A new documentary about Sacco & Vanzetti opens this weekend in New York. & No, in case you’re wondering, their case has nothing to do with gender. I’ve been a student of their case since I first read a reference to it in John Dos Passos’ The Big Money, which is the 3rd book of his U.S.A. trilogy.
What’s Good for the Goose Is Good for the Other Goose
South Carolina wants women who are considering an abortion to view the ultrasound first.
I say okay if women who aren’t considering abortion have to take tours of foster care and chat with Child Services first, too, then have their finances and future earnings analyzed by a forensic accountant, and their support network (extended family, friends, etc.) evaluated for soundness.
Ditto for the father. (Who?)
Maybe a short spiel on population control and global carrying capacity might be in order, too.
Giving It Back
Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle told the Feds to keep their money if the only education it can fund is abstinence-only.
Wisconsin has received the federal funding since 1997, but new guidelines tying the money to abstinence-only education programs were implemented this year. These guidelines include that students be taught that sexual activity outside of marriage could have harmful physical and psychological effects and that students receive no information about contraception or sexually transmitted diseases and infections.
How much does he rock?!
Four other states have already rejected this strings-attached financing: California, Maine, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
Women’s Health Budget Cut
The Office of Women’s Health – which researches funding on women’s medical issues such as menopause, birth control, pregnancy & the like – was allocated $4 million. $2.8 million of that is already spent or appropriated, and the final $1.2 million won’t be coming at all.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) plans to withhold 30 percent of the funding allocated for the Office of Women’s Health in 2007, an unnamed, high level official told the Washington Post.
The source isn’t allowed to speak publicly about it and remained unnamed.
Um, isn’t that our money?! As taxpayers? Shouldn’t we at least know who made this decision and why? This type of mumblefuck is exactly why we need more women in government. Sure we’re 51%, but with nothing close to that in terms of representation. I guess this is the way the Feds decided to celebrate Women’s History Month: thanks, guys.
Cool Women: Frances Allen
Frances Allen is the first woman to win the Turing Award, often called “The Nobel Prize of Computing.”
She recalled being one of four women in a room of 100 when she was a manager at IBM.
Even cooler? “Allen plans to create a scholarship fund for working class computer science students with the award money.”
Five Questions With… S. Bear Bergman
S. Bear Bergman is the author of Butch is a Noun, a writer, theatre artist, and educator who tours regularly. Zie’s book, Butch is a Noun, is one of my favorites of the past year because it’s funny, self-ironic, but full of a kind of combination of sadness and love that I found meditative and energizing.
1) I have to say that it was the title of your book, Butch is a Noun, that first caught my attention. Tell me how you came up with it, and why you chose it.
It’s both one of my talents and one of my, er, little problems that I’m a huge language geek. I love words, I love language, and I am always deeply satisfied when I can talk about something well, with good words. But I had a hard time, talking about butch. I would say I’m a butch, and people would hear I’m a butch woman or I’m a butch lesbian. Neither of which is comfortable, or accurate. I kept saying No, listen, I mean that I am a butch, as a noun, all by itself – not a modifier but a thing to them be further described.
For a while, I referred to it as The Butch Book, but I never really liked that as a title, it was just sort of a characterization – an internal shorthand. Then one day, I was applying for some time at a writers’ residency to finish it and when it asked for the project title I somehow just knew: Butch Is a Noun. 
Continue reading “Five Questions With… S. Bear Bergman”
Tennessee Blues
As if to send me on my way to North Carolina, this bizarre news from Tennessee: legislation has been introduced to require death certificates for dead foetuses.
Can we possibly get these people with too much time on their hands to feed hungry kids or something? I guess the legislators in Tennessee are perfectly happy with the state placing 41st out of 50 for education.
Please, Rep. Campfield, work for your money, would you?
QueerCents Interview with Jamison Green
A while back, Nina Smith of QueerCents did an interview with me, and later asked me to introduce her to other trans folk who might be willing to talk about personal finance. She talked to Jamison Green, who of course managed to make an interview about personal finance a useful resource on transitioning costs and to articulate clearly the debate about what insurance should cover. I’m not sure how many times they’ll let me join his fan club, at this point, but count me in again.
For that matter, Nina Smith gets huge kudos for going out of her way to get trans issues into her forum.
Why I’m Pro Choice
Today is Blog for Choice Day.
There is one reason and one reason only: because if abortion is illegal, women with money & power & connections will be able to have them still, and poor women with no power & access to pay for blackmarket services will not. While there are significant disparities of access and care with abortion legal, it is nothing like what it would be if it weren’t legal.
Abortion will not go away. It has always been with us. That said, holding men/boys responsible for children they father would be a good start. Getting honest sex education to teenagers and adults would be great. Free and easily-accessible birth control would go a long way toward preventing abortions. Dealing with the fact that people have sex – priceless.
AMS, PGW, Avalon & Perseus
The big news in publishing is that AMS (American Marketing Services), the company that owned one of the biggest book distributors in the country, PGW (Publishers Group West), filed for bankruptcy a couple of weeks ago.
It’s huge news because PGW’s distribution services effectively enable tons of small independent publishers to get their books out there, publishers like Soft Skull (who published Charlie Anders’ Choir Boy) and Cleis Press (who publish some of Tristan Taormino’s books) and McSweeney’s (who publish things like The Believer magazine and authors like Dave Eggers and Nick Hornby).
I’ve been very lucky in all of this, because my publisher, Avalon (APG) has been purchased by Perseus Books, who have their own distributor and a reputation for giving independent imprints room to be – well, independent. Avalon was the umbrella group for both Thunder’s Mouth Press (who published My Husband Betty) and for Seal Press (who will be publishing She’s Not the Man I Married). That is, I dodged a bullet because APG was first in line to be purchased, which is not true for other smaller independent presses like Cleis.
The final impact of AMS filing bankruptcy is yet to be seen. What’s being predicted is that many small publishers will just disappear without a distributor that serves their needs, and also because many of the moneys they were owed will not be paid to them, or because any buyout of AMS will mean investors will be able to buy for pennies on the dollar. It may turn out that Perseus will help PGW, which is good news indeed: PGW was created decades ago in a publishing environment that was much friendlier to growth than the current one is.
All in all it’s a huge mess with too-numerous legal battles to follow.