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A Blog Project About Violent Crimes against Transgenders in America

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Post 12: Creative Artwork

Born

Born into a world where everything is supposed to have its place.

Born into a world where conformity is the normality.

Born into a world where you can only be one gender.

Born into a world where it’s abnormal to try to be yourself

Courage

Courage to walk out into a world and fight its rules

Courage to walk the streets while being harassed

Courage to be yourself when everyone else wants you to be something else

Courage to fight for your own rights

Stupidity

Stupidity of the people who attack other humans

Stupidity of the people who hold onto a fragile definition of Masculinity

Stupidity of a generation who has become more ignorant even though they have access to so much information

Stupidity of a culture that isn’t open to changing with the times

Hope

Hope that one day the world accepts everyone

Hope that people can walk outside without anything to fear

Hope that the world will be at peace

Hope that one day people will know that all lives matter

 I write in hope that it brings out the idea that there is a social problem that people don’t necessarily understand. I tried to write it from a point of view of someone in the LGBTQ community. I want to bring awareness of the fact that this allusively pertains to how a LGBTQ member feels but also how others may feel as well. I want to bring awareness that how LGBTQ problems are just as important as other major societal problems.

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Post 11: Reflection

I’ve learned a lot more about violent crimes against transgender people. One thing that I’ve especially noticed is the fact that all these crimes, especially deaths, do not appear much in mainstream media. I don’t remember much about reading or hearing about all these crimes. I do know some of them because of the fact that some of the celebrities, Laverne Cox and Janet Mock, bring forth the information. I’ve learned that there is more intersectionality to these crimes then I’ve thought of before.

I’ve also learned the fact that transgender people are a lot braver then I will ever be. The fact that my friend can step into the world where they get discriminated against on almost every corner, even in their own home, and still have the will to live and fight is a strength that I will never achieve.

I’ve learned that hate crimes against transgender people most happen in bathrooms and that 1 out of 8 trans-women of color are likely to be targeted. I’ve also learned that the transgender death count has more than doubled then last year, which is scary to know seeing as how I was hoping that our generation would be a little more aware of social injustice. I will now try to be more aware of what’s happening in the world, especially our country, when it comes to issues with violent crimes because of the fact that it’s a very serious and growing issue.

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Post 10: Additional Resources

a.       Huffington Post – News website.

b.      Research Gate – Scholarly Journal, Produces many scholarly journals having to do with LGBTQ issues

c.       More Resources:

Advocate – Web Source for Gay News, LGBT Rights, Politics, and Entertainment - www.advocate.com

International Transgender Day of Remembrance – Website giving information about death of Transgenders around the world, provides info about Transgender Day of Remembrance - http://tdor.info/

Anti-Violence Project – Organization that helps fight against violence for those in the LGBTQ community. - http://www.avp.org/

Trans Student Equality Resources – An organization that fights for Trans Justice – transstudent.org

National Center for Transgender Equality – Nation’s Leading Social Justice Advocacy Organization for Transgender People - http://www.transequality.org/

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Post 9: Recommendations

a.       One way we can definitely help prevent violent crimes against transgender people is spreading awareness, especially in the younger generation. People need to be aware of the fact that transgender people are still people, people who are trying to be the person they want to be, like every human should. Awareness of the fact that these violent crimes are happening. Spread information across the globe, this is the generation of information and the fact is we have infinite amounts of ways to spread everything that is happening.

b.      Another way to help the cause itself is by spreading the idea that transgender murders have more than just to do with transphobia. It has a lot to do with many other aspects of societal inequalities, like race and masculinity. By bringing awareness that there are different reasons these crimes happen we can better grasp an idea on how to fight and prevent them.

c.       Lastly creating laws and rules that help protect transgender people. The fact is that our government does not do much to protect the LGBTQ community. People of the LGBTQ community can easily get fired for being gay or gender variant. There are not very anti-discrimination laws that help LGBTQ members. Especially when it comes to heath care.

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Post 8: Summary

I’ve learned a lot about the fear and the courage that transgender people have. They go out into the world full of danger and distain towards them. In the year 2015 there have been about 29 deaths in the world that relate to transgender people, which is more than double what it was in 2014. 1 in every 8 trans-women of color is likely to get murdered. Not only that there are many different reasons as to why people commit violent crimes against transgender. Transphobia, Threats against masculinity, homophobia, race, even embarrassment can lead to the death of people, of humans who are just trying to be whom they want to be. I’ve learned about the fact that you can’t just blame violent crimes on the fact that the person was transgender, though a lot of transgender activist do.

