Tuesday, March 17, 2015

The Mounting Problems With Zoey

Hanna Zoey Tur's  claim to fame before transition was as a journalist and the helicopter pilot who filmed the attack on Reginald Denny during the jump off phase of the 1992 LA Rebellion and the slow speed chase of OJ Simpson's Bronco down a Los Angeles freeway in 1994.

Tur has recently been hired as a reporter for Inside Edition, and ever since has been a living embodiment of a prescient Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. quote:

"Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity."

And I would add to that King quote, "especially when it comes out of the mouth of a newbie transsexual with access to a national media platform and is chasing fame."

Lately Tur's propensity to part those lips and say increasingly problematic stuff about the trans community has me concerned and pissed off at the same time.   When she gets called out on her loud and wrong statements, she resorts to attacking the messenger as she did with Dr Dana Beyer and Rebecca Juro.

Pro Tip: I give as good as I get Boo Boo Kitty, so your white privilege addled 'twoo twansexual' ass would be well advised to have several seats at Staples Center, have a nice tall glass of STHU and not step to me.  And if you are even thinking about it, better hit Google before you do.

You've been warned.   Back to riffing on your nekulturny behavior.

Ms. Tur has been mistakenly called the first transgender television news reporter.

Nope, Eden Lane beat you to that distinction in 2008 when she covered the DNC Convention in Denver for PBS and has had a show called In Touch With Eden Lane on Colorado public television since 2009.  Carol Marra in Brazil (2012) and Michelle Demishevich in Turkey (2013) also beat you to that internationally.

In her loud and wrong reign of conservaerror, Tur has stated that people who don't have genital surgery shouldn't get human rights coverage, the only true transsexuals are those who work in hypemasculine fields and have conservafool political views, she doesn't respect the gender identities and presentations of people she doesn't have anything in common with, and trans kids shouldn't be participating on athletic teams that match their presented gender among other loud, wrong comments.

That's mighty white TS separatist trans of your fresh off the SRS table behind.

In addition to that small sample of your rapidly accumulating transphobic body of work, you also got my attention when you took potshots at two people I and the African-American trans community have much respect and love for in Janet Mock and Laverne Cox.  

They along with Eden Lane opened the doors for you to get your Inside Edition show with their successful appearances on The View, the Melissa Harris-Perry show and other media outlets,, so don't get it twisted.

Janet and Laverne also have intelligently done so while having more class in their pinkie fingers than you have displayed thus far.

And WTF is wrong with you for basically claiming that trans men don't exist.  Bring your loud and wrong behind to any trans conference and you will see the rank stupidity that statement encapsulates.

Trans men don't exist? Really? That's news to Jamison Green, Diego Sanchez, Gunner Scott, Ethan St. Pierre, Yeshua Holiday, Kylar Broadus, Louis Mitchell, Yosenio Lewis and countless other trans men were advancing trans human rights and educating about our issues while your ass was flying that news chopper following OJ's Bronco down the 405 freeway.   

That comment would also be news to trans men like the late Alexander John Goodrum, Marcelle Cook-Daniels, Wilmer Broadnax, and Jim McHarris who were living their trans masculine lives way before you even thought about transitioning.

That would also be news to trans men like Carter Brown, Tiq Milan, Dr Kortney Ryan Ziegler and Lou Weaver who are trailblazing leaders in this community.


It's sad when our outstanding transkids like Jazz are more intelligent, eloquent and credible spokespersons for our community than this Susan Stanton 2.0 that is a trans legend in her own mind.

You have a right to your own opinions and political beliefs Ms. Tur.   Where I and other people draw the line is when you have a media platform to express those beliefs, they are loud and wrong, you refuse to listen to people who have far more experience navigating Trans Life than you, and your comments can be used by our opponents to undermine what little progress we have made trans human rights wise in this country.

As a longtime award winning leader in the African-American trans community whose members are already catching hell because of ignorance of trans issues, your comments make it harder for me and others to educate my people on the issues that impact our community.

