[Commentary] [USA] A Rallying Cry for CeCe, Paige, and Trans Women Everywhere: Your Lives Matter

[Stephanie Stevens]

Huffington Post, USA


Janet Mock

Writer and trans advocate; Staff Editor, PEOPLE.com

A Rallying Cry for CeCe, Paige, and Trans Women Everywhere: Your Lives Matter

Posted: 05/ 2/2012 4:12 pm


I was given the opportunity to deliver a keynote address
<http://janetmock.com/2012/05/01/usc-speech-cece-mcdonald-paige-clay/>
to the University of Southern California's LGBT graduates and allies
at USC's 18th annual Lavender Celebration
<http://sait.usc.edu/lgbt/lavender/history.html> on Sunday:

[Video: <http://youtu.be/l9WUSjr017Y> Janet Mock Speaks at USC:
Fighting for #GirlsLikeUs]

My speech would mark the first time a transgender person served as
speaker in the ceremony's 18-year history. While writing my speech, I
harkened back to Amanda Simpson's remarks about being the first openly
trans presidential appointee.

"Being the first sucks," Simpson told ABC News
<http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/amanda-simpson-transgender-presidential-appointee-begins-work-commerce/story?id=9477161#.T6AFPe2ft3Y>
in 2010. "I'd rather not be the first but someone has to be first, or
among the first ... and I always win people over with who I am and
what I can do."

Yet the pressure to represent for trans people everywhere weighed
heavily on me. But ultimately I had to speak my truth and share that
truth with those around me. The one direction given to me by Vincent
Vigil, director of USC's LGBT Resource Center, was to offer the
graduates a message of empowerment.

And so I thought about what empowered me to find, follow, and amplify
my voice as a writer, as an advocate, as a woman who is living
visibly. And that's when it hit me: It's always been about the girls,
#girlslikeus.

I thought of CeCe McDonald
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/laverne-cox/jenna-talackova-can-compe_b_1413062.html>
and Paige Clay <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/19/paige-clay-chicago-transg_n_1437606.html>
, two trans women of color, both 23 years old, both beautiful, and
both creative. I "met" Paige a few weeks back when I came across a
story of her murder in Chicago in April. I immediately thought, like
so many trans women I personally know, that her tragic end could
easily be mine.

I thought about how numb I initially was to her death, because I had
seen this story, this type of horrible murder, over and over and over
again, with revolving faces of trans women of color. Transgender women
make up 44 percent
<http://www.avp.org/documents/NCAVPHateViolenceReport2011Finaledjlfinaledits.pdf>
of all LGBT murder victims, most of them trans women of color,
despite the fact that trans people as a whole only account for about 8
percent <http://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/Gates-How-Many-People-LGBT-Apr-2011.pdf>
of the LGBT population.

And it hit me how disheartening it is that I had been desensitized to
the murders of trans women of color. In what kind of horrible world do
we live in that a woman's murder is seen as routine?

So I decided to speak about Paige; about her murder; about what it
means to be young, black, beautiful, and transgender; about how our
entire system fails us; and about how even when we defend ourselves
and stand our ground, our lives, too, can be jeopardized.

Case in point: CeCe McDonald, who was physically attacked and verbally
assaulted last June in Minneapolis because she is black and trans.
When her attackers cut through her cheek, she stood her ground and
fought back. Though she is the victim in this case, she sits in jail
facing a murder trial because the man who attacked her died in their
altercation. Activists have swarmed around CeCe
<http://supportcece.wordpress.com/> ; they've packed the courtroom,
worn purple in solidarity, and sent Twitter updates to #FreeCeCe
<http://twitter.com/search/realtime/%23freecece> , to spread
awareness.

Though the mainstream media have remarkably been silent regarding the
injustice that CeCe is facing, our community will not be silent. And
it is for CeCe and Paige and girls like us everywhere that I decided
to step forward and use my voice.

This speech is for them, and I will never be silent just because the
topic of gender identity and race are uncomfortable. These women are
human beings first, and when we turn a blind eye to injustice, we
close our hearts and minds on ourselves.


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