Estimated reading time: 4 minutes
November 20th marks the International Transgender Day of Remembrance. Ceremonies are traditionally marked with a reading of the names of our dead, with a particular focus on those murdered by individuals and the state. Although some communities also include the names of those murdered by the crushing pressure of transphobic society, a true accounting of our dead cannot be measured. Candles are lit and left to burn in memory of all those we have lost. This call to memory is an overtly political act, as systems of settler-colonial, imperialist, and reactionary violence have sought and continue to seek the total eradication of the trans lives they so readily take.
This eradication takes the form of misgendering and deadnaming transgender people after their death, as the police, bourgeois media, morticians, and families work in tandem to eradicate our ancestors and erase our collective history. It was in defiance of this epistemicide that the first recorded Transgender Day of Remembrance was held in memory of Rita Hester, a black transgender woman whose murderer is still being protected by police who refuse to investigate the case (as they do with most trans murder cases). Since that ceremony in 1999, this ritual of resistance has spread across the globe, with international groups long linking anti-trans violence to colonial and imperialist systems of genocide, femicide, and misogynoir.
These systems can be clearly observed in the data we do have. This year, the Trans Europe and Central Asia network recorded 281 reports of transgender and gender diverse people being murdered worldwide: 90% of these murders are femicides, 88% are Black or brown people, 68% of murders are recorded in Latin America and the Caribbean, and 34% of victims are sex workers. In this same report, it is observed that there has been a sharp increase in the targeting of trans activists, making 14% of victims in 2025 where they only made up 6% in 2023.
There are, however, differing numbers that will be listed on this day, as the organizations which track this information differ in philosophy on what they count as violence against our people. Due to these differences, the Remembering Our Dead project has recorded 365 deaths worldwide, a number that includes suicides, deaths in detention by police or in prisons, and more. No matter the number there are likely hundreds, if not thousands, of our sisters, siblings, and brothers whose lives were cut short and may never be accounted for in this naming of our dead.
In the last essay Sylvia Rivera wrote before her death in 2002, she expressed her recommitment to the struggle, stating in conclusion:
Before I die, I will see our community given the respect we deserve. I’ll be damned if I’m going to my grave without having the respect this community deserves. I want to go wherever I go with that in my soul and peacefully say I’ve finally overcome.
As we come together to honor our dead and our ancestors on this day of memory, do not forget that it is you and your community that have the means to struggle and achieve a liberated life in a liberated world. Let the flickering candle flames on this day be a kindling for a revolutionary passion. For together, you, your community, and your comrades have the power to bring about the world that is to be.
Leave a Reply