Saturday 9: Freeway of Love

Crazy Sam’s Saturday 9: Freeway of Love (1985)

Every Saturday I take time off from written on serious topics to have some fun…

Unfamiliar with this week's tune? Hear it here.

1) In this song, Aretha's ideal car is a pink Caddy. What's your dream vehicle?
A Tesla.

2) Have you ever owned a convertible?
Well not owned it, it was a MGB that my brother owned and he let me drive it when he was away at college.

3) Aretha longs to "drop the pedal and go." Are you a careful, conservative driver? Or do you enjoy going fast? 
I think I am an average driver. I don’t go fast, fast but I keep up with traffic.

4) Aretha's grandmother Rachel helped raise her. Tell us about one of your grandparents.
I didn’t really know my grandparents except for my mother’s mother who lived with us. My father’s grandmother lived in another part of the state I only saw her on holidays and both my grandfathers died young. My grandmother that lived with us used to bake stuff from the old country; I remember her making beer cruller, poppy seed roll, and nut roll. Unfortunately my grandmother never wrote down the recipes. I found a recipe that is close her poppy seed and nuts roll, but not for the beer cruller (Does anyone have a recipe for beer cruller that willing to share?) although a doughnut recipe using beer might be close.

5) Aretha played a waitress in the 1980 movie, The Blues Brothers. Have you ever worked in food service?
Nope.

6) Aretha was a chain smoker for decades and had a terrible time giving up cigarettes. What habit do you wish you could break?
Eating too much.

7) A sculpture of Aretha is at Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum in New York City. What's the last museum you visited?
The New Britain Museum of American Art.

8) Since Aretha has many honorary degrees, it would be appropriate to refer to her as Dr. Franklin. Who is the last person you addressed by his or her title (Officer, Father, Pastor, Dr., etc.)?
A therapist friend and he is a PhD. When I called his office the other day I only remembered his nick name and I couldn’t very well tell his secretary I wanted to speak to using his nickname.

9) The daughter of a minister, Aretha enjoys singing "church music" and her 1972 CD Amazing Grace is one of the best sellers in gospel music history. Do you have any gospel music on your phone, iPod or MP3 player?
No, definitely not.

The Up Hill Battle

That is what it seems like in passing non-discrimination legislation for trans people. We have to battle not only the opposition but sometime our allies.

Op-ed: Pushing Transgender Rights Bills in a Difficult State
What can the rise of transgender political power in Philadelphia can tell us about the fight in our state and elsewhere? How can trans folks keep the progress going?
Advocate
By Jordan Gwendolyn Davis
February 20, 2015

… state Rep. Mark Cohen, a Philadelphia Democrat, has introduced two major transgender rights bills. HB 303 is based on California’s Success For All Students Act, which allows for students to dress, use facilities, and participate in programs conducive with their gender identity, while HB 304 would require all private, public, and Medicaid health plans to include transition-related health coverage.
[…]
Philadelphia has been the city that says yes to the LGBT community when the Pennsylvania legislature has said no. Aside from a few administrative (i.e. changing gender on driver’s licenses) and judicial (i.e. marriage equality) victories, nothing has been done in terms of LGBT rights on the state level. On the other hand, Philadelphia had achieved trans-inclusive antidiscrimination, a slew of life partnership provisions, and a few administrative victories such as a homeless shelter policy by 2011. Even so, I found myself witnessing many Philadelphia candidates and elected officials hit all the right notes on LGBT issues, but when it came time to addressing the unique issues with the T — especially health care — finding it was a bridge too far for them.

And that is the thing; we get buried in the LG_bt in a candidate’s campaign. They get up on the podium and say that they are all for LGBT rights, but to the candidates they have a very narrow view of LGBT rights, for many of them it only means marriage equality.

She goes on to write,

As difficult as the drafting process was, the harder part will now be passing HB 303 and HB 304. Both these bills, as of this writing, have fewer than a dozen cosponsors (out of 203 house members); the cosponsors are all liberal Democrats, most of them from Philadelphia. As much as I thank them for this cosponsorship, there will be no victory unless there is bipartisan support all over the state. Although this will be a tough road, and I am not holding my breath about passing them this session, I hope that the transgender community mobilizes behind these two bills.

I think that was one of the problems in Massachusetts, they could not get enough support for public accommodations from the Democrats.

We were lucky here in Connecticut that we had the strong support of the governor who was willing to use some of his political capital to pass our bill. But it wasn’t an easy battle, it was touch and go all the way. The opposition has gotten better in the way they framed the bill.

Seeing Is Believing

Ever since Pope Frances was elected Pope there has been a steady thawing in relationships between the Catholic Church and the LGBT community. Last week the Pope met with a trans man and this week the Pope met with a LGBT rights group,

Gay Catholic group gets VIP treatment at Vatican for first time
Reuters
By Philip Pullella
Feb 18, 2015

(Reuters) - A prominent American Catholic gay rights group was given VIP treatment for the first time at an audience with Pope Francis on Wednesday, a move members saw as a sign of change in the Roman Catholic Church.

"This is a sign of movement that's due to the Francis effect," said Sister Jeannine Gramick, co-founder of New Ways Ministry, which ministers to homosexual Catholics and promotes gay rights in the 1.2 billion-member Church.

Gramick and executive director Francis DeBernardo led a pilgrimage of 50 homosexual Catholics to the audience in St. Peter's Square.

They told Reuters in an interview afterwards that when the group came to Rome on Catholic pilgrimages during the papacies of Francis's predecessors John Paul and Benedict, "they just ignored us".

This time, a U.S. bishop and a top Vatican official backed their request and they sat in a front section with dignitaries and special Catholic groups. As the pope passed, they sang "All Are Welcome," a hymn symbolizing their desire for a more inclusive Church.

The web site Christian Today reported that,

The suggestion that the New Ways activists were given any special treatment by the Pope has now been refuted by Vatican sources. According to Catholic News Agency (CNA), the seats taken by the group are not considered to be superior, and are available on a first come, first served basis. "The group was treated as any other group of faithful in the square," CNA was told.

So what is the truth? Was it a step toward relaxing the church’s positions as reported by New Ways Ministry or were they just another group that just was standing line to see the Pope?

What I want to see before I believe in this new thaw is the church back off from opposing non-discrimination legislation. I don’t care what they tell their faithful but when they continue to block legislation for equal rights and oppose us from being able to sit in a restaurant and being served, then I will continue to see the same old church under a fancy wrapper.

All In The Family

It is hard to deny your own family and when one of your family comes out as trans for most families it is hard to reject your own son or daughter. Yes, there are religious conservative or bigots who are so transphobic that do cast their child out on the street but most families don’t.

We tend to change family members views on trans people, it moves it from an obscure concept to reality. And it is even more dramatic if the family member is a legislator,

Rep. Mike Honda tweets he is 'proud grandpa of a transgender grandchild'
San Jose Mercury News
By Julia Prodis
POSTED:   02/18/2015

SAN JOSE -- U.S. Rep. Mike Honda announced in a tweet Wednesday that he is "the proud grandpa of a transgender grandchild," sparking an immediate outpouring of support for the Democratic congressman -- who said he hopes she "can feel safe at school without fear of being bullied."

Along with the tweet, Honda posted a photo of himself with his arm tightly around his grandchild, who has shoulder-length hair and a sweet smile.
[…]
"It's surprising just to hear a congressperson tweet something like that, but that's the beginning of something new, especially for transgender people who have been going through a lot of discrimination with their gender identity," said Adriana Covarrubias, who was volunteering at the center [San Jose's Billy DeFrank LGBT Community Center] Wednesday afternoon. "As a grandparent, he's going to see the things the child is going to go through."

Just by reading the comments he will get an idea the discrimination and bigotry she will face.

There are a number of legislators who have relatives that are trans; here in Connecticut one of the state legislators announced that he has a transgender cousin when we were passing our law in 2011. He spoke about his cousin who had just transitioned from male to female. He said that he sent his cousin a Christmas card using her female name and received a thank you from her telling him how she cherished the card.

As more people transition it will also mean that more family members also become aware firsthand about transgender us, our struggles and the battles that we face.

Yesterday I Was At A Homeless Shelter

I volunteered to do the Point-In-Time count of the homeless population. Every year the shelters are required to count the homeless in shelters and on the street and I volunteered to do the count at shelters.

