Trans visibility day 20214/19/2023 ![]() Randall Leonard, LCSW-C (they/them/theirs) Transgender Day of Visibility is a day of celebration. It is an annual event that acknowledges the accomplishments of transgender and gender nonconforming people while raising awareness of the work that still needs to be done to achieve equal rights and trans justice. Beyond the community, the visibility of gender expansive and transgender people is an invitation to all people to grow into our fullest selves. Transgender actor and activist Laverne Cox rejects the idea that she’s a role model – she prefers to call herself a “possibility model." For a group of people who’ve so often had to invent a fulfilling adulthood from their own imagination, the journeys of other openly gender diverse people can offer profound validation, self-acceptance, and inspiration. Kate Bishop, Education Coordinator (she/her/hers) We asked several members of the Center to discuss what transgender visibility, and the day of celebration, means to them: Across our clinics, our health care teams are trained to provide health care specific to the needs of transgender and gender non-confirming individuals. ![]() Unlike Transgender Day of Remembrance, observed annually on November 20 to remember those who have lost their lives to anti-transgender violence, Transgender Day of Remembrance honors the lives of transgender and gender non-confirming individuals around the world.Īt Chase Brexton, our Center for LGBTQ Health Equity is home to the Gender Journeys of Youth (JOY) program, providing expert health care services for transgender and gender diverse children and adolescents, and their families. As complicated as Trans Day of Visibility may be, know this: our liberation is beautiful.Each year, March 31 is celebrated internationally as Transgender Day of Visibility, an important chance to celebrate the successes and contributions of transgender and gender non-conforming individuals. Trans liberation is woven into the colors and syllables of this art. We aimed to not just create images we don’t see enough, but to create in radically different ways, through collaborative processes that center trans people of color and value the labor of artists at every step. This art is part of national campaigns that Forward Together has nurtured over the past four years, like the Trans Day of Resilience art project and the Trans Life + Liberation series. Or as the group BreakOUT! says, “Give us our roses while we’re still here!” ![]() ![]() They emerged from our need to honor trans and nonbinary people of color in life, not only in memoriam. We made these images as we grieved the murders of our sisters, fought to free our siblings from incarceration, and created cultural interventions in events like Pride and Trans Day of Remembrance. The art was created through relationships of support and solidarity, between trans and nonbinary artists and organizers on the frontline of our movement. This consensual and transformative visibility is possible, and it’s why we created and distributed nearly 300 Trans Justice Art Kits: images and poems sent to siblings across the country as a radical act of love and a firebrand of trans liberation. It must benefit our communities and serve the systemic redistribution of resources and power. Visibility must be grounded in consent and self-determination. And even when we choose it, individual visibility is not enough to radically transform the epic systems of anti-trans oppression and white supremacy that batter our lives. Being “visible” or “coming out” is not a choice or desire for many of us. Trans people of color, especially folks who aren’t passed as cis or don’t fit into the gender binary, experience a hypervisibility that includes more harassment, violence and criminalization. We need more windows into this world, because before we can build something we must first imagine it.īut too often, “visibility” has been sold to us as a replacement for freedom. Seeing each other is necessary to create a world that treasures trans and nonbinary people of color. We are thirsty to see ourselves reflected as whole beings-this is crucial to loving and actualizing ourselves. So we hold Trans Day of Visibility with complexity. We have always used all our creativity, beauty and power to survive.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply.AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |