Pushing the transsexual envelope

Candis Cayne is a real-life transsexual who plays Carmelita, a blond transsexual with a low, sultry voice, on ABC's Dirty Sexy Money.

By ROGER CATLIN
Hartford Courant

Gay people on TV are old hat.

By now, Entertainment Weekly reports this week, 61 percent of college freshmen, who grew up with Will & Grace, approve of gay marriage. The finding in the national poll is up 10 percentage points from a decade ago.

A turn around the dial will bring you gay story lines in daytime soap operas, same-sex dating on MTV shows like Next and A Shot of Love With Tila Tequila, and prominent gay characters on ABC's Brothers & Sisters and several cable shows — FX's Nip/Tuck, HBO's The Wire and Showtime's The L Word.

Suspected of being gay is no longer the guaranteed laugh it was on TV anymore, even on macho shows like Two and a Half Men. And characters like George on Grey's Anatomy or Barney on How I Met Your Mother can be credible as virtual Lotharios, even though they are played by gay men.

Some surprises

No, to add shock to TV shows in 2007, writers have turned to transsexuals.

How surprising was it last season on Ugly Betty when Alex, the long-lost brother of Mode magazine editor-in-chief Daniel Mead, returned as Alexis, who was not only a woman but also a woman who looks like Rebecca Romijn (exactly like her, as it turned out)?

A story line over the summer on Entourage involved Johnny Drama trying to get in good with the mayor of Beverly Hills by hooking him up with what appeared to be a beautiful woman at a trendy bar. Her pre-op secret was revealed in one of those skirt flash shots the paparazzi so love. But the mayor (Stephen Tobolowsky) decided he liked his exotic new acquaintance, anyway.

Another politician on a TV series who decided to stick with his transsexual is William Baldwin's Patrick Darling on ABC's Dirty Sexy Money. Although a married New York state attorney general running for U.S. Senate, he is determined to continue his illicit relationship with Carmelita, despite entreaties from his family lawyer.

Carmelita, a sultry blonde with a very low voice, is notable because she might be broadcast TV's first recurring transsexual character who actually is played by a transsexual.

Other shows

She is played by Candis Cayne, whose previous credits include Wigstock: The Movie, To Wong Foo Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar and an episode of CSI: New York.

A transsexual story line also occurs early on another new ABC series, Big Shots, in which divorced cosmetics CEO Duncan Collinsworth, played by Dylan McDermott, hooks up with a transsexual prostitute at a rest stop — a tryst that threatens his career when the story gets out.

A more normal depiction of a transsexual life comes as a small part of the FX series The Riches, about a family of grifters, whose youngest son prefers to dress in women's clothes.

Even as more daytime talk shows take a more serious look at transsexuals, including an October episode of Oprah Winfrey, some in the transgender community are not encouraged by TV's tendency to depict transsexual women, especially those of color, as prostitutes. The only transsexual women who so far escape that profession are white.

But on There's Something About Miriam, an imported BBC series on the Fox Reality cable channel, a group of men vie for the affections of a Mexican woman. According to Fox Reality, the show involves "six eligible men, one beautiful model named Miriam and an enormous secret reveal you never saw coming."

Miriam speaks out

But in this season of transsexuals, of course you saw it coming.

And if you didn't, it was revealed in the premiere (shown, oddly, on Halloween, following the announcement of a winner on The Search for the Next Elvira).

"I'm not a real woman. I wasn't born as a girl, I was born as a man. I'm a transsexual," Miriam says with about 10 minutes left in the first episode. "I see myself as a girl because I've been living about half my life the way I am living now.

"I don't have any operation. I'm totally natural, this is me."

A doctor from Spain is then interviewed, so he can say, "I can confirm that she has got masculine genitals."

"I see myself as a girl, so basically I like straight guys," Miriam says. The guys won't find out until the final episode.

When There's Something About Miriam first aired in the United Kingdom in 2004, it was called "the cruelest reality-show idea yet."

Filed suit

Its participants sued the show for conspiracy to commit sexual assault, defamation, breach of contract and personal injury in the form of psychological and emotional damage.

The cases were settled out of court, and the show since has been shown in Australia and Poland. Still, it is perhaps understandable that the cast refuses to do interviews related to the show's U.S. debut.

Mara Keisling, executive director for the National Center for Transgender Equality, has said, "It's just natural that as there are more trans people visible in public; that's going to be reflected in popular culture."

Some take offense

But with its emergence come terms that are offensive to the community, from "she-male" to "tranny."

And conservative watchdog groups are against it altogether.

Christopher Gildemeister, in the TV Trends column for the Parents Television Council, says ABC has an "apparent fetish for transsexuals" in a season where "bizarre forms of sex are being emphasized to a much greater degree on television than ever before." . . .

Sex changes put on police agenda

November 5, 2007

by Emma Stone

POLICE chiefs in Coventry are to get new guidelines on how to deal with officers who are going through a sex change.

West Midlands Police has plans to improve its policy relating to members of staff going through the sex change process and how it treats transsexual officers and civilian staff.

The current guidance used by managers in the force - which includes advice on dealing with the likely press interest, how to refer to individuals after surgery and how their pensions are affected - has been discussed by members of the Police Authority.

