Another violent incident in the same city where George lost his life, and Black Lives Matter trends in the wake of his tragic murder, people are reflecting on how inclusive that statement should be.
On Monday night in Minneapolis, Iyanna Dior, a black trans woman, was brutally beaten by a mob. Footage of the event has gone viral on social media, provoking people to call for justice and bring awareness to the high rates of violence against black transgender women.
At a gas station in Minneapolis after a reported fender bender ,Dior, who is 21, was attacked by a group of what appears to be mostly men. Dior told supporters in a post on her Facebook, that she needed time “to process everything that’s going on” and thanked people for reaching out to see if she was ok.
Celebrities caught wind of Iyanna Dior’s story and shared their support for her and the black trans community, launching it into the national spotlight. Some of the hashtags related to the movement include the phrasing, “All black lives matter” and “Black trans lives matter.”
According to the Human Rights Coalition, at least 26 transgender or gender non-conforming people were violently killed in 2019 alone. The vast majority of the victims were black transgender women.
“This violence has got to stop. All of our hearts should hurt watching the videos of this young trans woman being hit by a group of people. Black lives matter and that includes trans, non-binary, queer, cis and straight Black lives,” Tori Cooper, director of community engagement for HRC’s Transgender Justice Initiative, tells Rolling Stone. “The time is now for us to make changes through an intersectional lens that includes all Black lives.”
