Comorbidity

The name sound deadly with the root word “morbid” with the connotation of being something unhealthy, or disturbing, or unpleasant. But medically it means having coexistence of two or more disease processes. So what it means for us is having one or more mental health diagnoses besides gender dysphoria.

On Facebook this link was just posted…

3 Transition Obstacles I Never Expected as Mentally Ill and Transgender
Everyday Feminism
By Sam Dylan Finch
March 23, 2017

“I think we need to hold off on this,” the therapist tells me, “until you’re doing a little better.”

My heart dropped. I was stunned, sitting in total silence.

This was the third time I’d been given a red light and told not to proceed with top surgery – a surgery I desperately needed, but struggled to access because of my mental illness.

This was a struggle I knew all too well as both mentally ill and trans – a struggle many of my other transgender friends had never even heard of.

Intersectional feminism tells us that the various aspects of our identity will impact our lived experiences – especially as it relates to power and privilege.

This is true for me as a transgender person who is also white, and thus does not experience racism and benefits from white privilege. I think it’s really important to be mindful of the ways that this impacts how I move through the world – and how I can be a better ally to trans people of color.

• The article goes on to list the three roadblocks he faced.

• My Clinicians Have Interfered with My Access to Hormones

• I Keep Being Denied Surgery

• My Clinicians Don’t Have the Research They Need to Help Me – Because It Doesn’t Exist

Being diagnosed with a mental disorder is not a roadblock to treatment of gender dysphoria per se, there are a number of factors that should be considered.

The Standard of Care says,

3. Assess, Diagnose, and Discuss Treatment Options for Coexisting Mental Health Concerns
Clients presenting with gender dysphoria may struggle with a range of mental health concerns (Gómez-Gil, Trilla, Salamero, Godás, & Valdés, 2009; Murad et al., 2010) whether related or unrelated to what is often a long history of gender dysphoria and/or chronic minority stress. Possible concerns include anxiety, depression, self-harm, a history of abuse and neglect, compulsivity, substance abuse, sexual concerns, personality disorders, eating disorders, psychotic disorders, and autistic spectrum disorders (Bockting et al., 2006; Nuttbrock et al., 2010; Robinow, 2009). Mental health professionals should screen for these and other mental health concerns and incorporate the identified concerns into the overall treatment plan. These concerns can be significant sources of distress and, if left untreated, can complicate the process of gender identity exploration and resolution of gender dysphoria (Bockting et al., 2006; Fraser, 2009a; Lev, 2009). Addressing these concerns can greatly facilitate the resolution of gender dysphoria, possible changes in gender role, the making of informed decisions about medical interventions, and improvements in quality of life.

Some clients may benefit from psychotropic medications to alleviate symptoms or treat coexisting mental health concerns. Mental health professionals are expected to recognize this and either provide pharmacotherapy or refer to a colleague who is qualified to do so. The presence of coexisting mental health concerns does not necessarily preclude possible changes in gender role or access to feminizing/masculinizing hormones or surgery; rather, these concerns need to be optimally managed prior to, or concurrent with, treatment of gender dysphoria. In addition, clients should be assessed for their ability to provide educated and informed consent for medical treatments.

Qualified mental health professionals are specifically trained to assess, diagnose, and treat (or refer to treatment for) these coexisting mental health concerns. Other health professionals with appropriate training in behavioral health, particularly when functioning as part of a multidisciplinary specialty team providing access to feminizing/masculinizing hormone therapy, may also screen for mental health concerns and, if indicated, provide referral for comprehensive assessment and treatment by a qualified mental health professional.

So there is no reason for anyone to be denied Cross-gender Hormone Therapy or surgery if they have been diagnosed with a mental illness; as long as they are able to make an informed consent and have the mental illness under control.

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Scott Lively’s Alien Tort Statute Case Update

There is a court case that I am following and it didn’t end well for us. Scott Lively was sued by an organization from Uganda for the violation of the Alien Tort Claims Act (ATCA) (you can read about it here and here) and he got off scot free. However, that wasn’t good enough for him.

Homophobic pastor appeals his own legal victory, because judge called him a ‘crackpot’
Pink News
By Nick Duffy
8th June 2017

In a bizarre twist, a homophobic pastor who escaped ‘crime against humanity’ charges is appealing against a ruling in favour of himself – because he is upset that the judge was mean to him.

Massachusetts hate preacher Scott Lively has become one of the world’s most notorious homophobes, by helping ‘export’ anti-LGBT laws to suggestible countries around the world.

The pastor faced a ‘crimes against humanity’ lawsuit from LGBT activists for his role in securing Uganda’s 2014 Anti-Homosexuality Act, but a federal judge dismissed the lawsuit this week.

The judge in the case, Michael A Ponsor, described Lively as a “crackpot bigot” who has caused “immense harm” around the world, but ruled that there was no case to be heard as the actions did not take place on US soil.

In a surprise move, Lively has now confirmed he will appeal against that ruling, even though the court ruled in his favour.

From my reading of the act, I think that the judge was wrong; the Alien Tort Act was designed for actions by U.S. citizen abroad and it doesn’t have to involve the actions taking place on US soil. (I know Wikipedia is not a great source to use but here is their description of the Alien Tort Act)

So who is representing Lively?

His legal team from the Liberty Counsel, which is the same ultra-evangelical law firm that represented homophobic Kentucky clerk Kim Davis, accused the judge of pandering to an “LGBT agenda”.

What are some of the other cases they were involved in?

The HRC reports that…

Liberty Counsel’s Staver Defended Reparative Therapists, Calling Laws Banning The Practice “One Of The Greatest Assaults On Children And Families That Has Risen In Recent Times.” Mathew Staver, in an audio report on BarbWire.com called Freedom’s Call, said “Last week I had the opportunity to submit a brief to the U.S. Supreme Court and to testify before Congress regarding the attacks on religious freedom of licensed mental health professionals, minors, and their parents. Homosexual activists have attempted to enact laws throughout the country that would silence mental health professionals from expressing the truth that an individual can successfully reduce or eliminate unwanted same-sex attractions behavior or identity. These efforts are nothing more than an attempt to censure any viewpoint concerning scriptural teaching on human sexuality. They represent one of the greatest assaults on children and families that has risen in recent times.” The name of the post was ‘Liberty Counsel Defends Minors Against Homosexual Political Activists.”  [Barb Wire, Freedom’s Call, 6/19/2014, AUDIO]
[…]
Liberty Counsel’s Staver Said A Third Party Would Take The Place Of Republicans If GOP Gives Up On Marriage, “That’s What Happened With The Issue Of Slavery.” According to World Net Daily, “Mathew Staver is the chairman of Liberty Counsel and has represented the traditional marriage position in in many states around the country. He is appalled at the suggestion that Supreme Court has effectively ended the political debate over marriage. ‘That’s ridiculous. In fact, you can’t have anything such as marriage or life over as a political issue. It’s [absolute] stupidity to have that kind of an opinion. You cannot just simply sit back and allow the Supreme Court or any justice or any judge to undermine something as basic and as fundamental and as necessary and as important as marriage,’ said Staver, who is furious what he sees as the GOP wilting on this issue once it stopped being an easy political winner for the party. ‘They’re cowards, and if Republicans don’t stand up for this, the party will become a non-issue. There will be a third party that will ultimately take its place,’ he said. ‘That’s what happened with the issue of slavery, and there’s no party that’s immune from the situation.’” [World Net Daily, 10/8/2014, AUDIO]
[…]
Liberty Counsel Advocated For Biological Mother In Custody Dispute In Jenkins V. Miller Case. According to the Windy City Times, “There have been a number of recent cases across the country in which a biological or adoptive parent tries to claim the other parent has no parental rights. Best known among them is the case of Janet Jenkins and Lisa Miller, which has grabbed headlines nationally. Miller, the biological mother, asked courts in both Virginia and Vermont to deny Jenkins visitation and custody, and has taken issues to the U.S. Supreme Court five times, without success each time. Miller was eventually ruled in contempt of court for defying a Vermont court order that she allow Jenkins visitation. The court then granted Legal custody to Jenkins. But Miller went hiding with the girl at the end of 2009, and a man accused of helping her leave the U.S. was arraigned in a federal court in April…. In several of these cases, notably Miller v. Jenkins, attorneys from conservative legal organizations such as Liberty Counsel and the Alliance Defense Fund have represented the biological mothers.” [Windy City Times, 9/14/11]

No Surprise Here

We all know that Trump and Pence hate us and want to force us back into the closet. One of their areas of focus of their hate is trans people in the military, I believe they want us out of the military because of two reason; one they hate our guts and two President Obama was the one who brought about the change in military policy for us.

Trump Is Dragging Feet on Transgender Ban Evidence, Judge Rules
Bloomberg
By Erik Larson
March 14, 2018

The Trump administration has repeatedly failed to identify evidence it may use to defend the government’s stalled ban on transgender soldiers, a federal judge in Seattle says.

U.S. District Judge Marsha Pechman ordered the government on Wednesday to provide the information -- a standard procedure -- within five days. She criticized the administration’s earlier claims that no such information could be identified because the policy wasn’t yet in effect.

Pechman used President Donald Trump’s July 2017 tweets announcing the ban to challenge the government’s claim, noting the president posted that he made his decision after "consultation with my generals and military experts."