Members of the authority - the body that holds the force to account - asked the force to show them its current policy, so it can be discussed as part of the personnel committee's next meeting.

A transsexual is a person who believes that he or she belongs to the gender opposite to the gender they were born.

Having guidelines relating to transsexual and transvestite members of staff is now a must as part of sex discrimination regulations.

West Midlands Police diversity officer Emily Smith explained that the force's policy was unlikely to remain the same and would have to evolve.

She said: "We are trying to make sure that there is no discrimination in the ranks and that managers have an understanding of it - it is not something a lot of people know a lot about. We are looking at introducing a question in the staff data review, asking if the gender you identify with is the same as your birth gender.

"There is a lot of consultation planned before any of the changes are made.

"Transsexualism doesn't occur that often but it has done in the past and we have to be prepared to handle it in an appropriate and sensitive manner." . . .

FtM Transgender Documentary

AAP: Androgen Insensitivity Does Not Mean Immediate Surgery

By Charles Bankhead, Staff Writer, MedPage Today
Reviewed by Zalman S. Agus, MD; Emeritus Professor at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

November 02, 2007

SAN FRANCISCO, Nov. 2 -- Many patients with the intersex syndrome of complete androgen insensitivity can safely delay gonadectomy and vaginal reconstruction at least until late adolescence, suggests a long-term study.

Action Points

• Explain to interested patients that this study found that people with the intersex syndrome of complete androgen insensitivity can safely delay decisions about orchiectomy and vaginal reconstruction.
  
  
• This study was published as an abstract and presented orally at a conference. These data and conclusions should be considered to be preliminary as they have not yet been reviewed and published in a peer-reviewed publication.

Of 27 patients who underwent gonadectomy, 20 had the procedure in late adolescence or early adulthood, and seven had surgery in childhood, Todd Purves, M.D., of Johns Hopkins reported at the American Academy of Pediatrics meeting here. None of the surgical specimens demonstrated evidence of malignancy.

Additionally, 11 patients have had vaginal reconstruction, 10 procedures performed after puberty. Seven of the 10 postpubertal patients who had vaginoplasty are sexually active, as are 12 of 15 who decided not to have the surgery.

"A woman who has a vaginal depth of two or four centimeters won't be able to have sexual intercourse, but that finding and that decision [about surgery] can be made at age 19," Dr. Purves said in an interview. "The decision can't be made at age two or three or four."

"One of the bottom-line findings of this study is that if a physician sees a two- or three-year-old child with this condition, it would be inaccurate, inappropriate, and wrong to tell the parents 'Your child is going to need vaginal surgery,'" he added. "That is incorrect. Not all of these patients need surgery."

Much of the debate about caring for patients with complete androgen insensitivity syndrome centers on the need for, and the timing, of gonadectomy and vaginal reconstruction or dilation, Dr. Purves noted. For patients who have surgery, the principal issue becomes timing: Should the surgery be done before or after puberty?

The testes are not necessary for development after puberty, but patients with the syndrome face a risk of malignant transformation of 2% to 5% per year after age 25. Additionally, some patients and parents are advised that surgery will be required for normal sexual functioning.

Complete androgen insensitivity syndrome occurs in two to five of every 100,000 live male births, according to the National Institutes of Health. Those with the condition have XY sex-determination chromosomes of males, but because their body does not respond to androgen, they may develop female characteristics, including sexual characteristics. . . .

The travails of the third gender

October 29, 2007

Karachi

Bindiya, a member of the Hijra (Eunich) community, won the hearts of a jam-packed audience at The Second Floor on Saturday night with her witty responses during the question-answer session after the screening of a documentary on her life entitled, ëBindiya Chamki Gií.

The 24-minute documentary was a short narrative on the lifestyle and challenges encountered by the Hijra community [also known as Khwaja Siras] in Karachi and Pakistan in general. Through the documentary, Bindiya highlighted the harassment they face at every step. ìBe it public buses or

public toilets, we are harassed by both men and women. We donít even know where to stand in public queues; the women say we should be with men, when we join the menís queue they tease us and ask us to join the women,î shared Bindiya during her interview with Ragini Kidvai, Director/Producer of the documentary.

Ragini, through her documentary, tried to draw peopleís attention towards this important segment of the population, whose rights are conveniently being ignored by the government. From the issuance of NICs to the provision of jobs, the presence of a third gender has still not been acknowledged by the state, she complained. Ragini informed that the Hijras can be classified

into three types - transsexuals, transgenders and crossgenders - and that most of the doctors are unable to determine the right gender at the time of birth.

In the documentary, Bindiya disclosed that her parents could not determine that she belonged to the third gender until she was old enough. “I had other brothers and sisters but could not relate to either of them. When I found out about Hijras I starting hanging out with them and realised this is where I belong and then abandoned my family to stay with other Hijras. However, I am still in touch with my family,” she said.

Bindiya said that the Khwaja Siras, would willingly accept jobs if offered by the government or the private sector. ìWe deserve as much respect and recognition as any other citizen of the country,î said Bindiya. . . .

