Day Of Remembrance, And Remembering What It's About

"Heard of a van that is loaded with weapons,
Packed up and ready to go.
Heard of some gravesites out by the highway,
A place where nobody knows.
The sound of gunfire off in the distance,
I'm getting used to it now." — Life During Wartime, the Talking Heads

Today is officially Transgender Day of Remembrance (DOR) across the globe. For me, it was last week in Chicago for their Day of Remembrance. Chicago does theirs a little early as Kimberly Nicole and Cyndi Richards professional set up and film the event there in the Windy City in order to have it edited and uploaded onto YouTube in order to coincide with Day of Remembrance.

The Chicago event was moving, and the location in New Spirit Church of Oak Park was an excellent stage for it. According to Rev. Bradley Mickelson, the church was apparently once where Theodore Roosevelt worshipped at his congregation — an interesting bit of history.

It was also well-attended DOR as the church nearly filled. A lot of thanks goes out to Cyndi Richards and IGA, the church staff and volunteer Marsha Jackson (an old friend from my late 90's lobby days in DC) for busting ass and ensuring that the entire event and the spaghetti dinner afterward were a success.

My reason for being there was to keynote the event. The one thing that I did was to address the creeping "external opportunism" from super-sized, cash-guzzling organizations on DOR itself, and to remind those attending of the history of how this collective community memorial came into being.

DOR was extremely grassroots in creation, totally spontaneous based upon the suggestions of Gazebo chat list attendees in 1998 in response to Rita Hester's murder, and over the course of the frustrating year following when local authorities never resolved her case. Gwen Smith, the list moderator based in the San Francisco bay area, decided to put the thoughts into action by getting San Fran activists and others together and hold the first official Day of Remembrance. There were also reports of a similar vigil taking place in Boston on the same anniversary night.

There was no big political organization, no entity, no non-profit fundraising, no staff, no one benefitting from it personally. Only volunteers.

The following year, Day of Remembrance went national with about a dozen cities. It was all begun by local group leaders, activists, volunteer national advocates like NTAC members, and just everyday trans folks who'd never been involved in leading things, but felt strongly about our community's consistent bloodbath due to hate murders. Again, no national org's with fundraising ambitions laying claim (even with a few NTAC board coordinating local events).

"Heard about Houston? Heard about Detroit?
Heard about Pittsburgh, PA?" — Life During Wartime, the Talking Heads

We grew DOR on our own, with rudimentary resources out of our own individual pockets, for the most part. We researched and reported on trans murders that came to our attention and spread the word on DOR to other cities on our own time. Just a bunch of ragtag trans folks putting together what we needed to do to get word out and draw attention to the glaring and criminally ignored murder epidemic.

Keep in mind this was in the days before the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) had even bothered adding "gender identity" to their mission statement, and even that would not bring about their support for us in any legislation for years to follow. There was no "help from above." We had only ourselves, our own resourcefulness and determination to push forth our issue in the mainstream media. At some point, no matter how many obstacles, the message would eventually break through.

Later while helping push this around the country for new locations, I suggested to Gwen and took initiative to bring in our first couple locations outside the U.S: Vancouver and in Santiago, Chile. Afterwards was a watershed of international cities and trans communities joining the chorus. DOR was, and still remains, an international crisis in the Trans community, and having this go worldwide was appropriate.

After years of work and finally bringing it to the world stage, it finally started hitting the straight press and the colleges. Once the straight community started joining in and agreeing this was heinous – especially once they were aware of the commonly grisly details symbolic of typical trans "overkill" murders with mass stab wounds, multiple gunshots, body mutilations, decapitations, burnings — DOR suddenly landed on the consciousness of the world and elicited sympathy in what we were experiencing.

With this came need for the press to get commentary for news stories on the annual events.

And with that came the attention of the large GLB and T organizations, heavily bankrolled (anything over five-figure annual budgets in trans standards is massively bankrolled) with staff and big fundraising mechanisms.

Here was an automatically generated day of easy, positive public relations on the cheap. All they had to do was show up and put their face out there, express sympathy for the Trans victims and the situation, then walk away looking all-too-altruistic and heroic. Afterward, use the press as basis for raising more funds for their "sincere concern" about our plight. It's a simple as falling backwards into a swimming pool full of dollar bills.

Better still, they even began offering those of us original organizers suggestions: having the day moved from the date Chanelle Pickett was murdered on Nov. 20 (too cold, too close to Thanksgiving) to a warmer day in late spring; making it more of a soiree-type event replete with refreshments, where there can be awareness seminars in colleges (and great PR to new young recruits!); even requesting of us that it less somber and depressing (too dark) and lightening it up to more of a "celebration of life."

"This ain't no party! This ain't no disco!
This ain't no fooling around!
No time for dancing, or lovey dovey,
I ain't got time for that now!" — Life During Wartime, the Talking Heads

That last suggestion stunned a few of us who received it. Celebrating our memorialized hate murder victims? Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd be afraid to ask family of Holocaust victims to "lighten it up" and "celebrate" the lives of their murdered family members. Hell, I'd feel uneasy with asking Judy Shepard to "celebrate" the anniversary of Matthew's murder.

But I guess trans people are supposed to be the exception. We shouldn't have such feelings the way other humans would....

So when we insisted upon keeping our ceremonies solemn, darker and in the Fall (when foliage dies in the northern hemisphere), they simply circumvented and found other more accommodating trans folks in places like Houston, Orlando and Las Vegas [ http://lasvegas.hrc.org/node/331 ]. They tossed a little donation, got to stick their name and logo on the event and maybe even put out a little press blurb on it and – voila! – it's revised to seem they've been there all along with us and we're all just one big happy family!

At least that's the image these new organizing (and enterprising) hopefuls want out there.

But take a look at this symbolic "family": a majority of them robust and healthy, and dragging around these bony waifs by the arm, beseeching the world of this tragic situation and the need to help do something about it! Then when the world's attention is turned away, the bony waifs are thrown back into and locked in the dark closets and starved again. Yep, one big happy ....

"Sitting here in Queens eating refried beans.
We're in the magazines gulpin' thorazines.
We ain't got no friends. Our troubles never end
No Christmas cards to send. Daddy likes men....
We're a happy family: me, mom and daddy." — We're A Happy Family, the Ramones

All these years, with all the work put in by the likes of Gwen Smith, Ethan St. Pierre and other assistants like Monica Helms, Mercedes Allen or I, became a lot of blood, sweat and tears for us and a nice boost to the bottom lines and the staff of the opportunists. It's nauseating how easy it is for trans efforts to be usurped and utilized to benefit others. I never truly appreciated how hated we were until I found out how easily we were exploited.

Meanwhile, we finally got a large GLBT community action on the recent murder, decapitation and dismemberment of Jorge Mercado. As it's reported in the press, it was a most brutal murder of a gay teen in Puerto Rico. Buried in the details and away from most media reports, Mercado was wearing a blue dress and boots. This may well have been a gay teen. This was most probably a trans-panic response with all the overkill implications.

It reminds me of the Martinez case in Cortez, CO (and no, she never chose the name Fredericka! That was a joke name given to her by her classmate friends). That was yet another murder where all indications were it was "a gay teen, some gender issues, maybe trans...." At the vigil in Cortez, her mother Paula brought up an 8 x 10 framed photo of her as a female. I still recall Cathy Renna of Gay, Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) remarking in amazement that Paula had a great photo of her son, and wondered why she wouldn't use the photo of "a handsome young man" on the stage at the vigil.

How would a lowly trans such as I explain to an organizer of a national group like GLAAD that maybe they didn't take time to look at the entire picture, so to speak. In response I muttered to her that "maybe a mom best knows her child." There's no way for me to know if Renna listened or learned, but I learned something that day. We can't take all "gay hate crimes" at face value in the press. The Lawrence King story is another that comes to mind.

Another lesson learned is how easy it is for our hate murder victims to become a wonderful opportunity and potential for future fundraising to those who really don't give a flip about having us around anyway (at least not beyond the political correctness "diversity" requirements). We're street chattel: mere coffin fodder to help boost the big bucks for the ballroom boys and girls.


Cyndi Richards, who coordinated the Chicago DOR, sent an Email to me noting an observation to a preacher from a trans parishioner. The transperson noted that angels, like trans people, weren't of either of the two specific genders. Angel food for thought ....

To the hundred-plus fallen victims to anti-trans bias this year, whether you were angels or whether you were not, we do remember. We will not forget.

"A good friend once told me the way to be an effective speaker: make them laugh, make them cry and make them feel religious." — Rev. Bradley Mickelson of the New Spirit Community Church of Oak Park, IL

"And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away." — Revelation, 21:4, King James version

Hate Crimes: A Long Time Coming And A Long Struggle Ahead

[Note: this is a reprint from a requested project at Pam's House Blend]

"It's been a long time comin'
It's goin' to be a long time gone." — Long Time Gone, Crosby Stills Nash & Young


It’s been a long time coming. The historic passage of hate crimes legislation and signature into law by the President signals the very first federal law covering trans people in America. My emotions, though, are mixed: ebullience, wistfulness, solemnity, sadness

To have this finally pass, and to have it inclusive of trans people, is a major victory. Since 1997, I’ve been consistently taking time, shelling out money and visiting offices all over Washington DC and Austin – and even once in Annapolis this year – in attempt to get even this, the most elemental protection, passed with coverage for us all. With this official passage last week, all the memories of where we’ve all collectively been working to achieve what’s finally reality – seemingly against all odds – come streaming in.

In 1999 I had the opportunity to pull in the most critical component of what would eventually be the key to eventual passage of the James Byrd Hate Crimes Bill in Texas two years later. Taking two of my gay friends on their very first lobbying visit to show them how to parry and effectively argue our case, we landed the support of Rep. Warren Chisum, long-known as an arch-conservative, lightning rod author for the most heinous anti-GLBT legislation. His support brought in other crucial moderate GOP co-sponsors and votes and also provided cover for blue dog Dems as well. Our only responsibility was to change the wording to “sexual preference” and “gender non-conformity.”

It was a victory I was pleased to help along, but a hollow one personally. In 2001, gender non-conformity was refused inclusion in the bill (with a promise made to me that if we didn’t fight this and let this pass, they’d “come back for us” the next session). The bill passed, I held my tongue, but they never “came back” for us. Even this year, while in Austin, I visited with Rep. Chisum again a couple times. He chastised me with reminder that he didn’t want to revisit this bill again. However, he was ready once again to support. I’ll always remember the bravery of those like Rep. Garnet Coleman, author of 2009’s expansion bill in Texas, and the initial co-sponsors like Rep. Rafael Anchia and Rep. Alma Allen, as well as conservative Rep. Chisum and at least one other longtime Republican friend who were ready to bravely support and push this. The bill died in committee after testimony, but these unsung heroes deserve mention.

Memories of victims past stream back. Meeting one of our homeless trans girls in Houston mere months before she was shot and killed in the Montrose sticks in my mind: would this law have helped solve her murder and bring some solace? Seeing the abject, stoic sadness in the faces of the family of Terrianne Summers as I attempted to hold my own emotions in check while eulogizing my activist protégée, knowing her murder is also still unsolved with no justice.

Even in the cases where the murderers were caught, there’s only a little solace for the victims’ families past. Random memories. Watching the silent tears stream down the solemn face of Paula Mitchell at the Cortez, Colorado vigil in 2001 for her murdered child F.C. Listening to the sobs of Sylvia Guerrero over the phone in 2002, recalling her precious Gwen and how callously her body was dumped and buried, not long after Fred Phelps had found out Sylvia’s address and viciously protested in front of her home. Sitting alongside Queen Washington as she recounted for a reporter covering NTAC’s 2004 Lobby Day how her baby, Stephanie Thomas, was riddled with bullets a mere block from her home. Hearing the broken-hearted story from Sakia Gunn’s mother about the shoddy treatment from Newark authorities and community leaders and later seeing it first-hand in 2004 when our march from West Orange into Newark had only six white faces – four NTAC members and two local PFLAG parents – and was briefly refused entry into the city by police even after organizers had received permits. Hugging an activist friend, Ethan St. Pierre, who was shaken and teary-eyed after having making his very first speech in Boston recounting his aunt, trans woman Deborah Forte, being brutally murdered and having to go to the morgue to identify her body. There’s no way to adequately relate experiencing this.

I still recall vividly the long battles and the acrimony over the years of merely having trans people covered by hate crimes. Struggling with conservatives just as we did with the Human Rights Campaign or the Anti-Defamation League for protection. Vehemently arguing with Mara Keisling and Lisa Mottet at the 2003 IFGE convention as they agreed with HRC and ACLU lawyers, and tried to convince me, that “gender” would include “gender identity” due to congressional intent. Less than six month later, finding out first-hand from our own local District Attorney’s office that they didn’t “give a damn about,” nor had the time nor budget to research what congressional intent was as they were following the letter of the law as written in Texas, and nothing beyond.

Even something as indirect as political campaigning paid off. Being an Obama delegate won me few friends in the GLBT community during the primaries. From my lobbying experience though, I knew Hillary Clinton’s fondness for incrementalism and lack of knowledge on trans people just as well as I knew Obama’s full-scope approach to rights. Trans folks, including myself, fought hard during the campaign up to the national convention and all the way up until election day. That night, 1000 miles from home in battleground Dayton, Ohio, I knew we’d finally won our rights to be included when Ohio was called for Obama and later when it became official that President Barack Obama would soon occupy the White House.

We were branded as pariahs, had our characters impugned and reputations ruined for standing firm on trans inclusion. It was worth it. We now have what we set out to achieve: coverage, rights, recognition. Finally, federally, we’re now human.

The Hate Crimes Bill is a watershed symbolic victory for Trans Americans. But beyond the symbolism, we remain vigilant. It’s an important first-step, but not the final goal.

"You've got to speak out against the madness,
You've got to speak your mind, if you dare.
But don't – no don't now try to get yourself elected...." — Long Time Gone, Crosby Stills Nash & Young

Tricks, No Treats For Trans As Psychic Vampires Bleed Us Dry

“I ain't gonna work
For no soul sucking jerk.
I'm gonna take it all back
And I ain't saying jack.” — Soul Sucking Jerk, Beck

After a three month self-imposed hiatus, I’m back. A bout of depression and physical fatigue was wiping me out and gave me pause. After my friend Lisa Gilinger noted my recent inability to write about what I was feeling, and realizing my attempt to rid the blues cycle had little beneficial effect, it was obvious my pulling back wasn’t helping me.

So I restart on, of all days, Halloween. And tonight’s subject, something I’d recently learned about, is quite appropriate: Vampires.

Recently I’d watched an episode on the History Channel on the myths, legends and facts on vampirism. Everyone knows about vampires from popular culture. There are lifestyle vampires who are into the role-playing and the gothic fashion and even living it as a permanent style. There are also the most commonly known sanguine vampires – those who actually drink blood (though the attacks and neck-biting tend to be more the stuff of novels and movies.)

There is also a lesser-known category called psychic vampires (psi-vamps for short). Unlike sanguine vampires, they don’t suck blood. Instead, they feed off of others’ life energy – they suck souls. To my surprise, it made was eerily familiar to how I’d been feeling for quite a number of years.

Psychic vampires, when you come into contact with them, don’t stand out in any physical way. Rather, they usually have magnetic personalities but can otherwise appear rather ordinanry. They seek out vibrant, energetic, creative or hyper individuals or crowds of energetic people.

Per Michelle Belanger’s book “Codex: A Manual of Magick and Energy Work,” psychic vampires are unable to generate their own "life force," and must feed off of others, not just as an ability, but as a necessity. Feeding can cause an amphetamine like rush and most psychic vampires report to get greatly invigorated physically and psychologically. If unable to feed on others, symptoms of "energy deprivation" include extreme fatigue, depression, mood swings and immune system suppression.

While there are different types of psi-vamps such as elemental and symbiotic, emotional vampires only feed on certain emotions others elicit.

Usually, the negative psi-vamps will exert a strong mental control on the victim, and do as much as possible to provoke feelings of distress, shame, and sorrow. These types exhibit a seemingly insatiable need for conquest and, as such, an endless appetite for drawing energy from others – in essence, a Type A, uber-competitive version of a psychic vampire.

Sound familiar?

“Set all on ‘rave on,’ let’s see some action.
We’re gonna shine on, get satisfaction.
I am the singer. I take control.
I point the finger. I take your soul….
This is the only way to feel!” — Freedom No. 5, Scorpio Rising

While I’ve never given much belief in vampirism, it’s certainly coincidental that the trans community with all its initial energy and talent typically ends up burning out quickly, leaving us with husks of former leaders. While many gay and lesbian leaders have long, productive careers and lives, typically only the rare trans individual manages to survive similarly.

Historically, only two of the Trans community’s political leaders come to mind in a similar vein. And typically, most of the folks these two meet, work with briefly or for a period of time, end up feeling completely depleted (physically, financially or spiritually) after. Ironically, the older activist of the two is the inspiration and example for the protégée who only popped up in this decade, and who’s now overtaken and even fed upon and conquered her mentor.

It’s a rough world out there: feed or get fed upon.

Curses are something I don’t believe in either, yet the consistent pattern since my own reversal of fortunes beginning on Jan. 1, 2003, and the consistent string of horrific luck often makes me wonder if curses actually do exist, and are possible reason for my own situation. While I’ve personally hung in for over thirteen years, my situation is only agonizing refusal to give up. My tenacity’s come at a huge financial, spiritual, physical and emotional toll, though. Thus, the last-legs level depression. There’s virtually nothing left.

Incidentally it’s occurring on a constant and ever-widening basis throughout the community. Our community’s historical leadership appear to be dropping like flies, and its draining effects over time are pretty consistently noticeable.

Dr. Judith Orloff identifies several profiles of psychic, or in her terminology, “energy vampires”:

The Sob Sister who always considers her/himself the victim. The world is always against them and they’ll recount every horrible thing that has happened, wallowing in every perceived slight and whining all the time.

The Charmer, a constant talker or joke-teller who has to be the center of attention ad-nauseam.

The Blamer who cuts you down with criticism doling out endless servings of guilt.

The Drama Queen who lives in extremes of emotion with life being unbelievably good or horrifically bad and wearing you out while blabbing on and on and on.

Psychic vampires have various ways of sucking your energy. Sometimes it can merely be a casual contact, but they also have the ability to reach their victims long distance through anything from phone calls, to dreams, to even visualization (essentially meditating and seeing themselves drawing the energy from a vibrant individual into themselves and feeling the increase in power and invigoration.)

Effects on the people they drain might include: depression, fatigue, or loss of energy when people are around you, people sometimes avoiding you or withdrawing from you for no apparent reason, or people giving you harsh feedback about your alleged neediness, clingyness, intrusiveness or negativity.

Negative comments are very efficient at draining the life right out of you. ‘You can’t do that; you should do this; are you living in wonderland?” are all very effective at bringing you down. “What’s wrong with you? You are bad” – are (psychic) vampire tools that make you feel weak and small even if you are robust and tall.

Indeed I’m fully familiar with the chorus of steady criticisms beginning in 2000 on, beginning with the constant negative feedback from HRC folks to the latter trans community leader, post-GenderPAC schism. It was well-orchestrated and made for a nice echo chamber effect of cast suspicion and dubious intent on anyone in the ragtag activist element in the Trans Community.

It never abated and instead continues to crescendo even now from most of the very same parties and even some newer psi-vamp entries into the game. Just recently, none other than Mara Keisling passed along a typical comment to Ethan St. Pierre, declaring grassroots activism “dead.” It drew a rather emotionally rancorous response from Ethan, and he’s now paying a price most severe as the retribution is continuing to mutate and virally grow like an old 50’s era horror movie monster.

Yes folks, while Count Dracula may be figment of a novelist’s imagination it appears that at least psychic vampires are for real. And it appears the active members of the Trans community are all part of a mass psi-vamp feeding frenzy.

Google psychic vampires and read up on them, as well as how to keep them from depleting you and pulling you down. Break their cycle of usurpation.


Oh! And eat lots of garlic!

"It was enough to make an old world monster go back into the earth, this stunning irrelevance to the mighty scheme of things, enough to make him lie down and weep.” — The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice

Speaking Up For Those Mute "Trannies"

"People with virtue must speak out; People who speak are not all virtuous.” — Confucius

This blog I'm going to begin with what I finished with in the previous blog: how would the Gay & Lesbian community would react if Matthew Shepard's murder drew a manslaughter conviction instead of the murder conviction it ended up with?

Would Judy Shepard feel this was justice if Matthew's murderers received a manslaughter conviction?

Let's say theoretically that the jury found that the men that beat Shepard and left him bound to that cross-tie fence on a cold Wyoming plateau never had the desire to kill him, but just to "beat him and teach him a lesson," and they then came out with "Manslaughter One" conviction: how would the gay and lesbian community react to press reports of this being a "victory"?

Moreover, how would they react if it were Trans community, or African-American community members from NAACP that were coordinating this press and speaking the message in the mass media: this manslaughter conviction was justice served? Hey, what if they found Matthew partly culpable, drawing the unwanted reactions essentially by being gay and out in public in a place where gays should remain in the closet? Everybody knows Wyoming's no gay mecca!

How would they feel if we or the NAACP came out with those statements without bothering to ask their sentiments on the ruling?

These are questions I'd like answered honestly from the gay and lesbian leaders of our so-called movement (hereafter referred to as "the Biz".)

Will they answer? No! They know where this subject is going and damn sure don't want to face the dual standard.

Instead, they'll point to "facts in the trial" and offer a tempered response to the outcome. Yet, these same leaders, when given opportunity of speaking out on gay issues, have no problem opening up and letting the discord show.

Take a look at the responses of "injustice" plastered on media about California's vote to ban same-sex marriage, and later the state's courts upholding the vote response. Note their response to President Barack Obama in not being more outspoken on supporting them afterward (even though his campaign promises were always supportive of recognition of domestic partnerships, not marriage). Even the hue and cry over the lack of "out" gay or lesbian Cabinet members that the community could "respect," and the anguish over only 31 mid-level openly gay or lesbian staffers in the Obama Administration.

If you'll notice, the released press and statements were less concerned with the actual facts on the ground, and more about the big picture: furtherance of gay and lesbian values and desires through aggressive media advancement.

Media goes out to the entire public (not just the politicos). Aggressively asking for more than you expect means that when inevitable compromise comes, it settles on a much more desired result much closer to the actual goal. If you don't aggressively set the bar high (pushing the envelope, so to speak), when the eventual result settles in you end up with less.

That's smart press.

To wit: note how much the discussion has advanced (and the acceptance levels risen) in the subject of same-sex marriage. Note also how even while most of them supported his opponent, Hillary Clinton, in the primaries, the pressure the gay and lesbian press has put on the Obama Administration has shaken out some beneficial responses (more hirings, the recent reception for the community leaders and their partners in the White House, more attention paid to their leaders and issues).

Smart, aggressive press produces results.

So compare these to the press just release by these same folks on the manslaughter conviction for Lateisha Green. What is the message communicated from this? Weak.

"All my life I wanted to fly
But I don’t have the wings, and I wonder why
I can't break away!" — Breakaway, Big Pig

Of course there's been defense by those involved, and of course brushback from a few of our own. My Husband Betty's En-Gender blog by Helen Boyd wrote a piece entitled "Trans-Centric" :

I don’t agree with is the vitriol directed at the LGB leadership of the organizations that called the ruling on Teisha Green’s murder a victory.
[...]
What bothers me about the politics between the LGB & T is that there are plenty of other gay bashings and hate crimes experienced by the LGB that the trans community pays little attention to, such as Sean Kennedy’s. If you want an example of an absolute failure when it came to our legal system, that’s it. It’s horrific. Every time I see that young man’s beautiful face, and think about his parents’ loss, I wonder where exactly the trans community has been in raising awareness of that horrible injustice. No, he wasn’t gender variant. He was a young adult who was out and proud about being gay. But he’s dead just the same as Teisha Green is, & for the same reason: someone hated him for what he was.

Do we know Michael Scott Goucher? Richard Hernandez? Satendar Singh? Ryan Keith Skipper? Jeremy Waggoner? Daniel Yakovleff? These are the names of gay men who have been murdered for being gay in the last couple of years. I didn’t know most of their names.

Point taken. And indeed many of these hate crimes Helen notes have made nary a blip on the national screen. In fact, in one case on the hate crime for Sakia Gunn in Newark, I was rather astonished with the dearth of public press. It was interesting to note the press never materialized for them, and when the march and rally from West Orange NJ to Newark took place, there were only two groups who sent national level people: an African-American group and a transgender group (myself from NTAC). PFLAG had two local parents join the march. That was it: no GLAAD, no NGLTF, no HRC. Nada in their budgets for that show of support, I imagine.

Odd, that they will devote the money and work so hard to craft the trans message when similar cases of their own beg for attention.

However the most notable distinction in Helen's question on where the Trans community is on these cases: when is it that Trans people or Trans organizations are the spokespeople in gay or lesbian hate crimes – or any directly gay and lesbian issues? They certainly wouldn't trust us with that. It's pretty clear they'd worry about us bungling up their message by not fully speaking from the gay and lesbian community perspective.

So how is it we're expected to be the ones to forgive bungling this press from their leaders and the isolated house trannies they employ?

As Helen added in her blog post on En-Gender:

I agree with her that our standards are low when it comes to justice for the trans people, and their families and friends, who are murdered.
[...]
Our standards are low because we are too used to seeing no justice at all when it comes to people who intentionally hurt and kill trans people for being trans.

Far too many in the Trans community, regardless of whether they're speaking up or not, were upset with the manslaughter charge and it's portrayal as a "victory." Of course, who was going to bother asking us! Additionally, the hate crimes charge – while a first – may well be a complicating factor in a couple senses.

One has to be concerned with how legislators are going to view a pending bill like New York's GENDA with its hate crime coverage and what the response from the less supportive senators will be: "see, you're already covered, no need for more legislation."

As such it's galling that a group like Empire State Pride Agenda (ESPA), the very group that could not be troubled with including trans coverage in their bills when they were coming up – wouldn't discuss it – are now prominently celebrating press over the "justice" of a hate crime conviction knowing full and well what happened years ago. This happens while the state senate is considering the pending bill in the legislature that still has yet to come for vote! Are they really that politically naive? Or are they quite aware of their actions and how this may well dissuade some of the more conservative potential supporters?

If what I fear ends up happening on this conviction and the subsequent legislation, there will be no excuses.

This was not optimal press, certainly not a "victory" the gay and lesbian community would've been suffice with and not how we'd have done it on our own. But as always, we don't have that choice for our input.

As Helen noted in her blog, "Community goes both ways." Indeed it should. Unfortunately, it rarely ever pans out that way.

Well mama told me when I was young,
"Stand tall girl, you're number one."
(She said)
You can't be what you wanna be;
But you can shake the course of your destiny." — Breakaway, Big Pig

Syracuse Sucks If You're Trans And Murdered

"It's just one of those days
When you don't wanna wake up!
Everything is fucked, everybody sucks!" — Break Stuff, Limp Bizkit

How furious am I today? Let me count the ways ....

On second thought, no. Who's listening? Precious few. Yeah, cumulative things get to be a rabid bear when they're piled atop each other and compounded. Starting off the day fighting doesn't help. Nice sticky heat with none of the forecasted "cooling rain" magnifies it. Then losing water (my precious lifeline to cooling off!) for a good portion of the day added a topper to that.

But the news forthcoming wasn't anything pleasing. Quite disquieting actually – some of it, downright infuriating. As they say down here in Texas, it was enough to piss off the dead. First was word that the overwhelmingly democratic U.S. Senate, in its infinite wisdom, decided it would be a good thing to add the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act onto S. 1390: the Dept. of Defense spending bill replete with funding for F-22 fighters which are wasted spending and which Pres. Barack Obama has already vowed to veto if it makes it to his desk!

That's right. Democrats are helping kill off the trans-inclusive Hate Crimes bill in the Senate by sending a veto-ready bill for signature! And that, of course, is if it makes it past a Conference Committee with a joint-session membership (and manages to maintain all the aspects of the current Hate Crimes bill.) If something goes awry and gets cut out and passed in joint session, it goes from there to the President.

Then another headline caught my eye: "Sex-changer's suit claims bias against Parks Department." It was a headline from the New York Daily News (think FOX News in a newspaper format). Now the writer, Jose Martinez, did actually stick to the guidelines, mostly avoiding pronouns, and once referring to "her." But the screaming headline and later referencing that she had not had "a sex-change operation" lets you know where this is going.

The plantiff Chanel Birden wasn't helping her own case either, something her attorney Derek Smith should've monitored and didn't. As a result, the Daily News writer didn't focus much on the slurs and insults she was receiving and filing grievances about before her firing from the mail clerk position at New York's Central Park. Instead, the writer highlighted quotes from her self-describing herself as being "a gorgeous woman" and how she "would always go to work looking very glamorous" and similar responses. Sure, it wasn't officially out of bounds. But it's still predatory journalism looking to caricature and dismiss trans women who don't know better while sublimely covering his own tracks.

"The trans community always seems to have a knack for finding a way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory." — trans activist, Cathy Platine


Then I got the bombshell. Lateisha Green's murderer, Dwight DeLee, received his verdict in a Syracuse Courthouse. He was found innocent of second degree murder. He was convicted of first degree manslaughter. The jury determined that after DeLee had lobbed invective and epithets at Lateisha Green sitting in her brother's car, after he'd gone into the house to retrieve his rifle, and after lobbing a few more epithets and leveling the gun at point blank range into the car and shooting Teish, that he'd intended to only "seriously injure" her but had no intentions of killing her. Manslaughter, not a murder.

Any other victim killed in such a manner would expect their killer to receive a murder sentence. Ah, but Teish was murdered while Trans! And further, as my homegirl Monica Roberts would say, she was murdered while Black and Trans! As we read between the lines of this logic, it helps validate the killer's motivations. Why, having a trans person outside near his house practically requires one to go in their house and retrieve their rifle ... pop off a warning shot in their direction from a few feet away, just to make sure you don't have to fear for your life from the transsexual menace!

Certainly any average citizen in Syracuse would understand that threat, that fear! It's palpable!

Reality time: essentially this verdict actually foists some of the blame on the victim. That's right! The good people of Syracuse decided that being Trans, Lateisha Green should've known she's partially to blame for being attacked! It's kinda like women being partially to blame for being raped, Asian store owners being partially at fault for getting robbed in their stores, unarmed black men being partially understood to have been shot by police because of their potential threat – or even white men being partially culpable for getting shot while driving through a minority neighborhood! Everyone should know that's coming, and certainly expect that those who commit these crimes aren't to be fully blamed for it!

At least, that's the logic in Syracuse.

There were a number of statements in the press to note the verdict: "Today's verdict brings justice for Lateisha Green, but it can never heal the immense loss her family has experienced," said Jarrett Barrios, incoming President of the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD).

"This verdict sends a strong message that hate violence will not be condoned. How many more like Lateisha Green must spill blood before our society says no to harassment, no to discrimination and no to violence against transgender people? ... {J]ustice was served today." said Rea Carey, Exec. Dir. of National Gay & Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF)

A measure of justice, perhaps. But was absolute justice served? Is Manslaughter a strong message? It must be noted that neither Carey nor Barrios are Trans. Point of fact, only one of the statements put out yesterday on the DeLee verdict by the organizations was from a trans organization (TLDEF - the Transgender Legal Defense & Education Fund), but the statement was from their non-trans executive director.

