Why Do They Hate Us?

It is vengeful.

All because they cannot accept people who are different from them. Whether it is race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or gender identity they hate our guts.

New Texas rule lets social workers turn away clients who are LGBTQ or have a disability
A professional organization of social workers called the change "incredibly disheartening," while Gov. Greg Abbott's office said it was necessary to conform with existing state law.
Texas Tribune
By Edgar Walters
October 14, 2020


Texas social workers are criticizing a state regulatory board’s decision this week to remove protections for LGBTQ clients and clients with disabilities who seek social work services.

The Texas State Board of Social Work Examiners voted unanimously Monday to change a section of its code of conduct that establishes when a social worker may refuse to serve someone. The code will no longer prohibit social workers from turning away clients on the basis of disability, sexual orientation or gender identity.

Gov. Greg Abbott’s office recommended the change, board members said, because the code’s nondiscrimination protections went beyond protections laid out in the state law that governs how and when the state may discipline social workers.

“It’s not surprising that a board would align its rules with statutes passed by the Legislature,” said Abbott spokesperson Renae Eze. A state law passed last year gave the governor’s office more control over rules governing state-licensed professions.

The nondiscrimination policy change drew immediate criticism from a professional association. Will Francis, executive director of the Texas chapter of the National Association of Social Workers, called it “incredibly disheartening.”

He also criticized board members for removing the nondiscrimination protections without input from the social workers they license and oversee.

The question is why?

When some needs a social worker they are in crisis and now they face even more trauma at the hands of those who they went to for help.

And notice that the vote of the board was unanimously. The Republican control board was totally behind these vindictive rulings. According to the Advocate,

The vote struck down protections that had already been in place. The board banned discrimination based on sexual orientation in 2010 and gender identity and expression in 2012.

The move had been recommended by the office of Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, as the code’s former nondiscrimination protections went above and beyond those offered by state law, which oversees the disciplining of social workers. The governor’s staff had urged the changes in an email last Friday, which sparked the vote just three days afterward.

The Texas Tribune went on to report that…

Steven Parks, a social worker in private practice in Houston who works with child trauma victims, told The Texas Tribune the rule change was “both a professional and a personal gut punch.”

“There’s now a gray area between what’s legally allowed and ethically responsible,” he said. “The law should never allow a social worker to legally do unethical things.”

The National Association of Social Workers' Code of Ethics state,

Value: Dignity and Worth of the Person

Ethical Principle: Social workers respect the inherent dignity and worth of the person.

Social workers treat each person in a caring and respectful fashion, mindful of individual differences and cultural and ethnic diversity. Social workers promote clients' socially responsible self-determination. Social workers seek to enhance clients' capacity and opportunity to change and to address their own needs. Social workers are cognizant of their dual responsibility to clients and to the broader society. They seek to resolve conflicts between clients' interests and the broader society's interests in a socially responsible manner consistent with the values, ethical principles, and ethical standards of the profession.
[…]
1.05 Cultural Awareness and Social Diversity
(a) Social workers should understand culture and its function in human behavior and society, recognizing the strengths that exist in all cultures.

(b) Social workers should have a knowledge base of their clients' cultures and be able to demonstrate competence in the provision of services that are sensitive to clients' cultures and to differences among people and cultural groups.

(c) Social workers should obtain education about and seek to understand the nature of social diversity and oppression with respect to race, ethnicity, national origin, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, marital status, political belief, religion, immigration status, and mental or physical ability.

If they refuse LGBTQ clients they are violating the Code of Ethics.

Social workers are not just therapists, they also work for state agencies like Human and Social Services so this affects a number of specialties.

Saturday 9: Vision of Love

Sam's Saturday 9: Vision of Love (1990)

On Saturdays I take a break from the heavy stuff and have some fun…
I was up to my brother’s and sister-in-law’s condo in Maine last weekend for my birthday.


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

1) The lyrics refer to "sweet destiny." Do you believe in destiny?
No we make our own path in life.

2) This week's artist, Mariah Carey, has something to fall back on. She studied cosmetology and worked as a hair sweeper in a salon. When you get your hair cut, do you socialize with the stylist?
Naw… I just shave it all off and wear a wig.
When the wig gets ratty throw it out and get a new one (about every six months). It is actually cheaper, you save on hair cuts more than the cost of the wig.
 
3) She isn't likely to turn to cosmetology any time soon. Mariah is currently on the best seller list with her autobiography, The Meaning of Mariah Carey. Was the last book you finished fiction or non-fiction?
Science fiction. It was an audiobook, Dragonsinger by Anne McCaffrey, it is a classic trilogy…

Dragonsong and Dragonsinger feature 15-year-old Menolly, a girl with great musical talent raised in an isolated sea-hold (akin to a fishing village) where composition is no part of a girl's future. Dragonsong ends with her invitation to the main craft-hall of the harpers. Dragonsinger covers her brief apprenticeship there, ending with her promotion to journeyman.

Dragondrums focuses on Piemur, a secondary character in Dragonsinger as a boy soprano, and one apprentice who made Menolly feel welcome. His voice changes and he needs a new occupation, perhaps at the communication drums.

4) So far, more than 800 people have reviewed Mariah's book on Amazon. Do you review products/services online?
Nope… well not usually I think that I have maybe posted a half a dozen reviews. They have to really good or really bad.

5) When she was a high school student, she was nicknamed "Mirage" because she skipped class so often. Did you ever play hooky?
Yes.

6) Mariah doesn't apologize for spoiling her dogs, who have been known to travel by limo. Do you know anyone who treats their pets like people?
Unfortunately yes. She carries her lap dog in like a baby carrier on her back and her little dog watches over her shoulder. What gets me mad is that she says it is a service dog, she bought the paperwork and the vest on the internet.

7) In 1990, the year this song was popular, Martina Navratilova won the Wimbledon Women's Singles Tournament. How's your tennis game?
I playing the Nationals next year… yeah right.
The only game more boring than tennis is golf. And what is this about "love?" Who's in love??

8) Also in 1990, Pope John Paul II toured Mexico. Have you ever visited our neighbor south of the border?
What?
New York state?
Yeah, it's a great state to visit.

9) Random question(s): There are Gofundme campaigns for many purposes. Have you ever solicited funds online? Would you?
No, I rather let those who really need to do a Gofundme campaign do it.

Thanks so much for joining us again at Saturday: 9. As always, feel free to come back, see who has participated and comment on their posts. In fact sometimes, if you want to read & comment on everyone's responses, you might want to check back again tomorrow. But it is not a rule. We haven’t any rules here. Join us on next Saturday for another version of Saturday: 9, "Just A Silly Meme on a Saturday!" Enjoy your weekend!

Thirty Pieces Of Silver

That is the only reason I see why LGBTQ+ people vote for Trump and the Republican party.

Trump has done so much to oppress the LGBTQ+ community. He has reinterpret the ACA (Obamacare) to not in protections for LGBTQ+ people. He fought against the inclusion of LGBTQ+ in Title VII and IX. Trump tried to block LGBTQ+ adoptions from foreign countries.

But still trough all that they still support him.

Trump Pride: Gay Republicans on why they're backing the president
While LGBTQ Americans have historically been a reliable Democratic voting bloc, some gay voters say they're "100 percent on board" with Trump this year.
NBC News
By Dan Avery
October 15, 2020


[…]
“I had every intention of voting for Hillary in 2016, but Comey had released his statement the day before, giving me all sorts of doubts,” Rogers, 44, said. “I wasn't thrilled with Hillary as a nominee, and I don't trust the Clintons at all, but she acted more presidential. At the last minute, I went with Trump and have had no regrets since.”

He isn't blind to Trump's faults, but said the key issues for him this election are the economy and national security.

Greed wins, he rather have the thirty pieces of silver than have job security.

The exact size of Trump's LGBTQ base is unclear. An unscientific survey last month by the gay social app Hornet indicated that 45 percent of its American respondents were voting to re-elect the president. But a Morning Consult poll from June found 19 percent of LGBTQ voters backed Trump, while GLAAD's State of LGBTQ Voters report in September reported just 17 percent of LGBTQ registered voters were supporting the president.