Does anyone really believe that Trump consulted anyone other than religious leaders about trans people in the military?

No Excuses!

They only want known actors

There are no good trans actors

Trans actors don’t have a track record

Well that cannot be said anymore a trans actress won an Oscar!

Chilean drama 'A Fantastic Woman' addresses transgender rights 
Fantastic foray
Orlando Weekly
By Cameron Meie
March 14, 2018

"Fantastic," like "awesome," has lost most of the power of its original meaning and is now a sullied synonym for great. But in naming his film A Fantastic Woman, Chilean writer-director Sebastián Lelio has embraced all interpretations of the word – political correctness be both damned and respected – to create a film that honors gender identity while challenging our notion of what it means to be transgender.

Marina, a transgender woman and aspiring singer, is in love with Orlando, a wealthy man 30 years her senior. Though their love is unconventional, they have high hopes for their future together – until Orlando dies unexpectedly. Instead of being allowed to grieve, Marina is ostracized by Orlando's family.
[…]
Shot and scored beautifully and fashioned with a fittingly deliberate pace – the pace of grief – the film features intriguing supporting performances but is powered by newcomer Daniela Vega as Marin. Chile's first openly transgender model, actress and singer, Vega never strays far from her stoic, mesmerizing, almost one-note performance, but one always gets the sense that she herself has lived a life not dissimilar to her character's.

Deadline Hollywood writes,

The timely title began its career at the Berlin Film Festival in 2017 where it won the Silver Bear for Best Screenplay. On Oscar nominations day in January, Lelio told me he and Vega were “remembering how two years ago we were shooting wondering if everything was going to even work. It seems like a long beautiful journey.”

While the multi-layered/multi-genre A Fantastic Woman is “not a cause film,” Lelio has previously told me at its center “is a real beating heart, Daniela’s heart. It is a portrait of a real transgender woman, so it’s undeniable that dimension of the film is crucial… I’m happy to see it well received within the community, but especially how generously it has been received by people have no connection to the community, who have just been exposed to a love story that has a transgender woman. The complexity is beautiful.”

There are so many talented trans actors and actresses out there just begging for work and many of them have won awards for their performances.

• Rachel Crowl for her performance in “And Then There Was Eve.
• Michelle Hendley for her 2015 performance in “Boy Meets Girl.”
• Laverne Cox for her performance in “Orange is the New Black.”
• Rebecca Root is an award-winning actor and star of BBC Two sitcom ‘Boy Meets Girl’.

Then there are actors such as Candis Cayne, Tom Phelan, Jamie Clayton, Ian Harvie, Mya Taylor, Elliot Fletcher and Alexandra Billings who deserve a chance to star in a major movie.

It is time to stop making excuses why trans parts are given to cisgender actors.

The Old Fears Are Coming Back

We won… but it is all on the verge of being taken away by these so call “religious freedom” laws and the fear is coming back. What will happen if we are rushed to an emergency room only to be told “we don’t want your kind here!”

It’s ‘Scary,’ But Transgender Patients Are Fighting Trump’s Health-Care Discrimination Agenda
If the Trump administration gets its way, doctors will be able to claim a religious or a more nebulous moral objection as an excuse to deny care, gender-affirming or otherwise, to transgender patients.
Rewire
By Christine Grimaldi
March 13, 2018

Stefi Honey had been with her primary care doctor for five years, visiting as often as every other week without incident. When she began to live openly as a transgender woman, however, the doctor-patient dynamic changed.

Honey’s doctor eyed her dresses and asked if she was “gay,” though sexual orientation and gender identity are not one and the same. The doctor “wasn’t very gentle in the way she was speaking about it,” Honey, 57, recalled in an interview with Rewire.News. Neither were the nurses and office staff. She watched their “giggles” and “snickers” via a door window into the waiting room.
[…]
“She looked at me, and then she kind of hemmed and hawed and kind of got this stupid grin on her face, and she said, ‘Well, I just don’t believe in that, and I can’t help you with that,’” Honey said. “I cried. I cried.”

Now and for the rest of her life Stefi is going to have a tinge of fear and anxiety when she goes to a hospital or a doctor’s office.

As Health and Human Services start their department of religious bigotry we are going to all going to be tainted with apprehension as we seek medical treatment.

“What if a doctor wouldn’t put a cast on your broken arm because you’re transgender?” the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) asked in a video recapping various forms of discrimination that could have the administration’s blessing. “These situations aren’t hypothetical—this is what happens when a persons’ care comes second to their doctor’s religious or moral beliefs,” the NWLC explained in an accompanying tweet.

Even hospitals could turn away transgender patients. Catholic hospitals, which operate under religious directives that have been used to deny care, account for one in six acute-care beds nationwide.

The Trump administration is angling to give a giant out to the entire medical profession in the name of “religious freedom,” or religious imposition.

Well we don’t have to worry about that here; we have non-discrimination laws in this state… wrong!

If you remember that under President Obama’s administration they required every hospital that accepted federal Medicare or other federal funding to allow same-sex couples to have visitation rights for their spouses, well the same can apply in reverse.

The proposed regulations are open for public comment through March 27. Commenting allows advocacy groups and concerned members of the public alike to register their discontent and lay the groundwork for legal challenges, though HHS previously tried and failed to hide negative comments about anti-choice and anti-LGBTQ policy.

The National LGBTQ Task Force is collecting comments on the health department’s proposed regulations via an online portal. So is the National Center for Transgender Equality (NCTE). “We strongly encourage you to use your own words, including by sharing personal stories of how discrimination or the fear of discrimination in health care or related services has affected you or someone you love, or why you oppose this rule as a person of faith,” NCTE wrote in its appeal. Some of those stories are already circulating on Twitter under the hashtags #RxforDiscrimination, #LicensetoDiscriminate, and #PutPatientsFirst.
[…]
NCTE Director of Policy Harper Jean Tobin said that speaking up can take many forms, whether that’s “going and complaining to the administration of a hospital about the way you were treated by a provider,” or talking to the press, or fighting in the courts.

The thing is these fears are going to come to fruition unless we act!

I Looked At Life From Both Sides Now

I always loved that song by Joni Mitchell, I always thought it was a good song for trans people because we have literately looked at life from both sides.

What Trans Men See That Women Don’t
“Cultural sexism in the world is very real when you’ve lived on both sides of the coin”
Time
By Charlotte Alter

Three guys are sitting at a Harlem bartop eating fries, drinking whiskey and talking about love. One of them, Bryce Richardson, is about to propose to his girlfriend.
[…]
I ask the groom-to-be how he knew his girlfriend was the one. They met at work, he says, and by the time he came out to her, they were already in love. “I said ‘I’m trans, and you’re not gonna want me anyway,” he recalls, unable to keep the smile off his face. “And she said ‘I’m in love with you, I don’t care about that.’” His friend Tiq nods and says, “That’s your wife, right there.”

All three men are trans. But if they hadn’t said so, you wouldn’t have known.

That gives them a unique perspective that a lot of trans women don’t have, many trans women are like me we are not identified as trans until we speak or you get up close. At least for me I don’t know if the way I am treated is because I am seen as a woman or is because I am seen as a trans woman but for the guys they integrate into society perfectly.

Yet experiences of trans men can provide a unique window into how gender functions in American society. In the last few months, I’ve interviewed nearly two dozen trans men and activists about work, relationships and family. Over and over again, men who were raised and socialized as female described all the ways they were treated differently as soon as the world perceived them as male. They gained professional respect, but lost intimacy. They exuded authority, but caused fear. From courtrooms to playgrounds to prisons to train stations, at work and at home, with friends and alone, trans men reiterated how fundamentally different it is to experience the world as a man.

“Cultural sexism in the world is very real when you’ve lived on both sides of the coin,” says Tiq Milan, a friend of the future groom.

The article goes on to list many of the things that are both a curse and privilege.

Most trans men I spoke to also identified another commonality: Once they transitioned, walking became easier, but talking became harder. To be more specific: walking home after dark felt easier, casually talking to babies, strangers and friends felt harder.

“I have to be very careful to not be staring at kids,” says Gardner. “I can look at a mom and her baby, but I can’t look for too long. I miss being seen as not a threat.” Ditto for kids on the playground and puppies, multiple guys said.

And to a man, everyone said they’d experienced a moment when they were walking at night behind a woman, and suddenly realized that she was walking faster or clutching her purse because she was scared.

“If I start to get too close, I can feel her fear, I can feel that she’s getting upset,” says Milan. “And it’s really just an indication of how dangerous this world is for women.

And if you are a trans man of color it is even harder for you. A trans man once told me before he transitioned no one questioned her right to be in a black neighborhood but as a black man he is always being questioned why a black man is in a white neighborhood.

As a trans man of color, Milan says he feels that the world perceives him as a menace, and his interactions with police officers have gotten much more fraught. “I’ve had people make assumptions that I was dangerous or I was a criminal. I’ve been followed around stores. I’ve seen white women who look physically scared, visibly shaken if there’s just the two of us in a elevator,” he says. “You can’t even ask a cop for directions as a black man.”
[…]
Dana Delgardo also says that being a man of color comes with new problems. “I bought a Porsche convertible and I’m afraid to be out late at night after having one cocktail driving that car,” he says. “It deters me from doing things that I think a Caucasian male could probably do without fear of being pulled over by the police.”