Before I researched this topic I had a general idea that it was a problem and like many people generalized that transgender violence is due to transphobia or homophobia. It’s very interesting how my ideas have changed do to reading some articles. Which I think is amazing because of the fact that I found all these articles on the internet which means these articles can change the views of many other people. There is something that most of the articles had in common; the fact that we need to change our strategy on how to fight against these violent crimes. They all point out that we need to gain a better understanding of the reasons as to why these violent crimes happen and that we need to be more specific and focus on our efforts to help prevent them.

A lot of this has to do with the overall general themes we have learned in society. We have gone over the fact that there are many inequalities when it comes to the LGBTQ culture. There is this idea that those who are part of the LGBTQ culture are seen as unnatural and therefore they should be treated as a lesser human, event to the point where they can be abused and killed. This is seen when the media doesn’t report the deaths of LGBTQ members unless it becomes major news.

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Post 7: Intersectionality

Transgender Violence does not only happen because of transphobia. Transgender has also to do with race and masculinity. In many of the articles I’ve read they talk about how transgender violence, especially against trans-women, has to do with threatening men’s masculinity. It can be seen as gay when men have sex with women who were former men. Even the thought of finding a transwomen can be seen as a gay action. These ideas can stem from one’s race and the idea of manliness. Culturally, many Black and Latino cultures say that men should be mainly, tough, strong, and many other things. So the idea that having sex or finding a former man attractive threatens this idea of manliness. This also relates to the fact that there are some cultures, like Hawaiian culture which we learned in class, have transgender or a third gender as a part of their culture. These cultures are threatened by the Western ideal that transgender or gender fluent people are unnatural, which can lead to hate crimes against them.

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Post 6: Power Structures

Some of the people who have fought for translives are  Laverne Cox and Janet Mock. Both hold a lot of power in different parts of the media. Lavarne Cox became a name when she first starred on Orange is the New Black and created a documentary Free Cece. Janet Mock is an activist that helps sheds light and brings up problems within the transgender community with help from the media. Both Laverne Cox and Janet Mock hold power within the institution known as the media. Media is such an important thing especially within today’s culture.

Using media in our culture is the fasted way to spread information from one end of the world to another. Our generation especially gets all of its information from the media. We are constantly on social media sites, such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, etc. We also are constantly learning whats happening in society through social media. Media is a powerful influence on today’s generation which can be used to put ideas, both good and bad, into our minds. So Janet Mock and Laverne Cox can have a very influential experience in our lives, especially being beautiful transgender women we may see everyday. 

A lot of sources I have read refer to different cases of transgender violence in the U.S. Which both Laverne Cox and Janet Mock have talked about. Janet Mock especially, who has talked and wrote about all these murders. Laverne Cox created a documentary on Cece who was wrongly arrested when trying to defend herself. 

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Post 5: Real Example

 I interviewed my friend who often goes out as the opposite gender that they were born with. They’ve told me that they themselves have never experienced any violent acts but have been constantly harassed on the streets and even in their own home. They talked about how their father wasn’t very accepting of the fact that my interviewee was transgender and they hardly speak anymore. My interviewee stated the fact that they think that it has a lot to do with the idea of embarrassment and transphobia. They were told by their father that it was very unnatural and that God wouldn’t accept them. Fortunately their mother, who is divorced, was very accepting of them. Their mother says that she just wanted my interviewee to be happy in life.  My friend talked about going out to only boystown now because it’s where they are most accepted and least harassed. They said they’ve been to other parts of Chicago and have experienced name calling, curse words, people purposefully bumping into them, and other forms of harassment.

When I did my interview I found it very enlightening about some accounts of acceptance in society and accounts of rejection that my interviewee faced. A lot of the sources I analyzed said violence had to do with masculinity and transphobia, and how I could see how it really does in the experience of my friend. I also found the idea of embarrassment very eye-opening because it’s very true. The fact that your parents may reject you just out of pure embarrassment that you’re not the gender that you were born. I also found it very interesting that my friend brought up the idea of religion. I also found out how hard and brave you have to be in order to accept how you are and proudly display it in front of others. It’s one thing to be gay, bisexual, asexual, pansexual, or queer which can all be hidden to a point, but it’s another thing when you proudly display it externally by wearing clothes, jewelry, how you do your hair.

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Post 4: Analysis of a Second Scholarly Source

http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Rebecca_Stotzer/publication/227265855_Gender_identity_and_hate_crimes_Violence_against_transgender_people_in_Los_Angeles_County/links/0deec52578acee29f9000000.pdf

Pages 24 - 42

A very interesting article speaking to the fact that National Transgender Day of Remembrance/ Remembering Our Dead Project speaks to the decontextualizing of transgender murders in terms of race. The article argues the fact that Transgender Day of Remembrance and Remembering Our Dead, which is not exclusive for transgender deaths, blames violence mainly due to transphobia. It brings up the idea that we deracialize these murders when we bring up these acts of violence just by showing photos of the victim and giving the victim’s name. We don’t necessarily know the circumstances in which they were murdered. By doing this we also gave false innocence to witnesses, especially white witnesses, who just look at these acts and don’t necessarily help.