Japan sex-change parents can't change records: court

October 29, 2007

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's Supreme Court has denied pleas from two people with gender identity disorders to change their sex in government household records, their legal adviser said on Monday.

Masami Osako, 51, and Sayaka Morimura, 47, had wanted to have their registered sex switched to female from male after undergoing sex-change operations.

But both were denied the move under a law that says people who have children cannot change their sex on the household registry. Osako and Morimura each have a child with wives they had divorced before their sex changes.

Lawyer Toshiyuki Oshima, who advised the two separate cases, said he now planned to urge politicians to change the conditions under which transsexuals can change their records.

"Now that the Supreme Court has denied the change, we now have grounds to ask lawmakers to revise the law so that people with children can also have their registry changed," Oshima said by telephone.

Under a law in place since 2004, people diagnosed with gender identity disorder can change their sex in Japan's detailed household registry system, but under several conditions, including that they are unmarried and have no children.

More than 570 people succeeded in changing their registered sex under the law up until the end of 2006, Oshima said. Eight have been denied the change, all because they had children.

The Supreme Court ruled that allowing a registry change for someone with a child would "add confusion to family discipline and would possibly cause problems for the child's welfare." . . .

Efforts to 'cure' gays draw protests

By AMAN BATHEJA

29 October 2007

McClurkin

The long-raging debate over efforts by some religious and psychological groups to "cure" homosexuals is flaring anew this weekend on two battlegrounds: at a conference in Irving and at a Barack Obama campaign concert in South Carolina.

Several dozen people demonstrated Saturday outside the DFW Airport Marriott, where the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality is holding its annual conference. Members are discussing research in conversion therapy: therapy to suppress homosexual desires.

Protesters are also expected to stage a vigil today in Columbia, S.C., where a gospel outreach concert is being held to help Obama's efforts to reach out to black voters in the pivotal South Carolina primary. At issue is one of the event's featured stars: Grammy-winning gospel singer Donnie McClurkin, who has said he believes that homosexuality is a choice, one he was able to break loose from with the power of prayer.

The message from the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender groups protesting at both events is that homosexuality needs no cure because it is not an illness and that attempts to convert gays to a straight lifestyle are based on quack science.

The views of the therapy association and McClurkin "are patently absurd, unscientific and have no basis in fact," said Wayne Besen, an author and political organizer who helped arrange Saturday's protest.

Besen also helped spark the national controversy over Obama's concert by publicly challenging the Illinois senator to disavow McClurkin. . . .

Born Again

October 31, 2007

Clinton Edwards’ journey to womanhood.

by Chris Dovi

It’s her hands that will always give her away.

Strong and broad and coarse with wide nail beds, they’re folded daintily across her lap, fidgeting and smoothing the fabric of her tan skirt. She doesn’t try to hide her hands. Doesn’t dress them up. No nail polish. No French manicure.

Just hands.

They are Clinton Edwards’ hands. They are also Nova Edwards’ hands.

Those hands had been used to hide things. They helped Clinton hide Nova. Tried to cover up all the little things that might have given her away. That might have revealed her true nature to the world, to her family, to the people that both she — and he — love.

Now they’re a reminder of Clinton and his sometimes painful past, but they’re nothing that Nova needs to hide from any more.

“My first memories of my life are of me identifying as a little girl,” says Nova, who stopped hiding from herself about three years ago. That’s when she began the rocky transition from a full-grown man — with a life and a woman who loves him — to the woman that she hopes soon to be.

She says she’s a much happier person than she was living Clinton’s lie, but there are some things from Clinton’s life that Nova doesn’t want to lose. Such as “Elizabeth,” Clinton’s girlfriend of 17 years, the woman who might have been his wife if life had turned out differently. The woman Nova still hopes might have a change of heart.

“I don’t want to say goodbye, because when I do, she’s not going to want to see me and she’ll consider me dead,” Nova says softly while sipping coffee in a booth at Perly’s on Franklin Street near her apartment.

Clinton and Elizabeth got together in 1990, when both of them were students at Virginia Commonwealth University. Clinton was 22 and had discovered only four years earlier as a freshman with unfettered access to a university library that there was a name for the way he’d felt all his life.

He told Elizabeth everything about his secret. He told her that at 19, he’d nearly begun the process of gender reassignment, but had held back for the sake of his mother.

Elizabeth didn’t like the truth, but she accepted him. Although Clinton wanted to be a woman, he was still sexually attracted to women — and to Elizabeth. They could make it work.

Now, their solid friendship is months — maybe days — away from the end.

While Nova gets closer and closer to the day that her transition from male to female will be complete, Elizabeth can no longer accept Nova as part of her relationship with Clinton.

And Nova can no longer accept Clinton.

Once bottled up inside Clinton, Nova is as honest as can be about who she is. She is a transgender woman — a T-girl, a TG woman — who as a man came to the decision to accept her true nature as a woman lost in a man’s body.

She’s not unique, but whether her condition is part of the natural range of human sexuality or the manifestation of perverted thoughts or a personality defect remains a public debate.

