IDENTITIES

Identities, is a sensitive and compelling documentary which explores the multicoloured, multicultural transgender community in Ireland. Five personal stories give shape to the different but parallel worlds of Transvestism, Transsexualism, Drag, Sexual identity, and Gender Dysphoria.

Intimate observational footage introduces us to the world of each character. Documented in a series of revealing black and white interviews, each narrative is preceded by a colour performance art piece, and more abstract self-representation. Personal histories charting hardship, rejection and discrimination will be placed in a wider social, political and religious context through these characters' personal experiences.

At its heart, this is a film about the human spirit. Overcoming stereotype and categorisation, the gender construct breaks open, allowing personality and human emotion a path to expression.

A film by Vittoria Colonna
(c) Underground Films 2009
www.myspace.com/Identitiesfilm

VittoriaColonna

'I Hurt People' Radio Host Says In Transgender Apology

By On Top Magazine Staff

June 12, 2009

Hosts of a Sacramento-based radio show apologized Thursday for making offensive comments about transgender people.

“I hurt people,” Arnie States told listeners. “And that wasn't my goal.”

That apology came after gay rights groups decried a May 28 broadcast of the Rob, Arnie & Dawn in the Morning radio show, which airs on KRXQ in Sacramento, where hosts Arnie States and Rob Williams called transgender people “freaks” and “weirdos” during a segment devoted to transgender children.

“If my son, God forbid, if my son put on a pair of high heels, I would probably hit him with one of my shoes,” States told listeners. “I would throw a shoe at him. Because you know what? Boys don't wear high heels. And in my house, they definitely don't wear high heels.” . . .Read More

Men Fool NY Into Performing Gay Wedding

6/14/2009

By ANTHONY BARTKEWICZ


(MYFOX NATIONAL) --

Gay marriage isn't legal in the state of New York, but that didn't stop two New York City men from marrying in May when one of them posed as a woman. The New York Post reports that despite the couple's marriage license, their marriage is not legally valid.

Hakim Nelson and Jason Stenson filled out their initial marriage license application online. Nelson is a male-to-female transsexual who lives as a woman and hopes to have gender-reassignment surgery. . . .Read More

Pregnant Transsexual Man Rubén Noé Coronado Suffers Miscarriage

by Mariela Rosario | 06.11.2009 |

25-year-old Spaniard transsexual Rubén Noé Coronado made headlines a few months ago when he revealed that he was pregnant with twins shortly after Thomas Beatie (aka the "Pregnant Man") gave birth to his first child last June.

Unfortunately, Spanish newspaper El Mundo is reporting that Coronado suffered a miscarriage in his 17th week of pregnancy and lost the babies. He and his partner had already picked out the names Rubén Noé and Luis María for the little ones. Coronado told the paper, "I began to have some pains this week. There were a few days where I realized that my stomach had seemed to shrink and that seemed strange to me. I went to the doctor and they had to scrape my uterus.". . .Read More

LGBTQ and Transhumanism

by the national gadfly

June 15, 2009

Question: What does someone that identies as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, transsexual or queer-fluid...have in common with someone who is transhuman?

Answer: These are terms that people use to define themselves regarding their own sex, gender, body.

. . .Read More

Commentary: Chastity, 'Good luck, brother!'

June 12, 2009

By Jamison Green
Special to CNN

Jamison Green is an educator, adviser and advocate on transgender issues, and the author of "Becoming a Visible Man" (Vanderbilt University Press, 2004).


Welcome, Chaz!

Before the word "transsexual" had been coined in English, an intrepid young person whose family belonged to the British nobility set out to transform herself from female to male. He received a medical school education, obtained hormones -- relatively new substances that were poorly understood at the time, and independently began living as a man in the early 1940s.

Eventually, he found a plastic surgeon to help him, and his physical changes were complete by 1949, but his family rejected him. The British tabloids hounded him. To escape publicity, he was forced to carve out a life for himself virtually alone. He became a Buddhist monk, and died in Tibet in 1962 at the age of 47.

His name was Michael Dillon, and he one of the Western world's first transsexual people, that is, someone who changes sex and/or gender by medical means. His extensive writings were suppressed and destroyed by his family -- only fragments survive. . . .Read More

Chaz Bono Gives Voice To An Often 'Invisible' Community

Trans Activists Say Chaz Bono Could Be Rare Face for Transgender Issues

By LAUREN COX and RADHA CHITALE
ABC News Medical Unit
June 13, 2009

Transgender men fighting for legal protections say Thursday's announcement by Chastity Bono, child of Cher and the late Sonny Bono, that she will be transitioning from female to a male as Chaz Bono is a welcome break from an all too common "invisible" paradox.

For reasons that are part biology and part society, transgender men say in some ways they have an easier time being accepted and recognized as masculine than transgender women have being perceived as feminine.

Yet at the same time, there has been a virtual black hole in public awareness of female-to-male transgender people.

"Testosterone is a powerful chemical," said Justin Tanis, a female-to-male transgender man and the community education and outreach manager for National Center for Transgender Equality in Washington, D.C. "For people who are female-to-male, it really changes your body and it makes it easier for people to perceive you as male.". . .Read More