Claire's picture

on Victoria

Thanks for regarding the injustice done to the incarcerated immigrant population in general and the brutality Victoria faced inparticular. This is an issue that intersects the struggle of the immigrant, the incarcerated, and individuals of underrepresented gender identity. I have only one point of departure, that being your use of the he pronoun "he" when referring to Victoria. Victoria identified as a woman and that is how we should model our representation of her. The impulse to label transgendered individuals as the gender they were assigned at birth rather than the gender they identify with is at the root of one of the grievances that Victoria faced by the criminal justice system. When placed in jail, both citizen and non-citizen transpeople are put into facilities with individuals who are not of the gender they identify with. Also, they are denied access to hormonal treatments they may have used for their gender transition. The former may cause very serious psychological effects to the incarcerated transperson. The latter may cause psychological damage and no doubt will cause physical damage to such a person; going cold turkey on hormonal treatment can seriously damage ones body. Although the primary issue in Victoria's case is medical neglect of incarcerated immigrants, as it was the cause of her death, we also have to realize that the severity of the injustice Victoria faced was most definetely compounded by a disregard for her gender identity by the criminal justice system. We cannot be a voice of the people if we reflect that disregard.


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