"Neither you nor any other parents of a gender-variant child are responsible for a child’s
gender variance or sexual orientation—any more than you or they are responsible for the
child’s being right- or left-handed. Remember that eventual sexual orientation is uncertain and
will remain so until your child becomes fully conscious of his or her sexual attractions, is able to
label that sexual orientation appropriately, and is willing to disclose it to others."

From Contemporary Pediatrics, February 2005:

GUIDE FOR PARENTS

Raising a gender-variant child

"Hairspray" clip with John Travolta as Edna Turnblad

Stealth Is For Airplanes…

by: transjenn

A little less than a year ago I wrote my ”coming out” post in several online forums that reached literally hundreds of people I’ve known over my life, after living essentially what we in the “gender biz” call a “stealth” existence. I thought I’d share it here. Comments welcome…disagreements encouraged!

*****

Well…it’s been an interesting couple of days since my last post. Several people have sent me emails and asked, “Are you OK?”

The answer is…yes, I’m just fine. Though this is one of those times in life that come along every now and then where you look at that empty bag you’re holding and wonder, in retrospect, where that damn cat went? Still….I know that’s the fear talking.

Sometimes, when you’ve lived with fear so long, it becomes comfortable…I mean people can adapt to anything. I think that is what the current regime in Washington is hoping. That we all will simply adjust to living in a constant state of fear so they can manipulate us to misdirect our energy, resources and national identity towards the fascist and authoritarian goals they want to enact.

Yesterday, there was an announcement from the Taliban spokesman (an American!) that we must all come to Islam now….it is our last chance. Otherwise, all those who don’t will be destroyed very soon.

How is that ANY different than the message being given out in this country to US, the American people, by the neo-conservatives and authoritarian fundamentalist religious right that controls that party?

BELIEVE WHAT WE BELIEVE! HATE WHAT WE HATE! BECOME WHAT WE WANT YOU TO BECOME! REJECT SCIENCE! REJECT MEDICAL ADVANCEMENT AND KNOWLEDGE! REJECT EQUALITY! NO ROOM FOR DISAGREEMENT! FEAR WHAT WE TELL YOU TO FEAR!

We can’t live this way. Take it from someone who has lived in fear all her life…you’ve got to let go of it at some point and just get on with things. We’ve all got to face the fear we keep inside, because at some level, that fear keeps us from becoming who we not only really are, but who we are capable of being.

For those of you who aren’t cryptologists and trained to figure out complex, interweaving conundrums, perhaps I can clarify it this way:

“I’ll take Obscure Medical Euphemisms for $1,000, Alex”

DING! DING! DING!

And the DOUBLE JEOPARDY answer is: ‘If someone tells you, ‘I’m not from “Greenville, or Louisville, or Brownsville…I’m from Toronto’, what segment of the sexual and gender minority community might they be referring to?”

“Alex, What is transgender?”

DING DING DING DING!!!! You win DOUBLE JEOPARDY!!

Yes, there it is. I hope it’s an anti-climactic revelation because contrary to what it may seem like at this moment, I’m NOT into any more drama than necessary. I’m just trying to deal with this humorously, because, well..it’s a pretty momentous public revelation for me to make. . . .

He Shoots, She Scores

When Mike became Christine, she gave Los Angeles sports fans a courtside view of gender politics

By John Ireland

Michael Daniel Penner returned to work on May 23 as Christine Michelle Daniels.

Sidebar

Transsexuals in popular culture

For all of its trappings of money, fame, and corruption, professional sports has a lot to do with character. Avid sports fans seem to respect those who face up to overwhelming challenge and overcome adversity. So it should not come as a surprise that readers rose in solidarity when a 23-year veteran sports writer announced in the Los Angeles Times that he would return from a short hiatus…as a woman.

On April 26, Mike Penner wrote what he thought would be the toughest article of his career. “I am a transsexual sportswriter. It has taken more than 40 years, a million tears and hundreds of hours of soul-wrenching therapy for me to work up the courage to type those words.” The piece ran in the Sports section, next to his regular column.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Penner’s story was “by mid-evening, one of the most heavily viewed stories on latimes.com in the last year, with about half a million page views.” Nancy Sullivan, executive director of communications for the newspaper, says “There was a massive response to this story, not only on our website, but across the media spectrum.” The online message board accompanying the article was closed to comments in less than 8 hours, with 800 comments logged in. Hundreds more messages were sent via e-mail. Responses to the revelation came in three distinct flavors: kudos from sports fans, effusive thanks from other transsexuals and rants from bible-thumpers. Readers’ initial shock, however, subsided almost immediately.

