Three people. Three frustrations in Akron’s transgender community.
Aveline Clark, an advisory council member with Trans Joy Akron, believes trans people are simultaneously hyper visible and invisible.
“That puts us in danger. Trans people experience such a high rate of violence in all forms,” said Clark, a 21-year-old who double majors in Sociology and Social Work at the University of Akron. Clark uses the pronouns she/they.
Tyrone Berry said people often politicize transness instead of viewing trans-identifying people as humans.
“The biggest struggles and misconceptions are people not knowing what transness is,” said Berry, 26 (they/he).
Miles Davis-Matthews (he/they), the co-director of Trans Joy Akron, said Transgender Day of Remembrance is an opportunity to discuss the dynamics of transness that are harder for people to deal with, “which is the race component,” the 25-year-old said.
Last Wednesday, all three attended an outdoor fire ceremony held in Akron on Transgender Day of Remembrance. The event, hosted by Trans Joy Akron, a non-profit that focuses on social engagement, education and building community, honored the lives of those killed in acts of violence.
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Since 2013, the Human Rights Campaign Foundation has traced the nationwide deaths of at least 372 transgender and gender-expansive victims as a result of fatal violence — including at least 36 deaths in the last 12 months. Other deaths are believed to go unreported or misreported.
An overwhelming number of the victims killed between Transgender Day 2023 and this week were young and people of color; Black trans women were disproportionately impacted.
The Human Rights Campaign Foundation, the nation’s largest lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer civil rights organization, revealed the LGBTQ+ data in “The Epidemic of Violence Against the Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming Community in the United States” in advance of 2024 Trans Day of Remembrance.
Said Davis-Matthews: “I think people are really starting to acknowledge that this loneliness thing is going to kill us all if we don’t get together and start dealing with things seriously.”