GLAAD's poll results were similar to exit poll findings from 2016, which found that lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender voters backed Hillary Clinton over Trump by 74 percent to 14 percent.

You can easily tell the LGBTQ+ Republicans from LGBTQ+ Democrats, the Republicans care about “Me” while the Democrats care about “Us.”

Phil Kazmierczak, a gay real estate agent in Virginia who said he's "100 percent on board" with the president, blames Democrats for fixating on identity politics.

"They force you to believe, with the help of liberal media bias, that you are no more than your sexuality or your gender or your race," Kazmierczak said in an email. "They want you to believe that someone is constantly coming for your rights. If you're gay, specifically, Democrat propaganda states that the Republicans are going to take away your rights."

Um… they are. They have. Don’t you remember these three Supreme Court case; Bostock v. Clayton County, Ga., Altitude Express Inc. v. Zarda, and R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes, Inc., v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission?

Maybe you don’t remember that the Trump administration argued that we were not covered by Title VII.

Once in office, however, Trump has consistently opposed LGBTQ rights — from rolling back Obama-era nondiscrimination protections to banning openly transgender service members in the military. The national LGBTQ rights group GLAAD has accused the Trump administration of 181 separate attacks on the community since his inauguration.

They have selective blinders on, they don’t remember Trump ordering US embassies not to fly the Pride flag.

Jennifer Williams, a transgender woman, was an honorary delegate at the 2016 Republican National Convention. She said some LGBTQ voters are looking beyond issues related to their sexual orientation and gender identity and are prioritizing things like unemployment and housing.
[…]
"By deregulating a lot of things, it's really freed up the economy," he said. "I think, pre-Covid, he did a remarkable job for minority communities in employment. The Obama administration, in particular the second term, really added a lot of environmental regulations that slowed down the economy."

Dear Ms. Williams I think being discriminated again and denied housing, which under Trump’s HUD and Trump’s Department of Labor allows us to be fired for just being ourselves. Forcing us to be homeless and unemployed are very, very important issues… it is the “us” not the “me.”

They ignore the fact that the current Supreme Court nominee wrote…

Barrett briefly spoke about Obergefell v. Hodges, the landmark decision that guaranteed the right to marry for same-sex couples, during the Jacksonville University lecture. She suggested that the decision was not the court explicitly ruling in favor of or against same-sex marriage, but rather ruling whether states had the right to decide if that right was guaranteed. Barrett defended Chief Justice John Roberts' dissent, which said that the constitution didn't speak to the question and thus it wasn't the court's place to decide, but that people had the right to lobby in state legislatures to make same-sex marriage allowed within the state.
[…]
She said that the transgender rights offered under Title IX is a "strain of the text," and since the original interpretation of the statute did not consider changes in modern ideas regarding transgender individuals, it is a "who decides" question on whether Title IX should be changed to explicitly detail transgender rights in the language.

But these Log Cabin Republicans only consider themselves and not others.

Me, me, me! 

Words Matter

And tells a lot about someone… it is just not a slip of the tongue.

Judge Barrett, don't use 'sexual preference' for LGBTQ people. It's incorrect and alarming.
Amy Coney Barrett graduated from law school first in her class. She's 48 and came of age with the LGBTQ rights movement. She should have known better.
USA Today – Opinion 
By Steven Petrow
October 14, 2020


Judge Amy Coney Barrett stepped into a queer hornet’s nest during her confirmation hearings to become the next Supreme Court justice. Asked about her views on discrimination against LGBTQ people, she replied: "I have no agenda, and I do want to be clear that I have never discriminated on the basis of sexual preference and would not ever discriminate on the basis of sexual preference."

Then the internet erupted in flames. That’s because Barrett used two words—sexual preference — that LGBTQ people find offensive, and which takes a blind eye to all the credible scientific research showing that sexual orientation is not a preference or a choice. It is an immutable part of our identity, and that’s true whether a person is straight or gay.

Sexual preference is a code word that is used by the right, it implies that it is a choice.

In fact, “sexual preference” is what’s considered a dog whistle, coded language to a specific audience. For instance the anti-LGBTQ Alliance Defending Freedom regularly uses “sexual preference” instead of “sexual orientation.”

So yes, words matter.

The Alliance Defending Freedom is the law firm that is suing Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference (CIAC) and towns here in Connecticut.

Who is Alliance Defending Freedom? The religious-conservative legal group has targeted transgender high school athletes in Connecticut
Hartford Courant
By Alex Putterman
February 14, 2020


The first sign that the families of three Connecticut high school track runners are serious about preventing transgender athletes from competing in girls sports in the state is the involvement of a group called Alliance Defending Freedom.

ADF, a longtime fixture in religious-conservative legal advocacy, has built an impressive record in front of the U.S. Supreme Court while pushing causes such as abortion restrictions and limits on LGBTQ rights.

Here is what to know about an organization the New York Times has called “the largest legal force of the religious right.”
[...]
In 2018, ADF successfully argued in front of the Supreme Court on behalf of Masterpiece Cakeshop, a Colorado store that refused to provide a wedding cake to a gay couple. Last year, the group took on a Pennsylvania school district that allowed transgender students to use bathrooms and locker rooms corresponding with their sexual identity. The Supreme Court declined to take that case, allowing the policy to stand.

Over time, the group has seemed to broaden its focus. Asked the connection between transgender athletes and religious freedom, ADF vice president of U.S. advocacy Jeremy Tedesco said the suit relates to “fundamental fairness in women’s athletics.”
[…]
In 2016, the Southern Poverty Law Center designated ADF as an anti-LGBT hate group, citing the following:

ADF’s support for criminalization of same-sex marriage.

• Its attorneys’ defense of state-sanctioned sterilization of transgender people in Europe.
• Its officials’ suggestion that homosexuality is linked with pedophilia.
• The group’s claim that gay rights will “destroy our society.”
• One SPLC executive has said an ADF lawyer’s support of an Indian law banning gay sex was “what really pushed [them] over the top" in designating the organization a hate group.

Now add to mix Judge Barrett who has close ties to the ADF, USA Today opinion goes on to say…

So, too, does Barrett’s actual record. In previous years she’s spoken five times to the ADF. “Were you aware of the ADF’s decades-long efforts to recriminalize homosexuality?” Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy asked the nominee. In response, she claimed not to know all of their positions. And while Barrett said she had never  discriminated against LGBTQ people, from 2015-2017 she sat on the board of directors of an Indiana school that opposed same-sex marriage then and still does now.

Did she simply make a goof at her hearing? Of course, that’s possible. And Barrett did offer a meek apology later in the day when pressed. "I certainly didn’t mean and would never mean to use a term that would cause any offense in the LGBTQ community. So if I did, I greatly apologize for that," she said.

Was it willful ignorance? Indeed her prep time has been rushed to ensure her nomination is voted on before Election Day. Still, ignorance is a hard card to play since a woman’s right to abortion, the Affordable Care Act and LGBTQ rights are the hot-button issues of these hearings. At the top of her handlers’ list of “LGBTQ 101 issues” would be this admonition: Do not use the term “sexual preference.”

You know that the Connecticut case with trans athletes will go to the Supreme Court, the question is will she recuse herself from the case and other cases where the ADF is the plaintiff's attorney? 

It Just Keeps Being Piled On

Everywhere we turn there is discrimination against us, whether it is when we try to vote, give blood, or trying to collect unemployment we face harassment or discrimination.

Why some transgender voters have an even bigger challenge to casting their ballots
CNN
By Scottie Andrew
October 13, 2020


Koby Ozias might have been kept from voting if he hadn't known his rights.

Ozias, a transgender man from Corpus Christi, Texas, couldn't afford to legally change his name or update his ID before he went to vote in state elections in November 2013.

He brought his old ID -- with a name he no longer used and a photo that no longer resembled him -- to the polls that year.

Poll workers grilled him on his identity. They attempted to stop him from voting, he told CNN. He insisted he was the person in his picture.

Voter ID requirements, purportedly put in place to prevent voter fraud, typically end up keeping Black, indigenous and transgender voters from voting at all if they don't have the proper identification, critics say.