I did it because I wanted to see what a shelter looks like and because I wanted to help. I get the calls for phone line CTAC (CT TransAdvocacy Coalition) and we get requests for “trans friendly” homeless shelters. I did it with a friend who is also trans and it looked that most people who volunteered to help had a friend along.

We first had training on filling out the forms (here is an electronic version of the form) and then were assigned a shelter while some volunteered to count homeless people who do not go to shelters.

I interviewed about six or eight people and out of the eight most were there because of hardship and not drug addicts or alcoholics. For whatever reason they were down on their luck and they were clean, very friendly and respective.

I found the shelter clean but very worn and in need of basic repairs like paint or the furniture was typical institutional furniture (heavy and basically a big cube with cushions. I did staff training at a mental hospital and it was the same type of furniture).

I think to sum it up in one word the word “basic” keeps coming to mind. It is not a place where you want to be, but it is basic communal living.

I Am Of Two Thoughts

There is an article on Bilerco about “Building a More Resilient Transgender Community” and I can see two different views. The first is that these are good tips for us and the other is that it is society that has to change. The article points out these areas that the community needs to do to be safer,

Optimism About Your Future – she write that negative thoughts are destructive and leads to suicide.

Strong Social Support from Family, Friends, and Co-Workers – one of the things that I learned in social work school was how important a support network. Those who have a strong support network are more likely to have a successful transition.

Belief That Your Life Has Purpose and Meaning – this is another important positive factor. Many times we wallow in depression with no focus, for me it is working toward making the world more accepting of us. Doing what I can to help other trans people.

Feeling Like You Belong to a Group – this helps, but I don’t know how important it I, I know many trans people who get by because they have a strong support network.

Willingness to Seek Help/Willingness to Talk and also Cultural Norms That Encourage People to Seek Help – I think many trans women still have that “male macho” culture stuff hanging around and try to go it on their own.

Effective Coping and Problem-Solving Skills – this is a biggy! I was using coping skill when I didn’t even realize it. When I was doing an independent studies class for the MSW, my professor gave me a book in coping skill and grounding and when I read it I realized that I was already using those skills. One time I was giving a seminar to doctors and therapist I went over some coping skills that I have learned. Afterward a therapist emailed me saying how great a presentation I gave, she said she rode up with me in the elevator and noticed the coping skill I was using, watching the floor numbers on the display to avoid looking at the other people in the elevator.

These are all good tips to learn, but my thoughts are why should we have to learn them. Society shouldn’t  force us to learn them, instead society should embrace diversity instead of ostracizing us. If we were not marginalized none of this would be necessary because all these skills are to deal with rejection.

There Are Two Sexes.

Wrong, it is something that trans people know, that nature is diverse and not black and white, but all the shades of grey in between.

Sex redefined
The idea of two sexes is simplistic. Biologists now think there is a wider spectrum than that.
Nature
By Claire Ainsworth
18 February 2015

As a clinical geneticist, Paul James is accustomed to discussing some of the most delicate issues with his patients. But in early 2010, he found himself having a particularly awkward conversation about sex.

A 46-year-old pregnant woman had visited his clinic at the Royal Melbourne Hospital in Australia to hear the results of an amniocentesis test to screen her baby's chromosomes for abnormalities. The baby was fine — but follow-up tests had revealed something astonishing about the mother. Her body was built of cells from two individuals, probably from twin embryos that had merged in her own mother's womb. And there was more. One set of cells carried two X chromosomes, the complement that typically makes a person female; the other had an X and a Y. Halfway through her fifth decade and pregnant with her third child, the woman learned for the first time that a large part of her body was chromosomally male. “That's kind of science-fiction material for someone who just came in for an amniocentesis,” says James.
[…]
When genetics is taken into consideration, the boundary between the sexes becomes even blurrier. Scientists have identified many of the genes involved in the main forms of DSD, and have uncovered variations in these genes that have subtle effects on a person's anatomical or physiological sex. What's more, new technologies in DNA sequencing and cell biology are revealing that almost everyone is, to varying degrees, a patchwork of genetically distinct cells, some with a sex that might not match that of the rest of their body. Some studies even suggest that the sex of each cell drives its behaviour, through a complicated network of molecular interactions. “I think there's much greater diversity within male or female, and there is certainly an area of overlap where some people can't easily define themselves within the binary structure,” says John Achermann, who studies sex development and endocrinology at University College London's Institute of Child Health.

These discoveries do not sit well in a world in which sex is still defined in binary terms. Few legal systems allow for any ambiguity in biological sex, and a person's legal rights and social status can be heavily influenced by whether their birth certificate says male or female.

Yes, this does not sit well with people who cannot think beyond the binary, to them it makes their head spin to think further than when the Bible says or what they learned in high school biology in the ‘50s.

Lavern Cox In A New Show

Ms. Cox is starting in a new series on CBS, she is doing a pilot as a transgender lawyer.

Laverne Cox cast as transgender lawyer in CBS legal drama pilot
LGBTQNational
Staff Reports
Wednesday, February 11, 2015

“Orange Is The New Black” star Laverne Cox, who was the first openly transgender actor to be nominated for an Emmy in 2014, has been cast in CBS’s legal drama pilot “Doubt.”
Variety reports that the project from CBS TV Studios, which was previously unnamed when it was ordered to pilot, revolves around a yet-to-be-cast attorney who gets romantically involved with one of her clients who may or may not be guilty of a brutal crime.

 Cox will play Cameron Wirth, a transgender Ivy League-educated lawyer “described as “competitive as she is compassionate.”

I think this is so cool, a trans person playing a mainstream character who is not a comic relief, a criminal or a prostitute.

I know a number of trans lawyers who are working in private practice, for non-profits and other are working in government jobs, some are doing very well while others are struggling.

Feminism

I am always a little confused when I hear the working feminism because the word means so many things to so many people; it is kind of like the word “Transgender.” There is an article about trans-feminism in the website Gay Voice Views,

Trans-feminism 101 (An evaluation of feminist thought through the eyes of a trans-man)
February 9, 2015
By CJ Shrewsbury

Trans-feminism 101

(An evaluation of feminist thought through the eyes of a trans-man)

As a “trans” man, not only have I struggled with my place within society due to my gender identity, but have also struggled in finding an identity within the feminist world. It was, as if, everywhere I turned I was confronted with oppression. I was tolerated by the feminist community but not taken seriously as a feminist. To most, I was seen as a traitor to femininity. Choosing to adopt masculinity and therefore I was now part of the patriarchal oppressors. Now given this was not the view of all feminists. Many groups, such as inclusive feminists welcomed me with open arms. Yet, I still felt like an outcast.

So what was I to do? I could not in my own conscious, morally or philosophically abandon my feminist identity and roots. However, no matter where I turned, I felt excluded and at times discriminated against due to my personal gender identity. I found this not only more troubling but confusing as well. For my interpretation of my scholarly research on feminism contradicted this unwarranted exclusion from the feminist world. My understanding led me to understand that feminism, regardless of philosophical ideology, aimed for equality for all people unjustly excluded and discriminated by the oppressive patriarchal society and their coercive institutions.

That is more or less how I view feminism, “aimed for equality for all people unjustly excluded and discriminated by the oppressive patriarchal society and their coercive institutions.” Where everyone has an equal chance to achieve their dreams, which all possibilities can be realized.

But like all movements it has splintered in different directions,

Yes, historically it began as a purely woman’s movement. But like all social movements and their correlating theories, feminism has evolved into a broader more inclusive identity. Including not only women’s issues but also taking into consideration, class, gender, race, and sexuality. Making feminism a movement seeking justice for all effected by patriarchy and acknowledging that women were not the only one’s suffering from patriarchy’s oppression. Despite the truth of modern feminist ideology, there still remains a small number consisting of mainly radical feminist who do not adhere to this 21st century notion of feminism. Most notably, the right-wing radical feminists known as the TERFS (Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists). I shall abandon the desire to elaborate further on the problems created by the TERFS and save the topic for a future article. For my purpose is not to narrate the divisions amongst feminism but focus upon the philosophy of trans-feminism.

And some have moved it from equality to oppression; just like those in the trans community who are exclusionist. Those trans people who look down at trans people who have not had surgery or can integrate into society.

Harry Potter And Tolerance

Here is an interesting article about the relationship between kids who read Harry Potter stories and those who don’t.

