Since it’s the day before April Fool’s, I guess I’ll post about being trans
Today, March 31, is Trans Day of Visibility. It always irked me that it was the day before April Fool’s Day. I don’t know how many countries celebrate that holiday, but it’s a day for pranks and making silly statements you don’t mean. Kind of the opposite of the very sincere holiday about coming out. And because of time zones, they overlap a lot!
I thought about not posting anything today. I have never felt more visible than this moment in time. I feel the target on my back, the fascist legislation coming for me and the people I care about.
Yet we need visibility more than ever, to counteract all the misinformation maliciously being pumped into people’s brains.
I don’t have anything new to say, nothing that Harvey Milk didn’t already say almost fifty years ago when he called on gay people to come out of the closet. Because that was the first step toward change. The more people who know someone who is gay or trans, the more likely they are to support human rights for these people, because they are more likely to see us as human.
That’s why I will not be silent. I will not go stealth for my own safety, though I don’t judge anyone who does. The very act of survival is subversive, when they are literally cheering for us to kill ourselves.
I’m not going to make their job any easier. I’m going to support myself and all other trans people in any way I can. And if I don’t, then I deserve to be called out. I’m not going to pull up the ladder behind me. I’m building stairs.