Oddly, the lone trans person responding from any major org was from the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) who tacked on a trans voice to Exec. Dir. Joe Solmonese's statement. "I am relieved to see Lateisha’s killer brought to justice," said Allyson Robinson, HRC Associate Director of Diversity.

Both IFGE and NCTE remaining silent on this is odd. And to think that NTAC was criticized for putting out press and "drawing attention to ourselves." So leaving the attention to non-T voices and orgs is better?

Either we just don't pay attention to the details any more, or maybe it's just gotten so bad that any conviction more than simple assault of a person who murders a trans woman is a victory. Maybe it's me and all the other Trans folk around the country who are pissed at this lesser treatment by the court that are out of step?

Or maybe this is just a great way to put out a message that's consistent, celebratory and assures that there's no dissension: ensure that there's message control.

One has to wonder how the Gay & Lesbian community would react to this? If Matthew Shepard's murder drew a manslaughter conviction with a maximum 25 year sentence, would Judy Shepard feel this was justice served? If it were the Trans community declaring before press that such as sentence was justice, would the Gay & Lesbian community agree with our statements and consider it closed?

Or if not, would they speak out? After watching their responses in recent months, I believe I already know that answer.

“Compromise used to mean that half a loaf was better than no bread. Among modern statesmen it really seems to mean that half a loaf is better than a whole loaf.” English writer, Gilbert K. Chesterton

"If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation." former First Lady to the 2nd U.S. President, Abigail Smith Adams

The 3 R's in Mass.: Rights, Religion And Restroom Fixations

"After complaints that there was a man in the woman's bathroom, a bouncer approached her stall and asked Ms. [Khadijah] Farmer to leave. The masculine lesbian has now filed a lawsuit ... to stop "sex stereotyping in public accommodation." After all, the toilet should not see gender, but flush feces with fairness.

[I]f you dress like a dude and alter your appearance so you look like one, you run the risk of people taking you for something you're not." — Greg Gutfeld, host of FOX News' Red Eye with Greg Gutfeld

Yesterday the state of Massachusetts had public hearings again regarding their non discrimination bill covering "gender identity or gender expression" pending before the legislature. Numerous Trans community members and their family members testified (and a special kudos to Ellen Hurn for her courageous testimony!)

Nicknamed the "Tranny bill," the "Bathroom bill" and "an important part of the Homosexual Lobby's agenda," the bill in this "most liberal state" as Rep. Barney Frank denotes has gotten national attention from the 19th century-minded groups and their press vehicles.

The Massachusetts Family Institute (MFI) has begun running radio ads warning mothers that they may no longer want to let their young daughters use public restrooms because "Beacon Hill is about to make it legal for men to use women's bathrooms."

"There's no restrictions in this bill as to what opposite gender can use the facility. We're not going to be able to police this," said Kris Mineau, president of MFI. "There's no pre-requirement of surgery or appearance or anything else."

Mineau said the bill would make it easier for the thousands of registered sex offenders in Massachusetts to gain access to children and women in public restrooms by claiming they are transgender.

Clearly there are a number of flaws in Mineau and MFI's convoluted logic. Foremost is that sexual predators tend to hang around where children congregate – places like parks and game rooms, the malls or adjacent to school grounds. Since when did America's daughters start hanging out at the public restrooms? Typically they are preyed upon when their defenses are down, and to do so, predators have to find situations that are sublime and seemingly innocent, such as being approached by the adult male in a park or near the school looking for a lost dog, or in a mall asking for directions to a store.

How sublime and disarming do they think it will be for their daughters to be approached by an adult male in a women's restroom and have him "get the drop on them?" Seriously?

Additionally, If they're felonious sexual predators, then being genteel about appropriate restrooms is the last thing weighing on their mind. If they're in the mood to commit such an act, then a "Ladies" sign or a female silhouette icon on the door won't be stopping their quest: Trans identity my ass! It'll be "damn the torpedoes and full speed ahead!"

If they're so concerned about sex-segregating the bathrooms to the Nth degree as per their birth certificates regardless of what gender someone presents as in public, then where does this end? Will we now need laws declaring male and female bathrooms in every home in America? We can't use the same restroom! Oh, that's right! It's family! There's no such thing as family incest or molestation, is there? Yeah, right!

And since it's the parks, game rooms and malls that attract both young daughters and those sex-offenders following them waiting for an opportunity, will sex-segrated malls be next? How about sex-segregating parks and playgrounds too? Don't want men around those places. There have even been infrequent incidences of daughters being molested or being preyed upon where people pray! As in churches! So should we also begin sex-segregating churches in order to keep daughters as far away from all men as possible? Lord knows there's a higher occurrence of these incidences from "men of the cloth" and Sunday School teachers than there are with Trans women. If it's a potential threat, segregate them all stringently beforehand – don't wait!

With all this segregation by the sexes, maybe the orthodox Sunnis in Saudi Arabia are onto something with that concept of "only men" and "only women" in various public functions. Perhaps America's family associations need to look to them for successful models to follow?

"Who is a hero? He who conquers his urges." — the Talmud

Another little kink in their seemingly impeccable logic on concerns of "men in restrooms" identifying as Trans women: we're on hormones! No, I'm not talking about crying jags or getting emotional ... think back for a minute. Back in the day, they used to prescribe estrogen as a kind of "chemical castration" for those who used to be convicted of first- or lesser offenses of sexual violations. The reason was simple: it greatly tamped down the male libido (as well as other feminizing side effects).

So now that there are male-to-female transsexuals and pre-ops who have self-castrated, chemically speaking, what is it these MFI types think we're going to get the notion to do in the public restrooms? Sex? From our over-nourished, female-hormoned "male" libidos? Really?

Instead they insist upon these female-appearing folks going into the men's room. Where their young sons may well be. That'll be an interesting conversation! At the same time, folks like Ethan St. Pierre (below) will be forced to use the women's room. Yep, this is what the conservatives want to push into the women's room with your daughters: take a peek at what this will look like!


Of course the Big Gay Man on the Hill, Barney Frank, isn't anywhere to be found on this bathroom discourse. He's not been very helpful to us on this subject in the past, and now that the current Congress is gearing up for Don't Ask, Don't Tell (and that touchy subject about shower usage amongst G.I.'s straight and gay, it's a subject he'll avoid at all costs about now.) But it begs the question: when sexual orientation discrimination was outlawed, was there a sudden surge in bathroom predators stalking kids in public restrooms? Nope? So much for that big fear about nothing ... maybe Trans rights will bring the same results, ya know?

"And you knew who you were then!
Girls were girls and men were men.
Mister, we could use a man like Herbert Hoover again!" — Those Were The Days (Theme Song for "All In The Family") sung by Jean Stapleton & Carroll O'Connor

Not to be outdone by restrooms, Timothy Tracey, a lawyer with the conservative Arizona-based Alliance Defense Fund, told members of the Committee on the Judiciary that the bill infringes on the religious rights of those who believe that men and women are different.

"The First Amendment mandates that no individual should be required to affirm, in act, word, or deed, that a man is a woman, or a woman is a man, against their sincerely held religious beliefs," Tracey said. "Yet this is precisely what (the bill) will do."

Mr. Tracey's obviously a sharp-eyed trial lawyer, but a crock of crap is still a crock of crap no matter who serves it up. There is nothing in this bill taking away his freedom of openly worshiping how he pleases, which is what the First Amendment covers. I'm unsure what religion it is that worships men being men and women being women, but rest assured that they will still be able to openly declare that they worship men being men and women being women after this bill is passed!

Meanwhile it will also ensure that those to don't believe in people who change gender or accepting them shall not abridge the beliefs and acts of other religions who, as Jesus noted to his disciples that "the call isn't for everyone" and, indeed, even eunuchs (both those born in the womb as so, and those castrati of that era) could follow the call – could follow Jesus. Some people actually believe in all of Jesus' teachings from the Four Gospels and wish to respect that, even if the folks Mr. Tracey represents wish to ignore and deny His words.

Some people believe in the Golden Rule: treating others as you would wish to be treated. Mr. Tracey represents folks who eschew that. No matter. It only means that the folks Mr. Tracey advocates for don't deny ability for others to worship and believe as they do, where everyone should be treated as equals without full considerations for a special group, and lesser considerations for the others left out. Mr. Tracey and others can continue defying the Golden Rule as per their religious beliefs.

This stuff really gets exasperating. It's amazing the lengths to which people will go to not only validate but to keep their irrational fears enshrined as the law of the land. Miscegenation, women as lesser humans, slavery, even mistrust of other different religions, all these things used to be controlled by laws of the land because of phobia: fear that those in power just cannot get beyond.

Let's hope this time that fears once again will not triumph over the courage of doing what's right. Lord knows that in this "most liberal state" in the Union, courage by even liberals in their own bastion has been in preciously short supply.

"If I were King of the Forest – not queen, not duke, not prince –
My regal robes of the forest would be satin, not cotton, not chintz.
I'd command each thing, be it fish or fowl....
Though my tail would lash, I would show compash
For every underling!
If I, if I ... were King!" — If I Were The King Of The Forest sung by Bert Lahr as the Cowardly Lion of the "Wizard of Oz"

"It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare." — Mark Twain

Seeking Justice When The Empire (State) Strikes Black (Trans)

"Just waking up in the morning, gotta thank God.
I don't know but today just seems kinda odd....
Plus nobody I know got killed in South Central L.A.
... Today was a good day." – It Was A Good Day, Ice Cube

As I intermittently work on this blog the day before the trial begins for the murder of Lateisha Green (fka: Moses Cannon), I'm thankful for a few things. First of all, the District Attorneys appear to be taking an aggressive approach to prosecuting this case. This is much better than many cases where trans victims of murder are African American, or to a slightly lesser extent other ethnic minorities. The second thing I'm thankful for is that Teish, as she's referred to by friends and family, has a family that loved and supported her death after her death as well as (to what extent I can tell) before her murder as well. Teish's family are actively involved in monitoring and pressing for justice for her.

That latter fact – the family's involvement – cannot be dismissed. In all of the cases I've noted over the decade plus of hate crimes our community has lived through, the supportive family – especially parents who refuse to accept dismissive investigation and prosecution – make the most notable difference in successfully bringing these cases to light and to justice in the court system.

Additionally, I'm happy to hear that there is a good amount of pre-trial publicity getting out there, thanks to the initial work of the TransGriot blog by Monica Roberts (one of NTAC's co-founders and former board members). Additionally there's some of our folks on the ground to monitor and tweet the ongoing court proceedings: both Gay & Lesbian Alliance for Anti-Defamation (GLAAD) and especially the Transgender Legal Defense & Education Fund (TLDEF) will be there. Having our watchers there is a reminder to the court and prosecutors to keep it on the up and up.


Another thing I'm grateful for is that her killer was known, and quickly tracked down and arrested. Far too often, most especially in cases where it's a trans woman of color who nearly always gets the automatic presumption that "she was a sex-worker" from authorities, there is a rather lax attitude about bringing their murderers to justice.

Murders aren't only illegal if they occur to non-minority, and especially non-trans people. It's supposed to be "blind justice." We're taught to expect "equal justice" in our democratic system. Far too often, we get neither. Why is it that our community and our families are practically required to ride herd over the investigative and judicial process in order to ensure no apathy that sets in?

At least the tools are in place to make this a successful prosecution for justice. The DA's office has even filed hate crime charges against Teish's killer. That said, I'm fairly certain that hate crime violations will be sacrificed in order to get a full sentence for the murder.

It's not that I don't believe there was no hate crime committed – there was. The problem is that New York State's hate crime coverage for transgender victims. As I learned from Houston's Harris County's D.A. office years ago, prosecutors will not push for charges or convictions on laws that aren't explicitly on the book (as is the case in both Texas and New York).

The reasoning as explained to me, beyond Texas' conservative narrow-minded approach to law, is that if there is a charge and eventual conviction on a law that isn't explicitly on the books, it opens the door for challenging later in a retrial. All it takes is a sharp-eyed defense attorney (or even a jailhouse lawyer who has nothing better to do with all his incarcerated time than to file challenges, and sometimes effective ones.) Nevertheless, I see it as a good strategy to use this now at this stage of the trial, especially if they can get a solid plea deal from the defense. It indicates the D.A. in this case wants to send a message that a victim who is Trans deserves the same level of sentencing that a non-Trans victim would.

And therein lies my beef. New York has had over six years since SONDA and the infamous "promise" form Empire State Pride Agenda's then-executive director, Matt Foreman (who shortly thereafter escaped to a nice reward: Executive Director of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force - NGLTF). In the years since, that promise (to place GENDA and Hate Crimes on the forefront of ESPA's agenda) has been of as much value as a three-dollar bill.

These rights should've been extended by now in so-called "liberal" New York. But they haven't. It sends the country a clear message: their Trans citizens are less than everyone else in the Empire State. Trans people are not human (or certainly not human enough to be covered by their human rights laws)! The bottom line is this: New York's legislators are being either lazy or cowardly, or a combination of the two. And every year that passes since their executive director Foreman's promise helps further cement ESPA's legacy of unconcerned deceit.

If they don't like it, do something concrete to address it. Otherwise, live with it.

Now I'm fully aware that not all groups support Hate Crimes bills. The Sylvia Rivera Law Project came out with a statement earlier this year declaring their opposition (not a misprint) of the GENDA bill as it included hate crimes enhancement provisions, which they oppose. In one sense, I can understand their position.

However they also overlook one glaring point: there is no parity in sentencing in general. It's especially so when the victims are non-white, and most certainly so when the victims are transgender women who typically have their lives completely debased, sliced, diced and offered up to the point of virtually slanderous claims of lascivious prostitutes and sexual freaks while the defense is cross-examining and pressing the defendant's case (which is what they get paid to do). Other than the Angie Zapata trial, there has rarely if ever been equitable sentencing for those convicted of murdering Trans women. And to believe that there is no difference between a simple murder of a Trans woman (such as over a debt or a simple quarrel) and the murder of a Trans woman because of the homo- or transphobic connotations – not to mention the perception by many in society, even in New York's legislature – that we are lesser human creatures, tacitly implying that no one will care for us simply strains the limits of credibility to its break point.

Until there is equitable sentencing, until there is equal consideration for the lives of all victims regardless of race, class or Trans status, until there is demonstrated action in treating murderers of Trans women or Trans men as the murderers they are, and not allowing the a bit of leeway because, "hey! She's just a tranny, probably with a sordid past and who cares about them?" ... until we reach that day where I don't have questions about the message they send to all of society about us by their light treatment of our victims, I'm firmly standing on the side of enacting hate crime coverage for gender identity, and prosecuting to enhance it everywhere it is applicable.

And if people have problems with it, well ... there's a simpler solution! Simply work to dismantle all other coverage for hate crime enhancement based upon race, religion, gender, sexual orientation and the like! See if you don't get a rise out of them when you attempt this! And explain to them that it's an unfair law, and ask their sentiments on whether or not they feel sentencing has always been just when their own community was attacked in such incidences.

Meanwhile, we're mourning in America. Yet another young, unrealized potential ... another African-American woman who happened to be Trans ... is gone. And it's just one more name on the litany of lost lives among Trans women of color. Something needs to be done to stop this pattern of hate and violence.

Doing nothing and accepting things as they are just isn't going to cut it. I'll care about our attackers sentences or the hurt feelings of legislators or our political leaders once they first start caring about the sanctity of our lives.

"Here's another point in life you should not miss:
Don't be a fool who's prejudice,
Because we're all written down on the same list." — It's Like That, Run-D.M.C.

The Massachusetts Model

"In this month of July, as we have just celebrated the Fourth of July and our Independence Day and the signing of the Declaration of Independence, we ... are reminded that the phrase, “All Men are Created Equal,” at the time really referred to only certain men, and at the time, only certain men who owned property. Much has clearly changed in this country since 1776. As our country grew, our population grew, and our Bill of Rights and the interpretation of them included a rational and evolving sense of what liberty and justice and equality for all meant." — Mass. Atty. Gen, Martha Coakley in July 8, 2009 press conference.

The year was 1989. Massachusetts passed a state law on non discrimination covering sexual orientation, giving gay and lesbian state residents protections in the workplace against unfair treatment, hiring or firing practices. Being one of the early states to enact it statewide, they were among the vanguard of the progressives.

Since that day twenty years earlier, more legislation has since been enacted covering the state's gay and lesbian residents: Adoption (1993), Hate Crimes (2002), School Bullying (2002), Marriage for in-state couples (2004) and for out-of-state couples (2008). They've also had not one, but two elected officials who were gay – Gerry Studds (1972-1997) and Barney Frank (1981-current). So-called the "most liberal state in the Union", Massachusetts had done well by its gay and lesbian residents.

Taking this into consideration, let's also take a look at the progress of Trans rights in this "most liberal state." By default, Massachusetts' Trans residents have the right to marry per the 2004 edict. Additionally by default, other non-Mass. Trans citizens may now marry there per the 2008 law. In 2009, Trans people saw the first trans-specific law passed: the right to have the new gender marker listed on their drivers license.

And that's about it currently. There's a current non discrimination bill to cover trans folks some two decades later which will go to hearings soon. Of course the same bill also went to hearings in 2007. Hopefully it passes now, but it's still a coin flip.

Twenty years after their initial rights victory, five years after winning the first-in-the-country same-sex marriage rights, and even a year after winning those rights in Mass. for same-sex couples from other states, the Trans rights push is in its early toddling steps. This in the "most liberal state" in the Union. It's a point that even the Big Gay Man on the Hill, Barney Frank, has used in his own defense to deflect crticism when he himself got cold feet on Trans inclusion in non discrimination bills.

Earlier this year MassEquality, the state's prominent LGBT advocate, made tacit promises of finally devoting attention to Trans rights in the state with its Trans rights org counterparts, Mass. Transgender Political Coalition (MTPC). Not long after, they plastered a photo of one of the Trans community's prominent Trans men, giving instructions for folks to contact them on info for Trans equality!

Shortly and subtly thereafter, they then start edging away from working on Trans issues in the state and focused more prominence on helping their neighboring states' marriage equality rights fights! They apparently discovered what Trans organizations have known for many years: big gay and lesbian money pours in on gay and lesbian issues, and magically evaporates when it's Trans issues. There's nothing sexy about Trans issues to gay and lesbian America, no pressing humanitarian (read: big media face time) need for involvement, nothing much to be gained for them personally. Why engage? Maybe another pressing G&L need may arise in the future? Perhaps divorce rights will be the next big ticket item on the agenda?

And if not, hey! There's always plenty of vacation spots to visit....

"I started looking at small companies that were running a sort of virtual reality cottage industry .... that's your dream of what it's going to be." — musician, Thomas Dolby

Of course, once all the rights for sexual orientation on their potential wish list are attained and there's nothing else left, why not give new up-and-coming gay and lesbian leaders a shot by ... coming back and getting those hapless trannies their rights! You continue keeping the org in place and keep the name recognition going! There's certainly no real urgency from a sexual orientation standpoint. They can give more young gays and lesbians an opportunity to develop leadership skills. (Something Trans people don't really need – after all, what are they going to do with them?) It spotlights again the talents and abilities of the gay and lesbian young leaders (something Trans folk have never really had, and frankly in their estimation don't need.)

It also keeps the reins firmly in gay and lesbian hands. You don't want to give trannies the keys to the bank 'cause Lord only knows how they could screw that up if given chance!

And if by chance they manage to win rights for their hapless gender-confused charges, all the better! It does so at low cost, gives these individuals a badge of honor and some pride in accomplishment, keeps the Trans community beholden to the gay and lesbian leaders and helps assuage some of that old "incrementalist" gay guilt and may help bury the legacy (which really needs sanitizing in order to look attractive in the historical annals).

To paraphrase the old adage, why teach a man to fish or give him access to fishing when you can simply just give him a fiah that you catch? Then he gets fed only at your convenience, and best of all helps keep the cottage industry under control! There's nothing like a captive audience to drum up business! If they must bring into their fold a Trans person, make sure they are agreeable and will help aggressively market the paradigm of LG first, then B, then T. A good Trans marketer in LGBT orgs can be an excellent public relations tool and adds the dual benefit of providing "cover" with the Trans and curious straight community folks.

And if they're crafty enough, they can stretch this out for quite some time and make a nice career of it! It's not like Trans people aren't familiar with the concept of gatekeepers.

After all, only a fool would give away the business secrets that make their business a success. When did Coca-Cola or Col. Sanders ever give away their secret recipes? Answer: never! It's why they're a success story for the ages!

Of course once all is acheived in Massachusetts, as we've seen, why not export this model to the other states? After all: "there's more education needed on Transgender issues ... they don't know who you are." And with any luck by these incisively-minded G&L leaders, they likely never will in our lifetimes!

As the Big Gay Man on the Hill loves to point out on progressive issues: as goes Massachusetts, thus follows the rest of the nation.

If you're Trans, you better pray, meditate like hell or scream bloody murder that it doesn't!

"The notion that you don't protect most people if you don't protect them all – that's never worked." — Rep. Barney Frank on ENDA in 2007

It's Marriage Mania In Maniacal America

"I'm goin' coconuts but least I'm goin' my way.
I'll probably be here when that sun goes down.
Goin' crazy, ooh, from the heat!" — Goin' Crazy, David Lee Roth

Maybe it's just the unending heatwave in Texas, where any day below triple digits actually feels slightly chilly, but it seems to my overcooked brain that both sides on this same-sex marriage tug-of-war are coming down with a chronic case of the wackies. Or maybe it's just a sizzling hot summer everywhere and it's not just me – everyone's losing it.

Marriage mania is in full bloom, and Pennsylvania joined the litany of states pushing for marriage recognition for same-sex couples. Amazingly marriage didn't get forced down the throat of President Barack Obama when the 300 some-odd LGBT leaders and their partners were invited to the White House for a private reception. However, just this week both Massachusetts and Oregon filed suit claiming the Feds violate their federalist states' rights by DOMA's effect on their states' ability to make independent decisions on marriage rights.

Meanwhile the California suit against the Feds has gotten interesting. Initially when this was filed (including one attorney who offered to press the issue who was also part of the Bush legal team who filed suit successfully to place Bush in the presidency post-Florida 2000 election results!) it was thought that things were looking rather rosy. Even LGBT organization heads from groups such as Lambda Legal, the ACLU's LGBT Rights Project and the National Center for Lesbian Rights all stepped up and encouraged all other groups to take a back seat in order not to complicate or jeopardize the pending suit. "Ill-timed lawsuits could set the fight for marriage back."

Well that was then. This is now. It seems these same three groups are now filing amicus briefs to intervene to allow PFLAG, Lavender Seniors of the East Bay and Our Family Coalition to file suit with the Supreme Court as well. (And they all thought we Trans folk couldn't get on the same page or being politically "realistic"!

The American Foundation for Equal Rights (AFER), who was leading the charge in Federal Court, wrote a pointed letter back to the three above mentioned groups, noting how they had all initially worked collaboratively on the project and anguishing over actions and quotes in the media from these other players that they felt "undermine" the case and the goal which they were all working towards.

Not only were they there first on this suit, AFER worries that this case "could be mired in procedurally convoluted pre-trial maneuvering for years—while and gay and lesbian individuals in California continue to suffer the daily indignity of being denied their federal constitutional right to marry the person of their choosing." I've attached a photocopy of the full letter from AFER to the parties below. It's, um, interesting:


So what are they trying to do here – out-compete each other for top attention and ego strokes? Or maybe bog it down in order to slow the process (and maybe milk more donations while it continues?) No matter! At least everyone's on the same page and it's all in the firm capable hands of our professionals in leadership of the gay and lesbian community! Lord knows if Trans people got a hold of it, it'd be a confusing mess, hmmm? Yeah, that's what they say ....

"What is important in life is life, and not the result of life." — German playwright, Johann von Goethe

Of course, not to be outdone on trying to conspicuously blunder and lose, the opposition is also working hard to snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory! It was bad enough that a FOX commentator compared the same-sex marriage issue to bestiality a la Pat Robertson and so many others. That's actually old-hat stuff now! Get the latest on the intra-species marriage issue from FOX (again)!

This was actually reporting on a story of a Swedish study that found that marriage was good for couples in that it kept them from dementia and Alzheimer's disease with absolutely not connotations on same-sex couplings at all. Yet their own Freudian mentality just keeps slipping out as on FOX & Friends morning show, we heard this from one of their triad of morning hosts, Brian Kilmeade:

BRIAN KILMEADE: I'm just amazed that they thought about doing this study in the – by interviewing people in the 1970s and the 1980s.

DAVE BRIGGS: A little dated, you think?

KILMEADE: The average is 50, and they see that they keep it together. I find this – I find this somewhat ....

BRIGGS: Go ahead.

KILMEADE: Different. Leave it to the Finns and Swedes to some up with something. They literally –

GRETCHEN CARLSON: Don't look at me, pal.

KILMEADE: Because that's a – we are – we're – we're a – we're – we keep marrying other species and other ethnics and other....

CARLSON: Are you sure they're not suffering from some of the causes of dementia right now?

KILMEADE: I mean, the Swedes ....

BRIGGS: What are you getting at?

KILMEADE: See, the problem is, the Swedes have pure genes.

BRIGGS: OK.

KILMEADE: Because they marry other Swedes because that's the rule. Finland – Finns marry other Finns, so they have a pure society. In America, we marry everybody.

That's right folks! Intra-species marriage is already here in America! As Kilmeade noted: "we keep marrying other species and other ethnics ... the problem is the Swedes have pure genes (ah! gotta watch them! the Master Race people!) ... Because they marry other Swedes because that's the rule. Finland – Finns marry other Finns, so they have a pure society. In America, we marry everybody." This is rife with alarmist xenophobia!

And marrying "other species"? Really? Are they buying that Georgia freak's Obama-as-Curious-George-the-Chimp T-shirt fetish as scientific fact? What a serious media outlet FOX has turned out to be, huh? It sure sorta hearkens back to the old miscenegation days from what I can see, all this concern about America's "intra-species" marriage and breeding! Wow.

"The most perfidious way of harming a cause consists of defending it with faulty arguments." — Friedrich Nietzsche

But if that's not wacky enough, it gets crazier! From no less than Washington DC, home of Marion Barry who supports everything EXCEPT for his staunch disapproval of same-sex marriage (and subsequent arrest this week for stalking – way to drive home the point of morals, Mr. Ex-Mayor!), we have testimony on the DC consideration of accepting same-sex marriage as law of the district from Rev. Leroy Swailes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFFYYjWjVuE


This one has to be seen to be believed. I can't make this stuff up, folks! Some of the reverend's philosophical proferrings are:

"You have human rights and you have inhuman rights. When a man dealing with a man and a woman dealing with another man, that's inhuman." Make sense of that logic!

Discrimination's a negative and a postive. ... I came out of my mama's womb like I didn't have a choice. That was a negative discrimination." Yeah, I guess you didn't have a choice ... unless you managed to self-abort! Is this an advertisement for abortion?

"If you discriminate against a homosexual that's a positive. Why? Because of children. You've got people they call pedophiles.... When you look in the eyes of a child and tell them "sex is between Adam and Adam, and Eve and Eve," that's a pedophile." Wow, it's that simple? And all this time I thought it was about something physical, like molestation or at least child nudity. What was I thinking!

"This book here talk [sic] about 'All Families Are Different' has to do with what? You have God's family, which is a natural family, and you have Antichrist's family." Yeah, all Godly families have to "be like us." That's exactly what the racist white families used to think during the days of Jim Crow, too, and they believed that the Bible told them where everyone else's family fell. It must be said that Rev. Swailes is African-American though his logic is eerily familiar, harkening back to those bad old days.

One child grows up to be
Somebody that just loves to learn.
And another child grows up to be
Somebody you'd just love to burn.
Mom loves the both of them.
You see it's in the blood.
Both kids are good to Mom:
'Blood's thicker than mud'
It's a family affair...." — Family Affair, Sly & The Family Stone

"Everybody should have human rights, but you have to be human! Human means you deal with the opposite sex...." Meaning that, what? All Trans people have tails? All gays are sick little monkeys? And I'm sure he meant it in the best way possible, no offense and all!

"Homosexuality destroys (life), it'll be the extinction of the human race.... Eighty-six civilized cultures, it was the death of their cultures why? Because they gave into ... strange flesh: the same sex, which is a form of bestiality. Why is that a form of bestiality? Because a beast has four legs and one gender! If you put two men together, you have four legs and two penises. That's one gender. That's a form of bestiality." Ah! Well that explains it! Four legs and one gender is animal! So if there's a three-legged dog, or a couple who are same-sex, but one partner only has one leg, then they'd be semi-bestial, right? Or if both partners are one-legged, then same-sex marriage would be okay because they'd be human! I recalled a show on Oprah once that showed a dog born with no front legs, and it literally taught itself to walk on it's hind legs, upright! That would make him human, not animal! So then a woman could then marry that dog and not be engaging in bestiality per Swailesian logic! But what about "eunuchs, which were so born from [their] mother's womb?" Vexing! Or for that matter, how about "eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men?" Hmm ... clear as mud!

"When you separate something, you have discrimination. When I put a glass of water here and a glass of poison, which one are you going to choose? You're going to choose a glass of water. That's a form of discrimination!" Ah! I'm getting it! We discriminate against poison every time there's a glass of it on the table and we avoid drinking it! Shame on us anti-poison bigots!

"I cannot look into the eyes of a child and tell them "you have a choice to be heterosexual or homosexual." That would make me a sadist! So what is a sadist? A sadist is the one who destroyed sex! ... and I don't practice Satanism." Not sure where the satanism thing came into play – a Freudian slip? And all this time I thought sadism, named after the Marquis De Sade, was all about inflicting physical or mental cruelty! Then again, I can see how some would get confused and think it cruel to tell kids they have choices in life. Better to eliminate all choices and just pre-destine everyone's life for them from inception! It eliminates all the guesswork! Just hand them an assignment sheet saying "here is your life – don't think, just live what we tell you." Hey look, I'm supposed to be a garbageman ...!

It's a wonderful world out there, kiddies. Yes indeed, batshit crazy.

Meanwhile, halfway across the globe, Iranians are protesting and taking to the streets, risking incarceration and even their lives for defying the Ahmadinejad Administration! And here in the U.S, that saga sure fell off of the radar screen fast! What's a country got to do to get a little media time over life-and-death issues like marriage? Iran's free people need a strong advocate here – someone like Mary Cheney: she who couldn't be bothered to bring up same-sex marriage or gay rights issues in her dad & Bush's campaign, and supported her daddy and the GOP (even with the antagonistic approach the Bush Admin took on her issues) because "there are terrorists who will stop at nothing to hurt this country ... I had to support the candidate who was going to do the best job to protect this country. And no offense to John Kerry, but it wasn't him."


So now that the people of Iran are trying to oust one of the heads of Bush's Axis of Evil, and folks in America are focusing on that less important stuff like same-sex marriage, where is Mary Cheney these days?

"...things get confused out there: power, ideals, the old morality...." — G. D. Spradlin as Gen. Corman from "Apocalypse Now."

The G & The L Rises, T Sinks And Fails, And All Is AOK? BS!

"He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it." — Martin Luther King Jr.

Well it didn't take long for responses to my last blog. One person wrote me privately saying she was disappointed I didn't "understand" how "serious" the Pam's House Blend controversy was and that I should've "come down harder" on her and Autumn Sandeen for these bannings or muzzlings they enacted on their trans "members and bloggers." Then on my posting I had a response from another suggesting I sit down with Mara and patch up philosophical differences, noting she was "not a card carrying member" of either of our organizations ... preferring to contribute to NGLTF because "they promote trans-inclusion."

