The Urgent Need for Intersectional Solidarity: We Need to Talk About Privilege in LGBTQ+ Communities While Other Communities Are Being Targeted
Originally written on February 16, 2025
Preface and my positionality:
I’d like to make this more of a practice—let me inform you again about my positionality and from what perspective I speak (in hopes that others can do the same): I’m a naturalized U.S. citizen and a Bengali American. I’m a brown, queer, non-binary, disabled person who grew up in a low-to-middle-class immigrant family and now find myself solidly middle-class with five college degrees. I use they/them/theirs, he/him/his, and ze/zim/zir pronouns. Most of my chosen family in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (yes, I live in a swing state!) are trans/non-binary or otherwise queer folks from various socioeconomic backgrounds and racial/cultural identities. I guess I’m also a millennial, which I’m sure provides so much context to this article! I say all this because our perspectives shape how we see the world, and right now, we need to be more nuanced about how we use our privilege and provide solidarity in our community.
Recent Political Developments
Recent political developments have put our LGBTQ+ communities in a panic about persecution and civil rights. And yeah, we should be concerned, especially when we’re seeing the literal erasure of our history happening in real time. The National Park Service just stripped the words “transgender” and “queer” from the Stonewall National Monument’s website, as if Marsha P. Johnson, Sylvia Rivera, and countless other trans and gender-nonconforming revolutionaries weren’t central to our liberation movement.
Look, this isn’t just our LGBTQ+ community getting erased—they’re coming for everyone who doesn’t fit their narrow vision of “America.” Want examples? Spanish speakers can’t find basic government information anymore because those resources have vanished into thin air. The CDC quietly scrubbed its website of crucial HIV prevention info that people—both queer and straight—relied on to stay healthy and alive. And holy shit, don’t get me started on what they’ve done to disability resources. Disabled people can no longer find basic information about their rights anymore because those pages have mysteriously disappeared from federal websites.
Let me tell you something: Marsha P. Johnson, who threw one of the first bricks at Stonewall and spent her life fighting for both LGBTQ+ rights AND supporting unhoused queer youth, would be the first to tell us that we can’t separate our struggles. She’d remind us that while we’re (rightfully) worried about potential future threats, there’s already a humanitarian crisis happening right now: the systematic detention and deportation of immigrants to facilities like Guantánamo Bay. And this isn’t just a Trump thing—this has been happening under Biden, under Trump’s first term, and, yes, even under Obama.
This moment calls for honest self-reflection from privileged members of the LGBTQ+ community, particularly those who benefit from white/white-passing privilege and/or socioeconomic stability. Our advocacy must extend beyond our immediate community to embrace true intersectional solidarity.
The Erasure of Our History Is Not an Accident
What’s happening right now is not subtle: They’re trying to erase trans people from our history while simultaneously attacking trans people in the present. The removal of “transgender” and “queer” from the Stonewall Monument’s website isn’t just about words—it’s about power. It’s about who gets to tell our story and who gets written out of it. (It is weird to witness as trans/non-binary/gender-nonconforming people have their stories written in ancient Hindu texts [but many modern-day Hindus ignore them] and in various ways in indigenous Americans’ histories.)
This systematic erasure is precisely what Orwell warned us about in “1984”—but it’s happening in real time, across multiple fronts. Just as the Party in “1984” didn’t just control information but rewrote reality itself, we’re watching as entire communities are being written out of existence. The Ministry of Truth didn’t just change documents—it changed what people believed was possible to think about. Sound familiar? When they remove “transgender” from historical sites, they’re not just changing words—they’re trying to make it impossible even to imagine our existence.
This erasure has real consequences. When you delete trans people from Stonewall’s history, you make it easier to justify deleting trans people from public life today. When you pretend that gender-nonconforming people weren’t central to our movement’s biggest moments, you make it easier to argue that they don’t belong in our movement now.
