Showing posts with label anti-transgender violence. Show all posts
Showing posts with label anti-transgender violence. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Another Day, Another Trans Assault

We haven't even reached Memorial Day yet and the signs are accumulating that it's going to be a long, uncomfortable summer for transpeople.

If it isn't the po-po's jacking with us, it's some fool who has self esteem issues that wants to take them out on us to make themselves feel more like a man or woman.

As the legal process continues to move forward in the wake of the Chrissy Polis McBeatdown in the Baltimore burbs, word of another transperson being attacked in Fredericksburg, VA is racing across the Transophere.

The 32 year old victim was leaving a convenience store near her home at 3:30 PM on May 21 when she was surrounded by two cis males and a cis female, taunted, and then assaulted.   The attackers fled in two vehicles  and the victim was able to get the license plate numbers of both vehicles.


View more videos at: http://nbcwashington.com.


The victim suffered numerous facial injuries and bruising of the hands and knees during the assault

18 year old Laqueta Webb was later arrested for malicious wounding by mob and is in jail without bond.   The two male suspects involved in the attack have yet to be arrested, but have been identified..

Virginia does have a hate crimes law on the books, but it doesn't cover sexual orientation or gender identity.

It figures.

But long story short, this bull feces is getting old.   I'm just waiting for the day when these wastes of DNA who get their jollies beating on transpeople runs into the wrong one.  

One who is more than prepared to defend themselves with either boxing or martial arts training or simply busts a cap in them.


Monday, May 16, 2011

Brown Faces Hate Crime Charges In McBeatdown

18 year old Teonna Monae Brown has been charged in the videotaped McBeatdown of 22 year old Chrissy Polis that went viral after it was posted on the Web last month.

According to WBAL-TV the office of the Baltimore County State's Attorney said Brown was indicted by a grand jury today on charges that included hate crime and first and second degree assault.

The 14 year old female juvenile accompanying Brown who participated in the attack is also facing the same charges, according to the office.

22 year old Polis was attacked inside a Rosedale, MD McDonald's restaurant on April 18.   The video of that assault was recorded by a now terminated McDonald's employee, posted online later that week and quickly went viral.

The video garnered thousands of page views on various websites and sparked outrage in the trans community..  The attack also happened just weeks after HB 235, a controversial trans rights bill that was stripped of public accommodations language died in the Maryland Senate.

Brown and the juvenile, who are currently being detained, were also charged with second-degree assault charges regarding Vicki Thoms, who tried to intervene during the attack, and Darrick Jones.


Stay tuned, this case is going to be followed by a lot of people inside and outside the trans community.


Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Suspect Arrested In Brutal Attack On PR Transwoman

I've written about the spike in anti trans murders and assaults in Puerto Rico and speculated that one of the causes of it is the anti trans attitudes and trans hate doctrine coming out of the Catholic Church. since 2003.


Ironically on the same April 18 day that Chrissy Polis was getting attacked in the Baltimore 'burbs, Francheska Gonzalez was minding her own business pumping gas in her car at a Rio Piedras, PR gas station when she was viciously assaulted.

According to an April 20 Radio Isla interview with Francheska's mother Olga Vazquez, she was kicked in the head and all over her body by her assailants.  Gonzalez suffered a fractured vertebrae and bruises all over her body as a result..

22 year old Jose Ortiz, one of the assailants in Gonzalez's attack was recently arrested after police responded to reports that a group of men were robbing and assaulting trans women in San Juan's Santurce neighborhood.

Gonzalez picked him out of a police lineup, and he will be charged on Wednesday April 27..

"We are satisfied that the suspect has been identified. Now we call upon the authorities to investigate the hate angle on this case, but foremost to do justice," Pedro Julio Serrano of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force told EDGE.. "Anti-LGBT violence cannot be condoned and the government has to send a message that it will not tolerate any bias attack against the LGBT community or any other community."

