Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Donna Rose - Our Stories, Our Selves




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Two former men share transgender experience

Diana Bubser


October 31, 2007

Transgender activists Barbara "Babs" Casbar and Terry McCorkell spoke to a crowd of about 30 College students Thursday night in Forcina Hall to address the historical, political and social issues of transgender advocacy. They also shared their own gender identity experiences: the two former men now each lead the life of a woman.

"This room is a pronoun-free zone," McCorkell declared.

The lecture was presented by PRISM, the College's organization supporting the equality of gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender people.

"We are always looking to educate ourselves and others," Angel Hernandez, president of PRISM, said.

Wearing a multicolored dress and flashy jewelry, McCorkell spoke of her teenage years, when she was not only interested in girls, but wanted to be one. However, she waited until her 30s to join transgender support groups and start communicating with others about the issue.

The work McCorkell did in the 1990s laid the foundations for New Jersey Laws against Discrimination, and she was honored by then-Sen. Jon S. Corzine as "Activist of the Year."

"I used to be shy as a man, but learned to be assertive as a woman," she said.

Casbar referred to herself as a "woman scarred by many years of testosterone." After her wife died, she realized she was a "lower-class citizen." Instead of crying, she decided to take action.

Casbar is now the head of the Gender Rights Advocacy Association of New Jersey and serves on the boards of Garden State Equality and New Jersey Stonewall Democrats.

A PowerPoint presentation was then shown explaining the difference between sexual orientation and gender identity.

"Sexual orientation is who you are attracted to, while gender identity is who you identify with," it said.

McCorkell feels New Jersey is the "most knowledgeable on gender discrimination" of all the states. However, she also points out that transgender acceptance is not nationwide. . . .

Reform Jewish Leader Calls on House to Pass Transgender Inclusive Non-Discrimination Act

Saperstein: The right to earn a living without fear of discrimination ought to be extended to all Americans, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity.

Contact: Sean Thibault or Kate Bigam
202.387.2800 | news@rac.org

Washington, D.C. October 29, 2007 — In anticipation of this week’s House vote on the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, Rabbi David Saperstein, Director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, issued the following statement:

We are pleased by the House’s planned vote later this week on the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, legislation that will provide long-overdue protection to gay and lesbian Americans at risk of workplace discrimination based on their sexual orientation. The right to earn a living without fear of discrimination ought to be extended to all Americans, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. Yet in 31 states, it is legal to fire, demote, or fail to promote an employee based on sexual orientation; in 39 states, it is legal to do so based on gender identity.

That is why it is essential that the House also pass an amendment to be offered by Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), which will add gender identity protections to the bill. Extending workplace protections to the entire gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community bolsters the moral power of this legislation.

Throughout our nation’s history, our leaders have had to make many tough decisions about issues of justice and morality. Rarely have these decisions been easy. As Reform Jews, we are guided by Jewish tradition and text that teaches us that all human beings are created b'tselem Elohim, in the Divine image. Our nation’s sacred texts also guide us, as well as Americans of all faiths and no faith, reminding us that we are all created equal. We look forward to working with members of Congress in support of legislation that achieves that goal.

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The Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism is the
Washington office of the Union for Reform Judaism, whose more
than 900 congregations across North America encompass 1.5 million Reform Jews, and the Central Conference of American Rabbis, whose membership
includes more than 1800 Reform rabbis

India: Depicting the transgender truth


Shai Venkatraman

Tuesday, October 30, 2007: (Mumbai):

It's a community most people ridicule or prefer to keep at arm's length.

But what does it mean to cross the gender divide, to be free of being male as society defines it?

That's the theme explored in the film Our Family.

A true story about a family of transgender women that unfolds over three generations.

The film's set in Tamil Nadu and tells the story of Aasha, Seetha and Dhana, who are bound together by ties of adoption.

Aasha is the grandmother, Seetha her adopted daughter and Dhana who is adopted by Seetha and her partner Selvam.

"We wanted to make a film which would question the way people look at the hijras. We wanted to look at the human rights violation, the stigmas and also look at the warmth and celebratory aspect of it," said Dr Anjali Monteiro, Filmmaker.

The film documents their journey as they discover their sexual identities and progressively blur the lines between themselves and what's seen as normal social behaviour.

"They become a regular family. So the woman Seetha does the cooking. She does assert herself but in trying to do so she asserts her womanly identity even more, one of the things that struck us was that they were normal but in trying to be normal they had to play out the politics of being normal in some sense," said K Jayanshanker, Filmmaker.

