Confetti Club, the student LGBTQ+ club at ASU, held a vigil on Tuesday as part of the Transgender Day of Remembrance.
The vigil intended to honor and remember all the transgender people who were murdered or committed suicide in 2018, said Confetti Club President La’Tithea Gay.
“Discrimination and violence towards transgender people has been a big issue for as long as I can remember, but a lot of people don’t realize it,” Gay said. “Events like these not only help honor the dead, but also help raise awareness to reduce the future struggles of transgender people.”
Micah knows what it’s like.
The transgender freshman at ASU chose not to give their last name for safety reasons. They said if more people understood transgender people, there would be less violence towards them.
“People harass us and are violent towards us because they are confused by us,” they said. “That has created an environment where I don’t even want to people to know my last name.”
The event began with a walk for awareness, with nearly 30 students in attendance holding candles and pictures of deceased members of the transgender community as they walked around the downtown campus.
Confetti club members wore shirts emblazoned with the Trans Lifeline number, 1-877-565-8860.
After the walk, the students gathered at the Beus Center for Law and Society, where Arizona State graduate student Rafael Esquer spoke to them about the struggles and loneliness a transgender person often faces in today’s society.
“We need to stay invisible to survive, but we are here,” Esquer said to the group. “Our voices have been screaming for generations, but nobody hears us.”
Then Anne Kotleba, an ASU professor and the president of the ASU LGBTQ Staff and Faculty Association, read the names of 24 transgender people that died in the U.S. in 2018.
“We lift these names up so they are always remembered, but they are more than just names and pictures,” Kotleba said. “These were our brothers and sisters.”
She explained that while the vigil was meant to honor the dead, it was also a reminder that they needed to continue to put in the work to reduce those deaths.
“Our goal is to see this list grow smaller and smaller,” she said.
Sisko Stargazer, a student at Arizona State University who identifies as gender fluid, said had the Arizona State community not been as supportive as they were, Stargazer might have been in an unthinkable position.
“I was lucky that I found a good environment when I came to college, with people who accepted me and let me be who I am, because if I didn’t, I might not be around today,” Stargazer said.
Esquer pointed out there are a lot of resources for people that do feel alone.
“A lot of people think there is nobody like them, but I promise, there are,” he said.
As Kotleba read the names of those who passed, and as the pictures were placed in the hands of students and allies at the vigil, Micah felt the impact.
“It was great to be able to honor the lives of people that had such a difficult time,” Micah said.
Contact the reporter at rvatti@asu.edu.
