Tamia (Tiny) Carson, nineteen. “When I was twelve years old, I used to get dressed in my mom’s clothes and put on her shoes, and I always fantasized about becoming a woman. And then one day I saw my first transgender woman, on Christopher Street. I feel like I’m not all the way there yet, but I’m a little happier, a little more comfortable. I have breasts now. But I’m not done yet. I’m still enhancing my beauty.”
The first image of a trans person that left an indelible impression on me was a still of Venus Xtravaganza, a twenty-something transgender drag ballroom performer, standing on the Christopher Street Pier, in Greenwich Village. I was fifteen at the time, embarking on becoming my own woman, and I can recall that image, from the 1990 documentary “Paris Is Burning,” vividly. The sun setting over the Hudson River streaked the sky navy, yellow, and magenta. Venus’s big blond hair hovered over her lanky body. She held a cigarette as if the Village were her own front porch.
It was in the Village, on Christopher Street and the nearby piers, where many trans and queer people first shared space with others like them. For generations, these places provided mirrors for those who rarely saw reflections of themselves. On Christopher Street, there were multitudes of potential selves: transgender, transsexual, non-binary, genderqueer, femme, butch, cross-dresser, drag king or queen, and other gender identities and sexual orientations that challenge social norms.
On June 28, 1969, police raided the Stonewall Inn, a popular gay bar on Christopher Street. Customers, including homeless youths, showgirls, street people, sex workers, and trans folk like Marsha P. Johnson, resisted and fought back. In the following days, thousands joined the protest. Most of the protesters had no assets or property. All they had was their bodies, and they put them on the front line for the cause of their own liberation.
Nearly fifty years have passed, and Christopher Street is recognized as the birthplace of the modern L.G.B.T. movement. In June, President Obama designated the area around the Stonewall Inn as the country’s “first national monument to tell the story of the struggle for L.G.B.T. rights.”
As the neighborhood has gentrified, attitudes among some residents toward the trans and queer people who still frequent the area have soured. Class and race tensions have risen. There are more police, making the area safer for those with resources but less welcoming for those without.
The bold blond film subject who touched me in my youth didn’t survive to see herself on the big screen. In December, 1988, Venus was found dead under a hotel bed. She had been strangled. No suspect has yet been arrested. I wish I could say that her fate is rare among my sisters, but there has been an epidemic of violence against low-income trans women, especially those of color. Venus’s last words in “Paris Is Burning” are “I’m hungry.” It’s a call for food, but I hear a resounding plea, too, for comfort, for love, for home—a communal call from the trans people on Christopher Street, and around the country, from Honolulu’s Merchant Street to Chicago’s Halsted Street.
My community is being seen and heard at unprecedented levels, yet we are still being scapegoated. The presence and visibility of trans people challenges every one of us. These are our streets, and these are our people.