Diamond Stylz-I Am Diamond Stylz

You've seen me post many of Diamond's videos on my blog about various subjects because my Houston homegirl has the same gravitas in the video blogging world as I do on the blogging side of things.

Now I get to post this one in which she tells you a little about herself and her video blog.

BTMI/BTWI Wants You!

I've been in an advisory role for BTMI/BTWI since the convention in Dallas last March and love the direction it's trying to go as an organization.  But let me let them tell you what's happening with them.

***

Black Transmen, Inc. has really made a great impact in the global transgender community over the past few years. Emerging as the leading first national non-profit organization for Black Transmen, BTMI continues forging onward with the support of Black Transwomen in leadership advocacy, education and performing outreach in the community about challenges facing the transgender community as well as building bridges with allies.

Espoused sister group Black Transwomen, Inc has been visible within the community this year with the help of trailblazing women, Minister Carmarion Anderson, Ms Monica Roberts, Ms Diamond Stylz and Ms Nekidra Brown. At this time, Black Transmen, Inc. is delighted to announce the formation of the first board of directors for Black Transwomen, Inc. this fall.

Black Transmen, Inc. is thrilled to announce:
2013-14 BTMI State Chapters and Leader/Board Members

Maryland/D.C - Mr. Vann Millhouse – BTMI Board
http://www.facebook.com/btmimd

Michigan - Mr. Mykell Price – BTMI Board
http://www.facebook.com/btmimichigan

Virginia - Mr. Charley Burton – BTMI Board
http://www.facebook.com/btmiva

Illinois - Mr Melvin Whitehead - President
http://www.facebook.com/btmiil

Pennsylvania - Mr. Mekhi Johnson - President
http://www.facebook.com/btmipa

Washington - Mr. Qayden Smith - President
http://www.facebook.com/btmiwa

Georgia - Mr. Kendall Brown - President
http://www.facebook.com/btmiga

Texas - Mr. Carter Brown – Dallas - President
Mr. Tye West – Houston - President
Mr. Jabriel Williamson – Fort Worth - President
http://www.facebook.com/btmitx

State Chapters Coming Soon: Louisiana, California & Connecticut

Black Transmen, Inc. is uplifted by the men and women who take a stand for equality through leadership commitment, serving as advocates in the trans community.

Are you eager to have a hand in creating increased positive visibility for the trans community nationwide? BTMI state chapters are currently accepting inquires from transmen and transwomen who desire to commit and serve in one of the volunteer leadership positions available. All skill sets are needed to fulfill a variety of management leadership roles: president, vice-president, secretary or treasure. Other non-management leadership opportunities are available within our outreach programs including our trans speakers bureau. The Black Transmen, Inc leadership program minimum commitment timeframe is one year; invitations are forthcoming.

The next BTMI/BTWI Leadership invitational will be issued in August and will take place online. Interested candidates should contact BTMI/BTWI at http://outreach.blacktransmen.org/ or http://outreach.blacktranswomen.org/.

Colorism Needs To Cease And Desist In The Black Trans Community

Just as race and class are issues the Black trans community will have to grapple with as we close ranks to become part of the greater community, so is the malignant cousin of race in colorism (or hueism).

African-Americans come in 23 identified skin tone shades from light, bright and damned near white vanilla creme to deepest darkest ebony.  

When we come out of the birth canal we have no control over what combination of characteristics we are going to get from our parents that are the building blocks of us. 

But you can bet that if you're on the lighter, middle or darker end of that 23 color skin tone palette the ways you experience being Black in America are undeniably going to be different based on that and what part of the country you grew up in.

If you came to the States from different parts of the African Diaspora like the Caribbean, the African continent or different North, Central and South American nations, that throws another variable into the mix.

Because we are a subset of the greater African-American community, the ills of colorism and hueism are also embedded in and contaminate our ranks. 

Just as the 'Are you Black' question comes up repeatedly for the people on the light, bright and damned near white vanilla creme end of the scale,  the reality is far different for the darker skinned Black trans folks among us because they get far more negativity unleashed upon them.  

The bottom line is that we are all Black and we are ALL hated for it, no matter whether we are light, bright and damned near white vanilla creme or deepest darkest ebony.

