YOUR TOOLS ARE BROKEN Ft. Mercury Stardust
Summary
On this episode of the Comment Section Show, we have Mercury Stardust on the show. Mercury is a handyman in his hometown of St. Louis, Missouri. He started his career on TikTok, where he became one of the most popular handymen on the internet. He's been around for a long time and is a great friend of mine, and I'm so excited to have him on the Show.
Transcript
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I'll be honest, whenever I talk to a mechanic, I'm always wearing dirty overalls.
00:01:10.260
Like, that day, I'm just like, I'm gonna bind my chest, and I'm gonna pull back my hair, and I'm gonna walk around,
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Yeah, it's the only time that I'm okay with being perceived as a man.
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I'm gonna take up as much space as possible and be like, hey, yeah, women, right?
00:01:37.400
Hey, everyone, and welcome back to another episode of the Comment Section Show, starring me, your fave, everyone knows me, who cares about me.
00:01:45.420
Today, we have the iconic, the legendary, the hilarious, the amazing, Mercury Stardust.
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Been dying to have you, but you're too busy, and you live in the Midwest.
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It's nice to be a ginormous fish in a very tiny pond sometimes.
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It's like, I'm taking up all the space, you know?
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Me and Mercury have been friends for a long time.
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But I would love for everyone who isn't familiar with your lore, I would love for them to know about your journey, like how you got on TikTok, like what made you want to start posting in the first place, how you became the trans handyman of the internet.
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Like, I was fixing a toilet, and I put the toilet through a wall.
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Yeah, so what happened was I was doing maintenance for a property management company, and I put my tool bag by my feet, and then I took the toilet off of its wax ring, and then I went to go turn after I was holding the toilet.
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And that toilet then was projected into the wall and smashed the living hell out of it.
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And I put a hole through the drywall, and I was so upset.
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And then I went on TikTok, covered in someone else's poo.
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And then I just posted a video to try to help someone because I wanted to actually solve a problem that day.
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Make sure they didn't have that issue of poop on them from a toilet.
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So it generally did happen from, like, an accident.
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I do not know if I would have been on TikTok that day if it wasn't for that very stupid thing I did.
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So when did you – was that your first video to, like, really go viral or just the first one you ever posted?
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I was only on TikTok for, like, two weeks prior to that happening, and I think it was, like, one of five videos I ever posted, period.
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Well, so when you – first of all, how long have you been in, like, maintenance and everything?
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Like, how long have you been working on things?
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I have, like, a dozen or so, like, certifications, and I work with industrial companies, construction companies.
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Any way I could get a bill, you know what I mean?
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I was going to ask about your burlesque journey.
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Oh, that came up – that was, like, the back door as well.
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I was, like, just performing in gay bars as a little twink back in the day, and people would be, like, you'd be so good as a burlesque entertainer, and I was, like, sure.
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And then I would Google it, and then I was, like, oh, I could perform half-naked for strangers.
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So on the weekends, I would get – I would show my butt to a bunch of people I will never meet again, and then I would fix their toilets, you know?
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You'd be like Clark Kent, Superman, you know what I mean?
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A very sexy, naked, but holding a plunger, Clark Kent.
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I did do a lot of burlesque numbers with plungers, though.
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So when you started making your content, like, what led you to want to start?
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Was it, like, comments of, like, hey, how do I fix this in my home or how do I do this?
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Because as someone who has literally no skill at all when it comes to any sort of maintenance
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around the house, the car, plumbing, anything like that, I myself feel very useless.
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That was a big reason why I loved your content in the beginning was because it's so helpful
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And men, like, particularly cis, straight, awful men, love to make anyone else feel so fucking
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Like, whatever they consider maintenance or upkeep or on the house, cars, whatever.
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It's like the industry, that status quo is people talking down to you.
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So, like, I always call myself, like, a trauma-informed maintenance technician, right?
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So, like, I understand what it's like to have someone belittle you.
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I understand what it's like to, like, feel like you're not even worth picking up a tool.
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But I didn't think it was going to resonate with people.
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You know, I did that first video and I started by saying, hello, I'm the intersectional,
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I'm the maintenance, intersectional, feminist lady or something.
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It was like, it took me 22 seconds to introduce myself in a minute-long video.
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And then eventually I figured out that trans handyman is way more catchy.
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But I don't know if I would have been able to kind of, like, link onto that if it wasn't
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People being in need to kind of light the problems, you know?
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I didn't know to make the content for it because I've been doing this for so long.
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You know, like, I didn't know door hinges were an issue.
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I didn't know garbage disposals were going to be so big.
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I was going to ask, like, what's the most common, like, problem around the house that
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I would say garbage disposals are right up there, right behind clogs.
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And there's, like, 500 different ways to unclog something.
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So there's always endless content for it, you know?
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The amount of times, though, I've had to call my dad and be like, I don't know what's wrong
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Like, even my toilet, my drain, like, and I feel like the stupidest person alive, and
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So that's why I always have to call someone I know instead of hiring someone.