Two completely different perspectives saying roughly the same thing: we need to make things work in gay and lesbian organizations or functions for us in order to make gay and lesbian led-groups succeed. Talk about your WTF moments! Perhaps my point in the previous blog wasn't clear enough.


Let me restate that point: we need our voice and for that matter autonomy, respect, experience, and control of our own destiny without shackles or limitations placed on us just as they need theirs. They have theirs already. Where do you see ours in any similar measure? It doesn't happen within GLBT. And outside GLBT we get a little awareness, but most of our own seems more than happy to build up the very gay and lesbian institutions while leaving the trans ones in neglect!

How do I need to rephrase this in order for our own community to understand? Maybe I do suffer from the communication disability that the G&L leaders so famously peg on us all. Lord knows trans people can't articulate our own issues, but let me know what I need to do to get this out and I'll struggle my way through it!

In 2000, during a visit at the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) with Michael Gray and Alex Fox, I'd expressed how I personally didn't have a problem with them leaving the T out of their mission statement and their work. Yes, I meant every word of it. HRC was – is – the voice of the gay and lesbian community and Trans wasn't their forte. We in the T community needed our own voice, and needed it expressed from our perspective just as they needed and had theirs.

In the next two years, they first amended their mission, then worked with a new upstart individual to create another Trans organization that would supplant NTAC and its independent voice. This new group would help them by humiliating those of us who weren't working "with our (so-called) allies," and isolating those of us trans people who apparently weren't our own allies for wanting to speak to our own issues. It was better addressed by the "allies" as their "professionals" and by this logic knew our own issues and could address them better than we did. HRC was "the 800 lb. gorilla in the room ... (that) must be dealt with."

Even after the new group moved away from being such fans of HRC, they still had to be friends with them as they "had to work in the same space."


That latter sentiment is pure BS. None of these so-called allies is required to "work in the same space" as NTAC or other Trans organizations kept out of the mainstream of the entitled Queer movement. None of them have ever gone through "proper channels" on anything with us, not even any of the newer Trans organizations now or in the future. Why lend credibility to any of that?

"I would like to be open with the public. I would like to not keep secrets or be careful when I talk. I don't want to have to plan things...I want to be outspoken. I want to say my opinions and I hope they're taken in the right way. I don't want to stop being free. And I won't." — actress, Angelina Jolie

Gay and Lesbian America are quite well established and are perfectly positioned for, and awash in successful ventures. They even have us (with our limited resources) giving them a hand to build up theirs.

Now take a look at Trans America and our own ventures. Where in the hell do you see anything of theirs reciprocated back to us in whatever configuration? There is no similar effort to build our functions nor any dollar-for-dollar return on funding, much much much less anything commensurate (considering the size of their community comparative to our small and quite limited cumulative income levels between our two communities).

And after so many years of demonstrated history, noticing the all-too-obvious patterns, we trans people are insistent upon building up gay and lesbian institutions for what again? Their outspoken leaders are ballyhooed and given prominence. Our outspoken leaders are shamed into silence – and they even enlist some of our own to assist in doing so!

It's been clear to many of us for most of this decade that there's nothing in this "LGBT movement" for Trans folk. We're appends that they begrudge but tolerate as they must appear politically correct. So these leaders do enough for appearance's sake, manage us best as they can and seek out ways to make it pay for itself.

Their leaders are heroes. Our leaders are zeroes – mere trash to be tossed. Not much unlike how Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson were considered back in their day, as only in death were they fondly remembered. We're every bit as useful and wanted to them as sand off the beach tracked into their shiny vehicles.

Make no mistake: Sylvia and many of the trans leaders and rioters of those days despise the movement for its hypocrisy and hard-heartedness. And though we must recapture our own voice, our outspoken leadership are and will continue to be as welcomed and as necessary as sand tracked into their vehicle after coming in off of the beach.

As Barney Frank, the Big Gay Man On The Hill, has noted so many times: they don't know who [trans] are. And as it's always a Barney, or a Joe Solmonese or a Matt Foreman or a Rea Carey or a GLAAD or someone similar who's always our prominent face to the rest of the world in politics, media and representation, that's who America will always believe we are.

And yes, in case you haven't noticed, they're all gay or lesbian. And yes, if that's who some of you trans folks wish to build up and promote, then I don't want to hear a word when we get ditched (due to insufficient education on Trans) and subsequently assumed and developed as a future cottage industry for these very same folks to continue validating themselves while continuing to keep us at bay and voiceless. Look around your NGLTF: how many trans people have they hired onto their staff historically? How many in any of these groups were leaders or highly visible throughout the years? If you can't answer those questions, then you haven't been paying attention anyway.

"All people saw on television were a few of my outspoken supporters out front; and they came away thinking that was me." — Sen. George McGovern about his presidential campaign in 1972

Ten years ago, I was one of the so-called "moderate voices of reason." My goal was to try to get us to some understanding of the needs of both sides and get these established groups to understand us as equals and to forge actual egalitarian ideals in our pursuit of rights as painlessly as possible. For my troubles, I ended up being written off as a radical protester and an enemy to be isolated and buried a few years hence. Yes I was naive and paid a price most severe.

Well, I'm not buried any more, and am in no mind to play "compromising" games that again rip our voices away from us. Giving up your right to voice your displeasure is and absolute zero sum game. You get less than nothing: helping them make their job easier is your only result.

Meanwhile, the State of Massachusetts announced today that they are suing the federal government over same-sex marriage and DOMA's infringement over the their state law per federalism. Meanwhile, trans people in that same state still have no hate crimes protection, no employment non discrimination and few if any job prospects. So do you think our voices have been heard? Do you really think that we actually matter? Or maybe fear and poverty aren't so bad, hmm?


This deep-seated mistrust of G&L institutions and functions didn't form in a vacuum and didn't happen overnight. This has been roiling underneath for quite some time. And it's about to boil over....

"When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose." — Like A Rolling Stone, Bob Dylan

Pride 2009: We Yelled, They Screamed. But Did Anyone 'Hear' Us?

"When you're drowning, you don't say 'I would be incredibly pleased if someone would have the foresight to notice me drowning and come and help me,' you just scream.” — John Lennon

It was one for the ages. Forty years after Stonewall, to the day (with an additional 12 hours added) ... we found ourselves marching down Fifth Avenue through downtown New York and cutting a path directly through Greenwich Village and right down Christopher Street in front of the Stonewall Inn where the riots – the flashpoint for the organized Gay Rights Movement around the world – began.


Marching through this parade, in the very same New York, with a banner for the contingent noting "Sons and Daughters of Sylvia Rivera" on this anniversary was inspiring. The roar of the crowd as we passed, especially throughout Greenwich Village, was absolutely deafening! My ears were literally ringing afterwards.

In so many ways this was an event to remember! As Sylvia Rivera recalled saying that night of the riots, "I'm not missing this for the world!"

Privately, it was also a trying and disappointing result. I knew it would be a logistical task coordinating something in a locale hundreds or thousands of miles away. But this one was a bit more "Murphy's Law"-like than most others. Everything that could go wrong ....


The banner people were nothing but a mass of confusion, and the banner had to be sent to Mona Rae's house in Yonkers NY as I was afraid I wouldn't receive it until after my flight to NYC. I literally picked up the banner at a drop off point on Friday in Manhattan just a few minutes before the Trans Day of Action after criss-crossing the town to pick up poster boards (which were shipped late) after a speech out in far East New York, and dropping those off in Hoboken where I was staying! Between that, crossed wires, lost items, help arriving too late to be of any good, a subway weekly pass that arbitrarily stopped working and family and personal issues to deal with long-distance while in New York, it was, um, interesting!

Coordinating things in your back yard is simply stressful. Coordinating things 1500 miles away tends to border on madness.


We were also unsuccessful in getting the Stonewall Girls to the 40th anniversary. One showed interest but the other two didn't. As one noted, there was far too much bad blood over how she and the other trans folk were treated to gloss over it. For a lot of old-line trans members, there's nothing to really celebrate and much more to mourn or stew over.


We had participants cancelling due to health reasons (theirs and their spouses), even a group cancelling while en route due to a communter train's power outage! We had a number of confirmed attendees who simply didn't make it; no idea why, just no-shows. Locally, even though I made the circuit to promote, we didn't draw any from those, save for five from Mid-Hudson Valley Trans Assn. up in the Kingston / Poughkeepsie region.


That said, we did get Alyssa Harley (who's taken pains to remember Sylvia Rivera every year by attaching red roses to the lamppost at Sylvia Rivera Way.) Both she and Breanna Smith helped lead our contingent and worked their asses off to stir the crowd. Jamie Dailey who made it down from Connecticut also gets props for working the crowd and for her help on the banner preparation on Pride day.

We also brought in a couple of the old Transy House crew: Rusty Mae Moore and Jamie Hunter. It was great seeing them again and especially marching as the Sons & Daughters of Sylvia Rivera. In fact, Jamie even brought her boyfriend Michael Gredowski, a brand new straight ally. Rusty originally wasn't sure that she could make it through the entire length of the parade route, but I noted admirably that she was just as energetic, holding her sign high above her head and stirring the crowd even at the very end of Christopher Street! Meanwhile Jamie did her own tribute to Sylvia Rivera by marching the entire route in heels (amazingly!) and was leading our contingent running and stirring the crowd herself. Michael, who stood in as our "Son" portion of the "Sons & Daughters" absolutely kicked butt and really got into the march himself.


Special thanks go out to both Jamie Hunter and Michael for all their help during and especially before and after the parade. They were indefatigable assistants that really helped make this succeed. In fact, with all the complications and potential to fall flat on our face, our team made it look effortless and successful!

We later had another older latino man (not even sure that he was gay) who joined us from the sidelines on the banner as our second "adopted" son of Sylvia, ha! We even had a couple other latinas join us as well! We were pulling people in from the crowd – it seemed everyone wanted to be part of the Sons & Daughters of Sylvia Rivera!


The Sons & Daughters of Sylvia Rivera garnered a lot of attention from photo journalists and the crowd itself! However, I believe I overestimated its importance to the Trans Community. While Sylvia herself was around and had her voice, people listened. However, she's been gone for over seven years now. Most of the newer trans community members either don't know of her or the history, or they are busy making their own individual history and doing and participating in their own ventures. Rather than one group, we're now spreading out into hundreds of groups and individually expressing our own perspectives.

"I just can't do what I done before,
I just can't beg you any more.
I'm gonna let you pass and I'll go last.
Then time will tell just who fell
And who's been left behind,
When you go your way and I go mine." — Most Likely You'll Go Your Way And I'll Go Mine, Bob Dylan

This is a good thing. However there is also a downside to that dispersal. As we all know after hearing it from Barney Frank or other gay and lesbian critics of the Trans movement, people "don't know" us, and we're "a very small segment" of the community. The message has always been that Trans people are an infinitesimally small portion of the greater Queer (originally Gay) movement. Between the stigma of Trans and being out about it, and the compulsion to do our own thing, it's tough to gather trans folks in numbers adequate enough to make a statement to gay and lesbian leaders and the world that we're not tiny, insignificant and doomed to utter obscurity.

At the risk of sounding like a skipping record, I can't stress the need for quantifying numbers of us. We need to establish our population and our income (especially lack thereof). Its needed not just for demographics for political attention, but even afterwards to establish our market share (the key to corporate funding for things Trans the way even the gay and lesbian and all other segments are able to draw.)


And again, these numbers will help us actually steal back our own voice (which is incresingly being co-opted and capitalized on of late). It's about the only thing we ever really had in the Trans community was our voice and it appears others think we've abdicated it. When you sit back and let anyone represent you, you end up with the type of governance or oversight you deserve.

Even while I was up in New York, there was an apparent dust up between trans folks and others on Pam's House Blend which ended up resulting in a number of people being censored or banned (I'm not sure which). There was a noticeable hue and cry over it all with folks complaining about the list's owner and the uneven treatment. But a reminder: it's Pam Spaulding's list, she's not a trans person and she can do whatever the hell she feels like with her blog (emphasis on "her blog"). If she wishes to ban trans people, it's her blog! She has the autonomy to do so.

If we trans readers disagree, well then, start your own. Nobody should think that anything trans that's valid must come from an entity that is always led and/or created by a gay or lesbian. Similarly anything that was created and that provides autonomy to trans people should not be quashed simply because it isn't led or created by gay or lesbian leaders who then choose the agenda and represent the de facto face of the trans community. TransAdvocate is attempting to do that right now.


Yet too many of us end up contributing to building up gay and lesbian-led institutions as "they're our allies" and end up watering down or thwarting our own voice in order for some perceived considerations or reward. Maybe that worked adequately for Mara Keisling or a few select folks from the NCTE ilk. For the rest of us there is absolutely nothing gained — it's an absolute net loss. All we do is water down our own numbers, our own voice and our own efficacy. We must get out there and actively take control of our own fate, lest we end up not even being the face of our own community.

"You know, with all the press releases you do, people think that it's just NTAC — or just you – drawing attention to yourself." — Mara Keisling of NCTE in a conversation to me in August 2004


Taking back the Trans community's voice is a must. It is more than needed, it's urgent. The original hope was that this would hopefully serve as a catalyst to begin earnestly to re-seize our destiny and our voice.

Is it possible? Well, after seeing the response on the march in New York and how easily separable we are from our own community, it's not likely. Far too many of us have no desire for the involvement (much less the work getting it done). The few of us with such desire for involvement or working to make things happen will be going our individual directions in things such as Pride parades. The solution to this still needs some rethinking.


We've got to find a way to take a Trans movement that's dying on the vine and get it spurred in the ass into some forward motion. We have people dropping out of the movement in frustration, fatigue and dreams of wanting to have a "real life" away from being "the tranny" or "the activist" and on point constantly. I've even had numerous others ask me how I'm doing this still after 14 years with the obvious burn-out and the high, high cost that it's come with. Certainly it would seem better to just admit it's fruitless and walk away. But that only makes certain defeat.

We need to bear in mind trans history, with all our forebearers efforts ending in absolutely nothing for those who gave all. We need to recognize there's nothing ever to gain from relinquishing our destiny to the trust of others who have no full understanding of our needs, much less the urgency. And I fully keep in mind that with no future or hope, I certainly have nothing to gain by giving in, and in fact nothing to lose (save for my life, which we all lose in the end) by anything I do. As I noted to the most recent activist stepping away asking how I continue this, I just put myself on auto-pilot – or more precisely auto-battle mode. As I had on one side, "when hope is gone, fight like Sylvia! (fiercely and to the very end!)"


In years down the road, Trans folks will realize we must re-seize our movement. Until then, I'll just be the crazy, quixotic old tranny, screaming in the wind about our need to own our voice, our movement and our destiny. Sylvia said the same thing years ago, and nobody much listened to her while she was around either. They may not hear, but we should continue speaking truth to power and never stop screaming it.

Maybe it's the roar of the crowd drowning us all out.


"Lift every voice and sing,
'Til earth and heaven ring,
Ring with the harmonies of liberty." — Lift Every Voice And Sing, James Weldon Johnson

"Ain't no one gonna listen if you haven't made a sound." — Filthy Gorgeous, the Scissor Sisters

Moments Of Pride After Forty Years

Some videos of the New York City Heritage of Pride Parade on the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots:


The marchers enter into Greenwich Village.


Marching down Christopher Street (and even picking up some extra volunteers to carry the banner!) Everyone wanted to be a part of the Sons & Daughters of Sylvia Rivera contingent heading down to Sheridan Square!


Marching next to Sheridan Square and coming close to the Stonewall Inn.


The Sons & Daughters of Sylvia Rivera contingent marches past the Stonewall Inn (and I nearly do a backflip over a crouched Japanese photographer taking pictures towards the Stonewall!) 40 years after and Sylvia Rivera's memory will not fade away, no matter what!

Lift Your Voices In Pride -- And Outrage!

“I think I was just fed up with the image that had been created around me, which I sometimes consciously, most of the time unconsciously cooperated with. It just got too much for me to really stomach and so I put an end to it one glorious evening.” — singer, Jim Morrison

"Scream 'til you feel it!
Scream 'til you believe it!
Scream and when it hurts you,
Scream it out loud." — Scream, Tokio Hotel

"Evil prospers when good men do nothing." — Irish politician, author, philosopher, Edmund Burke

This will be a short post. Actually I shouldn't even be awake, but it's one of those sultry, sticky nights following nine days of temps of 100 or over (save for last Monday's 99). Yes, for those of us without A/C, it's tailor-made for regular irregular sleep patterns.

Beyond the personal, it's Pride week for many of us. As I'm on an 11AM flight to New York (thank God for frequent flyer miles!), I'm looking forward to doing Pride where the movement both galvanized and mobilized the community. Pride in New York falls exactly 40 years and about 11 hours after the beginning of the Stonewall Riots.

Since that time, we've seen massive change – some good, some bad. One thing that strikes me though is that we as a nation have become imminently more docile. You look at the election fraud in Iran and what that's produced in mass demonstration, then compare it to the U.S. where we went through two shady election cycles to begin the millennium: virtually nothing. We just took it.

Similarly there's a strong sense of of many in America falling through the cracks into destitution. Nowhere is this more urgent than in the Trans community and Queer community of color.

So where's the outrage? Even with things moving toward marriage equality in many states, including what may be an imminent passage in New York state, there is no hate crime protection nor virtually any job opportunities (much less equality) for these mentioned segments of our community. Yet even for an event such as raising the visibility of this in Pride this year, we're more content to divide into camps and stay on the sidelines.

Meanwhile, the business opportunists take de facto dominion over our voice and seeming power of attorney of our decision making on how and when and what needs to be addressed. And as a result, we find ourselves jobless, often under attack and without hope ... but in some of these same locales, able to marry!

The time has come. We need to seize our voices back. Yes, this is a celebratory event, but keep in mind we are *marching* in the parade not much different than our LGBT forebearers in a much more active, much more responsible and much less docile time. Forget the commercialism, opulence and flash. Think of what it would've been like back before it became this big party if those early marches after Stonewall never occurred because Sylvia Rivera or Bob Kohler or Marsha P. Johnson or even Randolfe Wicker had decided, "no, I can't be bothered, too much work."

You have a voice. Use it or lose it. If you're outraged, if you feel manipulated, used and thrown away and disgruntled, then express yourself! And if you don't, then someone else will capitalize on your voice and you'll end up, to paraphrase Thomas Jefferson, we'll get the governance we deserve due to our apathy.

"I know that my children in later years, my transgender community will understand: We have to stand up and speak for ourselves! We have to fight for ourselves! We save their lives. We were the front line of the so-called 1969 rebellion of the Stonewall." — Sylvia Rivera from the documentary: Sylvia Rivera, A Trans Life Story

"Time has come today.
Young hearts can go their way.
Can't put it off another day.
I don't care what others say.
They say we don't listen anyway." — Time Has Come Today, the Chambers Brothers

Trans Teen's Brutal End Was An Elaborate Hoax

Well it turns out a number of us (myself included) were suckered. Yep, punked Ashton Kutcher style. Last night and this morning we read a story about Rachel or Raychel Roo, an alleged list moderator on Laura's Playground, and a brutal murder that occurred.

It turns out it was someone's sick idea of a joke.

After posting a blog on it myself before a long day of board meetings and a reception to attend, I get home twelve and a half hours later to find all references now denying the story altogether.

The list-serv had dozens of folks expressing outrage and depression over this list moderator. At this writing, it's not known if this was even a real person (or who she was representing herself to be as a teen mentor to other trans people) – much less a victim of a heinous murder. And perhaps this person has more than one persona on this list-serv, as there was a second person commenting about the family needing privacy and personally knowing this Rachel Roo's aunt – clearly playing along with the same scam.

So this person (or people) managed to deceive an entire list-serv and a bunch of others among us as they watched their deception make its way around the global net.

Net result? More second-guessing of trans people. More skepticism in a community with an overabundance of reason not to believe. Trans Americans are perennially betrayed, played and frequently lied to from political leaders and virtually every other side.

So these jokers figure "why not create more deceit? Why not get them to not even trust each other or trust in themselves?"

They succeeded. We'll be much more unlikely to listen to or believe anyone anymore.

Legislative Chatter On The Eve Of Pride: Will We Be Equal?

"Part of the problem, frankly, is with the transgender community and some of those who put that in the forefront, because they didn’t lobby. The only time they started lobbying is when we said ‘You know what, we don’t have the votes for this, we gotta to do it partially.’ Then they began lobbying the Democrats that were supportive. I’ve never seen a worse job of lobbying. For years, literally years, I have been begging them to start talking to people about this, and have said you, look, have political problems here, I wish we didn’t but we do, and you have to deal with them." — Cong. Barney Frank in 2007

As we converge on New York City next week for the 40th Anniversary of Stonewall (and others partake in their own cities' Pride celebrations), word comes out that the Employment Non Discrimination Act (ENDA) will be reintroduced to coincide with the occasion. This is tailor-made timing to induce good vibes to soothe over the raw feelings and disastrous previous sessions' disarray and fracturing of the community. How successful the community repairs will be leaves me naturally skeptical, but we'll see how they conduct themselves this time.

We've mostly heard the wording will stay similar to the original HR 2015 (the inclusive ENDA originally submitted before we were ditched and HR 3685 eventually passed. There has been at least a bit of a murmur from one contact that "there's talk of the language changing this time," but that's yet to be independently confirmed anywhere else.

There's one thing we can bet the house on. Trans folks most in need of such legislation, the outsiders and unequivocal backers of inclusive legislation, those not of the HRC ilk will be nowhere in sight or earshot of the negotiation table (much less participating). Yes, it'll be "trust us" yet again ... y'all know the modus operandi by now.

It's good timing for Rep. Barney Frank and HRC to submit this next week. In fact it couldn't be better. The Gay and Lesbian community will undoubtedly be overjoyed. There's a possibility trans people may also celebrate it equally. Maybe.

Until we see it we don't know what we'll be dealing with. Therein lies another reason the bill is timed well for Ol' Barn' and HRC: we'll be busy partying our butts off per their estimation, giving them a bit of cover in the off chance it was needed.

And as we've already seen, just because a bill drops in one version doesn't mean it's going to stay that version or that it'll not be switched yet again.

The House won't be the big worry this time unless we see a replay of Ol' Barn' and the backroom boys making a deal about abandoning trans due to the dreaded "toilet issue" (as in, "which one?") We hopefully confronted that adequately in lobbying this past May: all they have to do is look at NTAC's Lobby Packet cover to see what it is the conservatives are truly asking for – something I don't think they intended.

The worry on ENDA will be the Senate stripping out the trans inclusive language (or stonewalling it altogether.)

On a more uplifting note, the Hate Crimes Bill should be making it to the Senate vote any time now. In this case, we should have the votes to pass it. The only caveat is it's been attached to a Tourism Bill (whatever that's about). This means there will have to be a conference committee revisitation from a joint committee of Senate and House. Prospects are good, but anything can happen in a conference committee. The downside (if any) is if it gets stripped there, it goes on to the President for signature and we have no ability to affect it at that point.

If I had to put money down on it though, I'd say there are better odds on it passing inclusively as the President has already asked for the bill and checked it's progress.

Meanwhile on the DOMA brief from the Dept. of Justice, I've been watching the rhetoric and heat flying around. It's true that the head of the DOJ is President Obama's doing, but I'm sure that there's not been a massive purge of all former DOJ employees from the Bush years, nor is it the President's responsibility to micromanage the department. Atty. Gen. Eric Holder wasn't exactly known for his "bleeding-heart liberal" credentials, save for the likes of Rush Limbaugh or other extremists. Ultimately they do their job and the President reviews, but doesn't necessarily have obligation to second-guess everything.

That said, it seems some of the immediate blasts may have been more than just premature, but from a position of not even reading the brief in the first place! Originally even Cong. Barney Frank took initial umbrage, then stepped back from his initial statements by admitting he hadn't read the brief and was relying on oral arguments!

While that is a black eye on Ol' Barn', he actually came clean and admitted! That's a refreshing bit of honesty, and I've got to give Rep. Frank credit there.

Much of this seems deriven from John Aravosis' Americablog and possibly references to Charles Socarides' article, and its initial read (if indeed it was read) on the DOJ brief. Lawdork blog had the following to say (http://lawdork.wordpress.com/2009/06/17/chairman-frank-and-aravosiss-misstatements/)

Soon thereafter, John Aravosis published a piece that just went round the bound. I have tried to keep my blog as forward-looking as possible, but it’s clear that Aravosis’s heavy popularity at his blog and media contacts have allowed his false statements about what the filing means to push the debate into the twisted, contorted view he is giving it.

The two main problems that I have with Aravosis’s coverage are:

(1) His continued misstatements regarding whether Justice should have filed a brief in this case.

(2) His “comparing us to incest and pedophilia” claim is overstated and does not withstand any serious, legal scrutiny.

First of all, it’s clear that his poisoning of the well most likely led to Chairman Frank’s misimpressions about the brief, which he said he had not read until today. (I’ll admit that I too was surprised that he hadn’t read it yet, but I have noted before that Frank is wholly dedicated to the financial reform package that he’s been working on for the past several months.) Frank said: “I made the mistake of relying on other people’s oral descriptions to me of what had been in the brief, rather than reading it first.”

So, then John (Aravosis) falsely concludes that “Frank now thinks the brief is just super.”

Here’s what Frank actually said:

Now that I have read the brief, I believe that the administration made a conscientious and largely successful effort to avoid inappropriate rhetoric. There are some cases where I wish they had been more explicit in disavowing their view that certain arguments were correct, and to make it clear that they were talking not about their own views of these issues, but rather what was appropriate in a constitutional case with a rational basis standard – which is the one that now prevails in the federal courts, although I think it should be upgraded.

Of course, John cites to none of that in his post, which is very similar to what I’ve been writing and what Harvard Law School Professor Laurence Tribe and former Clinton Justice Department senior staffer Robert Raben have said as well. [...]

Then, Aravosis gets into this notion that the President regularly just “goes about telling the DOJ to oppose existing law in court.” Aravosis states that Richard Socarides’s vague statement results in a factual, final reality: “It’s not debatable, it’s what actually happens in the Oval office, and it’s not illegal – it’s a fact.” Yes, it is.

Aravosis has to turn words up-side-down to create this idea. He keeps changing statements from people, which admit of times when a law can be challenged, into statements that people haven’t said, which is that Justice can “never” fail to defend an existing law. Despite Aravosis’s false statements, Justice spokespersons never said that Justice always has to uphold laws. As I pointed out, Justice has consistently said only that it “generally” must defend laws. [...]

(2) “Comparing us to incest and pedophilia” claim is overstated and does not withstand any serious, legal scrutiny.

This claim, to which I’ve previously objected, has been Aravosis’s claim to fame on the brief, with him taking credit whenever anyone uses the claim.

Here’s the actual line — yes, only one sentence, and not really even a sentence but just a list of cases (called a “string cite”) after a sentence — from the brief:

And the courts have widely held that certain marriages performed elsewhere need not be given effect, because they conflicted with the public policy of the forum. See, e.g., Catalano v. Catalano, 170 A.2d 726, 728-29 (Conn. 1961) (marriage of uncle to niece, “though valid in Italy under its laws, was not valid in Connecticut because it contravened the public policy of th[at] state”); Wilkins v. Zelichowski, 140 A.2d 65, 67-68 (N.J. 1958) (marriage of 16-year-old female held invalid in New Jersey, regardless of validity in Indiana where performed, in light of N.J. policy reflected in statute permitting adult female to secure annulment of her underage marriage); In re Mortenson’s Estate, 316 P.2d 1106 (Ariz. 1957) (marriage of first cousins held invalid in Arizona, though lawfully performed in New Mexico, given Arizona policy reflected in statute declaring such marriages “prohibited and void”).

These were three cases about marriages, which were valid in one jurisdiction, not being allowed under the laws of another jurisdiction. There is nothing further. The brief does not ever use the words “incest” or “pedophilia.” And, by the way, the American Psychiatric Association Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition Text Revision (DSM-IV-TR), the standard for diagnosis, defines pedophilia as involving “sexual activity with a prepubescent child or children (generally age 13 years or younger).” Under that definition, there is not even a case involving pedophilia appearing in the brief at all — which is likely the reason that no mainstream publication has repeated that claim.

Despite all that, this is what Aravosis concluded this evening about Chairman Frank:

Barney thinks the language of the brief was great. He even, between the lines, defends the invocation of incest and pedophilia.

No, he clearly did not think the brief was great, as his statement made clear. Moreover, he never defended anything that isn’t in the brief, despite your constant claims to the contrary.

It is Aravosis’s spreading of this continued falsity — particularly to demean the smart, legitimate statements of members of Congress — that lead me to continued reporting about why it’s false.

That last point spiked my curiosity enough to pull up the brief and begin reading in search of the comparison to pedophilia (though I was still a long way from finishing before I got this post from the Lawdork blog. Hey, I'm not a legal beagle – it takes me a bit more time to read through the technical and the legalese. Nevertheless, I'm glad to see this. The claim seemed a bit more like hyperbole than fact, and apparently so.

One thing everyone needs to keep in mind is that the President cannot overturn DOMA. He can state his opinion (which he has), but ultimately it's something Congress must enact and then get the President's signature on. It's how the damn bill was enacted in the first place, and signed by Pres. Clinton! One person (one is they're George W. Bush with Dick Cheney interpreting his constitutional law) cannot simply overturn or undo a passed, signed and enacted law.

Additionally, it'd probably look a bit odd if the Dept. of Justice had sent a brief that supported overturning DOMA. Their job is to carry out the voted and enacted law of the land and interpret what's on the books. They are not in the business of defying existing law on the books (again with exceptions given to Bush-Cheney era justice opinion).

Perhaps they should've withheld any amicus, but they would've drawn howls for going against the DOMA law. If DOMA is to be overturned, even better than having the Supreme Court do so in a ruling, DOMA must be undone via legislation.

Yes, Obama could use his bully pulpit. But last I checked, we're still hemorrhaging jobs and the economy's still in the bottom of the tank. I know, I'm one of those falling through those widening economic sinkholes. Not to mention Iran, North Korea, corporate bankruptcies and fending off right-wing nutcases throwing the conjectural kitchen sink at him. Maybe priorities aren't there at the moment.

And this comes from one of those "impatient," "screaming" trannies from NTAC! Hmm ... and we're the only ones who are supposed to be histrionical, huh?

"No, I ain’t lookin’ to fight with you,
Frighten you or tighten you,
Drag you down or drain you down,
Chain you down or bring you down.
All I really want to do
Is, baby, be friends with you." — All I Really Want to Do, the Byrds

Who Cares About The Stonewall Girls (And Guys)?

"The crowd began to get out of hand, eye witnesses said. Then, without warning, Queen Power exploded with all the fury of a gay atomic bomb. Queens, princesses and ladies-in-waiting began hurling anything they could get their polished, manicured fingernails on. Bobby pins, compacts, curlers, lipstick tubes and other femme fatale missiles were flying in the direction of the cops. The war was on. The lilies of the valley had become carnivorous jungle plants." — Jerry Lisker, from the New York Daily News, July 6, 1969

As the LGBT community been enrapt in Pride celebrations in numerous cities across the globe this month, there's been plenty of news that's hit the wires. Most all of it in America has centered around Don't Ask, Don't Tell (a campaign promise by President Barack Obama that has yet to be addressed) and marriage issues or the Dept. of Justice's recent amicus curiae brief filed regarding DOMA (the Defense Of Marriage Act of 1996).

