I sat on a leather couch in a glass room, staring up at three faces I had just disappointed.
I had just turned down a major ad campaign, and my agents were not pleased. They called me into the agency headquarters straight after my freshman virtual reality programming class, as if I’d been caught cheating on a test, when all I had done was “no.”
In the room, I tried to explain: the company had a history of disregarding the environment and had made racist remarks in the past. To me, joining their campaign felt wrong.
Looking at their faces, I could tell my words evaporated before they even landed.
“Listen,” one of them finally said, “That kind of money is like a down payment on a house.”
It was true. Plus, I had just come out of one of the most financially vulnerable periods of my life. As a Deaf, trans artist in college, that paycheck could have paid disability bills, health insurance, and rent. A small voice in my head reminded me: these opportunities won’t last forever. As a trans and disabled person, the inevitable costs of medical and gender-affirming care would only grow with time.
It was a privilege to even be offered that much money—so much so that I’ve never spoken about this moment publicly. How do you balance gratitude for an offer most people never get with the guilt of turning it down?
That’s the trap for marginalized artists: our ethics are entangled with our survival inside capitalism. Saying “no” gave me peace, but it also closed doors. I haven’t been offered any projects that pay close to that much since, especially in today’s political climate.
Looking back, I see that my decision wasn’t just about one paycheck. And it was made based on the illusion of a moral binary. My agents told me, “You being part of the campaign would cause more good than bad.” At 18, they almost convinced morality worked that way.
I couldn’t control the company’s environmental practices. But I would have had complete…