Michael Daniel Penner returned to work on May 23 as Christine Michelle Daniels. So far, it appears to be smooth sailing. But Daniels’ very public transition has put a spotlight on a culture that is slow to acknowledge, let alone attempt to rehabilitate its ingrained intolerance and bigotry. . . .

A Culture in Trans-ition

07.17.07 | by Bernie Heidkamp

When HBO's "Entourage" made a transgender character the punchline on last week's episode, I cringed.

Now, to be fair, "Entourage" could be described as a equal-opportunity mocker, as it leaves few characters unscathed. Even the privileged lifestyle of the white heterosexual male protagonists in the story comes across at best, as silly and frivolous, and at worst, as woefully out of touch with reality. Christine has discussed its refreshing self-awareness as well as its shortcomings before.

But when the show is clearly not going to present us with a fully developed transgendered character -- let alone a diversity of representations -- there's really little excuse for giving this character such a dismissive role.

The Cliks

Fortunately, if you're paying attention, transgender lives are becoming visible and vibrant parts of popular culture. Our own Mark Blankenship has discussed the work of performance artist Scott Turner Schofield, who in his one-person show rails again a "system that says we can't be all of ourselves."

And both Rebecca Louie of AP and Shauna Swartz of AfterEllen have excellent profiles of Lucas Silveira, the frontman for the rock band The Cliks.

Silveira's transition to a male identity forced the band to abandon their all-girl identity. But, in the spirit of their rollicking rock and roll sound, it hasn't lessened the band's power: "When you give off that kind of energy, and you're open to the world in that way, the world also opens itself up to you," guitarist Nina Martinez. "And fans become more open to being attracted to everything that queer is about."

While performance art and music have long been spaces of openness, the sports world has not.

John Ireland of In These Times, though, has a fascinating portrayal of Christine Michelle Daniels, a sportswriter formerly known as Michael Daniel Penner, who came out as a woman after 23 years of work for the Los Angeles Times. . . .

Drag King: Buck Naked

Interview with an Iranian transgender

Posted by Mani in Human Right, Interview. trackback

26 July 2007

by Arsham Parsi
translated by Morteza

How would you like to introduce yourself?

My name on my ID is of no importance, but I’m known as Sayeh. I’m 26 years old and I’m a transsexual. I left Iran a year ago and I now live in Turkey. Could you please give me a tranquilizer please? I can’t think clearly. I am angry,I’m confused.

Why are you angry?

I’m in a country which does not support me. It has attached the term ‘refugee’on me. I neither know its language nor can understand its people and they can’t understand me either. Being a trans here is similar to being a trans in Iran. Although its government might be free (democratic) but its people are the same sort of people (as in Iran). They do not care at all.

What is your problem at the moment?

I have a lot of problems. The day I got here, the Turkish police told me that I should not leave this place frequently because if people realize my problem they will beat me. Initially, I listened to their advice and did not go out. I did not have a job. I did not have a home. I suffered so much. Now they are asking me for a residency fee. Everything about Turkey is difficult. You are a refugee. Nobody supports you financially and you frequently need to go to the police and give signatures. You are not a citizen and you can’t even make (official) complaints about anyone. I was beaten severely by some drunk Iranian men. I went to the police to file a complaint about them. I was told that we (the men and I) are all Iranians and if I file a complaint there will be headaches (complications) for all of us. I was threatened to death and was beaten but I couldn’t complain about the incident. They told me that they will cut my throat.

The Iranian refugees did?

Yes. The police can not do anything to them because they are refugees here.They told me that they will cut my throat and kill me. I can’t leave the house. I have financial problems. I don’t have money to buy hormones. My body needs hormones. I don’t have male hormones. When I get sick I can’t go to the hospital. I don’t have money to go to Ankara. I had problems finding a place to live and I didn’t know where to sleep. Everyone says that it is not their problem. Then for what reason am I here? The Iranian government is very similar to you (the Turkish government). They restrict the places you can go. Even when you have your identification card on you, they still don’t let you go to certain places. It is true that I’m a refugee but I need people/the society to understand me. Is it possible for one to not leave his/her living place just because she has been informed by the police that she might get beaten? A person needs to feel that there are people who might be willing to help her/him. There were certain constraints in Iran and there are some different constraints here. I believe that a fundamentalist or a Muslim country will never be able to deal with issues like this (transsexuality). . . .

