{"id":6994,"date":"2017-03-03T18:06:00","date_gmt":"2017-03-03T16:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/?p=6994"},"modified":"2026-03-03T18:47:53","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T16:47:53","slug":"march-2017-sistaazhoods-leigh-davids-makes-famous-trans-violent-exclusion-speech-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/march-2017-sistaazhoods-leigh-davids-makes-famous-trans-violent-exclusion-speech-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"March 2017 \u2014 SistaazHood&#8217;s Leigh Davids Makes Famous &#8220;Trans Violent Exclusion&#8221; Speech, South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">March 2017 \u2014 SistaazHood&#8217;s Leigh Davids Makes Famous &#8220;Trans Violent Exclusion&#8221; Speech, South Africa<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:30px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In March 2017, trans sex worker activist, <a href=\"https:\/\/sahistory.org.za\/people\/leigh-davids?fbclid=IwAR2TWFmwGuQCGigt93KNdeY_r5dcMoF5oKABGr_iz-nzIyU6dI1fhK5tcAQ\">Leigh Davids<\/a> from <a href=\"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sistaazhood-founded-south-africa\/\">SistaazHood<\/a>, made the now famous &#8220;Trans Violent Exclusion&#8221; speech at the 3rd Trans Health, Advocacy and Research Conference, hosted by\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/july-2005-gender-dynamix-gdx-founded-south-africa\/\"><strong>Gender DynamiX (GDX)<\/strong><\/a><\/em>\u00a0 and<strong><em><a href=\"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/founding-of-iranti-south-africa\/\"> Iranti<\/a><\/em><\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:30px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1200\" height=\"600\" src=\"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids.webp\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6995\" srcset=\"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids.webp 1200w, https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids-300x150.webp 300w, https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids-150x75.webp 150w, https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids-768x384.webp 768w, https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids-18x9.webp 18w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em>Photo by Gugu Mandla<\/em>. Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mambaonline.com\/2019\/03\/05\/remembering-leigh-davids-a-flame-in-the-darkness\/\">MambaOnline<\/a>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:30px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Under the Conference theme, &#8220;Decolonising and Depathologising Transgender Identities&#8221;, Leigh delivered a powerful critique, which was<a href=\"https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.1080\/10130950.2017.1372330\"> published <\/a>afterwards. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:30px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.1080\/10130950.2017.1372330\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"986\" height=\"1486\" src=\"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids-speech.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6996\" srcset=\"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids-speech.png 986w, https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids-speech-199x300.png 199w, https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids-speech-100x150.png 100w, https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids-speech-768x1157.png 768w, https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Leigh-Davids-speech-8x12.png 8w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 986px) 100vw, 986px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:30px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The speech highlighted the different income and social classes and levels of access within trans organisations and among trans women and activists. She spoke about living on the street, and she challenged the audience to think about what it means being a trans woman sex worker and how this Conference (or any other) is at all meaningful for trans women sex workers. In the speech Leigh mentioned that trans women sex workers do not live to be older than 40 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:30px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe title=\"Trans Violent Exclusion\" width=\"1290\" height=\"726\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ZbjABrwY0CU?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:30px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Leigh passed away two weeks before her 40th birthday, on 27 February 2019. <a href=\"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/Announcements-of-passing-of-Leigh-Davids-%E2%80%93-27-February-2019.pdf\">Read the tributes<\/a> to Leigh after her passing.<\/h5>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:30px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Transcript of snippets from a speech Leigh made in 2018 at the Kewpie Heritage Day<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading has-vivid-cyan-blue-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-afeda5ff50067c095704cecca3f846ae\">&#8220;Thank you for coming to the place where we live. We do not often invite people here. Like anybody else we enjoy our privacy and as you might imagine we don\u2019t have a lot of that here.<br>This is what NOT PRIVACY looks like.<br>This is what NOT HOME looks like.<br>This is what parents threaten their children with if they don\u2019t do their homework.