Helen Boyd Kramer's journal on gender and stuff
tv shows, magazine articles, movies
I’ve just been reading some good stuff over at On the Issues:
It’s a fantastic resource, OTI. Do go check them out.
& Here’s some classist bullshit from The NY Times. The question put to me by my friend who sent it:
“So, was working for women always a dog walking on its hind legs sort of thing? News: Upper class educated w choices have fewer than they’d like right now, but, don’t worry, their friends will hire them. What about the women who never had the choice and had to balance the job and the commute?”
Exactly. So for the record: this article is not about how the recession is affecting women. It’s about how it’s affecting a tiny tiny tiny privileged minority of women.
I’ve just been informed that both of my books are now available on Kindle.
I have no idea if this is a good thing or a bad thing for me, by which I mean, I have no idea what my electronic rights are.
But still, it makes me feel hip.
So here’s My Husband Betty
10 years ago, the award winning film Southern Comfort followed the last year in the life of transman Robert Eads as he died from ovarian cancer. Ten years later the film is still being shown around the world, and a new documentary is now in production. Robert’s death was a result of many factors, but the fact that he could not find a doctor to treat him ranks very high on the list. Your help is needed to promote better health care for trans people so no one else need die because of lack of medical care. This new documentary will address the changes in health care for trans people, as well as the lack of change within the last ten years since Robert’s death.
I just came back from seeing District 9 with some friends, including Betty, & wow: fantastic movie. It’s like Kafka via Chomsky with a little Giger thrown in. Do go. You’ll be in competent hands. I had moments where I thought I would need to leave the theatre – it gets very intense emotionally – but just as easily there’d be comic relief or some other distraction from the growing dread you feel watching.
& It delivers in so many ways: emotionally, politically, & lots of things blow up in cool ways. What more could you want? Go see it while it’s still in theatres; it’s totally worth the big screen.
In Stockholm, government-funded feminist porn will be screened for the first time. The porn is actually 12 short films, shot on mobile phones; all twelve of the individual directors are female, and one is an MTF transgender person.
What’s impressive is how little the article makes of that last fact.
(h/t to Guerrilla Girls on Tour, via Twitter)
September 2, 2009, New York, NY – The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), the nation’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) media advocacy and anti-defamation organization, received the following apology this morning from rapper and judge on MTV’s “Randy Jackson Presents: America’s Best Dance Crew” Lil Mama.
Lil Mama: “I would like to clarify anything that was misunderstood from Sunday’s show. My remarks were never meant to be disrespectful regarding Leiomy’s gender nor offensive to the LGBT community, which has been a community that has supported me in all my endeavors. However, in hindsight, I recognize that my words may have come across as hurtful. I spoke with her privately after the taping to express that it was not my intent to offend her or any member of the transgender community and that I still live for Vogue Evolution.”
GLAAD reached out to Lil Mama and MTV after receiving numerous calls and e-mails from community members and allies regarding comments made to transgender contestant Leiomy Maldonado during a critique on the August 30, 2009 episode of “Randy Jackson Presents: America’s Best Dance Crew.” GLAAD asked Lil Mama and MTV to publicly address the concerns raised after Lil Mama stated:
“Leiomy, come on. Your behavior…it’s unacceptable. I just feel that you always have to remember your truth. You were born a man and you are becoming a woman. If you’re going to become a woman, act like a lady. Don’t be a bird, like ‘Oh my god, I’m not doing this!’ You know what I’m saying? It gets too crazy and it gets confusing. You’re doing this for America. Even though you’re the face for transgenders, you’re the face of America right now with this group and it’s not about anybody else. It’s about y’all. You know what I’m saying? So do it for the team. Do it for the team.”
Yesterday I did an interview with a few other contributors of the On the Issues summer issue – Our Genders, Our Rights – do check it out.
There’s one great article about women in the world which to some degree states clearly that feminism is not dead & shouldn’t be, and another article, a book review, talks about the relationship between money and sex as laid out by the sex workers who wrote the essays in Hos, Hookers, Call Girls and Rent Boys
Friday they had a good article about Caster Semenya written by Alice Dreger.