The film will not release commercially and will remain limited to the festival circuit. Clearly that's one barrier that will take some time crossing. . . .

Stereotypes under fire

When Knoll Larkin was coming out, he said he thought everyone smoked.

Smoking seemed to be accepted as a part of the bar culture that historically provided the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community with a safe haven, said Larkin, health services coordinator for Affirmations, an LGBT community center in Ferndale, Mich.

These perceived high smoking rates inspired Affirmations to collect information on the number of actual smokers in the LGBT community and gather their views on the health, social and economic aspects involved with smoking.

It also prompted their support for a Michigan bill that would ban smoking in places of employment, such as bars and restaurants.

Affirmations’ study — using information compiled in 2006 — revealed that 53 percent of the more than 350 people surveyed were past or current smokers, 33 percent of which identified as current smokers.

The average age of survey respondents was 35, with a range of 16 to 66. Most respondents, 76 percent, identified as gay or lesbian, 14 percent identified as bisexual and 2 percent identified as heterosexual, according to the study.

Contributing factors to smoking for LGBT people include heightened stress levels, increased incidence of substance use, reduced access to health care and targeted marketing by the tobacco industry, according to the study.

Mandi Rabe, a member of People Respecting the Individuality of Students at MSU, or PRISM, said she doesn’t see the LGBT community as being affected by smoking more than any other population.

“I think it’s still a stereotype that the queer population does more drugs,” said Rabe, a political theory and constitutional democracy sophomore. “With my own involvement in the community, I don’t see it any more. Clearly out of all the stereotypes, it’s one of the least worrisome — but it’s still something that needs to be dealt with.”

According to the American Cancer Society, more than 30,000 LGBT people die from tobacco-related diseases each year.

Smoking also increases the risk of blood clots in transgender women who take estrogen, and heart disease in transgender men who take testosterone, according to the National Coalition for LGBT Health.

David Jaques, president of Respecting Individuals on Neutral Grounds, or RING, said the number of LGBT and heterosexual smokers seems to be proportionate.

“It’s like saying gay people ride more bikes than straight people — there’s not a correlation in my mind,” he said.

The difference in generations also should be taken into account, Jaques said. Older people seem to smoke more than younger people, he said.

Jaques, who said he doesn’t go to bars or clubs very often, said banning smoking would only make it more enjoyable to go out. . . .

Methodists Vote to Keep Transgender Pastor


Video by Pauline Bartolone

In a potentially landmark decision, the United Methodist Church has ruled that a transgender pastor who applied for a name change can remain in the ministry. The decision in case of the Rev. Drew Phoenix was released on Tuesday by the church's Judicial Council.

The United Methodist Church, or UMC, bans gay people from serving as clergy, but its Book of Discipline makes no mention of transsexual people. "Essentially, they said that I'm a pastor in good standing and therefore I'm appointable," says Phoenix, who leads St. John's in Baltimore.

In affirming Phoenix as an ordained minister, the council left aside the specific question of whether transgender people can serve. What mattered here was that Phoenix faced no "administrative or judicial action" beyond the question of the name change itself. "The Judicial Council does not reach the question of whether gender change is a chargeable offense or violates minimum standards established by the General Conference," council members wrote.

Phoenix says he always felt male. As a girl, the Methodist minister says, he was known as "Dave Gordon's son." Even when he was preaching as Ann Gordon, Phoenix says, people related to the pastor as a man. But it wasn't until last year, at the age of 47, that Gordon decided to undergo surgery and hormone therapy -- to formally become male.

After the then-Rev. Gordon was reappointed as Drew Phoenix at the Baltimore-Washington Methodist Conference in May, members of the UMC petitioned to ban transsexuals from serving. Now, with the Judicial Council's ruling, Phoenix plans to continue at his church.

Phoenix says he knows he's something of a test case, but calls his transition a gift to the church. The ruling "is outstanding," he says. "It's historic."

UMC members have been wrestling with issues of gender and sexuality, as have other branches of the wider Protestant church. The Phoenix case was one of several on the Judicial Council docket that dealt with such matters, including one from northern Illinois for an initiative called "Affirming All Familes" and another from the California-Nevada conference about plans to "Welcome and Include LGBT" people in church leadership.

The church could take up the issue of transgender clergy again at its general conference in April. Questions concerning sexual minorities have become regular a feature of national UMC gatherings. "It has come up at every general conference in recent years," says spokesperson Diane Denton, "so I would expect it would be an issue again."