Black Trans Lives Matter
Black Trans Lives Matter Solidarity March Wellington.
Saturday July 4th from 1pm.
Meet at Frank Kitts Park.
March to Parliament – mobility accessible route.
Speakers include Chanel Hati of New Zealand Prositiutes’ Collective, Wellington Pride Festival Chair Vivian Lyngdoh, aand Jayden Rurawhe.
You can register your name and email here for contact tracing Covid-19 purposes, but if that’s possible just come along. There is also a Facebook event here.
Organised by Black cis women in Aotearoa in solidarity – everyone is welcome to join.
You can contact the organisers Tammie and Chinwe 0210 835 2351 or email tammiewrites@gmail.com or chinwe.akomah@gmail.com
GMA won’t be formally speaking due to prior arrangements, but Ahi’s speech is below.
”Black Trans Lives Matter. Violence against Black trans women in the USA alone is astoundingly high, dozens of Black trans women are murdered every year. And that’s just the murders – how many Black trans people all around the world are subjected to invasive, unfair, inhumane, and violent treatment in day to day life? Even in Aotearoa where gun users need to be licenced, we have white supremacists massacring people of colour in their places of worship, and we have ”statistically disproportionate rates” of excessive force used against Maori by Police, and now we’re going to give them guns. We are terrified and justified in our fears. We reject that white supremacy is nothing but a handful of extremists – it’s in the structure of the court system and criminal justice process. [ref]. We cannot separate the violent extremists from the lack of equity in the system. White supremacist and transphobic extremists don’t come out of nowhere – they grew up in a society that says our lives are expendable at best. Ignore that pile of bodies under the rug, waiting for access to a house and healthcare and a simple. fucking. birth certificate.
”Trans people in Aotearoa are 9 x more likely than the general population to live with high psychological distress due to discrimination across every area of their public lives: 19% of trans people are homeless at some point in their lives – and this is closer to 25% for non-white trans people, trans people are at least twice as likely to be raped, yet there are almost no emergency housing or sexual violence support services for us.
1 in 3 trans people avoids going to a doctor when they need medical care because they are sick and tired of being disrespected. 83% of trans people in Aotearoa have the wrong gender marker on their birth certificate, and we are forced to have ”permanent medical changes” if we want to have accurate documentation. And for non-binary trans people it’s not possible under any circumstance. Trans people are so much more likely to be discriminated against in education and employment that the median income for trans people is half that of the general population. We are living in poverty. We’re hungry, we’re cold, we’re struggling. [ref]
”So it’s easy to compare Aotearoa to the USA and say it’s a small country here – we don’t have the same high murder rates, things are different, Black trans people are safe here. But white supremacy and anti-trans extremism are here, they affect the lives of Black trans people in Aotearoa every single day, and they won’t go anywhere until we get sharp, recognise them, and work together to stop them.
– Ahi Wi-Hongi