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It's generally hard to, like, feel vulnerable and feel like you don't know the answers.
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And I'm a Virgo, and I don't like not knowing friends.
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Yeah, and I'm a Sagittarius, so everything's got to be about me, you know?
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I will make the old maintenance about me, and then you will make sure that you ask me
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So I would love to know how you started marrying the two, because I know you're very passionate
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about your activism, and you've done so many fundraisers on Lives with Rory.
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Alluring Skull, for those of you that don't know.
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But y'all have raised so much money for trans people and transgender-affirming care, and
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I would just love to know how you married those two.
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You know what's wild is everything stems back from burlesque.
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Like, I did burlesque for, like, 15 years, but when I was doing burlesque, a lot of the
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It's about basically all the marginalized communities coming together to express ourselves in an
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art form that makes us feel like we're in our own skin, right?
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So because of that, you're kind of around people who are trying to actively make a difference.
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Like, a lot of the people that I worked with on a daily basis were involved with huge social
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movements of some kind, and a lot of them would do charity funds, you know, tits for tots kind
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of mentality, you know, or raising money to help kids and et cetera.
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But then you also get a lot of people who are expressing themselves as a trans person or a
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So when I was doing burlesque, I was, like, looking for something that made sense to me
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to try to help, and gender-affirming care was, like, the number one thing.
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So after I came out as a trans lady, then I was, like, I'm going to raise money for
00:10:04.240
other people's surgeries, and that's kind of how it led to that.
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So naturally, when I got a platform in front of me, I was, like, I'm going to do the same
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thing, but this time, I'm not going to show my butt.
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I think that's so beautiful, what you and Jory do together, especially, like, going live for
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What was that experience like when you first did it?
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Like, I mean, at least going nonstop for 24 hours.
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So I really, when I first started doing content, I was, like, I need to suffer in order for
00:10:42.820
So I was, like, if I do something really dumb, like, if I'm in front of a camera for 24 hours,
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So originally, I was going for $24,000 in 24 hours.
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The first day that we did that, which was three years ago, we raised, like, $24,000 in
00:11:03.980
So then we had to switch it to $50,000 and then switch it to $100,000.
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But that last hour, we raised, like, $50,000 on our own.
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We raised this money by putting, you know, a needless goal there or, like, a deadline
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And then we just, like, rush it towards the end.
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And then the closer we get to that deadline, the more intense it becomes.
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And that's the way we've been kind of able to do that.
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The longest we've done it, I think, is, like, maybe 45 hours straight I've been in front
00:11:46.220
And that's what, this most recent one, we were having a really hard time because we were
00:11:53.340
Literally, Jory messaged me and I immediately reached out to my friend at TikTok because I
00:12:03.780
That's so nice to hear because it's so, it was so lonely in this, like, we were in my
00:12:09.300
little production studio in Tropical Madison, Wisconsin, and trying our best to figure out
00:12:15.740
We had people watching it as a live audience, and we had my friends and my family watching
00:12:21.980
And the first, like, couple hours while we were getting banned was so devastating.
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Well, to happen right when you start is just so upsetting for so many reasons.
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And I kept getting my lives back, but Jory was not giving her lives back at all.
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And Jory is always treated differently than I'm treated differently.
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And it's so obvious that there's a lot of race attached to it.
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People always misinterpret how Jory is trying to help others and uplift people.
00:13:03.300
And I'm curious, like, what's been the response from the trans community?
00:13:08.920
Like, when y'all do this every year, you do it all the time.
00:13:13.540
But especially in these huge, like, milestone moments.
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Like, I'm sure it's been really cool to see for the trans community especially.
00:13:22.260
I think that, like, we don't – there's, like, 500-plus anti-trans bills that have been tried to have been passed across the country.
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The more we're in public eye, the less hope we have sometimes, I think.
00:13:35.800
Like, we're constantly talked about but never talked to.
00:13:38.960
So, I think that the fundraiser, especially because now it's on Trains Day of Visibility, I think that it kind of gives us a celebration to look forward to every year.
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I hope that as we grow it, it can become more of a celebration and a party and less of, like, please give us money.
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As if y'all aren't doing so much emotional labor all the time already.
00:14:02.780
This year, when we were trying to do it, we only raised 1.4 originally.
00:14:07.160
And then I was on live stream for two days straight sleeping, basically.
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And the audience was like, are you still raising money?
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I was on live a total of 90 hours this year to do it.
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But I commend you for being so passionate about taking care of the trans community, especially now.
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I think what you said is so profound about, like, you're always talked about but never talked to.
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And it's very, very frustrating to me when I see people, they make transness about themselves.
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As if trans people haven't been around for hundreds of thousands of years.
00:15:00.080
Yeah, it's wild to me that it's socially acceptable to say that trans people make you uncomfortable.
