As expected, Southern Decadence, which was supposed to start tomorrow in New Orleans, has been cancelled.
Five Questions With… Rosalyne Blumenstein
Rosalyne Blumenstein is the former
directer of the Gender Identity Project at the GLBT Center in Manhattan, and is the author of Branded T.
1. You emphasize the non-inclusion of bisexual and transpeople in your book Branded T by writing it “GLbt.” Do you think this still holds true – are bisexuals and Ts still left out of the majority of “gay activism”?
I currently live in LA. In June they have their Pride Weekend. It is called Gay Pride, need I say more? …Well I will anyway.
I think we have gone backwards just like the larger system. I believe there to be a parallel process going on with the way in which government is running things and the way in which our social movements are following. Here’s the deal and my swing on it. (Not that I know anything… opinions are like assholes – everyone has one, well mostly everyone has one).
Again this is only my opinion.
I believe everyone should be able to live they way they want, experience some semblance of freedom, love, be loved, feel fulfilled, dream, and be on a journey. However, within the gay agenda it is all about mimicking a Christian heterosexist mentality. Mind you, take this apart there is nothing wrong with Christian…having a certain belief system and having faith which is grand and extremely helpful in life…
And as far as Heterosexuality is concerned, there is nothing wrong with someone who identifies as male loving someone who identifies as female. I for one would love to be in another relationship with a man. Right now I would love to be in a relationship with someone breathing let alone what damn gender they identify as.
But from my understanding of a sexual minority movement it‘s about many different kinds of loves, not just the sanctity of marriage. It’s about not buying into just the white picket fence and the 2.3 kids.
So the Gay Agenda has become about wanting the same things everybody else wants which is not a bad thing but is not the voice of the whole queer movement. In fact most voices that are silenced within the movement are those
- that are either getting their ass kicked on the streets because they don’t blend
- or those with little power within the political system
- or those that care less about identity politics, they just want to be, live, have great sex, explore, be.
So the gay agenda doesn’t give voice to all concerned. Well maybe these groupings get some quality TV time during Pride since that is what media wants to show and that is what the larger gay movement does want to be viewed as. I think it is all about oppression and many times the oppressed (gay community) become the oppressors (the rest of us that don’t identify as gay).
So in answer to your question my dear I think B and T folk within the gay movement have the opportunity to participate within the movement but in the larger scheme of things and what is portrayed to the Universe is Gay= LGBT.
Continue reading “Five Questions With… Rosalyne Blumenstein”
Happy Friday!
Tomorrow: Wigstock and the SRLP Benefit @ Starlight!
^ And in the meantime, Endymion looking far more serious than he is.
A Day in the Life of HB: Part One
I thought this might amuse some of you, for whatever reason it would.
Wake up, slightly bemused at having dreamt I grew up with Sting living two houses away from me.
Put on tea water, weigh self (don’t ask!), turn on computer, light cigarette, say hello to Aeneas (who always greets me when I wake up), apologize to Endymion (who continues to sleep at my feet no matter how many times I kick him when I’m sleeping).
Go online, curse dial-up, delete pounds of spam. Do I really need to see ads for “young girls jerking you off†when I first wake up? No, I don’t. Do I even have a penis for these young sluts TO jerk off? No, I don’t.
Open the Animal Rescue site, tab to MHB, check stats, amazon sales rank, message boards. Tell someone to get bent and someone else to quit picking the same fights, already. Split threads, move threads, delete bitchy posts. Proceed to the Breast Cancer site, the Child Health site, the Hunger site, the Literacy site, the Rainforest site, which I let load in a background tab while I check out the boards.
IM Betty, who tells me about my email before most of it downloads. (We get cc:’d a lot of the same info.)
When the tea water whistles, if I hear it, pour tea; while tea is steeping, prepare a bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios. Yes, I’m addicted. In a still-sleepy daze, wonder if I should let the Cheerios go soggy while I finish smoking the cigarette I lit, or put out the cigarette to eat the Cheerios. (It’s about 50/50, as far as I can tell.)
Bug Betty via IM about the eight things we’re supposed be doing, who she’s supposed to be calling, what events we’ve been invited to that she hasn’t gotten back to me about, which reminds me to open my calendar, and see that I’m supposed to work, so I speed up my tea drinking and emailing.
