Media Ignores Rash of Assaults on Transgender Women
Jun 6, 2012 4:45 AM EDT
Jay Michaelson
The spate of violence has gone virtually unnoticed by the mainstream media, as well as by the mainstream gay community, which has been consumed by the same-sex-marriage debate and the Tyler Clementi/Dharun Ravi case, writes Jay Michaelson.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/06/06/media-ignores-rash-of-assaults-on-transgender-women.htmlWhile the sentence has sparked outrage in some circles, it has gone virtually unnoticed by the mainstream media, as well as in the mainstream gay community, which has been consumed by the same-sex-marriage debate and the Tyler Clementi/Dharun Ravi case. But in fact, the CeCe McDonald case is part of a recent, horrifying spree of violence against transgender people, particularly trans people of color.
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So how ought we to reflect on this tragic spate of violence? At the intersections of racism, sexism, and homophobia, these victims are triply victimized by stigma—four times over if we add in the element of class, and five times if we include transphobia as well. And we should; many reasonable people don't yet understand that gender dysphoria is real, that gender is not defined by anatomy, and that transwomen like Chrissy Lee Polis are not perverted men in disguise, lurking in restrooms. (Conservative legislators frequently block protections for transgender people on the basis of this myth, as if stalkers need a legal pretext.) Precisely because transgender is a new concept for many people, trans people urgently need protection and respect.
