Today is Trans* Day of Remembrance, a time to reflect on the violence perpetrated against transgender people. It’s also a good time to acknowledge that the majority of people affected by anti-transgender violence and murder are trans women of colour, trans women of colour sex workers, lower class trans women, non-binary trans* POC, and non-binary/trans* people from non-western countries. While violence can be experienced by any trans* persyn; racism, misogyny and classism, amongst other forms of discrimination, are massive factors in the ongoing abuse of trans* people. It’s important to recognize that it’s not just transphobia that kills trans* people, it’s the intersections of all these oppressions. As a privileged white trans* persyn living in Australia, I’m trying to think about how I can respectfully mourn the deaths of hundreds of trans* people each year, without co-opting this day to be about me and my experiences of transgender based violence.
- Casper Silver Swiftheart
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One important way to support the TDOR is to not always say “trans people” make up almost all those remembered when what we’re almost completely talking about is staight-ID’d trans women of color. Yes, there are some MAAB gender variant people of color as well, but to just say “people” basically robs these women of their gender. Another way is to respect the TDOR is to understand it is a memorial, not “happy trans day” nor “a downer” because it has a narrow, very specific and serious focus.
Other important aspects of respecting those who died is to not have white, middle class (and often FAAB) persons being self-appointed spokepersons for the memorial (or to willingly give in to be denoted as such by clueless media). I’ve seen several different videos featuring Masen Davis… a white trans man who does much good at the Transgender Law Center, but shouldn’t be the person interviewed as the “face of the TDOR.” Also, if someone white, middle class or, especially, FAAB is, at some point, murdered, don’t react to it all out of proportion to how you react to any of the other 265 faces of the TDOR in 2012. Far too many TDOR ceremonies still include Brandon Teena (murdered almost 20 years ago) to basically make FAAB queer and trans people feel included and completely leave out hundreds of black and latina trans women who were murdered this year because… well, there’s just too many of them to mention. That’s not right and not respectful to the memory of those women.