The Week In Transgenderism 2/9/15

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Jenner

This past week the dam broke; the dam that was keeping speculation about Bruce Jenner’s gender identity from flowing out of the tabloid press and TMZ and into the mainstream media. For months those media outlets have been featuring pictures of Jenner and speculating that Jenner was becoming a woman. We avoided any of those stories here in TWIT because they were sensationalist. Now we bring you a thoughtful and well researched article about Jenner’s possible transition from The New York Times.

The “Jenner is Transitioning” stories may already have more people thinking about trans issues. We found one columnist who used it as the starting point for a discussion of what you should and should not say to a trans person. Being inside the community, as we are, it’s good to learn what it was like for a cisgender male to learn about trans issues and become an ally. Steven Petrow’s column is in the Washington Post.

Jenner was involved in a traffic accident over the weekend in which one person died. Jenner was not hurt. Details can be found in USA Today.

Cherry Lemonade

Showbiz is a harsh mistress. The Portland, Maine drag artiste Cherry Lemonade was letting out the news that she might be one of the performers to make it to the new season of American Idol. Sadly we must report that she got eliminated in the Hollywood Week episode that aired last Thursday. Read about her disappointment in the Portland Press Herald.

Business paying attention to trans people is another example of the increasing awareness and acceptance we are getting. Just a few years back there was no mention of transgender in business news. Today you can find advice on how to handle a colleague coming out as trans. The article is in the Harvard Business Review.

Rodgiguez

How widespread is the trans phenomena? It, like rapper Pitbull, is world wide. Trans people can be found in every country on the planet. I far too many they have to stay hidden or be horribly treated by the state. Fortunately in the Canary Islands there is a more tolerant attitude and one 16-year-old trans girl is running for carnival queen. Meet Lola Rodriguez and learn her story in Newsweek.

We turn now to Australia where a 17-year-old trans boy is being allowed to receive gender treatment without his parents consent. In Australia you must be 18 to start hormones and other treatment without out parental consent. This boy’s parents, who live in another country, objected to his beginning transition but a judge has ruled it can go ahead. Get the details in Pink News.

Root

The BBC has started production on their trans themed sitcom Boy Meets Girl. The show follows the developing relationship between a younger man and an older trans woman. Unlike some other television shows we could mention (looking at you Transparent) the trans woman is played by an actual trans woman, comedian and actor Rebecca Root. Read all about it in The Guardian.

Trans students and faculty at the University of Colorado take note: the school will soon begin covering the cost of transition surgery. They have a new insurance plan taking effect on July 1 and it includes coverage for transgender treatment. Get more information in the CBS4 website.

Tur

The trans woman who, pre-transition, piloted the helicopter that followed O.J. Simpson on his infamous slow car chase back in 1994 has become America’s “first transgender television reporter.” (On a national show that is. We have heard and reported on some local trans TV hosts.) Zoey Tur has been hired as a part-time special correspondent by Inside Edition. Her beat is reportedly not just LGBT stories. Learn more at the TVGuide website.

Turkey is a Muslim country but is ruled secularly. In other words Sharia Law is not used as a part of Turkey’s penal code. Recently a Turkish trans woman won a legal battle with a Turkish bathhouse. She and a friend were denied entry to the bathhouse and the owner reportedly said to her “We do not let trannies here.” The bathhouse has been fined $1212 for violating Article 122 of the Turkish Penal Code. Learn more in GayStarNews.

A ladyboy

We mentioned last month that the new constitution just introduced in Thailand bans discrimination due to gender identity and that trans people would be officially recognized as members of a “third gender.” It turns out that cultural misunderstanding lead to bad reporting and it’s not quite that simple. Trans people are covered but for all the details read this article in The Daily Beast.

Creating Change, the 27th National Conference on LGBT Equality took place in Denver last week. The focus on this year’s conference was the disproportionate violence against trans women of color. Four trans women have been murdered in less than a month. While some of the violence was domestic in nature too much violence falls under the heading of a hate crime. Learn more about the conference and the spate of trans women dying by violence in the International Business Times.

Drag brunch

Are you visiting, or living in San Francisco, and looking for a good Sunday brunch. A Bloody Mary or a couple of Mimosas will get your Sunday afternoon off to a good start. And there’s a drag show while you dine. Good food, drinks and drag. What more could you want? Get a review and photos of the food from brunch destination Balançoire in the San Francisco Mission district in Mission Local.