We have far more serious issues to tackle in terms of our crushing unemployment/underemployment, off the charts anti-trans violence aimed at our Black transwomen, lack of media visibility, a fundamental misunderstanding of what trans is in the cis and SGL African-American communities and a six decade old trans narrative in the parent culture that is overwhelmingly stacked toward telling the stories of our white trans counterparts.  

We don't need the distraction of who has 'good vs kinky hair', 'light skin vs dark skin' colorism battles taking root in our Black trans ranks and diverting our attention from the work that must be done to make trans life better for the kids behind us and ourselves. 

It is going to take all of our collective talents to help us trans African-Americans lift ourselves up as we close ranks and become part of the greater society.  We don't have much room for error in that regard and we cannot afford to have in chocolate trans world colorism dividing us and sowing seeds of trouble in our African descended trans ranks. 

All of us are beautiful and handsome no matter what our skin tone, body shapes or the way we choose to wear our hair.  We are all proud trans African-Americans, and we experience and express our cultural heritage in different ways.

Let's focus on the community building in our trans ranks that needs to expeditiously happen, the education in our African-American community that must be done, and the bigger civil rights prizes we need to fight to achieve together whether we are light skinned or dark skinned or have good, curly, natural, braided or kinky hair.

Is It Something I Said?-More Musing About B.Scott

Been an interesting 48 hours since I wrote the B.Scott post that included the tweet I made hours after Scott's 'I'm trans' announcement

The reason I wrote the post in the first place is because I'm quite aware of the fact as a longtime Twitter user you cannot covey the nuances of a constantly evolving subject like transness in a 140 character tweet and I felt the need to further clarify where my head was at when I typed it. 

I'm not retracting or deleting the tweet because it's exactly what I was thinking at the time.  I also wrote almost eight years ago on these electronic pages:

There are times that what I write on an issue is going to be in lock step with your worldview and other times it's going to piss you off.  But the goal in either case is I want people doing hard, solid thinking and talking about the subject.

And boy have I gotten what I wanted to happen in this case and then some.  It triggered this interview one from Janet Mock.  Some folks are annoyed to pissed with moi because I did say it.  Others are congratulating me for having the guts to say what they were thinking as well in terms of asking the valid question that's percolating in many trans people's minds about the timing and sincerity of his 'I'm transgender' declaration.' 

I've gotten comments on my Facebook page and e-mails pro and con about it (mostly pro).   But for those of you criticizing me over the post that I included the Tweet in (and really didn't have to when I composed it), you also keep missing the money paragraph in which I said this. 

I'm quite aware of and know evolution and shifting along the gender line segment happens with people as they gain self-awareness and knowledge about where they fall under the trans umbrella.  I'm also quite aware of the fact that sometimes it takes years to get comfortable with the spot you're in under the trans umbrella.  But it's the timing of the 'I'm transgender' declaration that has my 'things that make you go hmm' antennae up.

So hello, I'm not 'erasing genderqueer identities', 'doing gender policing', 'hatin' on B. Scott' or some of the other specious charges that have been leveled in my direction.  

The post was not an attack on B Scott as I presumed I made crystal clear on August 7 or is debating whether he belongs under the trans umbrella or not.  I believe B.Scott does on the drag-genderqueer end of the umbrella.

I am amenable to the idea of having a discussion with B. Scott in the near future about his 'I'm transgender' declaration and exactly where he sees himself. 

I also want to make it clear to him why there are transpeople who have issues with that August 7 declaration 

Many of us on the end of the trans umbrella and gender line segment who live our lives as African descended transfeminine women have been in some cases for decades out there taking the slings and arrows of being trans as we live and fight for recognition of our humanity and human rights. 

Some of the people we've have to battle in that struggle for recognition of our humanity are sadly same gender loving people in our community.  Some of those SGL haters have been self identified effeminate gay men who bristle or get offended if you call them 'Miss', conflate them with transsexuals or ask them when they are going to have SRS. 

There's a sentiment fueling this 'yeah, right' reaction that's encapsulated by something that activist Nadia Belinda Roberts wrote (no relation) in a Facebook discussion on the issue.
"Everybody wants to be Trans, but they don't want to BE Trans!"  

