What’s that? Another campaign day? I’m afraid so, but this one has its uses.

The Transgender Day of Remembrance has been going for 11 years now, and shows no sign of being any less needed that it was when it started. Trans people are still at great risk of murder than almost any segment of the population. But TDoR is a very sad event, and no community should be remembered only for sadness, so someone came up with the idea of having a Transgender Day of Visibility [Facebook], something that celebrated the lives of trans people rather than commemorated their deaths.

That, of course, is not an easy thing to organize. Heck, even now, even in British universities, even gay people are frightened to be open. Here’s a quote from an article in yesterday’s Guardian Education:

While more than 90% of LGBT students are out to their university friends, almost two-thirds chose not to reveal their sexual orientation to academic staff for fear of discrimination; 15% of students feared losing the financial support – which the government assumes will be forthcoming – of their parents if they came out; LGBT students also reported significant negative treatment on the grounds of their sexual orientation from 50% of their fellow students and from 10% of academic staff.

The article talks exclusively about homophobia and sexual orientation. It doesn’t touch on trans people at all save for tacking a T on the end of LGB, so I have no idea whether those figures include trans people or not. However, trans people are generally much more frightened of being open about their identity than LGB people.

Today’s most visible trans person is Amanda Gonzalez-Andujar, because she’s today’s murder statistic. And sure enough at least one newspaper has chosen to deliberately insult her memory by describing her as a “man”.

Yesterday the spotlight was on Caster Semenya once again, because the IAAF are refusing the release the results of her “gender tests”, refusing to talk to her lawyers, and refusing to allow her to compete in her sport.

Much of the hatred and distrust of trans people arises from ignorance and fear. People still cling to the idea that all creatures come in two basic forms: male and female; and that anything that takes us outside that simple binary is somehow unnatural. Yes science journals are full of articles about the rich variety of gender in the natural world. There were two yesterday: one about flies, the other about olive trees. It would be rather odd if human biology was so simple when nothing else is, and of course it isn’t. We are, after all, rather complex animals.

The trouble is that if trans people are afraid to go public about their identity, how are people going to learn not to be ignorant and frightened? Indeed, how are they to understand at all? That’s a question that gay philosopher, John Corvino, tackles today at 365 Gay.

That makes this pretty much a Catch 22 situation. No one should try to force trans people to be more open, especially if it puts them at risk. Equally society as a whole needs to talk more about trans people, and it needs to get it right when it does so. Which is why I go on about it so much here.

I’m not going to point at anyone today, even if they are open. I’ll wait until tomorrow and see what posts I can find around the blogosphere to point you at. In addition, those of you who are going to be at Eastercon (and can drag yourselves away from the excitement of the UK 2014 Worldcon Bid Launch) might like to attend this:

Alternative Sexualities in SF Literature and Media. 9pm-10pm. Connaught. How are alternative sexualities and lifestyles represented in SF literature? How have these approaches changed over time? How accurate a picture do writers give of poly/gay/bi/trans people? Did SF help pave the way for wider acceptance of sexual minorities? No children without a responsible adult. Lilian Edwards, Persephone Hazard, Ian Jackson (mod), Roz Kaveney and Farah Mendlesohn.

Note that it too talks mainly about sexuality, so whoever put the panel together probably thinks that being trans is a “sexual orientation”. I’m sure the panel will take issue with that. Also at least one of the panelists has read my undelivered ICFA paper.