gender | >Re-PHOTO

Transgender Rights & Justice For the Cleaners

On Saturday 3rd January 2015 I photographed two protests. First was a vigil following the suicide of a transgender teenage girl and the second another protest in the long series of actions calling on John Lewis to pay their cleaners a living wage.

Vigil for Leelah Alcorn – Trafalgar Square, Saturday 3rd January 2015

Transgender Rights & Justice For the Cleaners

Leelah Alcorn was a 17-year-old who threw herself under a lorry after her Christian parents forced her into ‘conversion therapy’, refusing to acknowledge her gender and forbidding her from transitioning.

Before her death Leelah had written a poignant suicide note on her Tumblr blog blaming her Christian parents, saying that from the age of four she had felt she was “like a girl trapped in a boy’s body” and describing her relief when she found the possibility of transgender transitions – but her feeling of hopelessness after she realised that her parents “would never come around” to her transition.

Leelah wrote: “The only way I will rest in peace is if one day transgender people aren’t treated the way I was, they’re treated like humans, with valid feelings and human rights.”

“Gender needs to be taught about in schools, the earlier the better. My death needs to mean something. My death needs to be counted in the number of transgender people who commit suicide this year. I want someone to look at that number and say ‘that’s f**ked up’ and fix it. Fix society.“

Even after her suicide her parents remained unwilling to accept her transition, burying her with a gravestone under her former name ‘Joshua’.

Those taking part in the vigil included a number of people who had also transitioned as well as other supporters of transgender rights. Speakers condemned the practice of ‘conversion therapy’ which has no basis in medical science and carries a high risk of suicide, calling for it to be banned and for those carrying it out to be prosecuted. It is already banned in some US states. They also demanded that her gravestone carry her chosen name of Leelah.

The protest ended with the lighting of candles and a two minute silence in memory of Leelah.

More at Vigil for Leelah Alcorn

Pay John Lewis Cleaners a Living Wage – Oxford St, Saturday 3rd January 2015

Members of the Cleaners And Facilities Branch of the IWGB (Independent Workers Union of Great Britain) protested along with John Lewis customers protested outside the flagship Oxford St John Lewis store calling for them to live up to their ethical reputation and pay those who keep the shop clean a living wage. The cleaners complain the company treats them as second class citizens.

They were also protesting at the assaults on protesters by police at their previous month’s protest inside the store, where many were attacked as they were trying to leave after a peaceful protest. This time the protesters made no attempt to enter the store which was guarded by a line of police and extra security officers, but protested on the wide pavement outside.

Over 125,000 John Lewis customers had signed a petition calling on the company to ensure that it live up to its ethical reputation and ensure that the cleaning contractor pays all cleaners working in the store the London Living Wage. Neither John Lewis or the contractor recognise the IWGB as representing the workers, although it is the registered trade union which almost all the cleaners belong to.

As well as not being paid enough to live on, the cleaners have much poorer conditions of service than the directly employed staff they work alongside – who also get a large annual bonus as “partners” in the business. By outsourcing the cleaning John Lewis is refusing responsibility for work done in its store and vital for its running. They could include conditions for proper pay and conditions for the cleaners in the specification of their contracts but fail to do so.

*IWGB (Independent Workers Union of, Great Britain) General Secretary Alberto Durango*

The protest was led by IWGB General Secretary Alberto Durango and President Jason Moyer-Lee. There were short speeches of support by others including Green Party London Assembly member Jenny Jones, (Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb) and Mick Dooley of London TUSC, as well as a great deal of noisy shouting and blowing of horns.

*Green Party London Assembly member Jenny Jones, Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb*

Many of the public on busy Oxford Street took the flyers being handed out and expressed support for a proper wage for the workers and disgust at the failure of John Lewis to treat them properly.

After around an hour and a quarter the event ended with a march around the outside of the large building, with security and police rushing inside the shop to meet them at every door. But even though the protesters sometimes arrived before them, they made no attempt to go inside.

More pictures at Pay John Lewis Cleaners a Living Wage

Pioneering Women of Photojournalism

CNN recently published the article ‘These are the pioneering women of photojournalism‘ a story by Kyle Almond highlighting the website Trailblazers of Light, started by award-winning photojournalist Yunghi Kim who has covered stories all over the world for Contact Press Images and is best known for her story documenting South Korean “comfort women,” sex slaves used by the Japanese military during World War II.

Trailblazers of Light now lists more than 500 women who since the late 19th century have made significant work, reporting from around the world, including in war zones and other dangerous places, breaking their way into what is still – as a 2015 study by World Press Photo, the University of Stirling and Oxford University’s Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism confirmed, very much a male dominated world.

The CNN article is illustrated by over 30 photographs of some of these women at work, some familiar names, and others I was not aware of, each with short notes about their careers.

I think there are at least ten of them who had got as a mention when I wrote about photography including the history of photography for a commercial web site, and some I had featured at greater length such as Dorothea Lange and Berenice Abbott. It was clear to me back then that our history of photography has been dominated by men and that there were many women whose work had been sidelined and largely forgotten, and whose work demanded greater attention.

I was also finding many contemporary features by women photographers that greatly impressed me and I could link to on the site. And on the streets where I worked it was also clear to me that although women were much outnumbered by men, their numbers among those whose work I admired were rather more equal, perhaps because women have to work harder to be recognised.

End Murdoch’s Transphobia

Campaigners from Transmission, a group supporting the rights of trans people, came to protest outside the offices of The Times newspaper against their publication of transphobic articles.

The protest came after articles were published written by Lucy Bannerman criticised the work of the Tavistock centre, which runs the country’s only NHS gender identity service.

In a statement published the same day as the article, the centre strongly rejected the claims made in the article and stated:

The Service always place a young person’s wellbeing at the centre of our work and have a clear position of independence from outside lobby groups on all sides of the debate.
and
A recent Review into the Service found no immediate issues relating to patient safety and no overall failing in approach. It did make recommendations to further improve the Service, these will be implemented over the next 12 months building on the work of the Service to date.
You can read the full statement at https://tavistockandportman.nhs.uk/about-us/news/stories/gender-identity-service-times-8-april-2019/

This is not an isolated article and the same journalist has previously written unfavourably and inaccurately about trans charity Mermaids and has suggested ostracising trans athletes for competing in sports.

In a court case in which a transgender activist was convicted of assault, Bannerman tweeted unfavourably on the judge correcting witnesses who deliberately referred to the defendant, a trans woman as ‘he’. As was pointed out in a comment on her post, you would expect a judge to challenge racist or homophobic language and it should be no different for transphobic language.

Bannerman appears to have aligned herself with what are commonly known as ‘trans-exclusionary radical feminists’ or ‘TERFs’ for short. Its a description they don’t like, though it appears descriptive rather than derogatory. I’m unaware of any other satisfactory description which clearly distinguishes them from the wider feminist movement which is supportive of transgender women.

Terfs have a record of disruption which although it does not endorse the use of violence against them certainly makes it more likely as it enrages others. Last year they gained the opprobrium of virtually the entire gay community by hi-jacking the start of Gay Pride – a very diffferent reaction to a similar take-over the previous year by migrant gay communities which was applauded by all except a few of the establishment. They also caused chaos at the Anarchist Book Fair, leading to its cancellation this year.

Propaganda like Bannerman’s articles can only appear in The Times because it reflects the views of the editor and more importantly the proprietor of the paper, Ruper Murdoch.

More pictures at Times end transphobic articles.

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