<br>This is what Capitalism imprints in your mind to make you work harder, to spend your money,<br>to make you work for the man.<br>This is\u2026\u2026. THE STREETS.<br><br>The human mind and will is amazing. Even when it is hungry. Even when it is in pain all the time. Even when it\u2019s spirit has been attacked all it\u2019s life. It will find and make community, under the worst stress. The SistaazHood and our allies have been living on this spot for decades. Over there is our lounge and our kitchen. Over here is where we sleep together.<br>This is home for us.<br>Well it was until the part of apartheid that never died came and evicted us last week, evicted us yet again from District 6.<br>The first time was because of philosophy called apartheid. Ooh and we hate that word hey? All of us! Black white poor rich.<br>Say it with all the hate in yourself, all the disgust, feel appalled!<br>Wasnt it terrible? It was so terrible that once upon a time a government, a city could throw poor black people out of their homes, demolish them, send the people to the outskirts of the city. What terrible prejudice, human rights violation. That one could lose your home because of the colour of your skin, your culture, how you were born. Shocking hey?<br>But let me tell you that Big Brother Apartheid might be dead but his father is still with us. We never killed his father. His father\u2019s name is the CLASS SYSTEM and his father\u2019s job is GENTRIFICATION. In the name of gentrification the father of apartheid is still chasing poor black people from District Six.<br><br>And so? How many of you are working class? How many of you are middle class? Do you occupy the street to walk to work or do you occupy the street when you go for a jog or do you drive in it? If you answer yes to any of those you are more or less safe from the father of apartheid and his job &#8211; gentrification. But me and my sisters. He is coming for us. He came for us last week on his first round through Woodstock. He chased us around the corner. Next week he will take us to a concentration camp in a place called Wolwehoek. What is this? It sounds like a TV drama. But it is not. It is my life. It is our life. And maybe you wonder why I can sleep in the street, how can sleep on a piece of property I don\u2019t own, how I can complain when I am evicted from a space I don\u2019t own. Are you wondering that? Are you wondering if I am a nuisance to<br>people here? Do I make a noise? Do I use drugs, sell sex, urinate on the street? And isn;t it time for me to get my act together, find a job?<br>First of all &#8211; I HAVE A JOB. Sex work is work. You made it illegal.<br>Second of all. I don\u2019t live here by accident. I am not poor by accident. I am not without a home by accident.<br><br>There are places in the world where democracy does it\u2019s job, nobody sleeps on tar and cardboard there. There are places in the world where Capitalism works, does it\u2019s job &#8211; people don\u2019t sleep under plastic on cement there. There are places in<br>the world where dynamic communities with all the classes are designed by city planners. People from every class is together in one neighbourhood, diversity makes them thrive! Believe it! Those neighbourhoods work! And the most vulnerable? There are shelters for them\u2026..right there in the same neighbourhood where one guy jogs on the street, the other one walks on it to work and the one with mental health challenges sits on a bench under a beautiful tree, protected, maybe even healing. There are places like that in the world.<br><br>And do you know how they happened? They did not happen because poor people got their act together. They did not happen because poor people got themselves jobs. They did not happen because poor people got organised. They happened because people with power started doing their job. They built a society for everybody with their power. The middle class agreed to it. Insisted on it. That\u2019s how it happened.<br><br>So please leave us now and go do you job. Use your power. Get us off the street without evicting us. Gentrify with us in our heart and mind, not like we are trash that needs to be taken out\u2026..of town.&#8221;<\/h5>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>March 2017 \u2014 SistaazHood&#8217;s Leigh Davids Makes Famous &#8220;Trans Violent Exclusion&#8221; Speech, South Africa In March 2017, trans sex worker activist, Leigh Davids from SistaazHood, made the now famous &#8220;Trans Violent Exclusion&#8221; speech at the 3rd Trans Health, Advocacy and Research Conference, hosted by\u00a0Gender DynamiX (GDX)\u00a0 and Iranti. Under the Conference theme, &#8220;Decolonising and Depathologising [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":6995,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[575,335,39,534,495,541,32],"tags":[1621,211,113,27,112],"class_list":["post-6994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-activists","category-all","category-community","category-gender-diverse","category-gender-non-conforming","category-sex-work","category-trans","tag-kewpie","tag-leigh-davids","tag-sistaazhood","tag-south-africa","tag-trans-health-research-and-advocacy-conference"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6994"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6994\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6998,"href":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6994\/revisions\/6998"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6995"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/transintersexhistory.africa\/sw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}