It’s Transgender Day Of Remembrance: Let’s Celebrate Trans* Lives And Accomplishments

Today is the 15th annual International Transgender Day of Remembrance. This is the day where we come together to honor and remember all of the trans* people killed due to anti-trans* violence during the year. TDoR was started in memory of Rita Hester, a trans woman murdered in November 1998, as a memorial to trans women specifically. Sadly, more than a decade later, things are still extremely grim for trans* people both in the United States and abroad. According to Transgender Europe’s Trans Murder Monitoring project, 238 trans people were killed in the past year in cases of anti-trans violence. That’s one trans* person being murdered every day and a half. In the United States there were 16 cases of anti-trans* murders, one every 24 days. While these statistics include a wide range of trans* people, the truth remains that the vast majority of victims of anti-trans* violence are trans women, and specifically trans women of color, particularly black and latina TWOC (especially in Latin America). If you have a strong stomach, you can take a look at this list of trans* people who were murdered this year, but be careful, the list is very hard to read. It’s impossible not to cry when you see how many young people there are and how many of the causes of death are frighteningly violent.

On Transgender Day of Remembrance we want to honor all of the people who died. We want to make sure that they are not forgotten. One way to do this is to celebrate the lives of trans* people and appreciate those we still have with us. So today we’re presenting you a list of some of the awesome things that trans* people did this year and some of the victories that we’ve won.

This year saw the emergence of trans woman of color Janet Mock as one of the leading voices in transgender advocacy. Her book Redefining Realness comes out next February.

via Out 100

Thanks to the efforts of Calliope Wong and the college gender and sexuality advocacy group Q&A, Smith College put together a committee to address the fact that they wouldn’t admit a trans woman. Another women’s college, Simmons took it a step further, and actually admitted a trans woman as a student.

GLAAD made the announcement that they would be officially changing their name from the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation to simply GLAAD in order to show their commitment to supporting transgender rights.

DC Comics introduced its most mainstream transgender character yet when Batgirl’s roommate Alysia Yeoh came out as trans in Batgirl #19. The same month in the Marvel universe, a young Moloid named Tong came out as a transgender girl in FF #6 (a comic about a replacement Fantastic Four). This means there are two transgender characters in regular mainstream comics.

The first annual Trans 100 list was set up to honor the work done by 100 diverse and hard-working trans* people.

In May, MMA fighter Fallon Fox won her first MMA fight after coming out as trans.

via fallonfox.com

In June, elementary school student Coy Mathis showed the world how awesome she is and won a victory for trans* students everywhere when the Colorado courts ruled that she could use the proper bathrooms and facilities for a girl like herself.

Delaware passed a statewide Gender Identity Nondiscrimination Act, which protects trans* people from being fired or losing housing due to their gender identity with thanks to activist Sarah McBride.

via Equality Delaware

Several cities including San Antonio and my hometown passed LGBT non-discrimination ordinances.

With the debut of the Netflix original series Orange is the New Black we saw the breakout success of transgender actress Laverne Cox. In a show filled with nuanced performances, Cox has gotten the highest praise for portrayal of transgender prisoner Sophia Burset.

via Out 100

Transgender advocates in Malaysia fought to get equal access for trans* people despite moves to undermine their efforts.

After coming out as trans last year, Laura Jane Grace and her band Against Me! released the True Trans EP.

via Spin

For the first time, trans women started winning employment discrimination suits in front of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

In August, California became the first state to pass a law saying that transgender students will have access to the programs, athletics and facilities consistent with their gender.

Eli Erlick, an advocate for transgender student’s rights in California via NY Daily News

America’s Next Top Model had its second ever transgender model in 19 year-old Virgg.

The American Bar Association passed a resolution rejecting the use of the so-called “trans panic” defense for murder.

Alex McNeill became the first openly transgender leader of a mainline Protestant group when he was selected as the Executive Director of More Light Presbyterians, an organization that promotes the acceptance and inclusion of LGBTQ people in the Presbyterian Church.

Alex McNeill via Out of Order

Skylar, a 12 year old girl in Georgia, won her fight to be able to use the proper bathrooms at school.

The country’s largest federation of unions, the AFL-CIO added an amendment to its constitution that affirms that they will officially start to fight for workplace protections for trans* people.

Cassidy Lynn Campbell, a transgender teen at a California high school, was voted Homecoming Queen by her fellow students becoming the first transgender student to hold that title in her school’s history.

Transgender models including Nicole Gibson, Ines Rau and Arisce Wanzer exploded onto the fashion scene.

MAJOR!, a documentary exploring the life and work of trans woman of color trailblazer and Stonewall veteran Miss Major Griffin-Gracy reached its funding goal and won IndieWire’s Project of the Month in October.

via Kickstarter

Fashion designer Ari South returned to Project Runway after coming out as transgender during the three years between the seasons she competed on the show.

New Hampshire high schooler Ray Ramsey was elected Homecoming King by a landslide by his fellow students.

via The Crimson Review

British trans* advocate Paris Lees participated in the BBC’s “100 Women” event after being named the “most influential LGBT person” in Great Britain for 2013.

In the past few weeks over 40,000 people have signed a petition asking Victoria’s Secret to make Carmen Carrera their first ever transgender model.

A gender identity-inclusive version of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act passed the Senate. ENDA would provide federally mandated protection for LGBTQ people in the workplace.

The Out100, a list of “the year’s most compelling LGBT people” included many trans* people including Laverne Cox, Kate Bornstein, Janet Mock, Cassidy Lynn Campbell, Zachary Kerr, Jazz and Calliope Wong.

Zachary Kerr, Jazz and Calliope Wong via Out 100

Jeydon Loredo, a transgender high school student in Texas, wore a tuxedo in his senior portrait. After a fight with the school district, he won the right to have that picture in his yearbook.

After changing their name to reflect their commitment to trans* issues, GLAAD appointed its first transgender cochair, Jennifer Finney Boylan.

This time of year it’s very important that we remember those of us who have died due to ignorance, hatred and fear. Trans* people everywhere have the right to live. And when we do live, we are able to accomplish amazing things. Let’s hope that the upcoming year will see a dramatic decrease in the number of trans* people that we must memorialize and look forward to another year of great strides forward for the transgender community.

Also.Also.Also: Brittney Griner’s Makeup Class and Other Stories We Missed This Week

Hello, pumpkin pie slices with ice cream! I had a hard day. Is it Christmas yet?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqWig2WARb0

While I’m hanging my stocking, let’s talk about the stories we missed this week!

We Heart the OUT 100

From Laverne Cox to Brittney Griner, there’s no denying that the OUT 100 is diverse, beautiful, and altogether amazing.

State-By-State, Nation-by-Nation: Queer Battlegrounds

+ The New York Times dishes on six states resisting the rightful benefits of same-sex military spouses.

+ Hell is other people. Especially when the other person is your spouse that you’d really like a divorce from but it isn’t legally possible to obtain.

+ TIME breaks down the next stops on the Crazy Train of Love, AKA GAY MARRIAGE AND THE MOVEMENT FOR QUEER ASSIMILATION.

“The more people are winning, the more people are stepping up and wanting to become involved and move forward after,” says Evan Wolfson, founder and president of Freedom to Marry. “The more we make it real — the more places gay people share in the freedom to marry — the more people see with their own eyes families helped and no one hurt.”

+ The new Mayor of Seattle is the new normal: totally gay.

+ Zambia’s first lady is too fabulous to be homophobic.

Being gay is considered a crime in Zambia. In fact, two men are currently being prosecuted for engaging in consensual sex. Another is on trial for discussing gay people and HIV on television.  According to The New Civil Rights Movement, the country’s tabloids have recently taken to outing  men rumored to be gay, who then face harassment in their neighborhoods.

At the UNAIDS reception, Dr. Kaseba-Sata stated, “Silence around issues of men who have sex with men should be stopped. And no one should be discriminated against on the basis of their sexual orientation.”

She then told the audience that in matters of public health issues like HIV, the gay community has the support of her husband, President Michael Sata.

Lesbians React to “Blue Is The Warmest Color”

Welp.

You Should Go, You Should Give

+ AIRSPRAY, Friday, November 22:

AIRSPRAY: Worcester is a queer community group that will bring LGBTQ cultural events to Worcester catering to the alternatively open-minded and inspired! Connect, dance, and share in the love for music, art and community!

Our first event is a high energy queer dance party! Come early, have some hookah, stay late and dance the night away!

+ Support Sister Spit 2014, because I MEAN COME ON.

Sister Spit has come a long way from the tours of the 90s, when sleeping on a stranger’s floor was the norm and writers were paid $80 for a month of grueling, non-stop work. Nowadays we rent our vehicles to be sure they are dependable – in the 90s, Sister Spit vans were famous for catching fire in Nevada or outright dying in Mississippi. Now, We stay in hotel rooms, making the rigors of touring a bit easier on the crew. And we make a point to pay the writers for their work on the road and time away from their jobs.

Because Sister Spit makes a point to travel not only to the big cities but also seeks smaller, underserved queer populations, Sister Spit is able to provide audiences hungry for LGBTQ, feminist, underground voices with a slew of new writers to read and watch out for each year. By pairing up with local writers in many of these towns, local writers get to be part of a really big show, and Sister Spit gets exposed to even more new voices to work with in the future.

We are asking for community support to help this tour be as successful and far-reaching as possible! By contributing to Sister Spit, you make it possible for us to travel into cities and towns that might not be able to fund the full cost to put up our show. You make it possible for us to pay writers working their butts off to support their art. You help sustain the work it takes to get the show on the road – work that begins nine months before we roll into town.

+ WILDCATS: A group of cheerleaders deal with High School life in this dramedy about standing up for what you believe in, keeping up appearances, and the complexities of farting in a tight uniform. As Allison struggles with opposing the sexist traditions of her school (and what that may or may not suggest about her sexuality) she dances, dreams, and falls her way to some clarity.

F*ck Transphobia

California’s “bathroom bill” is bringing out the drama queen in every bigot.

“It kinda makes me nervous… if I run into… him,” stammers a faceless female teen on a YouTube video that has enraged thousands of viewers.

What’s got her so on edge? It’s not threats of stalking. It’s a transgender girl using the bathroom at a public school…

The video is part of Pacific Justice Institute’s attempt to take action against the so-called “bathroom bill,” a new California law designed to help curb transphobic bullying and harassment by requiring schools to respect a student’s preferred gender identity. The law, which passed in August, allows transgender teens to participate in crossgender activities at public schools, including using bathrooms and showers that correspond to their identified gender.

Michelle Tea Got Married

It’s true.

Brittney Griner Hates Makeup, The Patriarchy

When it comes to gender-bending, Brittney Griner is simply the best (and possibly the hottest). And when it comes to WNBA-sponsored makeup classes, she’s pretty clear that she “don’t need that shit.”

Photo via Getty Images

If you’re not already totally, head-over-heels, 100% obsessed with Brittney Griner, you’ve gotta read her latest profile:

Her outfit for her imminent television appearance was settled on a while ago: a blue-and-white seersucker suit with one of her signature bow ties. But backstage at Conan, she’s addressing another wardrobe concern: what to wear to the ESPYs, ESPN’s annual awards show. The event is three days away, and she needs something to wear with the gorgeous black suit that her stylist, Kellen Richards—who’s also Ellen DeGeneres’ fashion adviser—had custom made for her. “With Ellen, we choose women’s clothes and add menswear touches,” says Richards’ assistant, when asked to compare dressing the two women. “With Brittney, it’s all men’s. And it’s edgier.” (The last time she wore a dress, Griner tells me, was at her mother’s request, for her high school graduation. Never again.)

Griner quickly gravitates to a burgundy sleeveless T-shirt by Robert Geller and a black Saint Laurent sweatshirt top with cutoff sleeves and a narrow silver chain sewn across the yoke. Her agent, Lindsay Kagawa Colas, pulls out a Lanvin sleeveless tee with mesh sides as a racier alternative. “Would you like this with no shirt underneath, with nipples out?” she asks matter-of-factly.

“That would be sexy,” Griner replies, grinning, “but I don’t think I’m ready for that.”

Is This What Makes Us Girls?

Girls who identify as LGBTQ are at a higher risk for substance abuse and behavioral problems.

Queers Getting Schooled

+ Amanda Aceveda claims she was expelled from Preston High School because she’s gay. And she’s not pleased about it.

+ Megan Lent almost joined a queer sorority. If you care about it, that makes you and Vice probably, which I always liked ’til I found out it was owned by that total douchebag dude.

+ Skirts for Sasha day will melt your heart.

Until two years ago, Luke “Sasha” Fleischman was a shy teen, a loner with odd hobbies and a bright mind, but far from a civil rights activist.

But between Fleischman’s freshman and senior year something changed: Fleischman decided to identify as agender or “nonbinary” gender, neither male nor female. Sasha asked to be referred to by the pronouns “they,” “them,” and “their.”

Family members say that very personal decision helped the teen blossom. But police believe it also led another teenager to light Fleischman’s skirt on fire as the student slept on a local bus, causing severe injuries that could take months to heal.

Since the incident, public support for the injured 18-year-old has been overwhelming, with more than $20,000 raised to help with medical expenses and civil rights leaders expressing outrage about the case. And understanding seems to be growing about the issues of gender identity that Fleischman hoped to call attention to.