While the debate continues, so does the social stigma. It’s much more complicated, and less accepted, than being gay in today’s society. To want to change your sex is something else. Jobs are lost. Families are lost. Friends are lost. Few can — or want — to understand. Psychiatry still views transgenderism as a disease, classifying it as an aberration and recommending treatments in its official literature.

People like Nova often gather the courage to make the transition to living as women late in their lives, long after their duties and social ties have become well-established. It’s ironic that courage comes only with time, when an earlier transition might have made for a simpler reintegration into society as a woman. Hormones can do a lot for a teenager not yet fully endowed with the masculine traits of a middle-age man.

Often the decision to risk losing girlfriends, wives, children and extended families is one of desperation. Living for decades in a body they feel is not theirs and trying to play the role in society assigned by their gender, the transgendered desperately seek a way out. Years of depression — of contemplating or attempting suicide, or sometimes just the simple inability to continue in a lie — eventually take a toll.

Some transgender women commit suicide; various medical community statistics put suicide rates among TG women as high as 25 percent. That’s regardless of whether they are still living as men, are beginning a new life as something between man and woman, or have made the full transition to surgically achieved womanhood. . . .

Never mind the reassign

>> For Toronto’s the Cliks, queer and
transgender politics take a backseat to rock

CROSSOVER POTENTIAL: The Cliks

by ANDREA ZANIN

Toronto-based rockers the Cliks have attracted quite a lot of attention this year. Their music has been compared to the White Stripes and David Bowie, and their major-label debut album, Snakehouse, was released in April by Warner in Canada and Tommy Boy in the U.S. This summer, the Cliks played several cities with Cyndi Lauper’s True Colors tour, and now they’re making a few stops in Canada before heading off to open on the Cult’s U.S. tour.

It should come as no surprise that an all-queer band with a female-to-male transgender frontman, the charismatic Lucas Silveira, would have a distinctly queer fan base. But the labels are betting that the foursome (with bassist Jen Benton, drummer Morgan Doctor and guitarist Nina Martinez) has crossover potential, and Silveira has high hopes as well.

“All I know is that we’re creating music,” he says. “To be good, it should be universal. The kind of stuff I write about is particular to the human spirit as opposed to a community or a politic of people.”

Silveira is happy to embrace his pop roots. “I’m not underground. I grew up listening to pop rock and mainstream rock music, so of course the music I create would be of that genre.”

Much has been made of Silveira’s transgender status—the Toronto Star described him as “on the verge of becoming the first transgendered pop heartthrob ever to register on mainstream radar,” and he’s been told he’s the first trans male to be signed to a major label.

“Everyone has a story,” he says. “This just happens to be my story and I happen to be a songwriter. I’m visible because it’s important to talk about these things. But I walk around thinking about music, not gender.”

Musically speaking, however, a gender change is more than an interesting factoid. A typical female-to-male transition involves using testosterone to help develop masculine physical traits—including a deeper voice, which can take several years to mature. For a singer, that’s no small consideration, especially since Silveira’s transition began just as the band was embarking on the upward spiral of success.

As with everything else, though, Silveira has made some unusual choices—he’s opted out of taking hormones. “I decided right at the beginning about the effects it would have on my voice, and I just couldn’t take the risk,” he explains. “Having a moustache would have been nice but it’s not worth losing my voice. It’s carried me throughout my life. I felt sorry for myself at first but because of this, I was sort of forced to start thinking about gender a little differently.”

He did have a double mastectomy—top surgery—“so that’s made me feel a lot more comfortable with my body. But I don’t necessarily need to have a beard or a deep voice to consider myself a transgender male.”

Silveira wrote the album while going through an intense period in his life, and that certainly comes through in the music. “It’s a strong album not just musically but because it’s about going to the deepest, darkest places inside yourself and coming out and finding hope and strength that you never thought you had,” he says. “But if people just want to dance around and say, ‘Yeah, it’s hot, that’s a great song’—well, that’s fine too.” . . .

Thailand's secret history

An Australian academic is trying to preserve the story of Thailand's gay, lesbian and transgendered communities in the face of official opposition.

About 2,000 books, magazines, photo albums, video tapes, movie and audio CDs relating to homosexuals fill the small room that is the country's only library dedicated to documenting the local gay community. Called the Thai Queer Resource Centre (TQRC), it was founded by Australian scholar Assoc Prof Peter Jackson with the aim of preventing the history and voice of the Thai GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender) community from erosion by the state.

''No official library in Thailand is collecting this material. Also, the police are out to destroy them. It's therefore essential that the Thai GLBT community, and researchers such as myself work together to save these important records of Thai queer history,'' explained Jackson, senior fellow in Thai history at the Australian National University's Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies.

There is a lot of interest among Thai university students in conducting research on Thailand's gay, lesbian and transgendered community, he said, but the authorities view material that reflects the lives of the Thai GLBT community as immoral and illegal, which must be destroyed. So there is no place where students or researchers can find such historical records.

Hence his effort to set up the Thai Queer Resources Centre to collect as many publications as possible before the police and ill-informed government policies lead to them being destroyed.

The Thaksin administration's social order campaigns, for example, severely affected gay publishing in Thailand, with police raiding magazine and book shops, even second-hand bookshops, to confiscate gay magazines.