In other words, what Nadia is saying is that some trans women are of the opinion that some of the peeps under the trans umbrella want the benefits and perks of being able to perform femininity under the protection of it but don't want the other negative baggage that comes with taking on the trans feminine label. 

And when it comes to Black trans women, that baggage includes the horrific levels of anti-trans violence and 'unwoman' negativity we deal with inside and outside the Black community.    

That's a discussion for another day.   Why Scott is getting some skeptical reaction is driven by that sentiment and the fact that before August 7, 2013 Scott lived his life as a self-declared androgynous gay man.  If B. Scott had made the "I'm transgender" announcement before the BET incident and now subsequent multimillion dollar lawsuit, I submit there would be less controversy in Trans World about it and more 'welcome to Team Trans' sentiment about it instead of the 'yeah, right' sentiment prevalent in sections of it.     

Now I can't or don't have the ability to read B. Scott's mind, and can only go by what he has stated in Janet's interview or future ones as to whether his epiphany concerning his gender journey is valid and led him to make the declaration at this time.

But only future efforts to reach out to those of us on the transsexual-trans feminine end of the umbrella and the passage of time will reveal the next chapter in this unfolding B. Scott gender saga 
 

Trans Assimilation

TransGriot readers, you have got to see this video of one of my trans brothers basically tellin' it like it T-I-S is about his masculine reality. 

2014 BTMI/BTWI Conference Dates

We knew when the 2013 edition of this conference came to a close that the location of the 2014 BTMI/BTWI Conference would be in Dallas and it would be held sometime in the spring.

But what we didn't know was which DFW area hotel would earn BTMI/BTWI's 2014 convention business much less the date for next year's event.

Have been advised that the dates for the third annual BTMI/BTWI conference that I had the pleasure of keynoting last year have been determined.

Start making your plans to "Become The Change You Want To See In The World" by heading to the Dallas-Ft Worth area for the third annual BTMI/BTWI conference from April 30-May 4, 2014.

Hmm, that's around my birthday.   As soon as I get the hotel and other details as to when the convention site goes live I'll pass on that information as soon as I receive it.

We had a wonderful time at the 2013 event and BTMI/BTWI promises to be even bigger and better

TransGriot Update:  Been confirmed that the hotel will be the same one as well, the Doubletree Campbell Center. 

I Repeat: Black Trans Issues Are Black Community Issues

'We are one, our cause is one, and we must help each other; if we are to succeed.'--Frederick Douglass, 1847
I made that point in a 2008 blog post and seven years later, ain't nothing changed except for the fact I have more compelling data to back it up. 

I also have a growing list of legacy organizations in our community such as the NAACP realizing not only that Black trans community issues are Black community issues, they are vocalizing it more often. 

We Black trans people are part of the kente cloth fabric of the community and deserve our seat at the family table.  That point needs to be made even more clearer in the wake of the unjust Zimmerman verdict. 

We're dealing with 26% unemployment and underemployment, near genocidal rates of anti-trans violence aimed at us, zero Black trans people elected to political office since 1992, and difficulties in getting our identification documents to match up with the people we are now due to lack of consistent policies on making those changes accessible and affordable, and it must end now.

That's before we even begin to talk about the issues we have in common with our cis African-American brothers and sisters like stop and frisk policies and police brutality that disproportionately affect us, voter suppression and dealing with a society that hates our Black bodies just as much as they hate yours.   

We must help each other as Frederick Douglass stated if we are to succeed.   That also means you must respect and treat the trans community as equal partners in this struggle and not some unwanted relative you reluctantly speak to

The bottom line is if we are beginning the process of closing Black community ranks in order to build a more cohesive community to better execute the legal and sociopolitical struggle we're about to embark on, transpeople not only must be part of the conversation, but foot soldiers and leaders in it.

Black trans community issues are Black community issues, and now more than ever, that message needs to be burned into the brain of every African-American.

We don't have time for the petty BS when whiteness and white supremacy is still working on their now four century old effort of keeping all African descended people demonized and marginalized in American society for their benefit.

