Today’s Supreme Court ruling is deeply disturbing, and our solidarity goes out to trans communities across the UK, including migrant and racialised trans communities.
This ruling comes amidst an increasingly hostile environment for migrants, trans people, and trans migrant communities living at the intersections of racism, Islamophobia and transphobia, as border regimes, the detention estate and institutions of surveillance continue to expand. We are especially concerned about the ramifications of this ruling for trans people in the immigration and asylum system.
We have often spoken about the exploitation and oppression faced by trans migrant communities, including the erasure and disbelief they face in the asylum system, and the destitution they face due to barriers in accessing healthcare, housing and employment. We will continue to speak loudly about this oppression for as long as trans people remain under attack.
We know that this ruling plays into the already rampant scapegoating that trans people face. Trans people continue to be painted as “threats” by Governments across the world, precisely in order to distract from austerity and the unaffordability of every day life. We cannot sit idly by whilst this scapegoating goes unchecked.
Finally, we know that the gender binary is a White supremacist creation, and is upheld by the very same racial capitalist systems that seek to render multiple marginalised communities as subhuman and as undeserving of dignity and rights. And at a time of increasingly far right activity, the inseparability of racism, neocolonialism and transphobia continues to become clearer for all to see.
We stand in solidarity with our trans siblings across the country as they fight to be seen for who they are. We will always stand with you. Trans liberation now.
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