The Week In Transgenderism 11/16/15

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Alicia Perry

An Irish trans woman from Belfast has won a competition to represent Ireland in the Face of the Globe International Beauty Pageant finals in April of 2016. Not only is she the first trans woman to represent Ireland in the pageant but she at 39 is almost twice the age of the other contestants. Find out about Alicia Perry and how she got to the pageant in the Belfast Telegraph.

Chelsea Manning is a polarizing figure who some feel is a traitor to her country and other’s applaud as a hero who risked everything to let Americans know what their country was hiding from them. Either way you look at her actions in giving classified information to WikiLeaks you have to admit that the way she is treated in military prison is cruel and unusual. Read about it in the Yahoo News Digest.

The African-American trans woman who was arrested as a prostitute when she and a friend attempted to check into a West Des Moines, Iowa hotel back in July is suing the hotel with the help of the ACLU. Meagan Taylor was on her way to a funeral and when she tried to check in to the Drury Inn the staff called the police believing that she was a prostitute since she and her friend were “men dressed like women.” What else could they be? Tired travelers possibly? Get the details of what she went through on the KCCI website. (A TWIT Award was already issued back in July.)

The Cleveland Veterans Administration Medical Center will be opening the first VA clinic specifically dedicated to transgender veterans. Learn more on the WKYC website.

Jenner

Last Monday the Glamour Women Of The Years Awards were handed out at Carnegie Hall in New York City. Caitlyn Jenner took advantage of the occasion to accept her award in a glamorous floor length gown that featured a mermaid style bottom. See what she wore and read more about the event in The Daily Mail.

Could the wording of the 1964 Civil Rights Act already be providing protections to trans people? It seems possible that the wording in the Act that was meant to keep employers from firing female employees who didn’t “act feminine enough” could be interpreted to protect trans employees. Read about that and the proposed Equality Act in The Washington Post.

Violet Ri (L)

A trans girl a San Ysidro High School in San Diego County, California just missed being elected homecoming queen on November 6. She was nominated by her cheerleading club and was one of five seniors running for the crown. Find out how Violet Ri felt after she didn’t win the crown on the Breitbart website. (They had to get a dig in about taxpayer money paging for “sex change surgeries” for inmates in an otherwise pretty unbiased report.) There’s more information in the San Diego Gay & Lesbian News.

Did you know that November is Transgender Awareness Month? Well it is and trans people and their allies are attempting to educate the general public about the issue facing trans people. You can find eight of the issues in the Elite Daily.

A Catholic College in suburban Philadelphia is having a Transgender Day of Remembrance event on Nov. 19. It is refreshing to know that Cabrini College allows such an event and that they have an Office of Student Diversity. Learn more on the Church Militant website.

Angelica Ross

We have featured Angelica Ross before in the TWIT column. She’s that trans woman who has created a company to promote trans workers by getting them work as designers and training them in the skills they need to succeed. Thanks to TGF read Claire Crowley for pointing us to an article that covers the progress Ross’s Trans Tech Social Enterprises has made. You can find it on the Policy Link website.

There are two bills coming up for a vote in the Massachusetts House and Senate that would protect trans people from discrimination in public spaces. HB 1577 and SB 735 would be the first protections from discrimination base on gender identity in Massachusetts. Find out what major sports team is supporting the bills passage on the HRC Blog.

Cassandra, or Jessica Rabbit?

Is having such a deep desire to look like a cartoon character that you spend over $200,000 on plastic surgery and gender reassignment a fetish? It could be. That’s what a San Francisco trans woman has done, and she’s not done yet. She wants to have some ribs removed so she can get a true Jessica Rabbit waistline. As Woody Allen said, “The heart wants what it wants.” Cassandra, the living Miss Rabbit, says the only thing she hasn’t had surgery on is her heart. Get the story from the People website.

The backlash against the defeat of the anti-discrimination ordinance in Houston keeps coming. Last weekend Saturday Night Live did a segment of their Weekend Update featuring cast member Pete Davidson explained, in a comedic way, how the fears of Houston citizens were groundless. You can read about it and watch a clip on the Entertainment Weekly website.

Do you need inspiration during Transgender Awareness Month? If so there are plenty of trans icons now who offer words of wisdom that will give you some things to think about. Six quotes from six famous trans women have been assembled for you by Elite Daily.

In Olympia, Washington the manager of the city jail and a trans woman teamed up to work on overhauling the jail’s policy concerning trans people. The trans woman is a former police officer and has a master’s degree in psychology. The new policy, which will be implemented in January, seeks to make positive changes to the treatment of trans prisoners. Learn more in The Olympian.

On Tuesday The congressional LGBT Equality Caucus will announce the creation of a Transgender Equality Task Force which will be chaired by California Rep. Mike Honda. (Rep. Honda has a trans granddaughter.) The task force will work on policies to address the mis-treatment of trans people in many areas. Learn more about the task force in TIME.

Heklina

Queerty is an online site that is proud to say it’s “free of an agenda — except the gay one.” Every year they put out a list of LGBTQ people who have been business leaders. They call it the Queerties Awards and this year their list has a trans woman who is a senior manager at Barclays Bank and Heklina, the drag queen who ran Trannyshack and is now the owner of a San Franciso night spot called Oasis. Learn more on the Queeerty website.