I had a minor problem once by a poll worker. He asked me if I was Diana, now my voter registration was Diana, my driver license was Diana and had my photo of me as Diana. I said yes and he stared at me and I stared at him and finally handed my driver license back to me.

---

Then our name change can cause us grief…

Transgender Woman Says Illinois Is Denying Her Unemployment Benefits Because Of Name Change
CBS Chicago
By Tara Molina
October 12, 2020


A transgender veteran is fighting a battle to get unemployment benefits, saying her transition is keeping her from getting any money.


On Monday night, CBS 2’s Tara Molina asked the State of Illinois what is going on here, and what is being done to fix it.

Myra Lebron’s name change was delayed by the pandemic. When it was finally official, she said she wanted to celebrate it.

But then, the issues with the state started it.

The name Myra Lebron appears on her Social Security card and her driver’s license, and it is her name now. But she said the Illinois Department of Employment Security refuses to recognize it.

“To finally get the name change process finish and continue to with my transition, something I hoped for so many years, just to get smacked with all of this,” Lebron said. “It eats away at you, to a heavy degree.”

For my name change, the day that I got laid off (The new owners didn’t want us so they closed down our shop) I transitioned and I changed all my paperwork for work just before I got the pink slip.

Everything was fine until COBRA ran out and I went on my retirement health insurance but the stubs had my old name on them. After weeks of trying to straighten it out I called the former HR director (She got laid off also) and she used her contacts at corporate to straighten it out. She said that they had the old me as retired and Diana as working, I asked “Does that mean that I will get a pay check as well as my retirement checks?” No such luck.

---

I know some trans people who this was a problem but others had no problem…

Transgender Man Told to Identify as Female at Birth on Blood Donation Paperwork
NBC Washington
By Jackie Bensen 
October 8, 2020 


A transgender man says his sex at birth was required on his intake form when he was trying to donate blood in Virginia.

The man, who asked not to be identified because he’s still working through the demoralizing experience, said he went to an Inova Health System in Sterling facility Sept. 22 for his scheduled appointment.

He said a front desk staffer wrote down "gender at birth is female" and underlined it after repeatedly telling him, out loud in the busy clinic, that he must be listed by his birth gender on the paperwork.

"When you try to fight back, sometimes it just doesn’t work," he said. "They’re too big or too powerful, and in this case it happened, and I said, ‘I’m tired, I’m tired.'"
[…]
"I was angry," he said. "I kept thinking about the next trans person walking in there that does not deserve that."

I know one trans woman who filled out all the paperwork and was getting connected up to donate blood when the supervisor came marching out of her office saying in a loud voice “We don’t allow transsexuals to donate blood!” Can you say “HIPAA” violation!

Why I Don’t Vote Republican

When I cast my ballot I want to know that it will be counted.

However, the Republicans don’t like your vote to be counted, they don’t want to make voting easy and throw roadblocks in the way.

• 'Racist voter suppression': Texas laws keep Latinos from the ballot box, groups say – As the state sees more Latino eligible voters, it keeps making it harder to register and to vote, Latino legal and civil rights organizations say.
• California investigates unauthorized ballot boxes installed by Republicans
• Georgia Voters Face Hours-Long Lines At Polls On First Day Of Early Voting
• Voter suppression tactics against Black, Latino and Native communities

See last week’s post on Gerrymandering

And this does not include voting districts gerrymandering and other voter suppression tactics:

• Kansas Senate President pushes redistricting plan that ‘takes out Sharice Davids’
• How Texas became 'ground zero' for gerrymandering, voter suppression – When legislative districts are drawn to maximize partisan advantage, political parties tend to maximize their political power.
• Stacking the deck: How the GOP works to suppress minority voting
• Other ways that they are trying to block your vote.
• Racist robo calls – falsely attributing racist comments to candidates. Robo calls to minority communities that falsely attribute racist comments to Democratic candidates and to the white suburbs falsely saying that Democratic will force minorities in to white suburbs. 
• Voter ID – putting restricting on voting that are hard for minorities to do such as requiring a notarized copy of your birth certificate, which for minorities is something very hard to do because in some states you have to request a copy of your birth certificate in person. If you are working 50 to 60 hours a week it is almost impossible to get time off without losing pay. Connecticut does not require voter IDs or photo IDs and voter fraud is almost nonexistent here. 
• Limiting early voting – if you are working 50 to 60 hours a week sometimes the only time you can get off is on days other than Tuesdays.
• Placing “Poll Watchers” who are armed white supremacists in minority neighborhoods to intimidate voters.
• Automatic deletion of voter registration if you don’t vote regularly you will be deleted from the voter registration lists
• Placing fake voting boxes out in public
• Prohibiting felons from voting even if it is for non-violent minor infractions like selling under one ounce of pot
• Closing voting places in minorities areas
• Rejecting absentee ballots for minor differences in signatures like not using your middle initial.
• Requiring a physical address – many minorities are homeless, and indigenous people to have a physical  address when many reservations do not have streets as happened in North Dakota.
• Trump stirring up distrust for absentee voting

The Republicans are doing everything in their power to disenfranchise voters and make this a one party  country like China, North Korea, Russia, and the former Soviet Block countries.
For Republicans  “One person, one vote” is the antithesis of the Republican philosophy.

Not Three Steps…

But more like a major blow to trans people… the bigots won.

Transgender women in rugby union: Mixed reaction to World Rugby decision
BBC
10 October 2020


World Rugby's decision to prevent transgender women from competing at the highest levels of the women's game has provoked a mixed reaction.

The move has been criticised by LGBT charity Stonewall, while some women's rights and gay rights campaigners have welcomed the decision.

New guidelines published on Friday "do not recommend" transgender women play contact rugby "on safety grounds".

National unions can be flexible in their application of the guidelines at community level.

Stonewall says it is "deeply disappointed" with the decision, but Fair Play for Women - which "works to protect the rights of women and girls in the UK" - thanked World Rugby "for not trading away women's safety".

"The proposals were based on hypothetical data modelling that has little relevance to the questions of fairness and safety in rugby that the policy review sought to address," said Stonewall chief executive Nancy Kelley.

A gay and lesbian organization stabbed us in the back.

However, Bev Jackson, co-founder of the LGB Alliance, said the organisation "applauds World Rugby for conducting a thorough, evidence-based study and making a decision on that basis to protect safety in women's rugby. We are very pleased that they resisted political pressure and kept to scientific facts. Many lesbians play this sport and they are enormously relieved."

She added that "judging by the reactions we have received, a great many LGB people and indeed many trans people think this was the right decision".

It was based on bogus research, how do I know?  Because it was based on “based on hypothetical data modelling” you can model anything but the answer might not reflect reality the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has allowed trans women to compete in women’s events since 2004 and there has not been a single injury caused by a trans woman.

Their study deems to be based on the old saying in about computers… Garbage In Garbage Out (GIGO).

Speaking to BBC Sport in August, Grace McKenzie, a trans woman who plays for Golden Gate Women's rugby club in San Francisco, said she was worried "that other sporting federations will look at World Rugby and begin to second-guess the existing science that supports trans women's inclusion in sport, and begin to make policies based out of a place of fear instead of a place of logic and reason".

"I want to be able to participate fully with my team and in the sport that I love. I think that there is still a path forward to allow us to do that," she said.

If what the rugby union said is true then Ms. McKenzie would have left a trail of bodies in her wake, but not a single women was injured by her because she is trans.

Many Of The Younger Generation Do Not Know Our Pioneers

When I do a workshop on trans history I have this slide…

1999: National Transgender Advocacy Coalition (NTAC) founded
    • Vanessa Edward Foster, Monica Roberts and other activists

Many trans people probably have not heard of NTAC but it is one of the first political activist organization, it predates NTCE by about 3 years. In 2004 Transexual Menace and NTAC pro- test HRC for backing a non-inclusive ENDA.

Ms. Roberts lead the way in lobbying Congress and in the quest for our rights.

In 2015 she was awarded the Pioneer Award from Fantasia Fair, in her speech she said,
When the National Transgender Advocacy Coalition was founded in 1999 at an Italian restaurant in Bethesda, MD, two Texans were sitting at that table helping to put it together in myself and Vanessa Edwards Foster.  

