I was asked recently for resources for trans people with children. Honestly, there’s never very much, but here’s the list I sent her:

• COLAGE does a lot of work with LGBT parents, & coming out: http://colage.org/resources/parents.htm
• They have specific information on how to come out to your kids: http://colage.org/resources/coming_out.htm
• there’s a new organization called TransFamily that might have some stuff: http://www.transfamily.org/
• You may also find useful information at Abigail Garner’s Families Like Mine site: http://familieslikemine.com/
• We have a forum on our message boards for people dealing with kids & family: http://www.myhusbandbetty.com/community/forumdisplay.php?f=34
• There’s a Kids of Trans tag for this blog, too: http://www.myhusbandbetty.com/tag/kids-of-trans/

If anyone has any newer resources I haven’t yet seen, please do add them!

This is B.’s reaction to the Chloe Prince documentary that was on the other night. Since I’m a partner, & have a soapbox from which to talk about my reaction as a partner, I thought I’d open my blog to the child of a trans parent on her feelings.

She’s 15, and her father, now female, transitioned about five years ago. She was about the same age as Prince’s eldest when she as told of her father’s imminent transition.

At first all I really felt was sadness for the children and the wife. The poor woman had to watch her spouse say on TV that she thought she might not have transitioned if she had stayed with her ex-girlfriend, something that must have felt awful and been humiliating to watch. I was shocked that the children’s reaction to the fact that their father was going to become a woman had been recorded in the first place, let alone aired on TV. As the child of a transgendered person I would be horrified if my initial reaction was shown to people all over who I didn’t even know. It’s an incredibly private moment that the rest of the world doesn’t have any business in watching.

As the show progressed I started to feel increasingly angry, and not just because she seemed to me a parody of a woman, intent on acting like a stereotype of how a woman “should be” and appearing very feminine, or because despite this femininity she still did all the “masculine” chores around the house, and we got to see pictures of her working with tools and at her job (I would have expected someone who had undergone a male to female transition to not be sexist).

I wanted to punch a hole in the wall every time it was mentioned that the children had “lost” a father. I never lost my father, just because she’s a woman doesn’t make any difference to the fact that she is my father. A sex change operation doesn’t change that. Chloe had no right to be upset about being missed out on the mother’s day photo- it was for mother’s day, not father’s day. Those children are going to have a hell of a time growing up now, and will have to deal with people they don’t know recognizing them and even judging for something they didn’t even do.

Thanks very much B. for sharing your thoughts with us. I would love to read comments from other trans people with kids, if their kids watched, what they thought.

Reason #7: Because in locations like Montgomery County, Maryland, and in Gainesville, Florida, attempts are afoot to repeal trans inclusive legislation that has already been passed. (The Maryland attempt already failed, thankfully.) But they’re doing so with signs that say “Sign our petition to keep men out of the ladies’ room!” Said Florida legislation wants cities to conform to the state’s civil rights code, which is often far less progressive – and far less trans inclusive – than the cities’. (And there’s something similar going on in Colorado.)

A report, not from AlterNet, not from Mother Jones, but from CNN, about voter suppression and voter roll purging that’s important to read, especially since “identity document mismatch” could get trans people’s registrations thrown out.

Are you voting next week?

IT IS THE LAST DAY TO REGISTER TO VOTE IN SEVERAL STATES. IF YOU ARE NOT REGISTERED, GO GET REGISTERED RIGHT AWAY. ALL OF THE DEADLINES ARE COMING UP IN THE NEXT WEEKS.

& Really, how can you not listen to Dustin Hoffman when he’s got that cutey grin on his face?

Go here for all the information you need by state.

Below the break, all the voter registration deadlines by state:

More…

In case you didn’t read along all day, here’s what happened: We started the day at 105 donors and $5400. We ended the day (midnight, EST) at 196 donors and $10,746. That’s a net of 91 donors and $5346 for Obama’s campaign. We did good! Bloggers that posted:

• Caprice Bellefleur
• Kate Bornstein
• Andrea James
• Annie Rushden
• Lena Dahlstrom
• Jillian Todd Weiss
• (me) & (me at feministing)
• Autumn Sandeen @ Pam’s House Blend
• Angie @ Dakota Women
• Coming Out Trans
• Laura Calvo of Oregon’s Stonewall Democrats
• Monica Helms @ TransUniverse
• Betty at Daily Kos
• & a final, late-breaking video by riftgirl (in which she promises to have sex with her “friend” Les if we reach the goal of 200 by midnight) in addition to her earlier post

I suspect we will make our goal of 200 if we use midnight time (PDT) I’m sure, but I’ve got to go to bed. Our cat Aeneas had an echocardiogram and 6 teeth pulled today, so I’m emotionally exhausted on more than one front.

