response to violence against the butchies/le tigre 

October 7, 2001

hello all you brilliant performers & artists. WE NEED YR SIGNATURES 
NOW!!! 

by friday october 12 if at all possible...here's the scoop. many of us 
have been asked to make a public statement against the "womyn-born 
womyn" entrance policy at michigan womyn's music festival. most of you 
are aware of the atmosphere of violence surrounding the issue, & that 
the butchies in particular have been targeted & harrassed for playing 
the festival & supporting the policy. as a community we need to put an 
end to this violence before real change & growth can happen. 
regardless of our individual opinions on mwmf policy, we (the need & 
tami hart & the haggard) came up with this letter as a public 
response. assuming you agree & are willing to make a public statement 
of nonviolence, here's what we need from you. PLEASE REPLY TO 
citizen81369@yahoo.com WITH YR NAME & band name in parentheses--or 
"writer" or "drag queen" or "trans activist" or however you wanna be 
designated). please forward this to other performers you think would 
wanna contribute. we plan to print copies of the letter with as many 
names as we can get & pass them out as fliers at shows starting this 
coming weekend. we'll also post it online at strap-on.org & any other 
relevant siteor message board. WE NEED AS MANY SIGNATURES AS POSSIBLE 
BY FRIDAY OCTOBER 12. if you miss this deadline we'll include yr name 
in the next run of copies. thanks for yr help. it's really about 
fucking time we take a united public stand about this & get a goddamn 
move on. 

10-7-01

Response to the violence against the Butchies and Le Tigre

We, the undersigned, speak as artists and performers who directly or 
indirectly have been called on to make a statement against the "womyn-
born womyn" admissions policy at the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival. 
Some of us have been asked to make a public statement against the 
Butchies and Le Tigre on the grounds that, by playing the festival, 
they and their supporters are unilaterally transphobic. The focus of 
this letter is safety. It is written and signed with love, honor, 
respect, and support for our trans community, and in hopes of making a 
safe space to talk shit out and work together towards real trans 
inclusion in the big queer team. Regardless of our individual feelings 
and opinions on MWMF entrance policy and the tangled mess of issues 
around it, collectively we find the present climate of discussion to 
be unsafe. The Butchies and Mr. Lady have been verbally attacked, 
endlessly harassed and physically threatened. Bomb scares, death 
threats and prankcalls are not figures of speech. This kind of 
violence (and the trickledown name calling, gossip, misquotes and hate 
talk) is sick and intolerable. There can be no productive dialogue 
between people who are being physically and psychologically threatened 
and those who are threatening them. A united stand againstviolence is 
our only hope of moving on to real issues of trans inclusion in both 
the queer and women's movements. We support the Butchies' statement as 
one of the many voices among us. We support the voice of one who 
opposes them as another. As members of a divided community, we demand 
willingness to bridge and rebuild. We encourage candid disagreement, 
forthright opinions, and positive conflict tempered with patience and 
respect. We want questions and dialogue rather than answers and one-
liners. As a community of people who are queer, pro-queer, trans, and 
pro-trans, we agree to disagree. We sign this statement as an act of 
nonviolence. We will not tolerate any form of violence against women 
or transfolk or queers. We support and believe the Butchies and Le 
Tigre when they tell us they have been served death threats. We 
support our trans community in struggling to be heard. We support our 
queer community in working out their shit, but we do not support 
protesters who choose violence as their message medium.

1. Rachel Carns (the need)
2. Radio Sloan (the need)
3. Dvin Kirakosian (the need)
4. Emily Kingan (the haggard)
5. STS (the haggard)
6. Tami Hart