00:15:14.800
Well, Brad, you make me uncomfortable, so thank you.
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Do you think I feel comfortable having heard that?
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I mean, we know that when we are working out and we're trying to do, like, physical activities, that pain means that we're gaining strength, right?
00:15:34.300
Why is it when it comes to changing our views on things or trying to gain knowledge on something, when it starts hurting, we stop?
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The way that I'm, like, do you know how, like, especially when you talk about something as simple as pronouns, right?
00:15:56.260
When I, that seems to stump the most, like, alt-right person and they get so angry about it.
00:16:02.580
And I always say, like, do you know how bigoted you have to be in your everyday life for that to be a challenge?
00:16:07.640
To be like, well, that's just my everyday talk.
00:16:10.080
How am I supposed to talk to anyone at that point?
00:16:21.620
But most of the time, they're bringing up how they isn't appropriate.
00:16:37.800
And it's also so, it makes even less sense to me when they're like, well, all these new pronouns, all these blah, blah, blah.
00:16:43.720
When they complain about that shit, I'm like, you don't ever hang out with trans people.
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Like, you're never going to have these problems because you refuse to hang out with anyone that's not like you.
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None of us are going to cross the street to hang out with you.
00:17:00.660
We're not going to see that guy across the street go, I want to hang out with that stranger.
00:17:04.660
You're like, I don't care how much he hates me.
00:17:08.700
And I've said before, because I've had so many trans friends, and I've had so many guests on the show that are trans as well.
00:17:15.520
And every time we talk about it, I'm like, you have no idea how much.
00:17:18.300
They just want you to leave them the fuck alone.
00:17:21.980
Like, they're not asking for anything other than to leave us the fuck alone.
00:17:27.460
Like, let us live our lives, and you go live yours, and it can be boring and fucking cookie cutter, and you can do that.
00:17:36.300
I just want to fix drywall and hang out with my cats, okay?
00:17:40.420
I do not need your opinion about every single aspect about me.
00:17:45.660
And that leads me to my next question, because you know so much.
00:17:49.600
First of all, you're so incredibly intellectual, just in general, but specifically about maintenance, because like you said, you've been doing it for years.
00:17:56.880
And obviously, that's an extremely male-dominated industry.
00:17:59.880
And I'm so curious how that experience has been like for you in the workplace, but also obviously online, because there's always hate online from the worst people in the world.
00:18:06.600
But I feel like men feel really sunned by you, because of your vast knowledge.
00:18:11.840
Like, they feel real intimidated by that, I'm sure.
00:18:14.520
Oh, they always feel a need to nitpick everything.
00:18:16.880
Yeah, like try to correct you, catch you on shit.
00:18:19.200
It'd be as dumb as like, you're picking up the hammer around, you know what I mean?
00:18:24.100
Or they'll say stuff that just isn't true sometimes, too.
00:18:28.900
Yeah, they'll just be like, you know that's an impact driver.
00:18:31.600
And you're like, no, that's actually not an impact driver, but okay.
00:18:42.840
So, yeah, they have such an unprecedented amount of confidence, like the way that they
00:18:48.440
truly believe just because they identify as a man that they're inherently more knowledgeable
00:18:57.060
Those are the same men who would be on a job site with me that everyone would be talking
00:19:05.240
The best men on a job site don't care about your gender.
00:19:09.760
Yeah, they don't care if they want the job to get done correctly, and they're more worried
00:19:13.100
about the red tape they have to cross in order to get the job done correctly than they're
00:19:21.300
The men who try to take up all the space are always the men that are the smallest men.
00:19:28.680
Like, they're the least qualified, the least knowledgeable, but the loudest.
00:19:32.900
They learned something like 25 years ago, and they held on to that, that's what it's
00:19:40.560
You're supposed to hold a drill like this because my dad told me that you're supposed to, and
00:19:56.460
I feel like other than home maintenance in general, cars are where I know especially
00:20:02.020
So whenever there's any problem with my car, I feel so annoyed because I have to go to
00:20:07.240
the mechanic or something, and I'm going to have to listen to a man talk at me and talk
00:20:13.220
And when you're doing home maintenance or getting something repaired in your house, you
00:20:19.240
But when you are going to the mechanic, you are going out of your comfort zone into their
00:20:25.360
And it's so easy to get people to lean on you and make you feel like you have to do
00:20:30.820
this thing right now and spend $2,000 on a $50 fix.
00:20:35.480
And it's one of the many reasons my dad or my boyfriend, they just take it for me because
00:20:45.280
And it's because I, well, again, me being a Virgo, I hate not knowing things.
00:20:49.040
And I was like, when they talked to me about the car, I feel like what misogynists believe
00:20:52.240
all women to be, which is just the stupidest bitch alive.
00:20:55.380
And so when they talked to me, I'm like, I'll tell you what I know about this car.
00:21:02.880
Whenever I talk to a mechanic, I'm always wearing dirty overalls.
