Sunday, August 31, 2008
Iranian film explores transsexual world
By COLLEEN BARRY
August 30, 2008
August 30, 2008
VENICE, Italy (AP) — Organizers of the Venice Film Festival waited to announce "Khastegi (Tedium)" by first-time Iranian director Bahman Motamedian until the last minute to avoid alerting authorities to its sensitive subject: transsexuals in modern-day Iran.
The struggles of seven transsexuals depicted in the film are made more complicated by Iran's strict gender codes and cultural obstacles. But Motamedian, who is best known in Iran for theater work, insists the problems they face are universal to transsexuals anywhere in the world: finding their identity and seeking acceptance from their families.
"We know that throughout the world this problems exists," Motamedian said. "The idea was to raise awareness among families especially, because this is the first layer of barrier, and to help people to realize they are not alone and be able to face the problem."
Motamedian said he was inspired by the Italian neo-realists in his filmmaking, and for the movie he cast transsexuals, not professional actors, to act a role that he created. . . .Read More
Now he really is Jahn the Man
August 31, 2008
BY LYDIA MARTIN
Jahn Kirchoff calls to check in, and the voice on the phone is startling. It has dropped considerably in just a couple of weeks. No way it sounds like a woman's voice anymore.
''Yeah, my voice is getting deeper. My vocal cords are expanding -- and my beard is really growing in now,'' says Kirchoff, who is getting used to five-o'clock shadows.
In 2004, after living as a biological woman for 48 years, Kirchoff had surgery to remove his breasts. In August he marked the one-year anniversary of the start of hormone treatments.
''It takes almost three years of taking the hormones for all the changes to happen,'' Kirchoff says in his sweet, laid-back way.
As stories about gender transitions go, this one is remarkable for what Kirchoff hasn't had to endure: He was never shunned by family or friends. As co-owner of the popular Deli Lane cafes in South Miami, Brickell and Sarasota, he doesn't worry about being fired. Over the years, he has gotten plenty of ''long looks'' from strangers but isn't afraid, even as his transition from female to male becomes more obvious. . . .Read More
BY LYDIA MARTIN
Jahn Kirchoff calls to check in, and the voice on the phone is startling. It has dropped considerably in just a couple of weeks. No way it sounds like a woman's voice anymore.
''Yeah, my voice is getting deeper. My vocal cords are expanding -- and my beard is really growing in now,'' says Kirchoff, who is getting used to five-o'clock shadows.
In 2004, after living as a biological woman for 48 years, Kirchoff had surgery to remove his breasts. In August he marked the one-year anniversary of the start of hormone treatments.
''It takes almost three years of taking the hormones for all the changes to happen,'' Kirchoff says in his sweet, laid-back way.
As stories about gender transitions go, this one is remarkable for what Kirchoff hasn't had to endure: He was never shunned by family or friends. As co-owner of the popular Deli Lane cafes in South Miami, Brickell and Sarasota, he doesn't worry about being fired. Over the years, he has gotten plenty of ''long looks'' from strangers but isn't afraid, even as his transition from female to male becomes more obvious. . . .Read More
Dads who found love together
Aug 31 2008 by Katie Bodinger, Wales On Sunday
JENNY-ANNE Bishop and Elen Heart are a very unusual couple – they both have the bodies of men and were once husbands and fathers.
But they gave it all up to dress as women and become a “lesbian” transgender couple.
Like all transsexuals, Jenny-Ann, 62, who used to be Paul, and Elen, 65, who was once Alan, think they were born in the wrong bodies.
But they have decided against sex-swap surgery because of health risks at their age.
Instead they both take female hormones, doll themselves up in fashionable dresses, lipstick and mascara, and curl and style their hair and wigs.
“Our relationship is hard to define,” said Jenny-Anne who was married for 35 years before she met Elen. “We’re not exactly lesbians, but people might use that word. . . .Read More
Thursday, August 28, 2008
"Oxford Janitor Changes From He To She"
"A 8/19/08 news report from WBZ in Boston on Brianna Bonin, an elementary school janitor in Oxford, Mass., who changed gender over the summer. (8/19/08)" StephanieKayStevens
Off the Record
in loco parentis
by Diogenes
August 28, 2008
An article in Georgetown University's newspaper The Hoya welcomes the new director of its Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Questioning (LGBTQ) Resource Center and does some end zone celebration for our benefit. Georgetown, you may remember, is a university in the Jesuit Tradition. You'll be edified by the following details:
Jack Harrison (SFS '09), co-chair of GU Pride, also said he hopes to work closely with the new director in developing programming for the year. … Harrison said GU Pride is looking to launch efforts this year to make the campus more "trans-friendly" by working to provide bathrooms and better housing options for transgender individuals.
