(Philadelphia, PA) – The transgender community celebrated the groundbreaking U.S. Government’s recognition of gender dysphoria and its coverage of transgender surgery under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). However, as the law begins to be implemented and real transgender people attempt to use its coverage, they are starting to discover its acute limitations, even to the […]
The trans community was stunned recently by the announcement that Dr. Cerise Richards had passed. She had been battling leukemia for eighteen years, and it resurfaced, taking her quickly. I met Cerise many times. And every time she took the time to talk with me. She read this blog and seemed to know everything going on in […]
I was fortunate to get a seat at a private screening of an upcoming CNN movie called Lady Valor. It’s the story of Kristin Beck who was a 20 yr. Navy SEAL/veteran and is now a transgender champion for lots of different things. The screening was held in the Time Warner Building on 58th St. […]
Our Canadian correspondent, Linda Jensen, takes a trip to the place where all the breastforms come from. On a visit to Vancouver she drops in at The Breast Form Store and learns that it’s a lot more than a place where you can buy a nice looking chest. They carry everything that the discerning crossdresser needs to put herself together. From breasts, to hips, to makeup, wigs and more, The Breast Form Store has it all. Including a $1300 item called “Gurl Shorts” that gives you a feminine lower torso.
The last full week in July was an incredible week for transpeople in America. On Monday July 21, 2014 President Obama signed an executive order doing 2 things. First, it added “gender identity” to an existing executive order protecting gay and lesbian federal workers from discrimination thus protecting transgender federal workers. (It institutionalized and strengthened […]
Sexy, sultry, cheap, matronly, are just a few ways to describe the attire of the T-Girls at Hamburger Mary’s In Long Beach, California. The big event is the first Saturday night of every month. Sometimes it’s themed, for example “Jungle Night,” where everyone is encouraged to wear animal prints or jungle attire. My close friend Jamie Jameson […]
It’s July already and that means that the longest running, longest duration transgender event is rapidly approaching. It’s Fantasia Fair on Cape Cod and while it doesn’t happen till mid October you know you have to plan ahead, picking out every outfit for each day’s many activities. And then you’ll need to buy more suitcases. Read a review of last year’s event and think ahead to October on Cape Cod.
Paul McHugh is a former Professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins who denies the existence of trans as a real condition. He claims it is a disorder that is all in the mind and that transgendered people don’t deserve to have their civil rights guaranteed. He believes SRS is a waste of money and doesn’t resolve gender dysphoria. McHugh can believe what he wants but when he publishes his beliefs in a major newspaper as fact he does major harm to trans people. Dana Bevan tells us why.
You are packing for a long weekend en femme and you realize that you’re going to need a whole separate suitcase to carry all the shoes you simply must bring to go with every perfect outfit. It’s been an unavoidable fashion burden for years. Now there’s a solution to this fashion burden. They’re called High Pheels and they offer women, and other devoted wearers of women’s fashions, a simple way to change their shoes by just changing the covering using High Pheels “skins.” Read on and learn more.
The best kept secret TG conference in the country happened last week in Philadelphia, Pa. The 13th Annual Trans-Health Conference brought a diverse mix of trans people together at the Pennsylvania Convention Center for workshops, seminars and keynote addresses from Harper Jean Tobin and Janet Mock. You’ve never hear of the Trans-Health Conference? Read on and learn about it so you’ll be ready next year.
From the plays of Shakespeare to Charlie’s Aunt, Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, Kinky Boots and Casa Valentina, drag has a grand tradition in the theater. This year that was quite apparent at The 68th Annual Tony Awards. There were several actors playing women or crossdressers/TGs and one woman who won for her portrayal of a drag king.
