Tag: trans partners

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Dan Savage, Parent

Dan Savage in the NYT on the Arkansas ruling prohibiting unmarried couples – not just gay and lesbian ones – from adopting or fostering children:

That state’s Proposed Initiative Act No. 1, approved by nearly 57 percent of voters last week, bans people who are “cohabitating outside a valid marriage” from serving as foster parents or adopting children. While the measure bans both gay and straight members of cohabitating couples as foster or adoptive parents, the Arkansas Family Council wrote it expressly to thwart “the gay agenda.” Right now, there are 3,700 other children across Arkansas in state custody; 1,000 of them are available for adoption. The overwhelming majority of these children have been abused, neglected or abandoned by their heterosexual parents.

Even before the law passed, the state estimated that it had only about a quarter of the foster parents it needed. Beginning on Jan. 1, a grandmother in Arkansas cohabitating with her opposite-sex partner because marrying might reduce their pension benefits is barred from taking in her own grandchild; a gay man living with his male partner cannot adopt his deceased sister’s children.

I really do wonder how even people who hate gay folks think this is justified.

(thanks to Tina for the link!)

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Danish Girl’s Wife

It turns out that Nicole Kidman will be playing Lili Elbe in the upcoming movie The Danish Girl. Her wife will be played by Charlize Theron.

Thoughts:

  • The movie is based on the book The Danish Girl.
  • With Theron & Kidman playing them, this just seems like another excuse for “hot lesbian innuendo.”
  • I’m also a little perturbed by the “play a transsexual / get an oscar” trend.
  • Still, i’ve always expected the wife of a trans woman to be played by someone like Kathy Bates, & at her worst, too, so Charlize Theron isn’t so bad. Except that the book seems to imply her husband’s transsexuality was her own fault, and in the reviews of the book, it seems she comes off as a cheerleadery sort.
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Miriam Makeba

Miriam Makeba died on Sunday right after she finished a concert in Italy. She was a South African singer who I first discovered on a collection of music from the tv show Northern Exposure (of which I was, & am, a huge fan).

The Best of Miriam Makeba and the Skylarks – recorded in the 1950s – is one of my all-time spirit lifters; I have no idea what I’m singing but I sing along whenever these tracks come on. (I’d highly recommend this one, especially, to anyone who loves rocksteady.)

She had such a sparkling, clear voice – the kind that makes you think of beautiful sunny days.

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We Are the World?

If the world could vote is a site that’s logging votes from all over the world and not just in the US. Kind of staggering, really, though I do wish US citizens would consider the fact that we are the major world power, and maybe, just maybe, the world has something to say about this that we should listen to.

Oh, and maybe this crap is why.

But then, after that makes you feel like crap, read this stunning essay about why this guy didn’t vote for Obama.

& Then another, also about the past & the future, but from a decidedly NYC perspective.

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SCC Failure

A recent blog post written by someone who attended SCC reminds me, again, that whoever is in charge of partners’ events at SCC isn’t doing their job.

The only thing that I attended that did not live up to my expectations was the Comfort Zone, a group for SOFFA (significant others, friends, family and allies) of MTF trangender women. I qualified for the group as a wife of a MTF. The group was predominately made up of wives of cross dressers with about 4 of us being partners or wives of transgender people. It appears we all left before the meeting was over. The next morning Sarah and met two young women who had not been eligible for the group since their partners were FTM. They were in happy relationships. We exchanged email address and may try to put something on the internet for happy partners and wives of trans people.

This really thrills me. Two years ago a partner of an FTM was told she wasn’t welcome because she identified as lesbian, & this year they just don’t allow partners of FTMs into the partner support group.

It’s not hard to run an inclusive partner group. I’ve done it tons of times. I offer every year. I don’t need to get paid, just to have my costs covered. I would be willing to go down there to train some locals as to how to be inclusive of all partners.

Whoever is doing this workshop needs to be asked not to do it. The isolation most partners experience is quite enough, but isolating them further – at a trans conference! – is entirely unacceptable.

Please, SCC organizers, please. You have no idea what a knife in the heart it is, as a partner, to get to a conference and feel like no one bothered to care that you have a sense of community, too.