On Friday, about half the 100 students at Maybeck High School in Berkeley, where Fleischman attended, wore skirts for Skirts for Sasha Day and carried signs reading, “Get well, Sasha, we miss you.”

It’s Diversity, Stupid!

+ Kerry Washington’s performance on SNL wasn’t enough to fix their big diversity problem. (Salon also explores the experience of auditioning for SNL and almost making it to mecca.)

+ The Annenberg School for Communications and Journalism finds that diversity in film is entirely bleak.

+ Moms Mabley, the first female comic, was a lesbian. Whoopi said so.

+ The Swedes love gender diversity so much that they’re structuring their film ratings around The Bechdel Test.

Paris Lees Debuts On BBC’s “Question Time” In A Skeleton Top, Is Awesome

Last night I braved BBC’s Question Time, an hour-long political debate show, to listen to what activist and journalist Paris Lees had to say over the humdrum squabbling of British politicians. PinkNews has identified Lees as QT’s “first transgender panelist”; however, Eddie Izzard, who does identify as trans*, previously appeared on the show in 2005.

Lees was joined by Jeremy Browne MP (Liberal Democrat), Matthew Hancock MP (Conservative), Chris Bryant MP (Labour) and Harriet Sergeant (author and Daily Mail journalist).

In arguing against the privatisation of probation services, Lees shared her story about having been in juvenile prison as a 16-year-old and the need for state resources to continue to support and rehabilitate youth in positions similar to hers. Lees also commented on recent press regulation debates and legislation from her perspective as both a journalist and an activist working for better representation of trans people in the media.

Browne MP: We have a fantastic thing in Britain, which is that we stand up against the over-mighty, we fight back against a hierarchy, and it’s that freedom that the press argues so passionately for.

Lees: The press ARE the hierarchy. We’re talking about 500 of the most elite, pampered, privileged, overwhelmingly white, overwhelmingly male, overwhelmingly heterosexual old boys’ club that all went to Eton and Cambridge.

Other highlights of the night include Lees volunteering to take Jeremy Browne’s place should he ever step down to make way for a Labour Party actually led by working-class politicians, questioning why anyone’s work would be worth the millions currently on the paychecks of the chief executives of the Big Six gas suppliers, and of course, being dressed for Halloween.

Tbh I found the four men in suits far more terrifying.

Lees may have described herself as a “slag from a council estate that doesn’t know too much about anything,” but she held her own on the panel alongside seasoned politicians and then some. It was clear that she often carried the crowd’s favour, judging by their applause and the response on Twitter.

Placing the female panelists at the end of the table = bizarre male staring situation every time they spoke

Is that condescension or just a public school education I’m reading in these faces?

The BBC made a good call last night for trans visibility, but don’t worry – lest anyone think QT is getting too progressive for its boots, stay tuned for next week’s episode, in which they’ll be giving a platform to “not racist” UKIP leader Nigel Farage for the fifteenth time.

Also.Also.Also: Sally Kohn Gets The Heck Out of FOX and Other Stories We Missed This Week

I’m supposed to say something witty up here. Then we dive in to all the stories we missed this week! And look – a puppy!

More Doctors Should Be Talking About DV

76% of women have never been asked about domestic violence by a doctor. (Spoiler alert: more than 34% of women will survive domestic abuse.)

The Next Steve Jobs is Currently a 12-Year-Old Girl

Paloma Noyola Bueno is “the face of Mexico’s unleashed potential.”

In the Eyes of the Law

+ Leaders of the Maasai tribe are seeking royalties for pens named after them in the “Indigenous People’s Line” of the Italian pen-making company Delta. In other news, some people buy pens named after native tribes.

+ Native American tribes in Oklahoma are coming together to treat LGBT folks like average everyday humans, which is in and of itself an act of protest against the state. Telling.

+ Gender-neutral bathrooms are Philly’s first task as “the most LGBT friendly city in the nation.” (It’s on the rise. Or something.)

+ Varying perceptions of gender are partially responsible for the varying treatment of trans* folks in different environments and situations.

In the controversies we examined, it is access to bathrooms, locker rooms, and sports teams at the center of gender panics. Moreover, not all sex-segregated spaces are policed equally. Because of beliefs that women are inherently vulnerable, particularly to unwanted heterosexual advances, it is women’s spaces at the center of these debates. Thus, with these controversies, much of the discussion is about a fear of ‘male’ bodies in ‘women’s’ spaces.

All The Women Who Are Independent(ly Involved in Engineering) Throw Your Hands Up At Me

Trying to count female engineers might be the first step toward making sure more of them are to come.

F*ck the Police

Feministing has video of police targeting trans* folks with violence, but in Baltimore officials still think the problem is that LGBT folks need “guidance” on interacting with cops.

Pop Culture Roundup: Sally Kohn Overcomes, Eminem Still Sucks

+ Sally Kohn has left FOX for their liberal nemesis, MSNBC.

+ The Atlantic has warm fuzzies about bisexuality’s latest on TV.

+ …and Slate has the audacity to ask “BUT WHAT ABOUT THE MEN?!1” about the same screen.

+ Women internalize rape myths through sexualizing and dehumanizing video games. It’s science.

+ Eminem still sucks, and ain’t nobody got time for that.

“Granted, it’s not directed towards the gay community, but subconsciously it is. He’s using the word f-ggot to degrade another man. As if the worst thing a man can be is gay. What type of message does that embed into the minds of young kids, both gay and straight?”

Soloman’s SolRay Records labelmate LastO, who is also openly gay, added: “He’s a lil’ too old to be using gay and f-g and sh– as an insult; playground s—.”

Misandry Crafts

Some days you hate men so much you need a cross-stitch just to say it right. And trust me – there’s an Etsy shop for that.

(via HelloMountain)

And because ladies, even the most riotous of ladies—after all, this generation’s interest in crafts started under the Riot Grrrl movement, where girls first embroidered “feminist” on pillows and formed knitting groups called “Stitch ’n Bitch”—like being girlish and tough, the misandry message has evolved in the form of arts and crafts. Check Etsy for the word misandry and you’ll find super-cute pom-pom knit hats with “misandry” emblazoned between rows of hearts. You’ll also find lavender and white heart-shaped misandry hair barrettes, a plastic misandry necklace and a misandry-adorned heart-shaped felt brooch with beads.

That’s not all. There’s artwork too, like this vintage photo of a woman gazing somewhere into the distance (maybe into the future of women’s suffrage?), encased in a sepia pink-hued heart.

Men who love to blame feminists for the end of men will, I’m sure, troll these Etsy sites until the end of time, whining along as they click, “Told ya so.” It’s one of the reasons misandry crafts are possibly a response to this sentiment: You think we hate you so much? Okay, you’re right. We’re wearing it on our sleeve now. Or around our neck. Or on our heads. Or as a pin.

You Should Go: Mix NYC

Let the gay reign over your eyeballs at the upcoming MIX NYC “Queer Experimental Film Festival.”

Cat Writing: It’s A Career

The 20th annual Cat Writer’s Conference starts on Halloween. It’s real. Like, really. Like, quit your job right now.

Brittani’s Video Party: Disney Princesses Release Outtakes from Failed Pilot

Greetings. This is Brittani’s Video Party, where I bring some of the “best” videos from all over my internet together so we can clap, cry or deconstruct. Have you ever gotten to a video and it already has 33 million views and you wonder where the heck have you been? Well I’m here to help you so that you see it when it only has 32 million views. Aim low, world. Aim low.

Header by Rory Midhani

Jasmine, Belle, Ariel and Snow White trade in their tiaras for guns in the pilot episode of Black Ops: Disney Princesses. These animated Disney stars get live action counterparts as they make the world a safer place, one terrorist at a time. The series is created/produced/directed by Taylor Vaughn-Lasley.

Sarah Silverman released her failed NBC pilot, Susan 313 on YouTube. I don’t think anyone’s more surprised than Silverman that she was allowed to do this. It’s not an effort to rally support, it’s just a cool thing that happened. It stars outstanding humans Harris Wittels, June Diane Raphael, Tig Notaro and Jeff Goldblum.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euSL8cCy4-w

Outtakes is a semi-improvised mockumentary web series about two trans* guys filming web cam videos in a bedroom. It’s based on the transition video genre which captures people in the process of transitioning. The show was created by playwright, Sylvan Oswald.

I don’t understand why lyrics videos are a thing but if they’re going to involve women singing to each other while making dramatic faces, sign me up. In Katy Perry’s “Unconditional” video, model Erika Linder is giving you concerned butch face.

If you have a video you think everyone should see, tweet it to @bishilarious for consideration. And of course feel free to post your favorite videos from the week below.

Also.Also.Also: Ramming Lesbian Girl Scout Cookies Down Your Throat and Other Stories We Missed This Week

Hello, beautiful! It’s a SUNSHINE DAY! (DeAnne, are you surprised?)

Here’s the stories we missed while I was working for the weekend.

For The Cause: The Good, the Bad, the Reactionary

+ The ladies of Xelle are raising a red flag for LGBT equality, and it sounds pretty damn good.

+ Really pathetic Internet trolls are upset that professional sports teams were part of #SpiritDay last week and stood united against anti-LGBT bullying. But (surprise!) nobody really cared, and they remained on the right side of history.

+ Montenegro’s first-ever pride parade was met with violence.

+ Sigourney Weaver really, really loves you.

+ Fuck Emily Yoffe. And go go Amanda Hess!

This Week’s Unanimous “Fuck Y’all” Is Directed At PJI

Since the Pacific Justice Institute thinks allowing trans* folks to use their preferred bathrooms is equivalent to “harassment,” they should probably look into learning the definition of harassment. They’re currently organizing with parents in Colorado against a high-school student who has been out as trans* for two years and fears for harassment because she wants to use the girls’ room, because that’s a GREAT USE OF TIME.

Thank Alanis that her mom is speaking out to support her:

My daughter was the one who learned about the Pacific Justice Institute. She saw it online. She was upset. It made her panic. She saw where their story had become international news and she saw what people were saying. It gave her anxiety attacks. She was upset about the whole thing. She kept asking me how people could do that to her. She saw all this negative stuff about her and she can’t understand how they could say those things when they don’t even know who she is as a person. They don’t know what this does to a kid…

What you’re doing isn’t right. You say that you’re a God-loving people but you’ve targeted my daughter – a kid – like this. You shouldn’t do this to any kid. You should be ashamed. You’re wrong for what you’ve done to my daughter.

I’ll Drink to That

Meredith and her kick-ass Autostraddle column were featured in Beer Advocate! Turns out lots of people find women and beer to be an excellent combination.

click to expand!

Oh Na Na, What’s Your Name

Depending on the year you were born and the specific region of the United States in which you were located at that time, I probably already have a good idea. But we can check with Drake just in case, because I hear you’re good with them soft lips. (What the fuck does that even mean?!)

Ramming Gay Marriage Down The Throat of Homophobes Forever

+ Linda Oliver, Mayor of West Union, South Carolina, thinks us queers are “ramming” gay marriage down her throat. There’s an obvious punch line here but I’m way too kind to do that. I’m a journalist. Plus, nobody else likes her anyway so I guess she’ll go and eat worms.

+ Meanwhile, in North Carolina, the good deeds of a rogue county clerk are bringing local lesbians together for life. In matrimony, I mean.

+ Gay couples in Tennessee are gonna FIGHT! FOR THEIR RIGHT! TO A MARRIAGE PAAAAAARTAY.

I’m So Glad I Was A Girl Scout

If Girl Scout cookies are made with lesbianism, then I’m clearly not buying enough. Should we be sacrificing them to Lesbian Jesus at Camp after all? I was just busy eating them in bed while I counted pennies toward my abortion fund piggy bank, but I can be there in five minutes if you need me.

ready for what

Religious Right activists have long campaigned against the Girl Scouts of the USA, and pastors Kevin Swanson and Dave Buehner of Generations Radio have now joined in by urging listeners not to purchase Girl Scout cookies.

“Please, I beg of you, do not buy Girl Scout cookies,” Swanson said. “Please, I beg of you, stop buying Girl Scout cookies.”

But if they do, he said, they should “take a big, fat, black magic marker” and “start marking out all of the references to the Girl Scouts of America on all the boxes.” Swanson warned that the “wicked” Girl Scouts are promoting “lesbianism” and abortion, calling the cookies “food offered to idols.”

You Better Werq, Bitch

+ Don’t miss it: Our own Autostraddle writer Vivian Underhill, mastermind behind Queered Science, was featured on Bitch:

“In the early 90s at Princeton, there were only a handful of students who were out as LGB people,” says Dr. Donna Riley, who helped found the first engineering program at a U.S. women’s college (the Picker Engineering Program at Smith) and is openly bisexual. “We were mostly just met with silence. We knew to compartmentalize, and we knew when and where it was safe to be out—and that was definitely not in the engineering building.”

+ Elliot Sailers, a former Ford model, is making waves with a gender-bending new ‘do and a mission to make it in mens’ modeling.

Caitlin Oliver Pretty Much Pwned Everyone, And Other Queer Victories

+ Caitlin Oliver of Chicago set a new arcade game world record this week. It’s been reported that, in return, every bro on the globe accepted some ice for their burns.

+ In Eagle Pass, Texas, Eileen Hernandez (“I am actually a lesbian. I really am.”) and Jennifer Mijares (her straight friend) were elected Homecoming Queen & Queen. I have so many positive emotions about this that it’s actually crazy.

