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black lives matter toronto
Canada gave me my real voice.
Trans people struggle with employment, basic medical care, accessing things like housing and even public washrooms. Look around. Most of the services offered are categorized by gender, so trans people face constant barriers using them.
Black writers can't be expected to continually argue and prove the very basics of their life experiences every time they're granted some space in a publication. Can you imagine a (non-female) sportswriter being quizzed by readers about the foundations of their sports knowledge? Yet open up any Canadian news piece about Black Lives Matter, Islamophobia, or misogyny, and I promise you'll see the equivalent.
Police officers have begun wearing bracelets in support of Const. Daniel Montsion, an officer charged with manslaughter after an SUI investigation. We need to believe in everyone involved from the police, all the way up to the judges, are unbiased and out to do their jobs. This band, this in-your-face alliance around Montsion, doesn't do that.
"Black lives matter. Can we say that? Because if you can't even say it, how can people feel it?"
This was a missed opportunity to address the lack of great strides with the black members of the LGBTQ community, and black Torontonians as a whole. Once police make some progress on the"much to do" promise, which means actually working to reduce systemic racism in a real and meaningful way, then they can "decide" to rejoin the Pride Parade.
Yusra Khogali has made a habit of directing violent, hateful language towards people with white skin, so much so that I feel comfortable calling her out. When an individual at the helm of what could be a transformative movement distracts the public with hate, it is time for that individual to go.
Racial profiling is still an everyday reality for black Canadians.
Since Black Lives Matter Toronto's sit-in during Pride 2016, many of you have shown woeful levels of misunderstanding of where our community as a whole sits with the police. I've heard several of you say that the police don't pose a threat to LGBT people, because we've made "progress." "The bathhouse raids were 35 years ago. Everything is fine now between LGBT people and the police!" is how the argument goes, as if conflict between police and LGBT people is a thing of the past. What you mean to say is that your battle for your rights (which did not include an agenda for LGBT people of colour) was already hard fought decades ago.