A friend who is a project manager for an international engineering firm and has a BSEE and a MBA from well-known universities; before she transitioned in a meeting what “he” said was law. Now in a meeting no one pays any attention to what she said until a man says the same thing. One time she was even asked to get the coffee!

It is a unique perspective that we have on what male privilege is because we either gain or lose the privilege that we have and it becomes very noticeable.

I leave you with Joni Mitchell singing her song Both Sides Now.

Something We Have To Acknowledge

There are trans people who detransition.

For those who have followed the WPATH Standard of Care the rate of detransition is low, only a couple of percent, but it does happen.

A Different Stripe
For eight years, Renee Sullivan identified as transgender. Then it got more complicated.
Psychology Today
By Renee Sullivan,
Published March 7, 2018

One Saturday evening, when I was 26, I got dressed for a night out on the town. I cinched a binder around my chest to flatten my breasts and slipped on a black unisex T-shirt and straight-cut blue jeans. I put on a pair of men's shoes that I'd bought specifically for their chunky soles, which boosted my height a couple of inches, and stood in front of a full-length mirror. I felt pleased with my appearance. I could imagine people seeing me as a man rather than as a woman—and that was the point. But was that what I really wanted? I was no longer sure.
[…]
I came out as bisexual and joined my school's LGBT group. At a meeting one day, I picked up a pamphlet that for the first time gave me a detailed definition of what the T in LGBT stood for: people who feel discomfort with their biological sex and its associated gender role and who resolve the situation by presenting as a member of the opposite sex. It hit me: That's what I am. That's why I feel different. I'm supposed to be a man.

The revelation sparked an eight-year odyssey that stretched well into my 20s. Once I started to watch myself for the symptoms of gender dysphoria, I felt them distinctly. I would sometimes catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and be surprised to see a female face. Other times, I felt as if I were taller and more broad-shouldered than I really was, or as if I were flat-chested. I would occasionally have a tactile awareness of male genitals that weren't there, accompanied by an overwhelming feeling of wrongness in my own female genitals. I felt a knee-jerk anger when others addressed me as "miss" or referred to me as "she."
[…]
The younger people in the support group were noticeably different; they were enthusiastic about medical transition and encouraged me to pursue it. One of them, a trans woman in her early 30s whom I'll call Cindy, became my friend. Quiet and thoughtful, she was thrilled with the changes that female hormones had provoked in her body, and she had little patience for my own apprehension about beginning testosterone therapy. "Have you decided to start taking T yet?" she regularly prodded me, reacting with mild disapproval when I confessed that I hadn't. It was clear that transitioning had healed something deeply painful in her.  Like many people who experience a miracle cure, she seemed convinced that those of us who were still evaluating whether it was the best choice for them just needed a nudge in the right direction.

Do our support group focus on transition to the exclusion of all else? How do we handle those who are questioning their gender?

I think most of the peer support groups realize that we are on our own journey and gives safe space to question our gender. I say most because there was one group that was focused on hormones and transitioning, when I brought up a problem that I was struggling with I got shot down. A close friend had amnesia because of a brain infection and didn’t remember her transition and surgery. It freaked her out and me, I questioned if it could happen to me; I was worried and brought it up in the support group and my concerns got brushed aside to talk about Cross-gender Hormones Therapy, needless to say I never attended their meetings again.

When I told Cindy, she looked a bit shocked. "I don't think that's real," she said. "Women who like to wear men's clothes are just transgender men who are afraid of surgery." But I knew otherwise. I realized I could engage with womanhood on my own terms, ditching all the rules and expectations that surround it.

I embraced a new identity as an androgynous woman, and it gave me the same feeling of joy that I'd previously felt when people saw me as a man. I developed an adult version of my childhood wardrobe, with masculine and feminine clothing that I chose from at whim. I felt powerful and loved the way I looked. I had been shy all my life, but suddenly I was outgoing and confident.

Gender Dysphoria:

In adolescents and adults gender dysphoria diagnosis involves a difference between one’s experienced/expressed gender and assigned gender, and significant distress or problems functioning. It lasts at least six months and is shown by at least two of the following:

• A marked incongruence between one’s experienced/expressed gender and primary and/or secondary sex characteristics
• A strong desire to be rid of one’s primary and/or secondary sex characteristics
• A strong desire for the primary and/or secondary sex characteristics of the other gender
• A strong desire to be of the other gender
• A strong desire to be treated as the other gender
• A strong conviction that one has the typical feelings and reactions of the other gender

Just because one has been diagnosed with Gender Dysphoria does not mean that you have to transition, it doesn’t mean going on CHT, and it doesn’t mean having Gender Conforming Surgery. All it means is that there is a “difference between one’s experienced/expressed gender and assigned gender, and significant distress or problems functioning.” How it is treated is up to us.

The goal is to eliminate it or make it manageable and for each of us it is different. For some it might mean just a social transition, while for others it might mean having GCS.

Just because someone detransitioned doesn’t mean that they don’t have Gender Dysphoria; all it means is that transitioning isn’t for them… now. I know a couple trans people who detransitioned only to transition again later. I know of one person who detransitioned because they couldn’t get a job and they moved back in with their parents.

Life isn’t mapped out, everyone day we start off on a new journey to explore the unexplored.

How Many Times…

Have you seen comments about our chromosomes, if you have XY you’re male but that is nineteen fifties thinking.

This popped up on Facebook…

Sex biology redefined: Genes don’t indicate binary sexes
Stanford Medicine
Author Andrea Ford
Published on February 24, 2015

Imagine being a forty-six-year-old woman pregnant with her third child, whose amniocentesis follow-up shows that half her cells carry male chromosomes. Or a seventy-year-old father of three who learns during a hernia repair that he has a uterus. A recent news feature in Nature mentioned these cases as it elaborated on the spectrum of sex biology. People can be sexed in a non-straightforward way and not even be aware of it; in fact, most probably aren't. As many as 1 person in 100 has some form of "DSD," a difference/disorder of sex development.

The simple scenario many of us learned in school is that two X chromosomes make someone female, and an X and a Y chromosome make someone male. These are simplistic ways of thinking about what is scientifically very complex. Anatomy, hormones, cells, and chromosomes (not to mention personal identity convictions) are actually not usually aligned with one binary classification.
[…]
As quoted in the article, Eric Vilain, MD, PhD, director of the Center for Gender-Based Biology at UCLA, explains that sex determination is a contest between two opposing networks of gene activity. Changes in the activity or amounts of molecules in the networks can sway the embryo towards or away from the sex seemingly spelled out by the chromosomes. “It has been, in a sense, a philosophical change in our way of looking at sex; that it's a balance.”

What's more, studies in mice are showing that the balance of sex manifestation can be shifted even after birth; in fact, it is something actively maintained during the mouse's whole life.

Mother Nature does not like simple, life is so complicated and there’re many facets that we do not understand. It is like an onion, when we find something there are always another layer beneath that layer.

As our understanding of biology continues to advance, our social, legal, and medical systems will have to evolve as well. Check out the Nature feature for a discussion of these problems, as well as more interesting research into the biology of sex.

Something We Don’t Think About

As we age two of the diseases that we have a risk of are Alzheimer's and dementia.

Dementia care advice for transgender patients drawn up
BBC
12 March 2018

New guidance for staff caring for transgender people with dementia has been drawn up to ensure patients get dignified and compassionate health care in north Wales.

It includes advice about dealing with people confused between their gender preference and their birth gender.

Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board (BCUHB) believes it is the first in the UK to develop such guidelines.

It said the advice would help support the "unique, but vulnerable, group".
[…]
She [Jenny Burgess] said the advice was key as transgender people with dementia "may wake up one day and they'll be confused why they're dressed in a certain way".

She said: "Take for instance a transgender woman - they may well get quite concerned and disturbed at being in female clothes.

"They may worry why certain parts are missing from their anatomy. So it's these sort of things that I'd like staff to be aware of. There's no simple answer… but it really is a worrying scenario."

Far fetched?

No, it happened to a friend, she was in a coma and not expected to survive but when she did come out of the coma she couldn’t remember transitioning and have surgery. She paniced!

Her memory did return, but what would have happened if her memory didn’t return… it would have been living a nightmare.

Or suppose a trans person has dementia, is our gender dysphoria strong enough to survive? Will we remember that we are trans?

It is really a legitimate concern.

Good News Stories

Trans good news stories are hard to find but I found one from right here in Connecticut…

Coming out presents unique challenges for Stamford transgender student
The Stamford Advocate
By Erin Kayata
March 10, 2018

STAMFORD — On the surface, Jessie Tarzia’s bedroom looks like one belonging any 18-year-old girl.

Glass jars filled with well-used paint brushes sit on one shelf, and on a pink bucket chair is a white ukulele. The bookshelf is lined with nonfiction about the supernatural and horror novels, her favorite genre. A bulletin board features photo-booth snapshots with Jessie and her friends striking silly poses at a “Sweet 16” party. There’s also a tall, white umbrella lamp for filming YouTube videos, a remnant of her vlogging days.

Jessie is a high-school senior, a painter, an actress, a daughter, a big sister and a friend, among other things. She is also one of 1.4 million transgender people in the United States, according to estimates by UCLA’s Williams Institute. Being transgender is just another component of Jessie’s life. But coming out as a young student in middle school presented a unique set of challenges.