I found this article to be very enlightening. It gives a different opinion then the major idea that most violent crimes against transgender people happen to do with transphobia. I do understand the idea that we decontextualize a lot of these murders and just look at the fact that these were all just transgender people. These murders may not have to do exactly with the person being transgender. The article talks about the fact that we need to do some critical thinking before we can effectively fight against this violence. In what ways does the author think we can improve upon? How does focusing on other aspects such as race, class, status, etc. affect the cause against transgender violence?

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Analysis of a Scholarly Source

http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Rebecca_Stotzer/publication/222055542_Violence_against_transgender_people_A_review_of_United_States_data/links/0deec52578acf33ed7000000.pdf

This was an interesting study that focused of transgender violence in the U.S. They answered questions related to how and why transgender violence occurs. They take a look into three different sources to collect data, self-reports, hotlines, and police reports. The most difficult were police reports because of how general the information given was. The most informative was the self-reports because it took into detailed accounts of peoples lives. The reports found out that most hate crimes start at a very young age for transgender people. Also concluded that most perpetrators of either violent or sexual crimes have to do with people that are close to the victim. The study makes a case as to the reason that these crimes happen have to do with either transphobia or homophobia. 

 This article gave a lot of insight into transgender violence because it gave some solid information that was reported by transgender people themselves. What I really agree with is that the article stated that we can’t make policies and improve the lives transgender people until we understand the root of the problem which is something we don’t exactly know yet. A question I want to ask regards to the fact that they talk about the main reasons transgender people are being assaulted is due transphobia and homophobia. Why would transwomen be sexually assulated when it would sort of be considered gay to do so? And go more into details as to how transphobia and homophobia affect trans violence. This article doesn’t directly agree with the web source stated in post 2. The websource blames solely masculinity which can be tied with transphobia and homophobia, but they disagree on solutions. The websource listed things that we could do in order to improve situations, but this article provides the idea that we need to learn about what we’re up against before we can create a plan of action. 

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Analysis of a Websource

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/louis-f-graham/the-killing-of-transgende_b_8600358.html

This news article tries to make sense of different reasons as to why people may want to kill transgender people. It mainly focuses of reasons why transgender women are murdered/attacked. It goes into speculation about the threat it imposes to people’s masculinity, especially to those of Black and Latino descent. It also goes into hate crimes and its correlation to structural inequalities using data from the Detroit Youth Passages. It takes a look at social backgrounds, education, violence, sex, and employment. At the end the article gives a brief explanation of things we can do to help fight against this “epidemic”.

One thing that I do agree with is the idea that some people commit hate crimes against transgender women because of the idea of masculinity. What I don’t agree with is the idea that masculinity rooted in sexism and misogyny is the main reason that violence happens to women, especially to those who are trans. I believe that the reason that most violence happens to transgender women is because of the fact that they threaten men’s masculinity. The idea of being sexually attracted to a “former man” is usually met with discuss by most men. That feeling of disgust can turn into hate and contempt against transgender women. I do believe that sexism and misogyny do have some partial influence but there is a bigger reason why violence against transgender women happens.

One thing that I noticed is the fact that this article mainly focused on transgender women of color. It doesn’t really explain why murders committed against transgender men happens or transgender women who are white. If transgender murders happen to do with masculinity, then what’s the reason for transgender men who don’t really threaten masculinity? What solutions would be the most effective to help prevent these murders?

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Do you know these faces? If not you should. Trans men and women matter. Check out this article on advocate.com. Here’s a snippet:

Transgender advocates have, for years, been calling for an end to what they label the “epidemic” of transphobic violence. And while every November 20, the community and its allies remember those lives lost on the international Transgender Day of Remembrance, 2015 has been a particularly deadly year for transgender women in the United States. In the first seven weeks of the year, seven trans women were killed in the U.S. At press time, 11 transgender women have been murdered this year alone — with one additional victim whose gender identity has been disputed in press reports and among family members and activists. By comparison, 12 transgender women were killed in the U.S. in all of 2014, though neither of these totals account for individuals whose deaths were not reported or investigated, nor for victims who were misgendered or not regarded as trans women in death. Read on to learn more about the women whose lives were taken due to transphobic bias and senseless, fatal violence.

#transviolence #transphobia #transwomen #trans #violence #women #news #article

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Introduction

My topic that I have chosen is Violent Crimes against Transgenders in America. I think this is a very important topic to the LGBT community because over the past decades there have been an increasing amount of hate crimes/violent crimes against transgendered people. Not only has there been an increase in crime, but also there has hardly been any uproar in the media because of it. I think that it’s important to bring awareness to the fact that these crimes happen every day but are kept hidden from the public because the media does not inform us.