Leslie Feinberg's Transgender Liberation Movement

During the mid to late 20th century, trans individuals struggled to find recognition in larger, more prominent social movements. In response, the trans community established their own organizations and models of experience, centered around the identities for which they had been excluded. Trans activism has overcome a variety of boundaries to reflect the diverse needs and experiences of trans community members.
People who would now be considered members of the transgender community struggled to find a place in larger activist circles in the mid to late 20th century. One factor that inhibited the creation of a cohesive trans movement was the lack of language to describe the diversity of trans experience. During the 1960s, discussion of gender
Leslie Feinberg states in “Transgender Liberation” that “it’s hard to fight an oppression without a…language that honors us all” (206). Without an effective rallying point, it is difficult for individual activists to organize. In addition to inadequate language, the trans community was not able to find support in the more well-established gay liberation movement. Prior to the Stonewall riots, the impetus which sparked the escalation of gay pride, the gay community included all sorts of gender-diverse people (Enke, Lecture 4/26). In the process of gaining prominence, however, the gay liberation movement began to focus on the experiences of white middle class people, especially gay men (Sylvia Rivera 1973 Pride clip, 4/12). Sylvia Rivera describes the way in which drag queens and other people who trans’ed gender were left behind in her piece “Queens in Exile, the Forgotten Ones”: “[T]hey only believed in acquiring civil rights for the gay community as a whole. Which is fine. They did a lot of good just concentrating on the gay issue. But they left the queens behind” (80). In order to gain respectability and clout, the gay liberation movement moved away from “less respectable” embodiments and identities. Without