Answer ten emails in succession: one to a friend from my pre-tranny life, five to trannies currently emailing me regularly, two queries from people about info/resources, and one to someone I promised some bit of writing to. The tenth I forward to Betty about tech stuff on the site/boards.
Ignore the phone until I stop saying fuck under my breath when it rings.
Stop doing everything to give Aeneas his morning love-down.
Wonder if I have time to work out before I dress and bathe.
Answer five more emails: two responses that have already come back from the previous set, a third from a partner who’s freaking out, forward two other invites to Betty so she can not get back to me about whether or not she wants to go.
Read the new posts on the boards again, making sure whatever fights started have been dropped, then pick one myself about something feminist.
Remember to take my Zyrtec when I realize I’m itchy all over from the Aeneas love-down.
IM Betty about how she slept, say hello, only to notice a “brb†about five lines up.
Wait for Betty to get back so I don’t forget whatever it is. Drink tea, play with Endymion. Take out yoga mat. Check answering machine for previous night’s messages because I didn’t want to answer the phone. Get back to find 10 lines of IM from Betty that end with another ‘brb.’ Completely forget what I was supposed to IM Betty about.
Check my to-do list, cross one thing off and add another.
Make a few phonecalls.
Finally, Betty gets back from lunch and tells me she has no idea if she wants to go to anything I’ve mentioned to her. I resolve just to tell her what we’re going to and quit asking her, then forward her a few more emails about events in the next half-hour after I’ve made the resolution.
IM Betty to tell her I’m working out. Work out. (Okay, so this doesn’t happen everyday.)
Take a quick bath, dress, check the boards one last time, IM Betty that I’m going to work. Smoke another cigarette. Wonder how long it will take someone to write their own version of this blog post on the boards.
Why I Left Long Island
An article in Sunday’s New York Times is about what teenaged Long Islanders do for fun.
Most were from white neighborhoods with safe schools and nice homes in bedroom communities. But this was not their fault. Manhattan was only a 45-minute car or train ride away, but it might as well have been a foreign country. No one spoke of heading in there for an evening.
For the record, the kids they talk about in this article were the ones who liked to throw stuff at me and call me ‘freak’ and alternately decide I was the coolest person in the world and buddy up to me.
This was like a bad flashback with no acid involved.
Five Questions With… Damian McNicholl
Damian McNicholl is the author of the Lambda finalist A Son Called Gabriel, who I met at a Lammy reading here in NYC. He’s from Northern Ireland, and Gabriel is about a young man growing up in a Catholic community in Northern Ireland. McNicholl’s blog can be found at http://damianm.blogspot.com, and A Son Called Gabriel is in bookstores, and available, of course, through amazon.com.
1) Considering all the scandals here in the US considering priests and pedophilia, how have people responded to your novel?
First Helen, thank you for the opportunity to visit your site and answer your questions.
While the scene where Father Cornelius seduces Gabriel amounts to only one scene in A SON CALLED GABRIEL, nevertheless, its inclusion was something I wondered about because the scandal involving the church had broken and was gaining momentum. I wondered if it would cause anger among the American-Irish community, particularly among those who are fervent practitioners of their Catholic faith. But any reservations I had about including the scene did not last long because, within me, deep within, I knew I had to remain true to Gabriel, and his story, and the truth in this regard had to be presented. The truth is that in real life some priests have taken advantage of young girls and boys. It has happened in the United States. It has happened in Ireland. It has happened throughout the world. And, of course, I did have a counterbalance to reflect how things are in life because not all the priests are warped: Gabriel’s headmaster at the grammar school is strict but proper, and the parish curate is a very kindly man who’s very much in touch with the needs of his parishioners.
And I am very happy to report that my readers are sophisticated enough to realize these terrible crimes have been perpetrated by renegade, if not evil, priests, and those who have commented or asked about it have done so positively. Indeed, I’ve had more questions from readers about the issue of bullying that’s also covered in the novel, as well as the isolation a young person endures growing up gay in a very conservative community.
And, to be absolutely honest, I really didn’t care about what anyone conservative would say or think about my work after they’d read it. I didn’t, because I was pretty sure no conservative person would read the novel. I mean, let’s face it; conservative people are not interested in reading or learning about or dealing with truths like this because it simply does not conform to their views of the real world.
