Betty and I are leaving today to spend a long weekend in Burlington, VT – land of snow, University of Vermont, snow, and snow.
On Thursday, we’ll be talking to an Anthropology class on Kinship and Identity taught by David Houston. The class has just finished reading My Husband Betty. We’re expecting some interesting questions about crossdressing, gender, sexuality, and our relationship.
On Friday, I’ll be hosting a roundtable on Trans-Women and Feminism as part of UVM’s Women’s Center’s Women’s Herstory Month events. Their theme this year is women and activism. The organizer of these events, Tim Shiner, tells me they’ve discussed some of these issues before at the Women’s Center, so I’m looking forward to a good conversation.
On Saturday, the Translating Identity conference is also taking place at UVM. My first workshop will be the one on Trans-Sex and Identity that has been such a hit at Dark Odyssey, and I’m hoping it will be again. Later that day, I will co-host a Partners’ Caucus with Jill Barkley, who’s the partner of a transman. We have a lot of good ideas to flesh out with other partners – and though transfolks are welcome, they’re not going to be allowed to speak until the end of the session.
Luckily for me, the keynote speech at Translating Identity will be given by Les Feinberg, who I admire very much. Hir books, Stone Butch Blues and Transgender Warriors were both influential for me long before Betty and I met.
We are both looking forward to this trip, despite the fact that we’re both somewhat exhausted (booking five weekends in a row seemed like a good idea at the time). As long as we get there despite all the snow, I’m sure it will be an invigorating weekend.
The Phoenix Boycott Redux
Apparently I’ve stirred things up a bit by mentioning that I was boycotted in Phoenix by members of the local Tri-Ess group, Alpha Zeta. Word from Tri-Ess is that there was no “official” boycott whatsoever – not amongst the local group, nor from the National.
I was going by what I was told by one of the organizers of the event – which was reiterated by other people in the T community there. In fact, I was told this several times, over & over again actually. I nearly felt the need to address it in my speech (which was already written) but didn’t. That is, I felt bad to hear that my appearance there might have dissuaded people from coming.
The difficulty is, I get reports and I get reports. Just yesterday I heard from a spouse who was asked to write something for The Sweetheart Connection (Tri-Ess’ newsletter for spouses). She intended to write a review of my book, and then was told it wasn’t wanted, that “books about transsexuals have nothing to do with us.”
I didn’t ever think there was a boycott in the official capacity. What I thought was that a group of AZ members agreed amongst themselves not to come. Tri-Ess’ National leadership has been very clear: they have not made any public statement against the book, nor do they support it. Kind of “live and let live.” Some local chapters have read and reviewed the book, and as far as I know, were not reprimanded for doing so.
It turns out, of course, that there were other underlying politics involved, including the recent inclusion of a local BDSM group in the Glitz. Apparently, several Alpha Zeta members were not attending because they are uncomfortable with the presentations of some of the BDSM-oriented CDs.
Let me make it clear: I don’t feel defensive about Tri-Ess, and I don’t have any kind of “agenda” with them. For instance, I’ve had people forward me emails from other Tri-Ess groups where CDs are bashing the book without having read it! Stupid stuff like that. People like stirring it up – apparently too many have too much time on their hands.
On the other hand, there are many Tri-Ess members who have been positive about the book and without agreeing with everything I’ve said in the book, understand I’m on your side – even Tri-Ess’ side, in fact. I’d just like to see the group expand their horizons a bit – to catch up with the times, and the types of couples that are coming up now. I have never failed to acknowledge what a life-saver Tri-Ess has been for many, and I can cite the instances in the book where I talk about that. My only issues have ever been the half-truths (CDs never transition) and the exclusivity of membership – especially of gay CDs.
I hate this crap.
I still don’t doubt that a few people didn’t come because I was speaking, but I think the whole thing was blown out of proportion.
Shoot. We all have so many other better things to be doing with our time.
Why Men Wear Frocks on BBC4
Grayson Perry, the sculptor and winner of the Turner Prize last year, also happens to be a transvestite. He accepted his prestigious award in a very pretty, girlish frock.
He’s done an interview with BBC4 which has been turned into a documentary called Why Men Wear Frocks. There’s more info about it on BBC4’s website, along with a list of UK organizations, websites, and books (in which MHB is included).
