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Today’s the Day

From NCTE:

ACTION ALERT on ENDA from the National Center for Transgender Equality

House committee meets Tuesday to decide whether or not a version of ENDA that cuts out protections for transgender people will advance in Congress.

Your Representative needs to hear from you TODAY.

The House Education and Labor Committee is holding a special meeting on Tuesday to discuss the strategy proposed by some House leaders to pass an ENDA that cuts out protections for transgender people. A committee vote on the bill is tentatively scheduled for Thursday.

A list of Committee members is available at http://edlabor.house.gov/about/members.shtml

Your Representative needs to hear from you TODAY about your opposition to the flawed strategy of advancing a bill that leaves transgender people behind.

Call your Representative right now at 202-224-3121, even if you have already called him/her already about this issue. Tell him/her to oppose advancing H.R. 3685, the bill that leaves transgender people behind. Tell him/her to push for a vote on H.R. 2015, the transgender-inclusive ENDA, instead.

Please call today. You have been asked to do a lot in the last few weeks to support transgender nondiscrimination protections. The action you take today might make the difference.

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On ENDA, on National Coming Out Day

This is the text of the talk I gave in Denver on Tuesday. It probably won’t surprise anyone that I’ve been busting at the seams wanting to have a say in all of the dialogue going on about ENDA. At least I don’t think it should surprise anyone, not by now.

**

First, let me thank Ed and Jordan and all the students who asked them to bring me here. It’s a pleasure to be here in celebration of National Coming Out Day, a pleasure to see all of you gathered, celebrating who you are. Thanks to all the crossdressers, the gays, the lesbians, the genderqueers, the trans men & women, MTF and FTM, & to their partners. Thanks to all of you who are family, or friends, or allies, for being here.

Betty and I have been on tour a lot this year because I had a book published in March, and we’ve gotten a chance, once again, to meet a lot of people and to talk to a lot of trans people and partners, and this year, we’ve met more gay and lesbian people who aren’t trans than we did before. And it’s been a pleasure all around in hearing people’s stories of their own gender variance, or the stories of how they came out to loved ones, or of their first big crush or the moment when they realized they were trans or gay or lesbian or how they came to understand the first identity they understood themselves to be was not quite accurate in the long run. What I love to hear the most is about how queer people find one identity fits for a while and then not at all; like Oliver Wendell Holmes’ chambered nautilus, queer people build themselves bigger chambers, bigger categories, labels that are not so confining, over time.

That’s how it’s been for us, certainly. By the time people get used to what we’re calling ourselves our identities have shifted a little, changed usually by experiences we never expected and wouldn’t trade for anything. Continue reading “On ENDA, on National Coming Out Day”

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Donna Rose Resigns from HRC

A Statement from Donna Rose, Community Activist on the Human Rights Campaign’s Position on ENDA:

“An impressive coalition of local and national organizations has lined up to actively oppose the divisive strategy on the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) that would leave our transgender brothers and sisters without workplace protections.  This effort has galvanized community spirit and commitment in ways few could have imagined, and it has demonstrated to those who would divide us that anything less than full inclusion is unacceptable.

Unfortunately, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) – a group of which I am the first and only transgender board member – is not part of this group.  Their recently issued statement indicates while it is not preferable, they will not actively oppose a version of ENDA which is not fully inclusive.

Because of this unacceptable position feel compelled to resign my position on HRC’s Board of Directors.”

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Please Sign

Monks have already been beaten and several people have been killed. Please sign this petition to get the UN Security Council to help protect them, to enable them to peacably assemble, as they have done for the past few weeks.

They are raiding the monasteries and cutting off contact with the rest of the world:

“The big missing piece of the puzzle is what is going on in the minds of the senior leadership,” said Thant Myint-U, a former United Nations official who is the author of a book on Myanmar, formerly Burma, called River of Lost Footsteps: Histories of Burma. “Nothing that they have said in the last 20 years would suggest that they will back down,” he said.

(Get his book if you want more background on what’s going on currently, or if you want to know more about Burma and the 8888 Uprising.)

I’m worried now we won’t hear anymore, or won’t hear much, unless & until the UN gets more involved. It is quite odd to see actual video footage of what’s going on in Yangon (formerly Rangoon) on television. That beautiful huge gold pagoda you may see in the background is Shwedagon Pagoda, and the gold is – the real thing. But the demonstrators have been gathering at the oldest pagoda in Yangon, Sule Pagoda, which is the center of the city.

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Sign On

(1) If you’d like to be added to a letter being sent to HRC from the leaders of the transgender community asking them “for an unequivocal statement that HRC will oppose this new strategy and any bill that is not inclusive,” then send an email to Shannon Minter at sminter(at)nclrights(dot)org.

Do add any affiliations you have with trans groups, LGBT organizations and the like.

(2) NCTE & The Transgender Law Center have a petition directed to Nancy Pelosi up at iPetitions.com. You can have your name listed anonymously, so there’s no reason not to sign this one.

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Passed!

from NCTE’s website:

Senate Passes Historic Hate Crimes Bill

The Hate Crimes Amendment to the Defense Authorization Act (S. 1105) was passed on a voice vote of the Senate today, September 27th.  Immediately prior to the voice vote, a cloture vote to end debate of the Amendment was passed 60-39 with bipartisan support.This amendment was already passed on May 3rd in the House by a vote of 237-180.   NCTE is calling on President Bush to sign the bill with this historic provision included.

Mara Keisling, NCTE Executive Director, says, “While transgender people still have many obstacles to overcome, we are overjoyed that the hard work of so many people is coming to fruition.”

The Hate Crimes Amendment extends the federal hate crimes law to include sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, and disability.

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Hate Crimes Vote – Thursday

ACTION ALERT from the National Center for Transgender Equality

On Thursday, the Senate will be voting on Senator Kennedy’s Hate Crimes amendment to the Defense Authorization Act (S.1105). We need you to call your Senators now to urge their support of this critical bill, which would extend hate crimes protections to transgender people.

Please, call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 right now; let them know what state you are from and ask to be connected with your Senators.

The language of the amendment is identical to that passed by the U.S. House of Representatives on May 3, 2007 (H.R.1592). It is vital that you contact your Senator today or tomorrow. As you read this, the Radical Right is mobilizing to oppose the federal hate crimes bill and attempt to prevent its passage in the Senate. They’re using scare tactics and flat-out lies in hopes of killing the amendment. Make sure that your Senators hear your voice and how important this bill is to you and our community.

The Hate Crimes bill would:

  • Extend existing federal protections to include “gender identity, sexual orientation, gender and disability”
  • Allow the Justice Department to assist in hate crime investigations at the local level when local law enforcement is unable or unwilling to fully address these crimes
  • Mandate that the FBI begin tracking hate crimes based on actual or perceived gender identity
  • Remove limitations that narrowly define hate crimes to violence committed while a person is accessing a federally protected activity, such as voting.

Find your Senators’ contact information.
Background information about the hate crimes bill is available on NCTE’S webpage.

Call your Senators today and urge your friends and family to do the same.