“I noticed something was different when I was 5 years old,” she said. “I just didn’t feel comfortable with myself, with the clothes I was wearing, the way I acted, my interests. There were definitely some things I felt were still very boy-like...but I always felt there was this need for me to do something else.”

Given the name Justin at birth, Jessie always wanted to wear dresses, play with dolls and put on makeup.

It is the best of times it is the worst of times

It is the best of times for coming out pre-teen, before the evil puberty kicks in, before we develop secondary sex characterizes, before Tanner Stage 2.

The Tarzias met regularly with Rogers staff to discuss Jessie’s 504 plan — granted to her under the federal special-education law for children with disabilities. During those meetings, Jessie’s gender transition was discussed, and the school arranged for her to use the bathroom in the nurse’s office. But when the Tarzias learned about the Connecticut law allowing transgender people to use the bathroom of their preference, Jessie began using the girls restroom.

“I had enough of walking so far out of my way just to go to the bathroom,” she said. “I just went into the girls bathroom and when I came out, the world hadn’t exploded. Everyone was completely comfortable with it.”

A link to Connecticut’s Department of Education guideline is here and here.

---

The worst of times…

One of the things that I am concerned about is the push for the so called “religious freedom” legislation and how it will affect state laws.

Republicans return the anti-gay First Amendment Defense Act to Congress
Think Progress
By Zack Ford
March 9, 2018

When Donald Trump was elected president in 2016, Republicans in Congress were very optimistic this would mean they could finally pass a bill legalizing discrimination against same-sex couples. This week, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) followed through, reintroducing the so-called “First Amendment Defense Act” (FADA).

FADA singles out a specific set of conservative beliefs for special dispensation to discriminate: those who oppose same-sex marriage and those who oppose sex outside of marriage. The bill defines these privileges as such:

Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Federal Government shall not take any discriminatory action against a person, wholly or partially on the basis that such person speaks, or acts, in accordance with a sincerely held religious belief, or moral conviction, that —

(1) marriage is or should be recognized as a union of—

(A) one man and one woman;
(B) two individuals as recognized under Federal law; or

(2) sexual relations outside marriage are improper.

The language here is fairly insidious. A person who is held accountable for treating others unfairly because they oppose their same-sex relationship or their decision to engage in premarital sex would be considered a victim of “discriminatory action.” They would be entitled to cite FADA as a defense that they should not be in any way punished for their own discriminatory actions.

I fear that these federal laws will override state non-discrimination laws.

FADA protects this group from broad actions. The legislation stipulates they can’t be denied any tax benefit and they can’t be denied any access to “any Federal grant, contract, subcontract, cooperative agreement, guarantee, loan, scholarship, license, certification, accreditation, employment or other similar position or status.”

In a statement accompanying the bill’s introduction, Lee openly admitted that he wants to make sure organizations and individuals can discriminate without consequence. FADA ensures, he said, “that federal bureaucrats will never have the authority to require those who believe in the traditional definition of marriage to choose between their living in accordance with those beliefs and maintaining their occupation or their tax status.”

What will happen to Jessie is one of her teachers invokes the FADA? What happens if another student invokes the FADA.

I don’t think that this law will pass the mustard of the Fourteenth Amendment… but if Justice Kennedy does retire this summer and Trump gets to pick another religious conservative Justice that can reshape the entire legal systems.

Will these so called “religious freedom” laws be just another way to advance bigotry and force Jessie back in to the closet?

Ba Humbug!

The time change has thrown me off my schedule.

I am not a big fan of DST, it is too stressful for to many people because it throws our rhythm off. Did you know that there is an increase in car accidents, there is an increase in heart attacks and strokes, and it affects the economy?

One time back in the seventies when I was doing field service and I was in Xeon Ohio during the spring time shift, I was eating breakfast at a rural dinner. I overheard two farmers talking, one farmer said to the other that he hated the time change because the cow were late for milking and it threw off the cows their schedule. I felt like turning around and asking them “Why don’t you just milk them an hour earlier?”

But for many of us we are locked into our schedule by our jobs, we can’t just say I’m working an hour earlier. For older persons like me it is not as bad because I am on no fixed schedule, I can wake up at the same old time and it is not a problem. However, if you work on a factory floor or a retail store they have fixed hours.

I think the time has come to question once again the wisdom of DST.

Saturday 9 On and On

Crazy Sam’s Saturday 9 On and On (1977)



On Saturdays I take a break from the heavy stuff and have some fun…
Unfamiliar with this week's song. Hear it here.

1) This song describes the plight of "poor ol' Jimmy," who caught his girlfriend kissing someone else. Have you ever spied on a romantic partner?
Nope, but way back in high school I had a date with a girl from Vermont who was down in Connecticut and she called me and said she was sick and broke the date. Well later that night who drives through the parking lot at McDonalds, her and the quarterback from school.
Oh well, I figured it was good that it happened then instead of later.

2) In this song, Stephen Bishop sings that he "smiles when he feels like dying." When did you recently put on a happy face, even though you really weren't all that happy?
What stands out was when I was on the Sunday morning talk show “Face the State” and the moderator kept on asking the same question over and over about bathrooms. I had a smile on but inside I was doing a slow burn.

3) Stephen Bishop always wanted to be a musician, and as a child he began playing the clarinet. Did you take lessons -- dance, art, music -- as a child? If yes, did you take them because you enjoyed them, or because your parents made you take them?
I tried to play the trumpet and I think that the whole family had a sigh of relieve when I gave it up.

4) When he was 12, inspired by The Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show, he switched to the guitar and began writing songs. Tell us about someone or something that influenced your career path.
The science teacher in high school.

5) Stephen Bishop attended Will C. Crawford High School in San Diego. This school requires students complete 20 hours of community service every year. Tell us about an organization, cause or campaign you volunteered for, either as a student or an adult.
Well in my retirement I volunteer at the Hartford Gay and Lesbian Health Collective two day a week and I am also the volunteer executive director of a non-profit (hence the interview on Face the State).

6) In 1977, when this song was popular, Seattle Slew won racing's Triple Crown. Sam's mother has always been afraid of horses. Is there an animal you're uncomfortable with?
Naw.

7) Also in 1977, moviegoers waited in line for hours to see Star Wars. What's the longest line you waited in recently?
I try to avoid lines; I think longest line was at the Department of Motor Vehicles. Where else?

8) The mini-series Roots first aired in 1977. Today Americans are spending more time and money than ever to research ancestry. How far back can you trace your family tree?
I never traced my family tree but my grandmother one time said that we are related to Benedict Arnold.

9) Random question: It's often said that nobody's perfect. How about you? What quality keeps you from being perfect?
Well I’m tone deaf, can’t carry a tune or keep a beat.

It Is The Little Things…

That makes a difference, like the use of pronouns.

How Philly organizations tweaked their email signatures - and transformed their culture
Philly Inquirer
by Samantha Melamed
March 2, 2018

There are few things more mundane than an office email signature. But in December, the Philadelphia organization Gearing Up made a minor tweak to its digital protocol — with a surprisingly transformative impact.

It was an addition of just a few words, right below the sender’s name but above the job title: a line declaring the author’s preferred pronouns.

“Lately, with people talking about gender so much, we realized that policy wasn’t quite as clear or accepting as we needed it to be,” said program director Al Sharrock (whose preferred pronouns are they/them/their).

And, though subtle, the change is working for Gearing Up, an exercise program for those recovering from addiction.

“For people who are nervous about whether they’ll be accepted in our space, it has brought them out of their shells,” Sharrock said. “I would imagine everyone else doesn’t really notice it. But the people who need it are seeing it.”

If you go to the waiting room for the dentist of the Hartford Gay and Lesbian Health Collective you will find LGBT magazine, on the forms there is a place for preferred pronouns, and preferred name along with “legal name,” yes you would expect to find that there but you also will find the same thing at my diabetes endo office.

However, it is not in most of my other doctor’s offices.

It is the little things like that and maybe having just a safe space sticker can make a difference and the West Hartford Jewish Family Services is making the difference, they will be the first organization who will have trained their staff to be LGBT friendly. Their staff has taken “Getting It Right” training that is giving by Connecticut Community Care.

The organization that I’m the Executive Directors is a member of the LGBT Aging Advocacy that guided CCC in developing the training program to make sure that they got it right. Which by the way is where I am at this afternoon… a meeting of the LGBT Aging Advocacy.

LGBT Aging Advocacy is also responsible in the Moveable Senior Center where a town senior center has a LGBT day at their centers one day a month at a different senior center.

Update 4:20 PM

At the meeting we heard how a social worker that had a “safe space” symbol on her name tag was at a client’s home when the client spied the “safe space” triangle, came out to the social worker and reintroduced her “friend” as her wife.

We can make a difference!

Yale Trans Legal

There is a seminar at Yale Law about trans health coming up…

Challenges in Trans Health: Legal Framings, Advocacy, and Barriers to Care
Thursday, March 22, 2018 at 5:30PM - 7:00PM
Sterling Law Building Room 129
Open to the Public

Description
Please join the Solomon Center for Health Law and Policy, YLS's OutLaws, and Outpatient @YSM, and Yale Health Law and Policy Socity (YHeLPS) for a panel discussion on challenges in trans health.

