The Week In Trans 9/17/18

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The overarching news story of the past week was Hurricane Florence. Rebecca Dunn, chairperson of the Carolina Transgender Society said, “Larger cities might be proactive, but the rural areas aren’t, let’s just say, kind to us and the reality is nobody knows what to expect because just about nobody has lived through a storm like this before.” The TransAdvocate reports that there is a fund known as the Trans Disaster Relief Fund. It was set up last year, in response to Hurricane Harvey. The Trans Disaster Relief Fund can be found at tdrfund.us.

Emme

GLSEN and MAP(Movement Advancement Project) have embarked on a “back to school” campaign aimed at telling the stories of young transgender people and highlighting the need for trans youth to have the same access to school facilities as their cisgender peers. To that end they have created infographics and a helpful toolkit that give people the facts they need to know about issues young trans students deal with. Part of the campaign is a PSA titled Hallway starring a young trans woman named Emme. Learn more about the campaign from Teen Vogue.

The State Department rewrote its page about changing the gender marker on U.S. passports. Rather than “Gender Designation Change,” they now call it a “Sex Designation Change.” The word “gender” was replaced with the word “sex” throughout the page, to the point where the URL was changed. However, Mara Keisling of the National Center for Transgender Equality says, “Transgender people can and absolutely should continue to update and renew their passports.” The State Department has removed helpful links to the American Medical Association and the World Professional Association of Transgender Health. Although the wording on the form for a doctor to fill out has changed, the process seems to be the same. This story was covered by Rewire.news. The Advocate quotes State Department spokesman Virgil Carstens as saying, “We apologize for inadvertently including some language which may be considered offensive and are updating the website to remove it.”

Gigi Gorgeous walking in the show.

Designer Marco Marco put on an all-transgender fashion show as part of New York Fashion Week. 34 transgender models took part in the show, including Gigi Gorgeous and actress Trace Lysette. There are plenty of pictures in LGBTQ Nation.

Londonn Moore was shot to death in Charlotte County, Florida. This crime occurred near the Gulf Coast of Florida. She is the twentieth transgender person murdered in the U.S. this year. Three trans women were murdered in the Jacksonville area this year, and one in Orlando. Pink News has more.

We have known for some time that transgender people have a significantly higher rate of suicide attempts than cisgender people. A new study in the journal Pediatrics reports that trans male teens are especially likely to attempt suicide, with suicide attempts by non-binary teens also rating especially high. You can read more in The Advocate.

The ballot in Massachusetts will have a proposal to repeal or keep a law protecting transgender people from discrimination. Freedom For All Massachusetts, the group fighting to protect transgender people, has raised $1.8 million this year and have spent $1 million. The anti-transgender group, Keep Massachusetts Safe, has raised $106,300 this year, and spent $80,000. Mass Live has this story.

Tenia Williams

A trans woman in Missouri met a man through a dating app. She was upfront about being transgender. The man was cool with that and asked if they could hangout. The two met and Tenia Williams invited him to come to her apartment. There they  had sexual relations twice. Her new lover got out of bed a couple of times to either “use the bathroom” or smoke. After the second trip to the “bathroom” he rushed back into the bedroom and began to choke her and demand where she kept her money. The story has a happy ending and you can get the details from the Springfield News-Leader.

We have all heard the nonsense about how allowing transgender people to use the restroom will create a huge increase in sex crimes in restrooms. Two new studies refute that claim. A study based in Massachusetts found that municipalities with laws allowing transgender people to use the restroom of the gender with which they identified had no increase in restroom crime when compared with municipalities that did not have such laws. That study was published in Sexuality Research and Social Policy, and a story about it appeared in the Boston Globe. Meanwhile, Dr. Brian Barnett, a forensic psychiatrist from Cleveland, has authored a new study in which he found that there has been only one instance of a transgender person committing a sex-related crime in a restroom, one instance of a cisgender person claiming that he was legally entitled to use the ladies’ locker room, and 13 cases where a cisgender man dressed as a woman in order to perpetrate a crime in a restroom or changing room. That is the entire list. By comparison, they found over ten times as many instances of cisgender men who committed sex crimes in restrooms or changing rooms without either pretending to be transgender or claiming that laws allowed them to be there. The results were published in the Journal or the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, and he wrote up the findings for the Huffington Post.

Student Zaini.

A school in Pakistan has taken a step toward assisting transgender people in that country to get an education and obtain employment. The Gender Guardian is Pakistan’s first all-trans school. It opened on April 15 with 40 students and graduated 17 on September 9. Learn more about the school from the Samaa website.

