Writing is at once such brutal hard work, but so satisfying, too, when it goes right. It’s so much easier to sleep the sleep of the just when it does, too.
Good night.
Masturbation Month
I was unaware that May is masturbation month, and it’s almost over! You do still have time to participate in a Masturbate-A-Thon, but if you’re not that kind of public, you can always celebrate masturbation in some other way – privately, with candles & lube (or whatever you’re preferred accessories, even if it’s just your left hand), or you can help raise awareness by posting something about masturbation on a message board or yahoo group you belong to.
Or you could just raise a glass to Jocelyn Elders.
Thanks to JoanieC for bringing it to my attention.
A Letter from Paisley Currah
I received this today & as an author of books on trans subject, I thought I should make it available for more of you to see. There is very little out there that recognizes good scholarship/writing on the part of transfolks.
Friends,
Some of you know that, in addition to being a transgender rights advocate, I’m also the Executive Director of the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies (CLAGS). Much of my work at CLAGS focuses on supporting writing, research, and advocacy about and for trans people.
I’m emailing you because, as activists, a scholars, or as scholar-activists, I know you’re interested in research on trans issues, and that you might be interested in supporting this work by making a donation to the Sylvia Rivera Award in Transgender Studies, a prize CLAGS gives out each year for the best piece of published writing in transgender studies. The 2004 winner was Jamison Green, for his book, Becoming a Visible Man. It probably won’t come as a surprise to many of you that there is still little recognition of transgender studies in the academy, and in publishing generally, so the very existence of this award does much to promote the work of those writing about transgender people.
I’m very proud of the work that we do at CLAGS to further transgender studies and advocacy, among other things. But here’s the thing–less than 7% of CLAGS’s operating costs come from the university that houses us. Almost all our work depends on the support of individuals and foundations. And all of the support for our fellowships, including the Sylvia Rivera Award, comes from individuals like you.
So please do consider supporting transgender studies by making a donation of any size (even a $10 or $20 donation would help a lot , $100 or $200 even more !) towards the Sylvia Rivera Award. Donations to the Sylvia Rivera Award count will also entail you to a CLAGS membership, including a subscription to CLAGSnews, other member benefits, and my undying love and gratitude.
You can make your donation online, right now. Just go to our donations page and choose “Sylvia Rivera Award” under “your support.” Or, you can send a check to CLAGS, Room 7115, 365 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10016.
For those of you who don’t know about CLAGS, here’s some background–CLAGS was established in 1991 at the Graduate Center campus of the City University of New York as the first and only university-base research center for Lesbian /Gay /Transgender /Bisexual /Queer (LGTBQ) issues, histories and ideas. For more than a dozen years, CLAGS has worked to foster and disseminate LGTBQ thought to the country through its public programming (panels, colloquium series, conferences), outreach efforts (free reading and discussion groups), and resources (a far-reaching newsletter, well-trafficked website, a book series with NYU Press). And in May 2005, we hosted a national conference, “Trans Politics, Social Change, and Justice.” More in-depth information about the trans conference and CLAGS in general can be found at our website, www.clags.org.
Thanks so much for considering my request.
All my best,
Paisley
Paisley Currah / Executive Director / Center for Lesbian and Gays Studies (CLAGS) / http://www.clags.org &
Director / Transgender Law & Policy Institute / http://www.transgenderlaw.org
The Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies (CLAGS) / Graduate Center, Room 7115 / City University of New York / 365 Fifth Avenue / New York, NY 10016
For more information about CLAGS’s events, programs, conferences, colloquia, and fellowships, to add to or search our directory of LGBTQ Studies, to join our mailing list, or to find out how to become a member, please visit our web site at www.clags.org.To make an online donation to CLAGS, go to our page at Groundspring..
The Plan – Two Months Later
Ah, the result of eating turkey meatloaf is that I’ve lost 11 lbs. since I started this plan on 3/19/06, and taken off a total of 4.7″.
I admire any of you who have had to lose 25 lbs or more ever, in your life. I’ve never had this much to lose before, and I am really really sick of this sterile way of eating – measuring everything & all. I’m about a third of the way through my weight loss, so if I keep losing it at about the same rate, I’ll reach my goal weight in about four months – or by our 5th wedding anniversary.
It’s kind of nice to look forward to, but in the meantime – ugh to green beans already!
Speaking of Eating…
Because of this whole plan to lose weight and work out more, I’ve had to teach myself how to cook. The other night I made my first meatloaf, and I’ve otherwise roasted a chicken, made my own chicken stock, then soup, and made meatballs. My father would be quite surprised.
Scene from Helen’s early teenage years: Dad sitting at head of table finishing dinner. Grandma and mom cleaning up. Helen putting away dried silverware.
Dad: “Isn’t it time she learned how to cook?”
Silence. Shocked faces on mom, grandma, and Helen. Dad still chewing.
