The strength of working at community intersections
Thursday, June 14th, 2012
Commentary: Trans Progressive
by Autumn Sandeen
http://lgbtweekly.com/2012/06/14/the-strength-of-working-at-community-intersections/Trans women especially have a history of working at intra- and extra-community intersections. At the Stonewall Riots, Stonewall Uprising and Gay Liberation Movement, Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson were there working on lesbian and gay rights. In the '70s feminist movement, Beth Elliot and Sandy Stone were there working on feminist issues in feminist spaces. That these folk were treated poorly by the movements to which they were working at the intersections didn't stop later trans people from still choosing to work at community intersections.
Many don't know that the marriage equality court case that brought Californians the freedom to marry prior to Prop. 8 being passed into law was argued by the National Center for Lesbian Rights' Shannon Minter – a trans man. Many in San Diego don't know that one of the two primary organizers of San Diego's 20,000 person march against Prop. 8's passage was Kelly Moyer – a trans woman.
And at the Netroots Nation Conference in June of this year, the panel of Feministing's Jos Truitt, Transgriot's Monica Roberts, Bilerico's Jillian Weiss, and I spoke of working at community intersections.
