Sixième

Friday was a harbinger of empowerment. I attended San Francisco's Critical Mass which haphazardly intersected up with the trans-march at two different points during the evening. I have never seen as many people riding together on bicycles as I did yesterday. There were literally thousands of us maneuvering through the tightly packed lanes. We started at the northeast end of Market street and proceeded to ride on a roundabout route through downtown, along Broadway, through a couple of tunnels, over to the Mission and Dolores Park where we had our first encounter with the trans-march, and finally after a loop through the Haight we met up with them again.







I then joined the trans-march. The route circled through the Castro, went down Market and then back to Dolores Park. The Trans March is a grassroots community building political event, celebrating and welcoming transgender people of all types, and their supportive allies. The march was meant to demonstrate Trans visibility, inclusiveness, and civil rights. The march marked the start of Pride Weekend in San Francisco. The theme of this year's march was "Marching for a Gender Inclusive ENDA", The objective was to bring a focus on transgender civil rights and to encourage the support of the broader LGBT ‘community.’ The keynote speaker for this year's event was be Donna Rose, the former HRC board member who resigned over the exclusion of Trans=people from the 2007 Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA).







There were so many immaculate, customized bicycles and beautiful people to look at it was practically overwhelming.