by MARK GABRISH CONLAN
Copyright © 2014 by Mark Gabrish Conlan for Zenger’s
Newsmagazine • All rights reserved
Respect Gender Pronouns
Jay and the Trans*
Flag
Autumn Sandeen
Daniela
Putting Up the Trans*
Flag
+with+dog.A.jpg)
Lyn Gwidzak (center)
with dog
Simon says …
Ezekiel Reis Burgin
Nemo
Group shot
Holly and Daniela
Overpass Light
Brigade: “Trans* … ”
Overpass Light
Brigade: “ … Power”
Trans* Children
Deserve Love
Son of Fire
On February 24,
the long wait for Transgender students in California and their allies ended. In
2013 the California state legislature had passed AB 1266, the School Success
and Opportunity Act, which gives Trans* students in the state’s public schools
the right to be treated as members of the gender they identify with, not the
one into which they were born. Specifically, it allows Trans* students to use
restrooms assigned to their gender of identification, and to compete in sports
based on their perceived gender identity. But radical-rights groups like the
National Organization for Marriage (NOM) and Pacific Justice Institute (PJI),
which helped put California’s anti-marriage Proposition 8 on the ballot in
2008, mounted a referendum campaign to put the School Success and Opportunity
Act before the state’s voters.
San Diego Trans*
activists and their supporters, including SAME Alliance (formerly San Diego
Alliance for Marriage Equality), Canvass for a Cause (CFAC) and Black and Pink
San Diego, sponsored no fewer than three rallies to call public attention to
the issue. The first took place on November 22, when the California Secretary
of State’s office was expected to announce whether the radical Right had
collected enough signatures to put AB 1266 on the ballot. Based on a sampling
of the submitted petitions, they hadn’t, but they came close enough to demand a
count of every single petition form. Trans* activists called a second rally
January 11, in hopes the count would be finished by then and they would know
whether the basic rights of Trans* students would go before the state’s voters.
The Secretary of
State’s office didn’t have the count completed by January 11, but they
announced that they’d issue a final ruling February 24. So the same group of
local activists called another rally for that date, held like the January event
at Sixth and University in Hillcrest, either to celebrate the failure of the
referendum effort or launch the campaign to persuade California voters to
support Trans* students’ rights. As things turned out, the event was a
celebration; less than half an hour before its 5:30 start time, the Secretary
of State’s office announced that the referendum against the School Success and
Opportunity Act had fallen 20,000 signatures short of making it to the ballot.
Daniela, the Trans*
activist who had spoken especially movingly at the first rally in November, was
chosen to MC. “I wrote this before I knew what the ruling was,” she said, “but
the fact that the opposition even tried to have a petition against this law
brought about a lot of much-needed awareness about our community to the people.
Without the opposition realizing it, they were planting seeds in the people’s
minds and hearts that our community exists. We are here and we’re not going
anywhere.”
According to
Daniela, the opposition’s primary argument against the bill — that non-Trans*
male students would use it as an excuse to use the girls’ restrooms and peep at
them — “hasn’t happened once in the 10
years this policy has been in effect in Los Angeles.” She advised the non-Trans*
people at the rally “how to be an awesome ally of the Trans* community: first,
use your Transgender friend’s preferred gender pronoun. And make sure when
you’re allowed to use their
preferred gender pronoun because not all Trans* people are out to everybody.
Call out transphobic language when you hear it. Don’t be silent. It plants a
seed in their heads and brings awareness.”
As at the
previous two rallies, the organizers set up an open mike but asked that only
Transgender people use it. The next speaker identified herself as Sahaila, and
said, “So often we hear our opposition talking in the name of ‘love,’ and in
the name of God, but we see all of these divisions set up in society to hinder
our love and connection towards one another. That’s not right. Although we are
here to stand up for Transgender students and Trans* rights, it’s important to
realize that the issue we are up against right now isn’t necessarily
transphobia. Transphobia isn’t necessarily the root of our suffering. Racism, misogyny and sexism aren’t the
root of our issues. The pervading issue, the main thing that’s wrong here, is
ignorance, fear and bigotry. We need to destroy this tree of ignorance from the
root cause, right now.”
“I’ll be honest:
I came here tonight expecting to have to give a speech about how we would have
to bounce back from defeat,” said the next speaker, Transgender therapist Ezekiel
Reis Burgin. “But that’s not the case. … Every year, every day, we are moving
towards justice, towards equality, towards a better world. Burgin cited two
Transgender heroines as especially powerful examples of the growing acceptance
and opportunities for Trans* people: author Janet Mock, whose book Redefining
Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love and So Much More became a New York Times best-seller; and actress Laverne Cox, who plays a
Transwoman in the Netflix series Orange Is the New Black.
Burgin said he
is currently writing two essays on Transgender issues for upcoming books. “One
is a textbook on social issues and political practice,” he explained, “and my
chapter is focused on Trans* communities — not the ‘LGBT’ [Queer] communities, Trans* communities. This is going to be taught to young
social workers and therapists who are going to go out into the world. This is
going to be one more brick in the wall against bigotry. They’re going to be
learning that Trans* communities matter, that we’re real, that we’re not just
the end of the ‘LGBT.’ We are actually here, different, vibrant, present and
unique.”
The other book
Burgin is contributing to, scheduled for publication in May, is Manning Up:
Essays by Transsexual Men on Finding Brotherhood, Family and Themselves. “Again,” he said, “it’s just essay after essay of us telling our own stories and being the diverse,
unique, vibrant people that we are. There’s not one Trans* narrative. You’ve
seen that with Janet Mock, with Laverne Cox, with me, with everyone here. We’re
all different. We’re all unique. We all have interests, not just Transness.”
Burgin said that just by being out and about in the world, people like Mock,
Cox and himself are advancing the cause of Trans* equality every day.
“I think we’re
done with explaining ourselves and finding good places to go pee,” said Nemo,
the final speaker — referencing the most basic human need addressed by the
School Success and Opportunity Act. “We now have the option for a lot of Trans*
youth to have that childhood a lot of us lacked: to be treated the way they
want to be treated. Under our government, education is mandatory. For those of
us who are studying history, we know how that’s been used. A big part of it has
been assimilation and indoctrination. At the same time, as a Queer, education
saved my life. It gave me a way of understanding things nobody around me was
saying. It gave me a way of understanding that I’m a person, in a way nothing
spiritual or social around me was saying.”
After about a
half-hour’s worth of speechmaking, the local activists chanted various slogans
upholding rights for Transgender people. At least one of the slogans —
“Gender’s chosen, don’t you see? You can break the binary” — highlighted
divisions within the Trans* movement between mostly older Transgender
individuals who see themselves as men born in women’s bodies, or vice versa;
and mostly younger people who are exploring gender identities that are between
male and female. The “binary” — the idea that people are either male or female,
and there is nothing in between — is taken for granted by most people,
including many who identify as Transgender, but it’s increasingly under
challenge by newer Trans* activists.
