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Part of GrrrlFever Zine Issue #2
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Posts tagged LGBT
It’s an all too common, if shocking story: A transgender Latina woman with HIV is attacked on a street close to her home in a low-income neighborhood in the Bay Area. Making a bad situation worse, police officers literally drag her from her bed at 6 a.m. because they think she committed the crime herself.
“They kept telling her she wasn’t who she was, and that she was a man,” explained María Carolina Morales of the San Francisco-based Communities United Against Violence as she recounted the incident to Colorlines. “She was arrested. She was taken to the station. She wasn’t listened to. She spent the weekend in jail.”
The woman went to court a month after her arrest, but disappeared shortly after her court date.
“She was somebody who was unemployed, who didn’t have a safety net,” noted Morales. “We don’t know if she ran away, if she ended up in jail or [was] transferred to another place, another city. Her phone was disconnected the day after court. We just don’t know—don’t know what happened.”
The National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs released its annual report on hate violence motivated by sexual orientation, gender identity and expression and HIV status last week. The report documents 27 anti-LGBT murders in 2010, which is the second highest annual total recorded since 1996. A whopping 70 percent of these 27 victims were people of color; 44 percent of them were transgender women.
The study also found that transgender people and people of color are each twice as likely to experience violence or discrimination as non-transgender white people. Transgender people of color are also almost 2.5 times as likely to experience discrimination as their white peers.
“It wasn’t a shock,” said Morales, whose organization is among the 17 anti-violence programs from across the country that contributed data to the NCAVP report. “For the last four years we’ve seen that trend—of transgender women and people of color in our communities experiencing higher levels of violence. Sadly that continues.”
Recent headlines certainly bear witness to this disturbing trend.
A Milwaukee judge sentenced Andrew Olaciregui to an 11-year prison sentence in December after he pleaded guilty to shooting Chanel Larkin three times in the head on a street corner in May 2010. Prosecutors maintain Olaciregui shot Larkin after he offered to pay her $20 to perform a sex act and found out she was transgender. Larkin was 26 at the time of her death.
In another high-profile case, Hakim Scott and Keith Phoenix both received decades-long prison sentences last summer for their role in the death of Ecuadorian immigrant José Sucuzhañay on a Brooklyn street in December 2008. Prosecutors contend Scott and Phoenix shouted anti-gay and anti-Latino slurs at Sucuzhañay as they attacked him with a baseball bat and bottles.
Juan José Matos Martínez received a 99-year prison sentence in May 2010 after he pleaded guilty to stabbing gay Puerto Rican teenager Jorge Steven López Mercado to death before decapitating, dismembering and partially burning his body and dumping it along a remote roadside in November 2009.
So what causes disproportionate rates of violence against transgender people and queer people of color?
“What the 2010 report allows us to do is document something we’ve seen and experienced for a long time,” said Ejeris Dixon of the New York City Anti-Violence Project, which wrote the bulk of the NCAVP report. “It’s really about an intersection of oppression.”
Dixon, who was a long-time staffer at Brooklyn-based Audre Lorde Project until she joined AVP earlier this year, said a lack of employment, housing and health care for transgender people all contribute to disproportionate rates of violence. Morales said that ongoing police harassment against these communities is an additional factor, making those most at-risk for hate violence also least likely to seek help.
“All of those things sanction violence,” said Dixon.
The NCAVP report found that half of those who experienced hate violence did not contact the police after their attack. The report further found that 25.4 percent of transgender women did not file a report. So what can be done to reduce these rates of violence against LGBT people and communities of color?
The Audre Lorde Project is among the groups that organize LGBT people in communities of color that are increasingly looking beyond law enforcement and the criminal justice system for a solution. The Safe OUTside the System Collective works with bodegas, businesses and organizations within Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood and surrounding areas to create safe spaces for LGBT people of color to curb violence.
“What’s true and important is our communities have been and continue to organize around issues of harassment—whether it’s neighborhood or community harassment or [harassment] by the police,” said Kris Hayashi, executive director of the Audre Lorde Project.
Morales stressed that empowering transgender people and people of color to participate in decision making processes around employment, health care, improved access to food and affordable housing is another key component to addressing the problem. “For that, our organizations and institutions need to prioritize opening spaces for people to develop their leadership, to be able to engage, to learn and make decisions and so that they can see themselves not only reflected, but see themselves in the process.”
Another potential solution is for anti-violence programs to tackle some of the underlying disparities that contribute to increased violence against LGBT people and people of color.
“That can mean a lot of things: We can talk about low-cost programs, intersections with immigration rights groups,” said Dixon. “It’s about crafting programming that focuses on these populations and also developing leadership of LGBT people of color and trans people.”