And that legacy of innovative Lone Star State trans leadership continues with Josephine Tittsworth's founding of the Texas Transgender Nondiscrimination Summit, which has resulted in 20 Texas colleges and universities and five school districts adopting trans inclusive policies.  Carter Brown has grown Black Trans Men Inc from a trans masculine centered conference that happened in Dallas to the Black Trans Advocacy Conference that will be held again in Big D in late April.
[…]
But unfortunately one thing hasn't changed since I began my own transition, and that is the level of anti-trans violence aimed at our community.

We received another reminder of it happening on the eve of this conference when Zella Ziona Smith was murdered last Thursday in Maryland.   The thing that infuriates me is that she was just 21 years old and continues the upsetting to me pattern of trans women of  color taking the disproportionate brunt of it.

It was at the Fantasia Fair that I got to meet her. I saw her at the Trans Pride march in Northampton but I didn’t get to meet her.

Just looking at all the articles in the mainstream media you can see all her accomplishments...

• Monica Roberts Uses Her Blog to Bring Justice to the Trans Community – The Advocate
• Transgender Rights Advocate And Journalist Monica Roberts Dies At 58 – NPR, ABC, The Washington Post. The Globe & Mail, Texas Tribune, and Democracy Now
• Monica Roberts, trailblazing trans rights reporter, has died – The Grio
• Monica Roberts, a Black trans journalist who covered the killings of trans women before national media did, dies at 58 – CNN
• 'A trailblazing voice': Monica Roberts, influential trans journalist and activist, dies at 58 – USA Today
• LGBTQ community mourns death of trans journalist Monica Roberts – NBC
• Monica Roberts Had 'Medical Emergency' Before Death – Out

However, not so strangely conservative media didn’t cover her death.

There are no confirmed cause of her death but rumors are flying around, one report that it was a hit and run driver another that she had an aneurysm.

Whatever the cause, we lost a major leader for the trans community. 

---

Suggested reading…

About Ms. Roberts;
Roberts, M., (2007, October 18). The 1965 Dewey's Lunch Counter Sit-In. TransGriot, Retrieved September 22, 2009, from http://transgriot.blogspot.com/2007/10/1965-deweys-lunch-counter-sit-it.html 

Roberts, M., (2012, March). A Look at African-American Trans Trailblazers, Ebony. Retrieved March 10, 2012, from http://www.ebony.com/news-views/trans-trailblazers

Trans History;
Ekins, R., & King, D. (2005, October). Virginia Prince: Transgender Pioneer. International Journal of Transgenderism, 8(4), 5-15. Retrieved July 1, 2009, from LGBT Life with Full Text database .

Fienberg, L. (1993). Stone Butch Blues. Los Angeles, CA. Alyson Books.

Feinberg, L. (1994). Transgender Warrior. Boston, MA. Beacon Press.

Feinberg, L. (1998). 'I'm glad I was in the Stonewall riot'. Worker’s World. Retrieved August 1, 2009. From http://www.workers.org/ww/1998/sylvia0702.php

Gan, J. (2007, Spring). Still at the back of the bus: Sylvia Rivera's struggle. Centro Journal, 19(1), 124-139. Retrieved July 1, 2009, from LGBT Life with Full Text database.

Green J. (2004, January). Becoming a Visible Man. Nashville, TN. Vanderbilt University Press.

King, D., Ekins, R., (2000), Pioneers of Transgendering: The Life and Work of Virginia Prince, GENDYS 2k, The Sixth International Gender Dysphoria Conference, Manchester England. 

MacKenzie, G. (1994). Transgender Nation. Bowling Green OH. Popular Press.

Meyerowitz, J. (2002). How Sex Changed. Boston, MA. Harvard Press.

Stryker, S. (2008). Transgender History. Berkley CA. Seal Press.

Push-Back!

Trump’s Executive Order to ban diversity training is getting a lot of negative push-back from businesses…

'It's already having a massive effect,' corporate America demands Trump rescind executive order on diversity
USA Today
By Jessica Guynn,
October 9, 2020


Michelle Kim received an email this week from a corporate client who asked her to make sure her anti-racism talk would comply with the White House’s new executive order prohibiting the use of terms such as “white privilege.” She offered to cancel the agreement instead.

“Even if I could deliver a compelling talk without using the term, I could not agree with the spirit of the ask,” Kim, an author and CEO of Awaken, which provides interactive diversity, equity and Inclusion workshops, wrote on Twitter. “I understand the predicament companies are in right now – ‘Does this expose us to legal risk?’ ‘Will we get sued?’ ‘Will we lose our government contracts?’”

President Trump’s decision to restrict the federal government and its contractors from engaging in what he calls “divisive” and “un-American” diversity training is sending a chilling effect throughout corporate America just as companies were stepping up efforts to address racial disparities following the death of George Floyd, a Black man, under the knee of white officer in Minneapolis in May.

The order created uncertainty in businesses and businesses don’t like uncertainty and they spoke up,

Push back is growing from civil rights leaders and industry groups. Dozens of civil rights groups including the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund and the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law this week condemned the executive order as another sign of Trump's "support for white supremacists while demonstrating deep hostility to civil rights and racial justice."

On Thursday, a group of 11 technology, software and advertising industry groups that represent thousands of government contractors, called on the Trump administration to rescind it. The executive order “fails to acknowledge the realities of ongoing racial inequality and inequities in America and represents an unwarranted intrusion into private sector efforts to combat systemic racism,” according to the letter sent to the Office of Management and Budget and the Labor Department. 

Now why would Trump ban diversity training?

It is almost like he is a white supremacist and does not want a diverse work force and wants racial unrest.

---

And speaking of diversity who do you think would be a good pick to head the Department of Education   unity on diversity, someone who is pro-diversity or anti-diversity?

Education Dept Puts Anti-LGBTQ Activist At Head Of Diversity And Inclusion Council
Some employees said the pick is disheartening and ironic.
HuffPost
By Rebecca Klein
October 9, 2020


In early 2020, leaders of the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights announced that they would be taking control of and reorganizing the agency’s employee-led Diversity and Inclusion and Employee Engagement Advisory councils. The two committees were combined into one and, in August, senior counsel Sarah Perry, a new hire with a long history of anti-transgender activism, was appointed as a co-chair, HuffPost has learned.

Multiple employees at the Office for Civil Rights (OCR), the department’s agency dedicated to enforcing civil rights laws in K-12 schools and universities, told HuffPost that appointing someone who has actively worked against LGBTQ people to help lead diversity and inclusion efforts is ironic and disheartening.

Perry previously worked at the Family Research Council, a Christian fundamentalist organization that preaches against the rights of the LGBTQ community, where she often spoke publicly about her opposition to transgender people.

I just don’t understand why anyone who is trans, lesbian, bi, or gay would vote for someone who wants them back into the closet?

As James Baldwin said…

We can disagree and still love each other, unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist.

I'm On Vacation

 I will be away from my laptop the next couple of days

Sadly One Of Our Pioneers Has Passed Away

 Monica Roberts, Pioneering, Acclaimed TransGriot Blogger, Has Died

Roberts, who won numerous awards for her coverage of Black trans women's lives, died Monday.

Monica Roberts, the activist and blogger behind TransGriot, has died, according to multiple sources on social media.

“It is with great sadness that the BTAC family has received notice of the passing of Monica Roberts, our sister, aunt, and friend,” the Black Trans Advocacy Coalition posted Thursday on Facebook. “We should have a well elaborated post about this, but at the moment we just need to notify the public and begin processing our grief and loss at this time. Please keep Monica's soul, friends and family in your prayers that they all may find comfort and peace at this time of separation. We love you Monica. Fly high, angel.”

This Says A Lot

Colleges and universities were required to have diversity education for their staff, but now Trump in an executive order did away with the mandatory requirements and actually bans diversity training.

Diversity Work, Interrupted
Some institutions have begun to cancel diversity, equity and inclusion programs in response to a Trump order. Critics say the order is censorship.
Inside Higher Ed
By Colleen Flaherty 
October 7, 2020


Two campuses are halting diversity efforts in relation to the White House’s recent executive order against “divisive concepts” in federally funded programs.

