Video: Renee Richards, physician and athlete
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Thriller with a Message
by Sunny Burns
Dee McLachlan (third from left) hopes the audience realises the types of cities we’re really living in.
The sinister workings of illegal prostitution have burdened our detention centres and courts for many years. Since the recent uncovering of sex trafficking in Australia, transsexual director and writer Dee McLachlan has embarked on a creative journey to tackle the issue.
Her latest film, The Jammed,captures the true essence of Melbourne and Sydney’s sex trade.
“I once read that 40 girls were being held captive in Kew – an upper class suburb of Melbourne. I was in such disbelief that a thing like this was possible,” McLachlan said.
“My script is mild compared to what really goes on. A large percentage of the girls don’t know that they’re coming to Australia to become prostitutes and they’re treated like dirt.
“I remember reading one transcript where a girl was repeatedly raped until she was broken in and agreed to do it. Some girls who refuse are locked away for weeks on end and fed pizza under the door.”
McLachlan said the demand for prostitutes in Australia and the lack of local girls willing to go into the business were key reasons why women were trafficked into the country and forced to serve as sex slaves. She said the problem was more pronounced in America where up to 50,000 women a year are illegally brought in to work as prostitutes.
“Our government is in denial. It’s much easier to deport them than to sort out the problems and see them as victims,” McLachlan said. “Many don’t testify because they fear the consequences and retribution on their family.
“Some girls won’t testify even with [a 30-day temporary] visa. They say, ‘Why should we help you and get our lives threatened at the other end?’ Other countries have amended the laws and the victims get residency and protection, which helps when testifying.”
McLachlan said The Jammed took just 19 days to film. The script centres on a Chinese mother who comes to Australia to find her missing daughter. She enlists the help of an innocent bystander and together they rescue three girls from a trafficking syndicate.
It is a graphic and confronting film, which contains rape and physical abuse scenes. But it is also an emotional movie that taps into the strength of relationships, desperation and a need to survive. . . .
Dee McLachlan (third from left) hopes the audience realises the types of cities we’re really living in.
The sinister workings of illegal prostitution have burdened our detention centres and courts for many years. Since the recent uncovering of sex trafficking in Australia, transsexual director and writer Dee McLachlan has embarked on a creative journey to tackle the issue.
Her latest film, The Jammed,captures the true essence of Melbourne and Sydney’s sex trade.
“I once read that 40 girls were being held captive in Kew – an upper class suburb of Melbourne. I was in such disbelief that a thing like this was possible,” McLachlan said.
“My script is mild compared to what really goes on. A large percentage of the girls don’t know that they’re coming to Australia to become prostitutes and they’re treated like dirt.
“I remember reading one transcript where a girl was repeatedly raped until she was broken in and agreed to do it. Some girls who refuse are locked away for weeks on end and fed pizza under the door.”
McLachlan said the demand for prostitutes in Australia and the lack of local girls willing to go into the business were key reasons why women were trafficked into the country and forced to serve as sex slaves. She said the problem was more pronounced in America where up to 50,000 women a year are illegally brought in to work as prostitutes.
“Our government is in denial. It’s much easier to deport them than to sort out the problems and see them as victims,” McLachlan said. “Many don’t testify because they fear the consequences and retribution on their family.
“Some girls won’t testify even with [a 30-day temporary] visa. They say, ‘Why should we help you and get our lives threatened at the other end?’ Other countries have amended the laws and the victims get residency and protection, which helps when testifying.”
McLachlan said The Jammed took just 19 days to film. The script centres on a Chinese mother who comes to Australia to find her missing daughter. She enlists the help of an innocent bystander and together they rescue three girls from a trafficking syndicate.
It is a graphic and confronting film, which contains rape and physical abuse scenes. But it is also an emotional movie that taps into the strength of relationships, desperation and a need to survive. . . .