Black Trans History: Wilmer 'Little Axe' M. Broadnax

Another proud moment of presenting more of your African-American trans history to you TransGriot readers.  This time I get to focus on one of my fellow Houstonians in gospel singer Wilmer M. 'Little Axe' Broadnax. 

The bespectacled, diminutive Broadnax was born in Houston on December 28, 1916 and performed in gospel quartets in the 40's, 50's and 60's. 



He and his brother William 'Big Axe' Broadnax performed with the St. Paul Gospel Singers in Houston before moving to Los Angeles to perform with the Southern Gospel Singers in 1939-1940.

The Southern Gospel singers all had day jobs that made it hard for Little Axe to get touring gigs, so Wilmer Broadnax formed his own group called the Golden Echoes.

The Golden Echoes became one of the top touring gospel quartet groups of the 40's, but William eventually left for Atlanta to join the Five Trumpets and Wilmer staying as the lead singer of the Golden Echoes.

In 1949, now augmented by future Soul Stirrer Paul Foster (the group that produced future soul singers Sam Cooke and Johnnie Taylor) they recorded a version of "When the Saints Go Marching In".  But their record label head decided to drop them before they could record a second single and the group disbanded.  

Broadnax took his powerful tenor voice to the popular Spirit of Memphis gospel quartet that included legendary gospel singer Silas Steele.   The Spirit of Memphis was one of the top grossing gospel acts of the time and were getting paid as much as $200 a week, which was big money in that time period.  Broadnax recorded and performed with the Spirit of Memphis Quartet until 1952 when he began working with the Nashville, TN based Fairfield Four.

When Five Blind Boys of Mississippi lead singer Archie Brownlee died in 1960, Broadnax was tapped as his replacement while also until 1965 continuing to lead his own group called Little Axe and the Golden Voices.
.   
As the popularity and commercial viability of gospel quartets waned, Broadnax retired from touring, but did continue to record with the Five Blind Boys of Mississippi into the 70's and 80's.

There is a dispute as to when Wilmer Broadnax actually died.  Various sources claim it was 1994, but the Untitled Black Lesbian Elder Project website asserts that he met his untimely demise in Philadelphia in 1992.

He and his girlfriend Lavinia Richardson were engaged in a heated argument when she stabbed him on May 23, 1992 and he subsequently died on June 1, 1992.

But the fact that isn't in dispute is when he died, it was on the autopsy table the subsequent discovery was made that Wilmer Broadnax was a trans man.

Wilmer 'Little Axe' Broadnax is another fasicanting story from our Black trans history and another concrete example of Black trans people being an integral kente cloth part of our Black community.   
    

More TransGriot Ten Questions Interview Links

I have an upcoming TransGriot Ten Questions interview on the blog for the first time in nearly a year.  That's too long an interval between Ten Question interview posts since my last one with Tracie Jada O'Brien.

In my defense, me keeping an eye on the 2012 presidential campaign and election cycle and last year's busy travel and speaking schedule was a major factor in producing that interview drought.

Still, that's too long an interval between interviews and I want them to happen more frequently.   Many of you readers noticed and have been asking me when I was going to start doing the TransGriot Ten Questions interviews again since it is a feature of this blog you tell me that you enjoy.   

Well, never let it be said I don't give my TransGriot readers what they want.  The next one goes up at 12 midnight CDT on the 17th.   You'll have to surf back to the blog to find out who is the subject of it.

As to why I started the TransGriot Ten Questions interviews in the first place, it was a way to continue fulfilling my blog's mission of compiling and documenting Black trans history and talk to (and talk up) our community's up and coming leaders, opinion shapers, artists, thinkers, historical icons and interesting personalities who are molding and shaping not only our chocolate trans world but the trans community at large.   

I ask them ten questions they can answer as short or as long as they wish on various subjects of interest to our trans community.  I'm also striving to have a mix of African descended trans people from across the Diaspora, of all ages as well and in different sectors of our community including the pageant and ballroom communities.

So yeah people, I'm thinking globally and locally with this feature.  

For those of you I've asked to be the next TransGriot Ten Questions subjects, once I coordinate our schedules to do so, I compile your questions and send them to your e-mail inbox, please get them back to me as expeditiously as possible so I can post them for my readers.  

