\u201cWe prevail, we prevail, we prevail\u201d is what I kept thinking as I wove my way through London Trans+ Pride on Saturday (July 25), trying to capture even a fragment of the protest. I couldn\u2019t believe the number of people who had shown up to scream, laugh, chant, cry, dance and, most of all, fight for trans joy. We prevail because, despite the immense weight of the fascist pendulum threatening to knock our beautiful community down, 150,000 people showed up in Trafalgar Square.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s been incredible to see how the protest has grown: this year\u2019s event was six times bigger than it was just three years ago. It\u2019s upsetting that we need it in the first place \u2013 that so much fear, anger and frustration has to be funnelled into a fight for survival, for the ability to find even a small amount of beauty in the everyday. That feeling has hung increasingly heavily in the air over the past few years, amid the global resurgence of the far right and its ongoing attacks on trans people\u2019s basic rights.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s why the fact that so many people showed up for Trans+ Pride, despite it all, is phenomenal. This year\u2019s march felt as though we had allowed ourselves to pierce through the oppression of the world and revel in the beauty we create \u2013 the sparkle we carry, which builds and intensifies when we come together. Many of the people I spoke to said that, throughout the day, they felt a sense of excitement and softness that had been robbed from them in recent years. This time, people told me they were choosing themselves, choosing their families, choosing their lovers and friends, and celebrating who they are. Trans people deserve that softness, that peace and that joy. This year, we shone an even brighter light in the faces of those who do not want to see us shine \u2013 or to see us at all.<\/p>\n
Much like Trans+ Pride itself, we continue to grow. Many of us have grown up alongside the protest. I had just turned 20 when the first event took place in 2019. Back then, the march ended in Soho Square, and there were just enough of us to fill the space; it felt like a summer barbecue. This weekend, now 27, I felt overwhelmed with gratitude as I bumped into old friends, made new ones and looked out over the vast sea of trans people who had gathered.<\/p>\n
As a little kid from Ciudad Ju\u00e1rez, M\u00e9xico, I never thought I would have the privilege of growing up like this. And as I watched other little kids and teenagers march through London\u2019s streets with glee, hand in hand with those who came before them, I couldn\u2019t help but believe that things will be OK \u2013 that we will make them OK.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cWe prevail, we prevail, we prevail\u201d is what I kept thinking as I wove my way through London…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":91638,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[26],"tags":[494,3157,3156,3158,3159,3160,3161,3162,1109,1038,3154,3155,27,674],"class_list":["post-91637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-london","tag-art","tag-dazed","tag-dazed-confused","tag-dazed-confused-magazine","tag-dazed-and-confused","tag-dazed-and-confused-magazine","tag-dazedconfused","tag-dazeddigital","tag-fashion","tag-film","tag-ideas","tag-ideas-sharing-network","tag-london","tag-music"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/116995318292590513","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91637\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}