Trans Day of Remembrance 2023

Highland News & Media

Highland Pride committee member Roz White speaks on the importance of Trans Day of Remembrance at the 2023 vigil outside Eden Court in Inverness.

Transcript

00:00 Regardless of where the community is, the importance of the day is to remind people

00:06 that all around the world people are still being murdered, murdered for simply trying

00:15 to sort out their own lives and live the way they feel that they absolutely have to.

00:22 Nobody in their right mind would choose to be trans.

00:26 No one would do it if there was any other option other than being miserable, lonely,

00:34 suicidal, unable to function in the wider society without putting yourself through this.

00:42 Because it's not easy, it's not quick, it's certainly not any sort of lifestyle choice

00:46 per se, it's a lifestyle necessity.

00:49 And I think whether it's in Inverness or the middle of India or New York or anywhere else

00:55 it's important that people realise this and that people are reminded that all over the

01:01 world this year, this last year, more than one person a day on average, somewhere in

01:07 the world has been murdered simply for trying to be themselves.

01:13 Not harming anyone else, not affecting anyone else, not doing anything illegal or intrusive,

01:23 just trying to live their lives and somebody else took it upon themselves to say that they

01:29 didn't like that and that person had to die.

01:33 I mean come on world, really, seriously, have we not got past this yet?

01:39 And that was a really powerful moment at the vigil tonight to read out the list of all

01:44 those names of people who have been killed.

01:47 Obviously you hope it's not going to be as long next year.

01:49 Well absolutely, we read out 392 names this year.

01:54 We always hope it will be less next year.

01:56 We always hope, as I said earlier, that it will be not even necessary to have this day

02:03 at some point in the future.

02:07 But we come here year after year, we read out the names year after year and the fact

02:13 that Trans Day of Remembrance has been going for a number of years now suggests that the

02:19 trans issue as some people see it is not going away.

02:25 You can't kill us all off and suddenly we won't be here anymore.

02:29 Trans people have always been there.

02:30 You only have to look back through unfiltered history to see that there have always been

02:36 trans people.

02:37 There always will be trans people.

02:40 They're killing us and we can fade quite happily into society, go to work, pay our

02:46 taxes, be useful, beneficial members of the society, wherever that may be.

02:53 And it's no skin off anybody else's nose.

02:56 We're not hurting anyone.

02:59 I fail to see what the problem is that requires 392 people to lose their lives over the last

03:05 12 months.

03:07 It just baffles me completely.

03:08 It really does.

03:09 I don't understand it at all but I will continue to read these names out every year.

03:15 I'm not going to bring it here anywhere.

03:18 My trans friends aren't going anywhere.

03:20 Deal with us.

03:21 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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