Transgender singer-songwriter Shea
Diamond has joined the Human Rights Campaign's (HRC) Equality Rocks
campaign.
“Equality Rocks is a public
engagement campaign featuring prominent musicians – both American
and international – who support lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender
and queer equality,” the campaign's
website states.
“As an artist now, I think the most
rewarding thing I can do is speak to the times now,” Diamond said
in a video released this week. “If you listen to your favorite song
right now, 20 years from now, would the next generation know that we
were struggling and still fighting for rights? Would they know that
trans women were being killed at the rate they were being killed?
Would they know that we are still living in an age where people are
still hiding their truth afraid to be killed? When you can blast
something and make a political statement, it means something.”
Diamond performed at HRC's 22nd
annual National Dinner. She dedicated her performance to transgender
people.
“With this climate, with over 20
trans women this year that we know of violently killed, I am more
proud of you than I’ve ever been,” Diamond said at the event. “It
is our moral obligation to fight for every single life, and that
includes trans lives. Trans lives matter.”
Diamond's debut album, Seen It All,
is available now.
Other artists who have joined the
campaign include Michael Blume, Jussie Smollett, Hayley Kiyoko,
Wilson Phillips, Portugal The Man, A Great Big World, Megan Hilty,
Daya, Brendon Urie, MUNA, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Neon Trees, Florence
and the Machine, Phoenix, Sara Bareilles, Tegan and Sara,
Sleater-Kinney and Animal Collective.