00:21:11.480
Like, that day, I'm just like, I'm going to bind my chest and I'm going to pull back my
00:21:22.380
It's the only time that I'm okay with being perceived as a man.
00:21:24.580
I'm going to take up as much space as possible and be like, hey, yeah, women, right?
00:21:36.160
I'm sure you get the same, if not more, hate than I do.
00:21:44.860
I think it's sometimes harder from our own communities.
00:21:48.200
Like, I think that I'm so used to men being like, you're a man.
00:21:55.840
Oh, I love when people tell me that I can tell, you know, saying that I don't pass.
00:22:00.800
And I'm like, do you think I'm attempting to pass?
00:22:09.600
Yeah, is it the fact that I'm called a trans handyman?
00:22:20.240
But what gets me is sometimes the microaggressions from the people who think they love me, right?
00:22:31.160
And sometimes they'll say something that's inadvertently very cutting.
00:22:35.300
Or they'll say something that brings me down a peg or two.
00:22:39.300
I totally know what you mean because I've said the only hate that ever really bothers me comes from the communities that I feel so driven to protect and take care of.
00:22:49.340
And so, like, when they post things that are either, like, it's almost, like, too familiar or over-familiar to the point where it's rude and disrespectful.
00:22:57.180
Or if it's, like, supposed to be criticism, but it's really just hate.
00:23:02.540
Those are the only things that really bother me.
00:23:06.600
Like, how often is it, like, they're mad at us for taking up a space that they wish that they could often be in?
00:23:13.600
And I, like, I understand the responsibility that, like, I inhabit now.
00:23:19.620
But, like, also, I just started answering questions about drywall.
00:23:25.380
So I am learning how to be the best version of me so I can help the most people.
00:23:32.120
And I think that sometimes it sucks when you see other trans people being, like, you're not really trans.
00:23:40.200
Yeah, if you haven't had this surgery, then you're not this.
00:23:42.780
A trans medicalist, you know, in the comment section is really rough sometimes.
00:23:46.420
Well, and it's also, like, who is that helping?
00:23:50.660
Like, there's so few of us already, like, fighting for the same cause.
00:23:54.520
Like, we're all fighting against one big common enemy.
00:23:57.440
And that's how I feel about the many different communities I defend also, too.
00:24:02.180
But even, like, women, just people who identify as women specifically when they're really misogynistic towards me or they hate me or they say mean shit about me.
00:24:16.200
It's like they started playing baseball on our team.
00:24:20.100
And then they went into the dugout and then went into the other dugout.
00:24:23.160
And they're just like, no one's going to notice.
00:24:28.480
No one's going to tell me that I'm bad at baseball.
00:24:32.080
They're going to tell you you're bad at baseball.
00:24:34.700
They jump ship almost immediately, which is so upsetting.
00:24:37.200
So I totally get that because I was curious because I know, you know, the fact that you create content and you, like, hold so much space for so many different people, like, that in and of itself is such an act of protest.
00:24:52.940
I just want to commend you for that before the end of the episode.
00:25:00.380
You still show up, but that's the hardest part, especially when you come from a marginalized group.
00:25:06.620
I think, Drew, it's 100% the community that has surrounded me.
00:25:10.420
You know how this is with your family and everything.
00:25:16.940
It's no way the first person I ever raised money for for gender affirming care is literally in this room with us right now.
00:25:26.540
We helped them with their top surgery and we just kept going.
00:25:29.660
And the people who have helped are often in my corner still helping me get to the next stage.
00:25:36.000
Even when I've I'm sure you've gotten this, too, because you've been doing this for as long as I have, too.
00:25:40.040
Like whenever you meet new creators, like up and coming creators and they ask you for like any sort of tips or advice, a lot of times when they ask me, I tell them to like surround themselves with community in real life, too.
00:25:51.140
Like you have your online community, but you need a solid support system at home.
00:25:57.220
How often are we asked by kids or like young adults?
00:26:01.060
Like, OK, what do I need to do in order to like get famous?
00:26:05.240
And then my first thing is like, well, hey, don't.
00:26:11.640
You want to start with your community, work with your community.
00:26:23.880
And so much of what we do, you and I specifically like stems from that.
00:26:29.000
And I'm nothing without the community around me.
00:26:34.460
It's like 15 years of me grinding my gears and then all of a sudden one day I broke a
00:26:42.240
Like it's so like that 15 years I would never exchange that for anything.
00:26:51.940
Sometimes I'm like, thank God this happened to me after like when I was like a fully formed
00:26:57.880
When I was even in my like early 30s, I really thought I was like, I'm going to make it.
00:27:04.700
And then when I gave up is when it kind of all started like working.
00:27:09.740
Because I like stopped pursuing performing regularly.
00:27:13.440
I stopped like traveling to major markets to try to like get into it.
00:27:18.040
And I just like focused on myself and my family.
