The fight for racial justice can only be enriched by feminist strategies developed with an eye toward trans inclusion and empowerment.
In the United States, brutally killing a Black person doesn’t necessarily lead to justice, especially without national attention; this is when Black feminist activists are forced to mobilize. The African American Policy Forum (AAPF), an organization cofounded by legal scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw in 1996, launched #SayHerName in 2014 to demand that Black women, girls, and femmes be “integrated into demands for justice, policy responses to police violence, and media representations of victims and survivors of police brutality.” But the question remains: How do we fight for Black women, girls, and femmes when they’re alive? Trans communities are showing us the way, with Nina Pop’s life, and death, urging us to stand together in that work.
As names like George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery ring through the streets, fewer people have heard of Pop, a 28-year-old Black, trans woman whose body was found in her Sikeston, Missouri, apartment on May 3, 2020. She’d been stabbed several times. Because people came forth with information, Joseph Cannon, 40, was arrested on May 15 and remains held without bond. Pop’s murder is as heartbreaking as it is common: Pop was at least the 10th trans person killed in 2020. Police haven’t determined a motive, but they also haven’t ruled out the possibility that her death was a hate crime. That consideration constitutes a mild victory because authorities so often ignore the fact that LGBTQ people are targeted; much like many Americans resist acknowledging that Black and Brown citizens are under attack, denying the existence of animus toward LGBTQ communities has become routine.
As such, it’s difficult to get officials to call a hate crime a hate crime: In its 2011 report, the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs documented a lack of bias classification—a reluctance of law enforcement to recognize anti–LGBTQ hate crimes—that advocates believe erase the realities LGBTQ populations face. And these realities are stark. Like other Black trans women, Pop faced unjust vulnerabilities created by the intersection of racism and sexism, and exacerbated by society’s denigration of trans lives. Unerased, a project from Mic, explains that Black trans women occupy a unique space in which they are regularly unsafe: When trans women are killed, intimate partner violence is “by far the most common scenario, accounting for 35 percent of deaths overall and 30 percent of Black trans women’s deaths.” Furthermore, “The data also show that Black trans women are at greater risk than other trans people of being attacked by strangers.”
While forced to navigate a society built on racism and sexism, women like Pop also face anti-trans hate that the American criminal justice system perpetuates. Just as a national spotlight on Arbery’s brutal killing was required to secure arrests that won’t necessarily yield indictments and prison time, crimes against trans people often go unpunished, and this is especially true when victims are trans and Black. Moreover, in the rare instances when convictions are secured, “People who kill Black trans women and femmes are usually convicted of lesser charges than those who kill people of other trans identities,” according to the Unerased project.
Just as activists and scholars must stand against this erasure of LGBTQ realities, they must also avoid reducing individuals to a single aspect of their identities, and instead understand them in full.
Transgender woman Chyna Gibson shot and killed in New Orleans
Transgender woman Chyna Gibson was shot and killed outside of a shopping center in New Orleans Saturday night, according to the Times-Picayune.
Gibson was also a drag performer who went by the name Chyna Doll Dupree. Though the Times-Picayune did identify her as trans, it also chose to "dead name" Gibson, meaning it used her birth name in the story.
An anonymous friend told the Times-Picayune that Gibson was visiting her family in New Orleans to celebrate Mardi Gras.
Gibson's friends and loved ones shared messages to her on Facebook in the hours shortly after her death.
"My heart breaks as this community must find a way to honor you in death and begin to move forward," one person wrote. "The stage will never be the same!" Read more (2/26/17 11:13 AM)
Ciara McElveen, transgender woman, killed in New Orleans
Ciara McElveen, a black transgender woman, was stabbed to death in New Orleans on Monday. The New Orleans Police Department found McElveen in New Orleans' 7th ward, according to the Times-Picayune.
According to a press release from the NOPD, she was transported to University Medical Center, where she died.
Her death comes only two days after news of the killing of Chyna Doll Dupree, another black transgender woman, in New Orleans.
This is the sixth reported murder of a transgender woman in 2017. Read more (2/27/17 7:43 PM)
24-year-old trans woman Keke Collier shot and killed in Chicago
On Tuesday, 24-year-old trans woman Keke Collier was shot and killed in Chicago's Englewood neighborhood, according to WLS-TV. Early reports misgendered Collier as male.
Shasha Lauren, a friend of Collier's who has known her for two years, confirmed that the person described in the WLS report is Collier.
According to LaSaia Wade, director of trans justice organization TNTJ Project, Collier also went by the name Tiara Richmond.
Lauren and other friends of Collier's shared farewell messages about her on Facebook. Along with a message to Collier, they remembered T.T. Saffore, who was killed in Chicago in September.
Collier is the fourth reported homicide of a transgender woman in 2017. Read more (2/22/17 9:00 PM)
Mississippi transgender woman Mesha Caldwell is first reported trans killing of 2017
Mississippi resident Mesha Caldwell, a black transgender woman, was found dead Wednesday night outside of Canton, Mississippi.
Initial media reports misgendered Caldwell as male, according to a family friend. Mary Young, a friend of Caldwell's mother said she was "hurt" by the misgendering.
Young said Caldwell was a beautician and hairstylist. "She always, always dressed like a girl," Young said. "And as she grew up, she became beautiful just like a lady."
She added, "I really don't know why somebody would want to kill her."
According to news reports, police are investigating the death as a homicide. Read more