Transgender Americans have long experienced great disparities in health care, with higher rates of suicide attempts, lower rates of insurance coverage, and high rates of delaying care for fear of discrimination. The Trump administration has made many headlines for its attacks on transgender health care, pressuring the CDC to remove the word “transgender” from its budget proposals and eliminating questions about LGBTQ individuals from national surveys. This panel brings together a lawyer, a doctor, an LGBTQ health policy expert, and member of Stonewall Speakers to discuss barriers to care for transgender Americans and policy options to reduce these health disparities.

Panelists:

• Sean Cahill, PhD: Director of Health Policy Research at the Fenway Institute, Affiliate Associate Clinical Professor at Northeastern University’s Bouve College of Health Sciences, and Adjunct Associate Professor of the Practice in Health Law, Policy and Management at Boston University School of Public Health
• AC Demidont, DO: Chief Medical Officer, Anchor Health Initiative
• Pooja Gehi, JD, Executive Director of the National Lawyers Guild
• Participant from the Stonewall Speakers Speakers' Bureau
• Moderated by Katherine Kraschel, Executive Director of the Solomon Center for Health Law and Policy and Lecturer in Law at Yale Law School

---

Yesterday I wrote about the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling about the Civil Rights Act of 1964 Title VII coving us and not being superseded by Religious Freedom Restoration Act, well Slate had a good summary of the reasoning behind the ruling…

This, the 6th Circuit explained in an opinion by Judge Karen Nelson Moore, cannot be right. First, she held that Title VII does outlaw anti-trans employment discrimination, for two independent reasons. First, Title VII bars sex stereotyping—punishing an employer for her failure to conform to gender norms. When Rost fired Stephens for transitioning, Moore explained, he penalized her for failing to conform to the sex assigned to her at birth. “[A]n employer cannot discriminate on the basis of transgender status,” she concluded, “without imposing its stereotypical notions of how sexual organs and gender identity ought to align.”

Second, Moore wrote, anti-trans discrimination is inherently sex based. “[I]t is analytically impossible,” she noted, “to fire an employee based on that employee’s status as a transgender person without being motivated, at least in part, by the employee’s sex.” Any business that mistreats a worker on the basis of her “transgender or transitioning status,” then, is taking sex into account—in violation of Title VII.

Moore then turned to the RFRA, which states that any “substantial burden” on “religious exercise” must be “in furtherance of a compelling government interest” and “the least restrictive means of furthering” that interest. Here, the funeral home alleged two burdens: It claimed that the presence of a transgender employee would “often create distractions for the deceased’s loved ones” and force Rost to leave the industry, because working with a trans person infringes on his religious beliefs.

Neither of these, Moore held, qualify as substantial burdens. Regarding the first burden, Moore wrote that employers cannot skirt Title VII by making assumptions about customers’ “presumed biases.” A company may fear that its customers will be put off by a trans employee, or a black one, or a Muslim one. But these fears do not give it license to discriminate in violation of Title VII. Regarding the second burden, Moore wrote that “tolerating Stephens’s understanding of her sex and gender identity is not tantamount to supporting it.” Stephens did not ask Rost to endorse or aid her transition; she only wished to remain on staff. Allowing her to remain employed does not “substantially burden his religious practice.”

Let’s hope that the Supreme Court sees it the same way.

Good News From New Hampshire!

All the New England states except New Hampshire have protections for us and now that may change, New Hampshire is about to join its sister states.

House bill to assure equal treatment of transgender people passes
Union Leader
By Dave Solomon March 7, 2018

CONCORD — Proponents of a bill that adds gender identity to the state’s civil rights statute cheered loudly from the House gallery on Wednesday, as representatives voted to guarantee transgender people protection against discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodations.

“Fear-mongering about public bathrooms and locker rooms is a smoke screen,” said Rep. Ed Butler, D-Hart’s Location, the lead sponsor of HB 1319, which now moves on to the Senate after a 195-to-129 bipartisan victory in the House.


“Nothing in the bill changes the fact that it is illegal to assault a woman or man in a public bathroom or locker room,” he said.

Wednesday’s vote caps a two-year battle by supporters to get a bill through the House. Butler was the lead sponsor of last year’s transgender rights bill, which died on the table after losing a 187-179 House vote.

Butler predicted a different outcome this time around, and he was proven right. He expressed the hope that the bill will eventually be signed into law, allowing New Hampshire to join 18 states and 200 municipalities that have approved gender identity protections.

Of course the opposition is shouting that this is a “Bathroom bill” and as the article says, they are using fear-mongering to rally the opposition.

“We’ve been told this bill is not about bathrooms or locker rooms,” said Rep. Mark Pearson, R-Hampstead. “But when we asked for additional language that exempts these places, we got loud and emotional blowback … To say, ‘Get over your fears’ is not a compassionate response.”

Those fears were expressed by Rep. Al Baldasaro, R-Londonderry. “Does this open up the door to showers where a male who says he is a female is able to take a shower with my granddaughters who have not had the operation,” he said. “Where is the protection for parents?”

The governor, a Republican, has said he will sign the bill if it gets to his desk.

Gov. Chris Sununu has indicated his willingness to sign HB 1319 into law if it passes the Senate. The vote in the House drew 48 Republicans to join all Democrats present in support of the measure.

The bill was endorsed by the state Business and Industry Association, Women’s Foundation, Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence and Association of Chiefs of Police.

In the past not even the bill sponsors voted for the bill but that all has changed, why?

I think it is because they have laid the groundwork for the bill. One thing that I have learned from what I have done over the last eleven years… you have to have other organizations backing you up. We cannot do it alone; we need to form coalitions. You need to talk to legislators long before the bill is introduced to educate them.

I hope that New Hampshire joins it six sisters in passing a law to ban discrimination against us, and I also hope that the will also include public accommodations.

Another Court Victory!

We have been taking many hits at the hands of Attorney General Session and Education Secretary DeVos but many of the courts are not having any of it.

U.S. appeals court says civil rights law covers transgender workers
Reuters
By Daniel Wiessner & Jonathan Stempel
March 7, 2018

(Reuters) - A federal law banning sex bias in the workplace prohibits discrimination against transgender workers, a U.S. appeals court said on Wednesday, ruling in favor of a funeral director who was fired after telling her boss she planned to transition to female from male.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said RG & GR Harris Funeral Homes Inc in Detroit unlawfully discriminated against Aimee Stephens, formerly known as Anthony Stephens, based on her sex.

The court also said the funeral home failed to establish that the federal workplace law, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, substantially burdened the ability of funeral home owner Thomas Rost, a devout Christian, to exercise his religious rights in his treatment of Stephens.

Several federal appeals courts have said that discriminating against transgender workers is a form of unlawful sex bias. But the 6th Circuit was the first to consider a religious defense in such a case.

Hopefully, this trend continues and the Appeals ruling has an impact on the Supreme Court’s ruling on Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission case.

In an article in The Hill the court was asked that,

Attorneys urged the court to rule that the funeral home qualifies for the “ministerial exception” to Title VII, but it said Stephens was not a ministerial employee and the funeral home is not a religious institution.

The court’s ruling reverses a lower court's summary judgment in favor of Rost.

“Discrimination on the basis of transgender and transitioning status is necessarily discrimination on the basis of sex, and thus the [Equal Employment Opportunity Commission] should have had the opportunity to prove that the Funeral Home violated Title VII by firing Stephens because she is transgender and transitioning from male to female,” judge Karen Nelson Moore wrote in the appeals court’s opinion.

Since the beginning of our country the courts have ruled against attempt to hide bigotry behind religious freedom. In the past the courts have looked favorably on if a law was a "neutral law of general applicability" but that is slowly changing toward a right-wing belief that laws could be ignored if it went against a person religious belief.

Let us hope that the courts follow in the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals thinking.

Another Court Win!

This time it is out in Idaho.

For us having proper documentation is vital. When we apply for a job, when we are stopped by the police, when we walk in to a bar and get cared, when you are on a bus and ICE is checking IDs, there are so many times when we need our ID to reflect our true gender and not having an ID that does not show our true gender can lead to legal problems or even violence.

Idaho can no longer automatically bar trans people from altering birth certificates
Idaho Statesman
By Nicole Blanchard
March 6, 2018

Idaho officials can no longer “automatically and categorically” reject transgender individuals’ applications to change the sex listed on their birth certificates, ruled an Idaho magistrate judge for U.S. District Court on Monday.

Federal Judge Candy Dale ruled in favor of two transgender Idaho women who claimed that the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare’s policy of automatic rejection violated their constitutional rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.

“(One plaintiff) asserts that living with a birth certificate declaring she is male is a permanent and painful reminder that Idaho does not recognize her as she is — as a woman,” court documents said.

The defendants in the lawsuit — three administrators with Health and Welfare — agreed that the automatic rejection policy was unfair, but explained they would need a court order to change that policy. Health and Welfare is required to uphold state laws with strict criteria pertaining to birth certificates and similar information.

The Huffington Post reported that,

In her ruling, Dale agreed that such discrepancies “can create risks to the health and safety of transgender people,” who the judge noted already face disproportionately high levels of discrimination. As such, barring transgender individuals from changing their birth certificates to reflect their preferred gender is “unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment,” Dale wrote.

Though applications aren’t guaranteed to be approved, Dale said that “such applications must be reviewed and considered through a constitutionally-sound approval process.”

