Mitch Nivalis
DR: Could you talk about your experience of being part of the
LGBTQIA+ community in Central Regional Victoria?
I think I've never had a really strong connection to community in terms of LGBTQIA+ throughout my life but when I landed here it was just incredible. I was a little bit nervous because my town is a tiny little pocket of Regional Victoria. There are no shops, like it's pretty remote, and I was really nervous about where I might have landed, but it turned out the queerness in this town is above the normal average. A lot of my neighbors are LGBTQIA+, and we've been able to form really great friendships and have such a great sense of community. For me, that became even stronger when I joined my footy team in Castlemaine – it’s been such an incredible experience. I can't quite describe how much that's changed my life in terms of being connected to a queer community but also a community full of allies. It's been really affirming and come at a really important time in my life. I couldn't have asked to be in a better place really in terms of that connection.
DR: What do you mean by important time in your life?
MN: I am doing a Masters and my project is on the footy club. Within that project I've had to dig in a lot to what it means to be included or excluded in sport, and also more broadly in society. The way the club has set up their foundations and their culture has allowed me, as part of the project, to really reflect on my own experiences. So I've unpacked a lot of things and realised how my experiences have affected me. The support of the Falcons and this community has just been incredible. So, yeah, I guess to reach 42 and have a lot of realisations around the way homophobia and people's discomfort with gender – all of that sort of stuff – has affected me. Having my Falcons teammates and this community around me has just … It's been amazing.
DR: Can you talk a little bit more about that homophobia and people's response to gender, and how that's impacted you?
MN: Yeah. Where do I start? I came out when I was 21, I think. And that was really difficult. I left the country in order to come out because I felt like I couldn’t do that where I was, where I'd grown up and around the people that I knew. And I probably didn't even realise I was gay until about 21. It was buried so deep because it was just not safe where I grew up to be gay.
DR: Where was that?
MN: South of Sydney, in a suburb in the Sutherland Shire. In the 80s and 90s it was very homophobic – lots of gay bashing. The soccer oval I played at was called Poofters Paradise and guys would go gay bashing there because it was a known beat. So, I was really aware from a young age that it was not ok to be gay. I had buried that so deep, I had no idea about my sexuality. But what did cause a lot of problems, which I couldn't hide, was the way I expressed my gender. I just was never comfortable with gender roles. So the things that I liked to do were often known as ‘boy things’, and that would cause problems. People were really uncomfortable with that. For me there was a lot of hurt around how I was treated, how I was expected to look and dress. There was a lot of peer pressure to look like a girl. I would try to conform in that way for a really long time and it just made me really miserable. I guess part of the reason I left the country was to try to get away from how I was growing up and who I was surrounded by, and try to find other people. That was the impetus. Once I left the country and started meeting a whole world of weird and wonderful people, that's when I was able to explore my sexuality and come out. I needed to stay away for years really before I could come back and feel like I could communicate who I was to the people at home.
DR: Where did you go?
MN: Everywhere. I was pretty aimless, I started in London but then I ended up living on a beach in Turkey, and then Edinburgh, and then a remote indigenous community in Costa Rica. It was a bit random. I would just meet someone and they’d say some place is good, so I would get on a plane and go there. I was pretty nomadic.
DR: Fantastic. Can you talk about your relationship and your thoughts on gender in general?
MN: Yeah, I identify as non-binary because I think the way we’ve constructed gender in our society is incredibly damaging. I don’t think this is a queer thing – I think it’s damaging for everyone. The way men are expected to behave and be is incredibly damaging, not just for men, but obviously for women as well. A lot of research has gone into the key drivers of family violence and the way we’ve constructed masculinity has a lot to answer for. What I love about sitting in the middle is that I can be either or both or neither, and move between. I’m really comfortable expressing what we traditionally know as femininity, and I’m also really comfortable being more masculine. I express those characteristics, I guess, based on the situation that I’m in. I feel like that’s a really healthy space to be, although I’m aware that it makes people uncomfortable also. People like to put you in a box. Kids ask me if I’m a boy or a girl. People are often confused by who I am – they’re trying to figure me out. We have such a need to know because we treat people so differently based on whether we think they’re male or female. It’s kind of interesting from a sociological point of view. But it's a weird space to sit, and depending on the day, sometimes it really bothers me and other times I couldn’t care less what people think. They can deal with it themselves, and I'll just carry on.