It's futile, as we all know, to point out the conflict between the Catholic view of the human person and Georgetown's LGBTQ enthusiasms. . . .Read More
Transgender Emergency Fund Will Start Offering Assistance in September
August 27, 2008
The Transgender Emergency Fund, a Central Mass.-based program that will provide critical assistance to low-income transgender or transsexual people, will begin providing financial assistance to people next month, says Jesse Pack of AIDS Project Worcester.
“As a result of stigma and discrimination, transpeople are more likely to be unemployed or underemployed, live in poverty, and to be homeless or near homelessness,” said Pack in a statement. “The fund will provide people with financial assistance with utilities, prescription co-pays, medical co-pays, and other basic needs.” In order to receive assistance, individuals must fill out a short application and provide copies of bills and proof of income. Individuals who receive assistance through the fund will not in any way be publicly identified as being transgender. . . .Read More
The Transgender Emergency Fund, a Central Mass.-based program that will provide critical assistance to low-income transgender or transsexual people, will begin providing financial assistance to people next month, says Jesse Pack of AIDS Project Worcester.
“As a result of stigma and discrimination, transpeople are more likely to be unemployed or underemployed, live in poverty, and to be homeless or near homelessness,” said Pack in a statement. “The fund will provide people with financial assistance with utilities, prescription co-pays, medical co-pays, and other basic needs.” In order to receive assistance, individuals must fill out a short application and provide copies of bills and proof of income. Individuals who receive assistance through the fund will not in any way be publicly identified as being transgender. . . .Read More
A trend of transgender movies
A feast of transgender and intersex films are highlighted at the Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival
AMERICAN-STATESMAN FILM WRITER
Friday, August 29, 2008
Do nine transgender and intersex films make a trend? They do if they're all playing during the Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival, Wednesday through Sept. 7.
Films about transgender characters are not as rare as you might think. A raft of contemporary features — 'The Crying Game,' 'Boys Don't Cry,' 'Hedwig and the Angry Inch,' 'Transamerica,' to name a few — dealt seriously with the issue. At least two entire film festivals — in Seattle and the Netherlands — are devoted to transgender-themed movies. . . .Read More
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Britney Spears Derrick Barry America's Got Talent
"Americas #1 Britney Spears impersonator Derrick Barry on America's Got Talent aired June 17, 2008." ElfBoyProduction
Senate gets transgender, gay rights champion
By Ron Hughes
28 August 2008
Transgender and marriage rights advocates have welcomed Senator Louise Pratt's commitment to LGBT rights.
28 August 2008
Transgender and marriage rights advocates have welcomed Senator Louise Pratt's commitment to LGBT rights.
The newly-elected WA Senator, whose partner is a transgender male, made her inaugural speech yesterday, saying, "I look forward to a time when we have removed at a federal level all discrimination on the grounds of gender identity and sexuality.
"A time when my partner isn’t denied a passport because his gender’s not recognised under our laws, when my friends’ children all enjoy the same rights and protections under Commonwealth law, regardless of whether their parents are straight or gay, and a time when my gay and lesbian friends who wish to be legally married can be.". . .Read More
Meet the transsexual Britney Spears impersonator taking America by storm
By
27 August 2008
27 August 2008
In case one Britney Spears wasn't enough, there's now another taking on America.
Derrick Barry left talent judges open-mouthed when he donned a schoolgirl outfit and danced to the pop star's hit Baby One More Time.
The male impersonator, who has performed as Britney for five years, made it through auditions for America's Got Talent earlier this year with a rendition of the singer's hit Toxic. . . .Read More
Young transsexuals should be allowed to put puberty on hold
Halting development allows teenagers time to consider their potential treatment, says Richard Green
Richard Green The Guardian, Thursday August 28 2008
Richard Green
Your article ('My body is wrong', G2, August 14) sensitively reports the anguish of the young teenage transsexual as the body changes in the direction of the wrong sex. That anguish is medically treated in other countries. But in the UK the "wrong puberty" is allowed to progress for years before treatment. Not only are these unwanted body changes traumatic as they develop, but if the teenager goes on to live as an adult of the other sex, they pose additional hardship. Aptly, the article tells of a mother whose (now) daughter was denied hormone treatment "until the age of 16, by which point she already had an Adam's apple, a deep voice and facial hair".
