Leslie identified as an anti-racist white, working-class, secular Jewish, transgender, lesbian, female, revolutionary communist.
She was a member of the National Committee of Worker's World Party and managing editor of the Worker's World newspaper
The institutionalized bigotry and oppression we face today have not always existed. They arose with the division of society into exploiter and exploited. Divide-and-conquer tactics have allowed the slave-owners, feudal landlords and corporate ruling classes to keep for themselves the lion’s share of wealth created by the labouring class.
Like racism and all forms of prejudice, bigotry toward transgendered people is a deadly carcinogen. We are pitted against each other in order to keep us from seeing each other as allies.
Genuine bonds of solidarity can be forged between people who respect each other’s differences and are willing to fight their enemy together. We are the class that does the work of the world, and can revolutionize it. We can win true liberation.
The struggle against intolerable conditions is on the rise around the world. And the militant role of transgendered women, men and youth’s in today’s fight-back movement is already helping to shape the future.
Excerpt from
“Transgender Liberation: A Movement Whose Time Has Come” (1992)
