Wits Pride highlights challenges faced by transgenders in SA

Challenges faced by transgenders were discussed at Wits University on 27 August.

The Wits Pride event was attended by transgenders, lesbians, gays, bisexuals and interested individuals.

A transgender activist, author and medical doctor Anastacia Tomson said despite liberal laws concerning sexual orientation and gender, the society still lack space for lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders.

“I fight for visibility because I understand my own identity, though there’s so much humiliation in the public space,” said Tomson.

Wits Pride is an annual event that forms part of the University’s transformation strategy focusing on creating a non-hetero-sexist, non- sexist, non-homophobic and non-trans-phobic.

Tish White [www.wits.ac.za/], the Transformation and Gender Equity Project administrator at Wits, said the Pride’s programme called The Safe Zones, highlights the visibility of diversity in sexual orientation and gender identity on campus.

She said the programme strives to erase prejudice, while providing a support system for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, asexual, queer and other sexual orientations and gender identities (LGBTIAQ+) community at Wits University.

White said through education, advocacy and awareness-raising, the programme contributes to the campus climate that is safe and accepting for all members of the university community.

Carla de Bouchet, [peoplespride.blogspot.com/] member of People’s Pride Working Group, queer and transgender activist, said it is sad that in this century we still have communities or individuals discriminating against transgenders, lesbians and gays.

“I’m lucky to be working at an environment where they accept and treat me the way I am without questioning my identity. But I am not impressed about how we are treated out there,” she said.

She added that many people confuse transgender and transsexual people with people who have intersex conditions.

“They see two groups of people who would like to choose their own gender identity and sometimes those choices require hormonal treatments and/or surgery.

“It’s also important to understand the differences between these two groups because in spite of some similarities they face many different struggles, including different forms of discrimination,” she said.

De Bouchet said people who identify as transgender or transsexual are usually people who are born with typical male or female anatomies but feel as though they’ve been born into the wrong body.

Katherine White, a software developer, said they get ridiculed in a public space and sidelined because of transgender, but she learned to stay firm because she knows who she is.

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