In a campus memo, the University of Iowa’s interim associate vice president for diversity, equity and inclusion, Liz Tovar, said, “Let us state unequivocally that diversity, equity and inclusion remain as core values within our institution.” However, she continued, “after consulting with multiple entities, and given the seriousness of the penalties for non-compliance with the order, which include the loss of federal funding, we are recommending that all units temporarily pause for a two-week period.”

John A. Logan College in Illinois also suspended diversity events, including a Hispanic Heritage Month talk planned for next week.

The executive order, released Sept. 22, invokes the Declaration of Independence, Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King Jr. and describes the “fundamental premises underpinning our Republic” as follows: “All individuals are created equal and should be allowed an equal opportunity under the law to pursue happiness and prosper based on individual merit.”

Yet today, the order says, “many people are pushing a different vision of America that is grounded in hierarchies based on collective social and political identities rather than in the inherent and equal dignity of every person as an individual.” Such an “ideology is rooted in the pernicious and false belief that America is an irredeemably racist and sexist country; that some people, simply on account of their race or sex, are oppressors; and that racial and sexual identities are more important than our common status as human beings and Americans.”

In his executive order he goes so far that he tells federal contractors to stop their training!

In a series of tweets he said…

A few weeks ago, I BANNED efforts to indoctrinate government employees with divisive and harmful sex and race-based ideologies. Today, I've expanded that ban to people and companies that do business…
...with our Country, the United States Military, Government Contractors, and Grantees. Americans should be taught to take PRIDE in our Great Country, and if you don’t, there’s nothing in it for you!

NPR reported,

Trump Expands Ban On Racial Sensitivity Training To Federal Contractors
September 22, 2020


President Trump on Tuesday said he had expanded a ban on racial sensitivity training to federal contractors.

His administration had instructed federal agencies to end such training earlier this month.

Trump said on Twitter on Tuesday that he had expanded the ban on "efforts to indoctrinate government employees with divisive and harmful sex and race-based ideologies" to contractors doing business with the federal government and those receiving grant funds.

"Americans should be taught to take PRIDE in our Great Country, and if you don't there's nothing in it for you!" he tweeted.
[…]
Last week, Trump announced efforts to promote "patriotic education" and railed against students learning about systemic racism.

He signed an executive order that requires contracts to now include a provision that says contractors with the federal government will not have "workplace training that inculcates in its employees any form of race or sex stereotyping or any form of race or sex scapegoating" or face the cancellation of contracts.

Notice his choice of words, “indoctrinate,” “scapegoating,” and “ideologies” and it it’s place he wants “patriotic education.” Is that what Hitler did? Didn’t he ban “Jewish” propaganda?

"Instructors and materials teaching that men and members of certain races, as well as our most venerable institutions, are inherently sexist and racist are appearing in workplace diversity trainings across the country, even in components of the Federal Government and among Federal contractors," the order says.

The trainings cited include references to white privilege and systemic racism.

This has all the schools and businesses running for cover, they have no idea what is covered by the law and what is now banned by Trump.

I do a lot of diversity training and some of it for colleges and universities will this be affected by the order? Will I have to have a lawyer review my training to make sure that I will not be arrested for “indoctrinating” the students with trans propaganda or our “agenda”?

Does this sound like what Trump has done with his Executive Order?

European Court blasts Russia 'gay propaganda' law
BBC
20 June 2017


The Strasbourg judges said Russia had discriminated against three gay rights activists who opposed the law. It was adopted in 2013, banning promotion of homosexuality among people under 18.

The law "reinforced stigma and prejudice and encouraged homophobia", the ruling said.

Gay rights groups condemned the law.

Under the law, private individuals deemed to be promoting "homosexual behaviour among minors" face fines of up to 5,000 roubles (£67; $85), while officials risk paying 10 times that amount. Businesses and schools can be fined up to 500,000 roubles.

Homosexuality was decriminalised in Russia in 1993, but anti-gay prejudice is rife.

Critics see the propaganda law as part of a state campaign to marginalise LGBT activists, whose work includes dissemination of sexual health advice.

Does Trump EO sound anything like the Russian law?

A Sad Day

We broke a record the other day, the record that we broke is the number of murdered trans people in the U.S. this year so far.

More than 30 transgender people have been killed in 2020, making this already the deadliest year since records began
Insider
By Canela López 
October 6, 2020

• As of October 6, there have been 31 recorded killings of transgender and gender non-conforming people in the US in 2020, according to The Human Rights Campaign.
• 26 of those killed this year were Black or Latinx. 
• 2020 marks the deadliest year for transgender people on record, surpassing the 27 people killed in all of 2019. 
• Experts say the devastating statistic is part of an ongoing epidemic of violence against transgender women of color. 

Felycya Harris, a 33-year-old transgender interior designer and entrepreneur, was shot to death in Augusta, Georgia on October 3.
[…]
The new total, updated today, surpasses the 27 reported killings of trans people in all of 2019, 26 reported killings in 2018, 29 in 2017, 23 in 2016, 21 in 2015, 20 in 2014, and 19 in 2013. 

Experts say the numbers reflect what has been an ongoing epidemic of transphobic and racist violence against transgender women of color in the US.

However, that number doesn’t include those who were attacked but survived.

Transgender woman ‘brutally stabbed’ in targeted attack at MacArthur Park, police say
LA Times
By Kevin Rector, Faith E. Pinho
October 6, 2020


A transgender woman was targeted and “brutally stabbed” in MacArthur Park in Los Angeles’ Westlake neighborhood on Sunday night after being surrounded by a group of men who suggested hatred for “gays,” according to the LAPD.

The 42-year-old woman, whom police did not name, was seated on a park bench about 9:30 p.m. when she was surrounded by four to five men, one of whom said “something to the effect of, ‘We don’t want gays in the park,’” officials said.

Hate crimes through out the U.S. has been increasing,

Violent Hate Crimes Reach 16-Year High in United States
ASIS International
By Claire Meyer  
01 February 2020


The number of violent hate crimes reported in the United States in 2018 was the highest in 16 years, according to the FBI.

The U.S. Department of Justice defines a hate crime as a “criminal offense against a person or property, motivated in whole or in part by an offender’s bias against a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender, or gender identity.”

Although the total number of reported hate crimes in the United States de­creased from 2017 to 2018, the number of offenses rose 12 percent. Physical assaults against people also increased, accounting for 61 percent of the incidents, according to FBI data released in November 2019. Of the 7,120 hate crimes reported to the FBI in 2018, 4,571 were crimes against persons, including intimidation, assault, rape, and murder.
[...]
Around 60 percent of the crimes were motivated by race, ethnicity, or ancestry bias. Attacks against Latino or transgender people rose significantly in 2018; 485 crimes were determined to be anti-Latino, compared to 430 in 2017. Since 2016, crimes targeting Latinos rose by 41 percent. Hate crimes against transgender people increased 34 percent from 2017 to 2018.

Do you feel safer now or then you felt 4 years ago?

Why I Will Never Vote Republican.

I am starting a weekly series, every Tuesday a 3 until election day, I am posting why I will not vote Republican.

Back in the sixties and seventies the Republicans saw that most of the Democratic funding came from unions and the votes came from the working class so they set about in dismantling the unions. And as a bonus they passed “At Will” employment.

In addition they started passing “Right to Work” laws that were designed to strip the Democrats of they funding and as an added bonus it made the major Republican donors happy.

The other thing the Republicans notice that blacks and Latinos, and inner cities voted Democratic so they set about disenfranchising those voters but the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was blocking their efforts for them to block minority voters, so slowly they dismantled the act.

The Washington Post

In Republican states they started to gerrymander the voting districts. In some voting districts the district went down on side of a street so they could connect the heavy Republican suburbs with a slice of a Democratic urban districts. They also started imposing voting restriction once again after the Supreme Court struck downs parts of the Voting Rights Act and they also denied felons from voting, so if you got busted for selling a joint you could lose your right to vote. Since most of the felons are black this resulted in preventing mostly Democrats from voting.

