Trans Week of Action demonstration shuts down D.C. intersections
Action is one of many occurring during Transgender Awareness Week, leading up to Day of Remembrance
About 50 D.C. residents took to the streets on Tuesday evening and marched from Mount Vernon Square to Union Station as part of a rally designed to call attention to the plight of transgender people.
The march follows an Office of Human Rights study finding significant amounts of hiring discrimination in the transgender community. It also coincides with the D.C. Trans Needs Assessment, which shows not only high rates of hiring discrimination, but stark disparities in health, income and employment status, as well as high rates of HIV, poverty, and harassment and anti-trans violence.
With those statistics in mind, activists from DC Trans Power and Blackout DC organized the rally and the march, with the express purpose of blocking major traffic arteries throughout the District to call attention to the plight of transgender people. Other groups who sent representatives included the TransLatina Collective and the National LGBTQ Task Force.
The demonstration also marks a week of various marches, rallies, protests and memorial services as part of Transgender Awareness Week, which leads up to the national Transgender Day of Remembrance on Friday, Nov. 20. The activities, dubbed Trans Week of Action, call for an end to the ongoing violence and homicides targeting transgender and gender non-conforming people throughout the world.
As they moved along the route, the demonstrators halted three times — in Chinatown, at 5th and K Streets NW; at First and H Streets NW; and at the intersection North Capitol and H Streets. After about 20 minutes at each stop, the march continued, with demonstrators chanting “We’re here! We’re queer! We refuse to live in fear!” and “What do we want? Justice! When do we want it? Now! If we don’t get it? Shut it down!”
The demonstrators were escorted by police as they traveled along the route. Most of the demonstration was peaceful, though one woman tailed the demonstrators from First and H Streets to North Capitol Street and attempted to fight or argue with them, even screaming anti-LGBT slurs.
Some drivers, stuck in their cars, honked their horns or attempted to turn around, and some pedestrians made nasty comments about the shut downs, noting that the buses had been blocked from traveling while the demonstrators made their stand. Overall, though, the demonstration was peaceful and the mood among the marchers was one of solidarity.
More than half of the demonstrators were people of color, with a significant percentage having ties to Blackout DC, the Black Lives Matter Movement, or other racial justice groups — as well as ties to the District’s LGBT community.
“I think it went really well,” said Jes G., one of four lead organizers, who is affiliated with DC Trans Power. “We were honestly expecting more pushback. When there was the Black Trans Lives Matter action that people put on in August, and we took the intersection of 14th and K, people were getting hit by cars. Some dude came out and punched a bunch of people. We got no support. I was very pleasantly surprised that it was only one particular person.”
The marchers eventually ended by convening inside of D.C.’s Union Station, where they read aloud the names of transgender people who had died due to anti-trans violence or suicide in 2015. Organizers refer to suicide as society-sanctioned murder, resulting from transphobia and discrimination that drive people to take their own lives.
“I feel like it went really well, but it’s really too early to figure out the kind of impact it had,” said Lane B., another chief organizer, who is also affiliated with DC Trans Power. “I think it was an important action. I think this Week of Action is very important. I’m glad we got this many people out there. I’m glad we were able to take the streets for so long.
“The thing I want people to take away from this the knowledge that trans people’s lives and existence are valued and cared about and loved, and there are plenty of people who are willing to be kind of confrontational, who are willing to take action to protect trans people,” Lane continued. “The current state of circumstances facing the trans community is entirely unacceptable. The rates of violence and poverty and discrimination that trans people face need to change. … It’s also really important to acknowledge our commitment to fight for trans people while we are still alive, and that we have a community that will fight for us and stand with us.”
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