Tag: marriage

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Not Since Supergirl

Betty sent me this article about match.com, written by a woman about the disastrous effects of the plethora of women available to men on services like match.com. An article like this confuses me, not because I can’t relate – believe me, I can: I had guys cheat on me, guys who didn’t want a commitment, guys who failed to mention girlfriends. & I’m certainly sure that none of the women reading that article and relating to it – the kind of women who use match.com and who need or want or imbibe the “dating principles” at the end of the article – will really care for advice from a woman married to someone trans.

But I’m going to say it anyway: I don’t understand how a woman could be confused as to whether a guy is interested or not. Does he treat you as well as your friends do, or better? Then he likes you. If he doesn’t, walk. If you can’t tell, he’s not interested.

But still, reading it, I’m struck by this urge women have to make themselves into “what guys want.” I go into this some in the new book, but I don’t get re-shaping yourself according to some abstract idea of what men are looking for in women. It doesn’t matter what guys want, what cultural trends are. It just doesn’t. It takes one guy, who’s well-suited to you, who likes you for the things that most guys *don’t* find attractive about you, or at least who aren’t likely to. I’ve always had a hard time understanding what Betty liked about me, and then we rescued Aurora, who is an ornery, difficult, complicated cat who also happens also to be loving, sweet, playful, loyal and smart. It’s only seeing how much she has Betty wrapped around her little paw that the lightbulb went off: Betty likes difficult women. Mystery solved.

I just don’t see how becoming a cookie cutout of a woman would ever help along the quest for a mate. But I guess a lot of women want cookie cutouts for husbands, too, which is also something I don’t understand. I guess my marriage to Betty is more than ample evidence that I prize singularity, as does she. Continue reading “Not Since Supergirl”

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Five Questions With… Richard M. Juang

Richard JuangAlthough Richard M. Juang is an otherwise studious English professor, I came to know him through my participation with the NCTE Board of Advisors, and increasingly found him to be gentle and smart as a whip. We got to sit down and talk recently at First Event, where he agreed to answer my Five Questions.

(1) Tell me about the impetus that lead to writing Transgender Rights. Why now? Why you, Paisley Currah, and Shannon Price Minter?
Transgender Rights helps create a discussion of the concrete issues faced by transgender people and communities. Our contributors have all written in an accessible way, while also respecting the need for complex in-depth thought, whether the topic is employment, family law, health care, poverty, or hate crimes. We also provide two important primary documents and commentaries on them: the International Bill of Gender Rights and an important decision from the Colombian Constitutional Court concerning an intersex child. Both have important implications for thinking about how one articulates the right of gender self-determination in law. We wanted to create a single volume that would let students, activists, attorneys, and policy-makers think about transgender civil rights issues, history, and political activism well beyond Transgender 101.Transgender Rights

One of the things the book doesn’t do is get bogged down in a lot of debate about how to define “transgender” or about what transgender identity “means”; we wanted to break sharply away from that tendency in scholarly writing. Instead, we wanted to make available a well-informed overview about the legal and political reality that transgender people live in.

Oddly enough, Shannon, Paisley and I each did graduate work in a different field at Cornell University in Ithaca NY. (Apparently, a small town in upstate New York is a good place to create transgender activists!) The book represents a cross-disciplinary collaboration where, although we had common goals for the book, we also had different perspectives. The result was that, as editors, we were able to stay alert to the fact that the transgender movement is diverse and has many different priorities and types of activism.

Continue reading “Five Questions With… Richard M. Juang”

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Gay Marriage Takes a Hit

In Massachusetts, the legislature voted against gay marriage, despite the state’s supreme court having ruled to the contrary. That said, this may only be the impact of outgoing Governor Mitt Romney’s last efforts, and there is hope on the horizon.

Incoming Governor Deval Patrick (D) is opposed to the ban. He lobbied throughout the State House and held a press conference to encourage legislators to cast a “No” vote on the measure. The New York Times reported that Governor-Elect Patrick strongly objected to the constitutional amendment process, saying, “I believe that adults should be free to choose whom they wish to love and marry,” and that an amendment should not be used “to give a minority fewer freedoms than the majority.”

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Upsetting

The Task Force recently issued a report about homeless youth: up to 42% of homeless youth are LGBT (even though only 3-5% of the population is).

While I’m glad to hear NYC has stepped up funding to help serve these kids, I wonder if a public education campaign isn’t also in order. That job, however, might need Federal support, which we certainly aren’t going to get just yet. Still, you’d think we could maybe let people know that throwing their LGBT kids out on the street is not a solution to anyone’s problem.

These throwaway kids are one of the ‘side effects’ of all the anti-gay rhetoric being thrown around, & that includes the anti-gay marriage rhetoric, in my opinion. Define a group of people as second-class citizens and this is what you get.

You can read the full report at The Task Force’s website.

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& Still More…

“Thoughtful, sharp, and provocative, this book delves into one of the most terrifying and universal elements of a relationship: change. Helen Boyd’s courage and insight are remarkable, and we have much to learn from her about redefining gender roles, marriage, and commitment in this century.”
—Tristan Taormino, author and Village Voice columnist

It’s an embarassment of riches, at this point.

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Jennifer Finney Boylan's Southern Comfort Speech

Thanks to Ms. Boylan for allowing me to reproduce it here; this is the complete & unedited version.
Hi everybody. Gosh, look at you all. You all look fantastic from up here. I don’t think I’ve ever been in a room before with so many large women.
(improvised joke #1)
(improvised joke #2)
I notice that some of you look a little tired today. Which is not to say, you don’t look fabulous, I’m just saying that some of you seem like you were up kind of late last night. Did you check out the parties last night? You know the one I mean, the theme party—Come as Your Favorite Nude Author?
(beat)
First time in my life I’ve ever been in a room full of a hundred and fifty nude Kate Bornsteins.
(improvise joke #3)
I have to be honest and say I feel a little bit like a fraud up here today, because I know that there are so many of you who are so much more articulate about these issues than I am. I am an English teacher from Maine, a storyteller— what I’m not is a therapist, or scholar of gender studies, or for that matter, much of an activist. I’ve tried doing some of those things sometimes, because I want to do my part, but I have to say I just so lame at them. I’m grateful that there are people doing all the work around the country that’s being done on behalf of people like us, including the organizers of this conference—our fabulous chairwoman, Kristen, as well as heather O’malley and Cat Turner, and Lola Fleck. I’m just as grateful for all the people who came before me, who blazed the trail that has made my life easier.. I know I would not be here without them, quite literally.
There is an old saying that I find true for me this afternoon—one reason I am able to see so far is because I stand on the shoulders of giants.
Continue reading “Jennifer Finney Boylan's Southern Comfort Speech”

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Week 7: Buster Film Fest

Today at Film Fest, Buster Keaton in The Cameraman and Spite Marriage. The Cameraman is one of the few Buster films shot in NYC, and is great for anyone interested in vintage footage of 1920s New York – it’s also one of the last best Buster Keaton performances of this era. Spite Marriage has one singularly brilliant scene, of newlywed Buster putting a very, very drunk wife to bed.