The Republicans have been closing polling places are the country, their latest trick is to remove ballot boxes to drop off absentee ballots since minorities use them more than white suburban voters. In Texas in one county they only have one ballot box for 4.7 million people! The Washington Post reported…

In several Texas counties that have a population of more than 1 million, the order would close several satellite sites. Harris County, which includes Houston and has more than 4.7 million residents, is the state’s largest county and the third largest in the United States, according to the census. According to the Austin American-Statesman, Harris County has 12 ballot drop-off sites; Travis County, which includes Austin and has a population of 1.2 million, has four sites.

The governor did it as a blatant voter suppression tactic, he all but admitted that he can't win without cheating..

Lastly they are taking control of the courts around the nation and packing them young religious ideologues who are anti-LGBTQ. Senate Majority leader McConnell blocked President Obama’s Supreme Court pick and held up over 127 of his judicial nominees and now they are packing the courts.  In 2016 McConnell said eight months before that they were going to wait until the elections to vote on the new Supreme Court justice for the people to vote in the November election, but now just weeks before the elections they are ramming through Trump’s Supreme Court nominee ignoring the precedent that McConnell set in 2016.  

The results of all this is that in Republican states they made it almost impossible for the Democrats to win and if they did win then in lame duck sessions they strip the governor’s power.

The Republicans know that they can’t win without cheating.

So what is their goal in all this?

Well I think that it is to dismantle the two party system and to have a one party systems like the dictatorships and oligarchies in other countries around the world.

The Never Ending Battle

Alaska is now the battleground state where we are fighting the to ban trans healthcare.

Lawsuit challenges Alaska Medicaid transgender coverage

Alaska is one of 10 states across the U.S. with a Medicaid program that explicitly excludes transition-related coverage.
NBC News
By The Associated Press
October 2, 2020


ANCHORAGE, Alaska — A lawsuit has challenged the legality of a rule in Alaska’s Medicaid program excluding transgender residents from coverage for transition-related health care.

The lawsuit arguing the exclusion is a civil rights violation names as defendants the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services and department Commissioner Adam Crum, The Anchorage Daily News reported Wednesday.

Alaska is one of 10 states with a Medicaid program explicitly excluding the transition-related coverage.

The lawsuit describes plaintiffs Swan Being, Robin Black and Austin Reed seeking care and being told Alaska Medicaid would not cover their treatment.

The state offered…

Crum proposed a change to state Medicaid regulations in February to allow “non-surgical services related to gender reassignment.”

Attorneys for the plaintiffs said the rule change would be insufficient because the proposal continues to exclude surgical gender-confirming care from coverage.

Unfortunately, by the time this heads to the Supreme Court the conservatives will have a six to four majority and Trump’s latest nominee hates our guts and she will ignore the law and vote for her religious bias. According to New Now Next…

Barrett has given speeches for members of the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), an extremist organization designated as an anti-LGBTQ hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. It’s the same org that represented Jack Phillips, the bigoted owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop in Colorado, in his now-infamous LGBTQ discrimination Supreme Court case. Asked about ADF’s classification as a hate group, Barrett claimed the org was only opining on a matter of “public controversy.”

Unless she is somehow blocked for being appointed we are in deep doo-doo for the next generation, no five years or ten but rather twenty or thirty years.

In the past, Supreme Court justices were pick with a long history of being on the bench, they were usually in their fifties or sixties but the Trump administration has picked young judges with no experience on the bench. One Appeal court judge didn’t even try a case legal case and BuzzFeed writes…

The Senate on Tuesday confirmed Washington lawyer Allison Rushing to a federal appeals court seat, making her President Donald Trump’s youngest judge to date, and the youngest federal judge in the country.
[…]
Previous presidents have put judges on the bench in their thirties, but it’s rare for appeals court judges, who have the power to set legal precedents that can only be reversed by the US Supreme Court and are more frequently tapped midcareer. Rushing, who was born in 1982, could spend decades on the US Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit.

She was also recommended by Alliance Defending Freedom which is espousing criminalization of homosexuality and has been paid by them for speaking engagements. They also call homosexual  pedophiles.

Vote on November 3^rd... Our lives depend upon it.

Silence.

There is growing violence and hate in Eastern Europe and once again when the oppressed demonstrate for their rights they are vilified by the right.

Under fire over LGBT rights, Polish leader blames activist
Associated Press
By Vanessa Gera
October 5, 2020


WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Bart Staszewski felt angry and hopeless when local governments in Poland started passing resolutions last year declaring themselves to be free of "LGBT ideology.”

The activist and filmmaker objected to the way conservative officials were using the word “ideology” to describe what he considers a natural desire for people who love each other to be together. At least 100 municipalities or regions, mostly in conservative southeastern Poland, have passed declarations that vowed to keep out “LGBT ideology” or adopted “family charters” that backed heterosexual unions.

“I am just a normal Pole who just wants a good life with my partner and to be able to marry him one day,” the 30-year-old said. “Where is the ideology?"

In response, he settled on a protest around the communities that are now widely referred to as “LGBT-free zones," a move that has enraged Poland's conservative, nationalist government as his posts have gone viral.
[…]
With Poland under mounting international criticism for its treatment of its lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki accused Staszewski of carrying out a “hoax” that has led some to believe that Poland has a human rights problem.

The Pope met with LGBTQ parents…

Pope holds private meeting with parents of LGBT children
Crux
By Inés San Martín
September 18, 2020


Pope Francis on Wednesday told a group of parents of LGBT children that God loves them as they are, and that the Church loves them because they are “children of God.”

The pope’s words came during a short, private encounter with some 40 Italian mothers and fathers of LGBT children that took place following his Wednesday general audience.
[…]
In 2013, Francis signaled a new approach to homosexuality in the Church with his famous declaration that if a person “is gay and is searching for the Lord and has good will … Who am I to judge?”

In 2018, he said that the Church has to find a way to help the parents of gays and lesbians so that they “stand by” their children. He also said he’d advise a parent whose child comes out to pray.

But is the Pope speaking out over the oppression of us in Poland and other Eastern European countries?

Poland is a heavy Roman Catholic country and most of the oppression is being lead by the Bishops.

Polish Bishop Claims LGBTQ Movement Is “Most Serious Threat to Humanity,” But Scholars Are Pushing Back
New Ways Ministry
September 14, 2020


A Polish bishop claimed in a homily that the LGBTQ movement is “the most serious threat to humanity,” escalating tensions in that country between advocates for equality and the nation’s episcopate, who have continued to receive criticism–from a philosopher and a Jesuit theologian/psychotherapist–about their August offensive statements.

Bishop Ignacy Dec, who once headed the Diocese of Świdnica before his retirement earlier this year, made the anti-LGBTQ remark during a September 5th homily. Radio Maryja reported (via Google Translate):
“The [bishop] drew attention to the negative influence of LGBT communities on society. Offensive actions by representatives of this environment destroys the existing values and ‘exceeds the norms of ordinary human decency.’
[…]
The term “LGBT-free” is sensitive because it carries an association of language used by Nazi Germany to describe areas free of Jews — Judenrein or Judenfrei — after they had been forced out or killed during the Holocaust.

Last year another Polish Bishop is against us...

Church in Poland continues confrontation with the LGBTQ community
National Catholic Reporter
By Jonathan Luxmoore
August 19, 2019


KRAKOW, POLAND — On this city's fabled Market Square, the Assumption Basilica, known as Kosciol Mariacki, towers over a maze of cobbled streets and alleyways. Founded in the 13th Century, the gothic edifice has long been a symbol of national defense, and a famous fanfare, or Hejnal, is still broadcast daily from its 260-foot tower, commemorating the moment a Polish trumpeter was shot by a Tatar arrow while rousing inhabitants against an attack.

So when Krakow's Catholic archbishop, Marek Jedraszewski, chose the basilica for a televised denunciation of LGBTQ campaigners on Aug. 1, the 75th anniversary of Poland's uprising against the Nazis, he would have been aware of the likely impact on audiences across the country.

"The red pestilence no longer marches across our land, but a new, neo-Marxist one has appeared, which seeks to conquer spirits, hearts and minds — not red, but rainbow," Jedraszewski told his massed congregation.

