I don’t think too many people understand just how much queer POC are being pushed out of conversations and not being considered whenever things that are dangerous to the queer community are being brought up. Like for example, talks about trans men and our experiences with being perceived as a threat (whether within queer spaces or outside of them), desperately need to start including more trans men of color.
I can only speak on my experiences as Black trans man but masculinity and embracing it for me, is dangerous. Yes I love being masculine and appearing as such but being perceived as masc, even if I wasn’t a man, is enough to get me targeted simply because I’m Black. And there’s not a whole lot of conversation around that and how being myself and transitioning the way I want, might end up getting me hurt or harassed.
Another thing is that terfs, usually white women, pushing that trans men are scary once they start transitioning to pass more as a man, is inherently racist. Period. Black men are often perceived that way, and it’s a big reason why we get targeted by the police. To reinforce this idea is to ignore the countless lives of Black men lost due to the police seeing us as a threat, whether it was because we simply had a hoodie on or were carrying non lethal objects in our hands.
Things like this are only two examples of how being Black and a man intersect, this isn’t even getting into the deeper side of how being trans would effect that identity as well.
The intersectionality between being a person of color and trans is way too significant to ignore and I really wish more conversations included how harmful statements from terfs effect LGBTQ+ POC ten fold. Such as how transphobia is inherently linked to racism and effects the deep queer history within communities of color who have recognized multiple genders and multiple queer identities for centuries. And how the gender binary is a product of colonization.
At the end of the day, I’m barely scratching the surface with this post. I highly encourage folks, especially white people, to think twice before posting something about transphobia or queerphobia because I can guarantee that the microaggression or act of violence you’re talking about, effects LGBTQ+ POC differently or more.
It’s honestly about time that we broaden discussions about oppression and include POC in them, whether it be within queer spaces or outside of them. Our lives as people of color effect literally every aspect of our life, and to be excluded from conversations surrounding oppression (or anything for that matter) would only harm us more. Even if we’re cishet, or cis, POC are still affected by things like the gender binary and white feminism (which is linked to the gender binary). For example, cis women of color are often excluded from feminism, denied womanhood, and told their features are ugly due to the fact that they don’t align with white women’s.
If more people knew about what we go through and experience, it’ll get more people to open their eyes and realize just how vital we are to discussions as well as get white people to realize what we face because of our race and queerness.
jbbartram-illu
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