Here's the link to a 2011 compilation post making it easier for you (and me) to find the initial group of interviews and the ones I've done in the wake of that October 3, 2011 compilation post.   

TransGriot Ten Questions Interview-Isis King

TransGriot Ten Question Interview- Tracie Jada O'Brien

TransGriot Ten Questions Interview- Cheryl Courtney-Evans

TransGriot Ten Questions Interview-Diamond Stylz

Two Trans Murder Trials Start Today

The eyes of the African-American trans community and our allies will also be focused today on Washington DC and Milwaukee,WI as the alleged murderers of Deoni Jones and Evon Young face the legal music for their crimes.

Inside I-495, 56 year old Gary Niles Montgomery after two psychiatric evaluations that declared him mentally competent to stand trial, finally gets to face a jury for the fatal February 2 attack last year on trans woman Deoni Jones at a NE Washington DC bus stop. 

A few hours later in Wisconsin, Billy Griffin, the first of the five suspects involved in the murder of transmasculine Milwaukee rapper Evon Young goes to trial.  They were all initially charged with first degree intentional homicide but Victor Stewart plead guilty June 5 to second degree reckless homicide and will be sentenced on July 23.    

Ron Joseph Allen and Ashanti Mcalister are the next scheduled to get their day in court on June 24 and Devin L. Seaberry will be schedule to go on trial July 8.

If they are convicted of first degree intentional homicide they are facing maximum life in prison sentences.
   
Will Deoni and Evon receive justice?  We'll have to wait and see what happens as the legal maneuverings take place in those courtrooms in our nation's capitol and Wisconsin in front of the judges and jurors empaneled to decide the fates of those defendants.

Based on past cases involving trans murder victims and the outrageous verdicts that have come from past trials,  it's a valid question for the African-American trans community and our allies to ask right now.


TransGriot Update:  Devin Seaberry also took a plea deal to a lesser charge in this case in exchange for his testimony.    In Washington DC, the Deoni Jones trial is once again held up by questions over Montgomery's mental competence to stand trial.

Happy 25th Birthday CeCe McDonald!

Today is CeCe McDonald's birthday and I wanted to make certain this day didn't pass without the TransGriot acknowledging it.

I and the entire trans community wish you weren't unjustly stuck inside those Minnesota prison walls for basically standing your ground and defending yourself/   Our fondest wish for you as a community would be that you were out and about being able to do what any girl hitting 25 could do on her special day and celebrating it with friends and family.

But the bottom lines for today are that you're alive and you still have your life to look forward to going forward from today.   

Happy 25th birthday CeCe!   May you have many more birthdays to come.. 

 

Race In The Transgender Community Podcast

On Monday I had the honor and pleasure of being part of a Prism Radio podcast show with two people from the Louisville portion of my life.  

Holly Knight has 70 episodes of this Blogtalk radio show under her belt since June 2010.

For Episode 71 she invited the TransGriot and Jaison Gardiner (AKA Nephew) to tell it like it T-I-S is about 'Race In Transgender Community' and how it affects the transitions of person of color on multiple levels.

Once again it was one of those shows in which we needed more than the 90 minutes we had allotted to break down this topic.  You know neither Jaison or I are shy about speaking our minds either..  

It's now posted and you can listen to it here if you missed the live podcast.  

Why The Negative Plain Dealer Coverage May Result In Cemia NOT Getting Justice

As I noted yesterday, the police in the Cleveland suburban hamlet of Olmsted Township have arrested 36 year old Andre L. Bridges,who is accused of the murder of 20 year old Cemia Dove Acoff.

Cemia's funeral is going to be this morning at 10 AM EDT at The Temple Baptist Church in East Cleveland, OH and there will also be a vigil held afterwards at the AIDS Taskforce of Cleveland.  It's a local organization in Cleveland according to Zoe Lapin that has heavy trans POC participation levels and significant POC trans involvement .

While the police and FBI capture of Bridges is a wonderful development in this case and as Olmsted Township Police Chief John Minek noted there is still an active investigation going on, I fear the damage has already been done that will ensure that Cemia may not get justice when this case finally goes to court.