Protest or Support?
It occurred to me that around this time last year, emails and T newsgroups and mailing lists and blogs were inundated with protests about the nomination of Michael Bailey’s The Man Who Would Be Queen for a Lambda Literary Award. I was against the nomination as were so many of us, and the driving force behind the protest was pretty remarkable, if not always polite.
However, not one trans website I’ve found has actually posted anything about this year’s nominees. I noticed, of course, because I’m one of the people whose book has been nominated, in the transgender category, along with the likes of Morty Diamond, Mariette Pathy Allen, Jamison Green and Julie Anne Peters. There are some other trans writers up for awards in other categories, and yet I haven’t really read anything about it.
Did the Bailey controversy end up nullifying the awards for the trans community? Or are we just way better at protesting than supporting the writers and educators who are doing good work?
So here, without further ado, are a few of the book award nominees for the Lambda Lit Award:
In the Nonfiction Anthology category:
That’s Revolting!: Queer Strategies for Resisting Assimilation edited by Mattilda, a.k.a Matt Bernstein Sycamore, Soft Skull Press
In the Children’s/Young Adult category:
Luna by Julie Anne Peters, Little, Brown Books for Young Readers (which was also a finalist for the National Book Award this year)
In the Drama/Theatre category:
I am My Own Wife by Doug Wright, Farrar, Straus & Giroux (which has won so many other awards, like the Pulitzer and the Tony, you’ll have to check the website for the entire list)
In the Transgender/GenderQueer category:
Becoming a Visible Man by Jamison Green, Vanderbilt University Press (which also won CLAGS’ Sylvia Rivera award)
From The Inside Out: Radical Gender Transformation, FTM and Beyond edited by Morty Diamond, Manic D Press
Luna by Julie Anne Peters, Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
My Husband Betty: Love, Sex and Life with a Crossdresser by Helen Boyd, Thunder’s Mouth Press
The Gender Frontier by Mariette Pathy Allen, Kehrer Verlag
Thanks, Josey
Betty & I filmed a short clip for a Canadian television show called Richler Ink which showed on Book Television, which is an entire channel dedicated to books & authors (so you know it’s not American). They themed their shows “Naughty Librarian Month” for January and so focused on sexual topics. (Whether or not we all think crossdressing is a sexual topic is beside the point, since 1) the point is outreach and education, as long as it’s done respectfully, and 2) the rest of the world still thinks it is, and they’re not going to understand otherwise until they hear about and maybe read a book like mine).
I hadn’t seen the show ever before, but it was explained to me that there would be in-studio guests, and Betty & I would be a segment. What I didn’t realize at the time was that the two books used as segments (My Husband Betty and another on women’s orgasm called She Comes First) would be commented on by the in-studio guest. It was as if Daniel Richler (the host) and the in-studio guest – who was in our case Josey Vogels – were watching the video clip of us with the audience, and when it finished, they chatted about it.
I was pretty upset when Daniel Richler couldn’t seem to keep a smirk off his face, and started muttering things about “kinky” & the like. But Josey Vogels, I’m happy to say, is not only well-informed but a pro. She’s apparently talked to straight, nervous, vanilla guys about sex before! And she talked a little bit about the transgender movement, and otherwise made sure Daniel Richler didn’t get to go anywhere with his nudge, nudge, wink, wink crap.
I’ve already thanked Josey Vogels, of course, for being a first-class act, and for not allowing the show to sink into Springer-esque insinuations, and she’ll hopefully be writing one of her columns about My Husband Betty as a result of our correspondence.
And though I certainly don’t mind spending time praising Josey Vogels (who was on promoting her current book Bedside Manners), that’s not why I sat down to write this: I write this because I was suddenly reminded that the world still thinks crossdressers are funny, or kinky, or both. In more than a year of going to trans-conferences and the like, you start to believe that everyone is tuned into the finer debates about passing, or other standard fare that’s dicussed within the trans community, until you realize – maybe because of a nervous talk show host or because of something someone shouts from the street – that we’ve got a long way to go.
