Behavioral Health & Recovery Services Blog

You are invited to join us for Transgender Day of Remembrance, an annual event that aims to commemorate our transgender community members that have lost their lives due to brutal and unconscionable anti-transgender violence.

This event aims to raise public awareness of violence that transgender people face that often goes underreported or incorrectly reported in the news media, with those who are mentioned often misgendered or “deadnamed,” a term used to describe when a transgender person is referred to the name they were given at birth and no longer use. Transgender Day of Remembrance allows us to come together and publicly mourn our transgender siblings as well as find strength within each other as we mobilize to combat anti-transgender violence.

Transgender Day of Remembrance will feature community speakers and altars to commemorate the lives of transgender siblings lost in 2017, as well as 2016. After hearing from community speakers, we will have a candlelight procession down El Camino Real towards Central Park in San Mateo. We will finish the event with a call to action to encourage our community to mobilize against anti-transgender violence and stand up for transgender and gender-expansive members of our community.

Individuals who are interested in contributing to the altar for 2017 are welcome to join us at  the San Mateo County Pride Center on Tuesday, November 14^th from 5:00pm-7:00pm. This event is brought to the community by San Mateo County PRIDE Initiative, The San Mateo County Pride Center, San Mateo County Behavioral Health & Recovery Services Office of Diversity and Equity and the San Mateo County LGBTQ Commission.

For more information about Transgender Day of Remembrance contact Annette Pakhchian at apakhchian@smcgov.org or (650) 454-7083.  

To learn more of other LGBTQ+ affirming events visit the Pride Center’s full calendar here.

Written by Annette Pakhchian, Office of Diversity and Equity, LGBTQ+ Outreach Worker