Genre Fluid Performer Marches To Own Toone

By Jacob Anderson-Minshall
Published: July 12, 2007

“Punks from my time weren’t supposed to want to be famous, or care about recognition or even having enough money to support themselves. “

It’s difficult to sum up the accomplishments of trans performer Anderson (nee Annie) Toone in a few paragraphs. Ever since the late ‘70s, when a teenaged, harmonica playing Toone backed legendary San Francisco blues musicians and beat poets, he’s been a “genre fluid” musician, drag king and performer who changes personas as often as some guys switch partners.

“It’s always been my nature to mix, mutate, experiment with and collage together [musical] styles, instruments and cultures.”

A founding member of the New York no-wave girl group The Bloods—who he calls “a butch amalgam” of rap, jazz and punk—Toone toured Northeastern U.S. and Western Europe for two years, opening for bands like The Clash, REM and The Go-Gos, while their single, “Button Up” became a dance hall favorite.

“Part of what we were doing was just being an alternative—whether to apartheid, Reagan, Thatcher or the [lesbian-feminists] who told us we couldn’t wear leather, watch porn or do consensual kink because they said so.”

When The Bloods broke up, Toone stayed in Europe for a decade, founding first the jazz ensemble Idiotsavant and then country/punk band The Well Oiled Sisters (which headlined the 1990 country music women doc, Stand On Your Man). By 1992, Toone was back in San Francisco creating new “dykeabilly” sounds with the Bucktooth Varmints.

When Toone (andersontoone.com) switched genders on stage back in 1980, at New York City’s first W.O.W. Festival, he became one of drag kinging’s founding fathers. He’s thrilled with how things have changed since those early days. “In 1980 there were literally three kings…and now we’re in virtually every major city. The explosion is fantastic.”

He’s disappointed that drag kings haven’t gained the respect or mainstream exposure garnered by drag queens, but he’s still holding out hope for validation. “John Waters’ famously said kings would be the flavor of this new century—we’ll see if our 15 minutes is actually imminent.”

As a king, Toone has held a dozen drag names, putting his “transgender twist” on a range of masculine archetypes and exploring “what it means to ‘be a man’. It’s the activist strategy of…writing us erased trans-masculine folks back into the picture.”

The multi-talented artist has also taken his drag personas into full-scale reviews, like 2004’s Bucky & Bebe’s Holiday Hooteneanny, and the 1996, one-of-a-kind, drag king musical, Hillbillies On the Moon. . . .

Football player becoming a woman

Gina Duncan, formerly known as Greg Pingston, began living as a transgendered woman last November.

David Whitley

Sentinel Staff Writer

July 15, 2007

Greg Pingston was a star linebacker for Merritt Island High School's unbeaten state championship team in 1972.

Gina Duncan, at her College Park home in Orlando recently, will undergo the final step to becoming a woman by having sexual-reassignment surgery next spring.

Greg Pingston (2nd from left) was one of only 4 sophomores who made the Merritt Island varsity squad in 1970. The others were Dave Taylor (left), Jimmy Black and Waldo Williams (right). Pingston went on to play at East Carolina while Black and Williams played at Florida State.

Former Merritt Island football star Greg Pingston is completing a transgender change to Gina Duncan.

They still talk about the tackle around Merritt Island. Greg Pingston, the baddest player on the baddest team in the state, zeroed in on his victim.

The kid was returning a kick up the sideline in front of the Mustangs' bench. Pingston locked on to him with his tackling radar.

He angled in at full speed, plunged his helmet into the runner's chest and drove upward. The runner's entire body jolted into reverse.

"His chin just exploded with blood," receiver Mike Garo recalls. "It was the perfect tackle they'd always taught us, but it went beyond that.

"All the guys went nuts. It was totally tribal."

Pingston hopped up and walked away. After the game he showered, went home and hoped nobody would be around.

He went into his parents' room and walked to the closet. Then he put on one of his mother's dresses.

"I felt like I could breathe," Pingston says. . . .