"The greatest tolerance becomes the height of intolerance when violence, humiliation and sneers against sacred symbols issue from mouths proclaiming fairness. … We are called to stand against this and defend authentic freedom."

Jedraszewski's words were aimed at people of same-sex orientations and transgender identities, who've been staging controversial equality marches across the country. As such, they marked a new stage in the Polish church's confrontational stance.

Meanwhile in the rest of Europe they have no problems with the LGBTQ community and even some of the urban areas of Poland are accepting of us, they are areas where the Catholic church has less power.

Belgium Just Elected a Trans Woman as Its Deputy Prime Minister
Petra De Sutter is now one of the most senior trans politicians in Europe.
Vice
By Bianca Ferrari
October 2, 2020


Petra De Sutter, a gynaecologist and Green party member, has been appointed deputy Prime Minister of Belgium. “Incredibly grateful for the support I have received from my party!” she tweeted last night.

De Sutter is a longstanding activist on sexual health and trans issues. Last year, she was elected as a Member of European Parliament for the Green party where she chaired the Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection. She’s one of seven politician to hold the Deputy Prime Minister title, one for each of the seven parties that form Belgium’s new coalition government, which was sworn in on the 1st of October.
[…]
De Sutter is currently the most senior transgender politician in Europe. The list also includes Mary Cau, the first openly trans mayor in France, Gianmarco Negri, the first trans mayor in Italy, plus members of parliament in Spain, Sweden, Germany and Poland.

We are being used a scapegoats to direct the people from the real problems in Europe and the rest of world.

---

An update to yesterday’s post about Gay Inc.

It seems to me that many gay men put money before human rights. They know that they are supporting a party that wants to criminalize us and force us back in the closet but they donate to the Republicans anyway hoping for some table scrapes from them.

Advocate and Out Magazine Owner Breaks 2018 Pledge, Donates to Anti-LGBTQ Republicans

The Wrap

By J. Clara Chan

September 29, 2020

Adam Levin, the owner of the parent company behind the magazines Advocate and Out, has broken a 2018 pledge to stop donating to anti-LGBTQ Republicans with recent donations to Sens. Steve Daines and Thom Tillis, according to Federal Election Commission filings.

As first reported on by LGBTQ Nation, Levin donated $2,800 each to Daines and Tillis, as well as $5,600 to the Tillis and Daines joint fundraising committee. Both senators received a zero on the Human Rights Campaign’s congressional scorecard, in part, for not supporting legislation like the Equality Act and other non-discrimination bills.

In 2018, Levin came under fire for his donations to Republicans with anti-LGBTQ stances like Devin Nunes, Dean Heller, Josh Mandel and Dana Rohrabacher. At the time, Nathan Coyle, then the CEO of Pride Media — the parent company of Advocate and Out, which is owned by Levin’s Oreva Capital — said Levin supported those politicians because they were pro-Israel but would no longer do so if they were also anti-LGBTQ.

LGB v. T

I hate these battles that divide us and it is usually only a vocal minority.

Rupert Everett complains that the transgender rights movement has ‘completely overshadowed’ gay issues
Rupert Everett has complained that the movement for trans rights has “completely overshadowed” gay issues.
Pink News UK
By Emma Powys Maurice
October 3, 2020


Speaking to The Times, the 61-year-old Shakespeare in Love actor bemoaned that he now feels like “the wrong type of queen” and that the gay community has “completely lost our profile”.

He criticised what he sees as an overly reproachful outlook among young people, and spoke of his fears of being “cancelled” for speaking about transgender issues.

“This might be the first time that the older generation has felt that they have to tiptoe around the younger generation and turn everything off,” he said.

Well first off, the older generation always feel like they have to tiptoe around the younger generation and not just in the LGBTQ+ community.

Well we the trans community feel that we were “canceled” during the quest for marriage equality and how many time were we thrown under the bus. The Sexual Orientation Non-Discrimination Act (SONDA) was passed in New York state in 2002 and the Gender Expression Non-Discrimination Act (GENDA) was passed 2019. In 2002 gender identity and expression was included back in 2002 but in a backroom deal we were thrown under the bus and dropped from the bill. The Empire State Pride Agenda worked to pass the bill but in 2015 they threw up their hands when the governor signed an executive order granting us protection. Slate magazine wrote…

Although it’s true that Empire State Pride Agenda, the state of New York, and the LGBTQ movement as a whole have come a very long way, we’re frankly shocked by the organization’s declaration of “mission accomplished.” This announcement exacerbates the perception that once same-sex marriage became legal nationally, there was no LGBTQ equality work left to do. This perception is both wrong and dangerous.

Let’s start with the state of New York and look at how well it protects (or doesn’t protect) its transgender residents from discrimination. Although the state has an anti-discrimination law that protects lesbian, gay, and bisexual people (SONDA, the Sexual Orientation Nondiscrimination Act), that law was passed in 2002 without protections for transgender New Yorkers. That was due in large part to strategic decisions made by—you guessed it—Empire State Pride Agenda, which decided to jettison pushing for trans protections in the law in exchange for more expedient passage of the bill. This decision drew furious criticism from many in the LGBTQ community, and it is one that a former ESPA executive director has said publicly that he regrets.

Fast-forward to today, and there are still no statutory protections for trans New Yorkers. After 15 years of advocates trying in vain to return to the legislature to fix SONDA, Gov. Andrew Cuomo has put a Band-Aid on the problem by issuing an executive order extending protections to trans folks. The problem with that solution is that an executive order can be rescinded following regime change in Albany, so the protections extended to trans New Yorkers are far flimsier than those extended to gays and lesbians. In other words, after failing transgender New Yorkers in the first instance, Empire State is doing it again—even though transgender people face discrimination at astounding rates.

But last year they did pass GENDA.

Now we have this gay man crying crocodile tears over not being the center of attention in Britain. But in Britain there is a strong effort by the conservative right to strip us of our protections and healthcare.

We are way more likely to be a victim of violence or discrimination than gay men, while gay men can hide in their anonymity we are always “out”.

There are so many more LGBQ people who support us then stood in our way.

Saturday 9

Sam’s Saturday 9: What's Love Got to Do with It? (1984)

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


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

What's Love Got to Do with It is also the title of Tina Turner's film biography, which tells of Tina's escape from her abusive, controlling husband, Ike. October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month. Spread the word that help is available.
 
1) The video was shot around New York City in spring. Kids are seen jumping rope. Were you good at jump rope? Has it ever been part of your workout routine as an adult?
That supposes two two things, first that I jumped rope and second that I have a “workout routine.”
I have never jumped rope and I don’t have a workout routine.

2) In real life, Tina Turner played basketball for her school. Were you good at team sports?
Ha!
I hate team sports. I used to ski and go backpacking, I would like to still do both but I now limit my exercise to walking.

3) In the video, Tina Turner wears a little black dress topped with a denim jacket. That jacket is a fashion staple 36 years later. Do you own a denim jacket?
Yes, I wore it last night.

3) This song was first offered to Cliff Richard, a major pop star in England who never enjoyed gained superstar status in the US. Perhaps, if he had recorded "What's Love Got to Do with It?," he would have been better known on this side of the ocean. Tell us about a time when you said "no" when "yes" might have been the better answer.
Hmm… that’s a hard one because I really keep track of something like that. I don’t mark it down on my calendar... “Today I said no when I meant yes.”

4) Tina's first marriage, to Ike Turner, was a painful one. Her second marriage, to German music executive Erwin Bach has been far more supportive. This has been a blessing, since Tina has had serious health problems in recent years. Do you have any medical/dental appointments scheduled?
Not until January and February, my appointments were back in June and July.

5) Tina met Erwin at Heathrow Airport in 1986. He was there to help her prepare for her London performances. They immediately liked one another, but didn't become romantically involved until months later and were surprised to find themselves falling in love. Have you ever had a romantic relationship that crept on you?
No.

6) The Rolling Stones' Keith Richards referred to Tina as his "favorite aunt." Is there anyone who isn't a relative of yours by blood but you refer to as aunt, uncle, brother, sister, etc.?
Nope.

