Helen Boyd Kramer's journal on gender and stuff
Well, we leave Wisconsin today, drive home through Illinois and Ohio and Pennsylvania and whatever other states I’m forgetting, and in a few days we’ll be back in Park Slope.
I’m sure I’ll be happy to be home. I hope I’ll be happy to be home. But wow did I enjoy living in Wisconsin. & Believe me, that surprises me more than it surprises just about anyone else.
I’ll try to blog from the road.
If the killing of Lawrence King wasn’t sad enough, there are too many other stories — all murders of trans POC that took place this year.
This article from The Root has a list.
And this murder, committed a little while back, has recently come to more widespread attention, as has the murder of Simmie Williams.
My students have asked, because they’re reading Stone Butch Blues, if the violence against gender diverse people is still as bad as it was then. And what can I say? Ask Lawrence King? Ask Adolphus Simmons? Ask Sanesha Stewart? We can’t. They’ve all been killed as a result of trans/homophobic violence. The daily threat might not feel so great for many of us. But that doesn’t mean people who don’t conform to gender norms aren’t at greater risk.
I so long for a new president who will get gender identity included in Federal Hate Crimes protection, whether it does any good or not. What I want is to see articles written about people like Sanesha Stewart that at least respect their choice of pronouns, as well as articles that don’t ask what the person was doing at the time – as if what a person is doing at the time she’s murdered makes it more acceptable for her to have been murdered! When are the powers-that-be going to understand is that sometimes all you have to “do” is be queer to be killed?!
The news also came through this week that Gabrielle Pickett, twin sister of Chanelle Pickett, was killed during the summer of 2003. Chanelle was killed in 1996.
I’m just tired this week. Tired of counting the dead. Tired of feeling so sullen and leaden with grief.
(Sorry, I couldn’t resist.)
Both Clintons’ support for NAFTA was why I lost faith with them years ago & started voting for Nader (who, btw, is running again, if anyone still cares) so I’m finding very little sympathy for Clinton during the debate talking about how against NAFTA she’s always been.
Goddamn politicians. Hate ’em.
Lantos was thought to have introduced the first pro-transgender effort in the U.S. Congress – the resolution he introduced would have condemned, “all violations of internationally recognized human rights norms based on the real or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity of an individual.”
The only survivor of the Nazi Holocaust ever elected to the U.S. Congress, Rep. Lantos was a strong supporter of human rights for all people. He was a co-sponsor in 2007 of both the federal hate crimes bill that passed the House of Representatives and of the unified and inclusive Employment Non-Discrimination Act (H.R. 2015) that was eventually abandoned this fall.
Our thoughts are with the family and friends of this brave leader.
For more about Lantos, do check the Mercury News article about him.
Yours Truly was interviewed for an article on “Ten Hot Sexuality (and Gender) Issues of 2007 by Naked on the Internet author Audacia Ray. My bit is mostly the “(and Gender)” part of it, about ENDA & the Hate Crimes Act.
I think it’s the first time I’ve been interviewed for anything that was also about pole dancing.
Is anyone else horrified by Vagisil commercials? The most recent one has a woman in it who is all dressed up but sees her own reflection as looking crummy, in a hoodie. And why does she feel that way? Because she worries that other people will smell her bad smell.
Ugh. I mean, come on already.
Buying a tube of whatever because your vagina is itchy and/or smelly is demented. First off, if things are itchy and/or smelly temporarily, that’s just how it goes – you don’t need Vagisil; you need a bath and maybe to wear cotton panties for a week. On the other hand, if your vagina consistently and chronically itches or smells bad, you need to see a doctor, not buy a tube of Vagisil. Yeast infections can be fatal, and you can give anything else that would cause itching (like crabs) to sex partners, and you know, that’s just not nice.
But the whole “women are icky and smell bad” = specifically because their vaginas smell bad = is misogynist bullshit. Women’s reproductive systems actually work to maintain a PH balance on their own, and while having a lot of unprotected sex with multiple partners throws off that PH balance, that’s not really an advisable thing to do anyway, considering all the possible STDs, including HIV, and of course potential pregnancy.
Read Natalie Angier’s Woman: An Intimate Geography. It’s a great, scientific, readable book about women’s bodies and how they work, a must-read.
The Transgender Day of Remembrance fills so many of us with fear and sadness, and while I think it’s a vital part of the trans community’s consciousness raising, I also think we need to celebrate who we are, the victories we’ve had, both personally and as a community.
My goal in posting this is to allow people to post whatever it is about their own past year that has increased their pride, happiness, or visibility as a trans person, partner, friend or family member of a trans person, so I’ll start, since mine is easy: it’s been a pleasure and an honor to have published my 2nd book about being married to Betty, to have seen our relationship not just weather the complications of our life but thrive, and to see Betty become even more of the person she needs to be.
This year, in particular, it seems like the perfect precursor for American trans, since it’s the day before Thanksgiving.
So, your turn:
For this year’s Transgender Day of Remembrance, FORGE, a group out of Wisconsin, has released two new handouts. One is about keeping yourself safe as a trans person – or really as any person. It includes tips like wearing clothes that aren’t restrictive and making sure you carry a cellphone.
But more impressively, at least to me, is a document on the friends, family, & partners of trans people who have been the victims of violence either against trans people or for defending trans people or for being partnered to trans people – and in one case, only for being assumed to be trans or gender variant.
I’m especially pleased to see a group create this printout as I have been, in the past, told that I can’t use the word “we” when talking about TDOR precisely because I’m not trans. But as the FORGE document more than indicates, those of us who are partners or SOFFAs are also at risk when transphobia walks the streets.
Have a safe Day of Remembrance. Honor the lives of those who we have lost, and tomorrow, celebrate all of your own victories and those of other trans people in your life. We have a lot to celebrate as a community as well, despite the violence and hate that is sometimes directed our way. I’ll post tomorrow to allow anyone to add their own personal victories, as well.
Interestingly, Ted Kennedy is sponsoring ENDA in the Senate, and even more interestingly, the Senate version will also exclude gender identity.
Of course Bush has already said he intends to veto whatever version comes his way. Still, this may be another opportunity for more education.
In the meantime, Mara Keisling of NCTE will be on C-SPAN tomorrow morning at 7:45 AM, & if you miss it, you can catch it on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal site.
There are not a lot of stories of successful transsexual / non-trans partner marriages. One recurring theme that I see is the need for pacing. Unfortunately too many trans-partners once they have their epiphany rush like a runaway freight train towards transition. Like most runaway freight trains these relationships typically end in destruction.
I’m not going to say that there is any one right way to transition. We all know that those paths are as unique as the individuals who tread them. However, if a couple is going to have any possibility of remaining intact each partner must be willing to recognize that compromises will be an integral part of the process.