Psychologists Find a Surprising Thing Happens to Kids Who Read Harry Potter
Science Mic
By Tom McKay
July 30, 2014

The first took 34 Italian fifth-graders and plunged them into a six-week course on Potter. The researchers began by having the students fill out a questionnaire on immigrants, and then split them into two groups which read selected passages from the series. The students in the first group discussed prejudice and bigotry as themes in the books, while the others didn't, serving as a control group. The students in the first group showed "improved attitudes towards immigrants," but only if they identified with Potter.

A second study with 117 Italian high school students found that a reader's emotional identification with Harry was associated with more positive perceptions of LGBT people in general. A third, which surveyed U.K. college students, ultimately found no association between an emotional bond with Harry and perceptions of refugees. But it did indicate that students who had less of an emotional identification with Voldemort had "improved attitudes toward refugees."

In all three studies, the researchers credited the books with improving the readers' ability to assume the perspective of marginalized groups. They also claimed that young children, with the help of a teacher, were able to understand that Harry's frequent support of "mudbloods" was an allegory towards bigotry in real-life society.

Then we have this study, it is a little older but still interesting,

‘Harry Potter’ Books Brainwashed Millennials To Elect President Barack Obama, New Study Says
International Business Times
By  Rebecka Schumann
August 14 2013

The popular young adult book series “Harry Potter” is being targeted as a reason behind the 2008 election of U.S. President Barack Obama. In the study, released by University of Vermont Political Science Professor Anthony Gierzynski, it is alleged that millennials who read the fantasy novels are the reason for the 44th president’s success.

According to a report from the Daily Caller, Gierzynski’s study states that Americans born from 1980 onward have showed support for Obama due to being “brainwashed” by the moral lessons discussed in the best-selling, seven-book J.K. Rowling series. “The lessons fans internalized about tolerance, diversity, violence, torture, skepticism and authority made the Democratic Party and Barack Obama more appealing to fans of 'Harry Potter' in the current political environment,” Gierzynski said.

The claims were based on the study’s conclusion which found that 60 percent of 1,100 millennial-aged college students surveyed who had read “Harry Potter” also voted for Obama in 2008. Eighty-three percent of those surveyed who read the books also reportedly claimed to have an "unfavorable" view of Republican and former U.S. President George W. Bush.

Hmm… no wonder the conservatives hated the books. Also conservative Christians want the books banned from school libraries because they were about witchcraft and magic, little did they know the books also taught tolerance for those who are different.

Five

Sadly the count of the number of trans persons murdered this year is now at five. The fifth trans woman was murdered by her father,

22 Year Old Ohio Trans Woman Stabbed to Death By Father
Pittsburgh Lesbian Correspondents
By Sue Kerr
February 15.2015

22-year-old Bri Golec has recently returned to a transgender support group in the Akron, Ohio area. She had participated a few years ago, then stopped attending. Recently, she began to more assertively explore her gender identity.
[…]
Trans activist Jacob Nash has confirmed that Bri was a transwoman and was involved in the community. According to Bri’s obituary, Facebook page and friends, she was a drummer and an artist. She loved her cat and had many friends. Bri will be buried this Friday, February 20 in Ohio.

Her father’s attempts to cover up the murderous attack took a bizarre turn when he told police that Bri was in a cult, implying the cult was responsible for the non-existent robbery. Local activists believe the elder Golec may have been referencing the transgender community. They are hopeful that the police will consider Bri’s gender identity in their investigation.

Bri Golec is the 6th transgender individual to die a violent death in 2015. She is the 5th transgender woman to be murdered in Ohio since 2013 along with Cemia Acoff, Betty Skinner, Brittany Kidd-Stergis, and Tiffany Edwards.  Another trans woman, Candice Milligan, was brutally attacked in Toledo.

The media used male pronouns to describe Bri, the only reports from LGBT media identified her as trans. The other media dissed her in death, denying her true identity.

When will the hate end?

Update 2/17/15 9:00AM:

According to Janet Mock's blog, the count is sadly now six trans women killed since the first of the year.

Katz And Jane Doe

Katz was up for reappointment as commissioner of the Department of Children and Families (DCF) and she was reappointed.  During the hearing she was questioned about Jane Doe, the trans girl in the boy’s detention center.

Despite Criticism, Katz Endorsed For 2nd Term As DCF Chief
Hartford Courant
By Josh Kovner
February 11, 2015

Katz was also questioned closely by Rep. Cecilia Buck-Taylor, R-New Milford, on why Katz pressed for the transfer last year of a 16-year-old transgender girl to adult prison with no new charges pending – a move that drew outrage nationally from civil-rights groups.

The problem is the public only hears about a few cases. There are THOUSANDS of them that go unpublished.

The teen, known as Jane Doe, had an assaultive history. Advocates said DCF should be able to care for her anyway; Katz said her behavior was out of control. Katz and the agency lawyers invoked an obscure juvenile-transfer statute that hadn't been used more than twice in 20 or more years, and a judge approved the transfer after a trial. The teen has been back in DCF care since the summer.

"I didn't do it lightly," said Katz, first nominated by Gov. Dannel P. Malloy in January 2011 and renominated last month. "And I'm not going to walk that back now."

She told Buck-Taylor that DCF social workers and state correction officials "built a cocoon" around Jane Doe when she was at the York Correctional Institute for women in Niantic, "and she was successful enough to allow us to bring her back."

Despite a couple of setbacks, Jane Doe "is doing incredibly well now," Katz said. The teen has a room in her own wing at the CJTS boys facility, and Katz said she has visited and bonded with her…

Why is she in the boys’ facility? Why isn’t she in with the girls? That was a question that should have been asked?

State Of The Trans Community

There is an op-ed article in the LA Times about the progress we have made,

Getting Americans to accept transgender people remains a challenge
By Jennifer Finney Boylan
February 13, 2015

e tall young man, the head of a major LGBT civil rights organization, looked out at his audience and asked what seemed, in 2011, like a preposterous question. "Is it possible," he wanted to know, "that in the years to come we will be able to declare the movement over? That we will have reached, at long last, a time in which our goals will have been achieved?"
[…]
And yet, the last few years have left many Americans dizzy at the speed of progress, whether gay, straight, transgender or cisgender (an antonym of "trans" that applies to those comfortable with the gender they were assigned at birth). At times it's been hard even to keep track of the string of marriage-equality victories. Marriage equality is now the law in 37 states; in six others, courts have overturned the ban on same-sex marriage, but those rulings are being appealed. And the Supreme Court is expected to resolve the legal battle over marriage equality by June.
As I travel the country speaking about LGBT rights, I've begun to hear, with some earnestness, the question that seemed so preposterous to me just four years ago. Are we all done, then? Is it time to furl the rainbow flags and head home?

The answer, alas, is no, and not only because marriage equality is far from the only issue, or even the most important issue, affecting our community. Across the country, a gap has emerged between progress on the legislative front and progress that still needs to be made in Americans' hearts. Marriage equality and anti-discrimination laws have achieved remarkable victories in statehouses, electoral refrendums [sic] and the courts. But full acceptance is as elusive as ever.

We have made great inroads but most of them are on paper. Trans students are still being harassed in schools, trans employees are still being fired, and trans people are still being attacked because of we are.

We still have a long ways to go, what do you think?

customer surveys

Saturday 9: All Dressed in Love

Crazy Sam’s Saturday 9: All Dressed in Love (2008)

Every Saturday I take time off from written on serious topics to have some fun…

For Valentine's Day, we need a happy love song. Hear it here.

1) In this song, Jennifer sings, "I look good in love …" What about you? When you're happy, or sad, does it show? Or do you keep an even demeanor, no matter what? 
I am very good at hiding my feelings, I had a lot of practice.

2) This song played over the closing credits of a hit movie, Sex and the City. When you go to the movies, do you visit the concession stand for popcorn, or a soft drink, or candy?
No, I sneak in a bottle of either soda or water.

3) Think of the last movie you watched at home. Was it a DVD, DVR, streamed or cable presentation?
Streaming video from YouTube.

4) Jennifer Hudson got good grades in high school and went away to Langston University in Oklahoma. But she was homesick for her family in Chicago and came home after just one semester. Have you ever been homesick?
Yes, I’m a homebody. I lived all my life in one town,

5) Jennifer received acclaim for her renditions of "The Star Spangled Banner" at the 2008 Democratic Convention and Super Bowl XLIII. Do you agree with critics who say that our National Anthem is hard to sing? 
I don’t sing so I can’t comment on that.