While I hope and pray that when it goes to trial, it's proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Bridges did it and he spends the rest of his life getting three hots and a cot at the Ohio Iron Bar motel for what he's allegedly done, I fear that the Plain Dealer's transphobic coverage may have already poisoned the well and tainted the Cleveland area jury pool in the direction of Cemia NOT receiving justice for what was done to her.

If it happens that Andre L. Bridges gets a ridiculously low sentence or walks, you'll only need to look back to the day that the Plain Dealer's rabidly transphobic coverage of CeCe's death was unleashed upon the world..

For starters, the Plain Dealer went too far in ignoring the AP Stylebook guidelines and erasing Cemia trans feminine status.  Instead of reporting the murder of a trans feminine woman, you stripped her of any dignity by misgendering her, commenting on what she was wearing when the body was discovered, and categorizing her as 'it'  Then on top of that, you used her old name in the story, used mugshots of her and dragged her old criminal record into it   

Way to go in your first class efforts Cleveland Plain Dealer to dehumanize her.

Because you set the demonizing and dehumanizing framing of the story, that meant the other Cleveland area media outlets followed your transphobic lead to the point where the Lanigan and Malone morning team at Majic105.7 cracked jokes (around the 7:00 minute mark) about this killing. 

That initial negative framing led to a television interview with a family member that obviously wasn't down with Cemia's gender transition.  That family member constantly misgendered her as old male pictures were shot without balancing the story out with people who knew and loved her as CeCe and pictures reflecting that. 

Never mind the fact that Cemia was the victim in this and isn't the one that should be on trial.  And when the backlash started, instead of correcting the story, you started wallowing in white male cis privilege, circled the wagons and blamed everybody else but yourselves for the fracked up coverage you justifiably got called on and kept on digging that transphobic hole you started with. 

Even in the article you claimed was an apology, you are still using the jacked up photo of Cemia when there are more tasteful feminine photos of her and trying to stick to using her old male name which isn't germane to the story.

Tina Turner's old name is Anna Mae Bullock.  Do you call her by that name in any story you write?   See how fast you get another interview with Cher if you insist on repeatedly writing Cherilyn Sarkisian in that article or Reginald Dwight in one for Sir Elton John.   

 But back to focusing on the transphobic news coverage.   What it did was basically paint Cemia in a negative light, and it's something that Bridges' defense attorney will possibly exploit now that you media peeps did all their work in demonizing Cemia for them.

You've laid the groundwork for Bridges' defense attorney to possibly deploy the 'trans panic' defense and make the murderer look like a everyday and twice on Sunday church attending choirboy vis a vis the 'crazy tr---y' who 'deserved what she got'.  

Oh my bad, you refused to acknowledge that she was a trans woman.

And when that trial starts, we'll have an empaneled jury whose minds are already compromised by marinating in the anti-trans media negativity stirred up by that journalistic hate crime.   We already know the odds are going to be long (but not impossible) for obtaining a murder conviction of a cis person who kills a transperson.

Worst case is he walks, best case is he gets life in prison pending the evidence and skill of the prosecuting attorney.   What I wouldn't be surprised that happens in this case is we possibly get a plea deal for aggravated manslaughter.

Your transphobic reporting has pretty much framed this trial one it starts as a Black cisman kills 'deceptive' Black 'man' or in the minds of many people not well versed in the lives of trans people a 'freak who deserved to die for tricking an unsuspecting cis man'.

That's not me spouting over the top rhetoric, that's the gist of the comments running around in the comment threads on the various posts.  A mentality that may seep into the jury deciding Andre L Bridges fate.  

So Cleveland trans community, if Bridges walks or gets a ridiculously low sentence, you'll know where it started.

 

Another Black Transwoman Dies In Ohio And Is Disrespected In The Local Media

First the details of the third African-American transwoman this month to die too soon at the hands of a murderer, then I go Maya Wilkes concerning the over the top transphobic 'reporting' of  Cleveland Plain Dealer stenographers (they don't deserve the title of reporter) John Caniglia and Jo Ellen Corrigan

20 year old C. Acoff (I refuse to use the old name because this sistah has been disrespected enough) from Cleveland was found April 17 in a retention pond on MacKenzie Road, north of Cook Road, in Olmsted Township, OH nude from the waist down.  She was stabbed multiple times tied with a rope to a block of concrete

The body was found at 3:30 PM EDT by a renter living in an apartment building on the 20 acre property in the township. Acoff had been missing since March 27 and the body did match a previously filed missing person's report with the Cleveland Police Department.on April 19. 


Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner's office positively identified through DNA on Monday

Police are looking for the wastes of DNA who committed the crime.

Now that I've gotten the basics out of the way, lets talk about the journalistic hate crime that was just committed against Ms. Acoff.  Caniglia and Corrigan must have read this TransGriot post because this is the worst piece of alleged reporting on a trans murder I've seen in a while.  

Misgender the person at every opportunity?  Check
Use police mugshot?  Check
Drag old criminal record into the story?  Check
'Deception meme' injected into story?    Check
'Tragic transsexual' meme injected into this story?   Check
Use salacious and sensationalist headlines?  Check
Not give a rats anus about the victim's dignity and their femme presentation?  Check
Disrespecting another African-American transwoman?   Check.

I am so fracking sick of African-American transwomen who have unfortunately been killed repeatedly being disrespected by predominately white reporters.  Would you have done a story on a white cis female murder victim that way?   Would you have used a mug shot or plastered her criminal record all through a story reporting on her death?

No John Caniglia and Jo Ellen Corrigan, you damned sure would not have disrespected a white cis female murder victim that way even if she had a criminal record.  You probably would have left it out of the story or your editor would have done so before publication.

But you (and your editor) felt it was okay to disrespect Ms Acoff  in that jacked up manner. Is it because you and your editor actually hate transwomen?   If you don't, the two articles you wrote sure do leave readers (especially in the trans community) with the impression that you don't care about or think transwomen, and especially African-American transwomen don't deserve dignity even in death.

You damned sure left no room for doubt to local, national and international trans readers and our allies how you felt or whether you even cared about the victim.   It's also apparent you weren't concerned how these stories would be perceived by a community who is beyond sick and tired of being sick and tired of being dissed in the media.  

I'm even more pissed off about this journalistic hate crime because this is the third African-American transwoman who has been killed this month and the second who was disrespected by her local media outlet.

It's obvious you haven't heard of the AP Stylebook guidelines on how to RESPECTFULLY report on transgender people, so let's go over them shall we?

Transgender: Use the pronoun preferred by the individuals who have acquired the physical characteristics of the opposite sex or present themselves in a way that does not correspond with their sex at birth.   

If that preference is not expressed, use the pronoun consistent with the way the individuals live publicly.

These guidelines have been in effect since 2001, so I'd love to hear your excuses for how not one but TWO transphobic stories you signed your name to (and your editor allowed) got published. 

Better yet, talk to GLAAD about why you did it.  I'm sure they'll be calling soon to ask why.


TransGriot Update.  Thanks to TransGriot readers Jahaira, Zoe and Lilith found out Ms Acoff's femme name is Cemia Dove.  Friends called her Ce Ce.   Found the new picture of Ce Ce gracing this article on Ce Ce's Facebook page.

Brandy Martell Candlelight Vigil Tonight

A reminder for those of you in the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Area of the candlelight vigil being held tonight to commemorate the one year anniversary of Brandy Martell's April 29 death.  

It will take place at the Franklin and 13th St. corner in Downtown Oakland where she was fatally shot from 7-8:30 PM PDT.   If you need further information about it you can e-mail her at twoods@tri-city health.org or call her at 510-456-3521

Hope there is a large turnout for this memorial vigil.  I also hope that the waste of DNA who killed her will soon be brought to justice to pay for his crime.

Rest In Peace, Marcelle Cook-Daniels

I've been thinking about him recently, and when I Googled his name I stumbled across the obituary that reminded me on this date in 2000 the African-American and national trans community lost one of its major pioneering leaders in the person of Marcelle Y. Cook-Daniels. Cook-Daniels was born in Washington DC on March 1, 1960 where he resided until he moved to Vallejo, CA in 1996.  Marcelle worked for the Internal Revenue Service and a computer programmer/analyst and for Norcal Mutual Insurance.

He was also diligently working toward obtaining his masters degree in computer science at Golden Gate University. 

