Sunday, December 09, 2007
Sierra Leone: What Is Gender?
December 7, 2007
The term Gender being considered in this article has nothing to do with grammar; rather it has to do with development issues. To begin with, it is important to distinguish between gender and sex. Sex describes those characteristics of men and women with which they are born. Sex differences have to do with our biological characteristics that are natural, and, for most part, are unchangeable. Sex has to do with how we are created, and our sexually distinct functions such as conception, breast feeding, provision of sperm, impregnation, do not change.
Gender refers to a system of roles and relationships between women and men in a given social, (economic and political) context. It is an analytical term that refers to those characteristics of women and men which are socially determined. Everything that women and men do, and everything that is expected of them can change, and does change over time and according to changing and varied social and cultural factors.
From the time a child is born, the infant learns what is appropriate for a girl or a boy, a woman or a man. The way children are held, spoken to, played with and dressed, indicate the expectations that society has for them. The designation of separate colours for each sex during infancy is just the start of a long and slow process that teaches girls to be submissive, dependent and passive and boys to be active, independent and dominant. Through a subtle system of rewards and punishment, girls learn that they will receive more attention when they are coy, cute and when they behave like little ladies. They learn to take up less space, and make less noise and demand less than boys. . . .
Trans woman seeks to succeed lawmaker
‘It’s not how I wanted to become a delegate, but it is what it is and you make the best of what you have and you move forward,’ said Dana Beyer after the death of Del. Jane Lawton. (Blade photo by Henry Linser)Beyer could replace Maryland delegate who died
JOSHUA LYNSEN
December 7, 2007
A transgender woman is among the candidates seeking to succeed a Maryland state legislator who died last week.
Dana Beyer, who lost her bid last year to become a state delegate, could become the nation’s first transgender state lawmaker if chosen Dec. 11 to fill the vacant Montgomery County seat.
“It’s not how I wanted to become a delegate, but it is what it is and you make the best of what you have and you move forward,” she said. “And that’s how you honor the memory of those past.”
Beyer is among the candidates vying to succeed Democratic Del. Jane Lawton, who died Nov. 29 after giving a presentation before a federal agency. Lawton, 63, joined the Maryland House of Delegates in 2005.
“I always wanted to serve with Jane,” Beyer said. “I didn’t want to replace her.”
The Montgomery County Democratic Central Committee, which is collecting applications for the House position through Monday, will choose Lawton’s successor during a Dec. 11 meeting. There is no public vote.
Simon Atlas, the Central Committee’s treasurer, estimated that five to 10 candidates would seek to succeed Lawton. Among the applicants this week were Alfred Carr, a precinct vice chair, and Oscar Ramirez, a Central Committee member.
“I’d like to think the Central Committee will replace a strong woman with another strong woman,” Beyer said. “I think that’s what Jane would have wanted, but it’s not my call.” . . .
From drag ball to panels, Trans Week reviews mixed
December 7, 2007
On the first night of December, a chill was in the air and the first snow was on its way. Inside the Ezra Stiles College dining hall, Yalies stayed warm as they listened to a holiday tune playing over the loud speakers. It could have been a scene from a high-school holiday pageant.
Until the drag troupe walked in.
As members of All The Kings Men, a professional Boston drag troupe, began their performance, the chorus of “Sleigh Ride” abruptly transitioned to the bass line of “Lady Marmalade.” Before long, the event in the dining hall had turned into Yale’s version of Moulin Rouge.
Co-sponsored by the LGBT Co-op, the Yale Gala, the Women’s Center and the Joint Events Funding Committee, last Saturday night’s 2007 Drag Ball kicked off Transgender Awareness Week at Yale. Now in its fifth year, Trans Week featured a wide range of academic and social events — including several movie screenings, panel discussions and lectures from experts — that focused on transgender issues as well as more general ones about gender identity.
While some program participants said Trans Week was effective in encouraging a sense of solidarity within the trans community, those with little exposure to “out” transgender people said they think the program was not sufficiently accessible.
Anna Wipfler ’09, the coordinator of the Drag Ball and Trans Week, said she modeled this year’s Trans Week on the original event from five years ago, which was conceived and organized by Loren Krywanczyk ’06. Yet while Wipfler said she hoped to reach out to audiences beyond the trans community, Krywanczyk said she designed the week primarily for members of the community and did not intend the week to turn into “Trans 101.”
“Ideally, Trans Week would be a time when trans people could talk about and hear about issues that are very dear to them,” she said.
Krywanczyk, who traveled from Brooklyn to participate in the program, moderated a Sunday talk at the Women’s Center entitled “Trans-on-Trans,” which focused on how transgender people engage in sexual relationships. . . .
America in dire need of education on gender identity
December 7, 2007
Sometimes, the biggest mistakes come from the most intelligent of individuals.
Take my high school physics teacher. He received a Ph.D. from Berkeley, worked under a Nobel Prize winning physicist and was one of the few people I would ever label a genius. He was prone to tangents in class and one Tuesday morning in 2002 was no exception. During a discussion of art, sex and quanta, someone raised his hand and asked, “Hey Steve, what do you think of sex changes?”