6) Jennifer is a spokesperson for Weight Watchers and, with diet and exercise, went from a size 18 to a size 6. She says that while she's committed to healthy eating, she still enjoys ice cream occasionally. Do you prefer your ice cream in a cone or a cup?
I prefer it in a cup, or a cone, or in a bar, or… just give me ice cream anyway you have it.

7) Her fiance, Daniel Otunga, is a graduate of Harvard Law School. Harvard is the most famous of the eight "Ivy League" schools. Do you know the other seven?
Well I beg to differ; Yale is the most famous Ivy League. Let’s see there are Princeton, Brown, and Dartmouth, those are the only ones that I remember off the top of my head.

8) With a Grammy and an Oscar, Jennifer Hudson is one of the most successful American Idol contestants. Can you name another singer who appeared on AI?
Ah… no. I never watched the show.

9) Last year, Jennifer nearly bought a brand-new Ferrari because it was so great looking. At the last moment she backed out of the deal because she doesn't drive enough to warrant such an expensive car. What's the last impulse purchase you either made, or resisted?
I bought a new lens for my camera, a 150 – 500mm f5 – 6.3 zoom lens.

Trans Doctors

No I don’t mean doctors who treat trans patients but doctors who are transgender. There is a pediatrician down in Concord North Carolina, who is transitioning,

Patients support Concord doctor's gender transition
WCNC
By Tony Burbeck,
February 12, 2015

CONCORD, N.C. -- A longtime local pediatrician has announced he is going through gender transition.

Dr. Hal Levin is the medical director at Piedmont Pediatrics in Concord.

In a letter he sent last March, he said he will return to work as a transgender female and go by the name Dr. Laura Levin.

The clinic and Carolinas Healthcare System sent letters to patient families letting them know.
[…]
Dr. Levin's touched on that in a personal letter to patient families.

This is part of his statement:

"I want to assure you that the only thing changing about me is my appearance. The excellent care your family has received at Piedmont Pediatrics will not change. When I return to the practice in March, I hope you will see that I am the same person at my core that I have always been - a physician who cares deeply about patients, who provides compassionate, excellent care, and who is committed to patients' well-being and health. Being a woman does not define me. It just happens to be part of who I am that will now be visible to everyone else."

The clinic also sent out a letter where they said that they welcome diversity where it “promotes an environment where difference are valued and integrated into their workforce.”

I know a doctor who transitioned in her practice in the Boston area and she lost a few patients but the majority stayed with her. One of the first blogs that I found on line was that of another doctor, Dr. Becky Allison’s “Becky's Story,” and it was reading her blog that I first realize that my transition was possible.

Healthcare professionals who are trans help the community in many way, and I think the two important ways are that they understand what it is like to transition so they can treat trans patients better than non-transgender doctors and the second way that they help the community is by being visible. As a social worker I think I make a strong impact when I am meeting with other non-transgender professionals.

At A Meeting

I am at a meeting about homeless shelters this morning discussing the treatment of trans people at shelters.

The survey “Injustice At Every Turn” found some startling facts about homeless trans people. Some of their findings are,

• Respondents lived in extreme poverty. Our sample was nearly four times more likely to have a household income of less than $10,000/ year compared to the general population.
• Overall, 16% said they had been compelled to work in the underground economy for income (such as doing sex work or selling drugs).
• Respondents reported various forms of direct housing discrimination — 19% reported having been refused a home or apartment and 11% reported being evicted because of their gender identity/expression.
• Respondents who have experienced homelessness were highly vulnerable to mistreatment in public settings, police abuse and negative health outcomes.
• One-fifth (19%) reported experiencing homelessness at some point in their lives because they were transgender or gender nonconforming; the majority of those trying to access a homeless shelter were harassed by shelter staff or residents (55%), 29% were turned away altogether, and 22% were sexually assaulted by residents or staff.

It is the last fact that the meeting today is about, it is a planning meeting for another meeting next week.

Even through Connecticut has a strong gender identity and expression non-discrimination law, some of the shelters do not follow the law and when there is harassment of trans people by the residents, it the trans person who gets blamed for it.

Not all shelters in Connecticut don’t get it; I have done training for domestic violence shelters and there are shelters here that will house homeless trans people in the shelter of their gender identity and not their birth.

A Tale Of Two Trans Police Officers

First the good,

Austin PD welcomes first transgender officer
Senior Officer Greg Abbink has been with the force for a decade
KXAN
By Angie Beavin
Nov 26, 2014

Outside of Austin’s city hall on Thursday, people gathered for the Transgender Day of Remembrance. Each year someone from APD’s Lesbian and Gay Police Officers Association is one of the speakers. This year was the first time the department had a transgender officer be that person.
[…]
“Not that I started out to be this, but, I’d like to be a role model if I can,” he added.
Now the bad,

Here in Connecticut another police officer transitioned on the job in Middletown and she faced harassment and discrimination.

Fired Trans Police Officer Sues Connecticut Town Over Alleged Discrimination
Francesca Quaranta's lawsuit describes being verbally harassed, excessively scrutinized by superiors, and ultimately pushed out of her long-term job.
The Advocate
By Mitch Kellaway
January 14, 2015

In 2013, Quaranta made headlines when she officially filed a complaint with the Connecticut Human Rights Commission alleging her supervisors had created a hostile working environment, the Associated Press reported. According to the complaint, the discrimination Quaranta faced included excessive scrutiny, being asked to remove her earrings despite them being allowed for other female offiers [sic], and a lieutenant referring to her with a male name and questioning whether she was fit for duty.

A member of the police force since 2004, Quaranta stated that her longtime coworkers were initally supportive of her transition but soon became hostile, resulting in her taking a paid administrative leave for several months. When Quaranta returned to work, she reportedly failed a "fitness-for-duty" evaluation that resulted in her position being terminated.

Here in Connecticut we are a bastion of blue liberalism while Texas is known for its conservatism, how ironic that a trans officer finds support in Texas while here in Connecticut the trans officer is forced off the job.

And I also have to wonder if the fact that the officer in Texas is a trans man while here in Connecticut the officer is a trans woman, did gender play a role in the way each was treated? He became one of “the boys.” 

This Time The Lesbians And Gays Are Thrown Under The Bus

The tables have turned, a newly appointed Catholic Bishop in Vermont  welcome trans people but not lesbians and gays,

Vermont Catholic Bishop Affirms Trans People; LGB Folks, Not So Much
The new bishop in the Green Mountain State has welcoming words for trans people but less affirming remarks about same-sex relationships.
Advocate
By Stevie St. John
February 10 2015

Vermont — a state that adopted marriage equality early in the game and was the onetime home of “Hubby Hubby” ice cream — has a new Roman Catholic bishop, and he has some affirming words for transgender people. However, he sees same-sex relationships as not “matching up” to what the Catholic Church calls on its members to “strive for” when it comes to sexuality and relationships.

Bishop Christopher Coyne of the Burlington diocese, which covers the entire state, said during a recent Vermont Public Radio interview that he not only would welcome transgender people in church but that he acknowledges the evidence that trans people do not choose to be trans.

“There’s more and more evidence coming forward that a lot of this is biological ... that transgender people are really struggling with the idea of gender identity … and that’s through no fault of their own. And so there’s no fault to be made, actually. This is who they are. ... Everyone is God’s creatures. And I would invite anyone to come to the table,” said Coyne, who even said he wants people to call him out if he inadvertently uses the wrong pronoun for a trans person or says something harmful.

Sorry ladies and gentleman, I hope the tire tracks didn’t hurt too much.

But in all seriousness your sexual orientation is just as much a biological factor as my gender identity, it is not a choice, we are all born the way we are. The new bishop is just following the same ol’ party line.

You Never Know what Is Going To Happen At One Of Those Weddings

An interesting poll about same-sex weddings,

Poll: 43% of Americans ‘uncomfortable’ bringing a child to a same-sex wedding
Pink News
10th February 2015,
By Scott Roberts

Research by GLAAD shows some non-LGBT Americans still report substantial levels of discomfort with LGBT co-workers, family, and neighbours, despite historic legal progress for marriage equality.
[…]
One-third (34%) say they would be uncomfortable attending the wedding of a same-sex couple, with 22% saying they would feel very uncomfortable.

