Dean Spade is the co-founder of the Sylvia Rivera Law Project and a visiting professor at CUNY School of Law. In this provocative progressive critique of hate crimes laws, he discusses the limits of enhanced hate crimes penalties, transgender communities' experiences with the criminal punishment system, and alternative responses to the epidemic of anti-transgender violence. At the end he discusses some of the most promising emerging movements in transgender organizing.

Click HERE to listen to the unabridged 17-minute interview.

Click HERE to listen to the full Out FM program in which listeners respond to his arguments.

Dean Spade

Some of the groups discussed as models of alternative community responses to violence include Brooklyn's Right Rides, Seattle's Cara and Generation Five, and Oakland's Creative Interventions.