Norbit Trailer

E-Asylum Clip - Norbit - Eddie Murphy

Captain Jan, the transsexual Para, sues the Army for unfair dismissal

By ELIZABETH DAY - More by this author » Last updated at 22:45pm on 14th July 2007


The first transsexual officer in the Armed Forces is set to sue the Ministry of Defence for unfair dismissal and sexual discrimination.

Jan Hamilton, a former male captain in the Parachute Regiment who is now living as a woman, will lodge court papers claiming she was sexually discriminatedagainst and unfairly dismissed in April from a £45,000-a-year post.

Captain Hamilton, 42, had been due to become head of media relations for the British Army in Gibraltar in May.

But after she refused to turn up at a medical examination dressed in a male uniform – which her lawyers argue would have been 'humiliating and demeaning' – the job offer was withdrawn.

Her lawyers have, to no avail, repeatedly sought an informal meeting with her Army bosses to settle the issue out of court. Captain Hamilton has now been without a salary for four months and has racked up several thousand pounds in legal bills.

Scroll down for more...

Captain Jan: The transexual Para

'I would have been happy if someone had just asked me to come in for coffee to discuss what I was going through,' she says. 'All I want is to carry on working for the Army in an equal-opportunities capacity.' . . .

Whole Foods broadens reach

Grocery store will anchor gay community center in East Lakeview neighborhood

By Mary Ellen Podmolik
Special to the Tribune
Published July 16, 2007

Compared with its other area stores, the Whole Foods Market scheduled to open July 25 in East Lakeview will be unique in its broader range of prepared foods and its wine-sampling machine.

But what the natural and organic food chain is really touting, and what sets it apart in Chicago and nationally, is its location as the anchor tenant in the Center on Halsted, a recently opened gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community center.

Although Whole Foods is thought to be the first retailer of its size to anchor a gay community center in the U.S., the retailer views its location as more of a gold mine than a gamble, given the population density of its neighborhood just east of Wrigley Field and its demographics.

Store manager Tom Marciniak expects the 40,000-square-foot store, which along with two other Chicago-area openings this summer will bring the chain's local count to 13, to be one of the area's best stores in terms of sales volume.

Whole Foods' move comes at a time when mainstream corporate America is increasing its efforts to woo gay and lesbian consumers.

Ad spending in gay and lesbian print media totaled $223.3 million last year, up 5.2 percent from 2005 and an increase of 205 percent compared with a decade ago, according to The Gay Press Report, an annual study by Prime Access Inc. and Rivendell Media Co. In 2006, more than 180 Fortune 500 brands actively advertised in gay media, compared with 150 brands in 2004 and 19 brands in 1994.

Meta-Genesis

photography and text by Jane Lavender

What is Meta-Genesis?

Meta - at a later state in development
Genesis - the origin or coming into existence

Truth and honor of Transexuals through Photography and personal literary espression.

Echo's of one's heart is shared in spoken and written words, photographs are taken, bonding and respect I offer. I return home to create a visual moment of truth.

Art and Transition

A Columbia photographer illuminates the lives of the Transgender community

ALISON HODGSON Missourian

Jane Lavender, a local photographer, created “Meta-Genesis” to show people who transgenders are. She has been working on the project for two years and believes “every person has a story.”

By Lauren Zima

July 16, 2007 | 12:00 a.m. CST

About a year ago, photographer Jane Lavender sat at her dining room table, carefully pairing the words of her subjects with their black-and-white images. As the hours passed, Lavender laid scraps of sentences across the film, giving voice to a group of people who have spent much of their lives in the shadows.

“I live in survival mode — one day at a time.” . . .

gender play

Fancy that

Scott Turner Schofield returns to the cotillion for Debutante Balls.

By Mark Blankenship

SKIRT THE ISSUE Stradling genders onstage was crucial to Schoefield's vision.

Playwright and performance artist Scott Turner Schofield has come out in at least five different ways. When he was in high school—and was still living as a woman named Katie—he came out as a lesbian. In college at Atlanta’s Emory University (where he and this writer were classmates), he came out as transgender. But while those are powerful stories, they may be less surprising than the events that inspired Schofield’s latest show: As a young woman in Charlotte, North Carolina, Schofield came out at three debutante balls as a Southern belle.

For those who don’t know Dixie, the debutante ball is an annual Old South tradition in which young women put on elegant gowns, get paraded around mansions by tuxedoed young men and symbolically announce that they are ready to join society. For the debs, this ritual is called “coming out,” and the joke is not lost on Schofield. His solo piece Debutante Balls—which he performs twice this week at the Cherry Lane Theater as part of the queercentric Fresh Fruit Festival—pokes fun at the similarities between his time in cotillion culture and his journey within the realm of gender politics.

