auntysarah
in
tguk
Queer Up North: Bitch Protest Report
Crossposted to transnews
On Sunday last, I attended the protest against Queer Up North booking the transphobic artist, Bitch, for a gig in Manchester and being generally unapologetic about disregarding the concerns of queer transpeople.
A number of us, mostly motivated by the efforts of the lovely foibey, arranged to meet by the venue on Sunday evening to have a little protest at Queer Up North unapologetically booking an openly transphobic performer (and therefore, in the opinion of many of us, showing that they don't see the "T" as a valued and welcome part of the queer community) and raise awareness of these issues in the LGBT community.
Having found the venue, and satisfying ourselves that nothing was going to happen for ages, our valiant group retired to a nearby pub and I texted foibey to let her know where we were. She and brave_mercutio duly arrived after a few minutes. They'd brought a banner, and I'd brought just over a hundred flyers. On one side I'd printed out some stuff that foibey had written explaining the issue from our point of view. On the other I'd put a logo that was one of those circular roadsigns with a red circle and stripe crossing out the word, "Transphobia". Underneath was one of four different designs. One said, "Why is Queer Up North giving a platform to transphobia?", another said, "Transwomen are women too", the third had definitions for "transmisogyny" (misogyny directed against transfemale people) and "cissexism" (the belief that the genders of trans people are less valid than the genders of non transpeople), and the fourth (which got us into a little bit of trouble later for reasons which shall become clear) said:
GayLesbianBisexualTacked-on
More transpeople (mostly transwomen, but a couple of transmen) and allies turned up, and eventually there were just short of a dozen of us. More flyers and another banner also appeared, which was nice. We were positioned across the road from the venue, with our banners pinned to the wall, and being a bit nervous about going over. The door staff were very friendly and came over and chatted, and seemed bemused that we didn't want to go in.
Eventually a dribble of people started to turn up, and initially foibey and brave_mercutio, who I think were a bit more used to protesting than some of the rest of us approached people and asked if "they'd like a flier about the artist", and engaged a few people in conversation as they went in. As more of us, myself included, plucked up the courage, and a small queue started to form, we established a little "welcoming committee" by the venue itself, and handed out flyers and chatted to people.
Pretty much everyone seemed very receptive to our message - nearly everyone who went in (and I do mean nearly everyone - there were probably fewer than 5 people out of over a hundred who turned up where everyone in the group refused to take one of our flyers) took a flyer and read it. Loads of people read the flyers and started talking to us about the issue, mostly saying that they hadn't known about her transphobia. Many seemed genuinely conflicted about whether to go in or not, and said that if they'd known previously, they wouldn't have bought tickets. Some people did seem to come back out after a while and walk off (although they may have come back later).
We were asked whether web wanted people to boycott the performance (some people seemed genuinely ready to do so if we'd asked), but not wanting to be spoilsports we tended to say we were just wanting to raise awareness of the issue, and said we hoped they enjoyed the performance. Some people asked if we had a petition to sign, which was a good idea that we hadn't thought of!
Looking through the windows of the venue, as the crowds built, it seemed everyone was sitting around reading and discussing our leaflets!
At one point, a man came out of the venue with one of our flyers. I'm not sure what his connection was to the place, but he kept coming in and going out, and the doorstaff never stopped him. He was very drunk and rather confrontational. The flyer he had was the "Gay Lesbian Bisexual Tacked-on". He started reading it out (and got as far as "Bisexual"), before demanding to know, rather loudly, "Where do I fit in this? I'm a hetrosexual man, where do I fit? You're being segregationalist, and we don't want you here in Manchester. F*ck off!"
He carried on in the same vein for some time, and a few of us were worried that he was going to get physically violent. Thankfully he didn't, but he hung around and kept ranting for a while through the first part of what happened next; the venue had mostly filled and the creative director of Queer Up North came out to talk to us. He was telling us that he didn't see this as "the black and white issue that it's being portrayed as", and we were then treated to the spectacle of a cisgendered man "explaining" to a bunch of transpeople and allies that what we saw as transphobia wasn't really, what we saw as misogyny wasn't really, and he was apparently in a position to make this point because, get this, he knows some transpeople.
I very much got the impression that he was actually rather embarassed by the eagerness of the attendees to be sympathetic to our point of view, and it seemed to me that he felt backed into a corner, especially when a number of us made the point that some of the worst transphobia we encounter is from within the queer community, and that many of us often feel unsafe and unwanted within the queer community, and that he got to go home tonight and not be troubled any more by scary trans stuff, but we have to live it every day of our lives. I also suggested (since he seemed keen to tout his feminist ally credentials) that "explaining" to women why we were "wrong" to feel discriminated against wasn't entirely feminist.
The coup-de-grace was delivered by one of our group just as the performance was about to start. Bitch herself strolled up to the venue, and quick as a flash, one of our group asked, "Would you like a flyer?" and passed her one, which she took!
All in all, I think it was massively successful. Nobody beat us up, pretty much everyone seemed sympathetic to us, we seemed to have embarassed the organiser (which is probably more valuable than "converting" him), and hopefully we've helped get the message out that if you're an artist that supports the exclusion of transwomen from events like MWMF, it's going to start to cause problems at your other gigs. It's all about cutting off the air supply of transphobia within the queer and women's movements, bit by bit, and I think we made good progress on Sunday.
