June 30th is coming up and @LibraryJournal hasn't rescinded their award to the Seattle Public Library. Which means a lot of us are voluntarily rescinding the awards LJ has bestowed upon us over the years. https://thefeministlibrarian.com/2020/06/10/dear-library-journal/ 1/

As in so many of these situations, the initial problem (that the award committee overlooked the trans-exclusionary event that took place in February) was compounded by the attempts to explain why overlooking the event was justified. 2/

The LJ message shifted from "didn't realize it happened" to "didn't think it mattered" / "is outweighed by this other social justice thing that matters more" which is so much more hurtful. That they felt comfortable using that to explain themselves infuriates me. 3/

LJ is using racial equity as a shield to deflect criticisms about harm to trans people. This erases the embodied experience of trans people of color who were harmed by SPL actions, and for whom racial equity will not be effective in the absence of trans-inclusive practice. 4/

It’s also incredibly tacky and transparent to argue that work on behalf of marginalized group X makes you immune from criticism about, or cancels out harm done to, marginalized group Y. 5/

White queer folks don’t get a pass on racism because they’re queer; libraries don’t get a pass on trans harm because they do anti-racism work. That's not how any of this works. White, cis women (including myself) who make up the majority of library workers do not get passes.
6/

If you're interested in doing better trans-inclusive work in the library world, I recommend checking out this useful book: https://www.stephengkrueger.com/  7/7