Dear Oprah II

TransGriot Note: I wrote an open letter to Oprah back in 2007 asking when she was going to interview an African American trans person on her show. Time for another one.

Dear Oprah,
When you began to cover transgender issues on your show back in 2007, I along with the African descended trans community were excited that you were beginning to train your attention on the issues of transgender people.

The trans community in general deeply appreciates any opportunity we have been granted to educate the public. The sizable viewing audience exposed to your shows highlighting trans issues has been invaluable as well.

But once again, I have to ask on behalf of the African American trans community, when are you going to show us the same love you have shown the white trans community when we need the media exposure far more than they do?

We in the African descended trans community have been disappointed to see that our media blackout continues, even on Oprah.

The problem has and continues to be in the 57 years since Christine Jorgenson stepped off her flight from Denmark into the glare of media publicity in New York that the narrative of transgender exposure and experience has been predominately driven by white trans lives.

I wrote an open letter respectfully asking for equal time for transpeople who share your ethnic heritage. In the almost three years that have passed since then, I and the African American trans community have watched shows featuring Thomas Beattie and other white transpeople up to and including your recent show focusing on trans filmmaker Kimberly Reed.

But what still stands out for us is the glaring lack of African descended transpeople on your show.

The fact that your Emmy award winning talk show will be ending September 9, 2011 has added to the increased sense of disappointment myself and other African descended people feel as we fail to see ourselves and our lives represented in these shows.

That disappointment is heightened by the fact that we disproportionately continue to bear the brunt of anti-transgender hate violence.

Since your first 2007 trans themed show we have witnessed the late Duanna Johnson's beating by a Memphis police officer caught on videotape. We have had dozens of African descended transpeople such as Taysia Elzy, Ebony Whitaker, and Lateisha Green murdered, and far too often, the perpetrators of these heinous crimes against African descended transpeople share our ethnic heritage.

And frankly, our transitions are different from our white trans counterparts.

Your audience as you are keenly aware of consists of cis and trans African-Americans. It is inside and outside our African American community that we African American trans people struggle against violence, invisibility, faith based ignorance and rejection of our lives. The predominately Caucasian lens that transgender experiences have been framed in has led to a misguided perception in our community that being transgender 'is a white thang.'

Isis King is just one example of trans African Americans of all ages who are blowing away that myth. We're talented, proudly living our lives and wish to make greater contributions to uplift our people.

Like any other persons, we want unconditional equality and acceptance in our society and a fair chance to make that happen.

An appearance on your show by an African descended transperson or transpersons would not only be deeply appreciated by us, it could go a long way towards breaking down those barriers of ignorance about trans issues on the African-American community and who we are to the world at large.

It would also give our friends, supportive family members and allies a positive thing about us to point to.

Whether that happens before September 8, 2011 is up to you, and I pray it does.

Sincerely,

Monica Roberts
The TransGriot
2006 IFGE Trinity Award Winner

Letter To My African-American Transgender Elders

Dear African-American Transelders,

I hope and pray your golden years find you in excellent health, a secure life situation, and satisfied with the way your lives turned out.

But there's a question I've been dying to ask those of you who walked before me.

Why didn't y'all work harder to build an African-American transgender community for mine and the generations to come?

Yeah, I realize that y'all had a lot of thangs on your plate back in the day. Fighting Jim Crow segregation, getting our voting rights, the Civil Rights Movement, dealing with HIV/AIDS and trying to make a living making 70 cents for every dollar a white person earns. That does have a much higher priority than what I'm talking about.

Don't get me wrong, I'm eternally grateful for your contributions and sacrifices that helped make my life as a late 20th-early 21st century African-American better. I'm well aware that in addition to the other challenges you African-American transgender elders faced, I am cognizant of the fact that our community is somewhat conservative on gender issues and pursuing that may have opened you up to violent attacks and even death. I'm also aware of the fact that the HBIGDA/WPATH orthodoxy at the time you transitioned was to fade away and never let anyone know you're transgender.

But damn, I feel cheated.

By going stealth, I feel that my history as an African-American transperson has been hidden from me. I know HIV/AIDS took some of you away from us, but why didn't y'all do a better job of passing that history down to my generation? Where were y'all when I needed multiple transgender role models that share my cultural background to look up to back in the 70's? Why weren't more of you visionary enough like Justina Williams for example to build organizations on a local and eventually national scale that passed that knowledge down and build a networked national community at the same time? I know y'all had the skills to do so. You proved it time and time again during the Civil Rights era.

