Twitter has been so nice today.
Before I launch into the explosion of videos and stories currently lighting up social media for International Transgender Day of Visibility, though, writer and comedian Shon Faye asks us to pause and re-think what visibility means–often, highlighting photogenic people who are “younger, prettier, non-disabled and white” and ignoring “trans men and non-binary people.” She smartly notes that transgender people’s struggle ties into daily oppression which society ignores in general, such as poverty, police brutality, and homelessness. She writes:
[I am never invited on television or radio] to discuss cases like that of “Ms C”, a trans woman in my hometown of Bristol, who was stripped naked, pepper-sprayed and assaulted by police officers who taunted her by asking if she was a “man or a woman today” in the hours after she had tried to kill herself in 2015.
Media outlets are rarely interested when I tell them about Jo, a homeless trans woman from Bristol, whose possessions were set alight by tormentors while she was at church.
And visibility, she adds, comes at a price; she notes a 45% rise in transphobic hate crime in England and Wales in 2017.
And on this side of the pond, this fucker keeps banning transgender people from serving in the military, this bathroom shit is stupid and endless, and the Trump administration’s Department of Health and Human Services opened the door for doctors to deny treatment to transgender patients on religious grounds.
But still–Twitter has been so nice today.
A Fantastic Woman won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film this year, which forced Chile’s congress to address proposed transgender rights legislation. The cast was received by former Chilean president Michelle Bachelet, after which star Daniela Vega gave a televised speech on the need for trans people to be allowed to legally change their names.