Trans Day of Remembrance -November 20th, 2022

  

Trans Day of Remembrance -November 20th, 2022  

(By RunaMorgen/Brennin 11/13/22)

    Trans day of remembrance is a depressing yet nevertheless important day on the calendar for transgender people around the world, especially in the US. It is a day designated for mourning individuals who have been killed by hate-fueled anti-trans violence that unfortunately looms over and shapes the lives and decisions of nearly every trans person today. Those whose lives are ended prematurely in the struggle for acceptance as equal human beings hold a special place of honor to those in the community who remain, inspiring us to do whatever we can to build a safer future for all.

    Trans Day of Remembrance (TDOR) started in the US in 1999 as a vigil following the 1yr anniversary of the murder of Rita Hester (i). Ms. Hester was a beloved and highly visible black trans woman and advocate for trans equality in Massachusetts who was brutally stabbed 20 times in her own home at the age of 34. Rita’s tragic death has helped to bring new awareness to the general public about the severe danger facing many trans people, especially trans women of color, simply for being themselves. Although the vast majority of violent altercations are non-lethal, according to the data collected in the 2017 & 2018 National Crime Victimization Survey, the first criminal victimization data to include information on gender identity, trans people are vastly more likely to be victims of violent crime than non-trans people (ii). For non-trans people (“cis-gender”), only 23.7 (women) and 19.8 (men) per 1,000 people are victims of violent crime, but for trans people this measured to be 86.1 (women) and 107.5 (men) per 1,000, which further highlights the severity of the problem that resulted in the founding of TDOR.

    Only as recently as  2019 and 2020 did nine US states join California, Illinois and Rhode Island in the elimination of the “Trans Panic Defense” (i). Previously, this defense allowed a victim’s trans (or other LGBTQ) identity to be a legally admissible excuse for murder. Despite this achievement, violence against trans people has still continued to rise, with at least 375 known trans killings in 2021 alone (iii). The actual total however is estimated to be exceedingly higher than this already disturbing number due to the tendency for trans victims to be reported under pre-transition identities. Many hate crimes also go unreported or misrepresented altogether, especially in areas with weaker or non-existent trans advocacy organizations to conduct any sort of monitoring (iv).

    Today, when a transgender person on the community’s radar is killed they are often added to digital memorials like https://tdor.translivesmatter.info/reports/ where a photo and a brief description of the circumstances that led to the individual’s death are preserved. 368 such deaths have been recorded from between November 1st 2021 to November 1st 2022 (v.).

    Although the focus of TDOR is on mourning and conducting vigils for the dead, the week leading up to November 20th is typically a time of bringing public attention to this violence which continues to grow and permeate our society. Sometimes this violence is even openly encouraged by powerful individuals through gross mis-information and hate speech. Such was the case with congresswoman (R-GA) Majorie Taylor Greene’s appearance on conspiracy television this past year, where she publicly claimed transgender people are a “perversion.. grooming children to believe things that are lies and that are completely wrong” and should be “beaten into the ground” (vi.). Publicly encouraging such violence and misinformation is the pinnacle of dehumanization and such behavior has contributed to the over 286 anti trans bills introduced in the US between 2021 and 2022, limiting and preventing access to healthcare, everyday activities, and civil rights for trans people, many of which have passed into law (vii, viii). The passing of these anti-trans bills puts a considerable amount of stress on all trans people, often leading to suicide. This unfortunately was the case for Milo Winslow, a very well known and beloved trans man who took his own life at age 30 this past March, after over 18,000 people signed a petition to overturn a local ordinance he helped pass (ix). The ordinance Milo fought for helped to establish local protections for trans people from discrimination, but the opposing petition collected far more than enough signatures to force the ordinance to be overturned. As reported by the National Library of Medicine in 2020, suicide is already a well known problem among trans people suffering from mistreatment, with a staggering 56% of trans youth reporting having already attempted suicide and 86% reporting seriously considering it (x.). Statistics across all trans age groups were similarly abysmal at a 40% attempt rate with 82% seriously considering.