Individual organizers in the GLBT community are using this anniversary and devoting media to capitalize on the event to address the recent outrages in the gay and lesbian community.

It's a notable anniversary for Pride celebrations and marches this month as it is the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion. That occasion was also about outrage. The folks that night had had enough of being treated like crap. No más!

"If the police came in, they were going to check your ID, rough-up some people. The drag queens always seemed to get roughed-up first." — Larry Stansbury of Capital Pride.

Today, of course, those surviving veterans of Stonewall are all near, or in their sixties or above. They still remember that night well. And though this is a milestone anniversary, there appears to be a collective yawn in this country at least in recalling our history and having these pioneers of Queer history around for the retelling.

Odd. We want to revel in this special anniversary with parades and parties and such. Yet the organizers and perhaps a sizable portion of at least the gay and lesbian community would rather just forget what this date memorializes or the people who created the flashpoint on June 28, 1969.

"We've had all we can take from the Gestapo," the spokesman, or spokeswoman, continued. "We're putting our foot down once and for all." The foot wore a spiked heel. — excerpted from the New York Daily News, July 6, 1969

"[Stonewall Inn] catered largely to a group of people who are not welcome in, or cannot afford, other places of homosexual social gathering.... The Stonewall became home to these kids. When it was raided, they fought for it. That, and the fact that they had nothing to lose other than the most tolerant and broadminded gay place in town, explains why [riots occurred]." — Mattachine Society Newsletter, Aug. 1969


We currently have two or three trans members of the Stonewall Girls, those who began the protests that night, that live out in California. I've been in touch with one of them, Miss Major, and in touch with mutual friends with the others about marching with the trans community in the Sons & Daughters of Sylvia Rivera entry in New York. She was definitely interested in attending, but finances was the prime obstacle. At one point in frustration, she wrote:

I am hoping against the reality that the gay community will get off it's ass & do the right thing by the girls that are still here from the 1969! The shit stops here. (The) riot at Stonewall – when you think about it – that was 40 years ago. If you can add, that makes us elders, ones that need the respect for what we began and for living with the bullshit they throw at at us.... WE ARE STILL HERE, DAMNIT!!!

We are not going to disappear or fade away. I have no closet to hide in – I burned the house to the ground. NO HIDING PLACES.

I had to remind her that this wasn't being organized by the Pride or any gay/lesbian orgs, but was being done by trans folks, thus the lack of funding, etc. It wasn't without inquiring though. When the issue was brought to the Heritage of Pride organization in New York, they stated they had no money and added they weren't so keen on inviting more Stonewall rioters in. The Stonewall Veterans Association they already had marching tended to be "demanding" and generally a pain to deal with.

For Miss Major it was all for naught as she ended up twisting her ankle. But at least one of the other girls in Los Angeles that she had spoken with wanted nothing to do with Pride, the March, Stonewall or any of it. As Miss Major related it, she said "she was tired of us being shit on. All (Pride, Stonewall) did was bring back bad memories of how we got screwed over and shoved to the back of the bus."

We've got a gay Stonewall vet here in Houston, whose interview I reprinted in a recent blog. There's been a little interest on Big Roy McCarthy again, mostly from out of the country – the article will be translated into Danish and reprinted there on the anniversary of the beginning of the Stonewall Riots. Not only is he not getting interest in New York, even Houston's giving a collective yawn. Big Roy's not their idea of an attractive spokesmodel.

"Screaming queens forming chorus lines and kicking went against everything that I wanted people to think about homosexuals ... that we were a bunch of drag queens in the Village acting disorderly and tacky and cheap." — gay activist, Randolfe Wicker

In another ten years we'll see the fiftieth anniversary of Stonewall. Perhaps that will draw more interest in the folks who were there that night inciting the one catalytic moment in our community's history which is remembered around the world. Or perhaps, since these instigators were trans, drag queens, street hustlers, mostly people of color, and also those white trash rioters too. Perhaps that memory's one that the modern-day movement of the HRCs and the NGLTFs and the like doesn't want to face. Perhaps that's been the plan since shortly after the riots finished.

The Stonewall Girls and Guys? They virtually all feel they've been co-opted and tossed away by the modern day movement like a used condom.

Bob Kohler & Sylvia Rivera circa 1970

We march in the Parade and point to the history of Stonewall. But simultaneously there's no sense that anyone wants to know or to remember the community's warriors or even know the history of that night.

People want to mouth the words "Stonewall" as it's become only an occasion in which to party. Unfortunately there will be no lessons learned from it. In Twitter-ese, time to bring out the Fail Whale.

"I had been in enough riots to know the fun was over. The cops were totally humiliated. This never, ever happened. They were angrier than I guess they had ever been, because everybody else had rioted, but the fairies were not supposed to riot, no group had ever forced cops to retreat before, so the anger was just enormous. I mean, they wanted to kill.” — gay activist and "father" of the Stonewall movement, Bob Kohler

Presto! New York State's Same-Sex Marriage Without Even Passing A Law!

"That's great, it starts with an earthquake,
Birds and snakes, and aeroplanes -
Lenny Bruce is not afraid.
Eye of a hurricane, listen to yourself churn,
world serves its own needs, satisfy your own greed." — It's The End Of The World As We Know It, R.E.M.

The world ended in New York State on May 26, 2009. Or it least it should have. The AFA and the FOF and the NOM and all of those right-wingy, cover-your-thingy, religiopolitical fundamentalist orgs had long worried about the fabric of society suddenly disintegrating if ever a same-sex marriage occurred in a state where it was outlawed.

Well it happened! After the state of New York went through court same-sex marriage occurred!

So, how is life in post-apocalyptic New York? Hmm ... funny thing is it's still there! And life is going on as normal (there's that *word*!) I talked with a friend up there ... no big changes ... just an ordinary June day. No big bang, no anarchy? I guess I should be disappointed, huh?

In fact, the news media didn't even pick up on it until today's New York Post broke it this morning! And still everything's functioning! That's gotta be breaking some stony little religiopolitical hearts.

Here's the real kick in the crotch! As much as it's been a major wet dream for the gay and lesbian community these past years to be able to marry ... it was a trans woman and her husband who tied the knot! That's okay, though. They'll be buried in the annals of history with nary a memory. (It's the way things work in GLBT ... history must be by G or L – they'll see to it.)

As the Post put it:

Hakim Nelson and Jason Stenson married on May 26 with nary a raised eyebrow among the oblivious city bureaucrats who not only OK'd the marriage license, but conducted the ceremony, despite gay marriage being illegal in the state.

The plucky couple filled out their marriage application online at the Apple Store on 14th Street in May. A few days later, they went to the City Clerk's Office on Worth Street to complete the form and get their marriage license. [...]

The gullible clerk didn't seem to notice that both Nelson, 18, and Stenson, 21, have male first names. They both had to present identification to obtain the license. Stenson used his state ID card, and Nelson gave a state Benefit Card, which he uses to collect food stamps.

By a fluke, Nelson's ID card has an "F" for female on it, because the official who issued it in April assumed from his appearance that he was a woman.

Government issued I.D. in the gender she presents, female. Yet the courts want to consider her male in some states. As a result of this paranoid thrashing attempt at social engineering by the religiopoliticos, they've actually created more problems. States like Texas and Kansas consider post-operative transsexuals their birth gender, and perhaps New York currently intends the same. But if this couple goes across the river with their fresh new marriage license, legally married in a state that doesn't recognize same-sex marriage, the state of New Jersey will honor her marriage to her spouse, especially post-surgically.

And beyond all the gnashing of teeth and protests and blitzkriegs on statehouses around the country, what exactly is being hurt by this marriage beyond some peoples' feelings? There have been, however one wishes to slice it, same-sex marriages per some states' opinions for decades and decades! It's only now that it's a hot-button to keep "the gay agenda" in check that it's been moved to the fore.

In these times with foreclosures and destitution rising like bread dough, jobs disappearing like moderates from the GOP, and Kim Jung Il threatening nuclear annihilation to all (and to all a good night), very few people have enough spare time in their over-stressed lives to pay much attention to a same-sex couple getting married. They don't like the overpoliticizing and street-protest whiners, but bottom line is that if it happens, 99% of Americans are going to shrug and go, "whatever! It's not my problem! I got crap of my own to deal with!"

Crap like how to survive this corporate-induced economic Chernobyl we're in!

“This is exactly what the right wing is afraid of. People have had a year of legal marriage in Massachusetts to see how ending marriage discrimination helps gay and lesbian families and hurts no one.” — Exec. Dir, Freedom To Marry Coalition, Evan Wolfson

Congratulations to the new Mr. & Mrs. Stenson! Now move across the river to Jersey, settle down, have a nice life and leave the battlers behind to fight amongst themselves. It's official: New York state has married (per its estimation) a same-sex couple, and the world didn't come to a calamitous end!

So, New York legislature ... how about take a clue here? Just pass the damn thing.

Ultimately there's no equal reason to not extend everyone the same rights. Marriage has happened in five states now (and a sixth in January), including all of your neighbors adjacent to your eastern border have it. Their world didn't come to an end. Moreover, continuing to hold up passage only sanctions unequal application of the marriage rights granted all your state's citizens. Do you really want to advertise that to the rest of the world?

Then once it's passed, maybe then – FINALLY – we can finally start employing trans people in large numbers in these so-called civil rights groups there in the Empire State and allowing them to make the connections, speak to the powers and enact legislation to where Trans people can work? Maybe even get some protections from hate violence too? Equanimity in sentencing for all victims' attackers, hmm? Hey, it's only been, like, fifteen years or so pushing for that stuff there, forty years after Stonewall and the Gay Rights movement.

One fact I forgot to mention: the newly married couple reside in Sylvia's Place at the MCCR Church in New York: a homeless shelter for Queer Youth. Yep, they married. They just can't work or make a livable wage to survive anywhere in the Big Apple. Get it?

But yeah, I know ... priorities. Survival subjects aren't sexy. They're just so hard to market ....

"Gay people want the freedom to marry for the same reasons non-gay people do.” — Exec. Dir. for Freedom To Marry Coalition, Evan Wolfson

"Transgenders already have legal same-sex marriage. Why then is the lesbian and gay community reluctant to use this as a wedge issue when lesbian and gay same-sex marriage is debated on the news, on talk shows, and in litigation? The reluctance is incomprehensible." — from the Albany Law Review, "Same-Sex Marriages Have Existed Legally In The United States For A Long Time Now by Phyllis Randolph Frye & Alyson Meiselman

The Difference Between Trans And Gay

"I'm tired of hearing people talk about me,
Telling me I'm a disgrace to society.
Just look at yourself clearly in the mirror.
I'm not much of a sinner!
I'm just following my feelings." — Gay Pride, Omar Kamo

A recent documentary shown locally here in Houston last week got me to thinking. It was quite well done and really showed the history of the neighborhood well. Local gay and lesbian luminaries, activists, residents and others were the interview subjects, lending local flavor to the film. Something seemed out of place or missing, though. Nearing the end of the documentary it finally started sinking in: there was no transgender participants, perspective or stories (save for the mention of prostitution).


As films, news or documentaries go, it was quite typical. But it got me to thinking: why is it that even in the 21st century, you rarely if ever see any notable trans perspectives on these type shows?

Contrasting that with the documentary done 20 years ago, Remembering Stonewall, it was interesting to note that while there were a number of trans and drag folks interviewed who were primary players, there were also a few more gay and lesbian interviewees. A couple of the gay and lesbian folks were actual participants, but most were just people, gay and lesbian community leaders perhaps, who were just living in other places, or who were elsewhere that night or even avoiding that bar area altogether. They were there to discuss what beneficial impact the riot had on their lives as gay or lesbian Americans – more for flavor or color than anything else.

The percentage was approximately 50-50, with perhaps a slight edge to gay and lesbian interviewees as opposed to the "drag queens" or "transvestites" as they called them then.

Even today, in gay and lesbian subject programs if there are any gender variant images, as a rule drag queens are the only ones shown. However, unless the subject is specifically about female impersonation, the drag characters are used as wallpaper adorning the background or inconsequential scenes, or a rare sentence or two as a comic relief.

It got me to thinking a little more deeply about the differences between trans and gay – and not merely the issue of gender variance as opposed to sexual orientation.

"I tell you one thing!
You are not going to stop me!
I'm going to keep on going on
'Cause I have gay pride!" — Gay Pride, Omar Kamo

Trans people don't have the same type of history that gays and lesbians do. Still to this day we're considered temporary ... transient. As the Montrose documentary brought home, we don't have trans ghettos per se. We're rootless have never had a side of town or a place we could call home.

Like vagabonds, we're always on the edges, seen intermittently on the periphery. Nonetheless, it's never really home.

Trans history or attachment to something fixed for the ages was rare if not altogether non-existent. In popular culture, you never see visible trans participation in history. Many of us have been there in many of these instances, but we're merely the bit players or part of the background casting. On the rare occasion that we are front-line players in history, such as Stonewall, it is quickly co-opted and those trans players like Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson are pushed out.

Oddly enough, Sylvia was only revered by gay and lesbian cognoscenti after her death when everyone wanted on the bandwagon. During life, she was not only a pariah to the queer establishment, but most indeed tried to diminish if not altogether write her out of the history of the event – such as author David Carter in his book "Stonewall: The Riots That Sparked the Gay Revolution" from 2004.

Throughout the decades the leaders of the trans movement as determined by the community members themselves and per their work over the years have absolutely no place at all in LGBT history. If it's something beneficial to the gay and lesbian community alone, it's relevant. But if it's something we in the trans community do, regardless of trans-benefit only or LGBT in scope, it's special interest. The words LGBT are uttered in order to show consideration of all people in the community, but trans people in our collective history are completely invisible.

Much like unicorns, we're mythical creatures that are rarely ever spotted (much less heard) in media or public at large. (Nor for that matter are Bi)

"Please don't say it.
I won't take it anymore.
Why should I run and hide?
We, we are what we are.
We're just like anybody else." — We Are What We Are, the Other Ones


Rare sympathetic media attention paid to the trans community usually circles around hate murder victims. The only other time we rate media is in prostitution stings or some crime that's similaraly salacious.

Even in events or rallies, lack of trans leadership (beyond the one token trans slot) who are allowed to speak and lack of perception of anyone of note only underlines our irrelevance. And it speaks loudly, not only to our community but also to those observing from outside the Queer community.

None will ever know, much less understand what it feels like dealing with the extra obstacles: being the double minority of Queerland (or for ethnic minority trans people, being the triple minority).

They won't know the extra burden of mandatory medical treatment even without promiscuity, along with the psychiatric hurdles (to say nothing of the permanent branding as "disordered" per requirements in order to obtain surgery or even hormone therapy). None of them grasp the ID complications (especially in the era of the Real I.D. Act) and extra costs for even the name and gender consistency. None fathom the job search difficulties, much less the near total absence of professional success in those jobs once transitioned, nor the historical lack of similar connections to power or the abject lack of opportunity even within LGBT environs.

It's relatively rare for them worrying over being read in public, especially for those male at birth. Similarly the constant fear of attack is nowhere near as common, much less the commensurate level of attacks. Even in the 21st century, trans people who attempt to report an attack to law enforcement are nearly always presumed to have brought it upon themselves due to the stereotyped perception of trans person as "street prostitute." There's also nowhere remotely near the level of organizational support, nor the connections with the halls of power for defending our community.

After forty years of this movement begun at Stonewall, the LGBT community is surely on a trip towards equal rights. However we're on distinctly different roads: one a direct super-highway, the other a local road with detours, roadblocks, an uncertain path and a hell of a rough ride all along the way.

"I never asked you to go away.
Didn't want to cause you pain....
Oh, we only want to be ourselves." — We Are What We Are, the Other Ones

Chastity Bono Transitions, The Media Circus Follows Right Behind

It appears the tabloids were true. We today got confirmation that after his 40th birthday, Chaz (formerly Chastity Bono) has begun the transition process from female to male.

"Yes, it's true -- Chaz, after many years of consideration, has made the courageous decision to honor his true identity," publicist Howard Bragman tells Usmagazine.com.

"He is proud of his decision and grateful for the support and respect that has already been shown by his loved ones. It is Chaz's hope that his choice to transition will open the hearts and minds of the public regarding this issue, just as his 'coming out' did nearly 20 years ago," Bragman added.

I kinda feared that might be the case ... just a hunch (like the one I had about TransFM's Ethan St. Pierre ten years ago when I first saw him at Lobby Days!)

But the fear wasn't so much for Chaz as much as the reaction this would draw from those looking to exploit another trans figure. It was something I'd written about back in 2007 when this rumor first hit in "Freak Of The Week: The Tabloid Media" http://transpolitical.blogspot.com/2007/09/freak-of-week-tabloid-media.html

[W]hy is it such a heinous scandal to have someone attached to anything hinting of crossdressing or transsexualism? [...]

A couple of items jumped out at me this week prompting this. One was a tabloid (Star or Enquirer, can’t remember which) with a blaring headline replete with photos showing a sad looking Cher, and an alternate photo of daughter Chastity Bono in what appears to be a man’s suit. The headline was: Cher’s Heartbreak Over Chastity’s Sex Change Decision. [...]

Keep in mind if Chas (or Chaz if that's how he's deciding to spell it) decides to transition to male, this will not (or should not) be a capricious decision. There’s a lot of heart-wrenching changes this makes to both family and perhaps more importantly societal relationships.

That heart-wrenching change is something I could attest to. Career-killing, financial hell and a measure of family struggles, yeah ... it's no picnic at all!

In one sense, Chaz may have an easier transition inasmuch as finances won't be the worry. He may well discover the limitations in his career and peer set due to the "transgender effect". It's likely not to be as severe due to his high profile name, but there will be some exposure to opinions, decisions and actions which he may have glossed over before (not being personally affected) but which now will carry a new and extra sting to it.

But in other ways, I feel sorry for Chaz. The downsides are there too. Adam Lambert's recent coming out as gay was phrased as "no big thing." It's not something that trans people can hope to use and get away with. It may be another generation until it's "not a big thing" for being trans.

Due to Chaz's celebrity status, it's going to be a magnet for exploitation of the "high profile" trans. For media, it's automatic salaciousness – and salacious sells! Regardless of how low-key he longs to keep it, the media won't relent because it's how they earn their paychecks.

And for his former and current employers in gay and lesbian political advocacy, they'll quickly position to monopolize him to be their spokes-trans, and with it buy themselves validity with trans people long used to their games and the perennial hierachial agenda. If he stays with their talking points, he'll be their darling for the time. Meanwhile, he'll self-ostracize from his own newfound community as he helps his employers continue countering his own trans brothers' and sisters' work and history, and inadvertently helps long-term trans folk remain voiceless and marginalized.

Chances are likely that he'll not understand the critical backlash when that happens either.

Mostly, the one thing that a sizable portion of transsexuals do – going into stealth, woodworking in order to have a real life away from the objectification of society's view of trans – will be mostly unattainable. Just the family bloodlines alone prevent media and paparazzi from ever forgetting, to say nothing of the high profile years spent in gay and lesbian advocacy.

He's acclimated to growing up in the spotlight with his family. But still, everyone at some point wishes for a "regular life" without always being defined as "the tranny" and its vaguely sexual, "Ripley's Believe It Or Not"-styled oddity label attached to us. Nobody really wants a camera following them around 24-7 for 365 days a year, privacy and personal issues be damned.

It'll be a media circus with every media outlet wanting a story, and every political hack possible seizing upon the opportunity for some free face time for themselves – oh! And pushing forth their personal agendas for folks like themselves (read: donate early, donate heavily, and trans people are fine with us pushing marriage and their own long-term joblessness!) There's nothing we can do but roll our eyes and take notes of who does and says what.

Chaz Bono's transition is necessary for him. That his mother, Cher, has come around to accpet his true self is a very positive development. But for his coming years of media and opportunists hanging all over him to attend to fulfilling their own agendas and thinking nothing about him as a person, much less consideration to his own personal space, I gotta say I feel for Chaz's situation over the coming months and years.

"We ask that the media respect Chaz's privacy during this long process as he will not be doing any interviews at this time," publicist Bragman concluded.

Amen to that sentiment. And let that go for his mom, Cher, as well. No matter what you think about the transition, give a chance to have a life!

"They say we're young and we don't know
We won't find out until we grow." — I Got You Babe, Sonny & Cher

Remembering Stonewall, Forty Years Hence

"It's time to laugh, it's time to cry
It's time to be what you need to be!
It won't be long 'til they are gone
And we can be what we want to be!
I wanna run from everything,
Everything that holds me down!
Nothing to win, nothing to lose." — Free, V.A.S.T.

This is rearranged transcript from "Remembering Stonewall" which premiered July 1, 1989. The show itself interviewed both people at the scene of Stonewall as well as others who related how they felt hearing about Stonewall and what it meant to their lives. Rather than simply reposting, I took the liberty of culling the portions of it that had specific relevance to what happened in the early morning hours of Saturday, June 28, 1969 at the Stonewall Inn. Those relevant to the riot were left in and organized a bit better, rather than the cut and paste snippets of the original in order to give more of a feel for the sentiment of the night, especially from Dep. Inspector Seymour Pine and Sylvia Rivera – the nights two main players in this documentary.

COMMENTATOR: On Friday evening, June 27, 1969, at about 11:45, eight officers from New York City's public morals squad loaded into four unmarked police cars and headed to the Stonewall Inn here at 7th Avenue and Christopher Street. The local precinct had just received a new commanding officer, who kicked off his tenure by initiating a series of raids on gay bars. The Stonewall was an inviting target – operated by the Gambino crime family without a liquor license, the dance bar drew a crowd of drag queens, hustlers, and minors. A number of the bar's patrons had spent the early part of the day outside the Frank Campbell Funeral Home, where Judy Garland's funeral was held. She had died the Sunday before. It was almost precisely at midnight that the morals squad pulled up to the Stonewall Inn, led by Deputy Inspector, Seymour Pine.

SEYMOUR PINE: My name is Seymour Pine. In 1968, I was assigned as Deputy Inspector in charge of public morals in the first division in the police department, which covered the Greenwich Village area. It was the duty of Public Morals to enforce all laws concerning vice and gambling, including prostitution, narcotics, and laws and regulations concerning homosexuality. The part of the penal code which applied to drag queens was Section 240.35, section 4: "Being masked or in any manner disguised by unusual or unnatural attire or facial alteration; loiters, remains, or congregates in a public place with other persons so masked . . ."

You felt, well, two guys -- and that's very often all we sent in would be two men -- could handle two hundred people. I mean, you tell them to leave and they leave, and you say show me your identification and they all take out their identification and file out and that's it. And you say, okay, you're not a man, you're a woman, or you're vice versa and you wait over there. I mean, this was a kind of power that you have and you never gave it a second thought.

There was never any reason to feel that anything of any unusual situation would occur that night.

For some reason, things were different this night. As we were bringing the prisoners out, they were resisting. One drag queen, as we put her in the car, opened the door on the other side and jumped out. At which time we had to chase that person and he was caught, put back into the car, he made another attempt to get out the same door, the other door, and at that point we had to handcuff the person. From this point on, things really began to get crazy. [T]hat's when all hell broke loose at that point. And then we had to get back into Stonewall.

We noticed a group of persons attempting to uproot one of the parking meters, at which they did succeed. And they then used that parking meter as a battering ram to break down the door. And they did in fact open the door -- they crashed it in -- and at that point was when they began throwing Molotov cocktails into the place. It was a situation that we didn't know how we were going to be able control.

Remember these were pros, but everybody was frightened. There's no question about that. I know I was frightened, and I'd been in combat situations, and there was never any time that I felt more scared than I felt that night. And, I mean, you know there was no place to run.

For those of us in Public Morals, after the Stonewall incident things were completely changed from what they had previously been. They suddenly were not submissive anymore. They now suddenly had gained a new type of courage. And it seemed as if they didn't care anymore about whether their identities were made known. We were now dealing with human beings.

RED MAHONEY: My name is Red Mahoney. I've been hanging out drinking, partying, and working in the gay bars for the last thirty years. In the era before Stonewall, all of the bars, 90% of the bars, were Mafia controlled. There wasn't that many gay bars. You'd have maybe one, two uptown on the Upper East Side. They would get closed down. Then there'd be one or two on the west side, they'd get closed down. In midtown there'd be one, two, three, maybe open. As they would get closed down they would move around. And they were dumps.

The Stonewall? Oh, that was a good bar. That was. Just to get into the Stonewall, you'd walk up and you'd knock on the front door. You'd knock and the little door would open and "What do you want?" "A Mary sent me." "Good, come on in girls." You know. The Stonewall, like all gay bars at that time, were painted black. Charcoal black. And what was the funny part, the place would be so dimly lit -- but as soon as the cops were gonna come in to collect their percentage or whatever they were coming in for, from it being a nice, dimly-lit dump, the place was lit up like Luna Park.

SYLVIA RIVERA: My name is Sylvia Rivera. My name before that was Ray Rivera, until I started dressing in drag in 1961.

The era before Stonewall was a hard era. There was always the gay bashings on the drag queens by heterosexual men, women, and the police. We learned to live with it because it was part of the lifestyle at that time, I guess, but none of us were very happy about it.

At that time we lived at the Arista Hotel. We used to sit around, just try to figure out when this harassment would come to an end. And we would always dream that one day it would come to an end. And we prayed and we looked for it. We wanted to be human beings.

The drag queens took a lot of oppression and we had to . . . we were at a point where I guess nothing would have stopped us. I guess, as they say, or as Shakespeare says, we were ladies in waiting, just waiting for the thing to happen. And when it did happen, we were there.

You could actually feel it in the air. You really could. I guess Judy Garland's death just really helped us really hit the fan. People started gathering in front of the Sheridan Square Park right across the street from Stonewall. People were upset -- "No, we're not going to go!" and people started screaming and hollering.

"Call out the instigators
Because there's something in the air.
We've got to get together sooner or later
Because the revolution's here, and you know it's right." — Something In The Air, Thunderclap Newman

SYLVIA RIVERA: I remember someone throwing a Molotov cocktail. I don't know who the person was, but I mean I saw that and I just said to myself in Spanish, I said. oh my God, the revolution is finally here! And I just like started screaming "Freedom! We're free at last!" You know. It felt really good.

Once the tactical police force showed up, I think that really incited us a little bit more.

BIRDY RIVERA: My name is Robert Rivera and my nickname is Birdy, and I've been cross-dressing all of my life. I remember the night of the riots, the police were escorting queens out of the bar and into the paddy wagon and there was this one particularly outrageously beautiful queen, with stacks and stacks of Elizabeth style, Elizabeth Taylor style hair, and she was asking them not to push her. And they continued to push her, and she turned around and she mashed the cop with her high heel. She knocked him down and then she proceeded to frisk him for the keys to the handcuffs that were on her. She got them and she undid herself and passed them to another queen that was behind her.

HOWARD SMITH: My name is Howard Smith. On the night of the Stonewall riots I was a reporter for the Village Voice, locked inside with the police, covering it for my column. It really did appear that that crowd – because we could look through little peepholes in the plywood windows, we could look out and we could see that the crowd – well, my guess was within five, ten minutes it was probably several thousand people. Two thousand easy. And they were yelling "Kill the cops! Police brutality! Let's get 'em! We're not going to take this anymore! Let's get 'em!"

There were a couple of cops stationed on either side of the door with their pistols, like in combat stance, aimed in the door area. A couple of others were stationed in other places, behind like a pole, another one behind the bar. All of them with their guns ready. I don't think up to that point I had ever seen cops that scared.

"Hand out the arms and ammo
We're going to blast our way through here
We've got to get together sooner or later
Because the revolution's here, and you know it's right." — Something In The Air, Thunderclap Newman

MISS MARTIN BOYCE: My name is Martin Boyce and in 1969 I was a drag queen known as Miss Martin. I remember on that night when we saw the riot police, all of us drag queens, we linked arms, like the Rockettes, and sang this song we used to sing. (singing) "We are the Village girls, we wear our hair in curls. We wear our dungarees above our nelly knees." And the police went crazy hearing that and they just immediately rushed us. We gave one kick and fled.


RUDY: My name is Rudy and the night of the Stonewall I was 18 and to tell you the truth, that night I was doing more running than fighting. I remember looking back from 10th Street, and there on Waverly Street there was a police, I believe on his . . . a cop and he is on his stomach in his tactical uniform and his helmet and everything else, with a drag queen straddling him. She was beating the hell out of him with her shoe. Whether it was a high heel or not, I don't know. But she was beating the hell out of him. It was hysterical.

SYLVIA RIVERA: Here this queen is going completely bananas, you know jumping on, hitting the windshield. The next thing you know, the taxicab was being turned over. The cars were being turned over, windows were shattering all over the place, fires were burning around the place. It was beautiful, it really was. It was really beautiful.

I wanted to do every destructive thing that I could think of at that time to hurt anyone that had hurt us through the years.

A lot of heads were bashed. But it didn't hurt their true feelings -- they all came back for more and more. Nothing -- that's when you could tell that nothing could stop us at that time or any time in the future.

MAMA JEAN: My name is Mama Jean. I'm a lesbian. I remember on that night I was in the gay bar, a woman's bar, called Cookies. We were coming out of the gay bar going toward 8th Street, and that's when we saw everything happening. Blasting away. People getting beat up. Police coming from every direction -- hitting women as well as men with their nightsticks. Gay men running down the street with blood all over their face. We decided right then and there, whether we're scared or not we didn't think about, we just jumped in.

I remember one cop coming at me, hitting me with the nightstick on the back of my legs. I broke loose and I went after him. I grabbed his nightstick. My girlfriend went behind him – she was a strong son of a gun. I wanted him to feel the same pain that I felt. And I kept saying to him, "How do you like the pain? Do you like it? Do you like it?" And I kept on hitting him and hitting him. I was angry. I wanted to kill him. At that particular minute I wanted to kill him.

COMMENTATOR: The riots were well covered in the media. The New York Daily News featured it on the front page. There were reports on all of the local television and radio stations. By the next day, graffiti calling for gay power had started to show up all over the West Village. The next night, thousands of men and women came back to the Stonewall to see what would happen next. While a couple of trashcans were set on fire and some stones were thrown, the four-hundred riot police milling around outside the bar ensured that the previous evening's violence would not be repeated. But on this night, gay couples could be spotted walking hand in hand and kissing in the streets. Just by being at the Stonewall -- surrounded by reporters, photographers, and onlookers -- thousands of men and women were proclaiming that they were gay. The crowds grew and came back the next night and for one more night the following week. What happened at the Stonewall on those nights helped to usher in a new era for gay men and lesbians.

SEYMOUR PINE: Well, I retired from the police department in 1976. Twenty years have passed. I'm going to be 70 in a few months. I still don't know the answers. I would still like to know the answers. I would like to know whether I was wrong or whether I was right in ever thinking that there was a difference, in ever thinking that maybe you shouldn't trust a homosexual because something is missing in his personality.

MAMA JEAN: It's like just when you see a man protecting his own life. They weren't the "queens" that people call them, they were men fighting for their lives. And I'd fight along side them any day, no matter how old I was.


SYLVIA RIVERA: Today I'm a 38-year-old drag queen. I can keep my long hair, I can pluck my eyebrows, and I can work wherever the hell I want. And I'm not going to change for anybody. If I changed, then I feel that I'm losing what 1969 brought into my life, and that was to be totally free.