''If private citizens, academics and Thai gay organisations do not work together now, then the negative attitudes of Thai bureaucrats and the police may mean that vital historical records will disappear forever in this country,'' he pointed out.

''To understand the real lives and situations of the Thai gay, lesbian and transgendered communities, it is necessary to read what they say about themselves and their own lives,'' he said.

''This material forms an excellent record of how Thai gays, lesbians and transgendered people have lived their lives in Thailand over the past few decades amid so many negative and misinformed stereotypes of gays, lesbians and transgender people in the Thai press and media.''

Thai GLBT magazines have been written and published by people from these communities, for readers who are gay, lesbian and transgendered. They include short stories and novels, biographies and autobiographies and movie reviews.

Jackson himself has his own academic collection in Australia, now kept at the Australian National University. It will eventually be transferred to the National Library of Australia. To him, it is important that a similar collection also be established in Thailand.

He started collecting Thai magazines and books on gay, lesbian and transgender issues in Thailand on his first research visit to Thailand in 1982.

''I now have about 300 Thai-language books, and about 2,000 Thai gay magazines, which have been published since the early 1980s. I think I probably have the largest collection of Thai-language publications on gay, lesbian and transgender issues in the world,'' he said proudly. . . .

Breaking The Binary

Running of the drag queens

by Aya Mueller

11/1/07

Men dressed as Audrey Hepburn, Pocahontas and other famous females were on full display Tuesday night at the annual high heel race in Dupont Circle.

Hundreds of spectators - including D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty - gathered to see men dressed in drag sporting high heels running through the streets. More than 100 drag queens hurled the short stretch between JR's Bar and Grille and Trio Restaurant, vying for the grand prize of a $50 bar tab at JR's, the de facto organizer of the race.

The event is a famed pre-Halloween social gathering that unites the local lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender groups, along with anyone else who cares to join.

"I think every neighborhood needs something like this," said Mike Wilson, 30, a first time volunteer at the event. "You get thousands of people out on the street having fun in the middle of the week. It's just one of those events that can bring the community together."

The first onlookers arrived around 6 p.m., quickly crowding bars and sidewalks and then competing for spots in the front row. Meanwhile, contestants - headed by a mixed-gender team of cheerleaders - flaunted their costumes under flashing cameras.

"The High Heel Race makes absolutely no money," said David Perruzza, the general manager of JR's. "We buy a tent, we pay to clean up the street, and we buy the volunteer T-shirts. We end up in the hole because we pay for all the stuff."

At 9 p.m., police cautioned everybody "who is not wearing heels" to get out of the way. Then the race began, covering 100 yards and lasting roughly 90 seconds. While the front 50 or so sprinted, the latter half merely paraded in front of the cheering crowds.

The race was won by a contestant under the alias "Chlamydia Parker, Duchess of Gloryhole," dressed in a yellow wig flowery dress and sunglasses. Her costume was relatively tame compared to many of her compatriots.

"They really enjoy it," said Pina Perruzza, volunteer and mother of David Perruzza. "Some of them start making their costumes as early as a year in advance. Nobody has been hurt since my son took it over, 12 years ago. Nobody has ever been hurt, actually."

The intricate and gaudy costumes included Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho), pants down, being pushed on a mobile toilet; a walking Obelisk; and an authentic looking Lady Diana complete with bodyguards.

What started out two decades ago as a friendly challenge between a few drag queens drinking at JR's to run down the street, down a shot, and return, is now a tradition.

"I've been here in D.C. for 12 years and my first year I came to the High Heel Race and thought it was really fun," said Lorraine, an onlooker who did not want to disclose her last name. She has she has returned multiple times since.

Fenty, who also attended last year's race, joined the jovial festivities shaking hands and bowing to the queens.

"The reason I like it," Lorraine said, "is because it's something that going on in D.C. that is not repressed and boring."

Transsexual fights for her lesbian rights

Sarah Price
November 4, 2007

A TRANSGENDER psychotherapist has taken a gay association to an equal opportunities tribunal, alleging she was discriminated against by being refused entry to a lesbian event.

Tracie O'Keefe, of Sydney, said she requested an invitation to a South Australian event organised by lesbian support group Sappho's Party.

The group has a policy of excluding transgender people from its workshops, camps and social events because it only supports lesbians who were born female.

Ms O'Keefe said she was refused an invitation and told the event, in the Adelaide Hills in January 2006, was exclusive to lesbians raised female from birth.

"I sent an email to them saying that I would like to go and they sent me an email back saying it would not be appropriate for me to attend," Ms O'Keefe said.

Ms O'Keefe has taken the issue to the South Australian Equal Opportunity Tribunal, which part-heard the matter last month.

One of the event's organisers, Stacey McCaig, reportedly told the tribunal that Sappho's Party was strictly for lesbian women who were raised as females from birth.

The tribunal also reportedly heard organisers did not want Ms O'Keefe to attend because her presence would affect "intimacy, level of trust and discussion".

Ms O'Keefe, who wants an apology, started living as a woman 35 years ago, at the age of 15, and has had gender reassignment surgery.

"It was offensive," she said. " I've lived in a lesbian relationship for 14 years with the same woman. I don't get discriminated against in any other part of the gay community."

