The Week In Trans 11/2/20

| Nov 2, 2020
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Blaire McIntyre

Blaire McIntyre, who served in Afghanistan with the 101st Airborne Division and is still a member of the Michigan National Guard, is suing Governor Gretchen Whitmer and Adjutant General Paul Rogers, to allow her to stay in the National Guard after transitioning genders. Her civilian job is also with the National Guard, and requires her to be an active member of the National Guard. The Detroit Free Press has this story.

Julie Hindsley has a transgender daughter, Ella, who is six-years-old. She knows how much is at stake in this election, as there are no laws to explicitly protect Ella from discrimination. This story appears in Popsugar.

The Associated Press notes that there is a lot at stake for transgender people in this election.

Although there are efforts to keep transgender people from voting, Bloomberg Citylab notes that there are still ways to get your vote to count.

More information about voting while transgender can be found at LGBTQ Nation.

Elections do have consequences. Deborah Fernandez-Turner, a mother in Tucson, Arizona, told the Human Rights Campaign that the students at school suddenly became emboldened by the election result. Her transgender child suddenly found swastikas on their desk, and it affected their entire outlook on life. Pink News has this story.

Taylor Small

Taylor Small is likely to become the first openly transgender person to win election in Vermont. She was encouraged to run by Diana Gonzalez, whom she will replace if elected. She is profiled in LGBTQ Nation.

Stephanie Byers is a retired teacher who is running for a seat in the Kansas state House of Representatives. If elected, she will be the first transgender person to win election in Kansas. NBC News has a profile of her.

The Human Rights Campaign has a new pledge for politicians to take which aims to end violence against transgender people, especially transgender women of color. The pledge itself can be found on their website, and a list of politicians who have already taken the pledge can be found here.

Joe Biden has said that he will enact the Equality Act if he is elected. However, the Supreme Court is set to hear a case, Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, in which Catholic Social Services is asking for the right to deny service on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. Out.com says that a ruling in favor of religious liberty could make enacting the Equality Act difficult.

Recently, we told you that the Texas State Board of Social Work Examiners decided to change their practices, removing requirements that practitioners not discriminate on the basis of gender identity or sexual orientation. That did not last long. Although Governor Greg Abbott wants the changes, the group has reinstated those protections, as they ask for legal opinion on the protections. The legal opinion will be given by the state’s Attorney General, who is likely to say that the group should not have instituted those protections in the first place. This story comes from The Advocate.

The Philadelphia Inquirer has a story about being transgender in Philadelphia, featuring several local transgender people, and WBOC-TV has a story about being transgender in Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia, featuring several local transgender people.

Wynne Nowland

Wynne Nowland is the CEO of Bradley & Parker. She transitioned three years ago, while already in charge of the company located on Long Island. Newsday has a profile of her.

Medical organizations recommend that transgender children be allowed to transition, both socially and medically. But, when is the best time for that medical transition, in order to achieve the best results? That question is the subject of an article in Pediatrics.

Children with gender dysphoria are more likely to have various other mental health issues, including anxiety, depression, self-harm, and suicidal thoughts. This study is summarized in Healio.

A study has found that an increase in media reports about transgender people has lead to an increase in the number of children seeking help with their gender identity. The study was done in Britain, but it may well have implications for transgender health care elsewhere. Pink News has thiss story.

A transgender man is suing the Bay Medical Centre in Shanklin, on the Isle of Wight, for refusing to update his name in their medical records until he spoke to the manager. Even with the name change, he alleges that discrimination has continued. His story appears in The Island Echo.

Transgender activists in Bristol, England, painted a mural in support of transgender people. It says that the current situation is rather grim, but moreover, it mentions the suicide attempts by transgender people as a reason for concern. It points out that the waiting lines to receive service at gender clinics can be deadly. Pink News has this story.

Jay Galante

Access to medical practitioners who deal with transgender people is an issue in many places. A patient in Tallahassee, Florida, had to drive for five hours to get to a specialist. That has changed, thanks to Planned Parenthood. Jay Galante, a senior at Florida State University, tells his story to The Tallahassee Democrat.

About 10% of LGBTQ+ teenagers identify as asexual. The Advocate talks about what this means.

After much speculation, discussion, and commentary, World Rugby has indeed issued its decision to not allow transgender women to compete in leagues with cisgender women. Although local leagues are allowed to make their own rules, this does tend to drive the direction for local leagues. The New York Times has something to say about this.