A substantially larger group (43%) responds they would be uncomfortable bringing a child to the wedding of a same-sex couple.

You never know what will happen at a gay or lesbian wedding… maybe it will be an orgy. You know how those people are! They are having sex all the time.

Really what do they actually think is going to happen? It’s a wedding! Yes the couple will probably kiss when the minister or justice of the peace pronounces them married and probably at the reception when people start ringing their glasses the couple will kiss just like any other marriage.

When Will The Hate End?

Four dead.

Four trans women murder in the last month.

When you are LGBT it is like walking around with a target on your back for every bigot to take their hatred out on you and it is even worse if you are a person of color.

Every Breath a Black Trans Woman Takes Is an Act of Revolution
Huffington Post
By Lourdes Ashley Hunter: National Director of The Trans Women of Color Collective
Posted: 02/06/2015

Every 28 hours a Black person is murdered. I also know that every 32 hours a transgender person is murdered. The average age of the 12 transgender women of color brutally murdered last year in this country (in less than 6 months) is less than 35 years old. What I do know is that Islan Nettles was pummeled to her death outside a NYC police station and none of the 12 cameras in the surrounding area that should've recorded her attack were operating properly -- and even though the police pulled her murderer off her body, he still walks the streets today.

This inhumane treatment of our lives has taken its toll. In January, there were reports of four brutal murders of Black trans and gender non-conforming people of color. There has been no national outrage over our lives. The lack of response regarding the physical and structural violence we face sends a resounding message that our lives are disposable, that our lives don't matter.

And it is not just trans people who are being murdered, it is also lesbians and gays.

Lesbian couple gunned down by obsessed U.S. Coast Guard co-worker
LGBTQNation
Staff and Wire Reports
February 8, 2015

BOURNE, Mass. — A heavily armed Coast Guard member, allegedly obsessed for years with an attractive former co-worker — a lesbian who married another female co-worker — is charged with fatally wounding the woman and seriously injuring her spouse.

Lisa Trubnikova was killed in a shooting in Bourne, Mass., on Thursday. Her spouse, Anna Trubnikova, was wounded and was hospitalized in stable condition.

The two women were U.S. Coast Guard petty officers.
Another Coast Guard member, Adrian Loya, of Chesapeake, Va., has been charged in the shooting.

Please stop the hate.

Shh… Big Brother Is Listening

Or in this case your appliances like your TV, phone, and other voice controlled devices.

Be Careful What You Say Around Your Samsung Smart TV
Voice-recognition data collection can be turned off, but it may prevent you from using all of the voice features. 
BY Stephanie Mlot
February 9, 2015

As first reported by The Daily Beast, Samsung's Smart TV privacy policy includes the following warning.
"Please be aware that if your spoken words include personal or other sensitive information, that information will be among the data captured and transmitted to a third party through your use of Voice Recognition," the site says.

Those third parties, according to Samsung's policies, perform tasks like converting speech to text, while data collection helps the company improve its services, it said.

Do you remember George Orwell's novel 1984 where the government had listening devices everywhere, well 1984 has arrived, but instead of the government it is big business. Its capitalism, if there is a buck to be made, we’ll make it and we will happily go along with it because now we don’t even have to push a button was just have to say a word.

Why I Will Never Vote Republican

Did you see the bill (HB 583) that a Republican Florida state legislator introduced?

Anti-Transgender Bill Is for Knuckle-Draggers, Surely Not for Florida
Sunshine State News
By: Nancy Smith
Posted: February 6, 2015

It's hard to fathom why any legislator in the 21st century would want discrimination as part of his legacy, but Rep. Frank Artiles apparently has his reasons.

The Miami Republican, chairman of the House Economic Development and Tourism Subcommittee, this week introduced a bill that would invalidate protections for transgender Floridians and criminalize the use of public restrooms by transgender people.

It basically would write transphobic discrimination into state law.
The article goes on to ask the question what will happen if a non-trans person is detained,
Said Daniel Tilley, LGBT rights staff attorney for the ACLU, "In addition to dehumanizing transgender people in particular, it invites humiliation and harassment of anyone who is not considered sufficiently feminine or masculine in the eyes of the beholder. Will girls in soccer uniforms be stopped at the bathroom door and asked to produce their birth certificates?"

Tilley further explains, “This bill also puts the burden on business owners to monitor customers’ use of restrooms and ask intrusive and humiliating questions of customers or be at risk of liability. That’s not good for business, much less for the customers themselves, whether transgender or not. The bill would essentially require everyone to carry their birth certificate around so that other citizens can subject them to random interrogations in the restroom.”

Could they get sued if they stop the wrong person? What would happen if I got stopped and my Connecticut driver license has an “F” on it? Connecticut law recognizes me as female and under "Full Faith and Credit Clause" of the Constitution doesn’t Florida also have to recognize me as female? The clause states,

Full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state. And the Congress may by general laws prescribe the manner in which such acts, records, and proceedings shall be proved, and the effect thereof.

It seems to me that this proposed law will create all types of legal nightmare not just for the trans people but also for all the other citizen of the state of Florida.

This bill is just another mean spirited Republican bill.

You’re Better Than Your Brother

That was what a trans woman that I know was told when she gave a presentation at a conference. She is well known in her field and has given workshop as a male before but this was the first time she gave one as a woman and they thought she was better than her "brother." I have heard similar comments from other professional trans people and one of their concerns is maintaining their professional identity.

What to Do When Your Colleague Comes Out as Transgender
Harvard Business Review
By Dorie Clark
FEBRUARY 5, 2015

By now, many professionals have openly gay colleagues at work, including the 66,000 U.S. employees of Apple, whose CEO, Tim Cook, famously became the first Fortune 500 CEO to come out last October. But far fewer people have had the experience of working with an openly transgender colleague (i.e., someone “whose gender identity or expression is different from those typically associated with the sex assigned to them at birth,” according to advocacy group the Human Rights Campaign).

So what are some of their suggestions for when a colleague transitions?

• Unless you’re already good friends, keep your reactions to a minimum. Someone who comes out to you as transgender certainly hopes for a positive response – but also doesn’t want coming out to be a huge deal.
• Take your cues from your colleague. Some of your transgender colleagues may be pleased to discuss their own experiences or trans issues in general, while others may be more reticent.
• Be mindful of the pronouns. No one is going to expect you to become an instant expert on transgender issues.
• Relax about the bathroom. Bathrooms were a source of great sturm und drang during the debate about gays in the military, and they may be so even more when it comes to transgender issues.
• Do research on your own. You may be tempted to pepper your colleague with questions about transgender issues, and on one hand, that’s a laudable impulse.

I think these are some good tips for employees when a co-worker comes out as trans. For many of us we just want to concentrate on the job ad we don’t want to be the center of focus. Just treat me as just another employee.

Update: My touch of OCD noticed that the hit counter is at 191903, only 16 more hits for 191919, I have to see if I can catch it then.

Dissed In Death

Or why a will is important. When we died, we have no control over what happens to us, we are at the mercy of our family or loved ones. We hope that they will do the right thing.

The first thing that we do not have control over is our death certificate, there is no law mandating what gender to put down on the death certificate. Some say it must reflect the gender on our birth certificate but nowhere does anything say it has to be the same.

The next thing is something that we can have control over and that is who will be our administrator of our estate. Hopefully the courts will follow our wishes, but there are many cases where they do not and maybe an estranged family might be in control of our estate. In the Windy City Times there is an article about this,

Denying LGBTQ identities in death
By Dana Rudolph
2015-02-04

Some transgender people have faced a somewhat different but no less tragic erasing of their selves upon death. When transgender teen Leelah Alcorn died by suicide in December, her mother refused to use her preferred gender pronouns when talking with the media. They put Leelah's legal name, Joshua, on her gravestone, and banned her best friend, Abby Jones, from the funeral, reported the U.K.'s Daily Mail. After Leelah's death, Abby had posted online a photo that Leelah had taken of herself wearing a dress and it quickly went viral, which apparently angered Leelah's parents.

Her mother told CNN that she and her husband "don't support that [Leelah's transgender identity], religiously," although she added, "But we told him that we loved him unconditionally." Hmm. Refusing to acknowledge a child's gender identity isn't quite what I think of as "unconditional."

