It's one of the reasons I started putting the 'T' in TBLG first, will add the 'I' sometimes to represent the intersex community or will sometimes mix up the lettering in posts.
But one thing we damned sure need to do is be more forceful and vocal about the fact that we need civil rights coverage, we are tired of being marginalized, ignored, lied on and disrespected by friend and foe alike and will not tolerate it in this second decade of the 21st century and beyond.
Putting ourselves first as transpeople not only means the symbolic nature of putting the 'T' at the head of the alphabet soup designator for this community, it also means being tough minded enough to criticize in Kingian love our allies when they engage in actions that are detrimental to our community.
It also means having the intestinal fortitude to kill legislation that is not in our best interests and loudly protest injustice aimed at us. We must also rediscover the will to do direct action when needed to highlight issues that affect us and call out and repudiate disinformation about this community wherever it comes from.
We trans people need to stop using conservalanguage like 'race card' , 'politically correct' and 'lifestyle' when discussing policy inside and outside our community.
And oh yes, speaking of community, we must reject the ridiculous assertion pimped by transsexual separatists that there isn't a trans community. That's conservafool 'rugged individualist' BS, and when you are a marginalized community denied your civil rights, rugged individualism isn't going to work against an oppressor determined to not give one millimeter on granting you the civil rights you not have a God-given constitutional right to like any other American citizen, but are fighting tooth and nail to obtain.Putting Ourselves First also means if you claim to love transpeople, that means all transpeople, not just a certain slice of the community.
Kwame Ture said it best, 'In order to participate in the greater society, you must first close ranks.' We deserve and need to demand first class citizenship and not stop until we get it. When trans protective laws are proposed, they need to be comprehensive and as loophole free as possible when they are first introduced, not toothless wastes of legislative time, nor allow our allies to browbeat us into accepting 'incremental progress' when they won't do the same for their issues..
We need to do a better job of closing ranks and focusing on developing that national sense of community if we wish to have lasting civil rights coverage.
Transpeople, it's nation time! It's past time to put ourselves first in this civil rights conversation, and our transkids are depending on us to be the trans men and women we say we are so they aren't 20 years from now struggling to deal with the same problems we are jousting with in this decade..
