Y'All White Queers Better Quiet Down in North Carolina

BY Qasima Wideman
4/6/16

http://www.advocate.com/commentary/2016/4/06/yall-white-queers-better-quiet-down-north-carolina

As I sat in the General Assembly with a strong crew of trans and queer warriors, listening to the scapegoating of trans women (and trans people in general) for the violence of sexual assault, I felt triggered and violently abandoned by people who claim to be a part of my community.

I sat beside close friends and fellow members of the #BLM QTPOC coalition, fellow trans survivors of sexual assault, who had all signed up to give public comment and speak on the bill. Not a single one of us was allowed to speak. When I got up to demand we be given the time to speak that had been promised us and said that the General Assembly — which was costing taxpayers $42,000 to hold that special session — could not refuse to hear from trans people of color, I was grabbed by police officers and escorted out of the building.