Charlie Riedel/AP
Across social media, right-wing posters are complaining that President Joe Biden has usurped Easter. “Joe Biden just proclaimed that ‘Transgender Visibility Day’ is on Sunday,” once-presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy posted on X, “I wonder how he came up with that date.”
Except Biden, of course, did not come up with this date, he just issued a pretty standard proclamation recognizing it. (His administration also recently issued proclamations recognizing National Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month, Cesar Chavez Day, and Care Workers Recognition Month.)
Trans Day of Visibility has fallen on March 31 since it was created in 2010 by Rachel Crandall-Crocker, the executive director of Transgender Michigan. Crandall-Crocker recently told NPR she was hoping the day would be an opportunity for the trans community to come together and feel joy. That mission is important as ever as legislation across the country takes aim at the rights and safety of trans people, some of which, as my colleague Henry Carnell reported, cites anti-trans reporting coming from our country’s largest and most important newspaper, the New York Times.
Meanwhile, Easter can fall on any Sunday from late March to mid-April. So basically, Easter falling on Trans Day of Visibility is no different from when Hannukah fell on Thanksgiving in 2013. Which was actually pretty cool! My mom got custom boxes of mints that commemorated “Thanksgivukkah,” and we had latkes with our turkey, which is a delicious combination and a concept I think we as a culture should revisit. And sometimes my birthday falls on Mother’s Day, which is less cool because it should really be about me, but then again, my mom was here first.
Point being, sometimes two holidays are on the same date. And Biden does not control the calendar or whatever forces dictate when Easter comes. So have a lovely Easter, and a lovely Trans Day of Visibility, and while you’re at, it remember what Crandall-Crocker learned from organizing the latter: “I changed the world. You don’t have to be perfect. Come and change it along with me.”