    In the past few months, significant attention was brought to an online terrorist organization known as “Kiwi Farms” that has been taking advantage of the suicidality of trans people, with documented successful coercion of multiple suicides through extreme harassment tactics (xi). Widely reported by reputable news organizations such as NPR (xi), NBC (xii.) and MSN (xiii), Kiwi Farms was known for doxxing their targets, often through illegal means.  This involved distributing personal information like home addresses, current locations, previous identities, and even the contact information of family members of everyday trans people to conduct extremely targeted and aggressive attacks with the intent to kill. For years, many trans people, especially activists or those with larger social media accounts have lived in fear of gaining the attention of Kiwi farms, who then relentlessly barraged victims and their families with violent death threats, false accusations, hate speech and “swatting”. Swatting was a particularly common method of harassment for Kiwi Farms where the aggressors would anonymously falsely report trans victims to law enforcement as being dangerous and violent in the hope that a SWAT team would arrive and possibly kill the target, or at the very least demoralize and make their life even more difficult. To much immediate rejoice of trans people everywhere, efforts to bring down Kiwi Farms were finally successful earlier this year.

    Each year is marked by great victories as well as great losses for the transgender community, but the frequent unjust loss of life in such a small and loving community is particularly bitter. Many of those who perish in this struggle are people who have made my own life measurably better. Those who use their voice to bring positive change more easily become targets for hate, but without trans people loudly advocating for themselves none of the incredible progress made throughout the past few decades would have occurred, and even more of us would still be forced to be in hiding. None of the deaths we remember on November 20 should have ever happened but they do have profound meaning, especially to trans people alive today and likely for many generations of trans people to come.

i. Alice. (2022, June 5). Rita Hester (Nov 30, 1963 - Nov 28, 1998). Defrosting Cold Cases. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://defrostingcoldcases.com/rita-hester-nov-30-1963-nov-28-1998/

ii. UCLA School of Law - Williams Institute. “Transgender People Over Four Times More Likely Than Cisgender People to Be Victims of Violent Crime.” Transgender People Over Four Times More Likely Than Cisgender People to Be Victims of Violent Crime, 23 Mar. 2021, Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/press/ncvs-trans-press-release/

iii. Wareham, J. (2021, November 11). 375 Transgender People Murdered In 2021-‘Deadliest Year’ Since Records Began. Forbes. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamiewareham/2021/11/11/375-transgender-people-murdered-in-2021-deadliest-year-since-records-began/?sh=353aebc1321c

iv. Transgender Day of Remembrance Resource Kit for Journalists. (2017, January 12). GLAAD. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://www.glaad.org/publications/tdorkit

v. Remembering Our Dead - Reports. TDOR Info. Remembering Our Dead. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://tdor.translivesmatter.info/reports/

vi. Frias, Lauren (2022, February 24). Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene made transphobic comments in conversation with conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. Business Insider. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://www.businessinsider.com/marjorie-taylor-greene-transgender-people-camp-counselors-california-2022-2

vii. American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Legislation Affecting LGBTQ Rights Across the Country. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://www.aclu.org/legislation-affecting-lgbtq-rights-across-country

viii. Branigin, A., & Kirkpatrick, N. (2022, October 14). Anti-trans laws are on the rise. Here’s a look at where — and what kind. Washington Post. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2022/10/14/anti-trans-bills/

ix. Remembering Our Dead - Milo Winslow (3 Mar 2022). (2022, March 3). Remembering Our Dead. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://tdor.translivesmatter.info/reports/2022/03/03/milo-winslow_lincoln-nebraska-usa_2d894b73

x. Austin, Ashley, Craig, Shelley L, D’Souza,  Sandra, McInroy,  Lauren B, & PMID: 32345113 DOI: 10.1177/0886260520915554. (2020, July 29). Suicidality Among Transgender Youth: Elucidating the Role of Interpersonal Risk Factors. National Library of Medicine. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32345113/

xi. Yousef, O. (2022, September 12). A campaign made it harder to access an anti-trans website linked to multiple suicides. NPR.org. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://www.npr.org/2022/09/12/1122482174/a-campaign-made-it-harder-to-access-an-anti-trans-website-linked-to-multiple-sui

xii. Collins, B., & Tenbarge, K. (2022, September 2). Kiwi Farms: Anti-trans stalkers chasing Keffals around the world. NBC News. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/internet/cloudflare-kiwi-farms-keffals-anti-trans-rcna44834

xiii. Burns, K. (2022, September 10). Kiwi Farms made the internet more dangerous for trans people. MSNBC.com. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/kiwi-farms-made-internet-more-dangerous-trans-people-n1298815