Video: Transgender woman in Scottsdale Arizona speaks out after filing discrimination

Click here.

TRANSGENDERED; A look at the lives of two individuals who have a strong desire to become members of the opposite sex

Stradiotto, Laura
Local News - Saturday, July 21, 2007 @ 09:00

Editor's note: At their request, the people in the following story are referred to in their felt-gender (not born gender).

Starr Danyals is in the initial stage of her transition. It's a process that will take years and could cost more than $20,000, but Danyals hopes it will bring inner peace.

"It's something I've always known, that the inside of me wasn't exactly reflected on the outside," Danyals said.

"As a child I always played with girls' toys, I always related to the female role.

"I remember being two years old and playing with my mother's clothing, her lipstick and her jewelry."

Today, Danyals is wearing an East Indian-inspired blouse and skirt with matching bandanna. Her eyes and eyebrows are outlined in black eyeliner, but a faint stubble is visible in the sunlight.

Danyals wishes to "go all the way" and have surgery to become a woman - although emotionally she feels like she's been a woman for most of her life.

When Danyals started performing in drag about 10 year ago, it was the most comfortable she had felt in a long time.

"When I was in drag, I had a better self-esteem, I had a better self-worth. I felt attractive and that was something I never felt like as a man."

Starr Danyals, born Daniel Valiquette, is transgendered. According to a 2000 Ontario Human Rights Commission report, Danyals belongs to one of the most "disadvantaged and disenfranchised" groups in society.

Transgendered is a term that describes, but is not limited to, cross dressers, transvestites and transsexuals - a group of people who experience a high level of harassment and discrimination based on their appearance and identification. . . .

When one twin gets a sex change

Portugal's cross-dressing 'general' dies after 20 years as a man

Giles Tremlett
Friday July 20, 2007
The Guardian

Maria Teresinha Gomes, or ‘la generala’, who lived as a man for nearly 20 years until discovered as an impostor in 1992

The protagonist of one of Portugal's most gripping courtroom dramas has died after almost 20 years in which she fooled everyone, including her live-in companion, that she was actually a male army general.

With her general's uniform complete with medals, Maria Teresinha Gomes cut a dashing figure as the respectable and charming General Tito Anibal da Paixao Gomes. What started out as a costume for the 1974 carnival, knocked up by a tailor in Lisbon, soon became the defining aspect of an invented personality. The general was only occasionally seen in uniform, but even in his civilian clothes he had a distinguished martial air about him that was enough to convince almost everyone.

It was, apparently, good enough for a nurse called Joaquina Costa, who became the general's companion, sharing a house, and a life, with the general for 15 years.

The general's polite and cultured attitude garnered him the respect and admiration of neighbours. He eventually used his position of authority, however, to persuade them to hand over part of their savings for investment. High returns were promised, but never forthcoming. It was not until 1992 that "la generala" was unmasked and put on trial.

"There were people who dealt with him every day and never doubted that he was a man," one witness told the court. . . .

Discrimination surprised bar patron

Nightclub owner had singled out her transgender friends, she says

Richard Ruelas
The Arizona Republic
Jul. 20, 2007 12:00 AM

Michele de LaFreniere, the transgender woman who filed a complaint against a Scottsdale nightclub that refused her admittance, said she is used to being stared at but is not used to discrimination.

"Growing up as a White male, I never knew discrimination," de LaFreniere said Thursday at a news conference.

The 52-year-old, who started outwardly identifying as a female in June 2004, filed a civil rights complaint with the state Attorney General's Office against Anderson's Fifth Estate.

The owner of the nightclub, Tom Anderson, said he is scheduled to meet with state investigators Aug. 7.

De LaFreniere, a tall blonde with a square jaw, wore a bright top with a plunging neckline to meet with reporters at the headquarters of Equality Arizona, a Phoenix organization that fights for gay rights.

De LaFreniere said she routinely danced the night away to '80s music at Anderson's Fifth Estate, both as a man and as a woman, with no incident. Trouble started in September, when she started bringing five or six friends "in different parts of transition."

One evening, she said, one of her friends asked the bouncer which bathroom to use and he said to use whichever one made the friend comfortable.

The friend chose the women's room, but found the toilet too gross.

"So, she stood up," de LaFreniere said, "and there was a complaint."

Other friends used the men's room, but a male patron took a picture using a cellphone camera, she said.

Weeks later, Anderson met de LaFreniere at the door and told her he didn't want the business of "her and her kind.". . .

Emerging force

Daniel Beaty's Obie winning one-man show 'Emergence-SEE!' returns to Atlanta next week.

Emerging force Multi-talented performer says his work necessarily includes gay, transgender characters

By JIM FARMER JUL. 20, 2007 . . .Beaty performed “Emergence-SEE!” last year at New York’s off-Broadway Public Theater to great commercial and critical acclaim — including winning two Obie Awards for theater excellence. He's touring the world now, but it has not been a quick process. Beaty first performed the show at the Shakespeare Company in Berkshire, Mass., six years ago and made numerous changes since then. one of the central figures is freddie, A gay man who is in pursuit of love. “He is in conversations with others about finding a lover," Beaty says. "He secretly has a crush on another guy.” In the play, Freddie’s best friend Ashes is transgender. “That character is a big, bold personality," Beaty says. "One of the other characters in the piece is attracted to her, not knowing she is transgendered.” To Beaty, it is imperative to include gay characters, especially since he says being gay is still very much a taboo issue among African Americans. “Particularly in the African-American community, we want to slip homosexuality under the rug," he says. "But it is just as present in our community as anywhere. We are all connected, in spite of age, class, sexuality. You see Freddie’s heart in this show as he looks for love, and Ashes is so free, and so determined, you feel empowered by her boldness." . . .