If an application is approved, the reissued birth certificate cannot have a record of any name changes or amendments to the assigned gender. This is to protect transgender individuals from possible discrimination.

The court order goes into effect in April.

Here in Connecticut we can change our gender marker on our birth certificate without having sterilizing surgery, we only need a letter from our therapist.

This Is What Happens When Hate Rules

We are seeing this happen all over the world, hate is coming to rule.

Emboldened By Trump, Georgia GOP Pushes Anti-LGBTQ Adoption Bill
Huffington Post: Opinion
By Michelangelo Signorile
March 5, 2018
Georgia is on its way to creating a law that would allow state-funded adoption agencies to turn away LGBTQ couples ― or, more specifically, to turn away any parents the agencies don’t approve of based on religious beliefs.

Make no mistake: This anti-LGBTQ adoption bill is part of a wide-reaching plan by religious conservatives ― backed by President Donald Trump and his administration ― to turn same-sex marriage into second-class marriage with a longer-term goal of overturning federal marriage rights for gays and lesbians entirely.

How are religious conservatives turning same-sex marriage into second-class marriage? By getting courts to rule that wedding-related businesses can turn away gay couples based on the business owners’ religious beliefs, by allowing governments to refuse to give the same benefits to spouses within same-sex marriages as they do to those within opposite-sex marriages, and by allowing adoption agencies to say no to LGBTQ parents.

To me this seems to fly in the face of the Fourteenth Amendment and the Supreme Court.

Georgia is not the first state to pass biased anti-LGBT laws…

Anti-LGBTQ adoption laws, which Texas and other states have passed and which Georgia may soon pass, are integral to these strategic efforts. And Trump has become instrumental in anti-LGBTQ conservatives’ short-term and long-term goals, not just by courting white evangelicals and signing orders that would harm queer people ― such as banning transgender people from the military ― but, more important, by putting Neil Gorsuch on the Supreme Court.

The Republicans have shown their true colors now that they control Congress, the Presidency, and most of the states they have shown that they are a party of hate, bigotry, and divisiveness.

They use hate as a weapon to energize their base, they use hate to bring in campaign donation.

Seeing Is Believing

I want to believe he is turning over a new leaf, but his actions and words will be the true test that he has changed. In the past he has badly hurt the trans community and it will take a lot to heal the deep wounds.

RuPaul tweets 'regret' over controversial transgender comments: 'The trans community are heroes'
Entertainment
By Joey Nolfi
March 05, 2018

RuPaul has issued an apology for controversial statements he made about members of the transgender community.

“Each morning I pray to set aside everything I THINK I know, so I may have an open mind and a new experience,” the two-time Emmy-winning host of RuPaul’s Drag Race tweeted Monday, two days after the The Guardian published an interview with the LGBT icon in which he indicated he likely wouldn’t allow a post-operative transwoman to join the show’s cast. “I understand and regret the hurt I have caused. The trans community are heroes of our shared LGBTQ movement. You are my teachers.”

In the past he has named segments of the show "You've Got Shemail" or the game "Female or Shemale" where you try to identify the cisgender woman; he has far to go to show that he is culturally aware and it is going to take a long time to show me that he changed.

I do not hate drag queens, it is just not my “cup of tea,” I know many “drag queens” and I know many trans women who started off as drag queens, but Ru Paul has hurt many trans women by his comments, let his actions and words show that he has changed.

---

Back in 2014 it wrote this…

Ru Paul
Okay, here is my two cents.

There is a lot of lateral hostility within our community… I’m transgender* you are not… I’m more transgender than you… and on and on.

There are many exclusionists in our community and they usually draw the line under them, drag queens are looked down on by crossdresser, transsexuals look down on crossdresser, post-op transsexuals look down at pre-op transsexuals, and those that can integrate into society look down at those who cannot and call them “men in a dress.” Some transgender people think I am not a “true” transsexual because I haven’t hocked my house to have surgery even though I have been living full time for almost seven years.

So why is this? Why do they want to separate themselves from other people they see as being below them?

The origins of lateral hostility have its roots in our internalized shame as we worked to overcome our own feeling of inadequacy; we transfer that guilt to other people that we see as being below us… I am not like “those” drag queens. We cannot attack those who oppress us so we distance ourselves from those that we see as being below us and oppress them. It is also caused by internalized homophobia/transphobia, our fear of being labeled as gay, transsexuals’ fear of being “just a crossdresser,” and post-op transsexuals who can integrate into society fear being seen as a transsexual.

Another part of the problem is the way the media looks at us. When the media covers a pride event what photos do you see in the newspaper or on TV? Usually it is the flamboyant drag queens or the six foot seven crossdresser, and not the trans-woman who is integrated into society.

We also lump together those that we feel as being below us. Ru Paul is one person, and he is not the “Drag Community” (even though he thinks he is). But we demonize the whole drag community because of him. I am a firm believer that you hate that what you don’t know; so here is a homework assignment for you this Pride month. Get to know a drag queen. That’s it nothing more.

*My definition of transgender is anyone who crosses the gender norm. That transgender is a spectrum from drag queens/kings to post op transsexuals.

From Good, To Bad, To Worst

They went through the golden age of discovery, through an age of hate, and now they are trying to claim the golden age, can they do it?

Hopkins Hospital: a history of sex reassignment
By Rachel Witkin
May 1, 2014

In 1965, the Hopkins Hospital became the first academic institution in the United States to perform sex reassignment surgeries. Now also known by names like genital reconstruction surgery and sex realignment surgery, the procedures were perceived as radical and attracted attention from The New York Times and tabloids alike. But they were conducted for experimental, not political, reasons. Regardless, as the first place in the country where doctors and researchers could go to learn about sex reassignment surgery, Hopkins became the model for other institutions. But in 1979, Hopkins stopped performing the surgeries and never resumed.

In the 1960s, the idea to attempt the procedures came primarily from psychologist John Money and surgeon Claude Migeon, who were already treating intersex children, who, often due to chromosome variations, possess genitalia that is neither typically male nor typically female. Money and Migeon were searching for a way to assign a gender to these children, and concluded that it would be easiest if they could do reconstructive surgery on the patients to make them appear female from the outside. At the time, the children usually didn’t undergo genetic testing, and the doctors wanted to see if they could be brought up female.

“[Money] raised the legitimate question: ‘Can gender identity be created essentially socially?’ ... Nurture trumping nature,” said Chester Schmidt, who performed psychiatric exams on the surgery candidates in the 60s and 70s.

This theory ended up backfiring on Money, most famously in the case of David Reimer, who was raised as a girl under the supervision of Money after a botched circumcision and later committed suicide after years of depression.

It is interesting that they wrote about Dr. Money, the doctor caused the suicide of David Reimer and his twin brother and the divorce of their parents.

Back then the Harry Benjamin standard of care focused on your sexual orientation and not gender identity.

When Beyer arrived at Hopkins, the entrance forms she had to fill out were focused on sexuality instead of sexual identity. She says she felt as if they only wanted to consider hyper-feminine candidates for the surgery, so she decided not to stay. She had her surgery decades later in 2003 in Trinidad, Colo.

“It was so highly sexualized, which was not at all my experience, certainly not the reason I was going to Hopkins to consider transition, that I just got up and left, I didn’t want anything to do with it,” she said. “No one said this explicitly, but they certainly implied it, that the whole purpose of this was to get a vagina so you could be penetrated by a penis.”

And then came along Paul McHugh…

In 1979, SBCU Chair Jon Meyer conducted a study comparing 29 patients who had the surgery and 21 who didn’t, and concluded that those who had the surgery were not more adjusted to society than those who did not have the surgery. Meyer told The New York Times in 1979: “My personal feeling is that surgery is not proper treatment for a psychiatric disorder, and it’s clear to me that these patients have severe psychological problems that don’t go away following surgery.”

After Meyer’s study was published, Paul McHugh, the Psychiatrist-in-Chief at Hopkins Hospital who never supported the University offering the surgeries according to Schmidt, shut the program down.

Meyer’s study came after a study conducted by Money, which concluded that all but one out of 24 patients were sure that they had made the right decision, 12 had improved their occupational status and 10 had married for the first time. Beyer believes that officials at Hopkins just wanted an excuse to end the program, so they cited Meyer’s study.

With the shutting down of John Hopkins trans clinic they was a rush of other surgery centers around the country shutting down,

However, she thinks that shutting down the surgeries at Hopkins actually helped more people gain access to them, because now the surgeries are privatized.

“Paul McHugh did the trans community a very big favor … Privatization [helps] far more people than the alternative of keeping it locked down in an academic institution which forced trans women to jump through many hoops.”

Twenty major medical institutions offered sex reassignment surgery at the time that Hopkins shut its program down, according to a 1979 AP article.

I do not think he did any favors for us, it brought about the dark ages for us and he is still fighting against us.

However, McHugh says that it shouldn’t be surprising that Hopkins discontinued the surgeries, and that he still supports this decision today. He points to Meyer’s study as well as a 2011 Swedish study that states that the risk of suicide was higher for people who had the surgery versus the general population.

However, there are serious flaws in the study. For one thing those the study labeled as “transsexual” did not qualify medically as “transsexual” the researchers used a broader definition of transsexual than the DSM and another flaw was that those who dropped out of the study were listed as detransitioning.