Caitlyn Jenner has agreed to star in Duke Of The Valley, a sitcom based on the memoir of the late Dick Van Patten. Caitlyn Jenner will play the part of Heather, a “white trash” perfume salesperson who is a transgender woman. On the one hand, the idea of a transgender character who is also described as “white trash” is hardly good (and the fact that the character is “white trash” is transgender is not any better); on the other hand, the person playing that part is Caitlyn Jenner, which makes it at least slightly better. You can read about this in The Wrap.

Candis Cayne

OLM on Revry premiered this week. It is a new channel with stories of lesbian and non-binary women. Among its initial offerings is Crazy Bitches, which features Candis Cayne. You can find out more about it at The Advocate.

HBO is about to unveil a new documentary entitled Transhood. It looks at four transgender children, ages 4 to 15 in the Kansas City area. It will premiere on November 12, and you can read about it on People magazine.

A documentary entitled Born To Be centers on Dr. Jess Ting, a surgeon who performs gender confirmation surgery Indiewire gave it a grade of B+.

Jamie Windust has written their first book, entitled In Their Shoes: Navigating Non-Binary Life. Jamie is also doing interviews for Jameela Jamil’s YouTube channel, as Pink News.

Non-binary singer Sam Smith appeared on Vogue’s YouTube series Beauty Secrets. they talked about wearing makeup, and about how Lady Gaga helped them to come to terms with their gender. Out.com has this story.

RuPaul has a number of projects, including a movie, in the works. Ru is also writing a book and developing TV shows, according to Out.com.

RuPaul will provide one of the voices for an animated film called Hitpig. Hitpig is a bounty hunter who tries to capture an elephant, who has escaped, but instead, Hitpig and the elephant, Pickles, go on an adventure together. Out.com has more.

Kim Petras in her Halloween themed video.

Kim Petras has a new video, Party Til I Die. In the video, she has appearances by several drag queens. Details and a link are at Out.com.

The new film Dating Amber features a gay boy who dates a lesbian in Ireland in the 1990s. The boy needs some advice, so he turns to the local drag queen. You can find a clip at The Advocate.

Women’s Wear Daily opines that, while modeling has begun to embrace more genders, much more needs to happen in this area.

When last we saw the former Human Ken Doll, Rodrigo Alves revealed that she is transgender, and has begun living as a female. Now, she has reappeared with a new name–Jessica Alves. The New York Post has pictures as well as the story.

The company which produces the Lady Boys of Bangkok will get over one million pounds for the U.K. government, as a part of the relief package known as the Culture Recovery Fund. This story comes from Pink News.

Mridul Wadhwa is a women’s rights activist who is trying to become a candidate of the Scottish National Party for election next year. If elected, she would become the first transgender person in any British parliament. You can read about this at Pink News.

Katherine Foy

Katherine Foy is a business analyst who has been working with the Labour Party of Britain. She is now proposed for a seat on the party’s National Executive Committee, the group which basically runs the party. If she joins that committee, she will be, by some estimate, the highest-ranking transgender person in British politics. She admits that it is a low bar. She talked to Pink News about it.

Caroline Nokes, a Conservative member of the British Parliament, has called for a new inquiry into transgender equality. This comes as she admits that progress on efforts to reform the Gender Recognition Act are at a standstill. this story comes from Pink News.

LGBTQ employees of the BBC are unclear whether the network’s new impartiality guidelines will allow them to attend Trans Pride. Pink News has this story.

A cisgender woman who is being held in a British jail is asking a court to house transgender women prisoners in male prisons, after she claims that she was raped by a transgender female prisoner. The court will hold a hearing this week, according to Pink News.

A man has been sentenced to five months in jail for a dreadful beating on a transgender woman in Belfast. He also attacked someone who tried to stop his attack. This story appears in The Belfast Telegraph.

Non-binary queen Allen-Cummings.

Many trans candidates have been profiled in the press but there’s a trend that the news hasn’t covered as much. Drag queens running for office. W Magazine has an article on a drag queen and a non-binary drag queen who have sought public office and been successful.

Caspian Richard is a transgender student in Canada who has been deadnamed by his school, and he is not the only one in the district. He does, however, have a mother who is fighting this. Even The CBC heard about this through his mother’s efforts.

Thompson Reuters Trust reports that transgender people in Mexico have turned to the tech industry for employment, after being unable to find other jobs.

In India, transgender people are able to take a civil service exam, after the application form allows them to identify as members of a third gender. This story comes from Reuters.

In Brazil, Joana Domingos died after being shot seven times. Her death makes 141 transgender people murdered in Brazil this year. Pink News has this story.