This being the trans community, I’m sure that there will be criticism of this event, so I’ll tell you why I got so fired up about this idea & spent the day blogging it: because for me, it’s meaningful not just for an historically gay & lesbian organization like Nat’l Stonewall Democrats to set up a page for trans community donations, but that it’s important for the trans community to respond with enthusiasm when we get an org that is willing to work with us. I think that’s at least as important as criticizing orgs that take us for granted.

More than that, I believe in visibility. There was no minimum donation required, so that your “vote” (or your existence) could count very easily, even for $1. Political visibility is important – and this event made us visible not just to LGBT people, but on a national political landscape where we are, sadly, almost completely invisible. Or, as Angie at Dakota Women put it:

This is a great way to increase trans visibility, so when the election is over, we can point to exact dollars that the trans community and its allies brought in. That. Is. Huge. Whether you identify as trans or a trans ally, this is a win-win. You get to help make sure that we’re not all crying in our beers the day after election day, and help demonstrate the power of the trans community and its supporters–all at the same time!

Right on. For me, personally – well, I live in NY which always goes for the Democratic nominee for President, so it was nice to get to do something that had a little more reach.

My guest post about Trans Blogs for Obama is up at Feministing, and two new posts, this one from Angie at Dakota Women and this one from Autumn Sandeen on Pam’s House Blend.

As many of you know, Monica Canfield-Lenfest is the daughter of a trans woman and created a new resource, with COLAGE, for kids with trans parents. I highly recommend it.

1) First, tell me about COLAGE & how the book for Kids of Trans happened, what your goals were.

COLAGE (www.colage.org) is a national movement of children, youth, and adults with one or more lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and/or queer parents. We build community and work toward social justice through youth empowerment, leadership development, education, and advocacy. I first contacted COLAGE five and a half years ago, when I was working on my undergraduate thesis: “She’s My Father: The Social Experience of People with Transgender Parents”. Looking for references for my project, I discovered a diverse community of queerspawn who gave me the space to better articulate my experience and encouraged me to continue my work, since there are hardly any resources for transgender parented families. I started presenting at transgender conferences and gained a renewed sense of responsibility to build community and develop resources for people with transgender parents.

During a COLAGE conference in Dallas two years ago, I suggested to Meredith Fenton, COLAGE Program Director, that perhaps I could fill a fall internship position at the national office. We came up with a Fellowship model for my position, which has become a new program for the organization. I worked full-time for eight months focused specifically on the Kids of Trans Program. The major goal of the fellowship was to develop resources for people with transgender parents. Since there was no book detailing our experiences and offering advice to people with trans parents, the Kids of Trans Resource Guide became the obvious main project.

My goals in writing the guide were: first, to tell other people with trans parents that they are not alone; second, to recognize that the entire family transitions when a parent transitions; and third, to provide compassionate advice from people who have similar families. In short, I hoped to create the book I wanted my father to give me when she came out to me over ten years ago. More…

I wanted to point out a new section of my links/blogroll, which is for allies, family & partners. Right now it’s got Abigail Garner’s Damn Straight, Monica CL’s A Seat on the SOFFA, Annie Rushden’s Gardens in Bloom, COLAGE’S Kids of Trans pages, Jonni P’s Trans Married, and PFLAG’s TNET.

If people know of other partners, allies, or family members who regularly blog on glbT issues, do let me know so I can add them. Please, not just LGB allies; they have to regularly address trans issues and need to be currently blogging with some consistency and some history.

This year, to blog for LGBT families, I want to highlight the fantastic new work by COLAGE called the Kids of Trans Resource Guide (pdf). I’m not sure if I can express how desperately this guide was needed nor how happy I am to see it published. It includes not just tips for people who are children of trans people – whether they are still children or have become adults – but it also gives great advice to trans people who are parents, as well, including this gem:

“As a parent, remember that your children come first and your transition comes second. Transition is an inherently self-focused process, as you align your body and appearance with your gender identity. The best way to be a responsible parent during transition is to make your children a major priority throughout the process. Sometimes this means that you have to compromise your ideal time frame for your transition in order to keep relationships with your family healthy.”

Shock and revelation! Trans people are parents, children, spouses; they have families, extended families, and can adjust their transition goals to help the people who love them transition around them. How much does that rock? You can also access COLAGE’s Kids of Trans pages on their website.

(cross-posted to Trans Group Blog)

The Times of India ran an interesting story about a crossdressing religious tradition:

They are about to take part in the Kottankulangara Sridevi temple festival. The ancient temple in Chavara, Kerala, has a unique tradition. On the last two days of the festival, regular men, common office-going professionals, dress up as women for the chamayavilakku (chamaya is make-up, vilakku is lamp). Bedecked with flowers, lamps in hand, they wait patiently till the wee hours of dawn for the goddess to bless them.

