San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
Life and work of Black LGBTQ activist continues to inspire
A petition to remove a statue in New Jersey honoring Christopher Columbus and replace it with a statue of transgender and gay rights activist Marsha P. Johnson gained enough support last month that plans for a monument in her honor are proceeding.
Johnson was a beloved and well-known activist in the LGBTQ community during the 1960s through the ’80s. She was a key figure in the uprising at the Stonewall Inn in New York City in the summer of 1969, in which police raided the gay bar to uphold a discriminatory policy. Patrons fought back, leading to days of protests. She founded an organization that helped homeless, transgender youth and had a reputation for helping others — whether it was taking dozens of people home with her for the holidays, or giving her clothes to people she felt needed them more than she did.
For many, including Pamuela Halliwell, she was and continues to be an inspiration. Halliwell is secretary of the San Diego Black LGBTQ Coalition. She’s also therapist at the San Diego LGBT Community Center and a board member with the Gender Phluid Collective. (This email interview has been edited for length and clarity. A longer version of this conversation can be found at sandiegouniontribune.com/sdutlisa-deaderick-staff.html)
Q:
The life and work of Marsha P. Johnson are being memorialized with a monument in her honor in her hometown of Elizabeth, N.J., after a petition circulated seeking the removal of a statue of Christopher Columbus, to be replaced with one of Johnson. What were your thoughts when you first heard about this?
A:
My initial thoughts were that I was very honored and proud to experience a moment like this, both from a historical perspective, considering this country’s legislative struggle in seeing members of the LGBTQ community as equal, first-class citizens, but also coming from a place of shock, followed by hope. Hope that during this time in our country, during a pandemic and as the world wakes up to what has been occurring … to many of us who are Black, someone, some collective group of people, sees the importance, the strength, the power of this community. While it means many things, what it means to me most is being seen and taking a step in the right direction. That, during times of such travesty, the world can still move in the right direction.
Q:
Can you talk a bit about who Marsha P. Johnson is to you, and what kind of influence her life and work have had on your own life?
A:
This is a difficult question to answer because Marsha P. (“Pay It No Mind”) Johnson represents so many things. Revolutionary
Marsha represents a revolution and an uprising that is still inspiring folks to find their own little piece of Marsha within them, and to do with it what they feel is right and just. Pioneer Marsha represents what happens when the LGBTQ community stands up and unites as one to fight for the common good. Innovative Marsha represents a woman who was many things and would not give up her power, her freedom in order to be who she was and to fight for equality for all those in the LGBTQ acronym.
As she once said, “As long as gay people don’t have their rights all across America, there’s no reason for celebration.” This extends further than just to gay people, as she did so much to help the transgender and gendernonconforming community, terms that were not widely used at that time. Despite being the most marginalized — as a Black, trans/ gender-nonconforming, poor individual with a high school education and mental health concerns — she was able to look for the joy in a sea of controversy and pain. A sea that has expanded for decades to where we are today, where we see many of our community members still losing their lives and being silenced. What do you say and what does it mean that someone can do all these things: helping those with HIV and AIDS, helping homeless youth survive, fighting for social justice, all while struggling to survive, maintain a roof over their head, and secure money to stay alive in the same systems keeping us down today? What kind of power and spirit she had, and continues to have, and how can we honor and embody that, to continue what she started?
Q:
What does it mean to you as a Black transwoman to see that she’s being honored.
A:
As a Black transgender woman, as a Black woman, and as a woman, it means a lot that she is being honored in this way and that this information is being shared with the public when many articles didn’t wish to report much about her in the past. Now that she is getting this recognition, it says a lot for Black women, in general. It says that we are seen, that we are not merely walking around being beautiful and living our lives, but we are doing that while being seen. We are not invisible, we matter, and we can do courageous and amazing things.
Marsha P. Johnson’s work and legacy informs me in that, despite being part of the most marginalized community, I can still thrive, survive and empower. I have a place to belong. If someone tells me otherwise, I think to myself, “Pay it no mind,” and keep moving forward, making and paving a way where the world tells me there is no way.