Dublin’s first-ever Trans Pride will take place today, with students bolstering crowds demanding recognition and rights for transgender people in Irish society.
Those marching today have several demands: to introduce free transgender healthcare, an end to conversion therapy, an end to violence against transgender people and an overhaul of sex education.
Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU), the Union of Students in Ireland (USI) and Take Back Trinity will all attend today’s march, joining crowds that will include students from all over the country.
In an email statement to The University Times, TCDSU President Shane De Rís said that the union would be marching with the student bloc today.
“This is a momentous and historic occasion as the first official trans pride march and it is testament to the hard work of the Trans rights movement over the past number of years. TCDSU is proud of our trans members and we stand in solidarity with them in their struggle for their recognition and rights”, De Rís said.
Q Soc will be gathering outside of House Six today at 1pm before heading to Liberty Hall, where the march is starting, at 2pm. In an email statement to The University Times, Q Soc Chair Felix O’Connor said: “We really support what Dublin Trans Pride is doing in separating pride from corporate interests which have, in our and the opinion of many other LGBT+ organisations, taken over pride, distancing mainstream Dublin pride from the actual LGBT+ communities in the interests of big businesses.”
“As the first openly trans auditor of Q Soc, (and on a year when all three of our executive officers are trans) it’s very important to me that Q Soc come out in support of trans pride Dublin and show our resistance to the commodification of queer people and queer identity. Pride began as a protest and it should remain so”, O’Connor said.
The organisers of the march said in the description of the Facebook event: “The first Pride was a protest, Stonewall was a riot led by trans women and we will not forget our history. There will be no corporations, no businesses, no Rainbow Capitalism. This is protest for trans people, organised by trans people. Allies are welcome to march in solidarity with us. This is a protest for all of us, not just some.”
The march will begin at 2pm outside Liberty Hall, where Trans Pride organiser Ollie Bell and Ruth Coppinger of ROSA (for Reproductive rights, against Oppression, Sexism & Austerity) will address crowds among others.
The crowd will then march to Fairview Park, where the first Pride parade was held after the murder of Declan Flynn in 1982. A closing rally will see speakers from Transgender Equality Network Ireland (TENI), This is Me campaign, People Before Profit and Solidarity end the march.
The first Trans pride on the island of Ireland took place recently in Belfast, on the morning of the March for Marriage Equality. The march saw students north and south of the border unite to demand the same rights that were granted to the people of Ireland in the 2015 referendum.
In an email statement to The University Times, Aisling Cusack, USI’s Vice-President for Equality and Citizenship, said that “marching in solidarity with our trans siblings at the first Trans Pride in Dublin is an honour”.
“The T can no longer be silent and this Saturday that will be made clear, bringing the fight for Trans rights to the forefront”, she said.
Cusack emphasised the power of the student movement in fighting for transgender rights: “We are coming off the back of a historic mobilisation of students with the Repeal referendum and we saw that momentum carry into the trans healthcare protest in early July. Keeping that energy is critical in the fight for liberation for the trans and non-binary community as we demand improvements to transgender healthcare and abortion legislation that is inclusive.”
Take Back Trinity will be at the march and will form part of the housing bloc. Funding for social housing is one of the demands of those marching today. In an email statement to The University Times, one of the leaders of Take Back Trinity, Conor Reddy, said: “We plan on mobilising a significant bloc and dropping banners along the route to draw the focus of more young people to the burgeoning housing movement. This weekend will be a dress rehearsal for a more ambitious weekend of action at the end of August and a national mobilisation by USI and the National Coalition on Housing and Homelessness in October.”
“The energy around Take Back Trinity and the repeal campaign prove that young people are far from the apathetic sods we’re often portrayed as, in fact, when we mobilise, we’re determined fighters capable of contributing to meaningful social change”, Reddy said.