“If one person would try bringing us down, so many others would say no, keep your head up, what you guys are doing is awesome,” Hernandez says. So they kept those heads up and by Friday night, both girls were wearing crowns. “We’re just smiling like crazy,” Hernandez says. “Tears fell down our face.” “We were excited. We won. We won first place,” Mijares says. “And we made a difference,” Hernandez says.

You Should Go (And Give) (Unto Others) (That’s What She Said)

+ If you’re free Monday at 6:30 PM and you live in / around / near New York City, you should probably come on down to the Sallie Bingham Center’s discussion “about the political significance of documenting women’s lives and the importance of informing one’s activism with a historical perspective.” I’m in now way, shape, or form biased due to my own involvement in said discussion, which will also involve Jaclyn Friedman, Ellie Smeal, and Merle Hoffman. But if you like my face, that’s another good reason to show up, too. Whatever brings you to the table.

+ If you’re able to hit up La Casa Azul in Coyoacan before February 2014 you should check out Frida Kahlo’s dress collection. But if not, there’s a gallery for that.

+ I really, really, really want you to support Creeps.

Creeps is a movie that follows the highs and lows of Mona and Freddy, two best friends who decide to quit drinking and doing drugs for a week so they can have great skin for a party. Mona has recently found out that her ex-girlfriend has become a successful artist and is having a big art opening in a weeks’ time. Of course they MUST attend, look fabulous and have the sexiest arm candy in sight. They sadly agree that the only real way to accomplish this is to form a pact: 7 days of sobriety. By the time they make it to the opening, they aren’t speaking, they’ve barely slept, and disaster ensues.

The Weed Fairy Comes In Broad Daylight For No Reason

It wasn’t me. Promise.

Straddler On The Street: Jill/Gilles

Hi crush monsters, this is Straddler On The Street, a feature where I celebrate all of you incredible Autostraddle readers by hunting you down, demanding you chat with me, and then writing about you on the Internet so we can all crush on you. Get excited, because butterflies in your stomach 24/7 is a fantastic way to live.

Header by Rory Midhani

Straddler On The Street: Jill/Gilles, 23

If you attended Syracuse University a few years ago, attended A-Camp 2.0 or 3.0, or simply live in the Baltimore area, it’s likely that you’ve run into Jill/Gilles, a Professional Queer if I ever met one!

Jill/Gilles is “beginning to work out logistics of a transition from female to male” and currently uses female pronouns, and she spoke to me a bit about her transition, her gender identity and presentation, and how her family has reacted amongst many other topics. Like I said, she is super involved in the queer community, and she is currently on the executive committee of the Board of Directors at Baltimore’s Community Center (GLCCB) and works as Program Coordinator of Student Activities at MICA (Maryland Institute College of Art). She got a degree in Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies from Syracuse, and was an active member of the LGBT community there. She’s also interned at national and local LGBT non-profits in Washington, DC and has done extensive volunteer work in the community, always “striving to bring trans*, female-bodied, queer representation to a community that needs it.”

Say hello to Dapper Jill/Gilles!

Jill/Gilles, 23, at A-Camp 3.0, May 2013

When I asked about which pronouns you use, you said you are beginning to work out the logistics of your transition. Are you comfortable speaking about those logistics?

I’m totes cool with that. I just found out the place I was pursuing to go to in regards to transition services doesn’t take my insurance. And the other place I was thinking about requires them to be your primary physician. I also am unsure about my insurance, or about how the place I work at accommodates transition services. I am highly anxious about starting to pursue being able to pass, as well as starting the social transition – so it’ll be really interesting when I start to pursue that.

How did you come to the place you are now in your gender identity and gender expression?

It was a lifelong process, I suppose. I had extreme gender dysphoria as a wee lad… went through Catholic school and [it] made me forget all about it. Then high school and college reaffirmed it, and then A-Camp (especially) and the current work I do solidified my choice to begin transition. I suppose Catholic school didn’t make me forget, but it suppressed it and manifested itself as lack of self-care and hiding my true-self.

Where did you go to college, and were you involved in queer activities there?

I went to Syracuse University! I was a super queer! I worked at the LGBT Center, I was the art director at the queer mag there for a bit, I have a degree in LGBT studies through there – my BFA is in illustration, though. I also was a common staple at the queer party scene [and] hosted a couple myself.

To be honest I miss the college queer scene.

I miss the abundance and concentration of queer folk, but A-Camp certainly fulfills that function.

Tell me about your experience working on the queer zine. What are some of your favorite memories?

I was the art director for this issue and for the cover and center spread we had a nude photo shoot in the woods. We covered ourselves in paint and tried to really display our interpretation of the radical fairy group. But it was in a state park after sundown, which was illegal. The cops came. Whoops!

What ended up happening?!

The one clothed person checked in with them and told them we were here for a school photo shoot and that we [would] only [be] another 20 minutes, and they drove away. The finished product was fantastic!

Haha oh my god that’s incredible.

Very lucky. I’ll never forget painting my fellow editors, writers, artists, and volunteers in paint and romping around.

I want to ask more questions about your job and your art but I also wanna back up for one second. You mentioned Catholic school – do you still identify with Catholicism at all?

Oh I love the ornamentation, the gaudiness. I’m an aesthetic Catholic.

And what about your family? Are they supportive of your sexuality and your transition?

My parents claim they’ve always known that ‘I like women’ and that ‘I’ve wanted to be a boy/man.’ They’ve been as supportive as possible, and always curious and proactive to ask questions. They’re still trying to understand the transition. My mom just wants to have grandchildren, and is nervous about me growing hair. So I have to navigate that. They trip up sometimes, but I wouldn’t expect them to be perfect, as it’s not a community that they’re in.

That’s really awesome to hear. And that’s a very empathetic way to look at it from your perspective, especially as even the queer community fucks up sometimes when it comes to being supportive of all humans.

Oh yes, there’s so much to learn! The work and the education never ends.

It’s true! It sounds like you do a lot of work to that end. Can you speak about your work with GLCCB and also at MICA?

Yes! I was invited to apply to be on the Board of Directors at the GLCCB last October [by an alum of Syracuse who is a great mentor of mine]. I’ve been in that position for about a year, and man have I learned so much. As an illustrator and a person passionate about social development and mentorship, I started a job as Program Coordinator of Student Activities at MICA where I supervise about 20+ art students in our Student Activities Office. I absolutely love my students. They are so energized and creative, and it really gets me to work every day with a pep in my step.

What does a typical day at MICA look like for you?

On a boring day, I’m doing budget and database work and coordinating logistics for events. On an exciting day, I’m ordering gold underpants for our burlesque club and showing students how to Photoshop cat faces on people’s bodies.

Amazing. How could other Straddlers get involved in that sort of work if they are interested?

I’m very much on an entry level at MICA, but my student leadership at [Syracuse] and my internship experiences at LGBT non-profits really equipped me for the work that I do. For my position at the GLCCB, [I’d say what prepared me was] the LGBT non-profit experience and excessive volunteering, along with proactive networking and reaching out to people who inspired me.

You said you feel like you’ve learned a lot in the year you’ve been on the board. Can you articulate some of the major things you’ve taken away, so far?

[Being on the board is] really navigating how to be a radical queer in spaces that call for compromise with folks who’re homonormative. Because while I dislike Pride Parades – hell give me a Shame Parade or a Dyke March any day! – I was coordinating all of the volunteers at the one this year because I understand that the funding that comes from the event provides vital resources to folks who need it at the community center. You’ll see a lot of cities having for-profit Pride Parades [but] I’m fortunate enough that Baltimore is a non-profit parade.

Jill/Gilles (far right) volunteering at Baltimore Pride 2013

I didn’t know that there are non-profit Pride Parades… I think I assumed they were all for-profit.

Oh yeah. That’s why Shame Parades are awesome. Why do we have to depend on major companies to build community spaces?

I’ve never even heard of Shame Parades! I feel so out of the queer loop.

[Shame Parades are] queer radicals fightin’ the commercialism of your standard Pride Parade. I think both have merit; you get a very niche audience with shame parades.

Yes, I would expect that. Okay moving away from work and more toward play – tell me all your feelings about A-Camp.

OH GOD. I had such a pain in my throat and chest that I couldn’t go this time around. A-Camp has changed my life. My Snatches and Bombshells [cabinmates] have given me such strength, and are lifelong affirmations and anchors. The counselors, the other campers. History is happening on that mountain. You’ll be reading about A-Camp in LGBT textbooks, I’ll make damn sure of it, so young queers of the future can sigh like I do and be inspired. And I hope for their sake that they get to go. There’s never been a place where I could fully express myself with no questions like that.

I am probably gonna start crying. Do you have any specific A-Camp memories you’d like to mention?

My first camp… The ‘real talks’ and amazing conversations we had in the cabin. The truth or dares, the nude streakings in Klub Deer, the kisses, the cuddles, the hugs, the happy and sad tears. The life-long friends, the mentors. The lessons learned. The haircut from Casino! The Faggity Feud where I wore bike shorts and got soaking wet in way more ways than one. All of the snaps I gave to folks who just poured their feelings out!

My second camp… Really looking inside myself and grappling with the tough issues I didn’t want to confront. A-Camp in its entirety gave me the courage to do that. Getting to see old friends, dancing, not giving a FUCK, but giving ALL OF THE FUCKS at the same time. Katrina‘s ‘this is how we live, no fucks to give‘ essay got me through some rough times. It’s my mantra when I get triggered.

It’s so inspiring to listen to you talk about camp. I see the magic happen every camp but it’s so gratifying to know that you guys feel it, too.

I think we all feel it. Whatever ‘IT’ is is different for everyone, but it changes your life. ‘It’ could be something absolutely amazing, ‘It’ could be something heart-breaking, but you work it out and it makes you a better and stronger person once you process it.

That’s a great description of camp. Sometimes the work it inspires is hard, but it is always so necessary.

Yes. ::snaps:: I need A-Camp, and there so so many other folks in the world I know who need it too.

On a much lighter note – you’re single! What are some of your favorite ways to meet potential dates!

OH GOD YES I’M SINGLE. I have such a difficult time finding folks, so whatever I would tell people, please do the opposite.

Awww. What is difficult about finding people?

I’m really picky and an introvert, and that’s not a good combination. Please send me a stern but sweet soft/sissy to hard butch who loves to slow dance and wants to grow as people together. That’s what I pray to god every night for. Like Audrey Horne prayed for Agent Cooper in Twin Peaks. But there was nothing more fun than being single at A-Camp… wild and reckless abandon.

So I have heard! But have not experienced myself. Anyway! Who are some of your favorite artists?

Oh lord. Francis Bacon, Alison Bechdel, Junji Ito, Kazuma Kodaka, J.C Leyendecker, Marjane Satrapi, Egon Schile (minus the pedophilia), David Lynch and John Waters.

Awesome, thank you. What are you planning to dress up as for Halloween?

Well for work I have to dress as a circus animal with a sparkle vest!

What an amazing job! You mentioned the lovely Laura Wooley introduced you to Autostraddle, yes? Can you tell that story?

Why yes! We have a mutual friend – she went to high school with them, I went to college with them – and together we visited her in Philly and she was talking about this marvelous thing called Autostraddle. I was like, ‘Wow! I should check that out!’ I hadn’t consumed much LGBT media prior to then, and Autostraddle was EXACTLY what I was looking for. It also inspired me to really be passionate about LGBT issues and I would definitely attribute it as a gateway drug into my degree.

That’s so rad! Finally, do you have anything else you’d like to share with the Autostraddle community?

You are all such wonderful people. We’re all in such an interesting moment in history, with the internet and all. When you feel isolated or alone, know that the AS community is here, and we are all over the world just waiting to give you a hug and some tea. If you are ever in Baltimore, give me a ring, and I can give you just that. I can even offer a bed and a fun time!

Awwwww. On behalf of all of us: THANK YOU!

Awwwww maybe if you visit Maryland Jill/Gilles will bake you something and wear that apron!

If you would like to be featured as a future Straddler on the Street, please email vanessa [at] autostraddle [dot] com. Include a few photos, 3-5 sentences about yourself and put “Straddler Submission” in your subject line. Approximately a million people have submitted so far, so please be patient as Vanessa goes through her inbox — you’re all sexy with really smart brains, and don’t you forget it!

Does The Gay Agenda Have Room For Transgender Rights?

Earlier this week the New York Times hosted a discussion about whether or not it makes sense to think of trans* rights and gay rights as parts of the same movement anymore. Historically, we have talked about the “LGBT movement” as if lesbian, gay and bisexual people are fighting for all the same rights and protections that transgender people are. Trans* people are often told that we already have gay pride celebrations and LGBT history month, so we don’t need things to celebrate our own history, experiences and lives. Organizations with names GLAAD (which until just this year stood for Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) and the Gay-Straight Alliance are supposed to represent us all and be safe spaces for not just lesbians, bisexuals and gay people, but also trans* people of all different sexualities. However, as they pointed out in their debate, victories are being won in the specific arena of LGB rights, including constitutional victories for same-sex marriage and the end of Don’t As Don’t Tell, trans* rights are still struggling to find a foothold. Due to this upsetting trend, and the historic erasure of trans* people’s contributions to the LGBT movement, many are left wondering if the “T” really belongs with those other letters at all.

Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera

One of the most prominent starting points of the LGBT rights movement in America is the Stonewall Riots. Unfortunately, this is also one of the starting points of the tensions between the LGB part of the community and it’s trans* counterparts. Nowadays, we know that two trans* women of color, Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson were some of the first people to fight back at Stonewall and therefore basically gave birth to the entire movement. For much of the past 50 years, however, the importance of their contributions, as well as those of other trans* women like Miss Major Griffin-Gracy, have been purposefully swept under the rug. More recently, transgender protections have been pushed aside so that LGB rights will be seen as more acceptable to mainstream society. In 2007 Barney Frank, an openly gay member of the US Congress removed transgender protections from ENDA in the hopes that that would help it pass. Several times, the gay rights group the Human Rights Campaign has come under fire for suppressing trans* voices in it’s efforts to win fights for gay rights. Most recently, they issued apologies for telling trans* activists to remove their flags from same-sex marriage rallies.

It’s not just incidents like this that make trans* people feel left out of the LGBT community, though. Many trans* people are straight, and many don’t even identify as queer. In states where you can’t change the gender marker on your birth certificate, a straight trans* woman is going to run into more issues regarding same-sex marriage than a gay trans* man. Because of this, the intense focus on same-sex marriage and even the focus that the LGB community can sometimes have on sexuality don’t resonate with many in the transgender community. Same-sex marriage is hardly a top priority when four trans* women of color have been brutally murdered in the last three months. Allowing gay people in the military isn’t a priority when the extreme poverty rate is four times higher for trans* people than it is for the general population. Many in the trans* community feel like we are still fighting to simply survive while the mainstream gay rights movement has moved on to other things we aren’t even thinking about yet.

However, these recent victories won by the LGB community have allowed for many of them to see the transgender rights movement as the “next big thing.” In recent years, and even recent months, we’ve gained many allies. On one hand, this is a welcome development. The more people fighting for trans* rights the better. On the other hand, it feels a little bit like we’re getting the table scraps that were left over after everyone was done fighting the real fight. After we win a few victories, will they move on to another, more fresh marginalized group? I want all the help I can get, but I’m not sure that I can handle fair-weather allies.

So, are trans* rights a part of the larger gay rights movement? This is a tough question for someone like me. I’m both a trans* woman and a lesbian, so both of these fights are very relevant to me and the way I live my life. For me, and the other trans* people like me, gay rights and trans* rights are both vitally necessary. I don’t want one without the other. That’s the thing that I think bothers me so much about this discussion. It, like so many other mainstream discussions about oppression, ignores the intersectionality that often exists throughout these identities. When we argue that trans* and gay rights are separate battles, we ignore the fact that many people are both. We ignore that homophobia and transphobia both have many of the same roots in sexism and racism. Many of those who want to take rights away from LGB people and trans* people want to do it because neither group fits into their idea of how men and women should act. Laverne Cox wrote in her piece for the NYT debate that the way bullies see it, there’s little difference between gay and trans* people.

When kids are bullied and called anti-gay slurs, it’s rarely because the victim seemed to be attracted to members of the same sex. It’s because the child did not conform to gender expectations based on the sex they were assigned at birth. The bullies might yell “gay,” but it’s about gender expression.

I’m definitely tired of gay, lesbian and bisexual leaders and organizations who claim to represent the lgbtq community but tell us trans* people that we have to wait our turn. I’m tired of queer “allies” who use anti-trans* slurs as if they were their own to reclaim. But I’m also tired of pretending like my trans* identity and lesbian identity are separate. While the LGB movement definitely has plenty of priorities and goals that do not apply to a lot of trans* people, many of the enemies and obstacles are the same. Gay rights and trans* rights don’t have to be tied together, but they can be. If the LGB community is going to treat trans* people as if we’re only reluctantly invited to the party then perhaps it would be better to split the letters up. However, if the LGB community steps up to the plate, recognizes all they have in common with the trans* community and puts 100% into being the kind of allies trans* people need, both sides will be better for it and rights for all of us will come a whole lot sooner.

If Joan Of Arc Can Do It, Why Can’t I?

Ever since I went to a Halloween party hosted by my friend’s church youth group in the 6th grade, I’ve been almost inseparable from my identity as a Christian. From the time I was in middle school to the time I came out as transgender on my Facebook, I could be found at church at least two days a week. I grew up in a Catholic household, but we weren’t really too involved at church. Then, our family friends, who had a Catholic father and a Baptist mother and were heavily involved in both churches, started to invite us to events at their Baptist church. Going to this church was a whole new experience for me. They had uptempo music with electric guitars and a drum set. They had a pastor who wore Hawaiian shirts and told jokes and talked about football every Sunday. Most importantly, they had a youth group that was actually fun, unlike the tedious CCD classes I was used to taking. It was here that I truly found my place in the church, it was here that I stopped saying “the church” and started saying “my church.”

Now, I never gave up my Catholic identity, I still went to mass every week for a long time and even today I go on Holy Days of Obligation. Being Catholic is too tied into my identity as a Chicana and as a member of my family to ever truly give it up. My parents raised me to believe in a loving God, one who doesn’t judge, punish or hate gay people or women or non-believers or people who have abortions. But I was constantly reminded that most of the Christians around me didn’t think that way. Whether it was my pastor saying “Now, all I’m going to say on the topic of gay marriage is that God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve,” (yes, he actually used that horrible cliche in a sermon), or it was the Pope saying that gay people shouldn’t be allowed to be parents, or it was learning that my church offered gay reparative therapy for a time, I was constantly bombarded with the idea that followers of Christ were not cool with the idea of queer people.

Because of this, whenever I had inklings that I might not fit neatly into the traditional gender binary or the heteronormative narrative that I was being taught twice a year when my church had its “Sex and Marriage” series, I would do my best to ignore those feelings and say that they were just a phase. But by the time I got to college, they were still there. I was starting to go online and do some research about trans* women. I was learning that it wasn’t so strange to feel the way I felt. I was pretty sure that I had found who I really was. But then, during my first year of college away from home, I started to feel extremely depressed and suicidal, in large part due to my dysphoria and hiding in the closet. So I decided to move back home where I knew I had a strong support system of friends and family.

When I did, I got even more involved with the Baptist Church. I became a youth group leader, I taught Sunday School, I worked at the church’s coffee bar; I was one of the most recognizable faces in the congregation. In public, I had to keep mostly quiet about my opinions on gender and sexuality, but I also knew that if I really was trans* and a lesbian, I would need to gather as many people on my side as I could. I started quietly asking around, finding out my close Christian friends’ opinions on gay marriage and other queer issues. Soon I got more bold. I started having arguments with the youth pastor about how men and women should act and dress. I taught Sunday School lessons about how the Bible said that we should accept and love gay people. I would have open discussions in the church on Sundays with members of the youth group about how the verses in the Bible about homosexuality are mistranslated and taken out of cultural context. I even started dressing and acting more femininely. I dyed my hair pink, started wearing light makeup when hanging out with certain friends and added some more androgynous pieces to my wardrobe. I wanted to see how far I could go without actually coming out as transgender.

During my genderqueer phase

By the time I decided to finally come out to everyone at church, I was the longest serving member of my church’s youth staff, helping out there for six and half years. I also taught Sunday School for close to five years and was heavily involved in many other ministries. I was prepared for all of that to come crashing down. I was pleasantly surprised at what actually happened. I got messages of support from my friends at church ranging from “Love you and support you!” to “I am happy for your faith and I will pray that God gives you continual strength!” I even got several messages from parents of the youth I had served with who said that they were proud of me and would always support me no matter what. I was overwhelmed by the support I was getting online. I thought to myself, “These people really are showing me Jesus’ love.” My fears of walking into church and being met with hatred and judgement were relieved.

That is, until I talked to one of my friends. I had worked with his mom in the youth group for years and I was extremely close to his family; I spent more time at their house than probably any place but my own house, my job and school over the past seven years. When I asked how his mom responded, I was told that she started yelling that I was accusing God of making a mistake. That I wasn’t really a woman. That I was doing something horribly wrong. That’s when my fears started coming back to me. I called up as many friends as I could to go to church with me. If there were going to be people there who would judge me and attack me, I wanted to have people there who I knew would support me and love me and back me up.

On November 4th, 2012, I put on one of my favorite blue dresses, curled my hair and spent extra time on my makeup, making sure that I wasn’t overdoing it for church. I had been in public as Melínda several times before, but it had always been at costume parties, with close friends who I was already out to, or when I went out of town. This was my first time going out in public in my hometown in front of a large group of people. By the time my friend Richell came to pick me up for church, my stomach was all the way down in my painted toenails. The first person who greeted me at church smiled, shook my hand, and called me by my birth name, giving me very mixed signals about what I should expect. After that, I started getting hugs. Parents, my friends, and members of the youth group started coming up to me, telling me how great I looked and how happy they were for me. Several people told me that they had suspected something for a long time or that they had never seen me look so comfortable- that I seemed like I was glowing.

Right before heading out to church for the first time as Mey

But not everyone was happy for me. As a part of the sermon, the pastor asked everyone to write the name of someone on a paper fish and hang it on a net on the wall. These were people that were in our lives who didn’t know God. We were put in that person’s life, our pastor told us, to show them God. One of the youth who had been learning about the Bible from me for the past four years came up to me and told me that she wrote my name, and that she was excited to be praying for me. One parent glared at me the first time we saw each other. Later during church, she looked at me and her eyes started watering. Her friend put her arm around her and gave me a dirty look as they walked away. This was a woman who worked with me on the youth staff for years and who had some children I had taught in youth group and Sunday school and other children I was best friends with. That afternoon I found out that the Pastor had talked to my brother before church and asked him if I was being serious with all this stuff or if it was just “some Halloween thing.” I’m still not really sure what he meant by that.

Over the next few weeks, I went back to church many times. Every week more and more people were supportive of me. Some people from my church even friended me on Facebook for the first time after I came out. But the leadership felt another way. The pastor asked to meet with me, saying that he wanted to talk to me about my “life journey and my worldview.” When I finally got up the courage to meet with him face-to-face, he mostly talked about how he was worried that I was a “secular humanist” who didn’t believe in God. After I assured him that I still believe in Jesus, he started talking to me about how God created marriage for one man and one woman and how some parents complained about me working with the youth, so if I wanted to keep serving in any ministry, he and I would have to have many more meetings before that could happen. He also said that he would have to talk to the church elders and parents before deciding if I was going to be allowed back. Going to church was suddenly less fulfilling and a whole lot more conditional.

At the same time that my relationship with the Baptist church I was so deeply involved with was reaching a crossroads, I was actively avoiding the Catholic church. I knew their stance on queer issues and I had less friends to support me there. The next big step for me in my transgender church experience came around Christmas time. We drove down to Los Angeles to spend the holidays with my grandparents and other relatives. Both my father’s family and mother’s family are Catholic, so even though I had been happily accepted by all of them, I was very nervous to go to Christmas Mass. I had gone to church many times as Melínda, but never to a Catholic service, let alone at a church where the only people I know are the 20 members of my family.

Queered Science: Eradicating Misogyny in the Scientific Community

Queered Science is a series of profiles meant to highlight queer scientists and tell you all about them, for your intellectual edification and so you don’t feel excluded from a predominantly heterosexist subset of academia and industry.

Currently one of the most high-profile queer scientists right now is Dr. Ben Barres, who is a professor of neurobiology, developmental biology, and neurology at the Stanford University School of Medicine. He’s important to us because he’s been vocal in the fight against misogyny in the sciences. He’s also openly transgender, and has extensively discussed his identity and his experiences with the press and the general public.

Dr. Barres was always interested in science since childhood; he remembers playing with chemistry sets, magnifying glasses — all the nerdy things he could get his hands on. He also struggled with gender since he was young: “I was kind of ostracized growing up. I was never in the “in” group. I was always sort of socially rejected. Because I was different. I really was sort of like that boy in a dress, or something.”

He originally went to MIT interested in electrical engineering, but decided to focus on neurology after a particularly inspiring class on the brain in his sophomore year. “I was very intense about my studies. I knew a lot about science, but I didn’t know a lot about other stuff. I was a typical science geek, and I really had no other interests… I was very driven. I worked seven days a week, fifteen-hour days…”

The man himself, in his lab. via ai.eecs.umich.edu

Barres has also described that he felt more comfortable in professional settings than personal ones, because at work he didn’t have to wrestle with the questions of gender identity that haunted him in his personal life. In many ways this echoes what we already know, and what Dr. Erin Cech’s work highlights: that queer students often feel a strong separation between personal and public life, and are constantly juggling a kind of “mental calculus” over where exactly that boundary lies.

“I really felt by that point that life had been so hard on me- I never feel like I really do a good job explaining what it was like, but I didn’t sleep lots of nights, I was suicidal, life was so uncomfortable. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve really enjoyed my life, but somehow it’s like it was split into two parts. The person part, which has been very uncomfortable, and the professional part that’s been a pleasure, and I’ve really enjoyed. But the personal part was just so uncomfortable that sometimes you think, ‘I’ve had enough.’ It’s that distressing.”

At 40, already well established in the science community as a woman, Barres decided to transition. “I did not understand why I was different and I was too ashamed to ever once discuss my feelings with anyone. At the age of 40 years old, I learned about transsexualism, and decided to change my sex. Even though I worried that it would seriously harm my scientific career, I found that the opportunity to become a man was irresistible.”