DR: Can you think of a turning point, when you thought of something very affirmative in relation to your sexuality or gender identity?
MN: Yeah, there's been lots of them. Most recently its just been joining the footy club. It’s been such an incredible experience. I can’t quite describe how much that’s changed my life in terms of being connected to a queer community but also a community full of allies.
I think I’d only ever watched one game of footy before I turned up to the first training session with the Falcons. I was feeling like, I’m not sure why I’m turning up, but I’m interested. When I got there, they opened with an Acknowledgment of Country and we had to introduce ourselves with our pronouns. That immediately made me feel safe and comfortable. Like I could be exactly who I am and no one’s judging. That little action, I think, was really affirming for me. That was just a year ago, and that’s really the first space I’ve entered where it was good from the very beginning. I've not had to have any difficult conversations or educate anyone. I’m not a novelty in that space because the club has attracted so many queer people and people who are allies. It’s really the first time in my life that I’ve entered a space and felt like I don’t have to explain myself, and I’m completely accepted to present however I like.
DR: And the other things that come to mind – you said you could think of a few?
Yeah. I guess when I came out to myself, I had never met a gay person as far as I knew. So, I had no connection at all to queer people other than seeing Mardi Gras on TV, which didn’t resonate with me. So I was thinking, I’m gay, but I don't have any visibility to be sure. I spent a while feeling like, I really need to find someone to kiss to see if I’m right in thinking I would like that. I was walking home one night in London and walked past a woman. We kind of locked eyes, turned around, came back together, said hi, organised a date for the next night and had a pash. And I was just like, Holy shit, this is incredible! I’m right! I knew that I wasn’t feeling attracted to men, but I didn't know if that meant I was attracted to women or if someone like me who didn’t think of themselves as really butch – because that’s all I’d seen – would still fit that category. The stereotypes were so strong in the ’80s and ’90s and I didn’t feel like I fitted into them, so I was questioning if maybe there was just something wrong with me. I remember walking home after being with her, and thinking, I’m alive! Like I was feeling my body for the first time. It just felt incredible.
DR: What is it like being a couple in public space in Central regional Victoria?
MN: I think definitely in my town and absolutely in Castlemaine, it’s such an eclectic community and there’s a lot of people that have migrated to this area from Melbourne and other places. So, yeah, in no way, shape or form have I had one moment of feeling like someone’s staring or … you just don’t get that around here. It’s been all positive. I can’t think of a situation that has been uncomfortable here.
I just think regional Victoria in particular has really shifted and changed over the years. And Castlemaine has attracted quite an eclectic open-minded bunch of people. You can kind of do anything and no one would bat an eyelid.
DR: What about the period around the marriage plebiscite? Did the debate impact you much?
MN: Yeah, that was horrible. I really didn’t want to engage with it at all. Like I think I gave it as little attention as I could because I just didn’t … I’m sick of being hurt by hateful people basically. I went down a bit of a rabbit hole one day, reading some online comments about people saying horrible things. And so, I just switched off from the whole debate.
DR: Can you tell me a little bit about the film you’re making with the LGBTQIA+ community and the Falcons?
MN: The intention behind the project in the beginning was to use photography and video to challenge stereotypes and gender roles, and create more visibility for diversity, and that took on the form of footy – playing footy for the Mount Alexander Falcons. Because, I’d had such an affirming experience turning up to that club, I decided I wanted to play footy as well.
DR: So, that was a secondary outcome?
