The Week in Transgenderism 2/13/12

We begin our TWIT today with beauty. The beauty of Andrej Pejic is back in the news and while Andrej is living the transgender dream there are still statements from him that he is just reveling in his beauty and isn’t transgendered. Sure. And we have a bridge in Brooklyn that we can sell you at a good price. Read the story and watch a video in the New Zealand Herald.

And now the beasts. Republican activists (or should that be reactionaries?) are at it again in Maryland. They have brought their vehement opposition to a transgender anti-discrimination bill back to the council meeting in Towson. It’s more of the same lies about men disguised as women lurking in the women’s restrooms to rape people. Read about this hogwash in the Timonium Patch.

On a brighter note, a Maine reproductive health organization has received a $50,000 grant to provide healthcare for GLBT people in Maine. Get the facts in the Knox Village Soup.

Transgender women are still being murdered at an alarming rate in our nation’s capital. The latest victim was stabbed at a bus stop last Thursday. Why are these people being killed? Look for some information in The Washington Blade. The police have a suspect in custody. Get the story at 4 NBC.

In Wales drag queens are running for relief. No, they’re not running to the restroom. They got all dressed up and ran down the main street in Cardiff to promote a much larger run in March called Sainsbury’s Sport Relief Mile. Sainsbury’s is a department store in the U.K. and they raise money with their event to provide for vulnerable people in the U.K. and around the world. Read about the queen’s early race at walesonline.co.uk.

Speaking of queens on the run, the always on-the-go Miss RuPaul Charles has created ratings history. A million viewers tuned in for the premier of Season 4 of RuPaul’s Drag Race on Logo. A million is just peanuts you say? Well for a major network that might be so but the suits at Logo are celebrating. (Do gay network execs wear suits? Maybe they wear jeggings and muscle shirts?) Read about the RuPaul’s big success at bestmoviesevernews.com.

Scotsqueen

Everyone knows that Scotland is the only country where men can wear skirts and get away with it. (OK, there’s some Greek guards that wear dresses and the south seas has sarongs, but still, when you think plaid skirts you think Scotsmen.) But we bet you didn’t know that Glasgow is a hotbed of drag perfomers. Meet Lady Guillotina Munter, Scotland’s answer to Lady Bunny, at scotsman.com.

Another spot you would think unlikely to have a large drag scene is the wilds of central Canada. There’s drag everywhere though so why should it come as a surprise that Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, names that usually bring echoes of lumberjacks, trappers and prospecters, should have a contest called The Search For Saskatoon’s Next Drag Superstar? We should have known the province was drag friendly. The capital is Regina. Read about the Saskatoon drag scene in The Star Phoenix.

Another place that seems remote is Kathmandu. It not only seems remote, it is. It’s in Nepal and it’s mostly associated with mountain climbing. Now come two things you didn’t know about Nepal. They have sitcoms on their television and they now have a new “perfect lady” in Kathmandu — the “new” daughter of one of their famous sitcom actors. It’s like Ray Ramano paid for his transgender daughter’s SRS. The story is a gmanetwork.com.

The latest female celebrity to join the ranks of those who love drag queens is Gloria Estefan. The sexy Cuban singer gave an exclusive interview to Village Voice columnist Michael Musto (who is also a fan of drag) and you can find all the dish on Gloria’s attachment to men in dresses at villagevoice.com.

A male celebrity who seems to do a lot of drag on his late night talk show appeared in drag in a post-Super Bowl special on NBC. He imitated several musical artists supposedly auditioning to be the halftime entertainment and one of the artists was country songstress Taylor Swift. Find out who the talk show host was (no, it’s not Craig Ferguson) and watch a video of his Taylor Swift at tasteofcountry.com.

An op-ed by Charles Blow in Saturday’s New York Times takes on the issue of manufactured masculinity. As much as the feminine ideal has been assembled by our culture in the past 100 years, so has the idea of what it means to be a man. Blow comments on a CNN sports commentator who Tweeted homophobic, and “pink” phobic, remarks about a New England Patriot’s choice of attire and an H&M underwear ad. The commentator’s attitude toward men who wear pink, or otherwise don’t meet his criteria for masculinity, could well extend to men in dresses. Read what Blow has to say in his Times op-ed.

Speaking of pink, the founder of the Pink Essence TG social group, Chloe Prince, was on the Anderson Cooper talk show last week with her ex wife discussing gender reassignment, her family, and her sexuality. The Christian Post ran the story and, amazingly to us, provided the transgender side of the story as well as commentary from someone with a Christian bias. Be sure the read the comments at the end of the article.

Our Meet The FtM article this week is about a guy named Lou Weaver. He’s the President of the board of directors of the Transgender Foundation of America and lives in Houston, Texas. Read all about him in The Venture.

Our Meet The Black Transgender Actress story for the week is about Laverne Cox, who has been acting in and producing films since 2000. She has appeared on Law and Order, in several films, and has three films set for release this year and next. Learn how Laverne went from being a boy in Mobile, Alabama to becoming a Hollywood starlet in her interview with bettyconfidential.com. There’s a video of the interview as well as the print version.

TS porn stars don’t get no respect. It seems that there are divisions and discrimination against TGs in all areas of society, even in the porn industry. Perfectly lovely and ultra feminine transsexual porn actresses have to get their industry awards in private, not on stage during the ceremonies. Read of their plight at Salon.com.

Our TWIT Award this week goes to the Suffolk School Board in Suffolk, Virginia. Reacting to concerns for the safety of a student who started attending high school en femme the Board members are considering a ban on crossdressing rather than an effort to protect the student’s right to express her gender openly. Perhaps really harsh penalties for bullying TG students would be a better idea? Maybe attempting to educate the bullies? No, let’s just make it go away. That kind of thinking gets you a TWIT. The story is in The Virginian-Pilot.

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Category: Transgender Community News