Going that long way is going to take working with the media where and when we can. Betty and I have had to turn down other television shows on advice from friends here in NYC who have been burned themselves or seen firsthand how disrespectful most of the talk shows are of their guests: from “surprise guests” to telling people the shows are themed other than they are, they actually trick people into coming on. Of course all the invitations seem respectful; none of them write to ask me if I’d be willing to portray a wife who’s been victimized by her crazy tranny husband.
And while I don’t even have cable TV because of the schlock that is American television, I’m well aware that most of America is informed via TV – depressing but true. Doing innumerable events like Trans-Week at Yale or speaking to a class at UVM are wonderful: talking to people who are intelligent and willing to learn and listen means a new generation aren’t going to become adults with the same uninformed notions in their heads as their parents.
The question is: what about the rest? How do we get to the rest of the people out there?
Doing publicity with a mainstream book helps. Knowing my book is in libraries where it can be found (not only by T-people and their partners but by any average, interested, curious reader) is something. People ask me all the time why we haven’t been on Oprah. After I ask them if they know anyone who works on the show who might get us on (no takers yet), I ask: why aren’t there more shows like Oprah?
Maybe those of us in the GLBT community can start pressuring networks not necessarily for more shows about us – but just for more intelligent shows, in general. We need to write to our local and cable stations and tell them we’re tired of schlock. The Jerry Springer-type shows wouldn’t hurt half so much if we had something to offset it. I was pretty amazed to find that when we did PBS’ In the Life, none of my friends in the red states could see it. Why? Their local PBS affiliate simply didn’t carry it.
But I’m sure that had nothing to do with why eleven states voted for banning gay marriage, or why we’re teaching Creationism in schools as if it’s science, or why no one seemed to notice that we’ve hung the whole of the guilt for the Abu Ghraib horror on guys who were following orders.
I’m sure it doesn’t have anything to do with it. It doesn’t, does it?
Lambda Lit Award Finalist
I’m happy to report that I’ve made the finalists’ round of nominated books for the Lambda Literary Award (or Lammy) in the Transgender/GenderQueer category.
Good luck to us all!
Please Donate
Betty & I are planning to do some great events this February and March, but I can’t afford to order my own books to sell! If you can donate, to help us do our outreach work, please do.
Thanks,
Helen
Lambda Lit Nomination / 4th Printing
My Husband Betty has just been nominated for the 17th Annual Lambda Literary Awards, in two categories: Memoir/Autobiography, and Transgender/GenderQueer.
You can see all the nominated books and categories at Lambda’s website.
I’m thrilled and honored and really, really excited – what a Christmas present! As it turns out, it was just the needed push for the book to hit its 4th printing, too!
Donations
Hello friends and readers,
This is the least comfortable request I’ve ever made, but we’ve spent way more money doing the book thing than we expected. Since we’d like to keep doing what we’re doing – education, outreach, and advocacy – we could use some help: keeping up this website, running the MHB Message Boards, getting to conferences. Contrary to popular opinion, there isn’t any money in writing books! There is, however, a lot of money spent promoting books, and attending conferences, and no-one’s paying me to hold anyone’s hand or to answer innumerable emails from people needing help, resources, a shoulder. If only! I don’t mind doing any of it – in fact, it’s one of the single most rewarding aspects of having written the book. But I’m not independently wealthy, or retired, and there’s no trust fund to be found.
Look, it’s been really expensive doing all this. It’s a LOT of time. I don’t really know any way to ask except to ask. So if you like what we’re doing, and want us to keep doing it, you can show your support by making a donation (of your choice).
This donation is NOT tax-deductible. We’re looking into how to do that, but for now, this would just be considered a gift.
Thank you so much to those who have already donated. Wow, do I hate asking people for money. I used to work as a fundraiser, and Betty has to do a lot of schmoozing for theatre fundraising, but it never, ever gets easier.
Thank you,
Helen Boyd & Betty Crow
Website Updates
As you may have noticed, Betty & I have been updating the website. Mostly Betty does the work, for which I am eternally thankful.
Here are some new changes/section of the site:
Press Kit (lists my publications, events we’ve been to, print/radio/tv media we’ve appeared in, etc)
Praise for the book from the TG community, the publishing industry, & other assorted places
AND what you’ve all really been waiting for, photos!
Enjoy!
Helen
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4/18/06 Update: Helen Boyd’s Press Kit has been moved, as have the reviews of My Husband Betty.