"We have got to get it together now" — Something In The Air, Thunderclap Newman

"You can't tell me what to do anymore
Now I'm free, now I'm free, now I'm free!" — Free, V.A.S.T.

Now They Figure Out We're Getting Screwed?

“Therefore thou hast forsaken thy people the house of Jacob, because they be replenished from the east, and are soothsayers like the Philistines, and they please themselves in the children of strangers.” — Isaiah 2:6

"First you said you would, if you just could, yeah.
Then you said you could if you just would, yeah." — Double Talking Baby, Gene Vincent & His Blue Caps

A little over two months ago, I took the Massachusetts chapter of the Equality Federation – MassEquality – to task. After the history of their organization and others dealing with rights in the Bay State over the past couple decades plus, I found their use of a friend on one of their promotional spots on their website a bit too exploitative. My blog entry Massachusetts' Shame noted it as follows:

Just yesterday I saw an advertisement for MassEquality with a photo of my friend, Ethan St. Pierre, on it. It was a very flattering photo of him showing up link stating "get the resources to help fight transgender discrimination here." Indeed it's an important first step for Mass. Equality -- an important first step in 2009.

Many would think this a positive development.

Many would ... and would also completely gloss over the shameful history of both Massachusetts and this very organization, MassEquality, on transgender rights. Many would completely ignore the selfish agenda of this organization and the gay and lesbian community in Massachusetts – commonly referred to by no less than Rep. Barney Frank as "the most liberal state in the union."

My whole beef around this was the seeming lack of concern they had with capitalizing on a trans issue when there was already an existing trans group there working on these very issues, and here was a gay and lesbian group, with virtually every right they'd ever had on their wish list accomplished, thinking they could simply waltz in like presumed heroes and just take over like the pros from Dover!

Of course, as my posts tend to be blunt, there were reactions to my Mass In-Equality post on March 14. Two of Massachusetts's own levied severe hand-slaps for my apparent harsh views on MassEquality.

From Cong. Barney Frank's hired trans staffer on the Hill, Diego Sanchez, came this response:

Vanessa shame! ... There's too much false information in this to flag each piece. From me, someone who HAS been involved for 20 years in MA LGBT, civil rights and social justice work: Every step that MassEquality has made, since its inception (and I say that because I was there when it was a spark in an eye and not yet formed) has been strategic and with participation, collaboration, negotiation, compromise and discussion with transgender people in MA. Your thoughts about Mass are so off base, you might want to focus on the many things you actually have lived through or are working on. Mass is NOT one of them. We'll handle MA as we have. I can't imagine what compels you to talk about Mass when you know us, the people who HAVE been doing the work. This is utter nonsense.

And from Gunner Scott, Exec. Dir. of Mass. Transgender Political Coalition (a group whom I suggested should've been getting the attention instead of MassEquality on trans issues) came the following response:

MassEquality has been one of our many strong partners in the coalition that MTPC's leads in advancing transgender rights in Massachusetts. I should know as the Director and founding member of MTPC.

Vanessa your assessment is off base, additionally you don't even live here or participate in MTPC. Lashing out at organizations and partnerships that you know nothing about is not helping build coalition, move our transgender rights movement forward, or encourage other state LGBT advocacy groups to work with their local transgender political groups.

You might want to focus on your own damn state, Texas, in moving transgender rights.

Points taken. NTAC and I weren't the only group to ever get involved with locals on other state issues as NCTE and Mara Keisling do likewise rather regularly. Perhaps, I thought, I'd been given less-than-accurate information on Massachusetts, and particularly MassEquality who I'd heard was directed resources to help other adjacent states in New England win marriage equality – not toward assisting trans groups and trans individuals lift up their own within their own state. Perhaps I was wrong.

Well, during NTAC's Lobby Days early in May I read a piece of a screed on MassEquality and had to put it down and come back to it (as we were in the midst of working Capitol Hill). Recently I had the opportunity to read it en toto. It's a blog on LiveJournal from the same Gunner Scott who sniped at my blog blasting MassEquality. Here's what he had to say less than two months later in his GenderCrash blog on May 7 from http://transgender.livejournal.com:

I posted this as a response to NH not passing trans rights, but I would like more people to see this...

Transgender issues will never be a priority for LGB(t) groups. Whether that is achieving laws, changing policies, or advocating for resources. I am not just saying this because I am part of MTPC, but if we want our community to be equal then we need to do the work. LGB(t) can support this, but we need to be steering that ship and not waiting for LGB(t) groups throw us a bone.

There is more to equality/rights/liberation then just passing non-discrimination laws. I think California is a good example - even though they have non-discrimination laws many trans people are still experiencing employment/poverty issues, so they next step is services, job fairs, education etc... and that is what Transgender Law Center does and this is and will be the types of stuff MTPC will do before and after a law passes.

We need our transgender organizations to advocate for us... we cannot wait for HRC, NGLTF, or MassEquality or any other state equality group to do it for us. We need to do it ourselves which means we need to fund our trans organizations, we need to volunteer, and we need to show up.

Wow. He made that 180-degree turn look effortless! And right on the heels of saying the exact opposite so recently at that! Well, I'm glad he's finally learned now after seeing the light. Maybe ... or maybe it's something else?

Gunner's LiveJournal blog continues:

If you have a job, then start donating (if you don't already) to a transgender specific advocacy group in your area and/or NCTE - monthly, $5 a month does make a difference when we have several people doing that. If you can do more then do that. I give to several transgender specific orgs, some monthly, others once a year. Lets get more transgender people hired to work for trans rights full time - it makes a huge difference to have trans people at the table advocating for rights and resources. We are the experts on our lives... we are not some LGB(t) group.

If you don't have money then donate your time and show and do something...

... And there's the rub! Now I see what this is! Keep in mind that it was Mara Keisling that popularized the notion, and NCTE who's entire raison d'etre was about "working collegially and collaboratively with our allies." Allies like ... HRC and NGLTF, et al. We're all quite familiar with the mantra from Mara, pushing back on all those of us who tried to warn the Trans community that Barney Frank and HRC were going to ditch us, and cutting off discussion by declaring that "everyone is on board" with trans inclusion, end of story.

Shortly after Southern Comfort, notice how facile the "collegial and collaborative" Ms. Keisling was in suddenly adopting the supposed "negativity," and NCTE calling for resignations of Joe Solmonese, all second-level staff and all board, calling it "controlled by and ... dependent upon white, rich, professional gay men." Mara's a master equivocator. So is this who's knee Gunner is learning from? Is that what our movement has come down to: whoever can sell the snake oil the slickest succeeds?

“Demagogue: one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots.” — journalist, H.L. Mencken

"They could be made to accept the most flagrant violations of reality, because they never fully grasped the enormity of what was demanded of them, and were not sufficiently interested in public events to notice what was happening." — novelist, George Orwell


Continuing on Gunner's blog:

"I know I sound like a broken record, but after doing this for over ten years and the reality is no one and I mean no one is going to fight as hard for our rights, for resources for our community then we are, trans people.

LGB people don't get us and I don't think they ever will...(and I also identify as being queer) yes they can be our ally, but our issues will never ever and I mean never be their priority. We as the larger trans community need to stop thinking that someday they will. The LGB(t) orgs are not going to save us. As long we have no power or influence in their organizations, meaning on boards and big donors, trans issues and the needs of the trans community will never be at the top of the list. There is no incentive for that. Our needs will always be pushed to the bottom.

So yes be mad at HRC or NGLTF or your state marriage group or equality group, but do something more with that anger...

We need to be our own movement, we need to make our allies and not just with LGB groups, we need to fund our own organizations, and push for our own rights.

LGB people don't get us and I don't think they ever will...(and I also identify as being queer) yes they can be our ally, but our issues will never ever and I mean never be their priority. We as the larger trans community need to stop thinking that someday they will. The LGB(t) orgs are not going to save us. As long we have no power or influence in their organizations, meaning on boards and big donors, trans issues and the needs of the trans community will never be at the top of the list. There is no incentive for that. Our needs will always be pushed to the bottom.

So yes be mad at HRC or NGLTF or your state marriage group or equality group, but do something more with that anger...

We need to be our own movement, we need to make our allies and not just with LGB groups, we need to fund our own organizations, and push for our own rights."

I'd comment on how great it was to hear the above, but it would be personally vain. It's something I've been espousing, and many others "supposed" heretics have been warning, for years now.

Nevertheless, it's good that he's come around and is now helping us get the truth out. That is, if he's truly come around. Time will tell if it's true, and those of us who've been in this independence camp will welcome the new blood if indeed they are now joining up to stay.

That said, I'm also very well aware of how many johnny-come-lately, flash-in-the-pans we've seen adopting faux anger for a time. Hell, even NCTE is back to casting furtive glances HRC's way, and NCTE's two board members who were on HRC's board of governors never left. In fact, NCTE's Dana Beyer is even helping rope in an occasional trans person to paid work for HRC. It's part of the old plan: keep talent, funding and resources away from trans people by tying them up in our "allied" organizations like HRC!

We've spent too much attention and allowed too much distraction by people claiming leadership in our community and yet have all the resolve of a flag in a hurricane. The only thing you can count on from the flag in a hurricane is that it will stand at full attention in whichever direction the wind blows, which could well be a 180 degree switch before the day's out.

We need to start holding these irresolute "leaders" accountable. We face enough obstacles with the gay and lesbian organization leaders, weak-kneed Democrats and virtually any Republican these days as they've rid themselves of nearly all moderates. Following our own leaders who zig and zag from one direction to the other doesn't lead us anywhere except to fatigue and ultimate frustration. All they've served to do is to run interference for gay and lesbian rights while keeping us directionless.

When it comes to the trans community, we need leadership who will take a firm stand and not simply adopt a posture because it's suddenly trendy.

"Hey Rocky! Watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat. Nothing up my sleeve ... presto!" — Bullwinkle J. Moose from the cartoon Rocky and Bullwinkle & Friends

"My friends tried to tell me, but they were too late, yeah.
What a fool I was to fall for your bait, yeah." — Double Talking Baby, Gene Vincent & His Blue Caps

“Nothing so completely baffles one who is full of trick and duplicity himself, than straightforward and simple integrity in another.” — writer, Charles Caleb Colton

You Can Marry, But You Can't Work

"I look at you and see the passion eyes of May.
Oh, but am I ever gonna see my wedding day?" — Wedding Bell Blues, Fifth Dimension

It became official yesterday afternoon when New Hampshire Gov. John Lynch signed a bill into law, making New Hampshire the sixth state to allow same-sex marriage. Lynch, a Democrat, personally opposed gay marriage but earlier said he would view the issue "through a broader lens." Virtually all of New England now allows same-sex marriage, with Rhode Island the sole exception.

Said New Hampshire's favorite gay son, Bishop V. Eugene Robinson, "It's about being recognized as whole people and whole citizens. There are a lot of people standing here who when we grew up could not have imagined this," Robinson said. "You can't imagine something that is simply impossible. It's happened, in our lifetimes."

So now we have yet another state that allows gay and lesbian couples, and even transgenders, to marry on January 1, 2010. You can bet there will be couples lined up taking advantage of the new law on New Years morning!


However if you're transgender, you won't be able to work. Like Massachusetts or Connecticut, you can only marry but still be fired for being who you are. As Bishop Robinson said, you're whole people, whole citizens – just not free to work in the Live Free Or Die state. And no, if you have no ability to be hired and end up homeless, you can't live FOR free there. Of course you do have the right to die there and they likely won't have much problem with that. It's the latter option in their motto, and we trans people certainly aren't free to work in New Hampshire.

For trans Americans (unless you live under a rock), we remember the recent New Hampshire senate vote on Trans employment non discrimination. Zero to 24 – we were absolutely shut out! That spoke volumes!

In discussing how marriage will affect the New Hampshire primaries in 2012, an Associated Press article noted it was likely to have an affect in that state's election dialogue. They note that in New Hampshire, Republicans tend to be more fiscally conservative and socially moderate.

"When presidential candidates campaign here, they have traditionally focused on the economy, foreign policy, health care," said political analyst Dean Spiliotes. "Social issues have never really played a major role here in the campaign."

That's rather interesting. It also flies in the face of recent reality, where Republicans defeated trans employment non discrimination by forcing a new name upon it: "the Bathroom bill."

Now I ask: does that sound like New Hampshire Republicans are socially moderate? Do you believe social issues never really play a major role there?

Yet even in hard-ass, conservative places like New Hampshire where they still openly play trans people as perverted freaks lurking around bathrooms, same-sex marriage is now legal. Six years ago marriage wasn't even on the radar. Employment non discrimination, which has been worked on for over 15 years is not a reality.

On employment, we in the Trans community are actually a bit worse off than we were when the marriage fight began. Not only are employment rights stalling, but bathroom issues and freakish caricatures of society's phobias about trans people are becoming more common in even the halls of government.

That's to say nothing of the increased difficulties in trans people getting jobs in the first place! Unlike gays and lesbians, when trans people transition we face the no-match problems with Social Security and other complications thanks to the Real I.D. Act. Blogger Marti Abernathey pointed this out in her TransAdvocate blog recently [http://www.transadvocate.com/no-match-no-job-no-surgery.htm]

I always thought when I got my documentation changed, I transitioned, and was passable, that I'd be able to live the nice normal life I did before transition. It hasn't quite worked out that way. Recently I was interviewed a few times and offered a job... and then I got that dreaded call.

"Marti, we were doing our normal background check and we have a problem. We keep getting a rejection with your gender."

I had to tell my potential future employer that I am a pre-operative transsexual.

It must be said that Marti lives in Wisconsin, the first state in the union to enact employment non discrimination for sexual orientation, and one that still has no such protection for trans folk like her.

Worse still, I live in good-old-boy, rednecked, so-arch-conservative-that-fascists-are-bleeding-heart-liberals Texas. My last permanant job was in 2002 with only a patchwork of temporary jobs since. Imagine the prospects for trans people in the southern tier of states.

Even if states like Wisconsin or Texas or any others newly enact non discrimination laws, it's not like marriage where folks line up and immediately take advantage of the new law. Marriage happens immediately upon the day it goes into effect.

Employment, especially for trans people who are still lagging far behind on being known and understood, it may be months, a year or years after before an employer hires trans people. So, when have we seen anyone in the gay and lesbian leadership or media prioritize employment recently?

Yes, we did have a big stink raised over President Barack Obama not nominating an "out" gay or lesbian to his cabinet yet. He's only hired 31 gays or lesbians to various staff positions that apparently aren't considered key or high-profile positions. But that's a very limited employment opportunity scope. And it's also for "high-ranking" and "respected" and "openly" gay White House staffer, per Charles Socarides May 1, 2009 article in the Washington Post.

To Socarides' credit though, he did also mention need for an "omnibus federal gay civil rights legislation, similar to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, outlawing discrimination based on sexual orientation." (Yeah, I know ... nothing in there that effects trans.)

But that's been about the extent of it on employment.

As for now I keep getting more stories from my friends of their lost jobs, their vastly reduced hours or income, the long-term-with-no-end-in-sight unemployment (not unlike my own!) and folks on the edge of going homeless. I've lost touch with at least one who likely has now gone homeless: another blip that stops pulsing on the radar screen.

Meanwhile, we have the right to marry who we wish in New Hampshire. That's important.

I only wish it were as important for trans people to live. Live Free ... or ... Die. Indeed.

"A lot of New Hampshire families have come to know people in their families who are gay -- co-workers, former classmates – and that's what really made this difference. We are no longer talking about an issue. We are talking about people." — Bishop V. Eugene Robinson

"To have no job is to have no pride. You're nobody. Where do you go? There's nothing...." — unidentified former professional man interviewed in a homeless encampment in Florida.

Talk Radio Has Its Voice, Gay & Lesbian Has Its Voice. Where's Our Voice?

"God forbid, if my son put on a pair of high heels, I would probably hit him with one of my shoes.... You got a boy saying, ‘I wanna wear dresses.’ I’m going to look at him and go, ‘You know what? You’re a little idiot! You little dumbass! Look, you are a boy! Boys don’t wear dresses!’" — Arnie States from his morning show on KRXQ FM in Sacramento.

There's been a bit of a brouhaha over the comments made on a radio show out in Sacramento. Today's show's second half, as I listened in, had less of the more incendiary commentary of what was said the day before (at least until the end when Arnie, the resident peckerwood, saved it for a parting shot before leaving).

One thing the commenters of this type of speech are neglecting to see is the potential to foment such behavior and validate it by high-profile (presumed to be worthy) opinion-makers. All they do, per their own words, is offer their opinion (and in a country with free speech, that should be allowed.) However, they fail to see their profile and media prominence, with an absolute lack of a counterbalance type of show, only provides a broadcast-induced mantra to the public.

As long as opinion is just opinion, it's harmless. It's just that not all listeners happen to leave it as merely opinion. As witnessed over the Bush years, and really even going back to the Gingrich revolution, there is a group that feed off of this mob mentality and feels entitlement to take things a step further. America is all about standing out, being number one, being extreme. So what happens when someone takes an opinion and superimposes their own spin, their own magnnification of it tailored to the individual's own personal frustrations and agreement that "these weirdos" are the problem?

We just witnessed a taste of that with Scott Roeder's Sunday church service murder of Dr. George Tiller. Tiller, a controversial abortion doctor known in right-wing media, especially among folks like Bill O'Reilly, as "Dr. Tiller the Baby Killer" was a prime example of media's power to stir amok with some of its listenership's emotions. Roeder was the impressionable type to pick up on a lot of O'Reilly's commentary and, after feeling both frustrated and emboldened enough, acted out in pretty much a fashion that O'Reilly's words would indicate he approved, regardless of whatever explanation his post-facto sentiments may try to claim.

So what happens when parents who are discovering they are raising a child whose birth sex and innate gender are incongruous listen in on this Rob, Arnie & Dawn show? To her credit Dawn Rossi played the level-headed foil. But hearing Rob Williams or Arnie States talking about enforcing a hard line with discipline, hitting them with shoes, belittling them with terms like "freak" and "dumbass" or discussing their "disorders" mandating therapy while doing nothing at all to try to understand they've failed to grasp this condition only signals a green light to any other vulnerable parent of a trans child looking for an answer. With suggestions that hitting them with a shoe or the child needing a beat down, a few of their listeners may use this to validate exactly such behavior.

"You know, my favorite part about hearing these stories about the kids in high school, who the entire high school caters around, lets the boy wear the dress. I look forward to when they go out into society and society beats them down. And they end up in therapy." — Arnie States from his morning show on KRXQ FM in Sacramento.

And to the Arnies of the world, I'll let you know right now: you don't ever beat it out of the kid. Lived through that. It didn't work. You can certainly beat the kid, but the kid remains the same; just beaten. They'll just wait, as I did, until they're an adult and do what they feel anyway. It's like a kid who grows up in a liberal hippie household whose parents beat him for wanting to be a soldier or a capitalist or something more conservative. The kid will eventually grow up and be themselves anyway.

The Arnies want to be understood for who they are – they just don't want to understand others (like trans kids) for who they are. All that the Arnie-style parents will do is raise kids who feel their parents were selfish, obstinate and didn't ever respect or love them. They'll guarantee their child's resentment and mistrust! Perhaps that's a victory to some parents: if your kid doesn't grow up the way you want him or her to be, just toss them out. Who needs them? Perhaps that's what our disposable society produces: disposable kids.

My personal opinion of that style parenting is the stereotyped, peabrained, liquor-addled trailer trash parent. Throw the kid away like you'd throw away a bottle beer in the general direction of the trash can. Pick up and move your mobile home on wheels to a different lot, or hell, just buy a new one altogether – a double-wide! Why stick with something, eh?

More than the kids, though, what does that indicate of those type of parents?

Now some of the commentary Rob, Arnie & Dawn received from the community was unfortunate, and quite over the line. As I explained to them, though, it's likely indicative of similar but greater frustration to what some of their regular listeners feel. They gave back some of the more extreme commentary that they've experienced over time, giving them a vicarious sense of what years of Michael Savage, Bill O'Reilly, Peter LaBarbera and others have wrought.


Yes, there should be free speech. But perhaps there should also be much more of the other side of this coin, and not just the inciteful and spiteful seeking what they feel is a feckless and defenseless target. They spent the morning show today belittling the gay spokesperson on FOX News for expressing his opinions, even if it was indicating he thought they should be taken off the air (which they won't). But neither Rob, Arnie nor Dawn realized he was similarly expressing his opinion! Really, when it boils down, even their extreme commenters ripping them up were expressing opinion as well.

So where is the arbitrary line crossed?

"[I'm] still saddened that people think it more important that their children conform to their preconceived notions rather than letting them be who they truly are." — Amy Guarr, mother of Ian, a transgender female-to-male teen who took his life shortly before graduation.

To be certain, as the show pointed out, transgenders are not the only people who suffer hate violence. However, we are targeted much more frequently than other groups. Therein lies the crux of the issue that this shows' hosts fail to, or refuse to grasp. The latter option is much more troubling.

Another point that Dawn rightly brought up is that the spokespeople who were on FOX or from GLAAD, speaking out loudest and maybe a bit more extreme in mainstream media against their show, were gay and lesbian – and that there was a difference between them and transgender. She noted how gay groups were trying to simply make the point and assist on the issue, but that it shouldn't automatically be attributed word-for-word to transgenders. She gets extra points for that (as many in the straight world have a bad habit of conflating one as being the other).

While we may have phrase things differently, it also points up the fact that we don't have our own organizations in media to speak to these issues. Nearly always it's a gay or lesbian leader from one of the established, funded and staffed organizations that makes the connection to media. And media, typically not knowing any better, usually believes it to be the trans community's choice, our voice, our words. Often times, it's not.

But we're left with that currently as we don't have the viable opportunities for our own voice as yet.

It was refreshing for someone outside of our greater Queer Community note that difference for once. Far too often in our own community, even we don't make those distinctions.

"Real love is unconditional. The foundation of a genuinely meaningful relationship with a child is unconditional love, for only this will nurture a child emotionally and spiritually. Only unconditional love can ensure that a child will not be plagued with immature anger, resentment, guilt, depression, anxiety, and insecurity. For only unconditional love places the needs of the child first. Unconditional love is the vital element of the first foundation stone of proactive parenting." — Dr. Ross Campbell from the website www.spiritrestoration.org

"Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself. They came through you but not from you and though they are with you yet they belong not to you." — artist and writer, Khalil Gibran

The Play: "I Survived Stonewall" ... an Interview with a Stonewall Veteran, Big Roy McCarthy

The following is a reprint of an article familiar to folks in the Houston area. It was initially done for the June 1999 issue of the TATS (Texas Assn. for Transsexual Support) newsletter which I edited for a number of years. It was ten years ago – the 30th Anniversary of Stonewall.

Big Roy McCarthy worked at KPFT (a Pacifica station in Houston) at the time I was doing my own radio show there for After Hours: Queer Radio With Attitude. Big Roy did our Queer News portion of our show.

Knowing Roy's history, I decided to commandeer him one night before our show and sit for a couple hours with a tape recorder to get him in his own words on what it was like being there at ground zero and involved physically in the Stonewall Riots. He wasn't one of the "Stonewall Girls", the instigators of the riot. However he had a shadier side to his personal life then as a young gay hustler, and could very much relate to the environ at that time and an eyewitness account that few others could report.

Afterwards, I transcribed it en toto, then cut and spliced the various bits of stories and arranged them to flow a bit more chronologically.

While Roy's perspective was mildly different than the T-girls and stone butches there, he still represents a part of the gay movement that was left behind, nevertheless. An editorial note: in those days (as we learned from Sylvia Rivera), "Transvestite" or Queen was the terminology for girls like us who were not post-operative. There was no "transgender" or "crossdresser" nomenclature for many years after, and I believe Roy was using those contemporary words more to be politically sensitive than in an accurate recounting of how trans folks were referred to in those days.

While ten years has gone by since, it's still worth retelling to those who may not know what Stonewall was really about (it was said that former HRC Exec. Dir. Cheryl Jacques had to be told what it was after hiring on with the group). This is the reason for June being designated "Pride Month"!

Now, Big Roy in his own words ....

*********************************************************************
To think that it has been 30 years since that night in June that all this has happened ....

We've made a lot of progress, but there's a lot more to be made. The fight continues on – and I'm right out there!

Opening Night

I had a most unusual beginning, an initiation to the riots. I was asleep!

I was across the street ... my childhood sweetheart was fixing to start his first year at Columbia University – he was a psych major. I was spending the summer with him, and I was upstairs in his apartment sound asleep; and his apartment was right across the street from Stonewall Inn. He comes running upstairs saying "Roy! Roy! The queens are rioting across the street! The queens are rioting!"

So I go running down, following him. By the time we got down there, the paddy wagon had just pulled up. The queens were just starting to come out and someone had just thrown a high heel. There may have been coins or whatever, but I was there within a couple minutes after the festivities started. I did see high heels flying!

The queens – the transgenders or crossdressers – were yelling something from across the street by the paddy wagon. They were yelling at the cops. We were cheering on the transgenders – the crossdressers – it just sort of snowballed from there.

Setting The Stage....

You gotta understand where everybody's head politically was at at that time. We're talking late 60's: 1969. We're talking about a period of time when it was not only okay, but fashionable to riot against authority thanks to the Vietnam War, and ... to the Civil Rights Riots a year before, Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King were assassinated. We had rioting in the streets!

We were rioting and protesting the Vietnam War all along, and we had Moratorium Day every October 17, somewhere around the middle of October. We had anti-Vietnam War Moratorium March, which almost always turned into rioting. Later on in the summer of '69 we also had Woodstock!

In the Gay community – now when I talk about the Gay community, people have to understand I'm not talking about male homosexuals. I am old school, and when I talk about gay community, the transgenders were a part of it. We never ever considered them not! Bisexuals, crossdressers, were never ever not considered part of it! We were all gay! I'm kind of sad that all this division and fracturization has come about.

Back then in the gay community we were kinda pissed off that everyone else was getting their civil rights and we weren't. We were tired of the police busting in and dragging us out just because we were out there to have a good time.

And even the crossdressers were pissed off because by law they had to have at least three articles of clothing on them that were according to their birth gender. All these things set up to ... guarantee that we would have a record. They would tell us to go across the street, and we would follow the police orders. And there would be another cop across the street waiting to give us a ticket for jaywalking.

We were tired of gay people being locked up in psychiatric hospitals and getting tortured! We had our own Auschwitzes and Dachaus! And we were just pissed off about all of that! And it had to end!

It was obvious with the paddy wagon there, they were just doing another one of their Saturday night raids.

It was hot and it was humid that night, and none of us were really in the best of moods that night. We had just buried Judy Garland that day in Forest Lawn out in Hollywood – our icon! We were kinda pissed off.

The First Acts

At first the cops cleared out Stonewall Inn. Those that weren't gonna get loaded up in the paddy wagons, the cops were telling them to go home. We started taunting the cops, and ... they saw the crowd that was starting to gather.

The crowd this time was getting bigger and bigger and we started pressing in on the police. And they got scared! They took refuge inside the Stonewall Inn and barricaded themselves inside. It was after that that somebody had pulled up a parking meter outside there from Christopher Street and smashed in a window.

I got by one of the police cars – the NYPD patrol care – and I was at the back and I start shaking up and down on the back. Then we started rocking it from side to side, up and down from the front and back, see-sawing the front and back and rocking it from side to side. Next thing, we ended up turning it over on its roof. We crushed its little 'bubble-gum machine' it had on top.

By now there was a huge crowd, and somebody somewhere had tossed a Molotov cocktail, and I helped set the cop car on fire. By that time it was only 20 minutes from the time I first arrived down there ... and there was a huge crowd!

The Emotion

Back then I wasn't as big as I am now. I was about 5'-7", about 130 lbs. I was a 19-year old male prostitute. In '69, I was a prostitute because I'd been kicked out of home and I was living on the streets and I had to survive. The Stonewall Inn was made up of the dregs of the community. Transgenders and transsexuals were not allowed in many of the gay clubs. And the Stonewall Inn was mostly prostitutes and drug addicts and drag queens and transgenders. It was not your respectable gay club!

But it was those of us who had nothing to lose and stood up, and everybody joined in afterwards. We were all very tight knit; very tight knit! It wasn't like we were giving verbal support to the queens who were getting locked up in the paddy wagon. It wasn't just some sort of spectator thing like at a football game. This was something from our heart, deep down inside.


The Climactic Scene

By this time we could hear cop cars coming like crazy from every which direction. And riot police were showing up. I was looking around for my boyfriend, my lover. I saw there was this leather-jacketed NYPD motorcycle cop who had my boyfriend in a headlock.

Now my boyfriend was wearing these John Lennon granny glasses which were very popular at the time. And [the cop] had him in a headlock with his baton, hitting him in the face with the bottom end of the baton. And blood was coming from my boyfriend's face. He was my first love, puppy love, fierce love!

I lost my mental capacity for reason. I jumped on the back of that cop and I took the baton from that cop and – with some strength from somewhere – the adrenaline got me going where I was able to take the baton out of the cop's hand and I was beating on the cop!

I know I got about three of four hits on the guy, and the next thing I knew – bang! I'm seeing stars and I'm on the ground. Then there's blood coming all down my face on the left side! A cop on horseback came up behind me and whacked me in the head with his nightstick. That was some of the TPF: Tactical Patrol Force.

This was before there was such a thing as a SWAT unit. They used Tactical Patrol and they were on horseback. And they used those police to disperse riots and ... that's what they did on me! And I was really bloodied. A piece of my skull got chipped off and wound up on Christopher Street.

To this day I've got a place in my head where a piece of my skull is missing – a little chip off the old block!

Salvation During Battle

It was four transgendered people who saved my butt! At the time they were called [transvestites] as opposed to drag queens. Drag Queen was a regular guy – gay or straight – who dressed up as a woman to perform a show. Crossdressers – or transgenders as now – were 24 hrs. Transvestites would dress up to go out to a club, but they were not necessarily performers. They would just dress up to go out to a club.

There was like one on each arm, my arms and my legs, and then they carried me down to a basement place where they helped patch me up.

There was some tear gas that had been shot at us, and in fact one of the canisters ... I do remember the canister going off not five, six feet in front of me when I was out on the street. I got a full face, full throttle. I told the transgendered person "get a bucket of water ... and just dump it on top of me." That's the best first aid; a bucket of water.

The rioting went on for about three days. I never was able to find my boyfriend until after ... later on the next week. I found out that a piece of glass from his eyeglasses got punctured through the eye and lodged in the brain. He is now in a psychiatric hospital up in Maine. Beyond repair.

His parents refused to bring charges against the police at the time because they said "this was God's judgment upon us."

In fact no charges were ever brought against any of the demonstrators. We were all originally arrested and charged with drunk and rioting and disorderly conduct and all that. But Mayor Jon Lindsay stepped in and ordered that charges not be brought against any of us, and we were all released.

When I say "we", I mean the other people. I was never in jail myself.

Antagonists Within

To this day I have no affection for Harry Hay and the Mattachine Society. To have us arrested and to tell us to "Quiet down! Don't rock the boat!" – I'm sorry!

I try to be inclusive, and I know there are other issues that people care about. But basic fundamental of the right to be, and the right to love who I feel attracted to is basic and most important, and overriding of everything else.

The Mattachine Society was afraid that if we rioted, we were going to throw the clock back 20 years – if that was possible!