The matter has been adjourned to December 19.

California public school cancels 'gender-switch day'

Allie Martin OneNewsNow.comNovember 2, 2007

Officials at a California public school have cancelled a cross-dressing day, following a slew of parental complaints.

Recently, students at Adams Middle School in Brentwood were encouraged to dress like the opposite sex during the last day of the school's "Spirit Week." The mother of a seventh-grade student found out about the activity and contacted the principal to express her concerns. The mother was told she could keep her son at home if she did not want him participating in the event.

She then contacted the Pacific Justice Institute (PJI) -- which counseled concerned parents and advised them on how to communicate with the school. The school canceled the event, and instead encouraged students to wear their school colors on the Friday of "Spirit Week."

PJI president Brad Dacus says the school did the right thing. "The only purpose that seemed to be involved with this event was for the sensitivity and tolerance of cross dressers, transsexuals, [and] transvestites. That's what the school was trying to push on these young girls and boys at junior-high age," says Dacus. He says this is also a good example of what parents and individuals can do when they stand up for what is right.

In a conversation with a PJI staff attorney, the school's principal says he wanted to encourage students to be "free thinkers," but that the community did not grasp the intent of the "gender switch day."

TheStar.com

Q: I'm 24 and have been in a relationship with a guy for four years. I discovered 18 months ago that he has a deep, dark secret: he wishes he had been born a girl.

I was the first person he ever told this to, but he's felt this desire since he was a child.

He hates the idea of sex-change surgery and also realizes he'd have to tell everyone, which would affect his social world. He's been seeing a doctor and has decided to dress as a girl at home and occasionally go out as one.

I hang out with him acting as a guy, and usually he'll stay dressed as a guy. I'm having a hard time deciding what to do because I really love being with him but feel very uncomfortable with this whole thing.

How can I deal with this? I don't want to have to leave him only because of it.

---

Torn

A: This is a transition period for your guy, which is going to require a lot more of his time and effort to find his own comfort level. He'll want to explore his gender identity further than this quick decision about cross-dressing and should ask his doctor for referral to a gender identity clinic for assessment.

But for your comfort level, you're going to have to decide, soon, how far your friendship or your relationship goes. He's confided in you and trusts you. You could continue to be his closest pal and support him through the process of self-discovery, but if you feel too awkward to stay a couple, say so.

Meanwhile, you both need more information, such as that most cross-dressers are heterosexual and only dress as the other sex part-time, for various reasons including pleasure or relief of stress.

Q: What's up with women and shoes? My fiancée has about 40 pairs and is always shopping for more. Is this a sign of insecurity, or is she a shopaholic I shouldn't marry because she'll make me go broke?

---

Four-Pair Guy

A: Everyone to their own retail therapy – and if you're into stereotypes, there are plenty of guys who can't resist a DIY store. For shoe-lovers, women and men alike, shoes are the key style statement, from "cool," to "funky" and more.

If your fiancée can afford this indulgence, it's her business. If not, better discuss future finances along with marriage plans.

Tip of the Day In relationships, pushy equals needy and is usually a big turnoff.

'The Second Half of My Life'

Talk of the Nation, February 8, 2007 · Dr. Richard Raskind was a champion tennis player and a renowned eye surgeon with a wife and son. But in 1975, Renee Richards emerged, after a highly publicized sex reassignment operation. Richards talks about her new book and questions the effects of her decisions and her notoriety.

Excerpt: 'No Way Renee: The Second Half of My Notorious Life'

by Renée Richards

Preface

In 1976, I was one of the most famous people in the world. The paparazzi were on my trail twenty-four hours a day, hungry for any photo, the less flattering the better. The mainstream press was better, sometimes. People, Time, Newsweek, Sports Illustrated — I was featured in them all, an international phenomenon. Once, at the height of my notoriety, I found myself in Uruguay, where I had gone beyond the urban centers like Montevideo and was walking down the beach at Carrasco, a tiny coastal village. I was enjoying a welcome sense of anonymity, but a man in a little kiosk pointed to my picture on a magazine and with much excitement asked me to sign it, which I did. Recognizable even in the countryside of Uruguay: that sums up the Renée Richards phenomenon at its zenith.

During that time I was deluged by a myriad of television opportunities. All the major figures wanted to interview me: Phil Donahue, Tom Snyder, Howard Cosell, and many others I can't recall. I was on the Today show, Good Morning America, and a host of other major shows. I was even invited to do The Hollywood Squares, but I declined. I had my limits.

And what had I done to merit this interest? Perfected an organ transplant procedure? Gone over Niagara Falls in a barrel? Neither. Simply put, I had undergone a male-to-female sex-change operation and then had the temerity to play in an amateur women's tennis tournament. Of course there was more to it than that, but basically that was the source of my infamy. To compound my audacity, I had not hung my head and apologized. I had gone to court, won my case, and played professional tennis as a woman.

The story of how I got into that situation was told in my autobiography, Second Serve. Born Richard Raskind. Raised a nice Jewish boy. Educated at Yale. Tournament tennis player. Top surgeon. Lieutenant-commander in the Navy. Married to a beautiful woman. Father of a wonderful son. But compelled by a secret drive that could not be suppressed, even with years of psychotherapy and every trick in the book. Another entity, Renée, kept growing stronger and stronger until she eventually took over.