Trans people in the south of India, in the state of Kerala, are getting some help from the local government in the form of a new policy that is meant to safeguard their rights. There are over 25,000 trans people living in that state and they have had to live with ridicule and worse. The Supreme Court in India passed a judgement in 2014 that gave legal recognition to trans people and now the Kerala Department of Social Justice is moving to implement the new policy. Learn more on the Catch News website.

The Tulsa, Oklahoma schools are voluntarily adopting new guidelines issued by the Federal government regarding the civil rights of trans students. Coming from the position that “everyone should have equal access to education” the school district will have single-stall restrooms available that are gender neutral and can be used by any students. Learn more and view a video report on the NewsOnSix website.

Every New Year’s Day the Mummers clubs in the Philadelphia area parade through the city decked out in sequins, and feathers while marching along to string bands playing show tunes. And these are not the city’s drag queens. The Mummers are made up of largely working class men and women who devote the whole year to preparing for the big day. Back before the ‘90s no women were allowed to march so female roles in the parades many skits were performed by men. After women were allowed to join and march the number of men in high heels and falsies decreased. (But there are still a few.) For the past four years a brigade called the Miss Fancy Brigade has brought full fledged professional drag queens back to the show. Read the story about them on the CBS Philly website.

A Kinsey Institute photo of Louise Lawrence.

Sadly we’ve only just learned of an exhibit in New York City that closed just a few days ago. It was titled Bring Your Own Body: Transgender Between Archives and Aesthetics and it was on display at the Cooper Union. It featured the world of 16 trans artists including Justin Vivian Bond, Effy Beth and Zackary Drucker as well as memorabilia and documents from the Kinsey Institute. While the exhibition is closed you an view much of the art and memorabilia on the Hyperallergic website.

TWITs

We often find ourselves giving out TWIT Awards to big right wing media that publishes articles and opinion pieces that scorn and denigrate trans people as some kind of fad, perversion, or otherwise immoral scam. Today we found a column in a small media outlet that shows these conservative, right wing views of trans people are not just the provence of the loudmouths at Breitbart, The Daily Caller, or Fox News. A columnist named Christine Flowers shows her ignorance and lack of empathy in a column she calls Undressing the bounds of gender awareness. She bemoans that “normal” is not normal anymore and that trans kids, under orders from President Obama, will be allowed to enter girl’s locker rooms and restrooms. She pulls out the right wing argument that liberals and trans people are all selfish and want to impose their “normal” on everyone else. No Ms. Flowers, what we’d like to do is educate everyone that the strange and scary trans people have been around for centuries and they are not some “big plate of crazy.” Her words. You can find TWIT Award winner Christine Flowers’ ignorant column in The Delaware County Times. She has her email address displayed at the bottom. Go ahead and educate her.

Representative Brad Hulsey, R-Kingsport, TN has announced to the media that he is introducing a bill to prevent boys from using the girl’s restroom, and vice versa. This defender of the sanctity of the stalls wants to require that all student use the restrooms and locker rooms that match the gender recorded on their birth certificates. Despite the fact that there hasn’t been any problem with trans students using the restrooms in his district Hulsey plans to introduce the bill in January. A TWIT Award to Rep. Hulsey. Read the story in the Knoxville News Sentinel.

Meanwhile the Restroom Wars have opened another front in Oregon. Most people think of Oregon as a tolerant progressive place. It does contain a few nut bars, however. One of them is Micky Garus, a Dallas, Oregon city councilor who had a conservative gut reaction to the story of an Illinois trans teen who was forbidden to use the girls’ locker room. He said he would issue “an ass whooping” to the trans girl if she tried that kind of stunt in a school attended by his kids. We will issue a TWIT Award to Garus and advice him to lighten up. It’s not even an issue in his town but he has to open his mouth and spew some violent hate? Read about it on the Oregon Live website.

A trans man in the Philadelphia, Pa. region was happy when he got out of high school and was hired as a bagger at a local supermarket chain. When he was hired the store had a unisex uniform policy for its workers. Button-up collared shirts and and slacks were worn by male and female employees. But the dress code changed and while male employees wore the same uniform as before female employees were told to wear a low cut t-shirt that exposed their cleavage. The trans man was pressured by the store management to “act normal” and wear the female specific uniform. He is currently suing the store. A TWIT Award to the Huntingdon Valley Giant store management. Get the details in Philadelphia Magazine.

We’ve mentioned that Caitlyn Jenner is on the road giving talks about trans issues and her transition. Last Thursday she spoke at a Chicago House fundraiser luncheon to raise money for HIV/AIDS services. After speaking to an attentive audience and answering questions she was confronted outside by protestors, angry possibly that they were not a lucky in life as Jenner, who said she was “an insult to trans people” and she had “no right to represent” them. While Jenner is not your typical trans woman, being a wealthy former Olympian and reality show star, her transition and her trans-ness are no less real than that of any other trans person. A TWIT Award to the protestors whose outrage just seems to be based on jealousy. See a video of the encounter and read more about it on the People website.

Tags: Angelica Ross, Caitlyn Jenner, Cassandra, Chelsea Manning, featured, Heklina, Mummers, news, TWIT, Violet Ri

Category: Transgender Community News