00:27:25.280
I feel like you probably I'm sure you have this very similar feeling.
00:27:29.560
But like for me, after I got fired and then I started posting TikToks, like it was the
00:27:35.780
I was like, OK, well, this is my this is my purpose.
00:27:40.260
And then once I got fired, I was like, that was not my dream or my purpose.
00:27:49.360
I was literally working in property management when this was all happening.
00:27:53.600
And two months in, I was doing this to the point where every single resident knew I was
00:28:01.080
I would get into someone's apartment and they would be like, oh, my God, Mercury, you want
00:28:20.400
The company basically told me that I needed to stop altogether.
00:28:24.500
And I was like, OK, well, I'll never film in their apartments.
00:28:32.080
But sometimes I do what I want evidence that I did the job.
00:28:36.040
So and they at the time encouraged us to take photos of completed jobs.
00:28:41.600
So to me, it made no sense to how there's a difference.
00:28:46.260
I mean, I just would take a whole, you know, standby video of like three feet away and put
00:28:57.360
And then you have evidence that the whole job was done, how it was done.
00:29:04.360
And it was a great way to make tenants feel comfortable, too, because they're in an experience.
00:29:14.760
I was the only person who was not a straight man.
00:29:20.760
And like it was it was very, very the entire time.
00:29:25.180
And the way that other technicians like straight up talked about their tenants, you know, people
00:29:31.680
would talk about them being animals, a lot of terrible things.
00:29:36.440
And the most of the people that we were serving were people who were not cisgender and white.
00:29:46.120
So it got to be a point where I was like, I need to get out.
00:29:51.180
And my spouse had top surgery on a Thursday and on Monday when I came back to work, I
00:29:58.040
I wrote a seven page essay basically about all the things that were wrong, about what
00:30:06.100
And then the entire team I worked with got fired.
00:30:11.660
It kind of breaks my heart because I don't I that is a solution you could do.
00:30:16.920
But also all you do in this industry is hire more people who are probably thinking the
00:30:22.100
They just don't want someone who's challenging the status quo.
00:30:25.620
78% of all the people in maintenance technician are men above 40 years old.
00:30:35.840
Seven or six percent of people in this industry are women.
00:30:41.020
And it's like it's also so like that feeling you get.
00:30:44.000
I feel like it's such a universal feeling regardless of how you identify.
00:30:46.740
But especially if you're in a marginalized group is when you have to call maintenance
00:30:50.300
and you're like, oh, they're going to be here and I get nervous and they're going to
00:30:54.540
ask me questions and I don't know how to answer them.
00:30:56.280
Like I never have a good feeling when I have to call maintenance for anything.
00:31:01.680
You know, like back before I came out and I would have like partners.
00:31:09.900
I got to make sure that the photos of my boyfriend are hit.
00:31:14.560
I was always just like, okay, how can I make sure that they think I'm a straight man
00:31:19.500
and make sure that I'm not going to be a threat to them at all.
00:31:24.260
And knowing that is like a trauma informed response.
00:31:31.080
That's also a reality for the audience in which that follows us.
00:31:34.340
And that means that I can talk to them in a way that men could never talk to them.
00:31:39.100
And I think that's like the huge leg up in this industry.
00:31:42.820
Trying to speak to people in a way that actually meets them where they're at rather than like,
00:31:50.240
This whole like there's only one right way to do everything is so stupid.
00:32:01.060
Because yeah, it's wild how quickly people devolve to like, you've got to be strong enough.
00:32:10.040
How dare you, you know, express any level of pain in a very physical taxing job.
00:32:16.580
As if they know anything about the person that they're talking down to.
00:32:31.560
Honestly, that book, writing that book has been an absolutely lovely experience.
00:32:41.560
I was like, oh my God, I'm actually good at this thing.
00:32:46.280
And I also had a whole bunch of other maintenance technicians look over the book and fact check stuff.
00:32:58.980
Like a literal guide for people who are too, like, they get too anxious or too nervous to, like, ask for help because they will be condescended to or discriminated against.
00:33:09.380
Everything in the book has, like, a lot of QR codes attached to it because some of us are visual learners.
00:33:17.580
And then there's an emotional reset after every single chapter.
00:33:21.420
And this emotional reset was basically because I know sometimes when we do this work where we feel like shit afterwards.
00:33:28.360
Like, oh, that's not how it was supposed to be.
00:33:30.880
And then emotional reset was there just to remind people that this is difficult.
00:33:41.520
So how was the writing process like for you when you were putting it together?
00:33:52.980
It was 100% really difficult to, like, get some of my ideas across.
00:33:57.800
But what I ended up doing was I just, like, voice memoed everything.
00:34:04.360
And that was kind of the most effective way for me to get my words out.
00:34:08.380
And to be honest, it then sounds like my voice more.
00:34:13.640
When I'm writing, I'm often, like, so concerned about exactly what word you're using.