Friend of TGForum, Cuban Legend David de Alba, has a show coming up on June 22 at The Onyx Theatre in Las Vegas. In advance of the show he has been doing all kinds of promotion, though we know he won’t have a problem filling seats for his Tribute to Judy Garland, A Lonely Stage. […]
Stormé DeLarverie, an acknowledged hero of the Stonewall Riots and a pioneer LGBT activist, died on May 24, 2014. DeLaverie was 93 years old. She was called the “Rosa Parks” of the gay rights movement. DeLarverie was born in New Orleans on December 24, 1920, and is well known for having a role in the […]
The Fantasia Fair Planning Committee will be awarding scholarships to the 40th annual Fantasia Fair, to be held October 19 – 26 in historic Provincetown, Massachusetts. Individuals receiving full scholarships will receive free tuition to the Fair, including all seminars, workshops, banquets & events, daily lunches/brunches, and shared room accommodations for seven nights. The scholarships […]
(Bala Cynwyd, PA) One of the main reasons female-to-male (F2M) bottom surgery has lagged behind male-to-female (M2F) bottom surgery has been that the technology had not yet been developed to surgically create a penis that performed as realistically as it looked, according to Dr. Sherman Leis at the Philadelphia Center for Transgender Surgery and an […]
The new play by Harvey Fierstein, “Casa Valentina,” as most everyone knows, is based on the real Casa Susanna. In the 1960s Virginia Prince attended a weekend gathering there to promote her idea for the Society for the Second Self. The play is a fascinating look into the transgender experience of the early ’60s and it is based on a book of photographs taken at Casa Susanna. In this article Dallas Denny reveals who took most of those photographs and how they ended up inspiring Harvey Fierstein to write “Casa Valentina.”
They say what happens in Las Vegas stays in Las Vegas. Well, that may be so in most cases but one of the features of Las Vegas is that it’s home to drag legend David de Alba. You all know that so the knowledge certainly hasn’t been confined to the city limits. Who starts these […]
The founder of the first training school from crossdressers in the U.S., Veronica Vera, has been awarded an honorary doctorate. It’s not, however, as a result of her work training CDs in the feminine arts at her Finishing School for Boys Who Want to Be Girls. This honorary doctorate is from the Institute for the […]
A film maker in Britain has launched a Kickstarter campaign to finance his film about a trans sex worker who begins her journey to self acceptance after she intervenes to save a homeless child from a dangerous situation on the streets of London. Award winning freelance writer and director Paul Frankl has written Roxanne, a […]
Latina cooking queen Soraya Sobriedad has won a prize. Sobriedad hosts a cooking show on cable channels in the New York City area that instructs viewers on how to cook delicious Latin dishes while keeping them healthy and low fat. This year she took a large cash prize in the Eighth Annual Queens StartUP! Business Plan Competition by cooking up a business plan the judges found to be very tasty.
Gypsy has been performing since 1950. At 82 you think he’d retire, take of those pumps and relax. But that’s not the plan. We met with Gypsy and his manager last week in Los Angeles and they told us about their plan to build an exciting new venue for female impersonation where Gypsy will be the host and M.C. And they’d like your help to get it started. Read all about it in our interview with a super performer — Gypsy.
In my last blog post I expressed concern about actual and perceived transphobia in the State of New Hampshire, a state with all sorts of gay and lesbian rights including Marriage Equality, but without codified basic protections for transgender people. I received an update this week from former New Hampshire state legislator Mo Baxley — […]
The new Harvey Fierstein play “Casa Valentina” has opened on Broadway. It’s the story of the crossdresser resort in the Catskill Mountains in 1962 where Virginia Prince proposed the creation of Tri-Ess. Jan Brown of the MHVTA support group attended a preview night with several other ladies. This is her review of the play.
Our occasional contributor and TG icon Dallas Denny participated in the Moving Trans* Forward Symposium last month at the University of Victoria on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. Also in attendance were several other TG icons including another occasional TGF contributor Ms. Bob Davis. Dallas posted a review of the event on her website and has […]
The fight for equal rights for transgendered people has hit another snag in the state of New Hampshire. A gay legislator is working to enshrine “sexual orientation” into the language and excluding “gender identity.” Meanwhile the Human Rights Campaign says there’s no need for a new law protecting TGs in New Hampshire. All TGs there have to do is file their discrimination complaint using being trans as a disability. Get the story from Babs!
The Dunes Resort, the “Midwest’s largest GLBT Resort & Entertainment Complex” is “proud to be the place to come and be who you want to be.” If you are looking for a Midwest transgender friendly getaway this fall the Dunes Resort, near the sister communities of Saugatuck/Douglas, MI, may be the place for you to […]