“There is only one reason anyone would ever get a sex change: boredom.”
While his comment was funny and fairly harmless, it stems from the same kind of ignorance that plagues the transgender community. And that ignorance is getting to be a lot more noticeable.
This past year, Largo, Fla., city manager Steve Stanton informed city commissioners of his intent to undergo a sex change operation. As he explained later, he had thoughts of being a woman since the age of seven, but finally decided in late 2006 to have gender reassignment surgery. He informed a small group of family and co-workers, collaborating with them to try to reveal this decision in an honest and open way. However, the media got to it first, and what followed was a firestorm of controversy.
While Mr. Stanton (now known as Susan Stanton) defended the decision and around 70 supporters came out to stand by him, Mr. Stanton was eventually fired. City commissioners said his gender switch had nothing to do with his termination, and many who spoke against Mr. Stanton cited a lack of trust. One city commissioner said his decision was borne out of selfishness while another said, “I find that I can no longer trust his judgment.” . . .
Transgender Students Search for Campus Niche
DECEMBER 7, 2007
Moments into Barnard orientation, Raemond Grosz, GS, knew he didn’t belong.
“The second I got to Barnard I was like, ‘This is not going to be okay because it’s just so girly,’” Grosz said, a transgender student who identifies as a man. He quickly transferred to the School of General Studies at the beginning of the semester. “I guess I was expecting more of a queer community.”
Grosz is one of a small number of students who are challenging gender norms at a younger age than ever before and finding that colleges are not quite ready for them, neither structurally nor socially.
While Grosz felt restricted by Barnard’s female environment, the all-female environment felt equally uneasy with him. Orientation had not finished before Grosz was informed by residential life that his roommate was no longer comfortable with the living situation. He said he was offered two options: either work things out with his current roommate or find a new person to room with.
“These girls [his suitemates] were all straight edge, typical Barnard students who don’t really like to party and don’t like to stay up late, who watch Grey’s Anatomy,” Grosz said. “I had nothing in common with them. I’d be better off dating them than trying to pretend we were the same gender.”
Grosz asked if a single room was a possibility, but was told that it was against policy to grant first-years single rooms.
Unable to find a new roommate, and unwilling to remain with his current one, Grosz lived off campus. “I was going to just not do college and say ‘fuck this,’ and live with my friend in her apartment because they weren’t giving me any options,” he said. . . .
Area doctor opens up Amherst practice
NASHUA – Jennifer E. Madden, M.D., has opened Souhegan Family Practice at 109 Ponemah Road in Amherst. Dr. Madden is affiliated with Foundation Medical Partners and is on staff at Southern New Hampshire Medical Center.
A graduate of Brandeis University, Dr. Madden earned her medical degree at the University of Massachusetts School of Medicine in Worcester, Mass., and completed her residency in family practice at Saint Vincent Health Center in Erie, Pa.
Dr. Madden was most recently employed as a family practitioner at Family Practice of Merrimack.
In her new practice, Dr. Madden will treat various traditional medical conditions within all age groups including pediatric well child exams, routine adult preventive health-care visits, gynecologic exams for women and care of the elderly. Having undergone gender reassignment surgery, Dr. Madden is able to offer health-care services to patients who come from alternative lifestyles, are gender variant, or who have diverse family situations. . . .
Middle East: Sex change op is successful
6 December 2007
A BAHRAINI woman has successfully undergone sex change surgery in Thailand, it was announced yesterday.
Bahraini Zainab Abdulhafed Rabie, 33, underwent an eight-hour operation at Yanhee Hospital, Bangkok.
The procedure was paid for by Bahrain's government, which gave BD50,000 to cover her operation, accommodation, plane ticket and food and drink.
She was also provided with a court order explaining her condition, which she can produce if she was stopped by immigration officers on her way home.
When she returns, her final hurdle will be Bahraini courts, where she is battling for the right to be recognised as a man and officially change her name to Hussain by law.
She had already undergone a mastectomy and her lawyer, Faouzia Janahi, said she was very happy that the final operation was successful. . . .
(This person, of course, is actually a transman. R.A.)
Saturday, December 08, 2007
Big Brother housemate auditions on YouTube
A Channel 10 Big Brother promo on YouTube inviting people to send in their audition tapes also features a mother of four who speaks to dead people, and a guy who just wants to "shag a hot chick on TV.". . .
'Southern Comfort' more than art, more than culture
By Caitlin Rockett
December 6, 2007
The central figure in the 2001 documentary "Southern Comfort" is Robert Eads, the epitome of a man who has lived his whole life in a rural town in Georgia. He drives a huge pick-up truck, wears Hanes t-shirts tucked into his high-waisted jeans, heavy work boots and he finishes it all off with a cowboy hat. Let's not forget the perpetual cigarette dangling from his lips.
But Eads is a transgender man with cervical cancer. . . .
Business appeals to mens' feminine side
6 December 2007
A fashion designer is helping men across the city get in touch with their feminine side - quite literally - by designing dresses and outfits especially for them.