It was a long nightmare for Dick, and just when it seemed to be over, another one started for Renée. She had to walk onto a tennis court and endure the intense scrutiny of thousands of people. It was a choice, yes, but not a happy one and not made out of a desire to show off. I took a stand on principle, but it exacted an emotional and financial price. When I left the tour, I was very tired of the fishbowl.

But I have had more than twenty-five years to get my second wind, so I want to respond to the question I hear so often: "What have you done lately, Dr. Richards?" One answer is that I have been doing what I always wanted to do in the first place: live a private life. Yet I remain a subject of interest and live in the memories of the many people who followed my adventures years ago. Unhappily, their mental image of me is too frequently tainted by grainy tabloid photographs and sensational headlines. I don't deny that my life has been strange, but strangeness is only part of a complex whole that is not well understood.

I have practiced a highly specialized form of eye surgery for forty years, and I am still operating every week. I am also an educator, having served as a clinical professor, first at Cornell Medical School and later at New York University, where I continue on the faculty to this day. I have instructed and influenced hundreds of residents and postgraduate fellows who are out in the world putting my lessons to work. They think of me as a distinguished mentor, not a curiosity. In 2001, I received the Helen Keller Services for the Blind Award, Manhattan Branch, given yearly to an outstanding ophthalmologist.

Many people know that I coached Martina Navratilova to two of her Wimbledon championships, but few know about the many lesser-known players, both professional and amateur, whose skills I have helped improve. They have gone on to become ambassadors for the game I love. This behind-the-scenes contribution is at odds with the picture of Renée Richards as an unbalanced, publicity-crazy flake. I am not despised by the tennis community. I am a respected figure, despite my notorious past, and in 2000 I was inducted into the Eastern Tennis Hall of Fame.

And I am seldom given credit for all that I have done in the area that has made me notorious, transsexualism. I'm the first to admit that I have not been an avid ambassador for transsexuals. I do not think of myself primarily as a transsexual. In fact, I fought for my rights largely because I was personally affronted that a medical operation could overshadow everything else I was as a human being. But there is no denying that when I retired from tennis, the world was much more aware of what a transsexual was, and that familiarity, not to mention my success as a professional coach, dispelled a lot of the condition's scandalous overtones. I opened doors for those who came after me, and I am a hero to many of them.

But I have not written No Way Renée as a justification of my life; rather, it is a look at the second half of a life that I hope no longer needs justifying. It is the story of how I thought through and reconciled my bizarre family life; how my son and I coped with my changed persona; how I gave my new incarnation an adolescence; how I restored my medical career; how I searched for understanding, stability, romance, health, and a sense of my place in a changing world. It answers the question in the minds of so many, "Was your sex change a mistake?" . . .

The Feminine Critique

By LISA BELKIN

November 1, 2007

DON’T get angry. But do take charge. Be nice. But not too nice. Speak up. But don’t seem like you talk too much. Never, ever dress sexy. Make sure to inspire your colleagues — unless you work in Norway, in which case, focus on delegating instead.

Daniel Horowitz

Writing about life and work means receiving a steady stream of research on how women in the workplace are viewed differently from men. These are academic and professional studies, not whimsical online polls, and each time I read one I feel deflated. What are women supposed to do with this information? Transform overnight? And if so, into what? How are we supposed to be assertive, but not, at the same time?

“It’s enough to make you dizzy,” said Ilene H. Lang, the president of Catalyst, an organization that studies women in the workplace. “Women are dizzy, men are dizzy, and we still don’t have a simple straightforward answer as to why there just aren’t enough women in positions of leadership.”

Catalyst’s research is often an exploration of why, 30 years after women entered the work force in large numbers, the default mental image of a leader is still male. Most recent is the report titled “Damned if You Do, Doomed if You Don’t,” which surveyed 1,231 senior executives from the United States and Europe. It found that women who act in ways that are consistent with gender stereotypes — defined as focusing “on work relationships” and expressing “concern for other people’s perspectives” — are considered less competent. But if they act in ways that are seen as more “male” — like “act assertively, focus on work task, display ambition” — they are seen as “too tough” and “unfeminine.”

Women can’t win.

In 2006, Catalyst looked at stereotypes across cultures (surveying 935 alumni of the International Institute for Management Development in Switzerland) and found that while the view of an ideal leader varied from place to place — in some regions the ideal leader was a team builder, in others the most valued skill was problem-solving. But whatever was most valued, women were seen as lacking it.

Respondents in the United States and England, for instance, listed “inspiring others” as a most important leadership quality, and then rated women as less adept at this than men. In Nordic countries, women were seen as perfectly inspirational, but it was “delegating” that was of higher value there, and women were not seen as good delegators.

Other researchers have reached similar conclusions. Joan Williams runs the Center for WorkLife Law, part of the University of California Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco. She wrote the book “Unbending Gender” and she, too, has found that women are held to a different standard at work.