Why did some of y'all hate us younger transpeeps so much that when we humbly asked you for the information as to the how to's of Transition 101 and longed to be mentored by you the response was stony silence, derisive laughter or derogatory self-esteem deflating comments?

My generation and others are paying for that lack of vision right now. Because you didn't think long term and pursue this in a more politically favorable environment we are now faced with the task of trying to build community and unite separate factions of dispirited peeps in a hostile conservative political environment. Our churches have been infected by a doctrine of hatred for GLBT peeps. It comes from the same white fundamentalist preachers that opposed y'all in your youth and distracts our churches from fulfilling their historic mission of seeking justice for ALL African-Americans.

But you know what? I and my generation can't wallow in what SHOULD have been done decades ago. We are faced with the daunting task of doing it now.

The transkids who are being born right now or who are are transitioning in elementary and middle school will need those resources to lean on. Shouldn't our kids have access to the same or equal resources similar to what our transbrothers and transsisters of European heritage have today that were painstakingly built up over the last twenty years? Shouldn't those resources also be geared toward their culture?

I'm not writing this letter to cast blame or start an inter generational war. That's not my intent. I'm approaching you in the spirit of Kingian love and respect for you as my elders. I wanted to convey to you the sense of loss and pain I and many African-American transpeople of my generation feel because we grew up feeling isolated and alone.

I am in the position now of being looked at as a leader and mentor to twenty something transkids. I don't want another African-American transkid on my watch to ever feel that kind of pain again and want to leave behind a world better than what I encountered. I and the current African-American transgender leadership need your help to achieve that modest goal. I would like to gain insight on what happened from your vantage point. We want and need to get your side of the story. We want to embrace the history you have to share with us so that we can pass it on. We've lost too much of our precious history already and our young people need to know about what you accomplished so that they can aspire to do something extraordinary with their lives.

Finally, we wish to lean on your hard won knowledge, be mentored by you in the time that God has granted you to remain with us on Planet Earth, learn from the mistakes as you see them through your generational prism and diligently work to ensure that we don't repeat them.

Respectfully yours,
Monica Roberts
The TransGriot

Letter To My Fellow African-Americans

Dear Fellow African-Americans,

As one of your transgender cousins who shares your ethnic heritage I am moved to ask this question.

What the hell is wrong with y'all?

What has caused some of y'all to take leave of your senses and work with white fundamentalists who only 40 years ago were not only opposed to us gaining our civil rights but didn't want you, your kids or your grandkids to marry their sons and daughters?

It's pathetically sad when you have a group of African-American ministers go up to Capitol Hill to lobby against the passage of the Hate Crimes Bill at the behest of the same group of white fundamentalist preachers who fought our inclusion during the Civil Rights Movement.

It's also mind numbing and sad to ponder that the baby daughter of the greatest American our country has ever produced, the man who eloquently stated that 'injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere' is associate pastor of a megachurch in which the senior pastor is one of our oppressors and has made anti-gay statements herself.

Why do some of you hate us so much that you will kill us, brutalize us and vote against your own political and economic interests to put people in power to curtail GLBT civil rights? Why are you tossing us out of our homes and churches, ostracizing us within our families, demonizing us inside and outside the African-American community and selectively twisting Biblical scripture to justify it?

Please spare me the 'love the sinner but hate the sin' bogus scripture BS spin line that some of you will use as an excuse to justify your ignorance and hatred. The real deal is that y'all have allowed a bunch of white fundamentalists to jack with our historic community unity by injecting a false issue into our community debate. We have far more pressing issues to deal with than whether Adam and Steve or Tanisha and Markisha get married. We have allowed The Forces of Intolerance to not only gain a foothold in our churches and our communities, but allowed them to distract our churches from their ongoing historic mission of seeking justice for our people and speaking truth to power.

And for what? So a few selfish ministers who aren't fit to shine Dr. King's shoes can chase faith-based bucks and lust for power.

Where were you Hi Impact Leadership Coalition members and sympathizers when our right to vote was being jacked with in 2000 and 2004? Oh yeah, y'all were cheesin' for the cameras at the GOP conventions and the White House. Where were you in August 2005 when our people were dying in New Orleans? Y'all constantly flap your gums to rail against GLBT peeps from the pulpit but your silence was deafening then.