He says he was in denial about the presence of gender discrimination in the sciences until his transition, at which point he saw first-hand the differences in how people treated him. He tells a now-famous anecdote: after giving a talk shortly after his transition to living as a man, he overheard a colleague say, “Ben Barres gave a great seminar today, but his work is much better than his sister’s work.” This inferior “sister” was none other than Barres pre-transition, and the work being presented was the exact same work. This was an inarguable example of gendered stereotypes of scientific competency at work.

Since then, he has dedicated a significant portion of his work to eradicating misogyny in the sciences. “As is true for many successful scientists, I had never thought much about gender discrimination. It did not occur to me that it was a serious problem. After all if I could attain tenure and full professorship as a woman, why couldn’t every other woman? It didn’t occur to me to think that I just might have been lucky or that I might have been successful by being several times more productive than comparable men in my career cohort.”

Summers left Harvard amidst controversy in 2006.
via wonkette.com

In 2005, the president of Harvard, Larry Summers, gave a talk at Harvard in which he suggested that women are innately worse at science than men. Summers based much of his argument on The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature by Steven Pinker, in which Pinker states, among other things, that men are inherently “risk-taking achievers who can willingly endure discomfort in pursuit of success” and that “women are more likely to choose administrative support jobs that offer low pay in air-conditioned offices.”

Steven Pinker
via telegraph.co.uk

The puzzling non sequitur of air-conditioned offices aside, (what does that have to do with anything?), obviously we disagree, and so did Dr. Barres. He wrote a pointed counterargument called “Does Gender Matter?” published in 2006 in Nature. And just like that, Barres was famous. “This is a street fight,” he says. He pointed out that much of Pinker’s work (and many similar theories as well) is based on evolutionary psychology, a field that has for the most part been strongly trounced. Barres argues that there is no evidence, only speculations on top of speculations, that women are innately bad at science thinking. However, there is strong evidence that prejudice, latent or obvious, against minority groups significantly decreases their success.

Just as Dr. Erin Cech mentioned last time, stereotype threat plays a huge part in minorities’ success: Barres defines stereotype threat as “the fear that one’s behavior will confirm an existing stereotype of a group with which one identifies… This fear causes an impairment of performance.” So, in practical terms, it’s been proven that women perform far worse on a science test if they are reminded beforehand that women are bad at science.

via prof.chicanas.com

What’s more, the scientific community should have a huge incentive to minimize exclusion of minorities in the sciences, for its own good; white men account for eight percent of the population, but constitute far higher percentages in the sciences. And the probability of getting the best and brightest minds from that eight percent is incredibly low. The longer we go with such a limited slice of our population, the longer we are only shooting ourselves in the collective foot.

After his commentary was published in Nature, other colleagues at Harvard used slurs about his transgender status to denigrate his work. Barres reports that Harry Mansfield called him a “political fruitcake,” and Steven Pinker said that Barres had “reduced science to Oprah.” Both of these men are also professors at Harvard. Regardless of the fact that these insults are glaringly unprofessional and inappropriate to any work setting, their spluttering inability to come up with coherent objections to his work shows that they have no real support for what they’re saying. Keep in mind that Mansfield, a philosophy professor, has also stated in the past (in his 2006 book Manliness): “Is it possible to teach a women manliness and thus to become more assertive? Or is that like teaching a cat to bark?”

Obviously these guys need to revise their gender beliefs a little, and it’s disturbing that they are professors of psychology and philosophy at Harvard. They occupy positions of moral and intellectual authority, and it seems frankly irresponsible that the leaders of schools like Harvard continue to allow this kind of ignorant rhetoric from teachers and mentors. Oh, but I forgot – the president of Harvard is the one whose sexist comments started this controversy in the first place. That was dumb – but I am a woman, after all.

In general, their way of thinking is on the way out – thankfully. The vast majority of emails that Barres receives on this topic are overwhelmingly positive. Look at this one, for instance:

via Ben Barres

Things like stereotype threat and internalized prejudice don’t just apply to women, they also apply to any other minority status – like queer or trans* identities.

Barres spends a lot of time speaking openly and publicly about his transgender identity, in the hopes of supporting other LGBTQ scientists.

“I have become aware that there are many students and academics who are gay who are still closeted, even in the Bay Area, for fear of harmful repercussions to their lives and careers. I always advise them to be open about who they are, including on job interviews, and I have yet to see one not get their first choice job. Your difference is your greatest advantage. Don’t let others take your happiness away.”

He is an inspiring example of using positions of power to effect social change. While he says his colleagues at Stanford (in an open-minded and liberal part of the world, it should be noted) have been overwhelmingly supportive — not everyone is. “I am tired of powerful people using their position to demean me just because I am different from them…I will certainly not sit around silently and endure them.”

Download slides from his basic talk.

CW Developing Transgender Teen Drama, Will Hopefully Cast Actual Trans* Actor

Today, the CW is a station mainly known for fierce reality competitions, angsty vampires and overly dramatic demon-hunting brothers. That could soon change as they’re adding a completely different type of show to that lineup. The channel is currently developing a new hour-long drama focused on the life about a transgender teen growing up in Texas. This show would be the first mainstream TV show to be centered around a transgender character.

The show will be executive produced by Michael London, the producer of such movies as Thirteen, Milk and Sideways and will be written by Obie award winning playwright Kyle Jarrow. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the show will be called ZE.

Written by playwright-musician Kyle Jarrow, ZE revolves around a Texas teenager who announces that she is transgendered and will be living life as a boy. As his dysfunctional family spirals into identity crises of their own, he discovers that despite his appearance, he may be the most well-adjusted of them all.

While the initial report does fumble a bit with its terminology (using “transgendered” instead of “transgender” and using “she” to describe a trans man before he comes out), the series does seem to be approaching the issue with care. However, if the show is titled ZE, a pronoun often used for non-binary or gender neutral purposes, one has to wonder if that is the pronoun that the main character will use.

Adam Torres from Degrassi

Recently, more and more trans* characters have been getting roles on mainstream TV. There are characters like Adam Torres on Degrassi, Alexis Meade from Ugly Betty and Unique from Glee, but none of them have been the main character of a show. This will mark the first primetime television show to have its main character be transgender. Additionally, trans* actresses like Laverne Cox in Orange is the New Black and Candis Cayne on Dirty Sexy Money and Elementary have been blazing trails by having trans* characters actually be played by trans* actors and actresses. Hopefully the CW will pick up where they have left off and cast a trans* actor in the lead role and any other roles that are for trans* characters. For the popular network to put a trans* actor in a starring role like this would be a great step in transgender visibility.

The CW does have some experience with trans* people on their shows. Back in 2008, Isis King was a transgender contestant on the eleventh cycle of America’s Next Top Model. She was eliminated in week five, but later returned in America’s Next Top Model: All Stars and has since had a successful career in the modeling and fashion worlds. Another transgender model, Virgg, was featured on the current cycle of the show.

Isis King from ANTM

With the recent developments in Adam’s storyline on Degrassi and Glee’s rough track record regarding trans* issues, it’s nice to see another show featuring a transgender teen. And this time he’s not just a side character or the focus of one or two episodes; the transgender character is the focus of the show. Hopefully he won’t stand alone as the only trans* character on the show. It would be extremely refreshing to see a trans* character on TV interact with other trans* people like we so often do in real life. With any luck, ZE won’t just lead to more trans* characters on the CW. Other channels should follow the lead that CW is taking with ZE, and look at the success of Orange is the New Black, Glee and Degrassi, and see that having transgender characters shouldn’t be such a rare thing.

Trans* Rights Gain 12 Million Backers As AFL-CIO Adds Workplace Protection To Constitution

For many trans* people in the United States, finding a job where you can fit in and are treated with respect is an extremely difficult thing. Even just getting hired or keeping your current job once an employer finds out that you are trans* can prove to be impossible. While some cities and states have been passing transgender anti-discrimination bills in the past several years and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ruled in favor of a trans* person who was denied employment because of her gender identity, trans* people still struggle to find job equality in most places in America. Those who hope to see all of that change got a big boost the other day as the nation’s largest federation of unions, the AFL-CIO, added an amendment to its constitution that states that they will start to officially organize to fight for workplace protections for transgender people.

via hrc.org

The amendment, titled “Welcoming All Workers to Our Movement,” includes gender identity in its list of groups that the union group plans to work for. The new amendment states that the AFL-CIO’s goals will now include:

To encourage all workers without regard to race, creed, color, sex, national origin, religion, disability, [or] sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression to share equally in the full benefits of union organization.

Union support and legislation for transgender workers is an extremely important issue. The 2011 report “Injustice At Every Turn” painted a very grim picture for trans people in the workplace. Unemployment rates for trans* people are twice as high as the general population. When the percentage those surveyed who were unemployed is broken down by race, the picture is even more grim. While 14% of transgender people overall were unemployed, 18% of Latin@ and multiracial trans people were jobless, 24% of Native Americans were, and a terrifying 28% of Black respondents were unemployed. When trans* people are employed, the picture isn’t much better. 78% of those surveyed said that they faced direct mistreatment or discrimination on the job. Another 23% were denied promotions at their jobs because of being transgender. In what is possibly the most frightening news, 7% reported being physically assaulted at work and 6% reported being sexually assaulted at work. Again, the rates for transgender people of color are shockingly higher, with 11% of Native Americans, 14% of Black Americans and 17% of Latin@s reporting that they were sexually assaulted at work.

The AFL-CIO also strengthened its support for the Employee Non-Discrimination Act by having a vote that calls on Congress to pass the law as soon as possible. ENDA would prohibit employers from discriminating based on gender identity and sexual orientation and would be a huge step forward in LGBTQ rights. This would make sure that all workers are protected no matter what kind of local laws there are regarding workplace discrimination. It has been struggling to get through Congress since 1994, but with the power of the AFL-CIO pushing for its passage, this could be the time the it finally becomes law.

via hrc.org

It’s important to see such a powerful union stepping up to bat for transgender rights like this because so many people don’t even see it as a problem. Polls show that 73% of voters support workplace protections for LGBTQ people and a whopping 89% think that these nondiscrimination protections already exist. However, as the new report “A Broken Bargain for Transgender Workers” shows, laws currently exist in only 17 states and the District of Columbia that explicitly prevent discrimination based on gender expression or identity. Furthermore, the study recommends taking steps like “Congress should pass… the Employee Non-Discrimination Act,” “Employers should send a clear message that workplace discrimination against transgender workers will not be tolerated” and “Employers should ensure support for transitioning transgender employees.” The new amendments make all of these things priorities for the AFL-CIO. With the AFL-CIO’s support, transgender rights in the workplace are stepping into the spotlight more than ever before. According to Rea Carey, who is the executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force:

“…ninety percent of transgender people reported experiencing harassment, mistreatment or discrimination on the job… that is why it is so critical for these protections to be in place for the more than 12 million workers that are represented by the AFL-CIO. It also sends a strong message to employers and unions that transgender people need the same protections as everyone else.”

via marketplace.org

Some smaller unions, including several that are included in the AFL-CIO, have already taken the step to include transgender protections among their stated goals, and so this move was the next logical step. However, it is still a big step. The AFL-CIO represents over 50 unions and 12 million workers, and therefore millions of voters. Due to this they wield tremendous political influence and their support could shift several votes in congress on the issue of transgender rights. With more and more members of Congress supporting legislation like ENDA and more and more cities passing their own non-discrimination acts, the movement for transgender workplace and employment protection is definitely gaining a lot of strength. Hopefully the next time a report is released showing the hardships that trans* people face in the workplace, the picture will be a lot brighter.

Also.Also.Also: MJ Corey’s On The Rebound and Other Stories We Missed This Week

In the last seven days, I picked up and went to LA and Las Vegas. Here’s the stories we missed while I won big at the Elvis slot machines. (And drove through barren desert with Geneva, but that’s another story.)

You Should Give

+ Rebound: Leslie Kwon, Rex Yau, and M.J. Corey set to making a short film based on the short story Rebound. The project took us to The Metropolitan Bar, where we’ve all had crazy Wednesday (girls) nights, and with an incredible cast, we made a film about heartbreak, sisterhood, Brooklyn, gayness, awkwardness, and angst that we are proud of. If you’ve ever tried really hard to feel less alone in a crowd at a bar, you’ll feel this movie. Now, in the post-production phase, we need a final push to be able to afford primarily sound mixing, but also festival fees, gifts for donors, printing, and a few high costs leftover from production.

M.J. Corey is a former writer for AS, and she told us:

What made the movie possible at all was Autostraddle. You sent me to a Bluestockings film screening that AS had sponsored, and there I met Leslie Kwon, one of the featured filmmakers. We immediately connected and decided to make a movie together. It was like fate, and Autostraddle was literally our matchmaker.

+ OUTMusic: Support OUTMUSIC – the LGBT Academy of Recording Arts (LARA) in our quest to amplify the music of LGBTQ recording artists who sing and write the LGBTQ songs of Freedom that make up the soundtrack to the Equality Movement.

You Should Go

The P-Town Women’s Week Retreat is “a chance to focus intensely on personal writing in the company of others during an annual celebration of all things women.” Count me in! Plus, although the workshop costs $695, it’s $100 off before September 9th. Register online or by emailing info@tmiproject.org if you’ve got nothing to do from October 16-20 this year.