It’s also become a gathering for “feminine men,” or Kothis – which the article identifies as homosexuals and transvestites.

(Thanks to Veronica for the link.)

I just found out that my publishers missed the deadline to nominate my book She’s Not the Man I Married for a Lambda Literary Award. Considering that it’s probably the only award that has a Transgender category at all, I’m – well, beyond words about how shitty this is.

It’s like the last kick in the ass from 2007 arriving a little late.

But congrats to all my friends & fellow writers on the list: Reid Vanderburgh, Eli Clare, Julia Serano, Mattilda, Virginia Ramey Mollenkott. May the best person win.

Like everyone, people frequently forward me dumb jokes that someone has forwarded to them, & on & on.

And often I’m offended by jokes that other people laugh at.

There’s this one, say:

A woman from North Dakota and another from the East coast were seated side by side on an airplane. The woman from North Dakota, being friendly and all, said: “So, where are you from?” The East coast woman said, “From a place where they know better than to use a preposition at the end of a sentence.” The woman from North Dakota sat quietly for a few moments and then replied: “So, where are you from, bitch?”

I understand that the joke is based on the woman’s rudeness, but I’m also tired of jokes about East Coast women, and educated women, etc. They tire me. I’m an educated East Coast woman, you know?

Don’t get me started on blonde jokes.

But what amazes me is that someone would actually send me these jokes. Not a stranger, either. Someone who knows well enough that I’m blonde, from the East Coast, and educated. Shoot, they even know I’ve taught grammar.

And I can’t figure out if this is weird passive-aggressive stuff, or if people just don’t think.

Either way, I get pissed off – probably more pissed off than necessary – and if I say anything about it (to the person, or to someone we both know) I get accused of being “too touchy” or “humorless” or “sensitive.”

Well, yeah, so I am. When people tell jokes that I’m the punchline of, remarkably, I feel offended. So sue me. But either way, it’s very hard for me to like the person who sent it much.

I’m generally having a problem with the way things are going these days, what with the South Dakota bill and the news that the US Government didn’t only fuck up New Orleans and the other areas that got hit by Katrina at the time but are continuing to fuck it up now, & that Paul McCartney is trying to keep people from beating baby seals to death. It’s the last one that got to me the worst – I mean, didn’t we highlight how barbaric that crap was like 20 years ago? I was almost surprised to find out it’s still happening; I thought Canada was cooler than that. Then Megan delivered the news that increased air travel – accelerated by cheap fares – will eventually guarantee that we can’t see the stars.

I keep hoping we human beings take ourselves out before we wipe out every other species that calls this planet home.

But something Sandy posted made me feel a little better:

I sometimes feel so weighed down by everything that is so wrong, and so bad, about how we humans treat each other and the world.

I worry.

I worry about an all-out, probably nuclear, war between the Muslim world and everyone else. I worry about bird flu. I worry about resistant strains of bacteria (and would everyone PLEASE quit using “anti-bacterial” soap, you’re making the problem worse, and gaining no benefit in the meantime). I worry about overpopulation and food and water supplies. I worry about the crazy rise in the incidence of all types of cancers in our country. I worry about plastics and pesticides and volatile organic compounds. I worry about all the no-money-down mortgages and credit card debt that people are getting into and not out of. I worry about the incredible, collossal amounts of waste in every aspect of our fat American lives. I worry about how stupid and sinister our government is, and how just plain stupid we citizens appear to be. I worry about the dubious role of huge corporations in society. I worry about children whose parents are mean to them. Now too, I worry about the demise of astronomy as we know it. I’m not being facetious. I care about all of this stuff.

My husband even worries about living on the East coast, downwind of all the air pollution in the rest of the country. I don’t go quite that far. But if we moved to the west coast, I’d probably worry about missiles from North Korea.

There’s no automatic healthy dose of “fuckit” attitude in my life anymore, that feeling that used to kick in when the world looked too cruel. All I can do these days is limit the amount of news I take in. (Ah, parenthood. It takes away some humor, for sure; thank God it installs some new kinds as well.)

One thought that eases my mind a bit is that people have worried like this forever… and life continues, and it’s mostly really, really good.

Thanks, Sandy.

South Dakota has just made abortion illegal, state-wide. No exceptions – not for the health of the mother, for rape, or for incest.

So I think South Dakota needs a new state slogan, yes? Here’s my entry:

South Dakota: The Inbred State

I’m sure some of you clever folks can come up with better ones.

This law is an attempt to take Roe down, absolutely. And in the meantime, women in South Dakota will now have to travel across state lines, at much greater expense, to have a safe, legal abortion. Greater expense often means delay, which means abortion later in the pregnancy, which means great health risks to the mother.

No matter who wins Ohio, I’m pretty clear that there are at least 10 states in this country that don’t want me or my trans-husband in their midst and at their malls.

Residents of Oklahoma, Georgia, North Dakota, Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan, Montana, Utah, Mississippi and Arkansas all came out to vote in record numbers, and they voted to keep gays and lesbians from their rights as Americans.

I wonder if they know any gay men or lesbians, any bisexuals, any Ts. I wonder if the CDs in those states voted for or against those bans. I wonder why it is that the legal marriage of a gay man to the man he loves scares some people so much that they vote with hate & inequality in their hearts.

I’m deeply saddened, and I don’t know who is going to be President. Right now, I’m not sure anyone who is sane, forgiving, and who believes in equality, a secular government, or the rights of ALL citizens should even be President of this country. God knows I don’t feel welcome here anymore, when so many of those states that voted for those bans passed it by raging majorities.

Now back to Ohio….

From The Washington Post:

Senate Scuttles Amendment Banning Same-Sex Marriage

By David Espo
The Associated Press
Wednesday, July 14, 2004; 12:56 PM

The Senate dealt an election-year defeat Wednesday to a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, rejecting pleas from President Bush and fellow conservatives that the measure was needed to safeguard an institution that has flourished for thousands of years.

The vote was 48-50, 12 short of the 60 needed to keep the measure alive.

“I would argue that the future of our country hangs in the balance because the future of marriage hangs in the balance,” said Sen. Rick Santorum, a leader in the fight to approve the measure. “Isn’t that the ultimate homeland security, standing up and defending marriage?”

But Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle said there was no “urgent need” to amend the Constitution. “Marriage is a sacred union between men and women. That is what the vast majority of Americans believe. It’s what virtually all South Dakotans believe. It’s what I believe.”

“In South Dakota, we’ve never had a single same sex marriage and we won’t have any,” he said. “It’s prohibited by South Dakota law as it is now in 38 other states. There is no confusion. There is no ambiguity.”

Supporters conceded in advance they would fail to win the support needed to advance the measure, and vowed to renew their efforts.

“I don’t think it’s going away after this vote,” Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., said Tuesday on the eve of the test vote. “I think the issue will remain alive,” he added.

Whatever its future in Congress, there also were signs that supporters of the amendment intended to use it in the campaign already unfolding.

“The institution of marriage is under fire from extremist groups in Washington, politicians, even judges who have made it clear that they are willing to run over any state law defining marriage,” Republican senatorial candidate John Thune says in a radio commercial airing in South Dakota. “They have done it in Massachusetts and they can do it here,” adds Thune, who is challenging Daschle for his seat.

“Thune’s ad suggests that some are using this amendment more to protect the Republican majority than to protect marriage,” said Dan Pfeiffer, a spokesman for Daschle’s campaign.

At issue was an amendment providing that marriage within the United States “shall consist only of a man and a woman.”

A second sentence said that neither the federal nor any state constitution “shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman.” Some critics argue that the effect of that provision would be to ban civil unions, and its inclusion in the amendment complicated efforts by GOP leaders to gain support from wavering Republicans.

Bush urged the Republican-controlled Congress last February to approve a constitutional amendment, saying it was needed to stop judges from changing the definition of the “most enduring human institution.”

Bush’s fall rival, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, opposes the amendment, as does his vice presidential running mate, Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina. Both men skipped the vote.

The odds have never favored passage in the current Congress, in part because many Democrats oppose it, but also because numerous conservatives are hesitant to overrule state prerogatives on the issue.

At the same time, Republican strategists contend the issue could present a difficult political choice to Democrats, who could be pulled in one direction by polls showing that a majority of voters oppose gay marriage, and pulled in the other by homosexual voters and social liberals who support it. An Associated Press-Ipsos poll taken in March showed about four in 10 support a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, and half oppose it.

Democrats said that Bush and Republicans were using the issue to distract attention from the war in Iraq and the economy.

“The issue is not ripe. It is not needed. It’s a waste of our time. We should be dealing with other issues,” said Sen. Christopher Dodd of Connecticut.

But Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee said a decision by the Massachusetts Supreme Court had thrust the matter upon the Senate. The ruling opened the way for same sex marriages in the state, and Frist predicted the impact would eventually be far broader.

“Same-sex marriage will be exported to all 50 states. The question is no longer whether the Constitution will be amended. The only question is who will amend it and how will it be amended,” he added.

He said the choice was “activist judges” on the one hand and lawmakers on the other.

� 2004 The Associated Press

Lady Boys in Singapore

and

a South Dakota politican who is transitioning

and

the jury selection process in the Gwen Araujo case