Just Nani

i don't know if you're aware of the news about Brianna Ghey, but if you are, I know a lot of us could use some words of wisdom. or just any words, really. if i had the right words i'd write them, but all i feel right now is devastated.

sorry to bother you

I'm devastated too.

There's a trans Day of Remembrance for a reason. I hope Brianna Ghey is remembered long after her killers and the people who inspired them or egged them on are long forgotten.

I wrote this page of Sandman 32 years ago:

TW // transphobia and violence against trans people

Brianna Ghey was a 16-year-old trans girl from Warrington, England. On Saturday, February 11th 2023, Brianna was found dead on the side of a park with multiple stab wounds. Two 15-year-olds have been taken into custody in connection with her murder.

People in the Warrington area have alleged that Brianna was being bullied in school, and that neither the administration nor the police did anything.

Despite this, local police have said there is no evidence that the attack was hate-based and most news articles don't mention her status as a trans woman. This is deliberate. This is genocide by the hands of transphobes and TERFs.

Britain does not have gender self-identification (your legal gender being determined by how you identify and not any arbitrary medical requirements), meaning even in her death she will be deadnamed and misgendered on her death certificate.

She deserved so much better.

Mourn the dead, and fight like hell for the living.

If you think this is ending with “Nina did you actually try to interview the KKK,” you are…wrong.

It is ending with “Nina DID interview the KKK.” It’s ending with “some KKK secretary or whatever saw an earnest, gullible teenager say ‘my mom says I should present both sides so I thought I’d ask if I can talk to someone’ AND HAD THE GRAND FUCKING DRAGON ANSWER ME.”

It is ending with “when I was thirteen I came dangerously, BLISTERINGLY close to being recruited by the KKK.” Because let me tell you about this Grand Dragon. He was nice. He was kind, and patient. He answered all of my questions about his chapter’s history and what various KKK symbols meant. He sent me supplemental links on various bits of Klan history (Google didn’t exist yet, so this was both a treasure trove and, you can imagine, a way to tip the scales in the KKK’s favor). He encouraged me to let him know how my presentation went and praised me for doing in-depth research. Most of the adults in my life thought my research rabbitholes were weird or even dangerous, so “good job looking for your own answers instead of stopping at your first three sources” was a really big deal. “I’m so glad you reached out, what questions do you have?” was a really big deal.

What stopped me from falling all the way down that rabbit hole?

I was deeply Christian at the time and uncomfortable with the idea of burning (or, as they call it, “lighting”) crosses.

That’s it. That’s all that stood between me and “yes, I would like to talk to a local leader, I had no idea how much I knew about the Klan was wrong.”