00:34:22.760
But when I'm speaking to someone, it's more fluid.
00:34:28.320
And there's a level of authenticity and genuine support that that feels like.
00:34:34.800
One of my publishers actually told me that the voice is the hardest part to nail down when you're writing, like, a nonfiction book, for example.
00:34:43.980
It's really important that the voice is strong and it sounds like you.
00:34:47.740
And I think you doing it in voice notes probably made that so much easier.
00:34:51.180
I do not know if it would have the same impact if it wasn't the case.
00:34:55.320
You know, sometimes the obstacles in front of us actually make for a really cool result.
00:35:04.240
We're trying so hard sometimes to blend and to, like, hit the status quo.
00:35:09.460
But in reality, our biggest strengths are our differences.
00:35:12.460
And if we lean into that, other people who are going through the same thing will also relate and connect to those things.
00:35:19.840
So I'm going to transition really quickly into our topic.
00:35:32.780
Okay, so our topic for today is why terrible men on the internet think women and femmes aren't capable of working with tools or doing any sort of home maintenance, which I'm sure you've gotten.
00:35:43.120
Like you said, they're trying to nitpick you all the time.
00:35:47.120
And they think they're smarter than you, which is the real joke.
00:35:51.040
Okay, so this first video is a woman in a construction vest and hard hat.
00:35:55.140
She's posing at a construction site with a text.
00:35:57.400
You're breaking up with me because I'm a construction worker.
00:35:59.640
And the caption says, your favorite flagger type.
00:36:10.040
A flagger is someone that, like, stops traffic and tries to, like, you know, regulate traffic.
00:36:14.940
And they're basically the starting level of construction.
00:36:19.180
Almost every construction person, unless they do nepotism, straight up is a flagger first.
00:36:26.660
And I bet men think that they're better than her.
00:36:31.080
This one says, this comment says, that safety vest ain't even dirty or the hat must be new or you work in the office.
00:36:43.320
Whenever I get a new tool, and I show it in a video or something, there'll always be a man who's just like, it's not even dirty.
00:36:56.260
I mean, of course you know what a broken tool is.
00:37:06.000
Also, the only time that men really care what I look like at all is when they try to disprove or discredit me.
00:37:11.920
My nails are already the biggest thing that people comment on.
00:37:17.420
People will just be like, oh, your nails don't even look dirty.
00:37:24.860
If you don't wash your hands, thank you for letting everyone know.
00:37:32.980
Yeah, it's like we're not all disgusting and then somehow that means you're incapable.
00:37:39.400
Okay, this one says a flag person wouldn't consider that construction.
00:37:47.120
Because it's the same guys who talk about football and they're just like, kickers aren't really football players.
00:37:52.640
I'm like, no one who actually plays football feels that way.
00:37:58.860
Well, also, we're both at home and they're over there playing for a living.
00:38:04.500
One of the most dangerous jobs in all of construction is a flagger because they're the ones who put themselves closest to the traffic itself.
00:38:13.240
I think they're one of the most dangerous jobs in America.
00:38:21.760
They're literally on six lane highways standing in the middle.
00:38:24.680
So, I wouldn't be talking shit about someone who has the power to direct traffic into you.
00:38:30.740
They're like, why don't you come down here and hang out?
00:38:36.740
This last one says, my girls ain't working unless it's for me.
00:38:47.100
And I can't even imagine the kind of harassment that happens on those job sites.
00:38:54.120
I mean, you would hear people say this constantly on job sites.
00:38:57.320
People will be like, well, I don't want to hire her because she'll change the environment
00:39:01.800
or she'll, like, change how we talk to each other.
00:39:08.100
It's like, they're like, well, I'm so disgusting.
00:39:10.860
And if she comes in, she might report me for you.
00:39:24.760
And also, the other men around that, hearing that, are just like, yeah, mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
00:39:34.280
I even, I think recently I was doing, I forget what I was doing, but they asked me, they were
00:39:39.760
And someone asked me, like, they wrote in a question.
00:39:42.060
And they were like, oh, I really love my boyfriend, but he has a friend, a best friend that I hate
00:39:50.180
And that's my, that's his best friend, though, of, like, 10 years.
00:39:55.140
And I literally told the person I was on the show with, I was like, okay, well, that's
00:40:00.700
Either your boyfriend's secretly a terrible person and just doesn't show you, or he's a
00:40:07.140
I was like, he won't confront his best friend of 10 years if he's, like, a racist.
00:40:16.840
As someone who was secretly a man for, like, 30 years, I will let you know that, like, that's
00:40:23.800
If they're genuinely allowing that to happen around them, the chances are they agree, but
00:40:32.160
And whenever a man does speak up about it, they're eating at lunch alone.
00:40:36.880
Like, I was constantly exiled from male spaces.
00:40:40.380
Because whenever I would express an idea that was even remotely feminine, you know, they
00:40:46.120
would just be like, oh, no, you're one of the weak ones.
