Why I chose to be an activist?

I remember that day very clearly. But before that I must start from here....

I was 12-13 years old and was constantly bullied at school everyday for being 'the boy who is feminine". Fearing and hating school, classes and teachers, I used to regularly escape classes the whole day and hide in parks and nearby forests of my town Pollachi.

I sat all day alone, idly looking at the trees, birds and the caged animals in the park. In the caged animals, I could see and identity myself so much. I felt that they were trapped like me too. Only that, I was moving freely but trapped inside. My emotions were trapped, my gender expressions were questioned, I was laughed at, all because I was born a boy, but was feminine. I was a complete woman inside ready to explode and express, it is how it felt then.

On some evenings, I met people like me who were also known as Aravanis, the transgender ladies. I instantly connected with them. We soon connected with each other and became friends. We met secretly in our transgender friends' rooms, would lock it and put on make up and costumes and wow.. we were ourselves, beautifying our real authentic selves and dancing, cooking, singing, making jokes, laughing out loud. Those were real moments of magic.

Once out of the secret happy rooms and entering into the world, it was so tragic and traumatic for me to see how many of my friends were treated by their own families. My mentor Apsaramma's brother tried to throw kerosene on her and burn her because' he felt so shameful that his brother is a transgender person'

The other friend of mine Saroja(name changed) ran away to Delhi and became a sex worker. In a few years she also became HIV positive. She was not even informed about her mother's death. She still lives in Pune, she has built her own house now after so many years and earns by dancing and blessing. She regularly sends money to her elder sister who lives 10 miles from my home. In the last 20 years, I saw her only twice.

And then the day Manju was raped. I remember that day very clearly. Manju (name changed) was an abandoned transgender girl, driven away by her family. To support her livelihood, she did sex work. She was kidnapped and raped by seven men one night. She never went to the police. "They will point at me that I am a prostitute and this will happen to me". Manju died in AIDS an year later.

The tears, trauma, anger, blood, wounds, fear and pain engulfed in my teenage years, of which I was a witness and a victim, is what made me an activist for the transgender persons of India. The family rejection is the root cause of all our miseries. Left on the streets and driven away, we were and are easily exploited by anyone from the society. When our community steps out of their parental homes, they are also stepping out of their education, bright future, dignity, security, safety and protection.

Kalki Subramaniam performing for her poetry

We in India are preparing to celebrate our 75th Indian Independence. But the transgender and the LGBQIA+ community is being continuously systematically ignored and (or) discriminated, the transgender and gender non-conforming children still go through so much of bullying and violence at schools. My heart breaks when even after all these years, I still continue to read news like this where a student from Faridabad was bullied for his sexuality and committed suicide.

In the last 10 years alone, I have lost more than 15 of my transgender friends to suicide and alcohol. Eleven years ago, in 2011, I wrote the article Dying Young – The death of two young transsexual women in my blog. Little has changed so far when it comes to family inclusion, protection of gender non-conforming children against bullies at schools, sensitizing the academicians to be sensitive and sensible in protecting the students.

This is exactly the reason why I continue to speak, write, paint, perform about the uncared, abandoned lives of thousands of transgender persons in our country who need to be embraced and included in the mainstream society.

Activists like me still face so many challenges to empowering transgender community's lives. Here are some challenges:

1. Religious, cultural, superstitious beliefs jeopardies our relationships with our biological families and puts a guillotine in the betterment of our future
2. Lack of basic education prevents them from accessing satisfyingly paying jobs
3. Discrimination and family rejection drives them to depression and suicide
4. Systematic discrimination in the legal, medical and academic fields prevents the community from freely and fearlessly approaching them for their needs.
5. Lack of sensitive and inclusive LGBTQI+ workplace policies leave our community to be vulnerable to rejection and discrimination.

How can you make a change?

• First educate yourself about gender identities and sexual orientations.
• Know why it is okay to be a gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender or intersex.
• I am not sure if you can teach your parents but you sure can teach your own family and siblings. Do you feel that it is a taboo topic to discuss at home? Not in 2022!
• Be an ally in supporting human rights of the LGBTQIA+ community.
• Stand up, Voice Out and Loud when a transgender is shamed in public.
• One's gender identity or sexual orientation is just one part of who they are, there may be so many talents and contributions from them which they can offer to the world only when they feel inclusive and appreciated.
• Is your college/university inclusive and have a club or a council for LGBTQI students to approach incase if they issues? If not, start a petition to do so.
• Is your company / corporate inclusive and giving employment opportunities for LGBTQIA+ persons? Does your company have a inclusive workplace policy for the community? If not, take action to start initiating it.
• When media is mindless, insensitive, homophobic or transphobic, revolt against such misleading portrayals by writing to them or writing to the newspapers whoever they are. Or just make a good film that tells the truth :).
• Finally, remember the slogan - My body, my rights. It is for you and me and for everyone of course.
• The future is for diverse people, the future is for non binary, the future belongs to everyone. Those organizations, corporates, governments and societies which are inclusive, the future will be shaped by them. That is my work prediction.
• There is more you can do. Write to me! : [email protected]

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Kalki Subramaniam

www.kalkisubramaniam.com

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