I find it not only disrespectful but, openly hostile to queer and trans people of color to invoke the Stonewall riots for this homonationalist white queer circlejerk. For you to say that Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson and the other stonewall activists died for your individual right to get married is such a misnomber and a liberal interpretation of their radicalism. My trans sisters did not die so that you could get married, they did not die so that you could remove queer and trans people of color (especially twoc) from the LGBTQ rights movement, they did not die so that you could spend billions on your individual rights all the while ignoring queer and trans individuals dying in the streets (suffering from homelessness, abuse, violence, poverty, etc.), they did not die so that this movement that they built could become a movement led and dominated by white gay men. Because what you get wrong when you invoke these names is that these women, these phenomenal trans women of color, did not want integration into the current queerphobic and transmisogynistic society, they did not want the homonationalism and gay liberalism that is so prevalent now, they wanted queer and trans liberation.
I am so tired of seeing their names invoked, and their legacies erased in order to uphold homonationalism. Because how do you say “thank you Stonewall activists” but, at the same time ignore everything they stood for and their descendants of color? How do you disregard their message of liberation in favor of your goal of integration? Why do you insist on speaking over them? Why do you insist on changing their message? Why are marriage equality activists invoking their names all the while wearing Human Rights Campaign pins (an organization that facilitates racism and transmisogyny; and supports companies that perpetrate violence against queer and trans people of color).
Why are these trans women of color forced to endure violence and erasure even in death?
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