Having spent a decade heading the adult gender identity clinic at Charing Cross hospital, the world's largest treatment programme for transsexuals, I have interviewed many patients who regretted not having treatment during their early teens. . . .Read More
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Bizarre Disorder Makes People Want to Sever Their Own Limb
by Andrew Moseman in Health & Medicine, Mind & Brain
We’ve heard a lot about “cutters” and other people who feel compulsions to hurt themselves. But there’s an extra, extreme level above that: Body Integrity Identity Disorder.
BIID’s somewhat cryptic name belies a strange affliction—its sufferers feel that their normal bodies are wrong, and that they were born to be paraplegic or handicapped. The compulsion is so strong that some with the disorder try—and succeed—at amputating their own limbs. Newsweek mentions one who, after many failed attempts to lose his left hand, cut it off with a power tool and then lied to his family that he lost it in an accident. Another man froze off his own leg.
Many doctors don’t even know how to classify such a strange phenomenon. Those lobbying for its inclusion as a mental disorder compare it to Gender Identity Disorder, in which people get sex changes because they feel out of place in their natural body. But performing a sex change operation is one thing, and amputating a healthy limb is quite another. . . .Read More
Hijra (South Asia)
August 25, 2008
For other uses, see Hijra.
Hijra in Goa, India
In the culture of the Indian subcontinent, a hijra (Hindi: हिजड़ा, Urdu: حجڑا) is usually considered a member of “the third sex” — neither man nor woman. Most are physically male or intersex, but some are female. Hijras usually refer to themselves linguistically as female, and usually dress as women.
Although they are usually referred to in English as “eunuchs”, relatively few have any genital modifications.
Contents
Fly-past tribute to RAF veteran
26 August 2008
They included the Deputy Chief Constable of Lancashire police force, who gave a speech outlining Lynne's involvement as a volunteer advisor on transgender issues, who toured the country speaking at various seminars and workshops – fighting for the rights of all transgender people. . . .Read More
A FLY-PAST of a lone Vulcan bomber across Morecambe on Friday was a
fitting tribute to a leading transgender activist, author and RAF veteran of 40 years.
The life of Lynne Janine Braithwaite BEM, who died on August 12, was celebrated at a packed Lancaster Cremator-ium where friends and family said their farewells to a remarkable person.fitting tribute to a leading transgender activist, author and RAF veteran of 40 years.
DETERMINED: Lynne Braithwaite.
They included the Deputy Chief Constable of Lancashire police force, who gave a speech outlining Lynne's involvement as a volunteer advisor on transgender issues, who toured the country speaking at various seminars and workshops – fighting for the rights of all transgender people. . . .Read More
Study: Transgender vets face discrimination
By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Aug 26, 2008
Aug 26, 2008
A new study by a California research center finds that transgender veterans — people who changed their sex after getting out of the military — believe they are facing discrimination and disrespect at Department of Veterans Affairs medical facilities.
Transgender people also complained they had a difficult time while in the military, with repeated inquiries about their sexual orientation. Such questions were more likely to be faced by men planning to become women than for women planning to become men, according to the study by the Palm Center at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
The survey is based on interviews with 660 people identifying themselves as transgender veterans who were asked about their military and nonmilitary experiences, including 18 who said they began their gender transition while still in uniform. . . .Read More
Monday, August 25, 2008
Born in the Wrong Body-Change of Heart
"MSNBC's latest show on transgenders changing back--part of the story that was left out."
returnedhome
Make houses of worship truly inclusive
By Jody M. Huckaby, August 20, 2008
The doors to our houses of worship ought to be open to all. That includes lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans, who often feel that religion has been used to divide and conquer their families and their rights.
On Saturday night at the Saddleback Church forum, Pastor Rick Warren asked both candidates about their definition of marriage, and both said that it was between one man and one woman.
This felt like exclusion, if not discrimination, to many lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Americans. And unfortunately, neither presidential candidate was asked about how they would welcome the LGBT community into the conversations about faith.
That’s too bad because history and progress are often made in the pews. The struggle for civil rights for blacks began largely in our churches — and was led largely by clergy — and was born out of a deep sense of religious conviction, rooted in the tradition of loving thy neighbor as thyself.
Today, however, LGBT Americans struggle to find the same passion for equality within some communities of faith. . . .Read More
Day Zero: I’m in Denver
By Marisa Richmond
25 August 2006
Well, I’ve made it & I have survived the first full day.
I was taken to the airport this morning by my friend Mark, whose partner, Julie, usually cat sits for me. My plane had several TN delegates including Congressman Lincoln Davis & House Speaker Jimmy Naifeh. There were also delegates from NH & VA. After I finally got to the TN hotel, I picked up my delegate package, which included up to date information, & lot of little gift, including a bottle of Jack Daniels. . . .Read More
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