They are expected to be nurturing, but seen as ineffective if they are too feminine, she said in a speech last week at Cornell. They are expected to be strong, but tend to be labeled as strident or abrasive when acting as leaders. “Women have to choose between being liked but not respected, or respected but not liked,” she said.

While some researchers, like those at Catalyst and WorkLife Law, tend to paint the sweeping global picture — women don’t advance as much as men because they don’t act like men — other researchers narrow their focus. . . .

Pumpkins through the Years

TransGender Michigan celebrates 10 years

Agency's anniversary corresponds with founder Rachel Crandall's discovery of self

By Jason A. Michael

"I do this work so people don't have to be lonely; so they don't have to be devastated. When I came out as trans, I was devastated. Within in a few months, I lost my marriage, my job, my career. But out of that came TransGender Michigan. And if my crisis hadn't happened, there probably still wouldn't be a statewide organization." - Rachel Crandell

Rachel Crandall seems to never leave home without a smile. She wears it as an almost-permanent accessory, like a brooch or bracelet she never takes off. It is her trademark.

But life hasn't always been smiles and sunshine for Crandall, the founder and executive director of TransGender Michigan. And Rachel hasn't always been Rachel. This week, she celebrates 10 years of living honestly - and the anniversary of introducing the woman she always knew she was meant to be to the world.

It began at 12:30 p.m. on Nov. 5, 1997.

"I was fired from my job as a psychotherapist at a small-town hospital," Crandall said. That's because Richard, the married man the hospital had hired, had begun growing his hair out and dabbing on a bit of rouge and shadow.

"They figured out what was going on," Crandall said. "I was beginning to transition. Then, at 3:30 p.m. the same day, I put all my male clothes in the back of the closet and became Rachel full time."

It was a metamorphosis long in the making.

"I'd always known," Crandall admitted. "But I'd go through moments of denial."

Exposed, though, the strong-willed social worker saw her options as few.

"I was so pissed off," she said. "I wanted to do something to make a difference ... to make sure that what happened to me didn't happen to a lot of other people. I remember feeling very lonely. So, I thought of an idea for a statewide organization to bring together all the transgender people feeling the same thing, so we didn't have to be so lonely."

The first thing the agency did was to launch a Web site and list a calendar of events happening throughout the state.

"We found that some people were doing good work, but no one three miles away knew about it," Crandall said. "So we started with that."

Next, they established a helpline, which exists today in the form of Crandall's cell phone.

"I talk right to the people who need help," she said. "There's no bureaucracy involved. There are no reams of paper involved. There's just people in crisis and they say, 'What do I do?' And I say, 'You know, I was in that situation and I didn't think I'd be able to make it through, either.'"

To date, Crandall has taken calls from people as far away as Australia and Hong Kong. And it's become more than just a tool for people in crisis. . . .

No Transgender Males Allowed in Girls' Bathrooms, Group Says

By Pete Winn
November 02, 2007

(CNSNews.com) - Council lawmakers in Maryland's Montgomery County are considering a proposal to give transgendered people protected status under law, and a local citizen's group is pledging to try to stop it, contending that, among other things, it would allow transgender men to use showers, lockers, and restrooms used by women and girls.

Bill 23-07 would add "gender identity" to the county's existing non-discrimination laws, if passed by the Montgomery County Council at its upcoming Nov. 13 meeting.

Michelle Turner, director of Citizens for a Responsible Curriculum (CRC), a parent's group in Rockville, Md., said the bill would basically allow males to have open access to women's restrooms.

"I am dumbfounded," Turner told Cybercast News Service. "They are saying, 'If you are a man but you feel like a woman, then even if you still have male genitalia, you would have access to restrooms and locker rooms and showers used by women and girls."

Dan Furmansky, executive director of the homosexual activist group Equality Maryland, said, in fact, the measure would protect a variety of what he called "gender-nonconforming individuals."

"Men who might appear effeminate or women who appear 'butch' - whether those are gay individuals or straight individuals - would have protection under this proposed legislation," he said.

Specifically, the law would apply to individuals who are living full-time as "a gender other than their birth gender."

He added: "Those could be individuals who are transsexual - meaning they have had sex reassignment surgery - or they could be people who are transitioning, or they could be people who cannot or are not going to have that reassignment surgery."

Regina Griggs, executive director of PFOX, Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays, said she is shocked that Montgomery County is considering protected status for a very tiny portion of the population - one which suffers from a psychiatric disorder.

"Transgenderism is legally considered a mental disorder," Griggs said. "It is not biological; people do not have a female brain in their body that is somehow different than their biological sex.

Transgenderism is listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV) - the book of guidelines that mental health professionals refer to in making diagnoses of psychiatric and psychological conditions.

The legal measure was quietly advancing through the county council until someone leaked its existence, Turner said. Members of CRC went to the Oct. 2 council meeting to speak out. Now a countywide effort is underway to alert parents and others about the bill.

"We have over 900,000 citizens here in Montgomery County, and we need to reach as many as we can to let them know what is going on behind closed doors by our county council - our elected officials," she said.

The bill is sponsored by Montgomery County council members Duchy Trachtenberg, Valerie Ervin, and Marc Elrich. None of the council members were available for comment prior to press time.