Opinion: Activist Taryn de Vere introduces Project Protect Protest, a week of events organised by Amnesty and running at Dublin's Project Arts Centre showing their Write for Rights campaign, which encourages people to write letters in support of people facing injustice.
During the Repeal The Eighth campaign, some repeal campaigners were physically assaulted by people opposing repeal, others were harassed via online bullying campaigns. I was one of the people who experienced threats and harassment as a result of my work as an activist. Choosing to stand up for what you believe in is rarely an easy path, and it's often an unsafe one. For trans women Yren Rotela and Mariana Sepúlveda, being an activist has caused the Paraguayan government to try and silence them.
In Paraguay, conversion therapy is not illegal. Trans and non binary people are not legally recognised and do not have the right to change their gender identity. There are no protections against the discrimination they face in Paraguayan law. Yren and Mariana say that the state is trying to make trans people invisible. What’s more, it’s difficult for trans groups in Paraguay to protest and speak out about the barriers they face.
We have our own struggles with equality for trans people here in Ireland. Transgender Europe’s (TGEU) recent Europe-wide survey placed Ireland last out of 27 countries for trans rights and equality. There’s no country that’s a utopia for trans people, no place where trans and non binary people have access to the same rights, healthcare, and status as cis people. In our fight for our basic human rights, we struggle to find spaces where our words and experiences can be heard, as many media outlets actively platform transphobic ideology.
The fight for human rights is a human one, not just an Irish one. We fight for rights everywhere, as we know that our struggle is interconnected. A win for one is a win for us all. We have the legal right to self identify here in Ireland, but this is a right that is denied to trans and non binary people in Paraguay. Amnesty International seeks to support trans rights and help activists targeted for their involvement in peaceful protest movements. People like Yren Rotela and Mariana Sepúlveda, who are being featured in the 2022 Amnesty Write for Rights campaign.
Amnesty are encouraging the public to write letters in support of people facing injustice for standing up for human rights around the world. While writing letters might seem like a small action in response to large-scale issues, the success of past Write for Rights campaigns has illustrated that even small actions can make monumental changes in millions of lives across the world.
In 2021, 4.7 million actions took place worldwide, including over 32,000 individual actions that happened in Ireland. This incredible support from the Irish public helped Amnesty fight for 202 individual "Write for Rights" cases over the last twenty years.
Amnesty has organised a week-long event, Project Protect Protest, which will be held in the Project Arts Centre in Dublin from the 5-10th of December 2022. This week of events allows people to pop in over the week to write letters to those around the world facing injustice for peacefully protesting. The public are invited to join workshops and events happening throughout the week.
During the week, the Project will host daily discussions, events, and showcases of activism and protest art, trans rights, housing, and the climate emergency. Highlights from the week-long calendar of events include Songs against Apartheid, a concert with both Irish and Palestinian musical artists hosted by Francis Black and featuring Síomha and Saied Silbak. Tropical Popical are creating a pop-up nail salon in solidarity with Dorgolese, a nail artist imprisoned in Cameroon for protesting, and public meetings on urgent issues like climate and housing feature leading cultural figures such as Andrea Horan and Rory Hearne.
As part of Protest Protest Protest, I'm working with other members of the trans and non-binary/genderqueer community to create a series of events that will be happening during the day on Monday 5th and Tuesday 6th. We'll be using performance art to engage people with the challenges facing trans people in Paraguay and elsewhere. Our hope is to gather letters of support for Yren and Mariana, and to collect letters to send to the Paraguayan government in support of trans rights.
Attendees can view the full Project Protect Protest calendar at www.amnesty.ie and register for both paid and free events through Project Arts Centre’s website.
For more information on how to get involved with the Write for Rights campaign and how your action can create a positive impact on lives across the world, go here.
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ
