Argentine activist Lara María Bertolini writes about the urgent need to build policies based on the voices of trans people themselves: without intermediaries, manuals, or party directives. And, to this end, she proposes a series of actions. By Lara María Bertolini* Photos: Ariel Gutraich During a meeting with my feminist colleagues—political activists, writers, and graduates in economics and literature—I realized that we don't have many trans voices exposed to offer a narrative: a profound opinion on certain social and universal issues. Few voices from the trans community are being heard, understood, or even considered. My fellow activists, with whom I have a close relationship, discuss things that would never be possible within our collective, given the self-importance and the lack of willingness to be challenged by others: to sit down and reason, to discuss. To think. We must construct "the genome of transness." That means giving the DNA of our collective its own political, social, and labor meaning. We must not cling to a linear path or a political party, remaining in the background without a real voice. We must not be a carefully crafted image, tailored to consumer tastes, leading society to believe that some are representatives of the trans community when in reality they are political "test dummies," rewarded for every political maneuver they learn. The actions being taken are currently focused solely on demands and agreements. This is the case with the trans employment quota law in the City of Buenos Aires, to which we were invited regardless of party affiliation. For me, this is not a space for dialogue, seeing how high-ranking politicians present laws in our name without even having a trans person on their team to study and draft the legislation. They are making egregious legal and knowledge-based errors, which any trans person—based on their experiences—knows are a real impediment to the implementation of the law's regulations.

To achieve this, we need:

- Demand the active participation of trans people in the creation of programs, laws, studies, and other initiatives that address the well-being of the trans community. - Map our trans population and begin, within our own movement, to establish actions for job placement, education, and healthcare. - Begin demanding the corresponding quotas from the places where laws for our community have been approved and regulated. No longer with mere notes, but with active legal action, because it is our right. - Begin to believe more in our own voices and not let ourselves be influenced by people who have the trans user manual down pat, knowing that our emotional and romantic vulnerabilities are our Achilles' heel. They exploit our loyalty for their own benefit, and then we see how trans people are politically sacrificed. Action in front of the Argentine Congress for the campaign "Recognizing is repairing" to grant a special pension to transvestite and trans survivors, victims of institutional violence.  Regarding compensation, it's time to demand more than just empty words or laws. The abandonment and socio-institutional violence are worsening, and we must mobilize all available mechanisms to demand physical and legal protection against the destructive, persecutory, and murderous actions of some members of society. Otherwise, mere spurious convictions will only fuel the violence, emboldening transphobic individuals to take the law into their own hands. From the current political perspective, this government's doors are closed to us; that's a fact. They can throw us gold coins, and we might feel compensated and rewarded. I'd even say deceived, since they obscure the real demands with circus-like, visual displays, masking the true needs and blinding some to the fact that there's more to it than just compensatory measures for our community. Finally, and most importantly in my opinion: we must begin a thorough review of whether current laws are adequate for our reality, or if they are merely a palliative measure, insufficient to address current realities. We must be the ones who propose actions, create, think, question, dialogue, and decide on what has been created for the trans community. No longer should we be mere signatures on studies or decisions made by those outside the community. *Trans activist Member of the Lohana Berkins Collective Dressmaker Member of the training team of the Mocha Celis Trans High School  Law student at the National University of Avellaneda]]>