And here’s the thing that makes my blood boil: Some people in our own community are more concerned about trans erasure than the crises that have been raging on for decades in human rights. But let me tell you something—that’s not how solidarity works. That’s not how liberation works. And that’s definitely not what Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera fought for.
This isn’t just about semantics—it’s straight out of Orwell’s cautionary words: “Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.” Sound familiar? When they erase words, they erase people. When they erase people from history, they make it easier to erase them from the present. Just look at what’s happening right now:
HIV/AIDS history is being sanitized, with references to gay men and IV drug users being removed from historical accounts
HIV/AIDs programs like PEPFAR (President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief) have stopped the distribution of life-saving antiretroviral drugs to almost 26 million people across the world (Yo! HIV/AIDS is still a global crisis!)
Spanish-language COVID-19 resources vanished from government websites during the height of the pandemic
Disability rights victories are being scrubbed from educational materials
Indigenous land acknowledgments are being banned from public institutions
The digital erasure directly enables physical oppression. When they remove language about gender-affirming care from medical websites, it becomes harder for trans people to access healthcare. When they delete Spanish-language resources about workers’ rights, it becomes easier to exploit immigrant laborers. When they remove accessibility guidelines from government websites, it becomes harder for disabled people to advocate for their legal rights.
Oh, and while we’re talking about disability rights, currently 17 states (PA is not included) are suing to get rid of “Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability in programs or activities that receive federal financial assistance from the U.S. Department of Education.” This lawsuit started before our current administration.
Section 504 is a crucial law that protects people with disabilities in the U.S. The lawsuit, Texas v. Becerra, says that Section 504 goes against the United States Constitution and that no one should have to follow any part of it. If the 17 states win, this would open up Section 504 being deemed unconstitutional, which would devastate people with disabilities. It would also affect the healthcare management of other marginalized groups.
Fun fact: my brother and several friends benefited directly from Section 504. If you or your child have ever received an IEP (Individualized Education Program) in a public school in the U.S. to accommodate learning and education, you or your child have benefited from Section 504.
If you live in one of those 17 states, please go to the link below, learn about the case, and contact your Attorney General.
https://dredf.org/protect-504/
The Immediate Crisis Facing Our Trans Family
Don’t get me wrong; we do need to address what’s happening to our trans family members right now, especially those who are already vulnerable. The ACLU has reported that over 2,000 transgender people currently in federal custody are facing immediate danger. The administration’s new orders are forcing trans women into men’s prisons and detention centers—a move that dramatically increases their risk of sexual assault and abuse. They’re also losing access to crucial healthcare.
These are not hypothetical concerns. The first groups of detainees have already arrived at the facility, and the administration has announced plans for daily military flights carrying more individuals. This is happening now to real people, many of whom have no connection to the criminal organizations cited as justification for their detention.
The vulnerability of trans people in detention or prison isn’t new—it’s been a horrifying constant across administrations. Under Obama, despite promises of reform, trans women were still routinely housed in men’s facilities. Under Trump, protections were explicitly rolled back. And even under Biden, despite campaign promises about trans rights, there were the same patterns of abuse and neglect. The system itself is the problem, and it’s been failing our most vulnerable community members regardless of which party holds power.
Black and Indigenous trans women and gender-nonconforming people, in particular, face compounded violence at every level FOR YEARS, under Democrat and Republican administrations alike! Every system is stacked against them—from the cops who profile them on the street to the judges who lock them up to the guards who abuse them in detention. And if you think this is just about a few bigoted individuals, wake up. This is about systems working together to crush our most vulnerable family members.
And you best believe this playbook isn’t just for trans people. It is being applied to immigrants, refugees, disabled folks, folks with HIV/AIDS, Spanish speakers, Indigenous populations, and more. (And, while this isn’t the point of this article, this playbook is not just happening in the U.S.)
Can We Check All Our Various Privileges?