The Mattachine Society is equivalent to our modern-day Log Cabiners. The Mattachine Society was a group of self-hating, self-loathing gay folks who felt we were all emotionally underdeveloped or something; sub-human in some way. These were a bunch of yellow-bellied cowards who were frightened in little corners, who didn't want us to upset the apple cart, who thought at that time that if we didn't create any kind of a mess ... if we just did things quietly and applied for disability – let the psychiatric people say we did not develop emotionally enough or psychologically, that there was something wrong with us mentally or emotionally because we loved people of the same sex or the same gender ... or because someone who was a male and always identified as a female wanted to really pursue that – obviously that person was wacked out! And it was just as strong with transsexual, transgender people.

Sexual [Reassignment] Surgery was started in the 50's or something. It was not new by the time the riot came around. However, there was a lot of kids who were sexually trying to [reassign] themselves in back rooms and hallways because of fear. And because there was just nowhere else for them to go.

However, thanks to the Mattachine Society telling everybody we're sick, we're mentall ill – that was hard enough for gay people ... but for transsexuals, where could they turn? Avenues of positive help were not open, even though they did exist.

And guys who wanted to be female had nowhere to turn. They felt so disgusted with themselves, they tried to sexual [reasign] themselves with a razor blade, and clean towels and a needle and thread! It just did not work! This was the same period of time when abortions were still illegal and many women were getting it in back alleys and butcher shops. A lot of guys hemorrhaged to death in their bathrooms and died in back alleys.

And the Mattachine Society wanted us to stay that way. I think it's also important to understand that most of the people in the Mattachine Society were middle-class and upper-middle and upper-class people economically. So they had a lot to lose, and they saw us as a threat.

The Log Cabin is in essence the modern-day Mattachines. The Mattachine Society did not speak for the gay community. Just like the Log Cabin does not speak for the transgender community. They never have, and they never will!


The Closing Act

For the next two nights there was rioting going on. Yeah, I was there! I was out there, bandaged-up head and all ... just screaming along with everyone else! We were just a big mob in the street. And there was this park – I think it was Washington Park – right there at the end of Christopher Street. Right there, at the end of three days, was born the Gay Liberation Front. Of course everything back in those days was Liberation Fronts And so, before there was a Gay Political Caucus, there was a Gay Liberation Front.

And in those early days – I shouldn't just say transgender-inclusive because nobody was excluded – the whole thing of Gay Pride Parade and everything ... of that night ... was started by and was all about the transgenders! Gay people – gay males – joined in! But it was started by transgenders.

Now even though we joined in within five or ten minutes, it was still five or ten minutes later! We joined in – it's important for people to understand! To join in means that somebody else was already there. And that was the transgenders.

Somebody said it was a brick – I say it was a high-heeled shoe. Who knows if it was a pump or a brick ... or a pumped-up brick! It was called "The Hairpin Drop Heard 'Round The World." That's how CBS news covered it, and ABC News covered it, and it was in Time Magazine.

"The Hairpin Drop Heard 'Round The World": I guess that was the first Gay Pride slogan!

The Review

My favorite memory is the moment I first went out the door, and I saw the queens and the transgenders being loaded up in the paddy wagon and somebody – finally – threw a high heel! It was that moment. It was such a liberating moment inside. It was so freeing!

It felt so good: finally we're not taking this shit no more! Pardon my french! We weren't going to take it any more! No more! Over! That is it! No más!

I have heard that people went around to a bunch of different gay clubs ... saying "out of the clubs, into the streets!" Or "out of the bars, into the streets!" I think that's what somebody told me was being said. I mean, I don't know because I was already in the street! That was a defining moment.

It feels special in some ways, and in other ways it feels like an accident of history. Thirty years later, I am so saddened by knowing where the community is at now; in which transgenders and transsexuals in many cities are excluded from the Pride Parade.

Many transgendered and many gay people do not know the role that the transgenders [played]; how important....

We would not have Gay Pride if it was not for the transgenders. We would not have Gay Pride Week! [...] Everything had its birth with transgenders and transsexuals finally standing up!

Some people call Harry Hay (founder of the Mattachine Society) one of the 'great founders.' He was founder of nothing! If anything, he held us back! And to tell us "Don't Make Waves!" Well, just remember this: if you don't make waves, you ain't going nowhere!

And we had to go somewhere, because this could not continue. The hypocrisy of it all was really astounding. Which is why, for thirty years, I have always been there for the transgendered people because, quite literally, you saved my butt! And helped patch me up!

Nobody's perfect. Sometimes, in spit of themselves, by accident they get it right!

"I like being different. I like deviating from the norm." – lesbian, feminist author, Tammy Bruce

"We are the Stonewall girls.
We wear our hair in curls.
We wear no underwear.
We show our pubic hair.
We wear our dungarees
Above our nelly knees." – chant by Queens at Stonewall Riots such as Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson and others as they regrouped to re-advance on the cops.

June Is Pride Month, But Trans Folk Just Don't Feel Much....

"When authorities warn you of the sinfulness of sex, there is an important lesson to be learned. Do not have sex with the authorities." — Matt Groening, creator of the Simpsons

Yesterday began the month of June: Pride Month in America and other countries around the world. It's, as the name indicates, a source of pride for many in the greater LGBT community. For some of us, it's a reminder of how little we have to take pride in at all.

While not in all cities, a sizable number of them hold their Gay Pride celebrations and parades in this month. Of course as many know already, this was the month chosen as it was the month of the Stonewall Inn Riots in New York City's Greenwich Village on June 28, 1969.

There have been a lot of gains made in the movement over the past forty years. Indeed, even same-sex marriage is gaining momentum, winning passage in numerous states on an issue that just over six years ago was merely a pipe dream. Gays and lesbians are winning acceptance and even popular support in media and even in politics for being considered "equal" citizens. Even one of the most arch-conservative voices around, ex-Vice Pres. Dick Cheney, just came out in a story reported in AP to support states granting rights for same-sex marriage.

"I think, you know, freedom means freedom for everyone," Cheney said in a speech at the National Press Club. "I think people ought to be free to enter into any kind of union they wish, any kind of arrangement they wish. And I think that's the way it ought to be handled today, that is, on a state-by-state basis. Different states will make different decisions. But I don't have any problem with that. I think people ought to get a shot at that,"

However you rarely see anyone saying the same thing about employment, and specifically about trans people in the workplace. About the extent we're treated to is Rep. Barney Frank: "“Efforts to include transgender people have failed in New York, Massachusetts and Maryland,” he said. “It doesn’t get easier when you throw in South Carolina and Utah.” Ol' Barn' said he's “more optimistic” that an inclusive ENDA would pass, but stopped short of saying he was certain the bill would pass with the gender identity provisions.

“There’s no certainty in politics,” he said. “People got to lobby hard."

"trans inclusion will be a legislative priority over my dead body" — Elizabeth Birch, then Exec. Dir. of the Human Rights Campaign (HRC)

There is one bright spot in President Barack Obama's proclamation on LGBT Pride Month, which began: "Forty years ago, patrons and supporters of the Stonewall Inn in New York City resisted police harassment that had become all too common for members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community." Did you get that? The President of the United States has actually uttered the word "transgender" (at least in writing)!
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Presidential-Proclamation-LGBT-Pride-Month/

While this has long ago become a fait accompli with gay and lesbian America, we're just now getting our first taste of even this small gesture: mere mention, acknowledgement that we even exist to the outside world! At times, we don't even get this from gay or lesbian leadership even in 2009. The President noticed!

It's not a panacea. We still have precious few rights, and even fewer opportunities for even the basics such as employment. In this increasingly anemic economy, trans peoples' lives are currently being devastated.

But at least in declaration, Pres. Obama has done what no other president has. "I continue to support measures to bring the full spectrum of equal rights to LGBT Americans. These measures include enhancing hate crimes laws, supporting civil unions and Federal rights for LGBT couples, outlawing discrimination in the workplace, ensuring adoption rights, and ending the existing "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy in a way that strengthens our Armed Forces and our national security.... During LGBT Pride Month, I call upon the LGBT community, the Congress, and the American people to work together to promote equal rights for all, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity."

There is a faint glimmer of some promise for Trans people.

Meanwhile we find ourselves in the midst of the auspicious anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, 40 years after. We have out federal congressmembers, out Administration staff and hundreds if not more than a thousand out state and local elected officials. Trans people have one mayor recently elected in Silverton, Oregon and a state school board member in Hawaii.

As has been the case for decades, there are gay and lesbians working on staff at even the highest levels on Capitol Hill. This year saw the first trans person ever hired by Congress in Rep. Barney Frank's office.

Americans are long ago familiar with the need for equality for gays and lesbians, and most of the country is already there in support. Trans people's issues get scant attention when it's our call. Our attempts to educate, when not closely guided by gay and lesbian leadership, are criticized and privately discredited at the same time the Barney Franks of the world chide us for "not doing the needed education" in this Catch-22 exercise.

Media and popular support are rallying around gay and lesbian leaders pushing for marriage rights and fighting for equality. When we do manage to get trans people's own independent thoughts out in media, we are reprimanded, and undermined and blackballed out of eyesight in order to ensure we don't get media's ear again. The message: we can't be trusted to speak from our own perspective or to articulate our own issues.

Yes it is Pride Month, and there's certainly something to note after forty years, especially after the President's proclamation.

But for trans people who've been pushing for well over a decade at great personal expense, losing jobs and income, going bankrupt, into foreclosure, going homeless ... pride is not what we're feeling right now. Desperation and the survival instinct are.

"I am sick of the disparity between things as they are and as they should be. I'm tired.I'm tired of the truth and I'm tired of lying about the truth." — from the play "The Death of Bessie Smith" by Edward Franklin Albee III

A Month Shy Of The 40th Anniversary Of Stonewall And A Pride Parade Is Boycotted

"We've been working our whole lives to make things equal. And we still got nothing. They don't care about trans people. ... But we will come back. We will fight back." — Sylvia Rivera from an interview on KPFT, June 9, 2001

As we come upon June 28, 2009 – the 40th Anniversary of the Stonewall Riots in New York City which catalyzed the public push for rights among GLBT people – we will see any number of events popping up to remember the occasion. While it may not have begun the actual behind-the-scenes work for rights, it arguably was the key moment to bring gay rights into the lexicon and consciousness of the rest of the world.

However, it became gay rights only shortly thereafter when those same behind-the-scenes, shadowy leaders in high places with memberships in the Mattachine or the Daughters of Bilitis commandeered the rough cut protests and tailored into a palatable visual for the inception of rights attainment.

This was a boon for the gay and lesbian community, but for those molotov-throwing "queens" and the "stone butch dykes" that began the physical confrontation and spontaneously organized the resistance, it was an opportunity quickly stripped from them. Any of them who would identify as the opposite gender, such as our movement's forebearers Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson and the like, would find themselves squarely on the primrose path to hell. Many of them would never live to see the day when they are equal.

Fast forward forty years: there has been much progress on the GLBT front. However, there is disparate levels of progress between the G or L portion as opposed to the T. Marriage rights is on everyone lips these days and enjoys a hearty push and the most recent victories in a few states. And as soon as these victorious laws are enacted, couples begin lining up immediately for the nuptials.

At the same time, employment is tenuous for everyone – but especially so for the trans community. We're seeing our folks losing work, and worse, losing homes to foreclosure and going homeless at startling levels. Even once non discrimination laws are enacted, it could be years before society wraps it's brain around it enough to actually hire trans people – hell, even gay and lesbian groups don't have faith enough in trans people to hire them beyond the rare instance.

In a sense, it is Dickensian: the best of times for some, the worst of times for the rest.


As we enter into Pride month and begin our marches and rallies, let's keep in mind the many of our pioneers who fought for equal rights for all, even after they were denied those same rights by actions of some of those very people they fought for. As the gay and lesbian community had their Bayard Rustin, so do we trans people have our Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson.

"Goodbye to the summer.
Sold down the river.
Unhappy ever after.
Well did you ever? ...
Burns are red, bruises blue.
Out with the old. Cheated by the new.
Do you suffer from long-term memory loss?
I don't remember ...." — Amnesia, Chumbawamba

And if you think we're rounding the corner into getting everyone in our collective Queer community on the same page, I've attached a press blurb below in its entirety from the more progressive (at least much more so than the U.S!) environs of the U.K., where London's Pride is exhibiting the community stress fractures as well.

http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=87458034207&h=KYuc9&u=af_fr&ref=mf

TransLondon announces boycott of Pride London, 2009

In a busy meeting on May 19th, members of TransLondon, London's largest support group for all trans-identified and genderqueer people, voted overwhelmingly for a boycott of the Pride London 2009 march and rally. As a result, for the first time since the group was formed, TransLondon will have no presence in the parade, nor at the rally.

This is part of an ongoing estrangement from Pride. Last year, a successful Pride march was marred at the rally in Trafalgar Square when a number of trans women were denied access to the women's toilets by Pride security stewards. One woman was subsequently sexually assaulted after being told to use the male toilets. Roz Kaveney, one of the women targeted in the 2008 "ToiletGate" incident, explained how she felt Pride London had only ever provided a grudging apology under threat of legal action, and that she felt they had never taken the discrimination against trans women in the 2008 rally seriously.

During the meeting on May 19th 2009, members heard how the democratic and transparent structure used in 2008 to co-ordinate participation of trans groups and the funds made available for transgender attendees, through the elected Trans@Pride committee, has been abolished by Pride London for 2009. Instead, Pride London have imposed their own unelected "representative" for the trans strand. Furthermore, requests for information about funding, how decisions were made and who participated in the decision-making process, have been rebuffed.

Last year, the elected Trans@Pride Committee consulted repeatedly with over a dozen groups and hundreds of individuals over before arranging travel bursaries for trans people to attend from around the country, hosting a breakfast for marchers on the day, commissioning artwork from a local queer artist as a rallying point for trans marchers, producing banners and bunting, arranging trans performers for all of the Pride stages including the main stage in Trafalgar Square and publicising the arrangements widely. In stark contrast, the meeting heard of how Pride London's appointed trans "representative" for 2009 has simply imposed Pride’s vision for trans participation in the march and rally.

The 2009 pride participation is, so we are told, to consist of a float at the very back of the parade which would pander to the most tired and inaccurate media stereotypes of trans people. Trans women would, in Pride's vision, be dressed in sequins, high heels and fairy wings and, apparently as an afterthought, a few trans men would be invited to pose in football strips. The Pride representative explained that the trans float would complement a float at the front of the march with members of the cast of the West End musical, "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert". In her vision, onlookers would be delighted to see "Priscilla at the front and Priscilla at the back". As a coup de grace, a visible cordon of security stewards would surround the trans float, ostensibly "for our own protection".


Rather than address the true diversity of the trans community, members of TransLondon felt that participating in such an event would serve only to bolster the kind of negative media stereotypes which portray trans people as "the cast of Grease", and that these undemocratic plans constitute an insult to London's diverse trans community. Sarah Brown, a member of TransLondon, an elected member of Trans@Pride 2008 and co-founder of the London Transfeminist Group said, "If I am to march at Pride, it would be as the lesbian woman I am, not dressed up as a corporate parody".

To determine TransLondon's official position on participation in Pride London 2009, three options were put to the vote:

Option one, to participate in the march under the terms we felt were being dictated by the Pride London board, received no votes.

Option two, to participate in the march independently of the "official" trans strand, as a form of direct action to show our dissatisfaction, received 31% of the votes cast.

Option three, to boycott the parade and rally received 65% of the votes cast.

There were some abstentions from members who wanted to see what their friends in other groups were doing before making a decision.

The democratic decision of the membership of TransLondon is therefore that the organisation will have no official presence or banner at Pride London, 2009.


Christina Alley, co-organiser of TransLondon and elected member of Trans@Pride 2008 said, "Volunteers from a dozen trans groups worked incredibly hard for Pride last year. Members of TransLondon are extremely disappointed at being betrayed, marginalised and stereotyped in this way by Pride. Members have made their disappointment clear in a democratic vote to boycott this year’s march and rally."

TransLondon is keen to hear from other trans groups, allies and any groups from other parts of the LGBTQ community who also feel disenfranchised by Pride London this year. We would like to discuss alternative arrangements for a celebration of the diversity of the LGBTQ community, free from cynical corporate politics, where we can enjoy the true spirit of Pride.

Reactions to TransLondon’s announcement:

We were extremely proud to march with TransLondon in the parade last year along with dozens of other groups and individuals of all ages and backgrounds. As a result of this announcement we are devastated this display of unity won’t be repeated this year. The only official offer of “support” from Pride this year has an offer to send a selection of our own members to be part of their separate and official “Trans Float” which we have already objected to on the same grounds as TransLondon. So we’ve had to seek funding for banner-making and costumes elsewhere as Pride London seem unwilling to hand any over.

We are currently reviewing our involvement in the parade pending the outcome of further consultation with our membership. Regardless of the outcome we remain committed to supporting safe, inclusive spaces for ALL trans young people even if many of our individual members decide to support a boycott.
Statement from Trans Youth Network http://www.transyouth.org

Contact: Joey McKillop (red_chimera@hotmail.co.uk)

Queer Youth Network members are still committed to participating in the parade because pride is often the first time they have had the chance to actually be out in public as a group so we will support anyone who wishes to do that. Some of our volunteers who have previously taken a break from their duties in order to assist Pride have decided not to offer their services as stewards this year. We appreciate the level of hard work that has gone in to organising the youth at pride activities and events, however we also accept they won’t appeal to everyone so our main focus will be supporting inclusive, grass roots events that bring all of our community together regardless of their identity. We have decided not to take part in the rally in Trafalgar Square and we will not be having a stall as we can’t afford the fees and most of us will be heading to Hyde Park instead.

Statement from Queer Youth Network http://www.queeryouth.org.uk
Contact: Jack Holroyde – Campaigns Officer (jack@queeryouth.net)

I fully support this boycott. I am sad to announce that Trans Ebony will not take part in Pride London this year. This would have been my first very pride in England having visited events all over the world. I was intending to enter a float for our group and was even told we could get some funding.

Pride London has the potential to offer a unique platform to showcase those normally ignored by the mainstream. As a struggling black transgendered artist I’m actually feeling incredibly angry towards those in charge of the festival. I was equally distressed to hear black and asian people have now been removed from the decision making process last week according to Pav Akhtar of UNISON and LGBT Muslim group IMAAN.

Deliberately closing so many doors on so many people does nothing but add to the multitude of prejudices trans ebony members live with every day of their lives. I accept we are a normally silent minority but that doesn’t change the fact London’s pride management have betrayed the very history it owes its existence to.

Angie Kingston (Founder) - Trans Ebony (tebony@teachers.org)

"Hey! We're just fucking 'round 'cause we've got no work, you know? ... You know what you want? Hey! You listen to me bollocks! You know what you want?!? A bloody revolution, that's what you want! Hey! Do you know what I think of you!?!" — Outsider, Chumbawamba

A Tale Of Two Protests

"Don't wonder why people go crazy. Wonder why they don't. In face of what we can lose in a day, in an instant, wonder what the hell it is that make us hold it together." — character Meredith Grey (Ellen Pompeo) in Grey's Anatomy

It's been interesting watching the two different protests in the greater Queer community over the past week: the APA protest over the categorization of trans people as a disorder, and the protests around the country after California's Supreme Court upheld Prop 8, removing the right to marry for same-sex couples.


Last week we saw the reports on the trans community's protest of the American Psychological Association's meeting to discuss reforms to the DSM-V (Fifth edition of the Diagnostic Statistical Manual dealing with mental disorders). At issue is the concern over how the DSM-V will categorize trans people going forth. It's bad enough to have had the pathologizing over the years. To continue the same after a full review would be devastating.

That said, they do have some folks on the committee considering the new version of the DSM who tend to favor keeping trans people pathologized. I won't go into the details on this as I know a number of other sources have covered it already, and have been dealing with it much more closely.


My one concern, which I haven't seen addressed yet, is when the DSM removes transsexualism specifically from the manual, then what? Over the years, I've understood the need to have something diagnosable in order to receive hormone replacement therapy. We need specific diagnostic categorizing in the Medical Association standards of care as soon as DSM is removed or sooner. As such, simply removing us from the DSM is only half the task.

"I have great confidence that our efforts are so crucial and colossal that we will render it impossible for our adversaries to reverse the direction of our socio-cultural transformations. As the great Reverend Martin Luther King said: “Unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.” [58] As we speak our truths, we must remember to love ourselves and our community members, and hold fast to the strength of our convictions." — trans activist and scholar, Joelle Ruby Ryan from the presentation "The Tipping Point"

The problem I see is that a condition such as ours which requires prescribed medication to assist and correct will need something to refer to. Physicians typically don't just write elective prescriptions upon patients' request (at least the reputable ones don't.) If we're removed from the DSM, without a psych's letter and without any standard of treatment in the medical journals, from where do we get our HRT?

Don't get me wrong: I firmly oppose our categorizing in the DSM. In fact, I felt so strongly about automatically being "disordered" (and the employment and insurance ramifications with it) that I circumvented the HBIGDA Standards and avoided counseling altogether, going straight to one of those less-than-reputable doctors back in 1995. Once on hormones, it was easy enough to move to another doctor more reputable and simply continue what was already started. But considering the prospects of everyone having to seek hormones through back channels is harrowing, considering black market medications coming over from China and elsewhere.

We need to be working on placement as a treatable medical condition in the AMA now (hint, hint).


But I digress. The protest drew 150 participants from around the country and speeches at the rally from those who've been deeply involved in this for some time, such as Andrea James and Kelley Winters.

Even Mara Keisling from NCTE was speaking and protesting, and it was good for her to be out there. The irony of Keisling, the self-appointed Washington insider, being in San Fran protesting can't be overlooked. She used to chide NTAC over our membership and lobbying for the LGBT Health Coalition, saying we weren't focusing on our primary issue: lobbying. In her words to me, we needed to "figure out what it is [we] want to be when we grow up." To her, I countered that we were lobbying with the Health Coalition, it did deal with legislation that would eventually be our primary purview (once ENDA and Hate Crimes passed), and we were right (as she herself later joined and lobbied with the Health Coalition).

However, protesting and working on GID reform with the APA which affects international standards of care for trans people is great work – but not going to affect legislation in DC one iota. When the Washington insider is in San Fran, who's minding the store? Maybe time for Mara to hear her own words and "figure out what it is you want to be when we grow up."

While the APA protest was successful in drawing a lot of participation, there was one thing the attendees and the rest of us noted. There was a collective yawn by the media. There was also wasn't much of any support from the gay and lesbian community or organizations, save for (ironically) HRC putting out a statement. Nevertheless, it registered nary a ripple outside our own community.


"I think heterosexuality and homosexuality are a kind of psychosis, and the truth is somewhere in the middle." — out lesbian, British novelist Jeanette Winterson

This week saw the same-sex marriage decision coming down from the California Supreme Court. Note the difference in attention level in the media. Also note the fact that even the trans community was awaiting and chattering about the "Decision Moment" and awaiting action. Sure enough, the Supreme Court upheld Prop 8 which was voted in last year. And sure enough, the protests began on both sides and even trans people were there front-and-center for the opposition to Prop 8 – even including APA protest organizer Danielle Askini in San Francisco.

Since then, the protest has been ubiquitous on all gay media and widely publicized on national mainstream news across the country – even though the law affects only one state. It's a pretty impressive media blitz on behalf of the gay and lesbian community, of which we should take note.

What gets me is how we're also seeing a number of trans folks around the country publicizing and working hard to pull support for Prop 8 protests in their states like Texas and Michigan! Michigan of course used to allow transsexual marriage until the year following the Massachusetts decision when that state (along with Kentucky) voted away the rights to same-sex marriage even for trans people. Texas, meanwhile, had the Christie Lee Littleton case where Texas' courts retroactively declared her Kentucky marriage was a same-sex coupling. Littleton's got scant attention from the media and, though proffered to the U.S. Supreme Court, was turned away from consideration by the high court.

Yet even here and other dark-age states where marriage is disallowed now post-Massachusetts and in states where marriage has been declared available to all, trans people are still attending the rallies, helping get the word out, expressing their outrage. Sometimes we don't even attend our own trans community protests in similar numbers!

Meanwhile, note the variance of participation and attention from the gay and lesbian community between issues key to gay and lesbians (marriage) and issues key to trans people (employment non discrimination vis a vis HRC, de-pathologizing trans in the DSM). No, I'm not the only one to notice this stark disparity.

"Marriage, n: the state or condition of a community consisting of a master, a mistress, and two slaves, making in all, two." — American satirist and journalist, Ambrose Bierce

"More marriages might survive if the partners realized that sometimes the better comes after the worse." — British Olympic athlete, Doug Larson

Even while we still have the criticisms of the gay and lesbian defenders of Barney Frank and HRC ringing in our ears after our attempts to raise our voice, we are now seeing protests and even public disobedience put forth by the gay and lesbian leaders. Our critics all but called us in words the "shrill" "crazy trannies" "protesting", and acknowledging that while we need employment, we also needed to wait. Now we have interviews on TV where protesters in California cry "not allowing us to marry is wrong! It's shameful that in this country I can be denied equal treatment just because I'm gay!"

(After New Hampshire's Senate vote last month, the dual standards of this entire scenario can't be missed.)

One blog even tagged it that "Gays and Lesbians are now 2nd and 3rd class citizens." It makes you wonder what class trans people are if we're somewhere well below 3rd class!


One out of state protester, Louis Thompson from Colorado, said "It's taxation without representation. It certainly is taxation without equal rights." And they even have elected officials that are gay. Trans people have none anywhere save for Silverton, Oregon. It seems the intensities of discrimination have somehow been flattened out all while marriage has moved front and center and supplanted the focus.

"We wish we shared the same rights you have, but we have to stand here until we have the same rights you do," said Kate Burns, another Denver protester who was arrested for their civil disobedience. "We don't feel that business should go as usual when all citizens aren't granted the same benefits and rights...."

There are even suggestions on the web to begin protesting President Barack Obama on his silence regarding Prop 8. And it's funny to think back that it was the Trans community who's long been portrayed as the screaming protesters, stirring up shit and living up to our "shrill" stereotype! Really?

One point of note is that these protests by the gay and lesbian community have had their effect. The media on the marriage issue has far eclipsed even employment non discrimination and hate crimes campaigns! Even on other recent subject, while being heavy supporters of Obama's rival Hillary Clinton's campaign, gays and lesbians even managed to draw media attention and use pressure on the Obama Administration to strive for out gays and lesbians in his cabinet and White House staff with at least a measure of success. After all the trans people working against Hillary and busting butt for Obama, how many have we seen? Zero?

The coordinated pressure, protests and media work! Especially in light of 2007, this is something the trans community must take note of!

Meanwhile, it becomes clearer every day that while the gay and lesbian community and the trans community are on similar quests, we're also on vastly different tracks – more so by the day. They're making gains. We're losing ground. We throw our effort into our issues and issues important to them. And how much are they supporting back? If you want to see what life is like once the gay and lesbian slate of issues on their agenda has been met, take a look at the Massachusetts example where trans people still have no hate crime protections, no employment non discrimination, virtually no rights at all and an Equality Federation group that helps their neighboring states win marriage rights and gives scant funding or assistance to the trans jobless or hate victims.

The one right trans people have is the right to marry! They can do so immediately. It must also be noted that even after employment non discrimination goes into effect, it may well be years afterwards before trans folk like me or Massachusetts residents like Ethan St. Pierre could ever be employed even in gay or lesbian workplaces or organizations.

So are our collective priorities set appropriately? It leads many of us to wonder....

"My advice to you is get married: if you find a good wife you'll be happy; if not, you'll become a philosopher." — Socrates

"You play. You win. You play. You lose. You play." — out lesbian British novelist, Jeanette Winterson

HRC Protest Houston: Only The Committed Continue Fighting Against The Odds

"There's no way out of here, when you come in you're in for good
There was no promise made, the part you've played, the chance you took
There are no boundaries set, the time and yet you waste it still
So it slips through your hands like grains of sand, you watch it go." — There's No Way Out Of Here, Unicorn


There was none of the controversy or the hype this year. There were no protest barricades, no crowd control police on horseback, no show of force whatsoever by the Houston Police Dept. The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) Gala in Houston went off with little fanfare on both sides.

As for the protesters, we only had two show: Courtney Sharp from New Orleans and myself.

In that sense, being honest, this was a big victory for HRC. You may also surmise it was seen as a big loss for the transgender community. Certainly from a visual perspective, HRC has to be happy in breaking the trans community down further, winnowing the small numbers further, and looking forward to the day when we give up completely and our voices silence.

Of course, there are still a number of folks who gave Courtney and I the moral support. One Gala goer admitted he hates the organization, and only does it for business and "for visibility reasons." He even came out to apologize to us and was honest about "being a quisling and going back in" to the party.

Another couple drove by, spotted us and asked us which organization we were from. When I told her I was from NTAC, the passenger whooped and called me out into the street to their car to shake her hand. As it turns out, she was visiting from out of town and was coordinating San Diego's protest of the Hyatt Hotel for their owner's contributions to California's Prop 8. She also commented that we needed "a lot more people out here!"

I agree with her. Sadly, the community's tired and doesn't want to be bothered. Being principled and consistent is a laudable thing – or at least we were raised on that being the case. These days, though, it's also what gets you punished. You're written off as the crazy dingbats, too stubborn to realize you've lost.


And of course, to the victor go the spoils. HRC will de facto own the trans community's voice, regardless of their spotty and shady history. We've allowed them to divide us and easily conquer.

However, as long as there's a few of us left with history, and a decided need for something to trust in, something more principled, there will always be a few of us showing to speak truth to power. We'll let them laugh at us and duck in to their well-heeled parties. It please them, so at least we can make someone happy! And meanwhile, we'll rare few will still walk it like we talk it!

Nevertheless, it got Courtney and I discussing when the trans community and the trans movement totally implodes and becomes annexed into the gay and lesbian community holdings, as it were. They have the money and the power. That alone allows them to take whatever they want. And as we've learned in politics, you don't have to be in the right. You only have to have the money and pull to buy whatever you choose to be reality.

We reminisced about the 2007 Southern Comfort Conference, with Courtney recalling Ethan St. Pierre's call to her concerned that he'd have to "walk home" to Massachusetts. Ethan and I were the only two visible folks giving a silent protest of the HRC presence, and the exalted position they and NCTE's Mara Keisling were afforded, celebrating the 'staunch alliance' and HRC's commitment to support only a trans-inclusive ENDA.


Of course, Ethan and I and the NTAC crew knew better. While Ethan was exhorted by IFGE's E.D. Denise LeClair to remove his "UnEqual" sticker, we both – me especially – did everything we could to warn of the impending betrayal. No one wanted to hear it. It was "negative" news. It sullied the dream. It was a direct threat to the illusory bubble that nobody wanted burst.

In the end, we actually generated a couple extra donations to HRC due to our warnings. I actually had one trans woman finish her argument with me by stating she believed Mara and Joe Solmonese, and just for what I'd said, she wrote out another $100 check to HRC right in front of me which she then took to give to Joe.

In the end, we were right ... and we were also the big losers! Lesson: don't do "the right thing." It's something I suppose I'm too stubborn to learn.


As Courtney mused, it was at that moment that she said we were done. HRC had won, and no matter what we did and what was accurate, our own community was not going to believe its own. We weren't going to support our own.

In short, we'd lost our community.