One might imagine an adult would escape the same treatment. Not always. In November, a 32-year-old transgender woman in Idaho, Jennifer Gable, died suddenly of a brain aneurysm. After her death, her parents referred to her exclusively by her birth name, Geoffrey, and with male pronouns. The memorial Web page they established at the funeral home website uses a photo of Gable pre-transition. Even worse, she was presented in the open casket at the funeral dressed in a man's suit and with her hair in a man's cut, reported the Miami Herald.

So give it some thought who you would want to look after you when you are gone, will they follow your wishes, or will they impose their biases on you in death.

Are We Harmed?

When a celebrity transitioned and all the tabloids go wild, what does all that press do for the community? Does it harm or does it help other trans people? I do not mean that in any way celebrities should not transition, what I mean is does the way the press cover us, especially the tabloids sensationalize us.

In the blog PrideSource Gwendolyn Ann Smith writes an Opinion about Jenner and celebrities,

This badly photoshopped photo isn't like Cox's Time cover. If anything, it is comical: a hit piece designed to scorn Jenner and -- by extension -- his ex-wife and family. The overall look of this cover is clownish, a thinly veiled mockery.

Whether they fully realized it or not, however, In Touch has painted a broader target than Jenner and the Kardashians. By putting this out, they have put transgender people at risk.
[…]
Others are nowhere near as fortunate. Others are at risk of violence in the home, in their school, at their workplaces and in their own neighborhoods. This cover only feeds into a culture that -- in spite of our advances -- still sees transgender people as freaks. That is what they have literally painted Jenner as on that cover.

This, too, is what fuels transgender people to self-loathing, to hatred and violence against themselves. When Leelah Alcorn took her life, one of her fears was that -- as she was not being allowed to start her transition early -- she would always appear masculine. In Touch has opted to display a somewhat-masculine Jenner in bad makeup and someone else's coat and scarf. What sort of message does this send to the next Leelah Alcorn?

Do these tabloids stir maybe not hostility but maybe paint us as Ms. Smith as freaks, something to laugh at? I think so, but there is nothing that we can really do about it.

Saturday 9: A Sleepin' Bee

Crazy Sam’s Saturday 9: A Sleepin' Bee (1957)

Every Saturday I take time off from written on serious topics to have some fun…

Unfamiliar with this week's tune? Hear it here.

1) This song is about the wonder of first love. How would you describe the sensation of falling in love?
Caring, caring about the person more than you care about yourself.

2) This 1957 album was the first Diahann Carroll ever recorded. More recently she recorded "A, You're Adorable," a nursery rhyme. (The lyrics are here.) Give us some words to a children's song that remain in your head to this day.
Twinkle, twinkle litter star, how I wonder…

3) 1957 was the peak of the Baby Boom (1946 to 1964). Are you a Boomer, a Gen X-er, a Gen Y-er, or a Millennial?
KaBoom! I’m a Boomer, I am a Medicare card carrying Boomer.

4) In 1974, Diahann was named to the Best Coiffed Hall of Fame by the Guild of Professional Beauticians. How often do you change your look?
Zero. I don’t, I like the way I look and I don’t want to change my hair style or color.

5) Ms. Carroll made history as Julia in the first network TV show to star a black woman. She played a nurse. Do you/have you ever worked in the healthcare profession?
Nope, but I have worked with healthcare professionals doing training.

6) She also played glamorous, scheming Dominique Deveraux on the nighttime soap, Dynasty. Who is the most memorable female villain you've ever seen in a TV show or movie?
Natasha Fatale from the Bullwinkle Show

7) Ms. Carroll began her career as a model. Her height (nearly 6' tall) is an asset in that profession. Are you pleased with your height? Or do you wish you were taller, or shorter?
Shorter, good grief… I’m tall enough already because I’m six foot and I don’t want to be any taller.

8) Now in her 80th year, she keeps on working. Recently she's appeared on TV in Grey's Anatomy and Blue Collar and on the big screen in Tyler Perry Presents Peeples. How do you feel about retirement? Is it something you enjoy or look forward to? Or would you prefer to continue working? 
I think retirement is great! I get to pick what and when I want to do.

9) In her long movie career, Ms. Carroll has played love scenes with some very good looking men, including Sidney Poitier and Billy Dee Williams. If you could steal a kiss from any actor or actress, who would choose?
Meryl Streep

Update 11:15:

By popular demand...

A TV Show With A Trans Actress

A sitcom in England is featuring a trans actress,

BBC starts filming sitcom starring transgender actor
Boy Meets Girl, to be shown on BBC2 later this year, will follow story of 40-year-old Judy’s relationship with Leo, 26
The Guardian
By Hannah Ellis-Petersen
4 February 2015

The BBC has begun filming a groundbreaking sitcom that will be the first to star a transgender actor. Boy Meets Girl was commissioned by the BBC after the script, by Elliott Kerrigan, won the Trans Comedy Award in 2013, and will be the first BBC comedy to feature transgender issues prominently, as it follows the developing relationship between 26-year-old Leo and 40-year-old Judy, who is a transgender woman.

Judy is to be played by actor and stand-up comedian Rebecca Root, who underwent transition surgery in 2005. While it is still rare to see trans actors playing trans characters on British screens, Root follows in the footsteps of comedian Bethany Black, the first trans woman to play a recurring trans character on TV, Helen in Russell T Davies’s Channel 4 comedies Banana and Cucumber.

It was no accident that a trans woman is playing the part of a trans woman,

Speaking about Root’s casting, Clarke-Jervoise said: “When we started out, we always knew we had to get a trans actress – I don’t think we auditioned anyone who wasn’t trans for the role. It just didn’t feel right. It was a no-brainer, really. We auditioned a lot of people, but when we saw Rebecca she had such a lovely, natural warmth to her, and that’s what we really wanted. And Rebecca has been incredibly helpful in giving us some background of her story, so a lot of it based on truth, which is really great.”

You got that? They purposely went out and found a trans actress. They didn’t look at cisgender actors to play a trans woman but the made an effort to go out and find a trans woman. Also notice what the executive producer Sophie Clarke-Jervoise said, “And Rebecca has been incredibly helpful in giving us some background of her story, so a lot of it based on truth, which is really great.”

There are some great trans actresses and actors out there that only need a chance to show their stuff and even though actors like Jeffrey Tambor give fantastic performances there are trans actresses and actors who might have given great performances also if they were given a chance.

Liberty Verses Vaccination

I am taking time off from trans issues this morning to write about freedom and what freedom means. I imagine everyone has seen about the measles outbreak and how it is spreading because so many people are op-outing of getting their children vaccinated. Many of them do so because of fears of complications from the vaccination, while many others do so out of political beliefs. Many are opposed to the government telling them what to do or not to do; they say that their liberty is being abridged.

Freedom means many things and it also means responsible. Just like you can’t yell fire in a crowded building or light a match in a gas vapor filled room because your actions causes harm to others, your “freedom” not to have your children to be vaccinated is cause harms to others. Just this morning a nursery school is under quarantine because of measles, all the children are too young to be vaccinated and somehow they were infected by measles.

Yahoo News has an article about what freedom means,

What anti-vax parents get wrong about personal liberty
By Rick Newman
February 4, 2015

They’re your kids. You can do what you want with them. Right?

Actually, no. The wonderful American tradition of individual liberty stops well short of the entitlements claimed by the parents opposed to vaccinations who have contributed to the alarming measles outbreak centered in California. The anti-vaxers, as they’re known, believe they’re asserting their right to individual liberty by rejecting the collective wisdom of public-health authorities and choosing not to have their kids vaccinated against measles and other dangerous organisms. But they’re confusing self-interest with liberty, as are tongue-tied politicians such as Chris Christie and Rand Paul. The whole episode reveals the troubling ways we have distorted and trivialized the true meaning of liberty in the so-called land of the free.

As popular as the concept is, liberty is actually a difficult word to define, as I explore in my latest book, "Liberty for All: A Manifesto for Reclaiming Financial and Political Freedom." Liberty means different things to different people, based on the rights and privileges they’re accustomed to, socioeconomic context and every individual’s life circumstances. For the purpose of my book, which focuses on economic issues and prosperity, I researched the views of many experts and defined liberty as this: the ability to make of your life what you wish, within reasonable constraints.