We’re Right Here

If you need help finding the #SmartBlackWomenonTwitter, The Root has you covered. And this week, Racialicious went ahead and compiled a list of 45 women of color in Sci-Fi / Fantasy films. So. No more excuses. Get diverse.

Gender Talk

+ Sindu was on HuffPo Live this week talking gender! Go Sindu!

+ Neko Case has some stuff to get off her chest, too.

#RaiseTheWage

Y’know, it isn’t hard to raise the minimum wage. And after 50 walkouts across the country, you’d think someone would fucking get moving on it by now.

Troublingly, five decades after the original march [on Washington] the grandchildren of those who participated are protesting for the same goal: essential economic fairness.

The problem is that the current minimum wage of $7.25 is a driving force behind the fact that one out of three Americans who work don’t earn enough to live. At minimum wage an employee earns only $15,000 a year. According to the Department of Health and Human Services, that’s the poverty level for a worker with one child.

And the minimum wage is a racial justice issue as well. Four out of 10 of those who hold these jobs are people of color.  A report by the Restaurant Opportunities Center found that three million people of color could be lifted out of poverty if the minimum wage were increased even to $10 an hour.

I Want Yr Lahv (And For That To Be Legal)

+ It’s like a horror movie for Republicans: same-sex weddings en masse in New Mexico!

+ In Pennsylvania, an attorney likened gay folks to children in an effort to make their marriages seem less valid in the public eye. But all he did was make himself look like a huge doofus, obvi. But sigh, like sands through the hourglass, so are the gays of our lives – and tomorrow, Pennsylvania begins landmark hearings on gay marriage.

+ If Walmart accepts gay relationships as real, what does that mean for everyone else in the corporate world? Besides THE DESTRUCTION OF VALUES, that is.

+ San Antonio WNBA player Sophia Young doesn’t support gay marriage. But that’s not really what people were talking about, so that’s awkward.

Very Important Business

Washington and Colorado states: enjoy a good, hearty, legal wake-n-bake for me as soon as you can. You fucking deserve it. For the rest of us:

(Oh, and young queers in England: slow down.)

Richard Cohen is a Skeezeball

He was never my favorite Cohen, anyway.

It’s A Celebration, Bitches

+ The IRS has affirmed that transition-related care is tax-deductible.

+ Diana Nyad, lesbian swimmer, has successfully completed her lifelong dream of swimming from Cuba to Florida at age 64.

Two Trans* Women of Color Murdered Within a Week; Anti-TWOC Violence Claims Even More Lives

Feature Image via dnainfo.com

Islan Nettles, a 21-year-old trans* woman of color, died from the injuries she sustained during a hate crime attack when she was taken off life support on Thursday. Nettles was attacked in Harlem by a group of men after they found out that she and her friends were transgender. Nettles is the second trans* woman of color to be murdered in the last week after Domonique Newburn was found murdered in her Fontana, California apartment on Tuesday.

Islan Nettles via dnainfo.com

Before she became the victim of a cruel and vicious hate crime, Nettles was well-liked and was often seen hanging out with a group of her transgender friends. She had worked at Harlem Children’s Zone as an assistant photographer and fashion instructor and also was working as an intern assistant designer at Ay’Medici in Harlem. She said on her LinkedIn page that she loved working in fashion.

Making my way into the Fashion industry has been my target since middle school. Fashion became a definite decision for my life after my first show with my hand designed garments in high school at the 11th grade.

Domonique Newburn via ktla.com

Newburn was also a well-loved figure in her community. She was an actress and aspiring singer who was one of the stars in the 2010 internet reality show Hollywood Houseboys about a group of gay friends trying to succeed in the entertainment industry. She had said that one of her goals was to become the first transgender person “to one day have a hit song on iTunes.”

The disturbing reality is that these kinds of crimes are not rare. Trans* women of color, and especially black trans* women, are especially vulnerable to this kind of crime. Another African American trans* woman, Diamond Williams, was horrifically murdered in Philadelphia only a month ago. These three appalling crimes in the span of just a month are sadly indicative of a larger trend. In 2011, 87% of anti-LGBTQ murder victims were people of color and 45% were transgender women. The numbers weren’t any better last year, with 73% of the victims were people of color and 53% being trans* women.

via huffingtonpost.com

When transgender women are the victims of crimes, they are often misgendered and mis-named in the news stories that report their deaths. This is despite the AP Style Book being clear on how to write about transgender people and GLAAD releasing a report titled “Doubly Victimized” about the mistreatment of transgender crime victims in the news. Additionally, in many cases the murders go unsolved. It’s sad, but trans* women often have just as much trouble finding respect in death as they had in life.

This is why it’s important that news sources use the correct pronouns, name and terminology when discussing Chelsea Manning. This is why it’s so disturbing when news anchors mock and belittle transgender students and the laws that are meant to protect them. When the mass media regularly dehumanizes trans* people in this way, it perpetuates the idea that this is an acceptable way to treat us. The news is supposed to inform viewers. And right now, what they’re “informing” them of is that trans* people are bad and different and are constantly coming up with insidious plots to spy on people in bathrooms. They are teaching their viewers that it’s okay to mock us and bully us and hate us. While great strides are being made in the fight for the equal treatment of transgender people, things are still incredibly bleak in many other areas — and the people who experience the worst part of this bleak reality are usually women, and usually of color.

Unfortunately for Islan Nettles, Domonique Newburn and the many other trans* women murdered simply for being who they are, not everyone is able to escape the transphobic culture that permeates so much of American society. Trans* women of color have to navigate a dangerous world where they face not only transphobia, but also misogyny and racism. Far too often these paths violently collide, leaving trans* women in their wake. These unnecessary tragedies are just another clear example of how much work we really have to do before any kind of equality is reached for transgender people.

Soldier Tried for Wikileaks Involvement Comes Out As Chelsea Manning

feature image via Reuters/Pawel Kopczynski

After being sentenced to 35 years in prison on a number of charges after collaborating with WikiLeaks to make classified government information public, the soldier who has ignited controversy and conversation about the difference between whistleblowing and treason has come out as Chelsea Manning, a trans woman. In Manning’s official statement made exclusively to TODAY, she thanked her supporters and talked about how she’d like to be referred to in the media and her future:

Subject: The Next Stage of My Life

I want to thank everybody who has supported me over the last three years. Throughout this long ordeal, your letters of support and encouragement have helped keep me strong. I am forever indebted to those who wrote to me, made a donation to my defense fund, or came to watch a portion of the trial. I would especially like to thank Courage to Resist and the Bradley Manning Support Network for their tireless efforts in raising awareness for my case and providing for my legal representation.

As I transition into this next phase of my life, I want everyone to know the real me. I am Chelsea Manning. I am a female. Given the way that I feel, and have felt since childhood, I want to begin hormone therapy as soon as possible. I hope that you will support me in this transition. I also request that, starting today, you refer to me by my new name and use the feminine pronoun (except in official mail to the confinement facility). I look forward to receiving letters from supporters and having the opportunity to write back.

Thank you,

Chelsea E. Manning

This isn’t a surprising announcement; based on some of the private online chats of Manning’s that were exposed during the investigation, it was implied that Manning wasn’t happy or comfortable with her gender presentation at the time, or with the prospect of the whole nation seeing her “as a boy” during the prosecution. And Manning’s gender identity was even used in her defense; Manning’s lawyers argued that the heteronormative, cissexist and DADT-compliant culture of the armed services contributed to Manning’s feelings of depression and isolation and may have been a factor in her decision to leak documents. They used an email that Manning had sent to her supervisor titled “my problem” that included a photo of Manning wearing makeup and a wig to support this argument in court. (A note: although this information has been available for some time, Autostraddle didn’t feel it was ethical to make a judgment of Manning’s gender identity based on documents she had never meant to be released publicly, and so had used masculine pronouns until today’s announcement. Feminine pronouns will of course be used for Manning from now on.)

Also unfortunately unsurprising is that many of the news outlets covering this story have been handling it very poorly, with egregious misgendering of Manning and a fundamental lack of understanding of basic facts about trans* identity. Trans Media Watch has encouraged readers to send their style guide to any publications they see engaging in problematic reporting and/or misgendering Manning. Gawker has published an article exploring the responsibility of media outlets in the wake of Manning’s sentencing and coming out:

Though the media and their sources both want to see news come to light, there is one big difference between them: the media is a powerful institution. Sources are not. Sources are disparate individuals with varying interests. The media is a vital social structure with well-established legal protections, and with the means to fight back strongly against any threats against it. “Never quarrel with a man who buys ink by the barrel,” goes the other old saying. …What this all means is that while the media and the source are equally morally responsible for the publication of a story, the media is (relatively) protected—by law, by resources, by institutional privilege, and by the ability to drum up public outrage—and the source is not protected at all, except by anonymity. If they are discovered, they are out of luck. So Chelsea Manning is sentenced to 35 years in prison, and all of the news outlets around the world that published hundreds and hundreds of stories based on the information that she disclosed shrug and carry on with their day.

While most media outlets probably won’t respond to the call to engage with Manning’s story in a politicized way, it does highlight how much Manning has given up for the information she shared. And given the fact that she’s now having to discuss her gender on a largely unforgiving global stage, it seems like very little is being asked of media outlets when she requests that they use her name and talk about her gender accurately (especially since the AP style guide already calls for this).

The prospects for Manning as she faces her prison sentence are fairly grim. As Mey outlined, trans women are rarely afforded the right to be imprisoned with other women, which Manning reminds us of as she asks supporters to use her former name when sending mail to her confinement facility. Although Manning expressed a desire to start hormone therapy in her statement, the Army has stated they won’t provide it, and it seems unlikely she’ll be allowed to be housed in a women’s prison. The ACLU has already issued a statement on the Army’s policy in this case, saying:

In response to Chelsea Manning’s disclosure that she is female, has been diagnosed with gender dysphoria and will be seeking hormone therapy as a part of her transition during her incarceration, public statements by military officials that the Army does not provide hormone therapy to treat gender dysphoria raise serious constitutional concerns.

If the ACLU moves forward with their case that denying Manning hormone therapy may be unconstitutional, Manning’s case could become groundbreaking in another way; as the most high-profile incarcerated trans woman in America, and possibly providing precedents that would be helpful to incarcerated trans women who aren’t household names, like CeCe McDonald.

Hopefully, Manning’s supporters — from the numerous support sites and blogs started in her name to the people who protested outside her sentencing — will continue to support her, and to petition Obama for her pardon. As of right now, it’s unclear whether they’ll continue to stand by her. Bradleymanning.org has posted a story titled “Heroic whistle-blower addresses gender publicly: ready to move on to next phase of her life,” which contains Manning’s statement and uses her correct pronouns, but the site overall still contains many references to the name Bradley and masculine pronouns. The Free Bradley Manning Facebook page has not updated its name or pronouns and hasn’t made any comment since Manning’s announcement.

Chelsea Manning’s future in a confinement facility doesn’t look bright. Efforts to get Obama to pardon her are unlikely to succeed, and even if she doesn’t serve her entire 35-year-sentence, she will probably be in prison for the next 7-10 years. There is no reason to believe that her gender identity will be respected or acknowledged in prison, or that she will be able to access the medical treatment she’s asked for. But at least Manning, whose freedom has been restricted for so long now and will continue to be, has been able to tell this truth on her own terms.

Binary or Blank: Germany Allows Parents to Refrain From Gender Assignment at Birth

Beginning this November, parents in Germany will be able to opt out of designating their children “male” or “female” at birth. The new law allows the gender field on birth certificates to be left blank, leaving it up to the individual to choose whether to identify as male, female or neither later on in life.

The German Federal Constitutional Court earlier ruled that being able to legally identify as one’s “deeply felt and lived” gender is a personal right.

Imagine all the colours we could have! (via Sutanta Aditya / AFP)

While the law will primarily affect intersex people, it is likely to also have effects in areas of legislation affecting trans* people, including “comprehensive reform” of registration rules for other legal documents such as ID cards and passports that presently restrict gender options to “M” or “F.” German family law publication FamRZ has recommended the introduction of a third gender category designated by “X”, partly to circumvent difficulties intersex and trans* individuals might encounter travelling overseas.

Marriage law is another major area that has been identified as set for reform. Marriage in Germany is defined as between a man and a woman, while same-sex couples can apply for civil partnerships. Neither arrangement has provisions for non-binary-identified individuals.

Germany is the first country in Europe to make this step in recognition of non-binary genders. While Finland has similarly made “significant progress” in this area, no concrete legislative change has yet been made. Australia is commonly cited as the first country to allow passport holders to use “X” (meaning “indetermined/unspecified/intersex”) in 2011, followed shortly by New Zealand in 2012, though hijras in India and Pakistan have been granted legal recognition since 2005 and 2009 respectively.

In June 2012, the European Commission released a report titled “Trans and Intersex People: Discrimination on the Grounds of Sex, Gender Identity and Gender Expression” which found that discrimination is still widespread in all EU countries, with “negative attitudes towards trans and intersex people […] often directly correlated to the importance that a determinate society places on the binary gender model.” It noted that the situation was made particularly complex as “legal recognition and rights afforded to this community are often intertwined with specific medical and psychological obligatory requirements,” and explored the dissonance between rigid laws and the actual lived experiences/choices of trans* and intersex people.