Cookie Dough as Sophia (Center)

Less happy news comes to us from San Francisco. Local drag star Cookie Dough who performed in in a drag version of The Golden Girls as the character Sophia was in Mexico to perform in a production of that show when she fell ill and was not properly treated by the local hospital. She was flown back to California and was diagnosed with meningitis which she subsequently succumbed to. Her obituary tells the story of a dedicated performer who also happened to be a really nice person. Read it in the Edge.

Pearle Gattes

Speaking of drag queens: There’s a belief that being a drag queen is just a gay thing. Gay men dress up to perform and that’s all there is to it. Well at TGF we feel that just being a gay male is not motivation enough for dressing up regularly. We have known plenty of butch gay men who would never dress up for day to day life, and we have known several drag performers who found themselves more comfortable in their femme persona than in their male identity. Here is an example of a 19-year-old student who sees himself as a drag queen named Pearle Gattes but his story of being more comfortable as a woman sounds pretty familiar. Read it in the Daily Mail.

But wait! There’s more drag news. You may remember that we featured a couple of TWIT items about a talent search for an HBO show pilot called Mamma Dallas. They were looking for a professional drag artiste to portray a queen named Liberty who is “a drag queen with an ebullient, chatty, upbeat personality” but has a criminal boyfriend and an older drag roommate who is strung out. In order to avoid a bad fate she reinvents her femme persona as a more conservative lady and gets a job as a nanny for some rich folks. Well apparently the search among the drag community didn’t go that well and they ended up hiring a professional actor for the role. Find out who they chose and more about the show in The Dallas Morning News.

The Netherlands is always a bit ahead of the rest of Europe. For example they have a place called the VU Medical Centre located in Amsterdam where children over the age of 12 can get puberty blocking treatments that make gender transition much easier by stopping the development of secondary sex characteristics. The Centre has treated over 300 teens. Read more on the West website.

Henley

We have mentioned a film called Boy Meets Girl (not the BBC television show mentioned about) that cast a young trans woman in the role of a young trans woman. In the old days actresses were discovered in Hollywood soda fountains. Michelle Hendley was discovered on YouTube. The film has been finished and this past weekend it opened in New York and other select areas. Columnist Michael Musto interviewed Hendley in his column in Out.

Could you imagine a female United States Senator announcing to the country that her husband of 16 years was trans? Probably a career ending announcement in the States. In Australia it took some adjustment for Senator Janet Rice but she and her partner, Noble Prize winner Penny Whetton managed the transition from a heterosexual marriage to a same-sex marriage. In fact Senator Rice has become an advocate of same-sex marriage after learning by experience that marriage is marriage no matter the genders involved. Read all about it on the SBS website.

TWITs

Miami-Dade County, Florida recently passed an anti-discrimination ordinance that protects on the basis of gender identity. The passage of the ordinance prompted a state representative to get a bill introduced in the state legislature that would invalidate local ordinances that protected trans people’s right to use the bathroom they wish to use. Of course our TWIT Award winner, State Rep. Frank Artiles, is not saying that trans people are dangerous and need to be kept out of the lady’s room. No, no. He’s saying that criminal rapists will use the law as an excuse to go into women’s locker rooms and restrooms to rape people. His logic is so flawed we can say no more. Read the story in the Miami Herald.

Here’s the story, of a man named Brady… At least his name was Brady when he starred as the dad on The Brady Bunch. These days Barry Williams is starring in a musical review in Branson, Missouri and in a recent appearance on HuffPost Live he dissed Bruce Jenner in a way that wins him a TWIT Award. He’ll have to pay the postage for shipping it to Missouri. Find out how he put his foot in his mouth on The Huffington Post.

A New York business called byteLair has been accused of running “transgender sex parties” in its leased office space. Say no more. TWIT Award to byteLair. That is if they have indeed been putting up sheets to partition their office loft into smaller spaces and advertising it on the Internet as a place to party and have sex with transgender individuals — and groups. The owner of byteLair, who happens to be trans, says she is running a transgender support group out of the office. Her landlord, the ironically named Hole in One Associates, maintains that it’s an illegal sex club. If they’re wrong then we will give them a TWIT Award. Read and decide who gets the TWIT in the Jewish Business Journal.

Tags: Brady Bunch, Bruce Jenner, byteLair, Cookie Dough, crossdressing, featured, Mamma Dallas, news, Thailand, third gender, Transgender, TWIT, VU Medical Centre

Category: Transgender Community News