Continue reading “Five Questions With… Damian McNicholl”
Privacy and the Boards
Due to the email harassment of someone who posts on our boards, Betty & I have had to change the access to the forums. From here on in, *anyone* who wants to read the forums has to register in order to do so. Only the ‘Technical Difficulties’ forum will be open to all, mostly because we needed a place to post this announcement so that people (esp our non-registered readers) would not be totally baffled.
It’s really unfortunate that we’ve had to do this, but the threat was serious enough that we feel we have no choice.
In terms of the harassment: someone has threatened to send various posts on these boards to the person’s employer: quite serious, indeed.
Again, apologies for this inconvenience. Believe me, once we confirm the harasser, their full name & address & photo will be posted here. We have no tolerance for this behavior.
Personally, I’m furious. Spending the time building a community like the MHB message boards takes a lot of time, effort, and work. And for one little bitter fuck to come along and ruin it for everyone really pisses me off. What it does, effectively, is make it possible for those who are already dealing with transness, at some level, to do so, but it prevents those who are more intrepid from getting any help, or being able to read the experiences of others. And that group includes the closeted CDs, stealth TSs, and especially partners, who are probably our most significant unregistered readership. Whoever sent that email (via anonymous remailer) is on my shitlist for taking much-needed resources from the people who need it most.
To those intrepid readers: I hope some of you will find the courage to register, to read or post or both.
If you are reading this, you anonymous, bitter shit, be forewarned that Betty & I have dealt with the likes of you before. We will find your local paper, we will find your name & address, & don’t be surprised when we use all three in combination.
Helen & Betty
The Reality of Transition
On the MHB Boards, Emilia posted a link to an essay by trans educator Raven Kaldera that I thought more people should see. It’s called A Letter to Would-Be Transsexuals, and points up twenty areas of change that will impact your life if you transition. I thought it was accurate and not sugar-coated – the kind of essay I like best.
More of Raven Kaldera’s writing on trans issues can be found on his website: www.cauldronfarm.com.
He’ll also be presenting at Dark Odyssey, where Rahne Alexander, me, Joe Samson, and other transpeople who will be talking about the many aspects of trans sexuality. (Dark Odyssey is not a trans conference, but an all-kink inclusive sex conference.)
The essay is also being discussed on the MHB Boards.
SRLP Fundraiser: Gender Splendor
Next Saturday at 7pm, after Wigstock, Betty and I will be going to a fundraiser @ Starlight for the Sylvia Rivera Law Project. We’d love to see a good crowd, since SRLP is a great org that does good work.
I’ll be reading as part of the entertainment, and drag king Johnny Kat will be closing the show.
Here are more details straight from the organizer:
Gender Splendor:
A Hot Summer Benefit for the Sylvia Rivera Law Project @ Starlight
Saturday, August 27, 7-9pm
Silent Auction / Drink Specials
Performances that deconstruct gender in all its sexy, dirty, angry, funny glory.
Cover: $5 minimum, more accepted
All Door and Auction proceeds to benefit the work of the SRLP
You can also donate to SRLP online, if you can’t make it.
Five Questions With… Loren Krywanczyk
Loren Krywanczyk is an undergraduate at Yale where he first organized Trans Issues Week in 2004, as a sophomore. The 2nd Annual Trans Issues Week took place in 2005, and Krywanczyk is currently planning the 3rd in the series.
< Loren (left) with his partner Vera
1) What encouraged you to start Trans Issues week at Yale?
I founded Trans Issues Week through my capacity as Special Events Coordinator of the Yale Women’s Center my sophomore year, a job that entailed putting together a speaker series during the spring semester. I was at the time purely woman-identified, and yet for some reason which I am still not entirely sure of I decided that it would be a good idea to devote the week to an exploration of intersections and tensions between feminism and trans/gender issues. I met with Jonathan D. Katz of the Larry Kramer Initiative for some direction in potential speakers, since I had very little knowledge of trans/gender issues or theory, let alone key visible figures in the field. Through contacting speakers and getting closer with the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program at Yale, I received a one-month crash course in gender while throwing together what became the first annual Trans Issues Week at Yale. The week itself inspired me personally as well as academically, and shortly after the series my sophomore year I began incorporating genderqueerness and fludity into my own everyday life and intellectual pursuits. I guess you could say that a personal interest and activist/education-buildling initiative sparked my organization of the series, but even so I don’t know exactly where that personal interest stemmed from at the time.
Continue reading “Five Questions With… Loren Krywanczyk”