As for speaking truth to power, you megachurch posers and wannabes are more concerned with photo ops, building arena-sized churches and acquiring expensive clothes and cars than fighting for the civil rights of ALL African-Americans and speaking out against injustice. Instead of leadership we get posturing, posing, doublespeak and hate-filled soundbites from anti-gay sermons instead of ones like Dr. King's 'Remaining Awake Through a Great Revolution'.

Hate sermons mind you that result in the creation of a climate of intolerance, ignorance and fear that resulted in the killings of African-American GLBT people such as Sakia Gunn, Rashawn Brazell, Amanda Milan, Stephanie Thomas and Ukea Davis. I wonder what DC church the African-American EMT attended who allowed a fellow African-American named Tyra Hunter to bleed to death after a 1995 traffic accident because he discovered that she was a pre-op transwoman? He stopped treating Tyra, but had the time to insult and crack jokes about her.

If you insist that every African-American life is precious and we don't have a person to waste, then that by extension includes same gender loving folks and transpeople as well.

We are your sisters, brothers, nephews, nieces, aunts, uncles, cousins, neighbors and co-workers. We are also proud African-Americans who work, vote, go to church, serve in our nation's military and pay our taxes. All we're asking for is the same thing that any African-American wants, which is respect and dignity to live our lives without unnecessary bullcrap and be contributing members of society.

How many deaths, how much spilled blood, how much pain and suffering and how long will it take before you get that message, my fellow African-Americans?


Respectfully yours,
Monica Roberts
The TransGriot

Open Letter to Kenneth Eng

Dear Kenneth,
For somebody that graduated from NYU, you are breathtakingly ignorant to paint an entire race of people with a stereotypical brush based on two movies and a rap radio station as you did in your recent February 23 column. (Personally I prefer classic R&B and jazz myself.)

I guess you forgot about the story of Joseph Cinque and the Amistad revolt? That wasn't an isolated incident. Many slave ship voyages didn't get too far away from the African coastline before the rebellions started. There were far more successful slave rebellions and revolts than the 'happy darkie' pro-slavery revisionist forces care to elaborate on and the first one happened in 1733. They feared slave rebellions from 1792 onward. Haiti's slaves liberating themselves from French rule in 1803 made them even more 'scurred' of us replicating the feat on US shores.

I see you're also clueless about Harriet Tubman, the Underground Railroad and the various ingenious ways that African-Americans escaped from plantations. They fought for their freedom in the Revolutionary and Civil Wars.

While were on the war tip, ever heard of the Buffalo Soldiers? The 761st Tank Battalion AKA the Black Panthers? The Tuskegee Airmen? The 54th Massachusetts Regiment? You desperately need to hop on the subway and spend some time at the Schomburg Institute.

And in which one of your science-fiction universes did you come up with that asinine statement? I'm tired of peeps like you dismissing our very real historical experiences in this country as 'whining'. The Christianity that the slavemasters forced on us was infused with our own religious experiences and traditions we brought with us from Africa. From that Christianity came some of our greatest leaders in the late 19th and 20th century.

Kenneth, what I don't get is your disjointed rambling about some obscure high school debate and what connection it has with African-Americans in general. But then again racists were never known to have logical linear thinking processes.

If you didn't see any African-Americans in your honors or AP classes, then you must have attended school in the 'burbs or went to a private one. I was in gifted and talented classes in junior and senior high along with many of my friends. Education was stressed in mine and many other households in my neighborhood.

George Santayana was right. If you don't study the past you are condemned to repeat it. That's why we just spent 28 days commemorating our history. African-Americans are painfully familiar with that statement more than anyone else in this country because we've seen the effects of neglected or ignored history disproportionately impact our community. For example, our experiences during Reconstruction in the late 19th century have eerily replicated themselves in the late 20th-early 21st century.

And it is rather troubling that this kind of virulent racism is alive and well in the early 21st century, especially in someone who is a 21 year old college graduate. I'm even more angered over the fact that you chose Black History Month to write such disgusting tripe.

We are heroes, Kenneth. I'm descended from peeps that survived the Middle Passage. Despite violent opposition, nattering naysayers and countless obstacles placed in our paths over the last 400 years that would have broken less sturdy peoples, to quote Maya Angelou, 'and still we rise.'


Sincerely,
Monica Roberts
The TransGriot