Transgender teen

Women's troubles

. . . .Back in Shakespeare's time, men and boys played all the roles, including the female parts. These days, men mostly dress up as women for comic effect. In Hairspray, the audience are in on the joke that an actor is playing Edna but the fact that it's a man isn't alluded to at all.

Unsurprisingly, Travolta took time to accept his sex change. "It was hard for me to grasp the concept of being a leading man for 30 years, and now I'm being sought out to play a fat woman from Baltimore," he explains.

Sometimes, as the country song goes, it's hard to be a woman. Just ask Travolta, who spent four to five hours in the make-up chair at the start of his working days. He was encased from forehead-to-toe in a full 30lb body fat suit and given separate gel-filled silicone prosthetic applicances (chin and lower lip, upper lip, two cheek pieces and one wrap-around neck and cleavage piece).

People were taken in by his transformation. One audience member asked after an early screening, "who was the lovely woman who played Edna?". The producers, too, report that cinemagoers didn't know it was Travolta until they saw his name in the credits at the end.

Even the actor didn't recognise himself on viewing the screen test. "I didn't see me in it, and I tested it on other people. I said 'take a look at that. There's this broad we're looking at to see if she's going to be good for the movie'," he recalls.

"I let them watch for five minutes, and I said 'what do you think of her?'.

They said, 'she's fun, she's bubbly, she's kind of cute'. And I said, 'good, that's me'.". . .

The lesbian couple who both had babies by a gay drag queen

By JAYA NARAIN - More by this author » Last updated at 11:04am on 18th July 2007

Comments (33)

With their baby son and daughter in their arms, Stephanie Burns and Joanne Bartle are the picture of proud motherhood.

And it's all thanks to a gay drag queen.

Miss Burns, 23, a trainee truck driver, was desperate to have a child with her lesbian partner. They had been looking for a sperm donor when they started chatting to 21-year- old transvestite singer Ryan Egeley in a nightclub.

He revealed that he, too, wanted children and agreed to be a donor.

Scroll down for more...

Happy families: Stephanie, Ryan and Joanne, with children Martha Rae and Elijah Jo

A nurse gave Miss Burns a handful of sterilised medical syringes and she carried out a DIY insemination at their home in Bawtry, Doncaster. She became pregnant at the first attempt.

Then, while decorating the nursery, 40-year-old Miss Bartle announced she wanted to have a baby as well. So the pair approached Mr Egeley again and he donated sperm on three further occasions before she, too, became pregnant.

The couple now have a 13-month-old son, Elijah Jo, and a ten-month-old daughter, Martha Rae.

To complicate matters even further Miss Bartle also has a three-year-old son, Jonah, from a previous heterosexual relationship.

Scroll down for more...

Sperm donor: Ryan in drag

"I wanted Jonah to have a younger brother or sister to play with," she said. "Now, thanks to Stephanie and Ryan, he's got two.

"They're our little angels. We're incredibly lucky to have both conceived. Especially with such a haphazard method. I didn't know what I was doing."

Miss Burns said: "I didn't really believe it would work at all. I was gobsmacked. We both literally jumped for joy. It was the best feeling in the world. . . .

Bar vs. transgendered: AG looks into complaint

Peter Corbett
The Arizona Republic
Jul. 18, 2007 05:19 PM

Scottsdale bar owner Tom Anderson believes he was doing the right thing when he banned several transgender patrons from the club after women complained about cross-dressing men using the women's bathroom.

But one of the banned patrons, Michele deLaFreniere, has filed a discrimination complaint against Anderson's Fifth Estate.

The Arizona Attorney General's Office is investigating and a hearing is set for Aug. 7.

"It looked like a man trying to get the ladies drink special," Anderson said of the cross-dressing patrons. . .

It did not work to have the cross-dressing patrons use the men's room, either, since some of the men chastised them and they were at risk of getting beat up, Anderson said. . . .

Who's your daddy?

Josey Vogels
jvogels@hour.ca

Clever '70s marketing isn't so far from today's reality for some FTM transsexuals

You're strolling through the park and you happen upon the intimate scene of a mother breastfeeding her baby under a tree. How sweet, you think, and before looking away - because your mother always told you it's not polite to stare - you notice the cropped hair and full beard. Seems mommy is actually a daddy. Breastfeeding his baby.

This isn't the only awkward type of scenario to arise when a female-to-male (FTM) transsexual decides to have a baby.

Imagine walking around looking like a man nine months pregnant - and it's not a beer belly. Or how the staff at the hospital is going to react when you show up at the delivery room - and you're not the one handing out the cigars.

FTM transsexuals face unique challenges when it comes to parenting, explains R, who was speaking on the topic at the Guelph Sexuality Conference this year and asked me not to identify him publicly because of his job situation.

Unlike lesbians, gay men and even male-to-female (MTF) transsexuals, who have their own boatload of troubles when it comes to becoming parents, many FTM transsexuals forgo genital reconstruction surgery (it's harder to turn an innie into an outie) and thus are left with their female reproductive anatomy intact. Which means, if they're off hormone therapy, they can get preggers and have a biological child. . . .

"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. . . .