The Week In Trans 9/24/18

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Kyle Andrews

If you recall your drag cinema you’ll remember that Priscilla the Queen of the Desert had the queens that rode in Priscilla stop in a Outback mining town. One of the queens got into trouble with homophobic locals but was rescued by her companions. What if you couldn’t be rescued but actually lived in a tough mining town in Australia. That’s the story of Kyle Andrews a teenage drag queen who lives in a mining town, not in the Outback but nearer to the coast. The majority of the inhabitants are coal miners so Kyle stands out in his long blond wig, and high heels. Read about his life in Clermont, Australia in the Daily Mail.

The Trump Administration has appealed a stay on its ban of transgender people in the military to the Supreme Court. Specifically, the Trump administration is arguing that it does not need to provide information on what advice the President received on the ban, from whom, and when. While the request is specific to the sharing of information, the Supreme Court could rule on the case itself. (Ruling on the case itself would be quite out of character for the Supreme Court, but they do have that right.) The New Civil Rights Movement has more on this.

In one of the four cases against the ban, Judge Jesus Bernal blew a hole in the Justice Department’s arguments that the ban on transgender people in the military was needed to preserve “unit cohesion.” He noted that “loss of unit cohesion” was previously used to deny integrating black soldiers and sailors, and to preserve “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” His comments can be found at Think Progress.

Karl Cruz

Sweetwater High School in the San Diego area elected transgender student Karl Cruz as its homecoming queen, according to KGTV News.

Since 2014, the State Department refused to issue a passport to Dana Zzyym unless Dana is described as “male” or “female.” Dana is intersex, and feels that either designation is a lie. This week, U.S. District Court Judge R. Brooke Jackson ruled that refusing to pick a gender is not a valid reason deny a U.S. citizen a passport. The judge stopped short of forcing the State Department to issue the passport, but did invalidate the only reason that has been given so far for not doing so. The Hartford Courant has the AP’s story on this decision.

New York City Council has resoundingly passed a resolution to allow a gender designation of “X” on birth certificates from the city. Adults who were born in the city can apply to have the designation on their birth certificates without a note from a doctor, and parents can choose the designation for their children. More information can be found at WABC-TV.

In Washington, D.C., the City Council also elected to allow the gender designation “X” on birth certificates. Metro Weekly has this story.

Anunnaki Ray Marquez

The state of Colorado has amended the birth certificate of Anunnaki Ray Marquez to list the sex as “Intersex.” This happy news was covered by Them.

In response to last week’s study showing the alarmingly high rate of suicide among transgender people, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommended acceptance of transgender and gender-diverse children so they “have access to comprehensive, gender-affirming, and developmentally appropriate health care that is provided in a safe and inclusive clinical space.” Sadly, as you will see in the TWITs, some people think that they know medicine better than pediatricians. Buzzfeed has this story. The press release from the American Academy of Pediatrics can be found at The TransAdvocate.

Zelda Menefee is suing the Huntsville, Alabama, city school system for not doing enough to prevent bullying and discrimination against her. Among the incidents described in the lawsuit, she mentions having her wig pulled off, being told to use the boys locker room and restroom, and being enrolled in a phys ed class for boys. The Hill has this story.

The city of San Francisco is looking at plans which would expand its Office of Transgender Initiatives into more of a focus on LGBTQ issues. The Office of Transgender Initiatives has always been interested in issues that affect the LGBT community. Among the tasks for the expanded office is preserving historic areas of interest to the LGBT community. This story comes from the Bay Area Reporter.

Trace Lysette

After appearing in Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again, Cher decided to release an album of ABBA covers. The video for SOS features an all-female cast — and one of those females is trans actress Trace Lysette.  Pink News has this story.

California became the first state to specifically state in law that transgender youths in foster care have a right to counseling, hormone treatment, and surgery. The Republic has this story.

A trans man who gave birth in Britain wants to be identified as “father” or “parent” on his child’s birth certificate. However, the government says that the person who gave birth to the child is to be listed as the “mother.” The child’s birth certificate is being held up as the matter goes to court. The Times of London has this story.

Chloe Allen has become the first transgender person in the British military to serve on the front line. She is profiled in the Guardian.

Liverpool’s mayor, Joe Anderson, called out the group known as “ReSisters” for their anti-transgender acts. He said that what they did was not about “having an open debate, it’s about bullying, it’s about intimidation and it’s about proposing hate against people that are different and that’s something that every single person in this council rejects.” The BBC covered this story. You can also learn more in Dina’s Diner.

