Monday, December 22, 2008
Lana Lawless is Transgendered Golfer
December 22, 2008
by Cathryn Friar
by Cathryn Friar
Lana Lawless is the current Women’s Long Drive Golf Champ, a sport driven by power, muscle and speed. How she got to where she is today is not your usual golf champ story - Lana use to be a man. Read more about her below, see a photo and a video.
Lana is a 55 year old bartender from Palm Springs, California who is transgendered. In fact, Lana was was a S.W.A.T. cop for 18 years working the gang unit in a very tough Southern California city.
“I had a very tough and mean exterior. People didn’t want to mess with me. I had a hard exterior, but I was compassionate inside. I always let the gay guys go; they had enough drama in their lives.”
As a man, Lana had been married but fathered no children. “I was hiding in the straight world,” she said, “but Lana was always in there, and I wanted her to live. I had started to go to L.A. to the clubs, playing dress-up on the weekends, but I wanted to be a normal girl.”
For 21 years, the big, burly swat cop played golf at a private club, got down to a plus-1 handicap and even won the club championship. But, after gender-reassignment surgery, she left golf and all her old friends behind. “Other than my family, I have no friends from my previous life,” she said.
After watching the 2006 ESPN broadcast of the RE/MAX World Long Drive Championship, her interest was peaked and she was drawn back into golf.
The image of a big burly policeman-turned-woman golf champ doesn’t sit easily with many of the other golfers because Long Drive is a sport driven by power, muscle and speed. . . .Read More
2008: A Year of Progress for Boston GLBTs
by Zachary Violette
EDGE Contributor
Monday Dec 22, 2008
With marriage equality in Massachusetts secured for the foreseeable future in 2007, GLBT-rights advocates turned their attention to the transgender community early in 2008.
MassEquality in January unveiled its plans for the year, which included getting protections for transgender men and women added to the Massachusetts hate crimes and nondiscrimination statutes.
The trans-rights community brought out its big guns for a blockbuster 13-hour Judiciary Committee hearing in March featuring written and oral testimony in favor of the bill from Gov. Deval Patrick, Attorney General Martha Coakley, and nearly 100 citizens.
Less than a dozen people, including MassResistance organizer Brian Camenker, testified against the bill. Despite the strong showing, the bill never made it out of committee, but its passage remains a priority for the GLBT community in 2009, advocates say.
Another long-standing legislative priority was the repeal of a 95 year-old law that had been used to prevent out-of-state gay couples from marrying in Massachusetts.
Proposals to repeal the so-called "1913 Law" had been floated ever since 2004, when then-governor Mitt Romney revived the law, which was initially created to curb interracial marriages. But those attempts consistently failed to gain traction in the legislature. . . .Read More
EDGE Contributor
Monday Dec 22, 2008
|
MassEquality in January unveiled its plans for the year, which included getting protections for transgender men and women added to the Massachusetts hate crimes and nondiscrimination statutes.
The trans-rights community brought out its big guns for a blockbuster 13-hour Judiciary Committee hearing in March featuring written and oral testimony in favor of the bill from Gov. Deval Patrick, Attorney General Martha Coakley, and nearly 100 citizens.
Less than a dozen people, including MassResistance organizer Brian Camenker, testified against the bill. Despite the strong showing, the bill never made it out of committee, but its passage remains a priority for the GLBT community in 2009, advocates say.
Another long-standing legislative priority was the repeal of a 95 year-old law that had been used to prevent out-of-state gay couples from marrying in Massachusetts.
Proposals to repeal the so-called "1913 Law" had been floated ever since 2004, when then-governor Mitt Romney revived the law, which was initially created to curb interracial marriages. But those attempts consistently failed to gain traction in the legislature. . . .Read More
Critique, Opinion, POV: Pope puts stress on 'gay threat'
23 December 2008
BBC.com
Pope Benedict XVI has said that saving humanity from homosexual or transsexual behaviour is just as important as saving the rainforest from destruction.
He explained that defending God's creation is not limited to saving the environment, but also protecting man from self-destruction.
The pope was delivering his end-of-year address to senior Vatican staff.
His words, later released to the media, emphasised his total rejection of gender theory.
Pope Benedict XVI warned that gender theory blurs the distinction between male and female and could thus lead to the "self-destruction" of the human race.
Gender theory
Gender theory explores sexual orientation, the roles assigned by society to individuals according to their gender, and how people perceive their biological identity. . . .Read More
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