This is good news: a 15-7 vote, says the Maddow blog, means there may actually be bipartisan support for ENDA, at long last.
The Night a Feminist Army…
… of loud angry bitches beat the GOP, is the full title. I absolutely love this article about what happened in Texas the night of the 25th. I stayed up and watched it as the midnight hour drew near and passed; I was watching when the time stamp was changed on the vote; I was watching when the “At what point?” question was asked – which should, imho, go down in history as AT LEAST as significant as the “Have you, at long last, no decency?” that was asked during HUAC).
It was an insane thing to see but a proud, proud thing to watch.
A feminist army of loud angry bitches. We need more of them.
Filibuster In Progress: Texas
Ann Richards would be proud.
Coy Mathis Wins
At long last, great news: Coy Mathis was being discriminated against when her school stopped allowing her to use the girls’ room as she had been all along.
According to TLDEF:
This is the first ruling in the nation holding that transgender students must be allowed to use bathrooms that match who they are, and the most comprehensive ruling ever supporting the rights of transgender people to access bathrooms without harassment or discrimination.
Great, GREAT news.
Allyson Robinson Fired from OutServe
A mere nine months into her position, Allyson Robinson was forced to step down as a result of what Bilerico is calling a “board coup”. There does seem to be evidence of board manipulation, but more than anything is the evidence that quite a few other board members – now a third of the board – have resigned in protest.
Because trans military were not included in DADT, and the US military still doesn’t accept openly service trans people, Robinson’s leadership was necessary. We in the trans community will keep watching this closely to see what happened, and where the organization – and the political mission of trans inclusion in the US military – will go from here.
Allyson is both a friend and colleague, and I have no doubt she will go on to do even more amazing things than she has already.
How (Not) To Be An Ally
My patience for snark is really, really low these days, but I still found some of the gems in “8 Ways Not To Be An “Ally”: A Non-Comprehensive List” pretty useful.
But I’m still going to re-articulate them for those who don’t understand irony. I’ve put her comments in italics, and tried to articulate in my earnest, non-snarky way, why this list is so vital. I’ve also added one of my own.
1. Assume one act of solidarity makes you an ally forever means fighting oppression is an ongoing, day to day struggle that doesn’t come with much resolution if any. One day the world is not going to just be better. Which means that you, as an ally, need to keep doing whatever work you do to minimize racism, sexism, homphobia, etc.
2. Make everything about your feelings, or, it’s not about you. The best way to go about this is to shut up and listen. That’s all. Stop talking so much. Listen. Pretend you don’t have an opinion and that other people’s lived experiences are actually as valid as your own. It’s a nutty idea, I know, but it’s true. People who live with marginalization are often – shocker! – at least as smart as you, if not smarter.
3. Date ’em all will not, in any way, make you an ally automatically. In fact, it could instead mean that you’re a fetishizing, exploitive, clueless jerk. (Trans admirers take special note here, please.)
4. Don’t see race/gender/disability/etc. is a good way of eliminating someone’s identity and specifically an identity which – because of the sexist, racist, transphobic, ablesist culture we live in, tends to essentialize a person due to that marginalization. Not seeing that aspect of them is belittling and really only lets you off the hook, free from your white liberal guilt. That is, it does nothing for people who are marginalized, but everything for people who aren’t.
5. Don’t try any harder, or, try until you succeed, not just until your white liberal guilt is assuaged. See above. Continue reading “How (Not) To Be An Ally”
Mark Pocan (D-WI) on ENDA and ExxonMobil
Pretty simply put with a lot of useful information about why ExxonMobil is the exception and not the rule and need to get out of the way of this important American legislation.
Mark Pocan is gay, out, and is now filling the position recently vacated by Tammy Baldwin when she became the first out LGBTQ Senator.
Here’s a 7 minute video of personal stories about the importance of this legislation. Even though it is specifically about West Virginia, it makes the point for many states without this kind of basic protection.
MN’s Birthday Present
Queer Wisconsin
Okay, maybe not queer Wisconsin, but definitely LGBTQ Wisconsin, at least. There are two interesting articles out about the state of gay rights and marriage equality and non-discrimination in this state.
One is mostly about Fair Wisconsin: its history, current goals, and what kinds of policy and legislation they’ve been addressing.
The details of how Action Wisconsin, the predecessor to Fair Wisconsin, got started are sketchy, though there seems to be consensus it coincided with the election of Tammy Baldwin to the state Assembly in 1992.
The story is that the newly elected Baldwin, then the first out lesbian elected to the Assembly, was in great demand as a speaker around the state. Belanger says Baldwin would go to these speaking engagements and collect names and contact information in a spiral notebook.
“The legend is that those lists started Action Wisconsin,” says Belanger. John Kraus, spokesman for Baldwin, now a U.S. senator, confirms the story.
The second is about the change of attitude about marriage equality and gay rights in the state:
Yet Wisconsinites are now out of sync with the rest of the country.
The latest poll from Marquette University shows that 42% of Wisconsinites support full marriage equality, while 26% support civil unions and 28% oppose any legal recognition of these partnerships.
That’s a positive change from 2006, when 59.4% of voters approved a constitutional ban on marriage equality and civil unions.
Although it’s the law of the land, the constitutional ban is at odds with Wisconsin’s long tradition of tolerance, said Katie Belanger, executive director of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) civil rights group Fair Wisconsin. She noted that in 1982 Wisconsin was the first state to make sexual-orientation discrimination illegal and voters clearly supported the election of Democrat Tammy Baldwin, a lesbian, to the U.S. Senate in 2012.
“We may disagree on all of the issues of importance to the full LGBT community, but a Wisconsin value is that we treat people fairly and with respect,” Belanger said.
And people wonder why we moved here! There’s so much to do! You can donate to Fair Wisconsin to help us keep moving things forward.
Happy May Day: The Internationale
“The Paris Commune had fallen … but now he was fleeing for his life. He was in hiding, Eugene Portier . . . and that very month of May, 1871, he writes six long verses & a chorus calling on all the hard working people of the entire world to overthrow their masters, and he was quite confident that they would, soon.” – Pete Seeger, from the documentary
There are six parts, and it’s a pretty cool bit of history. Gives us in the US, in particular, a little better sense of how exactly one-sided our political conversation has been since the 1950s.