Schofield has unwittingly broken rules in both worlds. Consider, for instance, the story of his debutante gown: As a middle-class kid who didn’t arrive in the South until his teens, he didn’t know that upper-crust debs usually attend balls in white dresses and kid gloves. So what was his coming out attire? A spaghetti-strapped number with a long black skirt and a leopard-print bodice. Blanche DuBois would have died. . . .

Philippines: Crossing borders

MANILA, Philippines -- For many years now, I have been hearing Filipinos joking about the need to grow a moustache or beard before going off to work in the Middle East because, they claim, without the facial hair, a man becomes too "feminine" and, by extension, attractive prey for men looking for male sexual partners.

Nadya Labi, writing in the May 2007 issue of the American magazine, The Atlantic, describes how amid the extreme sexual repression in Saudi Arabia, there's actually a frenzy of homosexual activity. One reason is that access to women is so restricted, and so the men turn to each other. Many of the men do not think of themselves as homosexual, and rationalize that they are going after men who look like women.

Appropriately, Labi's article is titled "The Kingdom in the Closet" to highlight the many paradoxes surrounding homosexuality in Saudi Arabia. Men openly look for other men in shopping malls, and through the Internet, yet they are always in danger of being arrested by the "mutawwa'in," the religious police fielded by the Committee on the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice.

Don't ask, don't tell

Labi describes the atmosphere in Saudi as one of "don't ask, don't tell," the phrase originally used to describe the US policy about homosexuals in the military. Officially, homosexuals were barred from the US military, but everyone knew they were there, and as long as they kept quiet, they wouldn't be expelled. In Saudi, it's an entire nation that works on a "don't ask, don't tell" policy, keeping all its homosexuals in the closet.

Now comes the overseas Filipino worker (OFW). I once attended a "despedida" [farewell party] for a very flamboyant Filipino "bakla" [gay man] who was leaving to work in Saudi and remember how his aunt sternly reminded him "to behave," with the threat: "Sa Saudi, pinupugutan ang ulo ng mga bakla" ["In Saudi, they behead homosexuals"]. Several months later I asked how "Jun" (not his real name) was and his relatives showed me pictures of him in drag (dressed as a woman) in Saudi. He was apparently having the time of his life, with claims that Saudi men were queuing for him ("pila-pila sila").

I thought of Jun reading The Atlantic article, especially because it had a photograph of someone with long flowing hair, a crown and a bouquet of flowers. The caption read: "Francis, in drag, the winner of a private beauty pageant held by Filipinos in Jeddah." Such beauty pageants are common, but not without risks. There have been raids and arrests and if participants are caught having sex, they could be liable for very severe punishments. Saudi law actually prescribes death for sodomy or anal intercourse.

Perhaps the out and out Filipino bakla are lucky in that they know how to skirt the rules. The Philippines isn't exactly that liberal so life here gives sufficient practice for the bakla when in comes to a life of happy subterfuge.

Labi mentions Filipinos several times, including one hilarious story about how 23 of them were arrested while holding a drag beauty pageant. They were dragged (pardon the pun) to the police station together with the evidence of their crime: wigs and makeup and photographs. Herded into a cell, the drag queens began to argue among themselves about who looked "the hottest" in the photographs. . . .

Frogs exposed to herbicides. . .

. . .don't know if they're Arthur or Martha.

A green tree frog

Carmel Egan
July 15, 2007

AUSTRALIAN drinking water standards are under scrutiny after scientific research linked commonly used herbicides to gender-bending in male frogs.

The National Health and Medical Research Council has decided to reassess its drinking water guidelines after miniscule traces of the herbicides atrazine and simazine were found to turn the frogs into hermaphrodites - creatures with male and female sex organs.

Australian guidelines allow up to 40 parts per billion (ppb) of atrazine in drinking water before it is considered a public health risk. But scientific studies have found male frogs grow ovaries when exposed to the chemical at the miniscule level of 0.1ppb in water.

"The current Australian Drinking Water Guidelines specify that atrazine should not be detected in drinking water, and that if it is detected remedial action should be taken to stop contamination," said research council spokesman Nigel Harding. . . .

M2F transition from some years ago. . .