That's quite different from simply doing whatever you want, which is where the anti-vax parents veer off-course. When exercising a particular type of liberty imposes no risk or cost on anybody else, everybody’s generally fine with it, no matter how wacky it might be. But when one person’s liberty interferes with somebody else's, civil society intervenes with rules meant to protect the largest portion of the population while harming the smallest.

There was a rebroadcast of a Nova program on PBS about the risks of vaccinations; it debunks many of the irrational fears about vaccines.

Program Description
Diseases that were largely eradicated in the United States a generation ago—whooping cough, measles, mumps—are returning, in part because nervous parents are skipping their children's shots. NOVA's "Vaccines—Calling the Shots" takes viewers around the world to track epidemics, explore the science behind vaccinations, hear from parents wrestling with vaccine-related questions, and shed light on the risks of opting out

As We Get Older…

Many of the elder LGBT people have fought all their life for equality and as they grow older they are still pioneering new territories.

Here’s a Bold New Strategy for Solving the Elderly LGBT Housing CrisisAdvocacy groups, in partnership with the federal government, launch a bold national initiative to provide housing—and security—to the growing population of LGBT senior citizens.Takepart
By Remy Tumin
February 04, 2015

Last spring, Smith, 69, turned to the Center on Halsted, one of Chicago’s largest facilities for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people. She signed up for a housing lottery and in September was awarded a subsidized $230-a-month studio apartment in a Center on Halsted housing development built primarily for LGBT senior citizens. “I find myself very fortunate to have found a place where I don’t have to go back into the closet,” says Smith, who works as an usher at a theater near her home. “The ability to be who I am, to live with dignity...I can’t begin to emphasize how much that means.”
[…]
Housing remains a key element in the country’s economic crisis. But so far, there’s been relatively little national conversation about the housing crisis’ impact on the first generation of openly LGBT senior citizens. This is no small matter. The current population of 1.5 million LGBT seniors is projected to double by 2030. LGBT people face high rates of unemployment, poverty, mental illness, and isolation, partly related to persistent homophobia. Nearly 48 percent of older same-sex couples report experiencing discrimination while inquiring about housing in senior living facilities, in some cases receiving less information about available units or getting quoted higher fees.

Some people ask, why special housing for LGBT seniors? For many LGBT it is not necessary but for other it is vital. Last month I went to a LGBT Coffee House and for one senior gay couple there it was the first time that they have been out of their apartment. Another senior said, that all her friends are gone and there are not many places where gay people of a certain age can get together to socialize. She went on to say that she has straight friends but sometimes I went to be with people who are like me. While for some it is the safety that an senior LGBT community provides, they don’t have to worry about homophobia or transphobia.

However, for us older trans people it is even hard to socialize with other trans people because we are so few.

You Talkin' me?

This morning I am going to an early morning class at a local college as part of the Stonewall Speakers, an organization of LGBT and allies that go around to colleges in Connecticut to talk about our lives. So I don’t have time to write my usual morning blog, so come back this afternoon.

Ops... The class got pushed back a week and I forgot to update my calendar. I had a nice trip through the snowstorm and a long walk across the campus so I got my exercise in for today.

Guess What Burr Is Sticking In Conservatives’…

You guessed it… bathrooms and this time is because the teachers’ union has endorsed trans students using the bathroom of their gender identity.

Does this teachers’ union want boys in girls’ restrooms?
Human Events
By Jason Hart
Wednesday Feb 4, 2015

The American Federation of Teachers has endorsed a transgender advocacy campaign asserting men should be permitted in women’s restrooms, and vice versa.

The public policy position taken by AFT, America’s second-largest teachers union, could have major implications for school children across the country.
[…]
Ryan Anderson, William E. Simon Fellow in Religion and a Free Society at the conservative Heritage Foundation, disagrees.

“The government shouldn’t force decisions on which bathroom people use based on ‘gender identity,’” Anderson said in an email to Watchdog.org. “Citizens should be free to make their own bathroom policies based on biological sex.”

I like the term “biological sex” does that mean they want to test everyone DNA or hormones levels and set standards on what determines maleness and femaleness? And what will they do about intersex people?

If they are so concerned with us using the bathroom of our gender identity then they should be able to use the nurse’s bathroom.

I Bet You Haven’t Heard Of This Movie

There is a movie that is winning all types of awards and is being shown at film festivals around the world,

Sundance Hit DRUNKTOWN'S FINEST Opens Soon in NY & LA
Broadway Movies
February 4, 2015

Indion Entertainment is excited to announce that Sydney Freeland's debut feature Drunktown's Finest, following an acclaimed run on the festival circuit, is coming to theaters this season. Presented by executive producer Robert Redford, the film will open in New York City at the Quad Cinema on February 20, in Los Angeles at the Arena Cinema on February 27 and follow in select markets over the coming weeks.

Drunktown's Finest premiered at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival and has since GONE on to win a number of awards, including the Grand Jury Prize for Best Dramatic Narrative and HBO Best First Feature awards at Outfest 2014, as well as Best Film at the American Indian Film Festival in San Francisco.

According to IMDB the movie is about,

Three young Native Americans - an adopted Christian girl, a rebellious father-to-be, and a promiscuous transsexual - strive to escape the hardships of life on an Indian reservation.

And that is not the only trans connection,

...Filmmaker Magazine lauded transgender Navajo American writer/director Freeland for her "authentic voice".

And the actress who plays the trans woman is also trans and a Navajo, according to Indian Country,

Carmen Moore isn't your typical up-and-coming Native actress, nor is her role in Drunktown's Finest, which premieres at the Sundance Film Festival on Saturday, January 18, the sort of character we've seen before in Native film. Moore, a transgender woman with a career in the adult industry, plays Felixia, also transgender, who is trying to figure out her place in the world while harboring a professional ambition that seems out of reach. Moore spoke with Alex Jacobs about this unique part and unique film.

Here is a movie that is directed and stars trans women and has won many awards at film festivals, so don’t tell that there are no talented trans actresses/actors who can play trans roles in movies instead of cisgendered actresses/actors.

Wow! Discrimination Does Not Pay.

Do you remember the bakery that refused to bake a cake for a lesbian couple? Well the court will be handing down the fine in March,

Bakery fined thousands for refusing to sell to gay couple
KGW
February 3, 2015

GRESHAM, Ore. – An Oregon bakery discriminated against a same-sex couple who wanted to purchase a wedding cake, the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries announced Monday.

The owners of Sweet Cakes by Melissa bakery will have to pay the couple up to $150,000, BOLI spokesman Charlie Burr said. The exact amount will be determined at a hearing on March 10.
[…]
The owners of Sweet Cakes by Melissa will have to pay up to $75,000 per person who filed the complaint, which means the same-sex couple could be awarded up to $150,000, Burr said.

I have mixed feels about the fine. I think fines should walk the fine line between being excessive and being a slap on the wrist. I feel fines should be enough to keep people from breaking the law.

If the judge does award the couple $150,000 I think it will create martyr for the conservative Christians. They will become a rallying point for “Religious Freedom” legislation. I would like to see the fine set at $2,500 for each of the plaintiffs.

What are your thoughts?

polls

I Am Surprised At Fox News…

This study was published in a number of news sites but I found it most interesting to find it on Fox News

Transgender children aren’t confused about their gender identity, study finds
Published February 02, 2015

An ongoing longitudinal study of transgender children and their siblings has revealed that these youths have a strong understanding of their gender identity. The paper’s findings, published in the February edition of the journal Psychological Science, counter the belief that transgender children are confused about their gender or are too young to understand what gender means.

“We found that gender cognition in the transgender kids was indistinguishable from their non-transgender peers and siblings,” study author Nicholas Eaton, an assistant psychology professor at Stony Brook University in New York, said in a news release. “They appear exactly like their non-transgender peers [or] siblings, but in the direction of their gender identity, not their sex.”
[…]
“Across all these tasks— across the more and the less controllable measures of gender development— our transgender participants look just like other kids, but in the direction of their gender identity rather than their sex assigned at birth,” Eaton said in the news release.

As I mentioned this story was published on many news sites but I was astonished to see that Fox didn’t cover it negatively. However, the comments are still what you would expect from Fox readers.

What’s Between Your Legs?