Gemma Partridge had been running a traditional clothes designing business for three years but decided to shift her emphasis to cater for male transvestites after being approached by a number of men who wanted dresses, corsets, and other outfits made-to-measure.
Miss Partridge, 29, from Grove Road, Norwich, signalled the start of her new cross-dressing empire by renaming the business Fem-men-couture and moving the company out of her home into an Exchange Street studio.
She said: “I was working from home initially and men would come and try my clothes on there. . . .
Still wrecked after all these years
Dec 5, 2007
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There’s good news and bad news for fans of TraniWreck and Wreckage, the deliciously demented performance art cabarets that have livened up Boston’s drag scene for the last three years. Truth Serum Productions has lost its residency at The Milky Way, and with no home base the future of Wreckage, beyond the next two scheduled shows, is up in the air. The good news is that Aliza Shapiro, the brains and sweat behind Truth Serum (and behind Wreckage’s velour-smooth MC, Heywood Wakefield,) isn’t going anywhere.
"The Milky Way is one of the few cabaret-style spaces in Boston, and that’s what our shows are suited to," said Shapiro. "So it’s kind of a shame that they’re looking to do more live music. But I plan to keep doing TraniWreck quarterly, and I’ll pitch shows to the Milky Way.". . .
Transgender Ga. Politician Loses Runoff
RIVERDALE, Ga. (AP) — A transgender city council member lost a re-election bid in a runoff Tuesday after a lawsuit that claimed she tried to fool voters by running as a woman.
Michelle Bruce said that even though a judge dismissed the lawsuit the day before the vote, the suit served its intended purpose.
"It was a personal attack," said Bruce, who was seeking a second term. "It was aimed at getting me out." . . .
Gay chamber hires transgender ED
New GGBA Executive Director Katherine Dean. Photo: Jane Philomen Cleland
by Matthew S. Bajko
12/6/2007With the country's LGBT community embroiled in a debate over protecting transgender people in the workplace, the nation's oldest gay chamber of commerce announced this week it has hired a post-op transsexual woman as its new executive director.
Katherine Dean, 53, took over leadership of the San Francisco-based Golden Gate Business Association Tuesday, November 27, but the chamber waited until this week to officially announce its decision. Dean replaces John D'Alessandro, who had managed the organization for the past two years and moved to Miami, Florida this week where his partner was relocated for work. . . .
Thursday, December 06, 2007
The Meaning of a Transgender Homecoming King
The story from The Pasadena Star-News has now been picked up nationally: “King for a Day: Transgender Student Elected Homecoming King.”
For Andrew Gomez, the month of November has been one of firsts.
First, he broke the news to his mother that he was transitioning from a female to a male. Then the 24-year-old transgender student was elected Homecoming king at Pasadena City College. Neither event came easily, but the second milestone nearly did not happen. PCC’s Homecoming committee initially ruled Gomez ineligible because of his pierced ear.
But after students complained, lodging charges of discrimination, the committee relented and reversed its decision. Gomez said his election earlier this month as Homecoming king surprised him, even though he initially ran hoping to become a source of inspiration for other gay, lesbian and transgender students.
“I wanted them to feel like they could do something like this, instead of having them feel, ‘I am not straight so I can’t do this,’” Gomez said.
I’m very proud of Andrew, who was a student in my Introduction to Lesbian and Gay American History class in the spring of 2006. . . .
Big Brother contestant appeals after libel action thrown out
4 December 2007
Former Big Brother housemate Lisa Jeynes has been given permission to appeal against a judge's decision to dismiss her claim that she was defamed by a newspaper which she says portrayed her as a man pretending to be a woman.
Jeynes, 38, who featured in the 2003 series of Big Brother, wants to sue over publications which appeared on the cover of Love it! magazine and in the News of the World in May last year.
Her complaint focuses on the words: "BB's Lisa 'the geezer'. My fake boobs fell out on date with James Hewitt!"
She claims that the innuendo - against a background of rumours in 2003 that there was to be a transsexual contestant in Big Brother - was that she was really a man posing as a woman, a transgender or transsexual. . . .
Boi Troubles
December 05, 2007
I am a 21-year-old transgender boy (bio female not taking hormones or having surgery) and I’ve recently come to the conclusion that I am into dominance and submission (D&S) and light bondage. Unfortunately, I am also a virgin and I have no idea where to meet girls who are into transboys, or where to go in Toronto to find a D&S community. I’m just looking for a sub girl who would enjoy being topped by an androgynous transboy and not have any issues about my gender. I’m tired of waiting to connect with a girl in an everyday situation. On the street, I find that girls are interested in me but it’s only because they think I’m a cute bio boy. Most get freaked out and run away when they realize I’m trans. . . .
Argentine Undergoes Sex-Change Surgery
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — A 17-year-old Argentine has undergone surgery to become a female only months after winning a court battle in the first case of its kind involving a minor in this country, a representative for the teen said Tuesday.
A judge in 2004 ruled the teen had to wait until age 21 for the operation, but the parents appealed successfully, swaying a court panel to issue a decision in September authorizing surgery as a minor. . . .
