I love JAC Stringer. Okay, there, I said it.
& Now you do too.
Check out the other stuff JAC does at www.midwestgenderqueer.com.
RIP Flo McGarrell
A Vermont artist who was also trans died in Haiti during the earthquake.
Our love & condolences to his parents, friends, & family.
RIP Dr. Maxwell Anderson
You might remember Maxwell Anderson as Robert Eads’ close friend in Southern Comfort, or maybe you’ve never heard of him, but he’s been a trans activist for a couple of decades, and was well-loved.
He died today after being diagnosed with brain cancer not very long ago.
His last words to his friends are here.
His last public talk – given at an Atlanta Rally this past June – is here.
From activist Monica Helms:
Please pass on your prayers for Max to Pastor Paul Turner, at: pastorpaul@gentlespirit.org, Stormie Marshall at: stormie@drmaxwellanderson.com or leave them as a comment on the video.
RIP Maxwell Anderson. You did good in this world, which is the best any of us can do. & Thank Robert for us, when you see him.
Conveyor Belt of Love?
I have no idea if anyone in the world watches the show Conveyor Belt of Love, but I did find this clip (& this blog post about it) interesting.
Scott Schofield, as he introduces himself, is Scott Turner Schofield, trans guy, activist, artist.
More interesting to me is the whole “geek hot” idea – I mean that it requires its own terminology. I didn’t know other people didn’t find geeks hot. When is smart not hot? Baffling. Once again, I discover that I have never done “straight woman” correctly.
Renault Trans-Friendly (& Trans Family Friendly!) Advert
Okay, this made me cry, really.
The world is changing. Slowly, but it is. I have met so many really cool kids – teenagers & adults, mostly – who are cool with their parents’ gender stuff that it is really nice to see this. That’s what made me cry; just seeing a presentation of all those cool KOTs (Kids of Trans) in any medium.
Not Just Amanda Simpson
From the “there goes the MTF end of things sucking all the air out of the room again” division: in fact there were two trans people appointed by the Obama administration in late November.
The difficulty arose because Simpson is a former NCTE Board member, & so they sent out a press release noting their former board member’s new job, which is what caused all the hullabaloo.
Who We Lost 2009
There are a lot of lists of who died last year, but I haven’t seen any specific to LGBTQ and feminist communities, so here goes:
- Mike Penner / Christine Daniels – transgender sports writer
- Michele La Freniere – transgender activist
- Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick = queer theorist
- Bea Arthur – gay icon/actor
- Dr. George Tiller – abortion doctor
- Virginia Prince – crossdressing pioneer
- Ted Kennedy – key legislator on LGBT rights
- Dottie Laing – crossdresser’s wife & out trans partner
Stars, all. Rest in peace.
Just Say Sorry, David Letterman
Ox Freeman of the Alabama Gender Alliance just posted the info from GLAAD about the stupid joke that was made on David Letterman about Amanda Simpson, and with it he commented that, “Trans people will not be safe from hate violence until it is safe to be attracted to us, to love us, and to regard us as human.”
He’s entirely right, of course, and it’s nice to have someone else articulate exactly why I do what I do.
Betty and I are both for trans people having more of a sense of humor, but we both agree: this joke is not even a little funny, exactly because this reaction to finding out a woman is trans is the same reaction that causes the heart-breaking violence trans people — and especially trans women — face.
As Allyson Robinson of HRC put it in an article by ABC News:
“Your skit affirmed and encouraged a prejudice against transgender Americans that keeps many from finding jobs, housing, and enjoying freedoms you and your writers take for granted every day,” HRC’s Allyson Robinson wrote in the letter.
Robinson said the punch line of the bit has “been used as a defense in nearly every hate crime perpetrated against transgender people that has come to trial.” She cited two cases in which individuals suspected of murdering transgender people claimed they did so in a rage after learning about their victims’ gender identity.
So now go to GLAAD.org and bug CBS, or do the same thing via change.org.
Anti-Trans, RadFem, Catholic Theologian Mary Daly Dies
She resigned from her position at Boston College because she wouldn’t let male students into her Women’s Studies classes. feh.
From her Wiki entry:
Also in Gyn/Ecology, Daly asserted her negative view of transsexual people, whom she referred to as “Frankensteinian.” She labels transsexualism a “male problem” and claimed that post-operative transsexuals exist in a “contrived and artifactual condition.”[13] Daly was also the dissertation advisor to Janice Raymond, whose dissertation, published in 1979 as The Transsexual Empire, is critical of “transsexualism.” Transsexual activist Riki Wilchins has accused Daly of being transphobic.
Mostly we’ll just wait for the rest of them to go, too. Being an anti-trans feminist these days is about as logical as being against same-sex marriage: wrong side of history.
Obama Hires Trans Woman Amanda Simpson
Amanda Simpson, who has served on NCTE’s Board of Directors for the past 3 years, has been appointed by the Obama Administration as a Senior Technical Advisor to the Department of Commerce. She’ll be working in the Bureau of Industry and Security.
Seems like an excellent augur for 2010.