Pray for Francheska's speedy recovery from her injuries and hope that justice is done in this case as well.
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Monday, April 25, 2011

Pam's Ponderings-Trans People Must Stand Up For Themselves

TransGriot Note:  Commentary from author Pamela Hayes

There has been so much buzz about the trans girl who was attacked and beaten by a couple of female thugs in a McDonald’s. I have not seen the video and I have no desire to watch footage of any person being punched, kicked, throttled or however the attack was administered.

A number of sites have reported the story, followed by comments galore. The poor child was disrespected when she was assaulted and many of the comments that followed were appalling and insensitive.

Conversely, there were some intelligent comments from people, who felt the beating was wrong, that the perpetrators should pull serious jail time.

The trans woman was accused of misleading people, called a freak and a he/she. Some folks said they felt no compassion for her. One man made an interesting comment about if a guy is going to live as a woman and if he doesn’t want any hassle or shit, that he better make sure that he can keep it on the low (in secret) because if someone realizes what “he” is doing, trouble will follow.

Well, there’s only a small percentage of trans women who can live without questions being raised about them and even if questions are raised, no one has a right attacking anybody because they disapprove of who that person is.

If a trans girl is clocked, trouble shouldn’t follow, but it usually does, which is a perfect segue into reiterating that trans women should learn self-defense.

Some people said that the victim in the Mickey Dee’s brawl didn’t fight back, that she allowed her assailants to punch and kick her and did nothing to physically defend herself.

That is a classic symptom of low self-esteem. Over the years, I've known a number of trans women who have been beat up by family members, other trans people, strangers on the street and they did not fight back. Did not swear out warrants on people who beat her. One t-girl was severely beaten by her brothers while her mother watched and did nothing. The t-girl should have had her brothers arrested. They didn't think twice about putting their hands on her, so why should she be concerned about them being thrown in jail and getting criminal records? 

Hey, I could go out there and get my ass kicked, but I ASSURE you that I’m going to get some punches in. And I will make every effort do damage.

Back to trans women and self-esteem. Many of the girls have low self-esteem. Which is deepened when they allow store clerks, nasty citizens to insult, ridicule, and degrade them and not utter a word in defense of themselves.
Human beings are not wired like that. Someone insults a person, usually they don’t accept it and move on. That’s not natural. And for a trans woman to accept such behavior from people, I wonder if she feels that she deserves it.

Also, if any person allows such indignities to take place, it is going to damage them emotionally. Hurt them psychologically, which could lead to depression as well as physical repercussions. Studies say that ulcers and other gastrointestinal disturbances are brought on by stress. And a trans person lives with put-downs, criticism, discrimination, familial rejection and all that is most definitely stress. A trans woman can make her life less stressful simply by fighting back. Simply by defending herself physically or verbally.

One t-girl told me that when people make stage whispers about her, that she has to ignore it. She can’t speak out. “Why the hell not?” I asked, totally confounded.

“See, I’m supposedly a real woman. So if someone suggested I was a man by calling me he or sir, I’m not suppose to realize they’re even talking about me.”

She actually said that to me. And it sounds like nonsense. I’ll concede that if they don’t say anything to a trans woman directly, she could ignore it and pretend as if the slur was not directed at them. Some things are not worth addressing. Some fool off at a distance saying, “That’s a man” is one of those things. But if someone is in a trans woman’s face calling her, he, him, sir and it, she cannot pretend that that is not aimed at her.

Also, I’ve lived long enough as a trans woman to say unequivocally that people who instigate trouble with other people are usually insecure and have low self-esteem. Secure, confident people do not go around bullying other people.

And looks are not everything, but ever notice that people who fuck with others tend to look like shit? They rarely look like cover girls, swimsuit models or models for men’s fitness magazines. Most of them are unattractive losers. And if necessary, t-women should inform them of that. She will feel better for it.

In closing, if you allow people to talk trash to you and don't say anything in defense of yourself, you're giving them permission to haul off and hit you.