7) Former President George W. Bush is also a big Tina Turner fan, and has praised her for having "the most famous legs in show business." What do you believe is your best physical feature?
My stomach, it is always out in front and leading the way.

8) At home, Tina often doesn't always play music or TV because she appreciates quiet as much as music. What about you? Do you enjoy quiet?
Yes.
I like sitting out on the deck in the evening after the traffic dies down at night.

9) Random question: On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being "very lazy" and 10 being "very productive," what number are you?
-4.
Yesterday all I did was read on the couch.
Today I was thinking about going for a walk and I thought the same thing yesterday and the day before, and the day before that... I do a lot of thinking about exercise.

I Am Making A Dire Prediction

Two articles this morning, the first is about a lawsuit in Virginia and the other article is about Jazz Jennings' book being banned.

There are lawsuits that I see that I wish that I saw another end to but I don’t, sadly I see non-discrimination laws being torn apart and shredded by the simple phrase “It is against my firmly held beliefs” and I see the courts coming down on the side of hate and discrimination for trans athletes.

Lawsuits challenge Virginia's sexual orientation protections
Associated Press
By Matthew Barakat
September 30, 2020


FALLS CHURCH, Va. (AP) — A conservative legal group has filed lawsuits challenging a new Virginia law that bars discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

The lawsuits filed this week in state and federal court by Alliance Defending Freedom argue that the new law infringes on their clients' religious freedoms.

In one case, a northern Virginia photographer filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Alexandria alleging that the law will compel him to photograph same-sex weddings in violation of his religious beliefs.

A second suit filed in Loudoun County Circuit Court says that the law will compel a nondenominational church to hire people who violate the church's beliefs against same-sex marriage and choosing a gender identity that differs from their biological sex.

Earlier this year, Virginia became the first southern state, other than Delaware, to extend anti-discrimination protections to include sexual orientation and gender identity. The legislation applies to housing, public or private employment, public spaces and credit transactions.

I see this as the first “religious freedom” cases going before justice Amy Coney Barrett and I see a 5 – 4 verdict against us.

That one case will wipe out all of the non-discrimination laws in the nation and probably unless there is a change in the court the dismantling of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

There will be two sets of laws.

All you will have to do is just declare that “It is against my firmly held beliefs” and there is no way to prove otherwise. Will the courts have to decide if it is really your firmly held beliefs? Will there be a “religious court? This opens a huge can-of-worms.

Will the courts just rule that “religious freedom” only applies to LGBTQ and abortion issues? Or could someone bulldoze down “Trump’s Wall” and claim that it violates their firmly held religious beliefs? Or refuse to rent to a black person or an unmarried couple?

And if the courts just rules that “religious freedom” only applies to LGBTQ and abortion issues isn’t that in itself discriminatory?

So much depends upon November 3^rd.

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Book banning is still alive and growing here in the U.S. and as you can imagine LGBTQ+ books are the leading books being banned.

Jazz Jennings says it's 'both disappointing and honorable' that her autobiography is on list of 100 most banned books

By Beth GreenfieldSenior Editor

October 1, 2020

This week, the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom — which has been documenting attempts to ban books in libraries or schools since 1990 — released its list of the 100 most banned or challenged books of the decade, from 2010 through 2019. And along with the expected classics of controversy, from To Kill a Mockingbird to The Catcher in the Rye, there’s a diverse range of newer works that have riled up certain conservative corners of the country, many dealing with LGBTQ themes and, within that category, those written with children in mind — like Heather Has Two Mommies, the sweet 1989 tale (rebooted in 2016) of a girl with two moms, and And Tango Makes Three, a picture book about two male penguins who create a family.

Another in that category is No. 13 on the list: I Am Jazz, the autobiographical picture book by Jazz Jennings, co-written by Jesica Herthel. Published in 2014 when Jazz was just 14, it was the precursor to the über-popular TLC reality series of the same name — now through its sixth season, in which the transgender teen and now young adult goes through a range of milestones, from dating and dances to bullying and college acceptance and even gender-reassignment surgery, all with her loving and supportive family by her side. And it’s that book that has created a large portion of the controversy that’s surrounded the proud transgender activist ever since she came out on a national television interview at the age of 6.

Her book isn’t the only LGBTQ+ book that were banned…

There were several other LGBTQ-themed books for kids on the list — George, And Tango Makes Three, A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo, My Princess Boy. Your follow-up book, meanwhile, Being Jazz: My Life as a Transgender Teen, is not on the list. Why do you think some people are particularly bent on silencing LGBTQ stories for and about children?

It’s all based on fear. Parents are afraid of the change that’s occurring in our society where the LGBTQ+ community keeps growing stronger and stronger. It may go against their personal beliefs, so they feel the need to shut it down before it creates impurity in their children. I think when it comes to children, they are viewed as so pure and unadulterated that parents don’t want them to be “corrupted” by “twisted ideologies” that they don’t stand for. The truth is that we are trying to create acceptance and peace at a younger age so that there is more understanding for youth who are trans or feel different.

But they are in good company; some of the other books that are banned are…

12. Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

15. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

26. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

28. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood

29. A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

39. Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich*

79. 1984 by George Orwell

As you can see some of the books are classics… we can’t have are children think too much, they might become liberals.

*In grad school for my MSW I had to read Nickel and Dimed.  The summary from Amazon…

In this now classic work, Barbara Ehrenreich, our sharpest and most original social critic, goes "undercover" as an unskilled worker to reveal the dark side of American prosperity

Millions of Americans work full time, year round, for poverty-level wages. In 1998, Barbara Ehrenreich decided to join them. She was inspired in part by the rhetoric surrounding welfare reform, which promised that a job—any job—can be the ticket to a better life. But how does anyone survive, let alone prosper, on $6 an hour?

To find out, Ehrenreich left her home, took the cheapest lodgings she could find, and accepted whatever jobs she was offered. Moving from Florida to Maine to Minnesota, she worked as a waitress, a hotel maid, a cleaning woman, a nursing-home aide, and a Wal-Mart sales clerk. She lived in trailer parks and crumbling residential motels. Very quickly, she discovered that no job is truly "unskilled," that even the lowliest occupations require exhausting mental and muscular effort. She also learned that one job is not enough; you need at least two if you int to live indoors.

Nickel and Dimed reveals low-rent America in all its tenacity, anxiety, and surprising generosity—a land of Big Boxes, fast food, and a thousand desperate stratagems for survival. Read it for the smoldering clarity of Ehrenreich's perspective and for a rare view of how "prosperity" looks from the bottom. You will never see anything—from a motel bathroom to a restaurant meal—in quite the same way again.

An Endorsement

A trans candidate is running for national office and she has a good chance of winning.

Barack Obama Endorses Democrat Who Would be First Transgender State Senator If Elected
Newsweek
By Jeffery Martin
September 25, 2020


Former President Barack Obama endorsed a second slate of Democratic nominees on Friday, including Delaware Senate candidate Sarah McBride. If McBride wins the election in November, she would become the first openly transgender person in the U.S. to be elected state senator.

Obama's involvement in the 2020 presidential election increased after it became evident that his former vice president, Joe Biden, would be the Democratic Party's presidential nominee. In April, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders suspended his presidential campaign leaving Biden as the last Democratic candidate standing. Obama officially endorsed Biden for the presidency in April. In August, Obama announced his first endorsements for U.S. down-ballot elections.
[…]
In a Friday tweet, McBride said she was "overwhelmed with pride" to receive Obama's endorsement.

"In 2008, I cast my first vote," McBride wrote. "It was for President @BarackObama. In 2012, I walked into the White House as the first trans woman to work there in any capacity. In 2020, I've been endorsed by the man I was proud to vote for and work for. I'm overwhelmed with pride."

In 2016 she was the first trans person to speak at any national convention.

It is fantastic that we are getting involved in politics and more importantly getting elected.

It is almost like Charles Dickens’ novel “A Tale of Two Cities.” But instead of “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness…” it is the age of hope, it is the age of despair.

With the courts being packed with anti-LGBTQ and anti-women judges and Cabinet heads stripping our protections we still have an electorate who are electing trans people to office. We still have people who stand up for us. As long as we have people like President Obama stand by us.

There is hope.