“Being LGBTQ , mahu wahine or mahu kane, and to be viewed at as wrong is actually a colonized point of view in a sense, where that has been a part of our history and our DNA from the start ...

“It is meant to reinstate the rightful place that mahu have between kane and wahine,” Wong-Kalu said, using the Hawaiian words for man and woman. The crowd erupted in raucous cheers and applause.

I also grew up being called “mahu.” Back when we did speak the Hawaiian language, there was the word “mahu kane” for trans man and “mahu wahine” for trans woman.