The Transexual Menace
| Formation | 1993 |
|---|---|
| Type | direct action |
| Purpose | Transgender rights |
The Transexual Menace, or The Menace, was a transgender rights activist organization founded in New York City in 1993. It was the first direct action group of its kind, and grew to be a national organisation with 24 chapters.
History and activities
[edit]The group was founded in 1993 by transgender activists including Riki Wilchins and Denise Norris, in response to the exclusion of transgender people from lesbian, gay, and bisexual Pride marches.[1]
Media attention
[edit]The Transexual Menace organized groups of demonstrators outside courthouses during trials involving anti-transgender crimes, for instance in the rape and murder of Brandon Teena. The movement became the subject of iconic gay liberation filmmaker Rosa von Praunheim's documentary "Transexual Menace".[2][3]
T-shirts
[edit]The trademark image for the Transexual Menace was a Goth-styled black T-shirt with the group's name in blood-dripping red letters.[2] The Menace T-shirts were designed by Wilchins and Wilchins‘ then partner Montine Jordan, with a design emulating the Rocky Horror Picture Show logo. The T-shirts were significant in that they allowed transgender visibility at a time when passing as cis was highly encouraged and desired. As described by Wilchins in the book TRANS/gressive, "If you passed [as cis], you were safe. But pulling on the T-shirt screwed all of that forever".[4]
Pictures are available of the Pittsburgh chapter's T-shirts and the Texas chapter's T-shirts.
Esquire interview and response
[edit]Esquire approached the group to do a piece about transgender activism. It was published under the title "The Third Sex - Now the men who have decided they are actually women are on the march. Welcome to the transgender revolution" on April 1, 1995.[5]
The Menace members were angry and the group immediately picketed Esquire's offices; eventually the writer of the story came down to apologise. In her book TRANS/gressive, Riki Wilchins describes the incident as reflective of the climate at the time, with "friendly fire" coming from people or institutions that were not even actively hostile.[4]
The Gay Games
[edit]The Menace protested trans women's exclusion from the Gay Games. Wilchins describes how trans women, unlike the other participants, had to "jump through a series of demeaning hoops" including providing medical records, a hormone test and a full gender verification regime. Six members of the NYC chapter crashed the board meeting of the Gay Games and instantiated a change of these regulations. The transgender-exclusionary regulations were re-instated four years later.[4]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ "Denise Norris - Andes, NY". MEUSA. Retrieved 2018-04-15.
- ^ a b Stryker, Susan (2009-01-07). Transgender History. Da Capo Press. ISBN 9780786741366.
- ^ "Transexual Menace | UC Berkeley Library". www.lib.berkeley.edu. Archived from the original on November 11, 2017. Retrieved 2018-04-16.
- ^ a b c Wilchins, Riki (2017-05-31). TRANS/gressive: How Transgender Activists Took on Gay Rights, Feminism, the Media & Congress… and Won!. Riverdale Avenue Books LLC. ISBN 9781626013674.
- ^ Taylor, John. "The Third Sex". Esquire Classic. Retrieved 2019-10-25.
