happy tdov

Here’s a few ways you can shine more light on Transgender Day of Visibility on social media

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Transgender pride flag backlit by the sun

In 2009, Rachel Crandall-Crocker created International Transgender Day of Visibility as a day of celebration and a counterpoint to the mournful Transgender Day of Remembrance that falls every November 20.

“I’d been wanting there to be a special day for us for a long time, and I was waiting and waiting for someone else to do it. And then finally I said, ‘I’m not waiting anymore. I’m going to do it,’” Crandall-Crocker, a licensed psychotherapist who’s also the co-founder of Transgender Michigan, told The 19th in 2021. “I wanted a day that we can celebrate the living, and I wanted a day that all over the world we could be all together.”

Her efforts paid off, as International Transgender Day of Visibility, or TDOV, has become a global occasion every March 31.

President Joe Biden marked 2021’s TDOV with a proclamation affirming that “transgender Americans make our Nation more prosperous, vibrant, and strong” and urging fellow Americans to “[uplift] the worth, and dignity of every transgender person.” 

Those imperatives are more important now than ever. The Trans Legislation Tracker has tallied 533 anti-trans bills—“legislation that seeks to block trans people from receiving basic healthcare, education, legal recognition, and the right to publicly exist”—introduced in the United States so far in 2024, of which 16 have passed and 430 are currently still active. Additionally, 87 anti-trans bills passed in 2023, more than three times the number that passed the year before, according to the tracker.

Related:

7 great, genre-spanning films from trans directors to watch in honor of Trans Day Of Visibility

From a hilarious comedy to an erotic thriller, these films show that trans stories aren’t limited by genre or scope—they can look like anything.

In an essay for Business Insider timed to last year’s TDOV, Victoria Scott asserted that the trans population needs not just visibility but allies. She wrote:

This needs to be a day where the country makes it clear they have our backs. We need more than throwaway State of the Union lines to protect us. We need federal legislation to protect us from state-level lawmaking. We need the people around us, in every city, to support us, rather than just in a scattered few safe places on the coasts. We need doctors who treat us like people instead of unfortunate accidents. We need our visibility to be repaid with a future we can actually imagine ourselves in.

For this year’s TDOV, allies can follow the National Center for Transgender Equality’s recommendations for supportive action or follow the Trans Formations Project’s steps for fighting state-level and national anti-trans legislation.

And to make TDOV even more visible, these informative Instagram posts are ready to be disseminated far and wide—with attribution, of course!

Related:

Trans hockey star Harrison Browne on his new film, scootering around L.A. & being a cat dad

Browne is writing a trans-positive short film, “Pink Light.”

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