Helen: “I’ll learn how to cook when YOU do.”
Which explains why I don’t know how to cook – because my father certainly never did. I did at least know where the spoons went, though, which is more than I could say for him. Anyway, I find it entertaining, but only when I can’t write anymore, because otherwise, I’m the type to put an egg onto boil and forget about them until they explode and hit the ceiling. I’m not kidding; I’ve done it lots of times, and I’m usually writing or reading when I hear the *pop* in the kitchen.
My meatloaf isn’t bad, either.
It's Official
I think I’ve officially made the category of crazy cat lady. Every birthday card I received had a picture of a cat on it.
This situation has been in the making since I was 11, when my 6th grade teacher gave me a beautiful coffee table book of cat photos which I still have. The weirder thing is that I grew up with a blue and an orange tabby, and now we have two blues and an orange tabby. I’m not sure if that means we have to get another blue next, or another tabby.
First we’d have to get a bigger place, either way.
Thanks, everyone, for the cards.
Happy Birthday Dad.
In honor of my dad, who is the Holder of All Records Involving Eating, a photo of big Endymion, walking away full, while Aeneas continues to chow down & Aurora eyes him suspiciously.
Happy 78th, Pops.
No "Them" Or "Us"
STRAIGHT RIGHTS UPDATE: I’ve been running around with my hair on fire trying to convince my straight readers that religious conservatives don’t just hate homos. Their attacks on gay people, relationships, parents, and sex get all the press, but the American Taliban has an anti-straight-rights agenda too. As I wrote on March 23: “The GOP’s message to straight Americans: If you have sex, we want it to fuck up your lives as much as possible. No birth control, no emergency contraception, no abortion services, no lifesaving vaccines. If you get pregnant, tough shit. You’re going to have those babies, ladies, and you’re going to make those child-support payments, gentlemen. And if you get HPV and it leads to cervical cancer, well, that’s too bad. Have a nice funeral, slut.â€
After raising the alarm for months back here in the sex ads section, I was intensely gratified to read Russell Shorto’s brilliant cover story, “The War on Contraception,†in the New York Times Magazine last weekend. To readers who think I’m being hysterical: So you don’t think the religious right would seriously go after birth control? Fine, don’t believe me. But maybe you’ll believe Shorto when he lays out the American Taliban’s plan to deny access to birth control—any and all types, folks, not just emergency contraception.
“In particular, and not to put too fine a point on it, they want to change the way Americans have sex,†Shorto writes. “Contraception, by [their] logic,†Shorto continues, “encourages sexual promiscuity, sexual deviance (like homosexuality), and a preoccupation with sex that is unhealthful even within marriage.†Shorto quotes Judie Brown, president of the American Life League: “We see a direct connection between the practice of contraception and the practice of abortion. The mind-set that invites a couple to use contraception is an antichild mind-set. So when a baby is conceived accidentally, the couple already have this negative attitude toward the child. Therefore seeking an abortion is a natural outcome. We oppose all forms of contraception.†And there’s this from R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary: “I cannot imagine any development in human history, after the Fall, that has had a greater impact on human beings than the pill… Prior to it, every time a couple had sex, there was a good chance of pregnancy. Once that is removed, the entire horizon of the sexual act changes. I think there could be no question that the pill gave incredible license to everything from adultery and affairs to premarital sex and within marriage to a separation of the sex act and procreation.â€
I’ll say it again, breeders: The American Taliban is not just opposed to straight premarital sex, with their abstinence education and hilariously ineffective virginity pledges, or gay sex, with their “ex-gay†campaigns and their anti-gay-marriage amendments. The American Taliban doesn’t think married heterosexual couples should be able to use birth control. If you care about your own freedom—not just your right to have premarital sex, but your right to decide whether, when, and how many children you’re going to have—you need to read “The War on Contraception.†And don’t comfort yourself with the notion that these are just some antisex religious wackos: The Bush administration not only listens to these wackos, it appoints them to important positions all over the federal government—and let’s not even think about the members of the American Taliban that Bush has already appointed to lifetime positions in the federal judiciary.
This is some serious shit, breeders. You’re being attacked. It’s time to fight back.
Copyright Dan Savage. Thanks to JoanieC for calling it to my attention.
We Were Smarter Back Then
From a January 1916 article in The Atlantic called “Further Notes on the Intelligence of Woman“:
“I think she will succeed, for I doubt whether any mental power is inherent in sex. There are differences of degree, differences of quality; but I suspect that they are mainly due to sexual heredity, to environment, to suggestion, and that indeed if I may trench upon biology, human creatures are never entirely male or entirely female; there are no men, there are no women, but only sexual majorities.” (Italics mine.)
Call for Submissions
It’s not often that I put a call for submissions up here, but this one is from Morty Diamond – and he wants to put together a book by trans folks, about dating, love, sex and relationships.
Great idea, so get to writing, and click here for all the details.