The Transgender Issue: Trans Justice Is Justice for All

by Shon Faye

They soon published their own political manifesto, Declare Your Sex, which clearly identified trans liberation as a part of wider gay liberation: Many gay people are confused by the separation between ‘gay transvestites’ and ‘straight transvestites’. But this is an artificial split, imposed on us by those people who seek to isolate us and deny our identities. A transsexual or transvestite is gay because she or he is transsexual or transvestite. Some of us are into men and some of us are into women. Some of us are homosexual, some of us are heterosexual, some of us are lesbians. But we are all transsexual or transvestites and it’s these identities that must be recognized and encouraged. To be gay means to break the rules of your official sex, to cross over the guidelines set up by the family, the schools, and the church. Some of us cross over by sleeping with the wrong person. Some of us dress the wrong way. Some of us do both. We are all gay.20