Kris Hayashi with the Transgender Law Center

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Kris Hayashi with the Transgender Law Center

Social media exploded this week when Vanity Fair’s cover introduced Caitlin Jenner to the world and continued a dialogue about the gender identity of the former Olympic track star who went by Bruce Jenner. But as Laverne Cox, another trans celebrity, said, “Most trans folks don’t have the privileges Caitlyn and I have now have,” and raised the issues of access to healthcare, jobs, housing, safe streets, safe schools and homes for our young people.

In February this year, a group of queer and trans people of color brought the Black Lives Matter movement into the Castro. They chanted and held up images of black queer and trans people killed by police or vigilantes. The National Coalition of Anti-Violence programs reported that in 2013, 72 percent of anti-LGBT homicides were against trans women, 89 percent of whom were transgender women of color.

The Transgender Law Center has been vigilantly working to make gender expression a basic right by changing law, policy, and attitudes so that all people can live safely, authentically, and free from discrimination regardless of their gender identity or expression. Int his timely moment, here’s an interview with TLC’s new executive director, Kris Hayashi, conducted by Monna Wong who runs API Equality Northern California.