CeCe McDonald and Intersectionality
CeCe McDonald is an African American transgendered woman who
identifies as bisexual. In 2011, she was charged with murder for killing a man
who attacked her during a racist and transphobic assault.
The assault occurred on June 5, 2011 when she and a group of
friends who also identified as LGBTQ people of color took a walk to a grocery
store in Minneapolis. As they were passing a bar, Dean Schmitz and his friends
assaulted them with numerous slurs such as "faggots",
"tranny", and "niggers". She testified that Schmitz yelled,
"You niggers need to go back to Africa!" and "Look at that boy
dressed as a girl, tucking his dick in!".
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McDonald |
A glass bottle was thrown at McDonald and when Schmitz approached
her with his fists up, she stabbed him with a pair of fabric scissors. Police
arrested McDonald and she was later charged with two counts of second degree murder.
She commented, “The incident in itself was so complex. We dealt
with race. We dealt with sexual orientation. We dealt with transphobia and
transmisogyny. We dealthy with homophobia…you don’t know what part of you that
you’re defending. I didn’t know if I was fighting for myself because I was
black. I didn’t know if I was fighting for myself because I was trans. But it
all coincided.”
After her arrest, the movement #FreeCeCe was started where the
CeCe Support Committee pursued two goals: to get her the best outcome in her
case and to activism around the prison-industrial-complex, especially for trans
women of color.
The intersections woven into this narrative are complex. If CeCe
McDonald were a straight white women, the narrative would be altered. If she
were a cisgendered white woman, it would be different. She not only is a woman
of color but she is transgendered and bisexual. Therefore, she doesn’t fit
neatly into any category. She faces discrimination in every aspect. We have to
consider these intersections when discussing a case like this.
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Schmitz |
It was revealed that Schmitz had a swastika tattoo, but this was
deemed irrelevant in court. How is having a blatant racist engraving on your
body deemed irrelevant in a hate-crime? The media also neglected to report on
his extensive criminal record which included charges of burgulary, domestic
assault, and drug possession. However, the media painted CeCe as Chrishaun Reed
who is a poor and dangerous person in transition from a man to a woman.
A well-written post on Intersectionality and Ce Ce McDonald. Thank you for your interesting posts this semester. 10/10
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