Where is the Justice?

On June 26, 2015 I opened up my Facebook to see some exciting news. Gay Marriage was now legal all across the United States.  Facebook had the option to use a filter on your profile picture in order to show support for the LGBT community. Your picture would have an overlay of the pride flag. All across my news feed were pictures with this filter. It was exciting and amazing to see so many people showing their support for the LGBT community. This support lasted for about two, three weeks tops. And then everyone went back to their same picture. No one was talking about this success, quickly it had become old news.  Gay marriage was a thing of the past. People had become accustomed to the idea of Gay Marriage quickly. It was a good thing because we want the LGB community to be easily accepted. However, it was also a bad thing that people were no longer talking about this success. The fight for gay marriage had gone on for so long, and after years of hatred and violence against this group of people, the vast majority of the world was no longer talking about the success of Gay Marriage. The people who fell under the stereotype of “normal” didn’t’ care about how long this battle had been going on or about the fact that this was just one battle won but not the war. The “normal” people who are heterosexual and who fall under the stereotypes of normal no longer cared about the war. Everything was resolved.

But everything is not resolved. Not everything is okay. We can just look out into the world and see all the destruction going on. All the hatred and all the violence and meanness. We can see that not everyone is treated equal or with love and care. People are still being discriminated. People are still being treated lesser than others because of what they look like or because of whom they identify with. We can pick out so many injustices from the world it’s almost devastating. From the current hatred being experience by the ISIL terrorist group half way across the world to the just in our backyards. We can see that gay people are still being hated upon. We can see that transgender people are still being killed. But for what? Why? We hate what we don’t understand or what we don’t identify with. We are afraid of what isn’t like us. And we never stop and think about how this hatred and confusion hurts others. We simply forgo our rationality that says “Oh, yeah, everyone is human”. We live life based on our fears. We aren’t as accepting as we claim to be.

Take for example the injustices that the LGBT people are having to endure every single day of their lives. From walking down the street and sitting together as a couple. All of those dirty looks that say “What are you doing kissing that man when you are a man? What are you doing brush her hair with love when you are a woman yourself?” Those injustices that we ignore because they are not affecting us and we think to ourselves, “Maybe they deserve what they are getting”.  For example prison.  When a person thinks about prison, he/she thinks about the actions that the prisoner did to get him/her into prison. LikeRodney, who was sent to prison and was forced to be a “prison ho”.  But what about the injustices that these people are facing in prison? From sexual assault to actually being killed in prison. Why doesn’t the mass population care about these individuals?

Where is the justices in the world? Where is the queer justices? And what in the world does queer justice look like? We know what injustice looks like. We know that queers get beaten down, looked down upon and even killed. Like seventeen year old MercedesWilliamson who was killed in Alabama, U.S.A for being transgender. Or the 102acts of transgender violence committed in the first four months of 2014. We know that these injustices exist. So where is the justice and what does that look like.  

I believe in queer justice. I believe in being able to wake up one morning, being able to wake up every morning and not be afraid. Of being able to just live life the way you want to live it and not have to worry and fear about what the rest of the world is going to think. This would be justice. But how do we start to achieve this justice?

Don’t define normal. We live in a world in which we need to know what is normal so we can all aspire to be that thing. We live in a world in which we need to know what everyone else is doing in order for us to do it as well. But not having “normal” would be a start. Who cares what normal is? Everyone is always a little different form everyone else. There is no need for normal, because no one is normal.

Stop with the sexual shame. Shaming people for their desires and their urges is part of the problem. Sex is something that is looked down upon. Even for heterosexuals. Sex is seen as being a disgusting act that belongs in the bedroom but our entire lives have to be sexualized. If we want to keep sex in the bedroom then so be it. But if people want to shout out that they love sex, then let them. It shouldn’t matter with whom you have sex with or how many times you have sex with someone. Let’s let sex be just something else we do.

Stop with the different labels. Having to label everything is part of this whole problem. Does it really matter if she is lesbian and I am straight? Does it matter if he is transgender and he isn’t? Let us stop with trying to define who we are. The world would be so much simpler if we all just let each other exist as we see fit.

Let us all try and do something to achieve justice. Justice won’t come over night. It may take a few days. It may take a few years. But eventually we will get there. But for now, we all need to keep fighting for queer justice. It shouldn’t matter if you don’t identify as queer, in fact this should make you want to achieve justice so everyone else can live a life in which they don’t worry about how their sexual orientation or their gender will affect their lives. We can do this with small steps. We can start by trying the National Center for Transgender Equality’s “52 things you can do forTransgender Equality” and start with taking out a transgender to lunch. We can attend the Pride Parade next year. We can simply be loud and advocate for queer justice.

Justice for anyone is difficult to come by. It is sad that so many times justice is reserved for the privileged. But let us all stop this nonsense. Let us all create justice for everyone, regardless of gender and of sexual orientation. Besides, aren’t’ we all human?