Trans Spirituality 8/24/20

People all over the United States have been “Crowing” joyously because of the selection, and now nomination, of Kamala Harris as the candidate for Vice President. As a transgender activist I could not join the celebration. Like many trans activists, I see her as a transphobic tool of the carceral prison-industrial complex.  I know these are harsh words, but I will back them up.

This is a spiritual piece, so let’s start there. I’m a rabbi. Judaism is a rabbinic religion, not a biblical one. That is, we place the Torah and all of the Hebrew Bible as extremely holy, but we do not follow it literally. We can’t, because the Bible commands us:

You shall SURELY pursue JUSTICE (Deut. 16:20).

To do this requires that at times we apply rabbinic interpretations to verses. So, for instance, the command “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth…” in Latin called Lex Talionis, the rabbis in the Talmud make it very clear that this means monetary compensation.

Nonetheless, in Leviticus Chapter 19, we find the Holiness Code. These are obligations that are quite obvious, even if they do sometimes require interpretation. So consider:

Do not place a stumbling block before the blind (Lev 19:14)Spirt

This broadly means to not do things that hinder the disadvantaged.

When Harris was Attorney General, she refused to grant permission for a trans woman inmate to have Gender Confirming Surgery (GCS). This inmate eventually sued and won, and had GCS while in prison. She was in for 20 years for manslaughter, not in for life for First Degree murder, we should note.

The skeptical might argue, she’s in prison, let her rot. Yet if one does the research, one will find countless cases of self-castration of trans inmates in prison. When this happens, these inmates usually die. These are often trans women housed in male housing, and mercilessly harassed and assaulted by their cellmates for being who they are.  This is the epitome of violating our biblical verse.  Even when trans women are housed with female inmates they are often unsafe.

The Affordable Care Act ruled GCS was medically necessary. If an inmate has cancer, they get the surgery. Surely therefore, they should get GCS too. But Harris refused. She later changed her tune, and made excuses, but to me that is just being a political chameleon, changing to go with the political winds, and shows that you cannot trust her, and that she has no spine and doesn’t even stand by her values.

As AG of California, she did nothing to reform the system that saw countless Black men put away for “crimes” that white people were not even charged with. Again, a violation of our verse.  Again, she said she was just following the law.

But she did NOTHING to advocate for changing the law.  People may argue she is not Black because she is Jamaican/Indian. I don’t know what the ethnicity of her Jamaican parent is, but most Jamaicans came from Africa, so it’s highly likely she IS Black. That she would be so callous about her own people is shocking to me, and again is a violation of our verse.

I am not impressed by the argument that she was following the law. So were the soldiers who testified at Nuremburg.

I don’t know why Biden picked Harris. Maybe Duckworth, Abrams and other better choices turned him down. Biden himself is a horrible choice for the U.S. Will I vote Biden/Harris? Of course, because this is still better than a Nazi grandson of an illegal immigrant Nazi officer who is destroying the very fabric of this country.

As a disabled, queer trans Jew, I belong to three of the four major categories the Nazis set out to destroy. I cannot let that happen again. But a Biden/Harris ticket is not the best choice for this country, and after they are inaugurated, I will be helping to dismantle the DNC because they have yet again failed the United States.

Peace out,

Rona

Tags: featured, politics, spirituality, Transgender

Category: Transgender Body & Soul, Transgender Opinion, Transgender Politics