Tanwarin Sukkhapisit

Thailand’s first transgender member of parliament lost her seat due to a ruling from a constitutional court. The court ruled that, as a stockholder in a media company, she is not allowed to sit in parliament. She thinks that this is less about her gender identity, and more about her pro-democracy political views, according to Pink News.

LGBTQ Nation has a list of three easy ways for children to unlearn bias based on gender identity and sexual orientation.

Tampax tweeted, “Fact: Not all women have periods. Also a fact: Not all people with periods are women. Let’s celebrate the diversity of all people who bleed.” This brought a reaction that was unfortunately what one might expect, including some praise and some criticism, according to The New York Post.

Kelly Katherine Roser was drummed out of the military 36 years ago when she tested positive for marijuana, a drug she used to help with her gender dysphoria. She finally has had that dishonorable discharge changed to an honorable one. Pink News has this story.

TWITs

We told you about Mieke Hacek, the mother of a transgender child who asked Joe Biden a question at a town hall. The Washington Post reports that, since then, she has been put at the center of a nasty political fight, with much misinformation and some personal attacks, including threats. To all who spread this misinformation, and especially to those who threaten others because of this misinformation, we issue a collective TWIT Award.

For International Pronouns Day, BBC Bitesize, a service of the BBC aimed at school-age children, tweeted a cartoon about pronouns. They had to delete the cartoon, due to backlash from anti-transgender activists. Baroness Nicholson was one of the more vocal opponents of the cartoon, and of the idea behind it, according to Pink News. For failing to show courtesy to people, Baroness Nicholson and other opponents of pronouns get a TWIT.

Basil Zempilas, the Lord Mayor of Perth, said that there are only two genders, and the genders are defined by genitalia. He did apologize, after he got “a very strong talking to” from his wife. However, the comments were made, and cannot be entirely taken back. For obvious reasons, he gets a TWIT Award. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation has this story.

The American Principles Project is sending out one million transphobic text messages to voters in Pennsylvania, in an attempt to sway the election. For expressing hatred of others, the American Principles Project gets a TWIT. You can read about this at them.

A trans elder, M. Sangeetha, gave R. Rajesh a job at Covai Trans Kitchen. This kindness was returned with sexual assault and murder. This certainly deserves a TWIT Award, and much more. The Hindu has this story.

Back in 2013 California state Senator Scott Wilk began an attack on transgender-friendly legislation with, of all things, a line from a David Bowie song. The irony of using a David Bowie song lyric to begin an attack on transgender people was entirely lost on him. Since he’s up for reelection the video has resurfaced. His TWIT-worthy response to the latest anger he has provoked can be found at Pink News.

The LGB Alliance of Ireland sprang into being last week, and like its counterpart in Britain, the only apparent goal of the group is to undermine legislation which supports transgender people. They use the unfounded idea that doctors are encouraging LGB youth to transition genders, when in fact, there is no evidence that this is happening. They claim that transgender people create homophobia in the general public, when the homophobia is already present in some, and in others, comes from the fact that some gay, lesbian, and bisexual people are so cruel to transgender people. For using bad logic to attack transgender people, the members of the LGB Alliance of Ireland get a TWIT. Pink News has this story.

Joe Rogan recently opined on the topic of transgender issues and especially transgender athletes. He started by comparing hardened views on transgender people to “a religion” or “a cult,” but failed to notice that indeed the people who agree with him are more likely to be religious believers than are the doctors whom he doubts. His complaint that you can’t discuss transgender issues is undermined by the fact that medical organizations did indeed discuss transgender issues, and came to the conclusion that what they instinctively believed was wrong. He talks about transgender teenagers as though they are getting gender confirmation surgery on demand at the start of puberty. He goes on to talk of transgender athletes with the same misconceptions and presumptions. For not bothering to learn before forming an opinion, and not being curious enough to check to see if his opinions hold up to fact, Joe Rogan gets a TWIT Award. You can read about this at The Things.

Joe Rogan’s point about how hard it is to have a discussion on transgender issues, The Christian Post reprints an article from Breakpoint, entitled “Transgender: How the unthinkable became unquestionable”. As mentioned above, medical science did indeed question whether their approach was the best way to treat what was then called “gender identity disorder,” and found that it wasn’t. For complaining about how people won’t say that bad logic won an argument, The Christian Post and Breakpoint get a TWIT Award.

TWIT is assembled by Cecilia Barzyk with additional content and editing by Angela Gardner. Care to make a comment on this post? Login here and use the comment area below.

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Category: Transgender Community News

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Every week Cecilia Barzyk diligently scans the internet to assemble as much trans-related information from the weekly news as possible.

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