US: The murder of black transgender women is becoming a crisis

“They’re just getting so blunt,” Ruby Corado said. “It’s just out there. It used to be more isolated.” Corado could be talking about support for the LGBT community. The Pride parades across the region this month drew huge crowds. And they’re not just drag queens and shimmy-shimmy dancers with in-your-face protests.

Social media has been filled during Pride Month with heterosexual couples and families showing up in rainbow regalia supporting LGBT rights with the same verve as they would a Fourth of July parade. We’ve got a gay presidential candidate kissing his husband from the podium, Chicago elected an out lesbian as mayor, and even Alaska has not one, but two, transgender politicians in office.

But Corado, who runs the LGBT community center Casa Ruby, wasn’t talking about the social strides her community has made in the 50 years since the Stonewall riots in New York. No, she’s talking about the recent, breakneck spate of violence and hate crimes against LGBT people in this city and in this nation. Primarily, the targets of this social whiplash have been black transgender women.

The murder of Black trans women is a crisis,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren tweeted, along with a list of 10 recent victims’ names. “We’ll fight this, and we will continue to say their names.”

It’s become so pronounced, the American Medical Association flagged the pattern.

“According to available tracking, fatal anti-transgender violence in the U.S. is on the rise, and most victims were black transgender women,” said AMA Board member S. Bobby Mukkamala in a statement from the association.

Violence against transgender women isn’t anything new. Corado knows that firsthand.

“This has been going on a very long time, of course,” she said. “And I thought things were so much better in D.C. But, these past few days.” Read more via Washington Post