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Fidelities

The NYT publishes a column about Polyamory and specifically about Poly Pride, a celebration being held in NYC this weekend.

Alex Williams, the journalist who wrote it, seems to have come away with the main impression I’ve come away with: too much talking. I can barely manage one person in my life, but I can’t imagine more. I just don’t have the patience.

Toothbrush disputes are the least of it. In the era of safe sex and cellphones, a life that seems to promise boundless sex in fact involves lots of talking. And talking. And talking.

For one thing, they constantly have to explain the way they live.

That last line ring out to any trans people & their partners out there? One of the reasons Betty & I love the various alt.sex communities we’ve run into is that there is a shared experience: you may not be explaining the same thing, but you’re still explaining. Or, as I like to explain in my Uneven Libidos class, the further you are from the socially-condoned relationship – heterosexual marriage with something like traditional gender roles – the harder it is to find validation and support for the way you live.

If you want to know more about poly, I highly recommend Tristan Taormino’s Opening Up, and her website, which lists tons of resources for poly people.

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Marc Bolan’s Extended Family

So here’s a little factoid for you musicheads out there: the song Tainted Love, made famous by Soft Cell, was originally recorded by a woman named Gloria Jones. & Who is Gloria Jones? She was Marc Bolan’s partner.

& When did Marc Almond of Soft Cell decide to become a pop star? When he saw Marc Bolan on Top of the Pops.

There is a DVD of a live tribute show to Marc Bolan that was recorded at The Shepard’s Bush Empire last year which came out Monday- featuring Marc Almond, Gloria Jones, as well as Bolan producer Tony Visconti – which I can’t seem to find anywhere online. If anyone sees one, do let me know.

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Trans for Obama: Ongoing Issues

Goal Thermometer

Kate Bornstein is fired up, and wants our various transgender communities to start working together more, all because she’s dizzily happy about being acknowledged by the Obama campaign. Jillian Weiss is asking similar questions, but more along the “how in hell did this happen?” about the Trans for Obama campaign. I love that she calls me a Transgender Media Empire – that kills me, since I’m really just an underemployed author with a tech-savvy partner. Even on Monday, when I put a lot of energy into Trans for Obama, half the reason was that I had to take the GRE two days later and my best-loved furball was having surgery.

Still, this issue of “community” is one that always frustrates me. Community is about being willing; if you want in, come on in, and if you don’t, please go away. It’s as simple as that, imho: the HBS type are free to do whatever it is they do (and some are active in feminist issues, actually, instead of trans ones), and the homophobic crossdressers, of which there are some, can hang out together by themselves, and – well, you get the idea. I don’t really care, honestly: since my existence as a member of the trans community is always liminal to some people, because I’m a partner & not trans myself, I’m all for defining community by those who want to be there.

But Monica Roberts (in the comments section of Jillian Weiss’ Bilerico post) has brought up the issue of trans POC not being encouraged, or recognized, and I think she’s right that we need to do more. So I’m looking for a trans POC volunteer to take over my blog for a day, to at least raise some awareness.

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Trans for Obama: Obama Pride Says Thanks

Trans folks and partners and allies: you did good with the Trans for Obama campaign, so good, in fact, that the Obama campaign has blogged about our efforts:

Obama Pride is honored by the enthusiastic support of so many in the transgender community and we congratulate all the participants in Trans Blog for Obama day for their huge success!

We’re very proud of us, too, and of Obama Pride for keeping LGBT issues visible for us all.

What’s even more important is that one of my favorite bloggers has written a remarkable piece about Obama from the perspective of someone who is female, African-American, and trans. Monica Roberts is a shining star in this community, and wow is that apparent from this current post of hers. My apologies that she did not hear about Trans for Obama Day until noon on Monday; the event’s organization happened very quickly, and while I tried to get to everyone – and tell them to let everyone else they knew to get on board – Ms. Roberts should have gotten her own invitation.

Sara also has a new post up about why she’ll vote for Obama now instead of voting for Kucinich in protest. & That’s exactly what Monday – and indeed this whole Trans for Obama week – was all about.