Living Trans Out Loud: A Reaction to Club Q and Dealing with Daily Violence

7 min readFeb 1, 2023

by: mike morse, 1/18/2023

It’s so hard to want to keep going when trans and queer lives are continually ending too soon. The National Center for Transgender Equality reported that 47 trans and gender non-conforming lives have been lost to violence since November 2021 (and this is only reported deaths). This year, on the eve of the Trans Day of Remembrance, five queer and trans folks were killed in a shooting at Club Q, the only gay nightclub in Colorado Springs. For months I struggled to make sense of and process this particular tragedy. This crime felt particularly heinous to me, as I am confident that the shooter purposefully chose this day to display his transphobic hatred.

Trans Day of Remembrance is already a day to mourn, memorialize, and honor the trans lives that have been lost over the past year, so, as a trans person, hearing about such extreme violence the night before our established day of mourning, only reinforced my overall sense of fear and insecurity. In addition to the physical violence of the event, the media and public, unsurprisingly, perpetuated further violence by incorrectly describing the identities of the victims. The trans woman who was able to bring the shooter down using the heel of her shoe was misidentified as a drag queen in the news outlets who did not verify their stories before publishing. Misgendering this woman was actively violent against all trans people as it belittled her true gender identity, and these seemingly minor actions are what contribute to and fuel more extreme violence against trans folks.

I think I was particularly distraught by this shooting as well because I related in multiple ways with the victims. One trans man who died was a bartender who had just moved away from Florida a few years ago to start his life over in Colorado Springs. Unfortunately, this is a common reality for many queer people, myself included. Many of us are forced to leave home just to be able to find the space to exist as our true selves and to attempt to find safety and community. Growing up, I spent most of my adolescence depressed and at times suicidal, because I was not able to truly discover who I was. I was closeted about my queer identity, and the only places I could explore these parts of myself were online, particularly on Tumblr. It wasn’t until I moved away from home after high school and started my life over that I found the space to learn about trans identities, and eventually discover my own gender non-confirming identity. Even now, I still struggle to have my identity validated and respected when I am around people who knew me in the past. I, like so many other trans and queer people, have more or less had to rebuild my life.

Queer and trans people have some of the shortest life expectancies nationwide, especially if they’re not white. Unfortunately, it is extremely common for trans people to at some point in their life deal with homelessness, poverty, or poor mental health conditions. Any other cause of death to so many young people would be taken more seriously by the liberal public, and preventable action would be encouraged. Ironically, the biggest reason for this sad reality is highly preventable. Heteronormative patriarchal mindsets allow cisgender individuals to experience a sense of superiority over queer and trans people, and this breeds anti-queer violence. Queerness is viewed as inferior to straightness thanks to many norms that permeate our culture, and even if most people do not actively think this way anymore, their actions still perpetuate this belief. What many have prided as growing acceptance over the past few decades is at best tolerance. Most acceptance of queerness and transness only occurs when we force ourselves to fit within heteronormative standards still (i.e. you must take hormones and fully transition physically to be truly “trans”, or that one partner should be the “boy” while the other is the “girl”.) In fact, many queer and trans people still report feeling strongly discriminated against in our society. I’ve identified as non-binary for five years now. I’ve asked people to use he/him or they/them pronouns for me for just as long, but it wasn’t until I started taking testosterone that I began hearing people regularly use my pronouns. I’ve also had people who have known I’m non-binary for many years still slip up and misgender me, always apologizing profusely afterwards. To me, this just shows that in their minds, they have made no permanent, active shift in how they view my gender identity. This inability to be able to understand and respect people whose identity is different from your own comes from a place of fear and misunderstanding, and unfortunately the United States’ government has been encouraging these mindsets to continue.

Our government is actively encouraging violence against trans people through countless laws that are being passed to harm queer people nationwide, such as Florida’s ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill. The full name of this bill is actually the “Stop the Sexualization of Children” act, which later became the “Parental Rights in Education” act. The bill is worded in a way that suggests discussing content related to sexual orientation and gender identity is an act of sexualizing children. It says that these topics should be treated as equal in subject to discussions of pornography and stripping — and therefore should be banned around children under the age of 10. By criminalizing topics related to queerness, many children will be limited in their ability to explore their own identity, and children who have queer parents will not be able to acknowledge their own family within their classroom. Additionally, Florida, through a corruptly-selected committee, has also been moving to pass legislation that would prevent trans children (under the age of 18) from receiving gender-affirming medical care. Similarly, Oklahoma is attempting to ban gender-affirming medical care for anyone under the age of 26, no longer just targeting minors. This twitter thread shows other anti-trans legislation being passed that will ban trans people from joining sports, receiving adequate healthcare, and using public restrooms.

Another series of events that have been under attack lately nationwide are children’s Drag Story Hours. These events are simply opportunities for drag queens and performers to read and tell stories to children, and to give kids a chance to play and use their imagination in a setting where gender fluidity is encouraged. The critics of these events argue that the events are ‘sexually-oriented’ — but this is simply not true. The goal of these events is to create a safe space for children to have exposure and opportunity to explore gender, expression, and queerness. Unfortunately, the conservative opinion that gender nonconformity is “unnatural” paints queerness as a “rated R” topic, or something that needs to be hidden from children and the public. This regressive, anti-queer, violent movement has to stop now before it goes too far. Most queer and trans people are merely trying to find a means of survival. The systems that were built to prevent queer and trans people from receiving the same benefits and treatment as any other cisheterosexual person are the same ones that perpetuate stereotypes of queerness as pornographic and demonic; these white supremacist, cis-heteropatriarchal systems deny the possibility for radical acceptance of queer and trans folks.

To decrease violence against trans folks, the (non-queer) general population needs to commit to learning more, understanding better, and respecting queer identities. Without non-discrimination laws, queer folks across America are at risk of losing their housing, employment, or public accommodations. There are few protections against anti-LGBTQ discrimination in healthcare, especially if you’re trans. Queer and trans people deserve to live without daily fear merely due to how we identify. Our survival should be just as important as any other peoples’. Most of us do live day to day just trying to find a way to survive, and we would just like to be given the same support, respect, and safety that so many others are entitled to.

Too many trans and queer youth are fighting to remain housed, fed, and clothed because they do not have enough social or financial support. Many trans people seek financial support through mutual aid, a form of political and community organizing to empower individuals from within their own community, or crowdfunding, an attempt to raise money from large numbers of people (usually on social media). Some people ask for direct funds through GoFundMe or other sources, such as PayPal, Venmo, or Cashapp. Other times people have the resources to share or sell their art, writings, or other products. Either form of crowdfunding should be viewed as legitimate, as no one knows what people’s situations are. This is not always safe, easy, or effective as many trans folks are harassed, asked to provide elaborate, explicit evidence of their suffering, or face online bigots who devalue their lives, but for some people it is their only means of survival. Anyone who is fighting for their own survival deserves no judgment on how they endure.

The best way that the majority of the population can support trans people is to give direct financial support. I asked my followers on Twitter if they would like me to share their crowdfunding, and have compiled a list below. To materially help some queer and trans folks today, consider sending funds to some of the people below who are trying to find stable housing and/or meet other basic needs (please note this list is made in a random order, so try to spread out funds so that not all go to the first few people on the list):

Max:

Al: