Dangerous Ideas

One of my first personal close experiences with injustice in our society was the murder of Vincent Chin. My mom worked for General Motors at the time (she never met him in person) and was involved early in the fight for justice for him. Until activists made an issue of it, the murder of Chin by two white laid-off auto workers didn’t make waves.

Bigotry-motivated murders are still happening regularly, and still being underreported. Although the brutal murders of Brandon Teena and Gwen Araujo are well known, the Transgender Day of Remembrance Web site notes that more than one person a month has died because of their gender expression:

The Transgender Day of Remembrance was set aside to memorialize those who were killed due to anti-transgender hatred or prejudice. The event is held in November to honor Rita Hester, whose murder on November 28th, 1998 kicked off the “Remembering Our Dead” web project and a San Francisco candlelight vigil in 1999. Rita Hester’s murder — like most anti-transgender murder cases — has yet to be solved.

Although not every person represented during the Day of Remembrance self-identified as transgendered — that is, as a transsexual, crossdresser, or otherwise gender-variant — each was a victim of violence based on bias against transgendered people.

We live in times more sensitive than ever to hatred based violence, especially since the events of September 11th. Yet even now, the deaths of those based on anti-transgender hatred or prejudice are largely ignored. Over the last decade, more than one person per month has died due to transgender-based hate or prejudice, regardless of any other factors in their lives. This trend shows no sign of abating.

Given the recent news about stripping gender identity protection from ENDA and that the stories of Brandon Teena and Gwen Araujo it’s almost surprising that the Day of Remembrance isn’t more widely covered. The Day of Remembrance has been going on for nine years. I’m on several LGBT mailing lists but only only one of them – Equality North Carolina – sent out a mailing mentioning the event. Of course, the HRC is one of the other organizations whose mailing list I’m on. They’re the organization I think of first when people talk about how same sex marriage is a rich gay white person’s issue. I don’t think that’s true, of course – marriage equality affects everyone – but I can see how people might come to think so if they see the HRC as a leading LGBT org.

Ironically, as Lambda Legal notes, removing protection for gender identity from ENDA cripples the act not just for transfolk, but for many others:

Lambda Legal’s preliminary assessment of the revised version of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act shows the bill to be riddled with loopholes in addition to failing altogether to protect transgender people against discrimination.

“Leaving out protections for transgender people is unacceptable, and passing a bill riddled with loopholes will make it harder to achieve equality on the job,” said Kevin Cathcart, Executive Director at Lambda Legal. “You can’t be fired for being lesbian, gay or bisexual but you can be fired if your boss thinks you fit their stereotype of one.”

FYI, one creative way some artists have marked the day is the Transgender Day of Remembrance Web Comics Project.