While many socioeconomically privileged LGBTQ+ folks (myself included) are freaking out about recent anti-trans executive orders—and yes, they’re terrifying—we need to acknowledge something uncomfortable. Our community’s response has often wholly ignored the immediate crisis facing immigrant communities AND our own underprivileged LGBTQ+ family members.
Let’s talk about what’s actually happening right now: Trans people can’t get their passports updated (effectively outing them whenever they travel), and the State Department has suspended all gender marker changes (leaving some people without valid passports).
But undocumented LGBTQ+ immigrants are facing double jeopardy. Undocumented immigrants, in general, are facing real threats. This selective outrage? It’s showing our privilege, and we need to do better.
The contrast is stark: while we debate potential future threats to trans rights—which absolutely deserve attention and resistance—immigrants are already being transported to offshore detention facilities with limited legal oversight and a documented history of human rights violations.
Fight for Intersectional Solidarity
I often say that we should not be playing the “struggle Olympics,” whether it’s about our various privileges in the world or our struggles. It’s about recognizing how all our struggles connect and doing something about it. If you’re a privileged member of the LGBTQ+ community (and if you’re reading this on Substack or Bluesky, you probably have some privilege), here’s what you could do:
Acknowledge the immediate crisis facing immigrant communities
Use our platforms and privileges to amplify immigrant voices and concerns
Recognize that the same systems threatening trans rights also enable immigrant detention
Support organizations working at these intersections
Challenge selective outrage within our own communities
The parallels to “1984” go even deeper than information control. Orwell showed us how language shapes reality—how “Newspeak” wasn’t just about limiting vocabulary but about making certain thoughts impossible to express. When they remove Spanish-language resources, when they strip away disability rights information, when they sanitize HIV history, they’re doing exactly what Ingsoc did—making it harder for people to even conceive of resistance. The “memory hole” isn’t just a metaphor anymore—it’s a delete button on a government website.
This isn’t some academic exercise about preserving the past—it’s about whether our people get to exist tomorrow. Every story they erase, every document they ‘update,’ and every website they scrub makes it easier to pretend we were never here at all.
Learning from History
Y’all, history’s screaming at us right now: when marginalized folks stand together, we’re stronger. Every time we let them divide us, every time we ignore another community’s pain, we’re doing their work for them.
The current expansion of detention facilities at Guantánamo echoes darker chapters of history. Just as the first concentration camps in Nazi Germany initially targeted political opponents before expanding to other groups, the normalization of extra-judicial detention threatens all marginalized communities.
A Call to Action (Because We’re Way Past “Raising Awareness”)
Here’s what you need to do, especially if you’re sitting comfortably with either socioeconomic privilege, white-passing privilege, or a steady paycheck:
Put your money where your mouth is—fund (and raise awareness) about immigrant legal aid groups
Shut down the BS when people start dehumanizing immigrants in your spaces
Make noise and speak up about detention conditions on every platform you’ve got
Get in your representatives’ faces about detention policies
Look hard at how our own rhetoric in LGBTQ+ spaces might be part of the problem
Center Black and Indigenous voices in your activism!!
Conclusion
We should not have to separate our broader fight for human rights and human dignity from our struggle for LGBTQ+ rights. Our various communities know what persecution feels like. That means we’ve got a special responsibility to show up for others facing the same tactics.
This isn’t about minimizing the very real threats to trans rights. Instead, it’s about recognizing that our liberation is inextricably linked to that of all marginalized communities. The time for selective advocacy is over. We must embrace a fuller, more inclusive vision of solidarity that recognizes that none of us is free until all of us are free.
Remember: It wasn’t just about language when they came for the Spanish-language resources. When they stripped away disability rights information, it wasn’t just about accessibility. When they sanitized HIV history, it wasn’t just about healthcare.
This is about power, about who gets to exist in public space, and about whose stories get told. The digital erasure and the physical oppression are two sides of the same coin, and we must fight both with everything we’ve got.