Josephine Zhao has dropped out of the election for San Francisco school board, following the revelation of comments on a Chinese-language website. She described two of her opponents as, “two transgender candidates. . .fighting for the title of ‘first transgender commissioner'” and wrote that there were, “also three homosexuals. Their highest priority for education would be to spread ideologies.” This story comes from the San Francisco Chronicle.

Karen White

In England, a prisoner named Karen White has admitted to sexually assaulting four women while in prison. This has raised calls for transgender women to be housed in prisons with men. The prison service admits to having made a mistake with Karen White, saying that her history of sexual assaults against women was not taken into account when she was assigned to a prison for women. The Guardian has this story.

In response to anti-transgender stickers, new stickers have appeared in Britain, saying, “Uppity trans women throw the first brick.” While the reference to Marsha P. Johnson beginning the Stonewall Riot is readily apparent, some feminists have said that the slogan seems “violent.” This story comes from Gay Star News.

Hannah Mouncey has decided to withdraw from the AFLW draft. The transgender Australian footballer presented evidence that she met the league’s maximum testosterone level for the last two years, but the fight against the league has taken a huge toll on her. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation has this story.

Two nasty incidents have occurred on subway lines. In Ottawa, a teen beat a transgender woman on the head. In the Philippines, a guard pulled a transgender woman out of the courtesy line for women, saying that other passengers had complained about her being in the line. Both incidents were caught on video. You can see the incident in Ottawa at City In 3, and the incident from the Philippines can be found on Pink News.

Joan Jett Blakk

Do you recall the presidential campaign of drag queen Joan Jett Blakk? It happened in 1992 and Ms. Blakk ran with the slogan “Lick Bush in ’92! While the campaign was conducted with drag queen flair and humor she was serious. Blakk’s primary campaign goal was to direct media attention to Chicago’s LGBTQ community and combat homophobia. Now a play has been written about her run for the presidency. It’s titled Ms. Blakk for President and it stars Tarell Alvin McCraney as Blakk. The show debuts on May 23, 2019 and opens June 3 at Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago. Learn more from NewNowNext.

LGBTQ Nation has excerpts from Bob Woodward’s book Fear concerning President Trump and the ban on transgender people in the military. President Trump referred to gender confirmation surgery as “getting clipped,” and accepted the ridiculous figure of $250,000 per operation. His staff was prepared to talk to him about the potential consequences of various actions, but before he got to the Oval Office, President Trump tweeted his ban.

The longest running transgender conference in the world returns to Cape Cod this fall. Fantasia Fair 44 happens October 14-21 in Provincetown. For more information on the Fair and its history visit the FanFair website.

Felix Sheperd

A 20-year-old trans man is a hit on The X-Factor. Felix Shepherd sang All I Want, and got a standing ovation. The Guardian gave us this story.

The Daily Mirror ran a profile of “Britain’s First Gender-Fluid Family.” Well, Dad Louise and Mum Charlie are both undergoing gender transition. They are raising their child, Star Cloud, without a gender.

TWITs

NLGJA: The Association of LGBTQ Journalists had to issue an apology after the emcee of its annual conference, Marshall McPeek, began the ceremony with the line, “Ladies and gentlemen, things and its.” While Mr. McPeek has since apologized for his remarks, they made it hard for many in the audience to remain. For a welcome that was far from welcoming, Marshall McPeek gets a TWIT Award. NBC News has this story.

In the non-TWIT section we mentioned Felix Shepherd on The X-Factor. Before he got a chance to show off his singing talent, he was interviewed by the panel of judges. Robbie Williams pressed him to reveal his birth name. For being tone deaf to the horrors of deadnaming, Robbie Williams gets a TWIT Award. This story comes to us from The Advocate.

A city councilman in Lafayette, Louisiana has introduced a resolution in council that would “denounce” Drag Queen Story Time at the public library. The resolution text is as follows: “The Lafayette City-Parish Council maintains that the Lafayette Public Library’s Drag Queen Story Time event for children, ages 3-6, is not an age appropriate educational program. As a result, the Lafayette City-Parish Council hereby declares that it does not support the Lafayette Public Library’s approval of the program entitled ‘Drag Queen Story Time’ as a Lafayette Public Library programmed event.” While the city council can’t do much about the event other than pass their resolution they could cause trouble for the library in the future since council appoints the members of the Library Board. The Lafayette government gets a TWIT Award for interfering with the library’s choice of programming. Read more in the Daily Advertiser.

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