I have been asked many times, on why or how I became an activist, and I think that I always cared about civil rights; however, I never acted on those cares.
My activism started out without direct thought about becoming an activist. When I came out of the closet in 1999, I began attending a support/social group called the Connecticut Outreach Society that meets twice a month. I started becoming active in COS because it gave me another night to go out dressed as Diana by attending the Board meetings for the Connecticut Outreach Society. At the Board meetings, I started to volunteer to work at events that COS took part in, I helped at events like the True Colors conference and Pride where COS had a table. Later I became Program Director and still later, I became their Executive Director, not out of activism but a desire to build COS back up again. Its paid membership was down to a little over a dozen members and its treasury had less than a thousands dollars, not enough to pay the rent and phone bill for the rest of the year.
I started to realize that my feeling was deeper then crossdressing, that it was more of an identity of who I am and not what I wore. I started to attend the Twenty Club, a support group for transsexuals and there I started to hear stories discrimination and oppression. I heard stories of members being fired when they came out at work or highly skilled workers who were unable to find employment. I heard members tell how they were thrown out of stores or restaurants because they are trans. I heard a story of how a trans-woman was beaten on the job and she was arrested by police for disorderly conduct and her attackers were not arrested. Of being harassed by the police. This went against my deep sense of justice and fairness, and I wanted to do something to end the injustice. Thus was my activism born, by asking a simple question, “What can I do to help?”
It lead to my involvement with the Connecticut TransAdvocacy Coalition and it lead me to pursuing my Masters in Social Work.
Great post!
ReplyDelete