Since then we've been working, especially after the grand betrayal, to bring things back. But as HRC has already discovered, the trans community appears to have a very short memory. Additionally, there's any number of available (and desperate) folks willing to be HRC's wedge, to keep us divided into pro-HRC vs. pro-trans camps. Time is on their side, and if they wait long enough, we'll die off and give them the defacto victory by attrition in a death-of-a-thousand-cuts style. They have the money and security to wait us out.

At the same time, take notice how the gay and lesbian community remembers everything. They have a full knowledge of their community's long history of being left out of the civil rights movement a la Bayard Rustin. They rally around their community in uniform outrage when they've been denied. They rally their troops and are aggressive in courting allies from other communities (even trans people!) to support their protests for their current causes. They know how to maximize their numbers, their echo chamber and thus their impact in making change for their own, even on marriage (the most sticky issue of all).

It's something trans folks should envy. But knowing how easy it is to divide us and break our will, it's not something I see us replicating in the short term. Only once the gay and lesbian community has won its entire slate of issues, and once the trans community realizes we're getting nothing of the like will we finally start realizing this – although many years too late.


To be sure, we'll have more losses. More New Hampshires, etc. Of course, knowing our community tendency, they realize in a year the trans folks will be saying "Who Hampshire?" We'll be worrying about the next new outfit we can buy, or maybe snaking a free ticket to an HRC banquet.

"Have We Lost Our Voice?" — Sen. Robert Byrd

NTAC Hits Capitol Hill On Its Tenth Anniversary

The last couple weeks have been jam-packed so much that it's hard to find time to sit and write! This week has been nothing but back to back board meetings and homework for those organizations.

The prior week, though, was Transgender Lobby Days in Washington DC with NTAC – the National Transgender Advocacy Coalition. As I write, NTAC is now celebrating 10 year anniversary! A full decade of working on advocacy at the federal level, it's hard to believe we're still in it. With GenderPAC now morphed into another organization name and vision at the beginning of the year, it leaves NTAC as the longest running federal-level advocate for transgender or gender variant issues.


Anniversary aside, this was the smallest group we've had to date thanks to the crushing economy and competition from other newer interests in the game. However we still managed to pull in people from every section of the country except for the Northeast, ironically enough. We blanketed the entire Senate and hit over 100 offices in our day on the House side as well.

While we're dealing with a much friendlier congressional environ with inclusive bills (concerns with hate crimes' definitions aside), it was still a good year to make it up there for other reasons.

Due to the Obama victory, I was facing the loss of my fourth, solid staff contact on the Hill. I was starting to panic a bit! While LGB and T groups will obfuscate or keep us collectively in the dark, it's always been our staff contacts who have kept us enlightened. Certainly for NTAC, they've been a godsend. Without them, we'd have been buying into the oft-repeated Barney Frank or Human Rights Campaign-concocted story lines: e.g. "gender includes the trans community" [2003], "Christopher Shays is holding back trans inclusion" [2004], "Barney Frank and HRC have been our champions in fighting for inclusion" [2004 & 2005]. "ENDA won't be submitted this session" [2006], "Rep. George Miller is keeping trans inclusion from ENDA" [2007] and of course "HRC has promised and is committed to supporting nothing but an inclusive ENDA" [2007]. While others were encouraged to disbelieve us for what we heard from our Congress friends, we weren't wrong.


Clearly you can see why we'd not want to lose some of our contacts on the Hill!

Those contacts, plus three new ones we gained (including one of our best contacts from the past who's now on the Senate side!) proved incisive again. The only item of concern on legislation was from only one office, but did allude to the possibility of "different language" coming on ENDA regarding how they deal with gender identity. So far, it's the only one and was very basic – nothing urgent. All other offices are still in the dark on ENDA and its status.

We even managed a few face-to-face visits with our drop-in, buttonholing method – including very good meetings with both Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) and Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT), as well as personal visits with both Rep. Ike Skelton (D-MO) and Rep. Anh 'Joseph' Cao (R-LA).

That said, the ENDA debacle has changed the game slightly. A number of offices in the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) who were opposing trans inclusion in the previous session are now back on board this time. That said, there are at least a couple like Sanford Bishop and James Clyburn who are outright opposed even still. We're not going to be able to count on a bloc vote of CBC with us in the equation, which could still prove problematic for us. This has potential to be used by the incrementalists to "fan the flames" smoldering on the lifeline we're dangling from.


Most of our information this time wasn't so much about the legislation though. This time we got quite a bit of information about how others felt about the last session. Many House offices felt they were jerked around sincerely by the various parties who were heavily involved in last session's ENDA "debacle." As one of our office visits noted, "Congressmembers don't like being played for fools. They're not likely to forget [last session.]"


There's now no uniform view of the inside and outside players in GLBT civil rights!

The primary members of the LGBT Coalition are still very much on board with HRC, and their word is still golden. To them, NTAC is still nothing but trash, and it's obvious they just want to hurry up and be done with our meeting to get us out of there. But the big surprise this session is that the National Center for Transgender Equality (NCTE) has now lost favor with them, almost to a person. Whatever lustre they had, after what occurred earlier this session, has now disappeared.

Now the second tier supporters of GLBT rights are the big find. HRC is now persona non grata, as they have major trust issues with them (having been jerked around in the previous session). Again, Mara and NCTE are also quite out of favor, and their handout of nothing beyond two sheets of talking points was "too thin – there's nothing that those of us not familiar (with trans issues) can use beyond repeating someone's scripted soundbites." In short, they felt they were not being given info to use and learn from but rather being directed to stick to talking points.

These same folks were quite eager to work with us, and also happy with the data and specific stories to be referred to, both for counterpoints and also to help edify themselves on the full range of what "transgender" is. Many of them know us, but as one Senate staffer reminded, they don't "fully know" us yet. That was sweet sounds to sore ears!

What really surprised me was the Senate side having issues with both HRC and Mara. As one Senate office noted, they have to play with HRC (alluding that they were the only game around on GLBT), but they'd rather not. However, noting that all the hijinx on ENDA in 2007, and the Hate Crimes language early this year occurred in the House, it's important (and surprising) to note they have issues with these two parties.

As for Barney Frank, he's the Teflon Don. They know what he did, but they all have to work with him. Considering his Banking Committee position and the clout that holds, they don't want to rock the boat.


So in a nutshell, NCTE has credibility with the trans community, HRC and NTAC have very little. NTAC has credibility with the supportive, non-prime LGBT coalition congress-critters, NCTE and HRC have none. HRC has credibility with the prime LGBT Coalition critters in Congress, especially Barney Frank, NTAC and NCTE have none. It's quite an odd predicament.

Nevertheless, it doesn't change the game on the Hill too much. While the second-tier supporters feel burned by Ol' Barn' and especially HRC, they're also not going to circumvent the LGBT Coalition on an LGBT bill. It's tantamount to passing a bill on issues for the black community without the support of the CBC. They must deal with them, and as expected, HRC is in the catbird seat with the all important folks who will decide legislation, language and set the agenda on issues LGBT.

As always, we're still going to have to watch this from the outside and monitor it very closely.

But the good news is, especially with our new contacts, Ol' Barn' and HRC are officially on notice. Any funny business they pull will be discovered quickly (on both sides of the Hill). We will not take their manipulations lightly!

Trans Lobbyists For NTAC Head To Capitol Hill

"Born down in a dead man's town.
The first kick I took was when I hit the ground.
End up like a dog that's been beat too much,
'Til you spend half your life just a-covering up." — Born In The U.S.A., Bruce Springsteen

Cinco de Mayo – a quick blog today until I get back. It's been a Murphy's Law past couple weeks between power outages, friend watches and worst of all, extreme family drama (I'm really wondering why I even have family at all!) Oh well, hell is hell, and what doesn't kill ya makes ya stronger!

Drama notwithstanding, the lobbying packets are done and we're preparing to once again hit Capitol Hill for the National Transgender Advocacy Coalition (NTAC). Thanks to competition and the horrific economy, this will be a smaller, tighter Lobby Day than previous ones. Nevertheless, these are the committed folks making it to this one. We have no real need for going slow, so we can hit the ground running! From personal experience, I've had my most efficient and productive days in either small groups or solo-lobbying (I actually made 128 offices one day on the Hill – my personal best. There was no lunch and I went 'til almost 7PM though ... not for everyone).

That said, we can at very least laud the folks hitting the Hill with us as heroic. NTAC has never lobbied for money or fame. No preening, no glitz, no show. We aren't the "HRC tranny" set. It's always been individuals lobbying – citizen lobbyists, the grassroots way. We all travel up out of our own pocket and on our own vacation time.


We've catching a break, never had the luck roll our way and yet still, after ten years, we make it up to advocate for the community's behalf. Our only reward is more of the same derision and belittling from the "moneyed leaders" of our world. Ironically though, it's these same "leaders" who've ridiculed us for our open lobby days approach, criticized our getting the media our widely back in the day or trashed our mistrust of HRC who came around to adopt our philosophy! We've never budged. And clearly since they abandoned their initial philosophies, there's no reason to move in their direction.

One thing they can never say truthfully is that we had no effect! In 2004, presidential candidate, Rep. Dennis Kucinich put transgender into the presidential campaign debates for the first of the past two cycles. Who else was conducting lobby days specifically on transgender issues in 2004 and before, putting lobby packets in legislators' hands, having sit-down visits with Rep. Kucinich? Rep. Ron Payne, who courageously dropped in on a committee testimony with trans panelists and spoke up on our behalf, learned Transgender 101 back in 1999. Who might've done that?

Yes, the folks traveling in from across the country for this coming week's Lobby Days are the true heroes. I'll say something that you'll probably never hear anywhere else: On behalf of the trans community, and also on behalf of NTAC, thank you!

"Receiving far less attention are the working class heroes, who go about their solitary work routines with quiet dignity ...." — commentator, Armstrong Williams

Hip, Hip, Hypocrisy!

"People of double standards never experience happiness." — author, Sam Veda

The headline blared: "Where's Barack Obama, the 'Fierce Advocate' for LGBT Rights?" It was a recent post on Pam's House Blend, the highly popular LGBT blog, that got a number of peoples' attention in the community [http://www.pamshouseblend.com/diary/10757/wheres-barack-obama-the-fierce-advocate-for-lgbt-rights] Originally I was thinking Pam Spaulding, the blog owner, published a tongue-in-cheek title on a pan of a column in the Washington Post by Richard Socarides [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/01/AR2009050103401_pf.html]. Socarides, a former aide to Pres. Bill Clinton, rather shrilly taking the Obama Administration to task after they surpassed his 100-day mark.

What makes this especially disappointing is that it comes during a crisis-driven "change moment" in our country's history that not only cries out for leadership but presents a particularly good climate for making substantial progress on gay equality.

Keeping in mind it was only 100 days into a brand new presidency with the largest amount of inherited urgencies of any presidency in modern times, I thought surely this was really going to get a slap-down for being rather immaturely impatient (not to mention self-centered). But no!

I think a good question to ask about the situation is where are the gays in the Obama White House? Is their presence merely tokenism -- that their existence is supposed to represent a salve to the wounds inflicted by the Bush administration? Another question -- do any of the gay White House aides and appointees have any influence on Obama? Clearly not much, based on the silence about LGBT issues.

Even with the two closeted high-profile appointments, and numerous other

It's interesting in that, for years, the trans community has had more than mere silence but a complete lack of folks we in Trans America trust to stick by us no matter what. Oddly, we're always the ones called upon to trust "yet again" the very same folks who do us wrong time and again. And when we balk? Well, Marti Abernathey responded to that on this blog post:

You and people like you, who bitch about Obama, in THE MIDST OF PASSAGE OF THE HATE CRIMES LEGISLATION, really bother me. If you hadn't noticed, the economy is in the shitter, there are two wars going on, and there's a possible pandemic on the horizon. As far as Iowa, Obama has NEVER said he supported gay marriage.
If we come to the end of his term and he hasn't repealed DADT, passed civil unions, hate crimes, and ENDA legislation, then complain.

It's kind of amusing, after many folks in the trans community have been accused of being hysterical "crazy" trannies that just don't understand how the legislative process works, to have complainers repeatedly bitch about things that Obama didn't promise.

Apparently the hysterical "crazy tranny" disease was infectious, and gays and lesbians are just as susceptible. No wonder they were keeping their distance from us, eh? Actually, I don't even recall us getting that riled that immediately ... maybe our disease mutated?

Apparently they didn't bother touching base with the folks from NGLTF or HRC recently about a meeting that about 30 of the LGB and maybe T organizations had with President Barack Obama himself recently. Columnist Deb Price had this to say [http://www.creators.com/opinion/deb-price/obama-puts-out-rainbow-colored-welcome-mat.html]:

To their happy astonishment, the president didn't just quickly shake their hands on his way to greet the 30 or so other guests that night.

Instead, he asked when hate crimes legislation will reach his desk so he can sign it. And he listened as they stressed the need for a federal ban on job discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity — legislation he supports.

"It was such a sharp contrast to the Bush administration — to have a president that recognizes the issues that our community has been working on for a long time," says Carey, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.
[...]
"I was able to bring to light a number of economic inequalities that (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) people face in the absence of marriage equality," Solmonese says. "I can't tell you how important it was to have that conversation."

Yes, the President actually stopped and chatted with the gay and lesbian leadership personally, listening to their concerns on passing ENDA quickly, and even taking initiative to ask them when he would see the Hate Crimes bill crossing his desk with gender identity included in it! So far, it's already passed out of the House, and the President issued a cursory statement urging Senate to likewise pass it quickly.

Apparently, though, that's not good enough. Socarides (whose dad, oddly enough, is a psychiatrist Charles Socarides, the very one of the opponents to removing homosexuality as a disorder from the DSM), had the following agenda to demand:

First, he should start talking about gay rights again, the way he did during the campaign. What made Clinton such a transformational figure of inclusion was his constant willingness to talk to and about gay people. When he said, "I have a vision and you are a part of it," you could feel his sincerity.

Second, he should move swiftly, as he promised during the campaign, to help secure passage of the bill now moving through Congress imposing new federal penalties for anti-gay hate crimes, as well as legislation allowing gays to serve in the military. Ten years have passed since Matthew Shepard was killed. We have endured 15 years of "don't ask, don't tell" discrimination. We have waited long enough.

Third, he should appoint a high-ranking, respected, openly gay policy advocate to oversee government efforts toward lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equality. Give this person access to policymakers, similar to what has been done on urban policy and for people with disabilities. This is especially important because, unlike Clinton, who had gay friends such as David Mixner, Roberta Achtenberg and Bob Hattoy around to nudge him, Obama has no high-profile gay senior aides with a history in the gay rights movement.

Finally, Obama should champion comprehensive, omnibus federal gay civil rights legislation, similar to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, outlawing discrimination based on sexual orientation and granting a basic umbrella of protections in employment, education, housing and the like (rather than the existing piecemeal approach to legislation). Such a bill should also provide for federal recognition of both civil unions and marriages as they are authorized by specific states.

No big ask, huh?

"He hits from both sides of the plate. He's amphibious." — Yogi Berra

First, Obama talking to gay people – visits with 30 of them, including Rea Carey & Joe Solmonese – check! Move the hate crimes bill through quickly – just passed the House, and on to the Senate – check! Don't Ask Don't Tell – not much movement in Congress, so I guess that's the President's fault then, huh? Appointing high-ranking, respected openly gay policy advocate? We can't even get a trans policy advocate anywhere, even in gay and lesbian organizations, and they demand one from the White House! Hmmm.

And omnibus civil rights legislation! That's actually a good idea, and something I've thought about. Typically civil rights has three criteria to be filled before congress acts on it: a demonstrated widespread disenfranchisement or systemic discrimination, proven economic hardship and a lack of elected representation to address this. Both gay/lesbian and transgender can easily prove the discrimination, but economic hardship tends to be transgender almost exclusively. Elected representation has some for gay/lesbian, but absolutely zero for transgender. We can fulfill all three criteria if we only have documented proof of our economic duress.

Yet note which community Socarides is asking for civil rights for? Sexual orientation. Start talking about "gay rights" and "anti-gay hate crimes." However he does note "transgender" equality ... but only when talking about appointing a "respected, openly gay policy advocate" to oversee this.

Speaking of liaisons, there have already been 30 out gay and lesbian hirees in the Admin, including high level folks like Vic Basile and Brian Bond. We in the community even know a couple well-rumored folks already in those high level appointments, though there's no reason to out them (so I won't). It's not much of a secret amongst ourselves, though. How many trans people does anyone know of who've been in Admin, ambassador or staff positions? If you guessed zero, like all the other Administrations through history, you'd be right!

Now imagine trans people raising the issues with the same intensity! In fact, just imagine trans people raising commensurate requests from gay or lesbian organizations or administrations! I can easily imagine the howls from the David Smiths of HRC to the Chris Crains who own media outlets to the Jim Fouratts stirring the muck in columns and blogs to the apoplectic response from the Barney Franks on Capitol Hill. Do ya really think we're all judged and awarded by the same standard?

"He's one of the few in the history of this country to run for high office talking out of both sides of his mouth at the same time and lying out of both sides!" — President Harry S. Truman

And speaking of Ol' Barn', he recently issued a statement on the decision to award Diane Schroer, a former Army Special Offices commander who had been offered a job with the Library of Congress as a terrorism research analyst and when notifying the Library of plans to undergo sex-reassignment surgery to transition from male to female, had the job offer rescinded:

The decision by United States District Court Judge James Robinson to award $491,000 to Diane Schroer because of the blatant discrimination she suffered at the hands of James Billington, the Librarian of Congress, is entirely justified, and is a strong indictment of Mr. Billington’s tenure. When this case first arose, I personally called Mr. Billington to urge him to reverse the decision to deny Diane Schroer the job she had been promised, primarily as a matter of fairness. Sad ly, Mr. Billington refused, and the consequence of this is that the government will have to pay a half a million dollar judgment, in addition to the legal fees that it incurred.

At the very least, Mr. Billington owes the taxpayers a prompt decision to reverse the discriminatory policy he enforced so that we are not again faced with a situation in which an individual is so unfairly treated, or that the taxpayers are forced to pay for the results that follow. Given the harm that has already been done to Ms. Schroer, I strongly urge that no appeal be taken of this decision and that payment to Ms. Schroer be made promptly.

When I spoke with Mr. Billington, he claimed, wholly implausibly, that he could not intervene in the decision to rescind a job offer to someone solely on the basis of her having undergone a change in gender, on the grounds that this was a personnel decision. Of course, the head of an agency has the prerogative to intervene in a policy matter such as this, and I regret the fact that because Mr. Billington refused to do so we are now forced to pay for his mistake. It is my hope that in this Congress, we will act to provide needed legal protection for people like Diane Schroer who suffer acts of discrimination, and in the interim, Mr. Billington will change the policy of the Library of Congress. As a Member of Congress, I am deeply distressed that the Library of Congress practiced discrimination in the name of the institution in which I serve.

That's nice....

What actually would've been nicer would've been to have not had the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) use Diane Schroer (exploit?) for some really beneficial public relations and to underscore the need for passing the Federal Employment Protections Act (FEPA) [HR 3128 in the 109th, HR 2232 in the 110th Congress) that was submitted a few weeks after her case hit the media with HRC. And as the legislation was submitted, it "protected from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation."

Notice anything there? Yep, use the trans person's abject discrimination to further a bill to benefit gays and lesbians only. Even though it didn't ever draw any more than 37 co-sponsors and did nothing but bottle up in committee, they weren't about to listen to trans complaints about adding gender identity in FEPA. How dare us!?!

Meanwhile, if Ol' Barn' was so concerned about this case and its outcome, why didn't he – as one of the lead co-sponsors – bother pointing the obvious glaring discrimination just suffered mere weeks before the bill dropped the first time? He certainly knew what gender identity was. Of course, the "official line" from HRC and NCTE was that it was "(Rep. Henry) Waxman's bill, and they couldn't get him to budge."

Now that's a steaming cowpie of mammoth proportion! Having visited Waxman's office in 2004 before the Schroer incident, the legislative director noted to me and my co-lobbyist on an unrelated bill that for their support of inclusive legislation, we "needed to get HRC on board first. If they aren't on board, it's going nowhere in this office." Yet it didn't stop HRC and NGLTF and others to push for passage of FEPA, with Diane's story of discrimination prominently helpful in giving the initial nudge.

But Barney? Well if he were so "deeply distressed" at the "blatant discrimination" of Ms. Schroer, he sure had a funny way of exhibiting it before now. In a nutshell, Ol' Barn' hadn't uttered a peep before now while the more exploitative folks used her story to further their cause while leaving her the rest of us trans folk behind.

These double standards coming from the gay and lesbian leaders are bigger than all outdoors. How they've determined that if we're not screaming about it then it's unnoticed really escapes me. They're determined to play trans people as brain-dead fools.

This author has determined that attitude is offensive as hell.

"People, who rise above their petty individual selfishness and work for the welfare of society are considered patriots." — author, Sam Veda

Virginia Prince: The Passing Of A Trans Icon

"She never compromises.
Loves babies and surprises.
Wears high heels when she exercises.
Ain't that beautiful?
Meet Virginia." — Meet Virginia, Train

We got word last night that we lost arguably the most important figures in the our community's history. An innovator. A true pioneer. A queen. A Prince.

Above all, she was the grande dame of the "Transgender" Community — a term she semi-coined. Virginia Prince passed away after a short illness this past month. She was 96. Dr. Richard Docter, who has been compiling her biography, broke the news to the Liberty Conference yesterday in Philadelphia.

Though she was never a lobbyist on Capitol Hill, she was certainly (in my opinion, at least) the pre-cursor to Transgender advocacy. It was ironic, considering that she was only crossdressing when she began this quest. The risk of such public outing of oneself is overwhelmingly anathemic to most crossdressers. Personal impact be-damned though, Virginia Prince was courageously public in educating the psychiatric community, the viewing public and even government administrators and the courts.

And she did it all quite effectively and successfully.

I had the good fortune of meeting and visiting with her a few times: the first time was Juneteenth in Houston (June 19) a decade ago, the most recent was the IFGE conference in Philadelphia, immediately after Pres. George W. Bush began bombing Baghdad. That was about the time she'd decided to move to an assisted living facility. It was both distressing and yet left me resigned that it was a proper decision on her part as her memory was starting to fade slightly.

My first meeting with Virginia was quite the contrary. At 86, Virginia was as sharp as a tack and still quite cantakerous, but was quite solid in promoting the trans community's understanding and advancement. She was actually very supportive of my budding advocacy and activism then, which I hadn't expected. Our only beef was her disagreement with my usage of the word "queer." While I tried to explain the disarming of the term by capturing it for our own, it was still a word with a lot of sting for her history.

We had quite a lengthy and animated chat in 1999, giving me a very generous insight into her. I was shocked that she had much larger breasts than I (especially considering I was transsexual and openly on HRT. She was bemused by my use (and the community's) of the word transgender, and how the story affixed it's authorship to her, even though she'd referred to it as transgenderist as a self-descriptor once she'd moved from occasional crossdressing to living as female, though not transsexual (she was quick to correct that!)

The photos I had with her and me were reflective of her visit in Houston (I always tried to have plenty of photos in those days as I was our local transsexual group's photo-laden newsletter editor.)

"You see, her confidence is tragic
And her intuition magic,
And the shape of her body
is so Unusual." — Meet Virginia, Train

My last meeting with Virginia was quite a bit different. Unlike the previous two meetings, she didn't remember my name this time and seemed notably less focused. Then again, I was also distracted (due to political happenings). Our last visit was nice, but nothing as weighty as previous chats. She even had someone (I can't recall who) that was acting as sort of a handler/caretaker.

Similar to my initial photos, the one photo I have from that meeting was also reflective. One thing that stuck in my mind was her lipstick which was noticeably messed up, and numerous people saying hello, but leaving her to look smeared, kind of clownish. I went over with a tissue and wiped the excess and retouched it, and Mariette Pathy Allen snapped a picture of me wiping her face. Mariette thought it was a touching, poignant moment. It's not one that I ever showed publicly though as I felt it was unflattering to her.

At the time I figured I'd get a chance to see her again on a better day, maybe more like the Virginia of the late 90's or early millennium. But that was my last visit with her. Nevertheless, there's nothing to take away from my memories or her legacy. To paraphrase creatively here, Virginia Prince truly lived a Full Personal Experience in her long life.

I'll end this by tacking on the article I did in 1999 for the TATS (Texas Assn. for Transsexual Support) Newsletter for July, 1999: Meet Virginia ....

Transgenderism's ultimate pioneer, Virginia Prince, paid a rare visit to Houston, June 19 at the Westchase Hilton. She was introducted by Tri-Ess' Jane Ellen Fairfax, who read a passage written about Virginia 'Charles' Prince and giving a stirring requiem of her loss (*there was a false obituary which was circulated at that time, noting the passing of Virginia Prince).

Then Virginia took the podium and, quoting Mark Twain, stated: "The reports of my demise are greatly exaggerated." She then mentioned she was here by "special dispensation," quipping, "I always said I'd be more at home in hell than in heaven — there'd be more of my friends there."

Born in 1912, she surmises she felt the first stirrings to crossdress around the age of 12. One incident from her adolescence stood clearloy in her mind. Her parents and she had taken a trans-Atlantic cruise when 'Charles' was 16, and during the cruise she was exhorted by the wife of another passenger to have her dress young Charles as a 16-year old girl. It captured the teen's imagination and ignited stirrings never realized before.

But she didn't do it. She was so wracked with self-guilt and denial that she couldn't release herself.

After receiving her PhD in biochemistry at University of California, she discovered at one of her pharmacology symposiums that one of the other interns was a crossdresser. An epiphany! She badly wanted to contact the individual, but realizing the environment and fearing for her career, she had to think up a moniker [in order to keep her true identity secret].

She chose the name Charles (her father's first name) and Prince (the street she lived on). Later, Virginia evolved from the Charles Prince persona. After contacting this other crossdresser Louise Lawrence, she got the names of others in the Los Angeles area.

Still 'Charles,' she realized there may be some validity to this behavior. Someone once asked her if she'd ever seen a psychiatrist, and she replied: "Yes, I've cured two of 'em!"

It wasn't until she visited a Dr. Bowman from the college she interned at that she got her second epiphany. After spilling her guts, the psychologist put his feet up on a desk drawer and said, "Okay. So what else is new?"

'Charles' was shocked. Hadn't the doctor listened to anything that was just said? Did he not care? Insulted and mad, the doctor then explained that 'Charles' wasn't "alone. There [were] thousands more like you." The doctor related that he knew of at least 350 in New York alone!

"Learn to accept yourself!"

Virginia then moved to L.A. and looked up a person in Long Beach – desperately poor and living in a small shack – and along with seven others, they began a loose-knit crossdressing club. It was there that she got her first idea for "Transvestia."

Transvestia published its first issue in 1960, pre-sold at a (rather hefty for that time) price of four dollars each! The first issues were mimeographed, which was found to be unworkable.

About that time in the early 60's, she formed the Hose & Heels Club, but it was a tense start. Because of rampant paranoia during that time, and also the fact that crossdressing was still outlawed (thus many were afraid to admit to it), the group had a difficult time trying to figure out how to begin.

"You started thinking," Prince remembered, "that the person sitting next to you was with the Sheriff's, and the one sitting across from you was the FBI...."

So they devised a way of safely finding out who was a member.

Each attendee, in those early days, brought two bags. In one was a lunch; in the other, hose and heels. In that tension-filled first meeting, everyone sat in a circle and ate their lunch from the first bag. Then after the contents of the first bag were emptied, Virginia piped up, "now we have to eat the contents of the second bag." The participants put on the hose, and then put on the high heels. That was the telling factor: "if they had shoes that fit, they were a transvestite."

Later, Virginia founded FPE (Full Personality Expression): the pre-cursor to Tri-Ess. There were a number of chapters around the nation, and she recalled a visit to the Houston Chapter. "It was strange, walking the streets of Houston," she mused. The fear was that this was a rednecked city with (as many municipalities) laws against her appearing in public.

During the mid-60's, Carol Beecroft formed Mademoiselle: an open-membership group (such as GCTC - Gulf Coast Transgender Community), that was a conglomeration of crossdressers, transsexuals and drag, hetero an gay alike. Eventually Beecroft left that organization and offered to merge with Prince's group, which became Sorority for the Second Self – or then, Tri-Sigma.

However, there was a real female sorority of the same name, "and when they found out, they were not happy!" After the sorority filed suit, the group decided to rename itself Tri-Ess (S). Since then, Tri-Ess has become the largest and oldest crossdressing organization in the world.

At one point, Virginia was actually arrested for mailing pornographic materials during the U.S. Postal Service's crackdown on homosexuality. "We all know how effective that was!" she quipped.

But the arrest inspired two things. First she was sentenced to 3 years probation – meaning no crossdressing for that period (keeping in mind it was still illegal.) However, her attorney mentioned she could perhaps do seminars as a kind of "release." He mentioned his involvement in Kiwanis Club, and Victoria agreed to do it.

The first presentation on "pseudohermaphroditism" went so well that she was asked to another, then another. Before long she was touting and giving lectures on the subject, which brought her to Washington DC for a TV (pun intended) interview. As an aside, Virginia claims origination of the acronym TV, coined so she could talk about the subject in public without openly referring to it.

While in Washington, acting on information she'd received from an attorney frind, she spoke with the Postal Inspector General, and long story short, was instrumental in helping halt the Post Office's heavy-handed censorship of the mail and overturned her probation. She was free to live as Virginia full-time again, and never looked back.

At one point this Tri-Ess founder had actually sexual reassignment surgery! It was immediately after hearing about Christine Jorgensen. "When she hit the newspapers," Virginia related, "if I'd had $5,000, I'd have been on the next boat to Denmark!"

The fact that Christine didn't have to worry about a permit to wear women's clothing and appear in public captured her initial fancy. But in the end, Virginia said, "I was flad I was broke at the time. It would've been the greatest mistake of my life." At one point, she got a chance to meet Christine and her mother as she was performing in L.A. Jorgensen was a curiosity, but Virginia had no impression of her otherwise.

Someone once referred to Virginia as a "pre-op." – a term she said had no meaning to her. To back up her view, she quipped, "we're all pre-dead! What does that mean?"

In her view, if you're not a transsexual, you're a transgenderist – a term she coined and uses to identify herself. In fact, she considers sexual reassignment surgery a mistake for anyone, and doesn't really understand one's identification with transsexuality.

She also disagreed with another term finding usage in the GLBT community: "queer." In her view, it is as defined in the dictionary: a derogatory term meaning unusual or odd (or as Webster's defines it, mildly insane.) While understanding the need for a term to identify the entire GLBT spectrum, she prefers the search for a more positive connotation.

On gays, lesbians and transgenders, Virginia proffered that we "all have the same enemy: ignorance!" She then mentioned that she'd like to see the gay / lesbian community confront societal attitudes, to tell America, "what damn difference does it make? It doesn't affect what a person does. It doesn't affect anybody else. It's no one else's business unless they make it their business!"

"Why can't we give people the choice to be who it is, or what is is they want to be? And why does society get upset about males who wear dresses?"


Virginia related she was also good friends with Dr. Harry Benjamin, who in fact gave her her first prescription for estrogen. She then related a story of how Dr. Benjamin lived to be over 100 years old. At about the time he was to turn 100, one of his friends asked him: "What's the first thing you're going to do when you turn 100?"

Dr. Benjamin thought for a few seconds and answered: "I'm gonna look in the mirror." After the friend asked why, Benjamin replied: "because I've never seen a 100 year old man before."

