Although the event was a relative success, its outcome leaves me most apprehensive. Regretfully, we had to end it early.
A hundred supporters of the transgender community rallied at the Victoria Conference Centre ahead of the annual We Unify conference, to denounce its transphobic speaker lineup.
The event was called by 1 Million Voices For Inclusion, a group of activists countering transphobic events such as the 1 Million March For Children last September. I was the lead organiser for this demonstration. I have to admit disappointment over the turnout; while respectable, we expected far more to attend given the degree of engagement we obtained in over a month of campaigning, such as a letter campaign reaching over 2000 hits, the backing of the Victoria Pride Society, extensive media coverage, a rally at City Hall and address to the council, and even the endorsement of two MLAs.
Indeed, BC Green Party leader Sonia Furstenau wrote a letter to Mayor Alto urging her to reconsider the City of Victoria’s decision to allow the conference to proceed at a public venue. And while Victoria-Beacon Hill MLA Grace Lore had originally declined to intervene in her response to our letter campaign, she released a video clip in support of the rally last night and attended it briefly this morning.
I’ve already documented in depth the We Unify: Reclaiming Canada 2024 conference, particularly those among its speakers that had been flagged far and wide for hate speech and transphobia, such as Lauren Southern, a notorious agitator who’s been barred from three countries altogether after performing racist and transphobic stunts.
While our rally point was by the Douglas Street entrance, it didn’t take long for us protesters to migrate to the atrium, to heckle the conference attendees attempting to sneak behind us via the Empress Hotel entrance. There MJ of the UVic Pride Collective gave an address to the crowd, expressing how love and acceptance matter to trans kids, and on the contrary how hate and prejudice hurts them. They said of the transphobes in conclusion: “I don’t hate you, because the love I feel for trans people will always prevail, and ultimately we know that you can never hate us more than we love each other.”
We had to vacate the area, however, because we were just short of the numbers we needed to hold our ground against Saanich police. Had we been two hundreds instead, we might have been successful in shutting down the event altogether, according to sources listening in on a conversation between police officers who seriously worried about escalation as the factions came into contact.
There were two notable hostiles with us from the beginning, one a boorish guest of the conference I also documented at a rally against a talk featuring Artur Pawlowski, the other a flamboyant agitator identifying with Gays Against Groomers. Drea Humphrey and her crew from RebelNews also came down to engage with protesters, as well as Lauren Southern later on.
Unfortunately, the demonstration would not end with a positive climax. At about the time Drea Humphrey was distracting us, the Gays Against Groomers character allegedly sexually assaulted a transgender minor in attendance. A criminal complaint was filed with VicPD, which took the victim’s deposition. While I am privy to the details, I withhold them for confidentiality reasons.
The perpetrator has tentatively been identified as Shawn Shirazi, according to online sources. Shirazi is known to disrupt trans events such as the transgender rights rally at the Vancouver Art Gallery last month.
In the aftermath of this incident, I had to deal with several allies in tears or in shock, and of course the serious risk of escalation. Putting the safety and well-being of the crowd first, I then took the difficult decision to end the event early. The crowd accepted my decision and dispersed in an orderly fashion. This isn’t the ending I had anticipated, and I’ve had to apologise left and right to people who in contrast thanked me and congratulated me for putting this together. I just can’t feel good about the outcome though.
Our organising team is debriefing and debating the best response to this mess. We are in contact with lawyers and are pondering legal recourse in retaliation. My plan is for us to release a formal statement on Tuesday; stay tuned for an announcement.
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