Though she finds the way that Hopkins treated its sex reassignment patients in the 60s and 70s questionable, she thinks that the SBCU [Sexual Behaviors Consultation Unit] has been a great resource for the transgender community.

“Today those folks are wonderful people,” Beyer said. “They’re very helpful. They’re the go-to place up in Baltimore. They’ve done a lot of good for a lot of people. They’ve contributed politically as well to passage of gender identity legislation in Maryland and elsewhere.”

But the community doesn’t think so…

The Maryland Coalition for Trans Equality’s Donna Cartwright said that the transgender community does not have enough resources available to them. She said offering surgery at a nearby academic institution could provide more support to the community.

“Generally, the medical community needs to be better educated on trans health care and there should be greater availability [of sex reassignment surgery],” she said. “I think it would be good if there was an institution in the area that did provide health care, including surgery.”

I think this article was written to push how great the Sexual Behaviors Consultation Unit is, it sounds like the article was written by someone in public relations. Looking up the other works of the author of the article, this is her first medical article, some of the other titles are “Delve into the lives of television characters,” “Five minutes of fame aren’t worth the underage shame,” and other non-medical articles.

Nowhere is there anything about Harry Benjamin who had his world famous gender clinic there.

In Of All Places

Out in California a judge made a terrible decision that is more indicative of the deep south than the west coast.

A California Judge Allows a Baker to Discriminate Against a Lesbian Couple Who Wanted a Wedding Cake
ACLU
By Rose Saxe
February 7, 2018

On Monday, a trial court in California’s Central Valley blamed a lesbian couple for the discrimination they experienced when they tried to buy a wedding cake. That twisted reasoning ignores the very real harms that occur when people are denied the freedom to participate in public life.

Eileen and Mireya Rodriguez-Del Rio tried to buy a cake from the bakery Tastries, but the owner Cathy Miller turned them away when they arrived for their scheduled cake tasting on Aug. 26, 2017, based on her religious objections to same-sex marriage. Miller instead referred them to a different bakery, even though Tastries regularly sells wedding cakes to heterosexual couples.

The court found that the Constitution creates a right to discriminate, in part by grossly minimizing the harm that the couple experienced when they were rejected. In ruling for the bakery, Kern County Superior Court Judge David Lampe said:

If anything, the harm to [the bakery owner] is the greater harm, because it carries significant economic consequences. When one feels injured, insulted or angered by the words or expressive conduct of others, the harm is many times self-inflicted.

Blaming Eileen and Mireya for the discrimination they experienced that day at the bakery is outrageous. It’s hard to fault people who experience injury when told they are not good enough to be served because of who they are. But the court didn’t stop there.

According to the judge, “the fact that Rodriguez-Del Rios feel they will suffer indignity from Miller’s choice is not sufficient to deny constitutional protection.” Judge Lampe went on to say that an "interest in preventing dignitary harms . . . is not a compelling basis for infringing free speech.”  That is just not true. Putting aside the bakery’s contention that freedom of speech creates a right to refuse equal service, the Supreme Court has long recognized that preventing harm to personal dignity that occurs with discrimination is one of the core purposes of our anti-discrimination laws.

Can you believe that judge!

So because the couple got mad at being discriminated against by the bakers the judge found them at fault. I guess the judge think we should kowtow to discrimination.

In a challenge to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of federal public accommodations law to ensure human dignity. Justice Arthur Goldberg, in a concurring opinion, wrote: “Discrimination is not simply dollars and cents, hamburgers and movies; it is the humiliation, frustration, and embarrassment that a person must surely feel when he is told that he is unacceptable as a member of the public.”

And in Roberts v. Jaycees, the Supreme Court recognized that discrimination — in that case, turning women away from membership in an organization — “deprives persons of their individual dignity and denies society the benefits of wide participation in political, economic, and cultural life.”

But I guess the judge does feel he has to follow the Supreme Court, that he can set his own judicial precedent.

---

I imagine most of you watched the Oscars…

Oscar winner 'A Fantastic Woman' draws attention to transgender rights
LA Times
By Jeffrey Fleishman
March 4, 2018

There is a moment in the Chilean film "A Fantastic Woman" when a transgender singer stands onstage and lifts her voice, an unwavering mezzo-soprano that rises above the cruelties and prejudices she's encountered in a country that has scorned her identity, ridiculed her love and chipped away at her pride.

Sebastián Lelio's story, which won the Academy Award for foreign-language film, is an unrepentant fable in a time when transgender people and others in the LGBTQ community are demanding wider rights in countries, including Chile, that have treated them as deviants and curiosities. The film follows Marina (played by transgender actress Daniela Vega) in a quiet rebellion for dignity against condescension and relentless humiliation.

"I'm on Jupiter. I can't believe that this happened," Lelio said of his Oscar. "It is a film that has managed to contribute to a necessary and urgent conversation."

Somehow I Don’t Think It Will Make A Difference

Trump & Company just don’t give a darn what people think. 97% of the people want background checks but Trump and the Republicans ignore us, so why do they think a commercial will persuade them?

New TV Ad Demands Trump Drop His Ban On Transgender Troops
The president might see it on Fox News.
Huffington Post
By Mary Papenfuss
March 2, 2018

The Human Rights Campaign and other LGBTQ advocacy groups are launching a television ad campaign across the nation Friday demanding that “impulsive president” Donald Trump drop his attempt to ban transgender service members in the military.

The 30-second spot will run on morning shows on CNN, MSNBC and Trump’s  go-to network, Fox News.

The total ban on transgender troops demanded by Trump last summer is currently blocked by federal court rulings and has been criticized by military leaders.

The ad, titled “Patriots,” features quotes from officials slamming the ban as unconstitutional and harmful to national security. “An impulsive president tweets that transgender Americans won’t be allowed to serve,” the ad says. “But decorated military leaders say there’s no reason to single out these brave heroes.”

So far it looks like that Defense Secretary Jim Mattis will allow trans troops against Trump wishes.

Do you think this ad will make a difference?

Come To Connecticut

For trans people who were not born in Connecticut or are not U.S. citizens can get their names changed in Connecticut* unlike many conservative states.

Transgender Man Can’t Challenge Indiana’s Name-Change Policy
Courthouse News Service
By Lorraine Bailey
March 2, 2018

CHICAGO (CN) – A divided Seventh Circuit ruled Friday that the 11th Amendment shields Indiana officials from a transgender immigrant’s challenge to the state’s citizenship requirements for a legal name change.

Suing under a pseudonym, John Doe challenged a 2010 Indiana law requiring any Indiana resident seeking a name change to provide proof of U.S. citizenship.

A 32-year-old Mexican national, Doe says he has lived in the United States since he was 5 years old. He got married in 2014 to a U.S. citizen and won asylum in the U.S. because of the persecution he might face in Mexico for being transgender.
The grounds for turning down his requests for the federal bench to order his name change is,
However, a federal judge ruled that the 11th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution – which deals with states’ sovereign immunity – bars Doe’s lawsuit, and the Seventh Circuit affirmed Friday.

So a Google search of Connecticut law didn’t find any requirement for the person to be a U.S. citizen.

Furthermore the Connecticut birth certificate law allows the courts to issue an order to other states or countries to change their birth certificate.

(a) In the case of a person who is a resident of this state and was born in another state or in a foreign jurisdiction, the probate courts in this state shall have jurisdiction to issue a decree of a change of sex [my emphasis]. Such person may apply to the probate court for the district in which such person resides for a decree that such person's gender is different from the sex designated on such person's original birth certificate and that such birth certificate be amended to reflect the change in gender. The application to the probate court shall be accompanied by the following documents: (1) A written statement from the applicant, signed under penalty of law, that the applicant's gender differs from the sex designated on the original birth certificate; and (2) a notarized affidavit by a physician licensed pursuant to chapter 370 or holding a current license in good standing in another state, an advanced practice registered nurse licensed pursuant to chapter 378 or holding a current license in good standing in another state, or a psychologist licensed pursuant to chapter 383 or holding a current license in good standing in another state, stating that the applicant has undergone surgical, hormonal or other treatment clinically appropriate for the applicant for the purpose of gender transition. Upon issuance, such probate court decree shall be transmitted to the registration authority of such person's place of birth.  

Many trans people do not realize this provision of the Connecticut. I once had a phone call from a New York lawyer asking how a client who was born in another country could get her birth certificate changed so that he could legally be married in the U.S., when I told him about the Connecticut law he didn’t believe me. I think he had egg on his face when the lawyer found out a non-lawyer knew more about the Connecticut law than he did.

The thing is the Connecticut legislature gave us a powerful weapon to get our documents changed here in Connecticut.

A friend who was born in California thought she would have to travel there to have her California birth certificate changed but she could handle everything from here.

*Do not take my word for it, I am not a lawyer so you should contact a lawyer to get a legal opinion.

Is There Life Out There?

Crazy Sam’s Is There Life Out There? (1992)



On Saturdays I take a break from the heavy stuff and have some fun…

Unfamiliar with this week's song. Hear it here.

1) This song is about a woman who married at 20. It's estimated that the average American groom is 2.5 years older than his bride. Why do you suppose that is?
Social pressure to comform?