While Morales conceded these most recent statistics are grim, she said she remains hopeful that they will allow her organization and others around the country to develop more effective strategies to tackle hate violence. She stressed, however, this hasn’t happened as much as she would like to see.
“It hasn’t been significantly stepped up enough,” said Morales, referring to strategies to further engage community members in the solution. “However, I have seen a lot more conversations and dialogue opening up around the community—the prison population continues to significantly increase every year, and violence continues to increase. I don’t believe its working. COAV doesn’t believe its working. I am hopeful [the report] will open up more opportunities to question the strategy to violence response.”
And this is why more visibility of LGBTQ POCs is so crucial. The endless parade of Pretty White Boy Love and the lack of [trans*] women of color plays into how this reality consistently gets ignored.
A guide to being an ally for friends and family of LGBT*QIA individuals.
Online ebook available [HERE] if you would like to share with others but do not wish to link to your tumblr. (Also, it’s fun to turn the pages.)
Original size 20x24” posters available for educational purposes. Contact me directly for files.
Everyone!!! Needs this!!!
Huh. So that’s what the term for it is (demisexual, which describes me perfectly. Just didn’t know there was a term for it). So I’m demisexual then~
Random rant about demisexuality in sexual identity discourse (not really in response to you Evelyn. ily you’re awesome and I’m not actually referring to you)
This isn’t so much a rant about the existence of the term or people’s desire to list random things about themselves. I repeat - this isn’t about people who randomly list demisexuality as a thing about themselves in their about me section alongside their love of grilled cheese and cats. It’s more of a rant about a lot of people’s growing desire to include Demi as a part of being a group that requires allies or is not already super accepted in society.
(Disclaimer - writing this as someone who fits the category of “Demisexual”)
Having the characteristic of only being attracted sexually to people you’re already romantically/emotionally bonded with is totally a super common actual thing (I fit that description as well - I find it difficult to be sexually attracted to people who I feel like I’m not emotionally bonded to via friendship/romantic feelings first), but I’ve seen a lot of people use it in terms of a sexual orientation, which I find imprecise in terms of categorization (because you can be “demi sexual” and still also be straight, bi/pan, or Lesbian/Gay). Sure, it’s interesting to know that that sort of thing has a name, but it’s so extremely common and fluid and not really all that categorized in society that I find it unnecessary in terms of the a lot of the sexual identity discourse (this sentence is worded weirdly - it is expanded on/clarified later in my post i think). Being sexually attracted to people only after you’re romantically/emotionally attracted to them is generally expected if you’re the type of person who has a particular view of the role of sexuality in your personal life (if you grew up with the conviction that for your personal life that sexual activity is only for people you love then that’s going to affect how open you are with comfort-zones and sexual attraction).
And while that characteristic is totally a thing that people can use to categorize themselves, I find that people who try to espouse demi-sexual as a main component of their sexual identity have some strange desire to differentiate themselves from people who are more open with their willingness to have sexual activity (those people that say “I can’t ever imagine having a one night stand or wanting to have sex with someone I just met so therefore I’m demi”).
I feel like part of what bothers me about how I’ve seen demi-sexuality used in sexual identity discourse as a whole is that I’ve seen so many people use it to make themselves feel like a special snowflake for not feeling like participating in more promiscuous behavior. And imo that’s such a subjective thing that I’m not sure it can be related to an “identity”. Levels of comfort with participating in promiscuity and varying personal needs for more emotional intimacy before physical intimacy is not really all that relevant to conversations about identity or being an “ally” because being demi-sexual is not an ostracized group that requires allies or a group that needs to differentiate itself in identity as a social statement of general attitudes/feelings like “queer” does. The only time it’s even remotely relevant is when we’re talking about people who are asexual (because asexual peaople/people close to Asexual on the spectrum actually do face a lot of erasure and issues related to that front) on some spectrum of Asexual-grayasexual-demisexual-sexual imo, or am I making an incorrect assumption?
But it’s really not all that relevant and I find that demi-sexuality has only been emerging in identity discourse as a reaction to the popular representation of hook-up culture. “Demisexual” isn’t a persecuted group (and actually faces even less social stigma than people who are more open with sexual attraction/activity because they don’t face as much slut-shaming in our absurd rape culture).
So I feel like as a non-persecuted group, the idea of coming out as demi after finding out there’s a word for it is as silly as coming out non-ironically for other non-oppressed identities. It’s like saying “I found out that being cisgender is a name of the gender identity I have so I’m going to come out as cis” or “I’m going to come out as straight after finding out there’s a word for it”. Like, it’s not terrible and people have a right to classify themselves- BUT there is this weird thing I’ve been seeing where people feel like they need to come out as demi the way some would one would come out as trans* or pan or bi —- it’s different to come out as a group that is oppressed because creating visibility gets rid of stigma and has an actual impact in changing societal comfort level and views about non-cis, non-hetero, etc feelings so that people realize that they’re not alone in their struggles with certain feelings. And Demi isn’t one of those groups.