Said Virginia, one of her goals is "to live to be 100, so I can look in the mirror. Because I've never seen a 100 year old crossdresser before!"

Stumbling a bit at one point, Virginia quipped, "I can't think ... I can't remember.... The important thing is to remember to think!"

Summing things up, Virginia mentioned we needed, "to get involved, in whatever fashion." She also exhorted the members of groups and organizations of the need to get actively involved, and to do their part to help their groups stay alive.

Sage advice indeed.

"Well she wants to be the queen,
And she thinks about her scene.
Well she wants to live her life.
And she thinks about her life." — Meet Virginia, Train

Summer Stress Starts Off With A Bang

"In times of great stress or adversity, it's always best to keep busy, to plow your anger and your energy into something positive." — former Chrysler CEO, Lee Iacocca

It's been a tough week! This coming week is Lobby Days for the National Transgender Advocacy Coalition (NTAC), and trying to get the packets printed up and the logistics coordinated for it all have been a bit stickier than usual. And to begin last week, I ended up inheriting (once again) President of Harris County's Women's Political Caucus here in Houston – just in time for putting together and conducting our city election candidate screenings! Our current president got a lobbying job in DC as of May 1, and our VP there was AWOL from her election. Nobody else has experience in the screenings but me, so ....


Methinks generally that I've put too much community activity on my plate and things are starting to fray around the edges, in-home family drama notwithstanding. Giving it an extra bump of Murphy's Law, we lost electricity again on three consecutive days (and I lost two first halves of a blog in the process each time – causing me not to bother with blogging until I was certain I'd have power in order to finish!) And as the week before, our block was the last one to be restored due to our wacky electrical grid!


Two days' worth of our power outage here was due to a rather heavy flood in West Houston. Thankfully I had no flooding, though folks on the other side of the bayou from me weren't so fortunate. The repetitive power outages really started getting on our block's nerves. After we'd gotten power back only to have it go back off two hours later once they powered on our neighbors across the street, one lady from around the block got a bit physically hostile with the electric crew, kicking the truck and hitting the poor guy trying to head up the project. We were all pissed, but that was a bit much.


Then again it turned out she had a salt-water aquarium that overflows and floods her house when the power goes out, and she'd had two incidences of cleaning up flood water and dead fish in her house before that particular outage. Anyway, personal drama. Guess we all have it in abundance, just in time for the dog days of a very humid summer! Joy.


Instead of the previous blog I was going to write, other issues popped up instead. There was lots of big news this week: Sen. Arlen Specter's big defection from GOP to Democrat, the Hate Crimes bill passed the House of Reps, and Supreme Court has had its first resignation: Justice David Souter, the progressive Republican on the bench.

Of course the Swine Flu in the U.S. has its first death, startlingly right here in Houston (when the day before there were no reported or suspected cases!) Now, of course the confirmed cases are piling up and we have ten schools now closed until further notice.

As we were hearing of the spread of Swine Flu here and I began wondering about the impact on NTAC's Lobby Day, got a call from my friend facing foreclosure whom I'd written about a few weeks back. Hearing her voice I immediately feared it was suicide watch time, but it was a false alarm of a different kind. It turns out she was coming down with the flu just days after a trip to her local Dept. of Human Services. And of course, now, her area has gotten its first confirmations of Swine Flu ... and she's unemployed and in desperate straits as is!

To make matters even more fun, our state's Hate Crimes bill which was moving along swimmingly, defying Equality Texas' earlier predictions of certain death, has suddenly and completely inexplicably languished for nearly a month in a committee known for processing quickly and efficiently. Even more interesting is the fact that my contacts in the State House are suddenly not returning my Emails and calls.

"Seem like the whole world's walking pretty and you can't find the room to move. Well everybody better move over, that's all! I'm running on the bad side and I got my back to the wall! Tenth avenue freeze-out...." — 10th Avenue Freeze-Out, Bruce Springsteen

Further more stressing is my pool of federal-level contacts has dwindled precipitously this year. It's actually good news for them as they're getting good Administration jobs in various departments (or in one case, a paid-lobbyist position). But I get nothing out of this except four lost contacts where I could monitor what was *actually* going on in committee and on the floor, as opposed to the sugar-coated poison pills we get from our so-called "advocates" and "champions."

Many years ago when I first began lobbying, I learned that lesson of relying on my staffer contacts and not GLB or T groups. They've been invaluable to me, personally, to keep me apprised of what was coming down the pike on specific bills I inquired about. Even without being physically in Washington, I was able to find out bits of information on trans-uninclusion and backroom dealings, probably even earlier than Mara Keisling!

Losing two of my really good contacts hurts, but at least I have faith in the Obama Administration and their principles. The key is getting decent legislation coming out of Congress, which is going to be much, much more tricky.

Meanwhile, we've got upcoming HRC Gala protests and the upcoming Pride Parade (again, I'm stressing as I'm coordinating both of those and not getting too much feedback). Malcolm Gladwell, in the Tipping Point, proffered the 80/20 rule: that 20% of the people do 80% of the work. Perhaps he was being too generous in the low number and way conservative on the high one!

Summer's starting off with a bang. Now all we need's another hurricane ....

"Ideas and behavior and messages and products sometimes behave just like outbreaks of infectious disease. They are social epidemics." — author Malcolm Gladwell

Operating Behind Enemy Lines

"When the Hoosegow police decided to come 'round they said:
"Boy what's the matter with you, what you trying to do?"" — Blind In Texas, W.A.S.P.

"As they say around the Texas Legislature, if you can't drink their whiskey, screw their women, take their money, and vote against 'em anyway, you don't belong in office." — Molly Ivins

One of my friends recently commented to me and expressed surprise that I had visited with and even gotten a photo with one of our conservative lightning rods in Texas, Rep. Warren Chisum (R-Pampa). It’s something that surprises others, but I never thought it all that surprising personally. He was a legislator and I wasn’t someone who, even when I first began, ever shied away from going in and talking with the most conservative offices. Hey! I live in Texas! Most of our folks down here are the reddest of the red-meat folks.

Lately Texas has become the butt of everyone's jokes, nationally. For the past eight years, we've had to live with everything from George W. Bush's apparent choking on a pretzel and passing out in his White House bathroom (begging the question: who the hell eats pretzels in the bathroom?) to every one of his Bushism's and incomprehensible musings. Once he left office, I was hoping we might get at least a little reprieve.

But no! Our governor's the latest national fodder for late-night material with his support of the teabaggers and even Texas' secessionist wing. While our governor's got all the brains God gave a drunken turkey, most around the nation may have never had the clue that Texans grew up and were even taught the urban legend that we retained the right to become our own Republic again when we ceded to the U.S. It turns out that's not fact, but there has nevertheless been a radically conservative wing in the state that's advocated for seceding from the union for years. They were so far out there that even the Republicans wanted nothing to do with them.

"Out in the countryside, just about every place that's got a zip code has somebody or some group of people battling the economic and political exclusion that Wall Street and Washington are shoving down our throats." — Jim Hightower

At least that was true until Barack Obama became president.

Now it seems even our own Gov. Rick Perry will fan those flames. It's not an embarrassment for Texas' GOP folks to talk of secession openly now. Worse still, there was a recent poll published by Research 2000 that asked whether Texas was better as part of the U.S. or as its own independent nation. Per Pam's House Blend, the poll came back 60% favoring staying in the U.S. and 40% opting for independence.

However, of Texas Republicans polled the opinion was evenly split: 48% for remaining in the U.S. and 48% opting for independence. They used to roll their eyes and snicker about the "wacko" secessionists and now they're out there co-opting them and cheering in their own echo chamber! They used to belittle and snidely dismiss those of us who feared for the direction of our country after Bush's 2004 re-election so much that we considered moving to Canada and called us wonderful names like "deserters," "treasonous," and "America-haters" who sided more with the terrorists than with our own country.

Now my own damn state's hardcore conservative types are taking our own logic and boldly proclaiming it prominently! And they're taking down the whole damn state with them! We didn't do anything seriously fleeing en-masse to Canada, yet we were considered loopy loons. As I write, our own legislature's even considering a bill to reaffirm Texas' state sovereignty (never mind that they weren't too sovereign to accept U.S. Government stimulus money in these trying economic times except for additional unemployment funds). And these nutbags are (to put it in Rep. John Culberson's words) "the most patriotic Americans"?

"Next time I tell you someone from Texas should not be president of the United States, please pay attention." — Molly Ivins

"I'm blind in Texas, the cowboys have taken my eyes." — Blind In Texas, W.A.S.P.

Of course the blogosphere is alight with all those agreeing with Gov. Closet-Case Perry, bellowing for the door to hit us where the Good Lord split us and lots of other sentiments expressing that our total state's a lost cause and to cut us loose. Toss us out: baby, bathwater and tub!

Not all of us are brain dead nor oblivious to what's gone on in our state or the rest of the world's perception of it. Even before Bush was elected, I was nearly begging people not to vote for the guy! We'd had six years of his train-wreck leadership at that point. But nobody wanted to listen! "He seems like a regular guy" and other comments about Gore's maladroit communication style along with his wife's crusade against free speech in music ended up being the razor-thin margin needed.

After eight years of Bush, I wasn't surprised at anything other than the increased intensity towards his hard-right shift.

Now that we're post-Bush, all of us in Texas get to pay the penance for the good times shared by a privileged few during the Bush boom. Bush's Power Rangers. All the while, folks like me on the progressive side were busting butt and trying to keep from losing every last right we citizens have. It's been grueling and even a bit brutal. Even still, while the rest of the world seems to enjoy a move away from the darkness, Texas still deals with Bush-level, DeLay gerrymandered GOP right-wingers who make conservatives seem like veritable socialists by comparison.

"I thought I was conservative 'til I moved to Texas. I was wrong. I had to re-learn being a conservative all over again." — unidentified GOP political activist who moved from Missouri to Texas.

As a trans Texans, I'm a very easily dismissed target for GOPers. Operating down here for the past couple decades is like being behind enemy lines during wartime. I didn't get to choose where I grew up. This economy has long sucked in my world, and with no ability to get out I have to make due here. With all our collective energy over the years, the community and I have made small gains, but we're overwhelmingly outnumbered in the most hostile of territory.

So imagine what it feels like reading the commentary that we as a state should all be written off. There's no support at home here in this sociopolitical hell-hole that's our only home. And now there's no support elsewhere either. We might as well have not even bothered.

For whatever reason, certainly due to no fault of my own, our state's become a magnet for everything from the Branch Davidians in Waco, to the polygamist sects of the Mormons and a so-called "sex cult" known as House of Yahweh, to the moms who cut off her baby's arms and the other who bashed her kids to death with rocks because they were allegedly instructed so by God, to the couple who started the Heaven's Gate cult, and believed the UFO's were coming down to spirit them away until the founder and cult self-castrated themselves and committed suicide. I don't know why this happens here in Bible-land. With other such luminaries as Charles "Tex" Watson of the Manson clan to Ted Hagee (the anti-Catholic apocalyptic) and Karl Rove to Tom DeLay. No wonder it's the "Texas" Chainsaw massacre ....

Meanwhile, I've got to try to make something happen with virtually nothing. As I've found in trying to push the hate crimes law to finally cover transgenders, instead I'm getting almost no support from Democrats — even personal friends who apparently want to support Equality Texas in their two choices, not ours!


Which brings me back to Rep. Warren Chisum. Ten years ago, I took a couple friends on their first-ever lobbying experience with NGLTF's Equality Begins At Home in Austin. We went directly to Chisum's office first. My theory was that once they saw how I verbally advance, parry and remise with the toughest, they'd have confidence to go into offices on their own, even if they're tough offices.

Fate dictated it would be a great learning exercise as we determined what Chisum didn't like about the hate crime bill language, asked if he'd support alternate wording (as long as it was defined to cover us all.) We left getting a critical GOP sponsor who brought over other Texas Republicans' support! That was me and my proteges Mark Wood & Patrick McIlvain. Eventually it was enough to get the bill passed the very next session, but without covering trans folks like me.

Another lesson it taught was not to presume that simply because one was Republican that they'd automatically be an enemy any more than if one was Democrat would translate into automatic friend. Actually, Rep. Chisum's enigmatic, but honest. He’s a decent guy. And like a couple of the other GOP folks I have good relations with, he's not the neo-conservative types who tend to be the younger or newly-elected types. The old-line conservatives are tough, but they're not inhuman.

It's a different world working with them than working with most of the Democrats. But sometimes, even when you're operating behind enemy lines, you can occasionally find an ally in the most unlikely of places.

I dearly love the state of Texas, but I consider that a harmless perversion on my part, and discuss it only with consenting adults." — Molly Ivins

"So farewell, my darling.
Perhaps we'll meet again
On some sin-infested street corner in Houston ...
Texas." — Heaven, Hell Or Houston, ZZ Top

Justice For A Trans Hate Victim

"I've been tossed around plenty before.
Had this heart of mine broken and more.
I can't find me a reason for sure,
But I've gotten used to bad news." — Used To Bad News, Boston

Finally, justice.

Just from a cursory recall, I can't remember any case involving a trans victim in the United States where there was a life sentence meted out along with the hate crimes (bias crimes) enhancement added. The Angie Zapata murder case and ruling on the killer Allen Ray Andrade was truly a notable verdict.

In a sense, it seems almost wrong to foist upon him this ignoble "first".

Then again, this is something that been a long time comin' for the Trans community of America. So inured we are to being written off as "freaks" or "its" or "objects" in media and in the legal system that I was skeptical that the court in Greeley, Colorado would be able to apply an equal sentence for a case where the victim was trans. In fact, the minute I found out that the judge had instructed the jury to consider "negligent homicide" as one of the verdict options, I was apoplectic and deeply furious. How could this be happening again?


To their credit, the jury in Greeley took little time and arrived at a sentence in roughly two hours time! And the sentence was appropriate: guilty of murder in the first degree, and guilty of a bias crime – the first time the law enacted in 2005 in Colorado had been used and successfully convicted.

For most of the country, even some in the gay and lesbian community, this won't be anything out of the ordinary. However, the trans community has had to watch our own, even in the most heinous of violence, be treated as if we weren't worthy of legal considerations the rest of the country expected. We have been always been casually dismissed as hookers or objects not worthy of full consideration in law as human beings, even when victimized by crimes most brutal.

My knee-jerk reaction on hearing the possibility of a lesser verdict and sentence was immediate outrage. It was time for protest and even use as fodder for our upcoming lobby day to point out the stark inequity in application of law. The jury's verdict defied my expectations. It was a nice surprise, even a mild shock.

That got me to thinking: I've become conditioned to expect inequality. More than a decade of being politically involved and knowing well how "law" is applied when it comes to trans people has trained me to expect the worst. The Gwen Araujo trials, which to most of us was considered a well-investigated case, ended up with woefully inadequate sentences. I'll never forget my initial displeasure at Jason Cazares' (who arguably killed Gwen Araujo) receiving a seven-year sentence.

Adding insult to injury, we had folks from the Horizons Foundation and Chris Daley from the Transgender Law Center chiding our complaints about the sentences, trying to impress upon the trans community that this was a just sentence! That's something I'll never forget. The trans community and Araujo's family both were quite upset with the prosecutors' results of convictions and plea bargains with relatively light sentences. Those who criticized our dismay were playing for political consideration instead of realizing the message that sentence sent to us trans folk: accept whatever you get and be happy, even when it's less than equal.

In a nutshell, the Gwen Araujo trial was a glaring example of how law is unequally applied. We weren't equal, and per some of our so-called allies, it was folly for us to entertain the notion of being equal.

The Angie Zapata case has finally given us a glimpse of how equal protection works.

Will this change my general outlook on whether we're considered equal? Not yet, not completely. This is one instance out of many others that have preceded it. Inequality is still a way of life that we both recognized and battle against.

For the time though, my heart goes out to the Zapata family for staying strong and supportive of Angie's memory. With the carriage of justice, may they now have some peace.

My heart also goes out to the Guerrero family who did likewise for Gwen Araujo's memory. This has to be a time of both happiness for the Zapatas, and also reflection of a true justice that was watered down and incomplete for their daughter, sister, niece. One wonders what they could've done to impress upon the courts in Oakland that Gwen too was just as valuable, just as loved, just as human as these judges and attorneys' family members?

This first just decision is a beginning. But until we're truly equal, it's only a beginning. And being on the downside of all this for all our lives, I remain an eternal skeptic until I see it happening consistently in real life.

"Justice cannot be for one side alone, but must be for both." — Eleanor Roosevelt

Hate Is On Our Minds

"Pick me up.
Been bleeding too long.
Right here, right now,
I'll stop it somehow.
I will make it go away –
Can't be here no more." — Alone I Break, Korn

Hate appears to be on the radar screens a lot lately. No, this time I'm not talking about the teabaggers or their hate of Obama and all things Democrat.

More to the point, hate crimes and legislation, laws and the prosecution of it are becoming the front-and-center as we prepare for hitting Capitol Hill. Just before the Easter break the Hate Crimes Prevention Act (HR 1913) by Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) was filed in Congress http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/thomas.

On the one hand, it's good to have something in the House that explicitly states "gender identity." This is better than the alternative of having us out completely.

The problem arises over the quirky definition (kept over from the previous session) in Sec. 7 of the legislation, amending Title XVIII, Chapter 13, Sec. 249(c)(2): For the purposes of this chapter, the term `gender identity' means actual or perceived gender-related characteristics. It defines gender identity as gender-related characteristics, not expanding the term gender identity but redefining it.

As Kathy Padilla noted in her blog to Pam's House Blend: http://www.pamshouseblend.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=9649

"The new definitions can generally be said to cover gender expression but not gender identity. Which in the real world would present the likelihood that gender variant gay, straight and transgender people who don’t medically transition would be covered by the Hate Crimes Bill.... Transsexuals would not be covered."

[...]

The redefining of identity to mean characteristics (in this case gender expression) is something that case law has already addressed in Title VII cases holding that expression does not equal identity; in those cases racial and ethnic identity. These were expressions that the plaintiffs associated with their racial and ethnic identities; such as hair styles and the use of their native languages but that might not be considered exclusively associated with those identities. The obverse would be applicable here – expression being covered, but identity being excluded. The history indicates that if expression only is covered in the legislation; unless one can concretely associate an expression with an identity, the identity wouldn’t be covered. It should be obvious - but the definition of gender expression discrimination is that it is based upon gender expression that isn’t associated with one’s identity."

And on a later blog, Kathy added: http://www.bilerico.com/2009/03/bulletproof.php

I followed up and asked if these [national-level organizations] had raised objections to the language in previous meetings and she confirmed that they had. The language hasn't changed since they raised these objections. And no one from these groups has stated that they were convinced their previous objections were groundless. It could just be that they maintain these objections, but won't voice them going forward out of process & political considerations."

"Drafting legislation is a highly skilled art. To be useful, civil rights statutes must be worded carefully. Sloppy or ambiguous language can create unintended loopholes or exclusions that may defeat the purpose of passing a law in the first place. Once a nondiscrimination statute is passed, courts will scrutinize the language very closely. Lawyers representing employers (landlords, businesses, etc.) will do their best to find loopholes and to persuade courts to interpret the law as narrowly as possible.... Individual litigants have won or lost cases depending on how narrowly or broadly a particular court has interpreted this single phrase. To avoid these problems as much as possible, it is a good idea to enlist the help of supportive attorneys and/or legislators who are skilled at drafting legislation, and who can help you anticipate criticisms, misunderstandings, and unintended consequences of language that is confusing, weak, or just poorly drafted." — the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force from their paper entitled "Transgender Equality."

While Mara Keisling of NCTE and presumably Lisa Mottet and other organizations' legal eagles had chance to review and even raised issue with the language (which I'd written about in my March 9 blog), since getting their hands slapped by Wade Henderson of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR) and Rep. Barney Frank they've all been conspicuously mute on the issue. Only recently did NCTE publicly respond, which I reprint from Helen Boyd's blog http://www.myhusbandbetty.com/wordPress/wp-admin/post-new.php:

From NCTE:

Last night, Representative John Conyers of Michigan re-introduced The Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2009, H.R. 1913. This would be the first-ever federal law to provide protections for transgender people. It is identical to the hate crimes bill passed by the House of Representatives in 2007 and includes the language that transgender advocates requested. It is also the first transgender inclusive bill to be introduced during this Session.

In his comments introducing the bill, Rep. John Conyers stated, "Hate crime statistics do not speak for themselves. Behind each of the statistics is an individual or community targeted for violence for no other reason than race, religion, color, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, or disability. Law enforcement authorities and civic leaders have learned that a failure to address the problem of bias crime can cause a seemingly isolated incident to fester into widespread tension that can damage the social fabric of the wider community. The Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2009 is a constructive and measured response to a problem that continues to plague our nation. These are crimes that shock and shame our national conscience. They should be subject to comprehensive federal law enforcement assistance and prosecution."

Representatives are heading home to their districts for spring recess from now until April 21st. It is vital that you call them in their district offices to urge their support for this critical piece of legislation. Those who oppose this legislation will be active during this time-we need to be as well so that members of Congress are hearing from those directly affected by this legislation. Please take this important step to help address the violence faced by transgender people.

[...]

WHAT THE BILL SAYS
The Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act, H.R. 1913, would:

Extend existing federal protections to include "gender identity, sexual orientation, gender and disability"

Allow the Justice Department to assist in hate crime investigations at the local level when local law enforcement is unable or unwilling to fully address these crimes

Mandate that the FBI begin tracking hate crimes based on actual or perceived gender identity

Remove limitations that narrowly define hate crimes to violence committed while a person is accessing a federally protected activity, such as voting.

[...]

For more information:

Read the specifics about this legislation from the Library of Congress, go to their website and search by bill H.R. 1913....

& That's exactly why I love NCTE: all the info you need to do what you need to do.

So much for noting Mara actually doing the right thing last month. Even Lisa Mottet, who was very hands-on with any proposed legislation and extremely keen on inadequate legislative wording becoming bad law, has been astonishingly silent. The very people who's paid job it is to make us aware of what's legislatively coming down the pike are, as Kathy put it, acquiescing to "process" for "political considerations." As I'd written about in February, this is what Washington has become.

Worse still, there's nothing we can do about it. LCCR's Henderson is already aggravated that the Hate Crimes wording has had to be expanded, most pointedly since it was the gay and especially the lesbian community who impressed upon him the pressing need for expanding the bill to cover atypical gender characterics. This coming after years of rebuffing the transgender community's calls for extending coverage! Reports are that he's of no mind to revisit it again.

And Ol' Barn'? "This is what you get!" is his general thoughts on it. He could not care less about what our concerns are on the subject. Gender expression is certainly covered by definition, meaning his community is now completely protected once it becomes law. Our opposing it gives Barney a delicious bit of irony: "this is what I get for helping them! (even with bad law language) Why should I bother?" Basically, it's all the cover he needs to leave us out of ENDA the minute we oppose it. And besides, he hired a trans man! He's got his "throw down" tranny! As comedian Jeff Foxworthy would say, "...there's your sign...."

I'm sure Barney, HRC and the back-room exclusionist queers are laughing so hard they wet themselves. One thing's for certain: none of these parties can ever look for to us ceasing the protests, or taking every opportunity to slam and embarrass them. Welcome to the wonderful world of dirty politics and crappy law.


"Whether it comes from a despotic sovereign or an elected president, from a murderous general or a beloved leader, I see power as an inhuman and hateful phenomenon." — murdered Italian journalist, Oriana Fallaci

All the while this is playing out, we're also seeing the beginnings of the Angie Zapata murder trial and its barristerial gymnastics by Allen Ray Andrade's defense team, doing what they are paid to do: dazzling the court-watchers by pulling off a logic-defying feat of avoiding conviction at all costs. In theory, the district attorneys and the investigators should have done such a thorough job that such lawyerly twists, turns and double backflips will be pinned dead to rights.

Of course, we all know that nothing is perfect. As the Gwen Araujo case in California showed us, even the most diligently investigated of cases can still snag.

The results there got convictions, but it was less-than-optimal. The DA out there chickened out, ultimately. Worse, we had some in the gay and lesbian leadership out there, who'd sidled up to the Guerrero family to bask in some of the media face-time afterglow, later instructing those of us in the trans community who were involved in the case from day one that the eventual sentences were just (including a seven year stint for the Jason Cazares who likely struck the killing blow)!

Imagine having a standing hate crimes law on the books during a Matthew Shepard and having prosecutors justify this stuff by saying it was panic and settling instead for a seven-year plea bargain. Then imagine the trans community instructing the gay community to be happy about the outcome. The community would be roiling in outrage.

The Zapata trial is going well at the moment. The district attorneys laid out their case quite adroitly in its opening arguments. Of course the Andrade defense team is trying to counter with the trans-panic defense regardless. It appears from initial impressions that the defense is playing a losing hand. However, this is small town Colorado and also the first bill testing their freshly enacted Hate Crimes law. I look forward to a proper conviction and sentence, but I'm also mindful that courts aren't always fair to either ethnic minorities or especially toward transgenders.

"The lies, the hurt, the pain, the hate
Really keep fuckin' with me.
There's no where else to go." — Embrace, Korn

As I'd mentioned in my own state hate crimes testimony a couple weeks ago, not all hate crimes end in murder. Some don't even reach the point of physical conflict, but are extremely unnerving nevertheless. Sarah Anne Vestal dropped me a note about a recent incident she had on the day before my testimony in Austin while she was returning a rental car to the Little Rock airport in Arkansas:

Late yesterday morning, I returned a rental car to National Car Rental at Little Rock National Airport. The attendant, obviously noting that I was a male to female transsexual, forced me to park my car in three different spaces, move my luggage twice, then move the car again before he would provide me a receipt for my car rental. During this time, he referred to me as a “screwed-up man faggot” and used other derogatory male terms even though I was presenting entirely as female. (I am a post-operative transsexual who has lived solely as a woman for years.) When I asked for the manager, he pointed at the person in their key booth in the parking lot. He followed me to that person and when I tried to explain what happened, the original attendant interrupted and threatened to “take the head off the big motha fuckin faggot” if I continued with the story. He then took actions which led me to believe he was going to cause me physical harm such as running up to me and cocking his arm as to hit me. The man in the booth yelled at the attendant to stop, but he then chased me into the airport while screaming more threats of bodily harm. This incident was also witnessed by the National Car customer service woman who had walked out of the desk area. She made no effort to help me with the attendant.

... I went straight to the police area near check-in. The officer who was behind the door listened to my story, looked at me crying, and said he could not do anything since the man did not physically hit me. The police officer told me to go back to the National Car rental area and speak to the manager....

... On the way through security, I stopped and tried to speak to LRPD Officer “Mack” so as to understand why they would not help me. Officer Mack rudely told me that if I did not calm down, he would make sure I would miss my flight home.

While National Car Rental (also dba: as Alamo Car Rental) is on the International Gay & Lesbian Travel Assn. (IGLTA) as a Platinum sponsor for the past two years, they've apparently not bothered with impressing upon their rental associates things like sensitivity, much less professional customer service with GLBT people. In their press release, National & Alamo's parent group Vanguard's International Marketing Manager, Paul Huber, stated “I am pleased to be partnered with a great group as the IGLTA. I am honored to participate in the “Driving Proudly” sponsorship and look forward to the great things to come.”

It doesn't sound like terroristic threats are quite what Vanguard's Huber had in mind. However, it was also equally noteworthy that Little Rock police thought that was no real issue to even bother with. Unless you're actually physically attacked or killed, why should he bother getting his butt up off the stool? That seems to be the general attitude.

Yes, hate seems to be on everyone's mind these days. Will we have some foresight about not revisiting these horrific tragedies and do the proactive thing now? Or will it simply sit stagnating, waiting to fester into something worse?

In explaining his impression of when Texas was going to revisit the James Byrd Hate Crimes bill to expand it to include trans people, Randall Terrell said, "it's probably going to take another tragedy (like Matthew Shepard or Gwen Araujo) before they address this." As MLK said, and as exhibited in actions thanks to LGRL's Dianne Hardy-Garcia and Texas State Sen. Rodney Ellis: "justice delayed is justice denied."

So the question begs: why?

"There are weapons that are simply thoughts and attitudes, prejudices to be found only in the minds of men. For the record, prejudices can kill. And suspicion can destroy. And a thoughtless search for a scapegoat has a fallout all of its own." — Rod Serling (from the episode: The Monsters Have Come To Maple St.)

The Monsters Have Come To Maple Street … Or Creekside Park”

"Look at that street. It's nothing but candles. It's like going back into the Dark Ages or something." — the character Charlie from 'The Monsters Have Come To Maple Street' by Rod Serling

Well, since my original blog post yesterday got hijacked (read wiped out) by the 21-hour power outage due to yesterday's run-of-the-mill thunderstorm, I'm doing a different one instead.

Yesterday and especially last night was right out of Rod Serling for me, save for the meteor vs. space ship controversy, resulting paranoia and eventual, chaotic turning against ourselves. We had nothing but a typical thunderstorm with heavy rain and not even a notable amount of lightning strikes, but we couldn't explain nor determine why it required us a full day in the dark. The Monsters had come to Creekside Park Drive.

As night fell, it became obvious that our block was the only one left without power! Literally I could walk down to the main road, or over to the next street and see light, but then turn the corner onto our street and it was pitch dark! Literally there was one house with light and another with no power right next door!

It was kinda creepy being the only ones left in the dark for the night. Even though we were civil amongst ourselves, there was edgy frustration. No one was happy, and we were either sitting on porches or truck tailgates in driveways or restlessly wandering the streets.

It was as if the rest of the world was going on with their regular lives and we were left out and forgotten. Our street was singled out for the Dark Ages. Oddly it's how I felt: I had so much I needed to get done along with the blog and I was simply stuck in neutral with a fully wasted day!

So I began today inherently agitated. It also occurred to me the date: today is April 19th. This is the wack jobs nut-out and commit mass mayhem day. It's also a red-letter day for liberal-hating right-wing types as it's the anniversary of the siege at the Branch Davidian compound outside of Waco. While his sect was deemed extremely controversial and referred to as a cult, the FBI raid and resulting violent immolation by David Koresh and his followers struck a nerve in neo-conservatives of the religiopolitical variety.

Extremist conservatives saw it as a catalytic date to strike back at the government. At the two-year anniversary, it was Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols who used the day to bomb the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.

Hopefully the day ends up with no incident, however the significance shouldn't be put out of mind with the current anti-government fervor by even more mainstream conservatives. To wit: the recent Teabaggers revolt. While the Teabag parties went on without incident on April 15, there was one incident in front of the White House where protesters tossed over a box of tea. In the post 9/11 world with America at war, it's no surprise that the Secret Service immediately seized upon the item and broke up the protest post-haste.

"Let me tell you: you're starting something here that ... that's what you should be frightened of! And as God is my witness, you're letting something begin here that's a nightmare!" — character Les Goodman from 'The Monsters Have Come To Maple Street' by Rod Serling


A number of articles looked at the tax day, teabag protests and seemed to note a lack of real message. It seems these are just protests of folks being angry just for the sake of being angry. And of course conservative politicians are taking every opportunity to be front and center, riding the wave of anger.

Brian Smith, a marketer from Greenville, S.C., in Washington on business who came by the rally stated his reasons for attending: "I love my country and I don't like what's going on. Government – to be honest with you, and this will probably be misquoted, but on 9/11, I think they hit the wrong building. They should have gone into the Capitol build