MN: Yeah. I had no intention of actually playing, I was expecting to just document some of the players. But because I felt so welcome and so affirmed, I just wanted to be part of it. And then it became, how can I be a footy player and create a documentary at the same time? That’s how I ended up putting cameras on my body to talk about what our bodies are capable of. Having GoPros on my body allowed me to collide with people and reframe strength and subvert the idea of masculinity. Becoming a teammate meant I had such a sense of trust with everyone. People started telling me their own stories. I'm also making a photo book – I interviewed 20 of our teammates and photographed everyone, and that's forming part of a book. People talking about their own experiences of inclusion and access. There's a lot of queer people on the team, so we're getting to share our own stories of how it feels – how it felt in the past, and how it feels now to be part of this space.
The biggest challenge for me in the project was, because I had the cameras on my body, it became clear that we needed to know who the body was in the film. I had a lot of meltdowns about that because of my history with how people see me. I didn't want to be visible, and I really struggled with the idea of being seen myself. It took me quite a while to come around to the idea that not only do I need to be seen for context in the film, but also it's important to create visibility for other people that maybe have been in similar situations to me.
So the project has been really confronting and has really challenged my own ethics around being a photographer and filmmaker, and working within community projects, and asking people to do something that I wasn't willing to do myself at the time. I really had to look at myself and I came to the conclusion that it's not ok. So I incorporated myself and my own story, and that's become the biggest part of the film really – my own journey within the Club's journey. It's allowed me to open up a lot of conversations. I hope the film allows people to see what is still happening today in terms of challenges and barriers for women and gender diverse people to access sport, and also the impact that it has on individual lives when we don't get access, and we aren't welcome and accepted in spaces.
DR: Why do you think it was such a challenge for you to be seen and be visible in the film?
MN: I think the message that I've got my whole life is that it's not ok to look like and be the way I am. It's one thing to get those messages in private spaces, one-on-one with people, family, and friends and whoever, but the idea of putting myself out into a public domain in a film that potentially will be seen by a few hundred people or a few million people … and knowing the way people respond online when they can say whatever they want, being bombarded with those kinds of messages, simply because people don't like the way I look or express myself. It was terrifying! And to be honest its still terrifying. I'll be putting in place a lot of systems to protect myself when the film is launched.
I think I've never had a really strong connection to community in terms of LGBTQIA+ throughout my life but when I landed here it was just incredible. I was a little bit nervous because my town is a tiny little pocket of Regional Victoria. There are no shops, like it's pretty remote, and I was really nervous about where I might have landed, but it turned out the queerness in this town is above the normal average. A lot of my neighbors are LGBTQIA+, and we've been able to form really great friendships and have such a great sense of community. For me, that became even stronger when I joined my footy team in Castlemaine – it’s been such an incredible experience. I can't quite describe how much that's changed my life in terms of being connected to a queer community but also a community full of allies. It's been really affirming and come at a really important time in my life. I couldn't have asked to be in a better place really in terms of that connection.
DR: What do you mean by important time in your life?
MN: I am doing a Masters and my project is on the footy club. Within that project I've had to dig in a lot to what it means to be included or excluded in sport, and also more broadly in society. The way the club has set up their foundations and their culture has allowed me, as part of the project, to really reflect on my own experiences. So I've unpacked a lot of things and realised how my experiences have affected me. The support of the Falcons and this community has just been incredible. So, yeah, I guess to reach 42 and have a lot of realisations around the way homophobia and people's discomfort with gender – all of that sort of stuff – has affected me. Having my Falcons teammates and this community around me has just … It's been amazing.
DR: Can you talk a little bit more about that homophobia and people's response to gender, and how that's impacted you?
MN: Yeah. Where do I start? I came out when I was 21, I think. And that was really difficult. I left the country in order to come out because I felt like I couldn’t do that where I was, where I'd grown up and around the people that I knew. And I probably didn't even realise I was gay until about 21. It was buried so deep because it was just not safe where I grew up to be gay.
DR: Where was that?