With each loud and wrong utterance that passes between your lips, you alienate more and more trans people in this community that once upon a time were willing to help lift you up while making our anti-trans opposition smile.

6 comments:

scarlet_filth said...

Co-motherfucking-signed. Thank you for writing this. I sincerely hope she takes a time out for reflection and actually learning about the trans community. *sigh*

Elle said...

Agreed wholeheartedly!!

Dana Andra said...

Yep, needed to be said.

attovishnu said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Tragic Lyric said...

Can we get rid of Dr. Drew as well. He has often given a platform to individuals like Zoey Tur recently and Adam Carolla back in the 90's on Loveline. He never really challenges these ridiculous unfounded claims either but rather supports them.

Peter Newman said...

I have been fortunate to have been educated on many of the issues pertaining to the transsexuality and transgenderism by a number of respected trans-activists such as Maria Roman (counselor at APAIT, actress, director, advocate), Dr. Susan Stryker (author, filmmaker, associate professor of Gender and Women's Studies, University of Arizona, director of UA's Institute for LGBT Studies), Donna Rose (speaker, writer, author, advocate, the Human Rights Campaign and the GLAAD boards of directors), Bambi Salcedo ( HIV Prevention Services Project Coordinator with LA Childrens Hospital. Program Manager for Transgeneros Unidas with Bienestar Human Services, founder & President of The Trans-Latin@ Coalition), and the late Alexis Rivera (Policy Advocate at Transgender Law Center, Commissioner for the LA County Commission on HIV/AIDS), as well as researchers, scientists and doctors such as Dr. Roger Gorski (chair Anatomy and Cell Biology UCLA , director of the Laboratory of Neuro-Endocrinology of the Brain Research Institute), Dr. Eric Vilain (Chair, Genetics UCLA, director of Center for Gender-Based Biology), Dr. Elise Turen (Associate Director Los Angeles Gender Center). In research studies and interviews with transsexuals it is very common that, when talking about at what age they knew they were 'trans' to hear comments like "I always knew" or "from my earliest memories I knew". The neural-architecture pertaining to gender occurs first in the womb about seven weeks after conception, gender based behavior has been documented as early as three months,and the individual's personal gender awareness develops as consciousness of self becomes apparent, between the ages of two and three. Now, can someone tell me if in any of her many media appearances Zoey Tur has ever discussed at what age she first began to be aware of her female gender identity? Now I have never questioned a trans-persons stated gender status as I know it is not a choice. They are indeed, as Gaga sings, "born that way". However, there are a few people that falsely or mistakenly claim trans status that clearly are not trans. Quite often the reasons for this lie not actual transsexuality or transgenderism but extreme neurosis (narcissism, compulsive transvestitic behavior) often mixed with substance abuse (crack cocaine, crystal meth, alcohol). The issue of substance abuse among this small group is not to be conflated with the issue of substance abuse within the Trans-Community at large. That is a completely different kettle of fish (no pun intended) and has nothing to do with actual transsexuality or transgenderism. If I were to make a judgement as to Zoey Tur, I would have to place her among the, for lack of a better word, faux transsexuals. She certainly exhibits extreme narcissism and seems to be a clinical sociopath. Her divisive statements are factually wrong, blatantly incorrect and purposely misleading. Her nonsensical opinions seem aimed at attracting the maximum amount of attention for herself, which she clearly enjoys, even as she torpedoes the trans-community and the entire LGBT movement. She undermine what all the progress have made in the arena of trans rights in this country and gives fodder to the transphobic, the ignorant, and the lunatic "Christian" right-wing. We must all continually contact the various media outlets on which she appears: Dr. Drew, John Rabe and Off Ramp, NBC's Today, ABC's Nightline, Inside Edition, Rescue 911, Fox News, CourtTV, and CBS and inform them of the reality of Tur's fallacious, malicious, and destructive commentary.