On Sunday last, I attended the protest against Queer Up North booking the transphobic artist, Bitch, for a gig in Manchester and being generally unapologetic about disregarding the concerns of queer transpeople.
A number of us, mostly motivated by the efforts of the lovely foibey, arranged to meet by the venue on Sunday evening to have a little protest at Queer Up North unapologetically booking an openly transphobic performer (and therefore, in the opinion of many of us, showing that they don't see the "T" as a valued and welcome part of the queer community) and raise awareness of these issues in the LGBT community.
Having found the venue, and satisfying ourselves that nothing was going to happen for ages, our valiant group retired to a nearby pub and I texted foibey to let her know where we were. She and brave_mercutio duly arrived after a few minutes. They'd brought a banner, and I'd brought just over a hundred flyers. On one side I'd printed out some stuff that foibey had written explaining the issue from our point of view. On the other I'd put a logo that was one of those circular roadsigns with a red circle and stripe crossing out the word, "Transphobia". Underneath was one of four different designs. One said, "Why is Queer Up North giving a platform to transphobia?", another said, "Transwomen are women too", the third had definitions for "transmisogyny" (misogyny directed against transfemale people) and "cissexism" (the belief that the genders of trans people are less valid than the genders of non transpeople), and the fourth (which got us into a little bit of trouble later for reasons which shall become clear) said:
GayLesbianBisexualTacked-on
More transpeople (mostly transwomen, but a couple of transmen) and allies turned up, and eventually there were just short of a dozen of us. More flyers and another banner also appeared, which was nice. We were positioned across the road from the venue, with our banners pinned to the wall, and being a bit nervous about going over. The door staff were very friendly and came over and chatted, and seemed bemused that we didn't want to go in.
Eventually a dribble of people started to turn up, and initially foibey and brave_mercutio, who I think were a bit more used to protesting than some of the rest of us approached people and asked if "they'd like a flier about the artist", and engaged a few people in conversation as they went in. As more of us, myself included, plucked up the courage, and a small queue started to form, we established a little "welcoming committee" by the venue itself, and handed out flyers and chatted to people.
Pretty much everyone seemed very receptive to our message - nearly everyone who went in (and I do mean nearly everyone - there were probably fewer than 5 people out of over a hundred who turned up where everyone in the group refused to take one of our flyers) took a flyer and read it. Loads of people read the flyers and started talking to us about the issue, mostly saying that they hadn't known about her transphobia. Many seemed genuinely conflicted about whether to go in or not, and said that if they'd known previously, they wouldn't have bought tickets. Some people did seem to come back out after a while and walk off (although they may have come back later).
We were asked whether web wanted people to boycott the performance (some people seemed genuinely ready to do so if we'd asked), but not wanting to be spoilsports we tended to say we were just wanting to raise awareness of the issue, and said we hoped they enjoyed the performance. Some people asked if we had a petition to sign, which was a good idea that we hadn't thought of!
Looking through the windows of the venue, as the crowds built, it seemed everyone was sitting around reading and discussing our leaflets!
At one point, a man came out of the venue with one of our flyers. I'm not sure what his connection was to the place, but he kept coming in and going out, and the doorstaff never stopped him. He was very drunk and rather confrontational. The flyer he had was the "Gay Lesbian Bisexual Tacked-on". He started reading it out (and got as far as "Bisexual"), before demanding to know, rather loudly, "Where do I fit in this? I'm a hetrosexual man, where do I fit? You're being segregationalist, and we don't want you here in Manchester. F*ck off!"
He carried on in the same vein for some time, and a few of us were worried that he was going to get physically violent. Thankfully he didn't, but he hung around and kept ranting for a while through the first part of what happened next; the venue had mostly filled and the creative director of Queer Up North came out to talk to us. He was telling us that he didn't see this as "the black and white issue that it's being portrayed as", and we were then treated to the spectacle of a cisgendered man "explaining" to a bunch of transpeople and allies that what we saw as transphobia wasn't really, what we saw as misogyny wasn't really, and he was apparently in a position to make this point because, get this, he knows some transpeople.
I very much got the impression that he was actually rather embarassed by the eagerness of the attendees to be sympathetic to our point of view, and it seemed to me that he felt backed into a corner, especially when a number of us made the point that some of the worst transphobia we encounter is from within the queer community, and that many of us often feel unsafe and unwanted within the queer community, and that he got to go home tonight and not be troubled any more by scary trans stuff, but we have to live it every day of our lives. I also suggested (since he seemed keen to tout his feminist ally credentials) that "explaining" to women why we were "wrong" to feel discriminated against wasn't entirely feminist.
The coup-de-grace was delivered by one of our group just as the performance was about to start. Bitch herself strolled up to the venue, and quick as a flash, one of our group asked, "Would you like a flyer?" and passed her one, which she took!
All in all, I think it was massively successful. Nobody beat us up, pretty much everyone seemed sympathetic to us, we seemed to have embarassed the organiser (which is probably more valuable than "converting" him), and hopefully we've helped get the message out that if you're an artist that supports the exclusion of transwomen from events like MWMF, it's going to start to cause problems at your other gigs. It's all about cutting off the air supply of transphobia within the queer and women's movements, bit by bit, and I think we made good progress on Sunday.