MN: South of Sydney, in a suburb in the Sutherland Shire. In the 80s and 90s it was very homophobic – lots of gay bashing. The soccer oval I played at was called Poofters Paradise and guys would go gay bashing there because it was a known beat. So, I was really aware from a young age that it was not ok to be gay. I had buried that so deep, I had no idea about my sexuality. But what did cause a lot of problems, which I couldn't hide, was the way I expressed my gender. I just was never comfortable with gender roles. So the things that I liked to do were often known as ‘boy things’, and that would cause problems. People were really uncomfortable with that. For me there was a lot of hurt around how I was treated, how I was expected to look and dress. There was a lot of peer pressure to look like a girl. I would try to conform in that way for a really long time and it just made me really miserable. I guess part of the reason I left the country was to try to get away from how I was growing up and who I was surrounded by, and try to find other people. That was the impetus. Once I left the country and started meeting a whole world of weird and wonderful people, that's when I was able to explore my sexuality and come out. I needed to stay away for years really before I could come back and feel like I could communicate who I was to the people at home.
DR: Where did you go?
MN: Everywhere. I was pretty aimless, I started in London but then I ended up living on a beach in Turkey, and then Edinburgh, and then a remote indigenous community in Costa Rica. It was a bit random. I would just meet someone and they’d say some place is good, so I would get on a plane and go there. I was pretty nomadic.
DR: Fantastic. Can you talk about your relationship and your thoughts on gender in general?
MN: Yeah, I identify as non-binary because I think the way we’ve constructed gender in our society is incredibly damaging. I don’t think this is a queer thing – I think it’s damaging for everyone. The way men are expected to behave and be is incredibly damaging, not just for men, but obviously for women as well. A lot of research has gone into the key drivers of family violence and the way we’ve constructed masculinity has a lot to answer for. What I love about sitting in the middle is that I can be either or both or neither, and move between. I’m really comfortable expressing what we traditionally know as femininity, and I’m also really comfortable being more masculine. I express those characteristics, I guess, based on the situation that I’m in. I feel like that’s a really healthy space to be, although I’m aware that it makes people uncomfortable also. People like to put you in a box. Kids ask me if I’m a boy or a girl. People are often confused by who I am – they’re trying to figure me out. We have such a need to know because we treat people so differently based on whether we think they’re male or female. It’s kind of interesting from a sociological point of view. But it's a weird space to sit, and depending on the day, sometimes it really bothers me and other times I couldn’t care less what people think. They can deal with it themselves, and I'll just carry on.
DR: Can you think of a turning point, when you thought of something very affirmative in relation to your sexuality or gender identity?
MN: Yeah, there's been lots of them. Most recently its just been joining the footy club. It’s been such an incredible experience. I can’t quite describe how much that’s changed my life in terms of being connected to a queer community but also a community full of allies.
I think I’d only ever watched one game of footy before I turned up to the first training session with the Falcons. I was feeling like, I’m not sure why I’m turning up, but I’m interested. When I got there, they opened with an Acknowledgment of Country and we had to introduce ourselves with our pronouns. That immediately made me feel safe and comfortable. Like I could be exactly who I am and no one’s judging. That little action, I think, was really affirming for me. That was just a year ago, and that’s really the first space I’ve entered where it was good from the very beginning. I've not had to have any difficult conversations or educate anyone. I’m not a novelty in that space because the club has attracted so many queer people and people who are allies. It’s really the first time in my life that I’ve entered a space and felt like I don’t have to explain myself, and I’m completely accepted to present however I like.
DR: And the other things that come to mind – you said you could think of a few?
Yeah. I guess when I came out to myself, I had never met a gay person as far as I knew. So, I had no connection at all to queer people other than seeing Mardi Gras on TV, which didn’t resonate with me. So I was thinking, I’m gay, but I don't have any visibility to be sure. I spent a while feeling like, I really need to find someone to kiss to see if I’m right in thinking I would like that. I was walking home one night in London and walked past a woman. We kind of locked eyes, turned around, came back together, said hi, organised a date for the next night and had a pash. And I was just like, Holy shit, this is incredible! I’m right! I knew that I wasn’t feeling attracted to men, but I didn't know if that meant I was attracted to women or if someone like me who didn’t think of themselves as really butch – because that’s all I’d seen – would still fit that category. The stereotypes were so strong in the ’80s and ’90s and I didn’t feel like I fitted into them, so I was questioning if maybe there was just something wrong with me. I remember walking home after being with her, and thinking, I’m alive! Like I was feeling my body for the first time. It just felt incredible.
DR: What is it like being a couple in public space in Central regional Victoria?
MN: I think definitely in my town and absolutely in Castlemaine, it’s such an eclectic community and there’s a lot of people that have migrated to this area from Melbourne and other places. So, yeah, in no way, shape or form have I had one moment of feeling like someone’s staring or … you just don’t get that around here. It’s been all positive. I can’t think of a situation that has been uncomfortable here.
I just think regional Victoria in particular has really shifted and changed over the years. And Castlemaine has attracted quite an eclectic open-minded bunch of people. You can kind of do anything and no one would bat an eyelid.
DR: What about the period around the marriage plebiscite? Did the debate impact you much?
MN: Yeah, that was horrible. I really didn’t want to engage with it at all. Like I think I gave it as little attention as I could because I just didn’t … I’m sick of being hurt by hateful people basically. I went down a bit of a rabbit hole one day, reading some online comments about people saying horrible things. And so, I just switched off from the whole debate.
DR: Can you tell me a little bit about the film you’re making with the LGBTQIA+ community and the Falcons?
MN: The intention behind the project in the beginning was to use photography and video to challenge stereotypes and gender roles, and create more visibility for diversity, and that took on the form of footy – playing footy for the Mount Alexander Falcons. Because, I’d had such an affirming experience turning up to that club, I decided I wanted to play footy as well.
DR: So, that was a secondary outcome?
MN: Yeah. I had no intention of actually playing, I was expecting to just document some of the players. But because I felt so welcome and so affirmed, I just wanted to be part of it. And then it became, how can I be a footy player and create a documentary at the same time? That’s how I ended up putting cameras on my body to talk about what our bodies are capable of. Having GoPros on my body allowed me to collide with people and reframe strength and subvert the idea of masculinity. Becoming a teammate meant I had such a sense of trust with everyone. People started telling me their own stories. I'm also making a photo book – I interviewed 20 of our teammates and photographed everyone, and that's forming part of a book. People talking about their own experiences of inclusion and access. There's a lot of queer people on the team, so we're getting to share our own stories of how it feels – how it felt in the past, and how it feels now to be part of this space.
The biggest challenge for me in the project was, because I had the cameras on my body, it became clear that we needed to know who the body was in the film. I had a lot of meltdowns about that because of my history with how people see me. I didn't want to be visible, and I really struggled with the idea of being seen myself. It took me quite a while to come around to the idea that not only do I need to be seen for context in the film, but also it's important to create visibility for other people that maybe have been in similar situations to me.
So the project has been really confronting and has really challenged my own ethics around being a photographer and filmmaker, and working within community projects, and asking people to do something that I wasn't willing to do myself at the time. I really had to look at myself and I came to the conclusion that it's not ok. So I incorporated myself and my own story, and that's become the biggest part of the film really – my own journey within the Club's journey. It's allowed me to open up a lot of conversations. I hope the film allows people to see what is still happening today in terms of challenges and barriers for women and gender diverse people to access sport, and also the impact that it has on individual lives when we don't get access, and we aren't welcome and accepted in spaces.
DR: Why do you think it was such a challenge for you to be seen and be visible in the film?
MN: I think the message that I've got my whole life is that it's not ok to look like and be the way I am. It's one thing to get those messages in private spaces, one-on-one with people, family, and friends and whoever, but the idea of putting myself out into a public domain in a film that potentially will be seen by a few hundred people or a few million people … and knowing the way people respond online when they can say whatever they want, being bombarded with those kinds of messages, simply because people don't like the way I look or express myself. It was terrifying! And to be honest its still terrifying. I'll be putting in place a lot of systems to protect myself when the film is launched.