Being demi is a grouping included in the range of variations that are so accepted and ingrained into the mainstream non-queer culture’s idea of “normal” variations that it doesn’t need the same treatment that other groups have. Eventually we want a society where people don’t HAVE to “come out” as gay or trans* or what have you because being those things is so accepted as a part of variations in being human. People who are “demi” already have that privilege.
Like, I feel like I personally don’t feel the need to distinguish myself as “demi” because there are other parts of my identity that actually require attention in discourse and public change of assumptions (being bi/pan) because being demi doesn’t make you a special snowflake. Being demi doesn’t affect societies institutional reactions to/assumptions about your existence (other than maybe occasionally being called a prude). It doesn’t affect your freedoms or what people think of who you are. If I told my mom and some other groups of people that I was bisexual she/they would probably beat me/physically abuse me and tell me I was going to Hell. If I told everyone I only feel sexually attracted to people after I get to know them and have become emotionally/romantically bonded, NO ONE WOULD CARE. The “demi” identity is one that doesn’t require people to be come out so that they feel less alone because they aren’t made to feel like freaks. And eventually we need to bring all the other groups into that sphere of comfort where they have the freedom to have variation and experiment with experiences and preferences and society not caring at all or making assumptions about what kind of person they are. Where people don’t have to “come out” in a heteronormative/gender-binary society.
I feel like the time when it’s appropriate to “come out” as demisexual/straight/cis/what have you if it’s alongside asexuals/LGBTQ/other groups in terms of expressing the spectrum of human existence (like on coming out day). Or if for some reason you were previously identified by others as another group and you want to clarify the truth.
I acknowledge that it’s cool that there’s a name for some characteristic about yourself. But I think we have to remember that a lot of these movements and communities we’re working on need to focus on groups and ideas that actually need the acceptance.
bilingual my ass. your either heterolingual or homolingual
#it’s just a phase #you’ll meet a nice language and settle down
I have a lot of respect for all my trans* friends because they basically have to educate every person they meet. Like can you imagine doing that every day? Exhausting.
Mandy Duan (left), 26, and Cat Liao, 25
Homosexuality is still viewed as a sickness in Chinese society. Duan, a graphic designer, and her girlfriend, Liao, a shop clerk, both left their hometowns for Beijing, where there are growing underground support networks. They met at a lesbian gathering and have been dating for a year. It’s still common for gays to marry straight spouses to hide their sexuality. At 19, Liao’s parents discovered she was gay and forced her to marry a man. Now divorced, she had to give up custody of her daughter to her ex-husband. There are a few positive signs of gay acceptance, however, such as the recent lifting of a state ban on lesbians giving blood.
I’m not quite comfortable with the painting of their struggle as fundamentally Chinese, given that we’ve got the Red Cross forbidding gay men from giving blood. Still, they’re cute and it’s nice to see lesbians(rather than gay men or straight women like Katy Perry) portrayed as a face of the queer rights movement in any context.
Lesbian Disney Princess <3
Thank you guys for all those notes! To celebrate my 40,000 views on my Gay Disney Princes, here are my lesbian princesses. Hope you guys like them :)
this is literally the best post I’ve ever seen
Bwaha, the glitter.
seriously the best thing ever
I think bisexuals indeed experience more (personalized) negative response from the GGGG community (note that lesbians are also marginalized), but the overwhelming majority of erasure, pathologization, denial and silencing comes from the straight population and culture. Think of it this way: if bisexuality was accepted by the straight population, then bisexuals wouldn’t at all have need of joining LGBT communities. Seeing as we’re not even close, we seek out those communities as refuge – and subsequently experience rejection and end up heartbroken. But the reason that inner-LGBT biphobia feels more painful to us than straight biphobia isn’t that it’s more common or really worse, it’s simply because it’s more personal, coming from where we least expect it, from where we came seeking support.
bidyke (2011)
Earlier this year, we interviewed six LGBT candidates running for offices around the country. Now that the dust has settled in the election, we check back in with them to see who won. (Spoiler alert: mostly good news!)
Coming Out Day
It’s that time of year - National Coming Out Day. “Coming out” is the term used for telling people that your sexuality is something other than straight. It’s a massive step for many people, but should only be taken when one is ready and IF one wants to. I’d love there to be a situation where ‘straight’ wasn’t the default in society and there was no need to come out, but the reality of today is different. So to my LGBT community who aren’t ‘out’, don’t feel pressured to do so. Do what’s right for you as an individual. I pray the time comes when we can live our lives the way we see fit. Until then, know that the mods at IANH are always here for you.
-Naeem