Silvian Agius, a co-author of the report, has expressed his frustration with the EU’s lack of progress since then.

According to Silvan Agius, policy director at human rights organisation ILGA Europe – the European chapter of the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association – the European Union is lagging behind on the issue. Though Brussels commissioned a report on trans and intersex minorities in 2010, and has since attempted to coordinate efforts to prohibit gender discrimination, progress has been halting.

“Things are moving slower than they should at the European level,” says Agius. “Though Brussels has ramped up efforts to promote awareness of trans and intersex discrimination, I would like to see things speed up.”

EU non-discrimination law still does not explicitly recognise gender identity or expression, though those who have undergone or are intending to undergo gender-confirming surgery may be protected by provisions on discrimination on the grounds of sex. Proponents of Germany’s new law, however, are optimistic that this move will place pressure on Brussels and perhaps other EU member-states to step up protections and provisions for trans* and intersex people.

Fox News, CNN Show Their Transphobic Colors In Response To California’s Transgender Student Bill

Feature Image via Archive.org

The Right couldn’t even wait one day before turning the great story about California passing a law protecting transgender students into an excuse for rampant transphobic fear-mongering. Instead of bringing in actual experts on the issue, both Fox News and CNN decided to showcase people who either openly admitted that they didn’t know what they were talking about or let that be known as soon as they started spouting “facts” about transgender people.

CNN, in a completely puzzling move, decided to invite Randy Thomasson to speak alongside Masen Davis about the issue. Davis is the Executive Director of the Transgender Law Center, one of the groups that backed the bill and lobbied for it. He and his organization have been working closely with this issue for a long time. Thomasson, on the other hand, is the President of Save California, which is listed as an Active Anti-Gay Hate Group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. He is not a legal expert; he is not a psychologist or gender specialist. It seems the only reason CNN would invite the leader of an actual hate group on and not identifying him as such is to hope that he would make inflammatory remarks. Well, Thomasson certainly didn’t let them down.

Thomasson immediately started misgendering these hypothetical trans* students, talking about “biological boys” and “girl’s basketball teams [allowing] boys that say they want to be on it.” Next he tossed out a term that doesn’t really mean anything but is sure to ruffle some feathers when he said that in California, they are considering “nine other sexual indoctrination laws.” But that was just the beginning. Thomasson really went off the rails when he was asked what he would do if he had a child who said that they were transgender.

Well if a child is sexually confused, they need professional counseling. Lots of children are being molested in America, lots of children are being abandoned by one or the other parent and that creates a problem with the child’s expectations in the child’s mind and so a child that is being sexually confused, they need professional counseling.

Thomasson’s terminology alone is confusing as he seems to think that being transgender is related to sexuality. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. His claim that trans* people are the way they are because of sexual abuse or lack of heteronormative parental guidance is so outdated and backwards that it’s hard to believe he’s being taken seriously by a major news network. By allowing him to be the spokesman for those who oppose this law, CNN is giving a stage to very dangerous misinformation and presenting it as news.

The next highlight in Thomasson’s complete and fundamental misunderstanding of who transgender people are came when he said that trans* people aren’t covered by the 1964 Civil Rights Act because being trans* isn’t an “immutable characteristic” and “if you are changing away from your xx chromosome or xy chromosome, your natural gender, if you’re changing away from that with the scalpel of a doctor, that is not deserving of a civil right.” There is so much wrong with that statement. Being trans* isn’t about trying to change an innate characteristic of yourself, it’s about being your true self and living your life authentically. Then he talks about “natural gender” as if it is the same thing as what chromosomes you have when it is really more about socially constructed roles, behaviors and attributes. And not only do many trans* people never get any kind of surgery, but according to science, you absolutely cannot change your chromosomes with a scalpel. Being the class act that he is, Thomasson signed off by misgendering Davis, a trans man, by saying “Hey, good to talk to you ladies.”

CNN didn’t stop there. On the show CNN Newsroom, they jumped right into the pot-stirring with a clip showing a worried mother of a nine-year-old girl saying “she could potentially have a 14-year-old boy walking in on her in the bathroom.” And again, they have non-experts speaking on the issue. CNN legal analyst Paul Callan said “when I hear that a first grader is a girl trapped in a boy’s body or vice versa… I wonder if the science sort of has kept up with where society is on this issue.” In fact, science has already said that transgender youth should be supported and allowed to explore their gender. The American Psychological Association has said that if a parent has a gender nonconforming child, they should work with their schools to ensure the child’s safety and that “It is not helpful to force the child to act in a more gender-conforming way.” He jumped on the misgendering bandwagon by agreeing that people should be upset “if they thought their first grade child, girl, was going to be in the bathroom with a boy who thinks he’s a girl.”

Not to be outdone, Fox News gathered up a whole army of pundits ready to misgender and spread misinformation and transphobia. But where CNN brought people on who pretended to be experts, the pundits on Fox openly admitted their ignorance. Sean Hannity said that when he was a kid he “didn’t know anything about this, I still don’t for the most part.” On Fox and Friends, Clayton Morris said that he didn’t even know what a transgender student was while Gretchen Carlson admitted that she “just can’t get [her] head around this.”

On Hannity’s show, he and conservative radio host Dana Loesch compared trans* students’ struggles with Loesch’s dream as a five-year-old that she wanted to be a flower. Hannity also came up with an unrealistic and misgendering situation where “the seven-year-old girl that goes into the locker room and there’s the 14-year-old boy naked in the girls’ locker room because that’s where he chooses to be.” It’s so strange how much those on the Right keep on focusing on this problem of people being in the wrong bathrooms or locker rooms, because that’s exactly what this bill prevents. If this bill hadn’t been passed, young trans* men would be forced to either use completely separate bathrooms or would have to use the girls’ bathroom. Similarly, young trans* women would be forced to get changed in the boys’ locker room. Those are the situations where someone is in the wrong locker room and is vulnerable to real danger, not when trans* people are allowed to be who they are.

It’s Fox and Friends who lives up to their reputation and takes the cake, though. They opened their coverage with a very tasteful graphic of a police car, sirens wailing, lights flashing pulling up to big letters that spelled out “PC Police.” This was followed up by a panicked-looking Michelle Malkin calling the bill “social engineering run amok” and saying it would lead to a lawless world where “transgender is defined anyway they want to! As long as a child has the self perception they are transgender they will be able to go into any bathroom that they want!” Well, that’s not true: A trans* woman shouldn’t be allowed in a boys’ locker room and a trans* man shouldn’t be allowed in a girls bathroom. Once again, the conservative commentator demonstrated a fundamental misunderstanding of the situation at hand.

Gretchen Carlson joined in with the idea that students like to pull pranks and might take advantage when “the boys want to go into the girls bathroom and the girls want to go into the boys bathroom and they can just say ‘oh i was just transgender for the moment!'” Ah yes, that classic prank where children purposefully uproot their life, potentially alienating their friends and getting kicked out of their homes, putting themselves in danger of being harassed, assaulted and murdered. As many trans* people know, convincing your parents that you are actually trans* and not just “going through a phase” is not not the easiest thing in the world. And facing your peers for the first time after coming out can be just as difficult, and even more dangerous. It’s difficult to imagine a real situation in which children would engage with these experiences for fun.

Now, I don’t expect every single person to be an expert on trans* issues and know all the correct terminology to use. I’m willing to cut people some slack. But these are people claiming to be experts on the issue, these are people who are supposed to be delivering the news. It’s their job to know, it’s their job to do the research. They really have no excuse to be spreading this kind of misinformation and transphobia and pretending that it’s the informed opinion of professionals or actual news. It is neither. What it ultimately is is ignorant and outdated opinions and dangerous ideas that lead to real-life crimes and abuses against trans* people.

California Becomes First To Pass Law Requiring Trans* Students Treated Equally, Because Humanity

Feature image via www.glaad.org

Back in July, we talked about California Assembly Bill 1266, which was facing some opposition as it moved through the California State Senate and Assembly. The bill states that within the California School System,

A pupil shall be permitted to participate in sex-segregated school programs and activities, including athletic teams and competitions, and use facilities consistent with his or her gender identity, irrespective of the gender listed on the pupil’s records.

Despite critics who were shocked that trans* students might get to use the same locker rooms as their cisgender peers, the bill was recently brought to the desk of California Governor Jerry Brown and in a major victory for transgender rights, he signed AB 1266 into law today. This is the first law in the country to require public schools to respect the gender identities of its students and treat them equally when it comes to athletics, activities and facilities including bathrooms and locker rooms. This means that every student who dreamed of playing sports or being in a school club that confirms their true gender has that chance. Every trans* student who wanted to use the bathroom in peace or get changed in the correct locker room is going to be able to. Students who need to pass Physical Education classes in order to graduate won’t be discriminated against. In short, this bill mandates that trans* students should finally get the support from their schools that cis students have been getting all along.

Gov. Jerry Brown
via latimesblogs

While other states like Massachusetts and Colorado have statewide policies with similar goals, this is the first actual law to address the problem. The bill was co-authored by Senators Mark Leno and Ricardo Lara and Assembly Member Toni Atkins and had the backing of many LGBTQ and human rights groups including the ACLU, The Transgender Law Center, the Gay-Straight Alliance Network and Equality California. Transgender students, such as Calen Valencia, an 18-year-old from Tulare, are lauding the move by Governor Brown and the California Assembly.

I’m so excited that California is making sure transgender students have a fair chance to graduate and succeed. I should have graduated this year, but my school refused to give me the same opportunity to succeed as other boys. Now other transgender youth won’t have to choose between being themselves and graduating high school.

via transgenderlawcenter.org

Laws like this are desperately needed because even though many states already have laws against discrimination within public schools, they don’t necessarily include gender identity or presentation, and transgender youth have continued to face an uphill battle to get a fair chance to succeed. Many trans* students already have a difficult time gaining acceptance from their families, with one in five being homeless at some point during their youth. School should be a place where they know they will be safe and supported. This, however, is often not the case. 78% of transgender students in grades K-12 have reported harassment, 35% physical assault and 12% have reported sexual violence in school, with a shocking 15% having to leave school due to discrimination they faced for being trans*.

Getting your sex changed on official documents is a long and expensive process in many states, and in others it’s not even possible. So it’s very important that schools will be focusing on the gender identity of students, who are often too young to have had the chance to change their documents and fix the inaccurate “F” or “M” it says on their records. With the passing of this bill, the future is looking better for transgender students. It remains to be seen how schools will respond to the policy and how consistently it will be enforced, but it’s undoubtedly a step forward. This law and the similar policies in other states are hopefully just the first in a trend of nationwide protections for trans* youth both in public schools and in other areas of society.

Mira Bellwether and “Fucking Trans Women” Zine: The Autostraddle Interview

“Here be dragons and sea monsters, my fellow genital cartographers, and we have a lot to learn from poking them.” – Fucking Trans Women #0

I’ve read a lot of zines in my life, and I’ve enjoyed most of them. I don’t know if I can honestly say that any one zine has impacted my life as much as Fucking Trans Women #0. It was put out in October, 2010 by Mira Bellwether. Fucking Trans Women has had a massive impact on my understanding of what queer women’s sexuality could look like in general, and a glimpse of the potential for my own sexuality as a queer trans woman.

Bellwether asks a bevy of questions in FTW, which range in scope and scientificness from “How do you court someone?” to “Which nerves run through a pre-operative trans woman’s genitals, and how can all four of them be stimulated at once?” The answers are provided with a combination of lucid narrative and the author’s own diagrams.

I think that may be the best way, actually, to explain exactly how fresh and needed this zine is: there were simply no extant diagrams or information for some of the sex acts and uses for certain body parts explored in FTW by Bellwether, and so she had to draw them herself.

The zine’s focus on the bodies of pre- and non-op trans women, and how these bodies move in bed, was revelatory. Reading FTW provided perhaps my first glimpse into an understanding of trans women’s bodies, like mine, not as incomplete projects or disturbing visions, but as always already carrying the capacity to be beautiful, the potential to be sexual and sexy. It also taught me about the ilioinguinal nerve branch, which is fun to talk about both softly in bed and loudly in public spaces.

I had a lot of questions for Mira floating around for years, and so I finally decided to ask them.

What’s your briefest synopsis of Fucking Trans Women?

Fucking Trans Women is, at its heart, a how-to manual, and the finished product is good sex.

I wanted to stress the biological facts of our bodies. We have to build a very basic vocabulary and common understanding in terms like, “this spot has lots of nerves running through it. This part likes pressure, this part likes stroking, this other part can do X, Y, and Z.” If you keep sex at the conceptual level, I think you find that it’s not as rewarding as you want it to be. In order to have good sex, I think we have to acknowledge our bodies, come to terms with them as they are, and be able to inhabit them. In other words, to be immanent rather than transcendent.

One of the reasons this zine happened was that I got really sick of explaining things and teaching my lovers about my body during time that should have been spent having sex. When one of my lovers said that she wished she had an instruction manual for my body, I took that and responded to it pretty literally.

Even at 80 pages, there’s still so much more to talk about.

Definitely. One aspect of your zine I found interesting was how many hints you drop about topics you want to address in the future. For instance, one of my favorite lines in the entire zine was actually scribbled in the margins of the introduction: “we deserve to have sex without it becoming a gender studies class.” Can you explicate this line further?