For a dozen years, the British LGBT rights group Stonewall has been using the phrase, “Some people are gay. Get over it!” They have made several variations on the theme as well. The latest variants say, “Trans women are women. Get over it!” “Trans men are men. Get over it!” and “Some people are non-binary. Get over it!” These received both positive and negative reactions, as Pink News reports.

Shaniquá TiwiSista mural.

In Darwin, Australia, a new mural appeared on the side of a building. The mural features a picture of Shaniquá TiwiSista. It salutes sistergirls ahead of Darwin Pride. Gay Star News covered this story.

Australia has a legal center specializing in transgender people’s legal matters. It is called Inner City Legal Centre, and is located in Sydney. It is doing well, according to Gay Star News.

Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison tweeted last week, “We do not need “gender whisperers” in our schools.” In response, a group of various transgender advocates has come up with t-shirts and bags with the phrase, “Gender Whisperer.” Gay Star News is our source for this story as well.

Tokyo is getting ready to host the 2020 Summer Olympics. In preparing for that, the city is preparing its first bill that will ban discrimination on account of sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression. This story comes from the Mainichi.

Singapore is getting its first transgender center. It’s being put together by Julie Chua, who leads the transgender group The T Project. It will have services for transgender people as well as a museum. Gay Star News had this story.

Nikki Janelle Enriquez

Juan David Ortiz, an agent for the Border Patrol in Texas, was arrested and charged with killing four women and kidnapping a fifth. One of the women he killed was a transgender woman. She was identified as Nikki Janelle Enriquez. She was 28-years-old. This story was in the Los Angeles Blade.

A federal judge in Wisconsin ruled that the state committed “sex discrimination” when it did not cover gender reassignment surgery in its insurance program for state employees. This came in response to a suit by two University of Wisconsin-Madison employees. the Madison State Journal has been covering this story.

Ken Wilson and Emily Swan report in Medium that there is a group of mothers who aggressively defend their LGBTQ children. They call themselves, “Mama bears,” and they are especially going after churches which reject their LGBTQ children.

TWITs

Last week, two studies came out with the same conclusion: transgender people in the bathroom are not a threat. (Those studies can be found here and here.) Nonetheless, Keep MA Safe, the group behind a ballot campaign to roll back protection for transgender people in the state, came out with a new ad which shows what appears to be a male sex predator in the ladies’ room. In the voiceover, they misrepresent the law as far more permissive than it really is. For using fear of something that does not happen to deny respect for real people, Keep MA Safe gets a TWIT. The Washington Blade has this story.

A former disc jockey in Winnipeg, Canada was fired after he made remarks on the air that equated transgender people with actors who pretend to be different people. The former DJ who goes by the on-air name of David Wheeler claims the station hired him to be a controversial voice and he’s suing to get more than $1.4 in damages. It is interesting to note that David Wheeler is not his real name. He’s actually Christopher Wheeler Johnson who has been pretending to be Dave Wheeler on the air. A TWIT Award goes out to this former DJ by any name. Get the story from Canoe.com.

Two groups, Warriors For Christ and Special Forces of Liberty, have filed a lawsuit in an attempt to prevent Drag Queen Story Hour at Lafayette Public Library. These fools do not seem to understand that drag is a performance, not an identity. The fact that the drag queens will be students from the local university — cisgender members of a fraternity — ought to be an anvil-sized hint, but these folks still miss it. The suit asks for 29 additional actions, including an end to same-sex marriage. For stupidity and audacity, Warriors For Christ and Special Forces of Liberty get TWIT Awards. Metro Weekly carried this story.

Arts Commons, an art venue in Calgary, Alberta, removed a work which used television screens to show the names of transgender victims of violence. The exhibit was taken down because of complaints of “nudity and profanity” which the venue claimed to have received, despite the fact that there was no nudity and no profanity on the screens. For overreacting without looking into the claims, Arts Commons gets a TWIT. You can read more about this at CBC News.

A number of people have used the study which showed a high rate of suicide and suicide attempts among transgender and gender-nonconforming teens as a reason to push for “conversion therapy” for transgender people. Of course, these people, such as Dr. Michelle Cretella, the former head of the American College of Pediatricians (the fake professional group), insist that the study’s finding is alarming. Yet, they fail to recognize that previous studies showed that transgender teens who are accepted in their gender identities have rates of suicide and other mental health problems that are indistinguishable from those rates for cisgender teens. Obviously, the rates for transgender teens who are not accepted in their gender identities must be very high — higher than those found by the study, in order to offset those teens who were part of the study’s group and who are accepted in their gender identities. Everyone who uses this study to recommend not accepting transgender teens’ gender identities gets 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