Trans Health Conference Sept. 5-8, 2007
The theme of the conference is “Looking to the Future: Environment, Transplantation, Telepsychiatry.” Among the forums to be discussed at the symposium are “On the Calculation of the Prevalence of Transsexualism” and “The Impacts of Gender Policy in Athletics.” See www.wpath.org for more info. |
UK: BBC3 commissions new teen transexual documentary
29th August 2007 17.20
Gemma Pritchard
BBC3 has commissioned eight documentaries for its third Body Image season, including the story of an 18-year-old trans woman who travels to Thailand to undergo genital surgery.
BBC3 will follow up last season's Lucy: Teen Transsexual with Lucy: Teen Transsexual in Thailand, which continues the story of 18-year-old Lucy Parker as she travels to Thailand to undergo male-to-female genital reconstruction surgery to bring her body into harmony with her gender identity.
Lucy has already undergone two years of hormone treatment, psychological analysis and surgery, making her one of Britain's youngest transsexual women.
The cameras will follow her throughout her surgery in Thailand and painful recovery.
It is one of three documentaries in the season made by UK production company Endemol's Brighter Pictures.
Brighter Pictures has also made Danny: My Secret Female Body (working title), which follows a 22-year-old female-to-male trans man, Danny, who has lived as a man for the past four years.
The documentary follows him as he gets chest reconstruction surgery to remove his breasts.
In the UK, there is estimated to be around 15,000 transsexual people who self-identify as the opposite gender from the physical body they were born with.
Around a third of them have surgery to change their bodies to be the opposite sex. . . .
Gemma Pritchard
BBC3 has commissioned eight documentaries for its third Body Image season, including the story of an 18-year-old trans woman who travels to Thailand to undergo genital surgery.
BBC3 will follow up last season's Lucy: Teen Transsexual with Lucy: Teen Transsexual in Thailand, which continues the story of 18-year-old Lucy Parker as she travels to Thailand to undergo male-to-female genital reconstruction surgery to bring her body into harmony with her gender identity.
Lucy has already undergone two years of hormone treatment, psychological analysis and surgery, making her one of Britain's youngest transsexual women.
The cameras will follow her throughout her surgery in Thailand and painful recovery.
It is one of three documentaries in the season made by UK production company Endemol's Brighter Pictures.
Brighter Pictures has also made Danny: My Secret Female Body (working title), which follows a 22-year-old female-to-male trans man, Danny, who has lived as a man for the past four years.
The documentary follows him as he gets chest reconstruction surgery to remove his breasts.
In the UK, there is estimated to be around 15,000 transsexual people who self-identify as the opposite gender from the physical body they were born with.
Around a third of them have surgery to change their bodies to be the opposite sex. . . .
Onetime JonBenet murder suspect began gender transition
by Ed Walsh
edwalsh94105@yahoo.comThe former suspect in the 1996 murder of 6-year-old beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey told the Bay Area Reporter that he had sought gender reassignment surgery, not because of any driving desire to become a woman, but to help him avoid capture by police.
He also said that a buried "gothic box" exists and that if uncovered, would result in his re-arrest for JonBenet's killing.
"I had one reason and one reason only to change my sex," John Mark Karr said last week in his only Bay Area media interview. "I saw it as an opportunity to change my identity and further evade law enforcement."
Karr, 42, was in Bangkok when he was arrested a year ago this month and extradited to Colorado. The Boulder County district attorney decided not to file murder charges against him after his DNA did not match DNA found at the murder scene. Karr revealed to the B.A.R. that before the DA dropped charges, he agreed to plead guilty to second-degree murder in exchange for avoiding the death penalty. The deal became moot when the DA declined to proceed with the case.
Karr was then extradited to Sonoma County to face 2001 child pornography charges, but those charges were dismissed after prosecutors conceded that they lost Karr's computer that they say had contained child pornography.
At the time of his arrest, Karr said that he had been undergoing hormone replacement therapy and laser treatments to permanently remove facial hair. He had been on track, he said, to get all the surgeries to completely transform into a woman by this summer. . . .
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