So much of what I read about sex and what I have seen out in the world stresses one point over and over to the point where it’s completely useless: communication. Yes, communication is important. Yes, we need to learn how to talk about our bodies. But one of the most common issues I hear about from other trans women is over-thinking everything, and being too preoccupied with our bodies to really enjoy sex.

I have a sort of mantra that I repeat to myself: if you’re in your head, you’re not in your body.

The more preoccupied or even obsessed you are with the ways in which you are NOT connecting with your body, the less you will be able to enjoy or even experience the ways in which you DO connect with your body.

I can imagine that some trans women reading your zine felt that the way they connect with their bodies is not the way you connect with yours, especially when it comes to terminology used for certain body parts. Have you received any criticism of Fucking Trans Women along those lines?

Yeah, the one criticism of Fucking Trans Women that has stuck out has essentially been, “my body doesn’t work that way.” But I don’t think I made any claims that I was describing the experiences of all trans women, so I have pretty much just said “okay” to those people.

For instance, I have a section on muffing. I’ve heard from more than a few trans women who say it’s just not their cup of tea, and that’s totally understandable and fine. I’m not invested in every one of us muffing, but I am excited when I hear from other trans women who have gotten a lot out of it.

Looking back on it now, I can see some places where I pulled my punches a little, said things a little more cautiously than I would now. I would call my penis my penis, my cock my cock. I stand by what I said in regards to it sometimes feeling more like a clit, but there are many times when I feel perfectly at home with having a penis.

That’s an okay thing to say. It isn’t everybody’s story, but it’s my story.

Right – we all have different stories. Some of what I consider the best parts of Fucking Trans Women serve as a road map to a body that not many people know what to do with, especially because those road maps and bodies can look very different. I’ve found myself in that exact position quite a few times over the years, especially before reading your zine.

Which position is that?

People would ask me: “So what are you into, where do you like to be touched?” and I could only ever respond, “I don’t know. I haven’t the slightest clue.” I lacked sexual agency, at the time, because I lacked the knowledge that necessarily precedes agency.

That sounds familiar. We as trans women often think of our bodies in a very metaphorical way or sometimes an instrumental way, like something we are driving or piloting rather than being in, of, and part of.

I think this is why sex has the potential to be so important for trans women: good sex can make you feel really present in your body, and part of being trans is that we frequently don’t experience presence and embodiment as much as we’d like to. Granted that not all trans women are interested in sex — for those of us who are, it can be uniquely empowering when done right.

I think it’s one of the most important things we can do to feel more connected, more whole, more sane, as women.

Given the extent to which our bodies interface with society’s varied (usually negative) impressions of us, I like how the word ‘fucking’ in Fucking Trans Women works equally well as a verb and as an adjective. In the former sense, Fucking Trans Women serves as a how-to guide, like ‘riding motorcycles,’ ‘flirting with cuties.’ In the latter sense, Fucking Trans Women depicts one of the possibilities for what it can look like when we, as trans women, fuck in a way that maintains, rather than erodes, our agency and bodily sovereignty. The sort of conversation we are having now, about the way trans women fuck, has a pretty messed up context. It’s rare for a public conversation about what trans women do in bed to have a vocabulary and grammar that we decide upon.

The basic distinction between how we’re portrayed as sexual beings is captured pretty well in the phrase “evil deceivers and make-believers,” which is the title of a piece by Talia Mae Bettcher. In most media we’re either cast as sexual predators who prey on unsuspecting men (hence “trap,” the disgusting slur that’s given to those of us who mostly pass as cis women or are taken to be cis women), or we’re looked down upon as objects of pity who do not and could not pass as women at all, who couldn’t conceivably even HAVE a sex life.

I like to think of this as the eunuch/pervert construct. We’re not presented as one or the other, but usually, paradoxically, both at the same time.

We have some vocabulary for this, including “transmisogyny.” I think it’s an important stereotype to be aware of and an important one to work against. You could say that FTW is an indirect response to negative depictions of our sexuality, simply by virtue of its existence: rather than focusing on how we relate or don’t relate to the presumed sexual and biological norm, FTW focuses on OUR bodies, on OUR sex lives. However, that’s not my main project in Fucking Trans Women, at least not directly. I’m more interested in our actual sex lives than I am in how they’re depicted by the largely ignorant and fearful media. I wanted to speak to aspects of our sexuality that are almost never given any attention in media whatsoever: those of us who enjoy sex with other women, trans and otherwise, and some of the difficulties (as well as unique pleasures) of trans women having sex with cis women.

I think that maybe the first step in either fucking a trans woman or being a trans woman who is fucking is to understand that we are innervated differently, that we are fundamentally different from men.

I used to be quite a skeptic on this subject because I didn’t want to believe that men’s and women’s bodies were all that different. What I’ve come to understand is that hormones affect our entire bodies, from the skin to the heart to the brain to the genitals, and in this sense we are WILDLY different from men of any type.

We have the same nerves as everyone else, which includes cis women, but our brains interpret them differently, I think. Our subjective experience does not match up with cis men very well at all.

As far as how the bodies of trans women are different, how our sex lives are different, I think the right way to think about that topic is actually in terms of our similarities to other women, punctuated with a few notable differences.

Which similarities come to mind?

The basic structure of the penis and the clitoris, for example, is very similar, and the distribution of nerve endings is roughly the same, whatever you may have erroneously heard from The Vagina Monologues: we have the same number of nerve endings, they’re simply spread out a bit more.

Who is FTW written for? Just trans women, or also those with bodies different from ours?

I think EVERYONE should read FTW. Trans women, cis women, all kinds of men and everyone else, as well. Even if you aren’t a trans woman, even if you have absolutely no interest in fucking trans women, I think it’s still worth reading because it has a lot to say about sex in general as well as the specifics of how trans women have sex.

You should read this because it might give you some insight into what’s going on with trans women you know. You should read this because it has a lot to say about — yes, I’m going to use that dreaded word — phallocentrism. And even though the focus is on bodies that are somewhat different from yours, there are still, by and large, more similarities than differences. But the way we interpret signals from those shared nerves and body parts, and the way sensation is changed by hormones, are unique to us. It’s just essential to know where your own buttons really are, and the truth of the matter is that, for all of us, they are more numerous and more diverse than we usually think.

Besides the cissexist way people often compare us to cis men instead of cis women as a baseline for understanding us, are there any other cisconceptions you’d like to address?

That trans women like to have sex any one specific way. We like to have sex in a wide variety of ways, some of which are unique to us or are better suited to our bodies.

For instance, vaginal intercourse involving the penis is popular with some trans women, but I wouldn’t by any means say the majority of us. I think that cis women, in particular queer cis women, often fear that having sex with us will be more like having sex with a straight man than having sex with another queer woman, and in my experience and from all accounts I’ve gathered, that’s just not the case. If there’s PIV (penis in vagina) going on, it’s probably occasional, and is probably not the main source of sexual pleasure.

One thing that I really tried to capture in FTW was that there are all sorts of ways to pleasure trans women. I gave a lot of time to soft penises for this reason, because in sexual literature they are almost completely ignored, and if they’re not ignored, they’re treated as defective or at rest or, even worse, an object of pity or scorn.

Earlier, you mentioned ‘phallocentrism’ as being a dreaded word. Can you speak more to phallocentrism and the terms origin in feminist discourse?

Well, I think that historically feminism in combination with sex is not a very safe bet — you’re as likely to read something awful and unhelpful as you are to read something mind-blowing, and that’s particularly true of vocabulary that emerged out of feminist theory in the late 70s. But phallocentrism is still an important concept to understand, especially taken quite literally. Especially for trans women: many of us have, biologically speaking, penises, and also experience erections less frequently. I think one of the ideas in FTW that I’m the most proud of is that the penis can be an organ for receiving pleasure in any state.

Your zine also covers a few ways that some trans women fuck which are unique to us. You mentioned muffing before.

I think it’s a sexual practice that is useful to a lot of trans women, even if it isn’t *unique* to trans women. To briefly explain for those who haven’t read the zine, muffing is the process of pushing the testicles back inside the body into the inguinal canals and/or penetrating the inguinal canals with one’s fingers or another object. If it sounds tricky that’s because it can be: it requires practice, a certain amount of flexibility, and patience.

Perhaps the most exciting thing about muffing to me has been that, before FTW, there was literally no language to describe the pleasurable act of being fucked in this particular way. It is a delicate and sensitive area, and the act of muffing comes more naturally to some than others. In my own sex life it was something of a revelation: that I could be penetrated in a way that is (mostly) unique to trans women’s bodies is a pretty exciting thing, and makes me feel proud of my body’s differences.

I think it’s fascinating that this language didn’t exist before. In the conclusion of the first issue, you mentioned the possibility of more to come, new topics, new issues of the zine.

Yes, there are future plans for at least one more issue of FTW. I’m interested, in the long-term, in collecting other trans women’s recipes into a sexual cookbook, a community cookbook for sex.

Miranda Bellwether

Do you disagree now with anything you wrote, considering that the zine was first published three years ago?

Old writing can often be troublesome to a writer because of our internal editors, who always want to update and correct everything. But I still agree with the overall thrust of what I was saying.

I still think we need to find ways to connect with our bodies as best we can,
I still think it’s important to make sex enjoyable and not an exercise in mental self-torture.
I still think that understanding our bodies as they are is a key component to enjoyable sex.
You have to know where your own buttons are. Without that, communication is almost worthless.

Anything you’d like to say in closing, especially to trans women who are reading this?

I hope trans women take away from the zine the idea we can all write our own recipes.
We can all write our own instruction manuals.

Purchase Fucking Trans Women #0 and check for future updates.

Kennedy Nadler is a queer trans person living in Brooklyn. She writes poems on planks of wood, on strange paper, and on skin. She’s getting over an embarrassing hobby of watching too many rap battles on youtube, and has now moved on to the only slightly less embarrassing hobby of pinball.

The Army Taught Me That I Can Change My Body (And It Will Still Be Mine)

feature image via Shutterstock

The first spring after I arrived home from Iraq I was in a long argument with a dear friend. This fight had been building for weeks and it finally managed to get ugly over a phone call. We worked together for an organization and the fight was over minor stuff, mainly about how the organization was treating LGBT people. It just hadn’t been processed right over the past year, the sort of thing that happens when two fairly polite individuals don’t take time to point out or apologize for small grievances. It happens.

But still, it got ugly. He ended the call by saying something like, “I don’t think you actually have as full an understanding of this situation as you think you do, and you know what, I don’t believe you’re actually a woman trapped in a man’s body!”

We hadn’t been arguing about anything relating to my being trans, but that just got thrown in. Sometimes when people don’t agree with me, this happens. I have a habit of talking politics (sometimes even with folks who don’t believe all the same things I do) and when some folks want to point out how deeply foolish I really am – how poorly I perceive the world – they’ll throw it a reference to the “woman trapped in a man’s body” thing.

But here’s the thing: I have never used that term to describe myself. I’ve used a lot of different narratives to try to understand and to talk about my transness – everything from Bruce Banner’s irradiated metamorphosis to the Hulk to Cinderella being magiced into a princess to that scene in the ’80s Transformers movie where the devil planet Unicron creates Galvatron from the ruined Megatron to New Testament language about how in Christ I am a new creation. I’ve thrown a lot of metaphors out there, but never that one.

There’s also, I believe, this assumption that all trans people, especially trans women, hate our bodies and are oddly and perhaps dysfunctionally disconnected from our physical forms. That plays into this idea seen in so many dramatic Hollywood shock reveals that trans bodies are inherently horrifying.

But here’s the deal: I both like and am my body. I am a girl, ergo I have a girl’s body. It’s neat. You know what I think helped me to be comfortable with my body more than anything else?

The US Army.

Back when I enlisted as a teenager, I was an unhappy chick. I was in the neighborhood of thirty pounds overweight, lonely, and quietly miserable. Going off to Basic at Ft. Jackson sounded like an absolute impossibility. When I arrived at Basic, I was a mess. By the skin of my teeth I passed the intro physical fitness test, but I kept falling out of runs and not being able to do enough push ups or pulls ups. One day outside of the mini-PX where we were sent to buy washcloths, soap and cough drops, two of the drill sergeants grabbed me and tore me apart for about fifteen minutes over my weight, my slowness and my supposed love of McDonald’s (a place, so we’re clear, that I’ve always thought was gross). During that extended process of my standing stock still as my entire character was hammered away by the drills, I happened to have a thought: I need a body that can run faster.

Then I realized that I could simply take this body that I already have and am, and make it a body that runs faster.

In knowing my body as a thing that belongs to me, that is mine to change or upgrade or mark or piece or whatever, I felt very free. Before I started passing my Army Physical Fitness Tests I wasn’t a soldier trapped in the body of a civilian, I was just a crummy runner. By doing the right work, I have the ability to change my body to be what I wanted it to be.

It isn’t always easy. Both my transition in the military and to living out as woman were both marked occasionally by middle aged men screaming at me. And sometimes there are limits, limits where it is an effort to find a workaround. Still, it’s my body and I can do with it what I please. I can make it run faster, I can make it look prettier. Because it’s mine, because it’s me, I get to choose.

And that’s awesome.

Special Note: Autostraddle’s “First Person” personal essays do not necessarily reflect the ideals of Autostraddle or its editors, nor do any First Person writers intend to speak on behalf of anyone other than themselves. First Person writers are simply speaking honestly from their own hearts.