a long distance between passive awareness to active solidarity.

I think a good next step is self-education.

I'm about to embark on a journey of googling, reading/watching lists, articles, books, podcasts so I know more about the perspectives of intersex people, the campaigning and activism that needs support and what's being asked of people who aren't knowingly intersex.

I normally start with searching for "[x] 101", or "[x] reading lists" or "podcasts about [x]", making sure I'm prioritising voices of people who are also marginalised in other ways, so that I'm not just getting a single-issue perspective (very easy to have, particularly if we only listen to white voices.)

I will at no point in these early stages ask any intersex people I know to answer any of my questions. Google, is, especially at this stage, of course, my friend.

If you've come across anyone or any media that should be on my radar, let me know?