00:40:52.420
And it's like, oh, I don't take pleasure in being disgusting about women.
00:40:58.140
Men always like to talk about themselves as if they're wolves, you know?
00:41:01.680
You know, they're always talking about, like, you know, a pack or an alpha, you know?
00:41:13.660
I was like, a lot of men like that, like, truly believe that they're like Steve Rogers
00:41:18.060
and Captain America, like, so downtrodden and an underdog and then chosen for a higher
00:41:28.140
Steve Rogers would probably give you, like, a swirly.
00:41:39.680
Oh, Marvel Universe is being turned upside down.
00:41:47.000
And this one, this next video, this is a woman explains that she wanted to redo her backyard
00:41:52.180
deck, but a contractor quoted her that it would cost $32,000.
00:41:59.160
The video shows a time lapse of her process doing a full demo of the deck by herself.
00:42:03.780
And then several men in the comments had unsolicited opinions.
00:42:06.940
And this first one says, 32K, he was trying to rip you off because you're a woman.
00:42:16.340
I think that fems are very well aware of how we're treated in the world.
00:42:26.900
I'm like, oh, on the comment where I said that was a scam, I redid it myself.
00:42:30.600
And he's like, I think he was trying to rip you off.
00:42:37.160
I think it's just weird when your first reaction isn't to uplift someone who just did an awesome job of redoing something.
00:42:44.240
It's like, it's because you're a fucking woman.
00:42:48.080
Oh, I was afraid he was ripping me off for another reason that had nothing to do with me being an idiot.
00:42:52.740
I also think it has a lot to say about their lack of actually knowing what looks good.
00:42:57.640
Like, I think that men, when it comes to like, if you don't know enough about construction.
00:43:02.400
I think they genuinely just lean into insulting people because then it takes away from the fact that they don't know what a deck screw is.
00:43:13.700
And it's also like, when you were saying they correct you on, they're like, well, that's actually a this.
00:43:24.900
I thought we were talking about the tools, but apparently not.
00:43:43.100
This one says, I already knew what the end result was going to be before I finished the video.
00:43:55.420
The same people who don't know how to tuck in a shirt are always just like, that does
00:44:02.000
Neither does your dirty fucking ripped jeans coming to someone's wedding.
00:44:09.060
The guys who don't know how to trim a beard are so obsessed with it.
00:44:14.080
I've even like, my boyfriend has gotten, there were like, I forget, he got one comment from
00:44:19.700
They always call him like a cuck and a soy boy, whatever about my boyfriend.
00:44:23.640
And I was like, that is a wild thing to say about someone who could like body press.
00:44:29.480
Like your boyfriend could snap most of those men in half.
00:44:33.740
Mercury's met my boyfriend in person and he's a big man.
00:44:42.700
That is a sign of a truly confident man when they take up the size of their actual body
00:44:49.340
instead of taking up the size of an entire room and they're just so kind to somebody.
00:44:55.000
He actually told me that he loves watching your videos too because he didn't grow up with
00:45:00.660
Like he has a stepdad now and he's been in his life for a very long time and that's his
00:45:06.220
So he actually didn't learn a lot of stuff around the house.
00:45:08.660
And so he said he's watched your videos a lot to like learn more about how to help do
00:45:16.020
My audience has grown a lot towards men over the last couple of months.
00:45:20.780
It's been really, and it used to not feel great.
00:45:25.380
When there was a lot of men watching me, you could tell in the comment section.
00:45:31.160
Like there's a lot of men who are following me.
00:45:34.140
And it's also, it feels kind of like the men are like secretly following me.
00:45:38.100
Like they don't want their friends to know they don't know how to hold that tool.
00:45:41.880
They're just like, I don't want anyone to know that I have tool anxiety.
00:45:47.400
So I'm just going to make sure that I hold this tape measure and then not necessarily
00:46:01.020
This last comment says, look, I'm proud of you, but learn to swing a hammer.
00:46:10.120
This is what's funny is that the men who don't know how to swing a dick are always the same
00:46:14.960
men are like, that's not how you swing a hammer.
00:46:22.000
So we, we treat you fine about you just pounding away.
00:46:25.960
But as soon as you see a woman do it, you're like, no, all of a sudden you care about cadence,
00:46:39.140
I was, I'm shocked that you predicted every single comment.
00:46:46.400
I'm like, I find it so fascinating that they continue to condescend to us and talk to us
00:46:59.700
Like, even when people ask me, how do I deal with hate?
00:47:01.720
How do I deal with like them calling me fat and ugly?
00:47:03.480
I'm like, that's the only thing they call me, girl.
00:47:07.160
I it's, it's so the content doesn't get any wittier or more clever.
00:47:11.380
It literally just, it's just a repeat cycle of the same shit.
00:47:15.720
And the rare times, the rare times that they say something original, I genuinely laugh.