2) A 2014 study shows the bigger the age gap in a marriage, the more likely the couple is to divorce. What do you think is the reason for most divorces?
Well since I never was married it is hard to say but from what I observed it is because people are lazy, they don’t want to work things out… it is about “Me” instead of "Us."

3) Reba's second marriage recently ended. Statistics show that second marriages are more likely than first marriages to wind up in divorce. Why do you suppose that is?
It is because they are still the same person and they are attracted to the same type of person that they married the first time.

4) This week's featured artist, Reba McEntire, was discovered when she sang The National Anthem at an Oklahoma City rodeo. Have you ever been to the rodeo?
Nope.
But this year when I went to the town agriculture fair they had a rodeo there that I stopped and watched for a few minutes.

5) Reba dropped out of Southeastern Oklahoma State University to go to Nashville and pursue a recording career. In that way, she's like the woman she sings about in this week's song. "She's done what she should, should she do what she dares?" Do you ever regret a risk or opportunity you didn't take?
Well I am about to find out… I am going to make a bid on a cottage on Cape Cod.

6) Reba's heroine is "dying to try something foolish, do something crazy, or just get away." Does that sound like you? What would you do, just for yourself, if time and money were no object?
Um… buy a cottage on Cape Cod.
I am petrified about buying it… what happens is something better comes along… can I afford… am I making the right decision…
My brother said that I inherited my mother’s worrying genes.

7) Reba recently became a spokesperson for Kentucky Fried Chicken. Whose chicken do you eat most often: Popeye's, Church's, Chick-fil-A or KFC?
Well Chick-fil-A is out, they are anti-LGBT
Church’s I never heard of
KFC tastes like they serve pigeons and instead of chicken
Popeye’s they opened stores in the area but I never tried any… so I would like to try them at least once.

8) In 2001, Reba starred in her own sitcom. On the show, her character is first an administrative assistant and then a real estate agent. Have you ever tried your hand at either of those occupations? If not, which do you think you would be a better fit for you?
Well I was an administrator (I ran a testing department) so being an assistant would be nice to see it from the other side.
An a real estate agent is a people person which I am not.

9) Random question: Which of these super powers would you rather have -- extraordinary strength or invisibility?
Strength, I’ve been a ninety pound weakling all my life so it would be nice not to be the last one hiking up a trail

Of Course We Are

It is only natural that Gender Confirming Surgeries (GCS) are on the rise. For many trans people they couldn’t afford surgeries without insurance paying for it.

More Transgender Patients Opting for Surgery
Demand for qualified surgeons may increase
MedPage Today
By Jeff Minerd
February 28, 2018

An increasing number of patients in the United States are being diagnosed with transsexualism or gender identity disorder and are seeking surgery to address these issues, researchers reported.

From 2000 to 2014, diagnoses of transsexualism or gender identity disorder increased more than threefold, from 3.87 to 14.22 per 100,000 patients, said Joseph Canner, MHS, of the Johns Hopkins Surgery Center for Outcomes Research in Baltimore, and colleagues.

During roughly the same time period, the incidence of genital surgery increased from 72% of all gender-related procedures in 2000-2005 to approximately 84% in 2006-2011, Canner's group reported online in JAMA Surgery.
[…]
The results "support the hypothesis that after the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services began covering transition-related services for patients covered by Medicare in 2014, more transgender individuals enrolled in these health programs," Canner and colleagues wrote. "This expansion of coverage may represent an important first step in enabling transgender patients to access previously unaffordable, yet necessary, gender-affirming care. As coverage for these procedures increases, likely so will demand for qualified surgeons to perform [the procedures]."

I think we knew that once insurance covered the surgery that demand was going to rise and as result there would be more doctors who would do the surgery. But do we want 90 day wonders?

I personally would be very careful of going to a doctor who is just starting out, I don’t want to be a guinea pig. So if you are looking to have GCS do your homework!

The Daily Mail reports that…

The Johns Hopkins study examined only data from surgeries Medicare and Medicaid, which may or may not cover gender-affirming surgeries, depending on state laws.

There were 4,118 gender-affirming surgeries performed between 2000 and 2014, the research found.

Between 2000 and 2011, about half of these operations were not covered by insurance.

But by 2014, only 39 percent of gender-affirming operations were not covered by insurance, according to the study, suggesting that Medicare’s 2014 decision to cover the operations may have had a significant effect.

The majority of states do not cover GCS and also those who are covered by ERISA (Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974) insured employers are not required to cover our surgery. For now Medicare does cover our surgery but that may change under the Trump administration.

The articles use “Gender-affirming surgery” or GAS but I don’t know about you but I don’t want gas.

A Vocal Minority

A small group of people (from the picture it looks like there are less than a hundred people protesting) got a lot of coverage to spread their bigotry.

Group: Cincinnati Children's Hospital transgender clinic should 'stop experimenting on our children'
Cincinnati.com
By Kevin Grasha,
February 26, 2018

A conservative group on Monday called on Ohio’s medical board to investigate the director of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center’s transgender clinic based on testimony that all children seen by the clinic are deemed candidates for treatment.

At a news conference on the steps of the Hamilton County Courthouse, Aaron Baer, executive director of Citizens for Community Values, said an ethics complaint will be filed Monday.

“We’re demanding they research this,” Baer said. “Stop experimenting on our children and start caring for them the way Cincinnati Children’s Hospital was designed to.”

The news conference was a response to a Hamilton County Juvenile Court judge’s decision earlier this month to give legal custody of a transgender teen to his grandparents. With some conditions, visiting judge Sylvia Hendon’s decision paved the way for the teen to pursue hormone therapy, which his parents oppose.

State Rep. Tom Brinkman said at the news conference that parental rights are under attack. He intends to introduce legislation “to make sure this never happens again.”

So the party of less government is going to step in and override medical science to tell doctors what they can and cannot do.

A local group that supports transgender youth, the Living with Change Foundation, said in a statement that it agreed with Hendon’s decision “to put the safety and medical care of the child first."

“It’s unfortunate to see these individuals attack the court-ordered rights of a young member of our community," the statement said. "Through education, understanding and open dialogue, we hope more people will put the health and safety of children first instead of holding on to outdated and misguided ideals.”

They want to pass a law that will have a negative impact on children and could increase the suicide rates for children all because of their hatred for us.

Don’t Hold Your Breath

Many of us dread flying because we have to go through TSA and there have been many horror stories that we have heard. Even experience trans travelers cringe when they get in line and those who have not had Gender Confirming Surgery (GCS) have apprehension when they go through the x-ray machine.

Well now the TSA is saying that they are more trans friendly.

TSA takes on issue of improving transgender screening
USA Today
By Bart Jansen,
February 27, 2018

WASHINGTON – The Transportation Security Administration has improved its screening for transgender travelers, but a 2015 survey found nearly half that flew during the previous year reported a negative experience, a congressional panel heard Tuesday.

The National Center for Transgender Equality surveyed 28,000 transgender adults and found 53% had flown in the previous year. Of those, 43% reported reporting a negative experience such as being patted down by an officer of the wrong gender or being loudly questioned about their body parts at a checkpoint.

“Some reported leaving the checkpoint in tears, while others fear that being outed to other travelers in the screening process could make them a target for other violence,” Harper Jean Tobin, the center’s policy director, told the House Homeland Security subcommittee on transportation security.

You can have all the training in the world but it is only a good as your frontline screeners, all it takes is one bad apple. All it takes is one bigot.

If they are truly serious about bring change they have to make sure they weed out those who do not take the training seriously. I have done a lot of training where the some of the staff were taking the training as joke. Some have been very hostile to the training. At a training for athletic trainers at the college some sat there arms crossed, manspreading  with a look on their like they just ate a lemon; they were shouting loud and clear… I don’t want to be here.

You want to bring about change to the TSA then they have to weed out those who will not follow the guideline to another position that doesn’t involve screening.

It Is The Simple Things

It is the simple things that make the difference, just knowing that there are people of support you can make a difference between life and death.

Simply Having a Gay Straight Alliance Reduces Suicide Risk for All Students
In schools with GSAs heterosexual boys were half as likely to attempt suicide
Smithsonian.com
By Rose Eveleth
January 23, 2014

Facilitating friendships between gay and straight students benefits everyone, according to a new study from the University of British Columbia.

Students in Canadian schools with gay-straight alliances were less likely to be discriminated against, had lower odds of suicidal thoughts and had fewer suicide attempts—regardless of whether they were gay or straight.

“We know that LGBTQ students are at higher risk for suicide, in part because they are more often targeted for bullying and discrimination,” Elizabeth Saewyc, lead author of the study and professor with the UBC School of Nursing, told the UBC press office. “But heterosexual students can also be the target of homophobic bullying. When policies and supportive programs like GSAs are in place long enough to change the environment of the school, it’s better for students’ mental health, no matter what their orientation.”
[…]
There’s definitely something to be said for having school that would support and implement a GSA in the first place. But the effects that the study documented were stronger for longer-lived GSAs, which suggests that GSAs themselves are helping, too. When GSAs were around for three years or more, the numbers the researchers documented were even more impressive. Gay and bisexual boys had 70 percent lower odds of suicidal thoughts.

Connecticut has something like 140 GSAs in schools, there is almost a GSA in every schools system in Connecticut and they are very active.

There are a number of studies that have shown a drop in suicidal idealizations just by having a support network including supportive family, those thoughts drop down to the levels of the general population.