When we are born all the doctor does to determine your gender is to hold you up and looks to see what's between your legs. That’s it. Nothing more, just a visual observation, no blood hormones levels testing, no chromosome testing, nothing.

So I always get a kick out of those right wing conservatives who are so black and white… boy/girl that’s it and whatever the doctors see in the first minute of your life should stay with you the rest of your life.

Woman genetically born as a man gives birth to twins
ITV
2 Feb 2015

A woman who was born with the genetic make-up of a man has given birth to "miracle' twins after hormone replacement therapy enabled her to grow a womb that was big enough to carry children.
[…]
The 28-year-old mother was "devastated" when she was originally told at the age of 19 that she would not be able to have children as she had been born with XY chromosomes and despite growing as a woman her female reproductive organs had not developed.

However, when doctors discovered that she did in fact have a small womb that could potentially grow to a size big enough to carry babies she we delighted.

According to the Daily Mail she has what is called Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome (AIS) which is a disorder where the body ignores the androgen or is insensitive to it and as a result of AIS some XY fetus may develops as a girl.

Isn’t nature wonderful! Everyone is so unique, no two of us are the same, our DNA can combine in an infinite array of possibilities. Can you imagine a world where everyone was the same? Like a world of identical twins, what a boring place that would be,

GAY Inc.

By that I mean the HRC (Human Rights Campaign) they are the elitist “LGBT” organization who supposedly advocates on our behalf, but in reality only cares about the top 1% of the lesbian and gay community.

Over the weekend there were protest demonstrations against them around the country about how the HRC ignores LGBT people with AIDS. On the ACT UP Facebook page it has about Saturday’s protest of the HRC $475 gala,

On Sat Jan 31, join ACT UP to protest HRC (Human Rights Campaign) at their annual gala honoring Fortune 500 companies. While HRC dines with the 1%, a 35+ year HIV epidemic rages on in our LGBT community, still cutting many LGBT lives short.

Health officials warn about the recent sharp increase in HIV infections among young gay men and transgender women, especially among communities of color. We need our national LGBT orgs like HRC to shine a spotlight on HIV and AIDS until the epidemic is over for all populations, especially our most at-risk LGBT people.

The HRC has repeatedly shown no interest in advocating for minority causes and has only pursued the cream issue… marriage and only give token support to other main issues like trans rights.

In San Francisco the HRC called out the police, the blog “O-Blog-Dee-O-Blog-Da” reports that,

Though billed publicly as a peaceful protest, HRC had called for a police presence in advance of the protest. When activists arrived, there were already 4 SFPD officers standing  on the street.  Activists unfurled a gigantic rainbow flag and waved signs outside the store,  chanting “BAD BAD HRC,” while curious tourists and community members were offered snacks and an explanation as to why we were there.

The HRC has the “Corporate Equality Index (CEI)” which is a good idea… but. It is only as good as it is enforced which is not at all making it rather useless. I have heard from a number of trans people who work for companies that have a 100% CEI rating but are treated lousy by the company.

An example of this is Saks Fifth Avenue, they had a 90% rating and they fired a trans woman who transitioned while she worked for Saks and in a statement Saks said,

However, the retailer rejected that argument, saying that the claim should be tossed because an employee handbook is not a contract.

It seems like the only thing the HRC is interested in is courting corporate sponsors and large donors.

No Get Out Of Jail Free Card

For trans people one of our worst fears is being jailed. When that happens we are either put in to solitary confinement (which is usually used only as a punishment) for “our own protection” or we are locked in the general prison population where we are raped.

Advocates Rally Around Transgender Migrant Woman Detained In All-Male Facility
Huffington Post Latino Voices
By Roque Planas
Posted: 01/29/2015

Immigration and Customs Enforcement has refused to release a transgender migrant woman from detention in an all-male facility, even though advocates say she has a credible asylum claim and has faced abuse from guards and fellow detainees.

The case of Nicoll Hernández-Polanco, an asylum seeker detained in Florence, Arizona, has become a rallying point for immigrant rights groups and the LGBT community, with some advocates arguing that ICE should stop detaining transgender people altogether.

This is her second time here in the U.S. she crossed over a number of years earlier when she started to transition and was being attacked because of her gender identity. She was send back and lived in shelters in Mexico, but returned to the U.S. and at the boarder asked for asylum based on the of persecution from her gender identification.

She was placed in an all-male detention center, despite Department of Homeland Security regulations saying that ICE should take gender identification into account when assigning migrants to detention facilities. Advocates say that since being detained, Hernández-Polanco has been assaulted by another detainee, and that guards have groped her during routine pat-downs and referred to her using slurs like “it” and “woman with balls.”

ICE is ignoring the law! The Prison Rape Elimination Act has regulations to prevent exactly what ICE is doing,

Current regulations say that ICE should take the gender identification of transgender and intersex detainees into consideration when assigning them to a detention center.

“U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is firmly committed to providing for the safety and welfare of those in custody,” ICE said in a statement. “ICE has a strict zero tolerance policy for any kind of abusive or inappropriate behavior in its facilities and takes any allegations of such mistreatment very seriously.”

ICE is not alone in its refusal to follow the law, here in Connecticut Jane Doe is still being housed in solitary confinement at a juvenile boys prison facility by DCF (Department of Children and Families) even through it is in direct violation of the Connecticut non-discrimination law.

A Crazy Question…

Did you reading about the question that Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) asked the attorney general nominee Loretta Lynch during her confirmation hearing?

GOP Senator Asks Loretta Lynch: Why Is Gay Marriage OK, But Polygamy Isn't?
The Huffington Post
By Igor Bobic
Posted: 01/28/2015

During Loretta Lynch's confirmation hearing Wednesday, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) tried to take the attorney general nominee down the slippery-slope argument often made against the marriage equality movement by inquiring what the legal difference is between marriage of same-sex couples and that of three or more people.

'What is the legal difference between a state -- a ban on same-sex marriage being unconstitutional but a ban on polygamy being constitutional?" he inquired at the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. "Could you try to articulate how one could be banned under the Constitution and the other not?"

Lynch, who is the current U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, didn't take the bait. She cited her inexperience in dealing with cases of precedent on the matter, and promised to "look forward to continuing the discussions with you."

If the senator doesn’t know that there is nothing in common with marriage equality and polygamy he shouldn’t be a senator.

It is all about marriage equality; what is allowed for opposite-sex couples should be allowed same-sex couples, it called the Fourteenth Amendment. You know the one that says “…nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” That is what marriage equality is all about, treating everyone equally under the law. There are no states that allow polygamy or as the conservative claim allow bestiality marriages therefore the Fourteenth Amendment will not apply.

All it does by asking a question like Senator Graham’s is to create fear and is a red hearing that is meant to stir up the Republican base.

My Persecution Is Your Freedom

There is a growing trend in legislatures to introduce “Religious Freedom” bills,

Anti-LGBT forces strike back with religious freedom bills
Washington Blade
January 27, 2015
By Chris Johnson

Amid a series of court rulings in favor of marriage equality, anti-LGBT forces are responding in state legislatures with bills that would allow discrimination to continue against same-sex couples.

The introduction of these bills — which range from allowing businesses to refuse services to same-sex couples to cutting off funds for the purposes of granting marriage licenses — comes as many conservative states are facing the reality of marriage equality delivered through court order and as the U.S. Supreme Court is set to deliver a nationwide ruling on the issue later this year.

Many of these bills, named Religious Freedom Restoration Acts, have the stated purpose of prohibiting the government from burdening an individual’s exercise of religion except to achieve a compelling interest, and only if that burden is the least restrictive means of reaching that interest.

But the wording in such legislation is seen as a thinly veiled attempt to enable discrimination by allowing businesses, such as florists and bakeries in the wedding business, to refuse services to same-sex couples, or by allowing court clerks to refuse to issue them marriage licenses. 

The conservatives have labeled anti-discrimination legislation as “special rights” when all we are asking is to be treated equally, while these bills put people above the law by allowing them not to obey any law just by claiming that it is against their religion. There is no test needed to make this claim, all you have to say is that this violates my religious beliefs and you do not need to prove it.

Some of the proposed laws are so very broad that they cover any law that a person finds offensive, while others just target LGBT non-discrimination laws. Those laws that just target us I think violate the Fourteenth Amendment, “…nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” because they single us out and not provide equal protection for us.

It should be interesting the first time these laws get challenged in court.