00:47:23.720
It's like, sometimes I'm like, okay, that was kind of funny.
00:47:26.600
Sometimes someone said, I dyed my hair orange a few weeks ago.
00:47:32.500
And someone said that I don't take any advice for anyone who cosplays vitamin C.
00:47:40.760
I was on the floor being like, that's so funny.
00:47:44.340
And they had like a super straight symbol in their bio.
00:47:56.140
I want to say a few months ago, but it was just like, I could tell it was someone young.
00:48:01.120
You know how sometimes you could tell they're young?
00:48:19.020
I just want to like put it on a bulletin board for everyone to see and be like, see, this
00:48:26.000
If you're going to treat me like shit, please come at me the same way that I would come at
00:48:32.680
I know you're just like me in the sense that you use hate comments a lot of times to farm
00:48:45.620
I like how when I'm like creatively bankrupt and I have no idea what to do.
00:48:49.820
I'll like see a comment and be like, thank you for the content.
00:48:55.220
I literally sometimes I got a hate comment the other day and I was like, oh, thank God
00:49:01.680
I was just like, I haven't posted in five days.
00:49:08.480
I'm like, damn, I need to go look in old videos, find a hate comment or something.
00:49:11.320
There was someone who said like a terrible thing to me on Instagram like a week ago and
00:49:16.520
then I just like did a very nice response to them and I used it for a clout and then
00:49:21.880
I posted what I said to them and it went viral and I'm like, thank you for paying my rent
00:49:28.440
I'm always like my business stands on the shoulders of men who hate me.
00:49:34.360
The meaner you are to me and the women around me, the more that I'm going to exist in the
00:49:43.880
I was like, you'll never stop and then I'll never stop and then it's when.
00:50:02.580
Well, we've talked about so many wonderful things, but just to kind of wrap up with a
00:50:07.800
pretty little bow at the end, what would you say is your best piece of advice for anyone,
00:50:12.560
however they identify, if they're maybe a little nervous about home maintenance or anything
00:50:17.240
regarding taking care of their home and they don't know what to do, what would you say
00:50:22.100
is your best piece of advice for them when seeking help or information or whatever it
00:50:29.440
The best advice that I ever heard about my transition was when people told me that you're
00:50:36.400
going through a second puberty as an adult in front of people.
00:50:40.340
And I think that when we are younger, we make room for people to learn new things, right?
00:50:46.260
But when they get to adulthood, we immediately thrust.
00:50:51.520
Just think about it the same way that you would think about me learning how to be my authentic
00:51:02.140
And you're making space for me to make mistakes.
00:51:04.680
If you do that for me, you should do it for yourself.
00:51:07.340
And I think that it's a really smart way to be like, once we learn compassion for others,
00:51:13.860
It's really easy for us to forget a bit about being compassionate to ourself.
00:51:30.860
For any trans people that maybe want to make content and maybe are a little fearful of
00:51:36.340
existing online because it is as beautiful and amazing and as fostering community as
00:51:42.540
it can be, it can also be very scary and very dark.
00:51:45.560
So what would you say is your best piece of advice for any trans person that maybe wants
00:51:51.340
Look, they're going to make fun of you no matter what.
00:51:53.420
They're going to make fun of you behind your back, in front of you.
00:51:56.500
They're going to make fun of you upside down and all the way around.
00:51:59.220
But if you can use that, use it for ammunition and use it for fuel, that is the best way
00:52:07.140
And I think that we're so scared of what people are going to say, but honey, they're going
00:52:13.460
And being afraid of other people's opinions about you does not have to be your reality.
00:52:17.520
So take up that same space and let's fucking show people how trans girls and trans men
00:52:26.280
Well, thank you so much for coming on the show.
00:52:40.060
You can find me on Instagram for Mercury Stardust Tops.
00:52:45.340
You can find me on YouTube and TikTok and Facebook.
00:52:48.640
And then, also, in any book place near you, Safe and Sound are in your friendly guide to
00:52:57.360
And please follow Mercury on literally everything.
00:52:59.820
But everybody who follows my show should be following Mercury already.
00:53:03.460
Because my show is truly for famous drag queens and gay people and trans people.
00:53:13.980
I've only had one, two, three, four straight men.
00:53:24.140
Is my boyfriend said, if you think about it, those numbers, that's like how many good
00:53:29.180
It's like only four out of, he's like one in 16.
00:53:32.340
If you're not speaking up against patriarchy, you are speaking with patriarchy.
00:53:41.480
Make sure y'all follow Mercury on literally everything and support her and buy her book
00:53:47.300
Thank you so much for joining us on this episode of the comment section.
00:53:49.780
Don't forget, new episodes drop every Wednesday.
00:53:51.760
You can listen to the audio on all streaming platforms or you can watch the video, which
00:53:57.740
Thank you so much to my amazing guest, Mercury.
00:53:59.520
Thank you all for watching and I'll see you next week.