I tried an experiment to see if I was being discriminated against and it went exactly how I was afraid of.
So a bit of background: I moved to a new city about 2 months ago and have struggled to find a consistent full time job the entire time. I had no problem getting interviews, but at the interviews the managers were either distant and cold and ghosted me, or were very direct in telling me I wasn't what they wanted.
I kept chalking it up to my schedule, but it wasn't sitting well with me because of everything on my resume and my references, that shouldn't have been an issue.
So on Thursday I decided to test something. I changed the name on my resume back to my dead name and sent it to a job that I knew I was qualified for. I got a callback VERY quickly and they were very excited and scheduled an interview for yesterday. I didn't shave all weekend, wore no makeup to the interview, bought a men's button up, acted like "one of the boys". It was night and day INSTANTLY. While other lower level jobs said my experiences didn't mean much, these interviewers basically threw themselves at my feet and offered me the job on the spot.
I really don't know how to process this, I don't think it explains EVERY failed interview, I do think it sheds a new light on some of them. I was under the impression that this area I moved to was more accepting but based on this experience I don't know whether to continue believing that.