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Feinberg Stresses Solidarity At UVM Address
Feinberg Stresses
Solidarity At UVM Address
by Kerry Slora
Solidarity is the key to winning our battle, according to Leslie Feinberg, and the noted transgender activist and author misses few chances to explain why.
Before delivering a speech at UVM’s Ira Allen Chapel in Burlington on April 5, Feinberg met with 15 area GLBT students and graduates to have dinner and become familiar with their thoughts and concerns. At first quiet and reserved, Feinberg listened intently to stories about GLBT conferences and workshops, involvement with Outright Vermont, an organization Feinberg was not familiar with, and the struggle of creating unity in our schools and throughout the state.
When Feinberg did speak, conversation touched on inclusion of gendered people in efforts like the Human Rights Campaign and the financial interests of groups that continue to exclude.
Those points came up later in the evening, during the address at UVM as Feinberg discussed the need for solidarity. “How are you gonna win anything without all of us?” Feinberg asked, reminding the crowd that a group is always more powerful than separate movements, and that it is not a winning strategy to exclude.
“Every single person in the closet dies a slow, suffocating death,” Feinberg said, envisioning a place and time where people want to come out on their own and citing the need for movement toward coalition that allows everyone to fight for each other when lives are on the line.
Feinberg touched on inconsistencies that have taken power away from the queer movement, including details as overlooked as the male and female boxes on the Census 2000 questionnaires and the debate over the importance of sexuality in the military.
The speech emphasized the impact of gender roles and the assumptions made about gender expression in our society, even from birth: “There’s a lot of gender assumptions mitigated in those little pink and blue caps!” Feinberg went on to say that the surgical tailoring of intersexual infants, deemed a medical crisis, is really a social crisis that cannot be ignored.
Addressing the role of politicians, such as Rudolf Giuliani and David Duke, Feinberg suggested that the term “hate crimes” has not provided enough emphasis, and though hate crimes bills are passed, loopholes often render them ineffective. With 15 murders of gays, lesbians, and trans people in New York City alone during the last 20 months, Feinberg said many of these “hate crimes” have been “old Klan” style, and more closely resemble “right-wing lynchings”.
“People have united in the past to push back the Klan... maybe if these murders were aptly named they would receive the right attention,” Feinberg told the audience.
Returning to the theme of solidarity, Feinberg talked about involvement with the pro-choice movement at home in Buffalo, NY, and how the Stonewall Rebellion arose from a similar sort of connection and convergence of oppressed groups.
“When they closed ranks together they made an impact, they made history,” said Feinberg.
Solidarity also means taking on others’ struggles, and Feinberg discussed the plight of political prisoners such as Leonard Pellitier and Mumia Abu-Jumal. “We want Mumia to fight shoulder to shoulder with us... we will not let them take him from us!” Feinberg said, discussing involvement in the Rainbow Flags for Mumia movement and its planned gathering at Madison Square Gardens in New York on May 9.
Feinberg finished the lecture with sentiments for slain youth Matthew Shepard, citing his murder as a “crucifixion” and comparing the incident to ancient crucifixions of rebellious slaves on the road to Rome. Feinberg said the message inherent is the same: “don’t you try to change anything or this will happen to you!”
Feinberg had a retort for that, a quote from the African-American poet June Jordan: “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.”