Marcelle during that time period was one of our early national transmasculine African-American  activists and leaders.  He was a quiet, principled and dedicated man who labored tirelessly to raise awareness about trans and LGB issues. 

He role modeled his personal values of family love, commitment, honesty, openness, and public service through being a loving son to his mother Marcella Daniels, supporting his longtime life partner of seventeen years Loree Cook-Daniels, and being a devoted father to his son Kai Cook-Daniels.

Marcelle's education and advocacy work on behalf of our community included presentations at the 1999 Creating Change Conference in Oakland (where our paths crossed but I sadly never met him), the 1998 "Butch-FTM: Building Coalitions Through Dialogue" event, several True Spirit Conferences, and numerous educational and advocacy events.

Marcelle was interviewed and photographed for the 'Love Makes A Family" book; the Dawn Atkins' book "Looking Queer: Body Image and Identity in Lesbian, Bisexual, Gay and Transgender Communities," and "In The Family" magazine.

He was an active supporter of COLAGE (Children of Lesbians and Gays Everywhere) and provided substantial material and volunteer support to the Transgender Aging Network, four True Spirit conferences, and the Maryland based transmasculine group The American Boyz that eventually folded.

He sadly lost his ongoing struggle with depression and took his own life.  His memorial service on April 26 was attended by family, friends, colleagues and all the people whose lives he'd touched during his 40 years with us. 

For you trans men who never had the opportunity to meet Marcelle, you definitely would have liked and admired him.  You are building upon the work he started and are walking in his footsteps, and I'm writing this post on the anniversary of his death to ensure that his contributions toward building the United States trans and transmasculine communities are never forgotten or disappear.    

Marcelle, you are still missed by all the people who had the pleasure of knowing you.  I'm saddened it didn't happen for us while I was in Oakland for Creating Change.  I hope as you look down upon us you are pleased to see the trans and SGL rights progress we have made since 2000, especially in your hometown of Washington DC and the state of California.

While we still have much work to do, your trans brothers and sisters are laboring mightily to live up to the high standards you set for us.  I still wonder at times how much farther down the path of trans human rights coverage we would be if you and Alexander John Goodrum were still here and had the opportunity to mentor mine and this current generation of transmasculine and transfeminine activists.

Rest in peace Marcelle, and say hello to Alexander for us.    

Conversations With Tona Brown Video Series

The multi-talented Tona Brown has started posting interviews of various people in the trans community and others that pique her interest on her YouTube channel. 

She calls the segment 'Conversations With Tona Brown' and if you're wondering when your favorite blogger is scheduled to do one, it's going to happen the next time I'm in the Washington DC area.

These are wonderful interview which are not only shedding light on these two longtime Baltimore area activists, they are capturing a historical moment in time for future generations of trans people and frankly deserve a wider audience.    

Here are some of the interviews she's done already with Cydne Kimbrough. and Monica Stevens

Cydne Kimbrough Part 1

 


Cydne Kimbrough Part 2




Monica Stevens Part 1





Monica Stevens Part 2

Whose Beloved Community? Black Civil And LGBT Right Movements

TransGriot Note: This Call for Proposals was forwarded to me by Ovid Amorson and looks like it's right in my activist wheelhouse.   This will be one tremendous conference at Emory University in the ATL on March 27-29 focused on the Black Civil and LGBT Rights Movements and I'm definitely interested in going or participating in it.

An international conference at Emory University, March 27-29, 2014

Call for Proposals: Review of proposals begins June 17, 2013. Notification of acceptance will be no later than September 15, 2013.

The role of Black lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people in both race-based and sexuality-based civil rights movements is frequently rendered invisible as a result of prevailing national narratives that present (presumed white) LGBT communities and (presumed straight) Black communities as opposing forces.  In recent years, however, an increasing number of scholars and activists have produced work seeking to make visible the vital points of intersection and contention among the U.S. Civil Rights movement, the LGBT equality movement, and Black LGBT communities.  This work is shaped by questions related to identity formation, intersectionality, tokenism, marriage equality, the role of religion and “respectability” in African American communities, the emergence of the South as a center of Black LGBT life in the U.S., HIV/AIDS and its continuing effect on African American communities, the proliferation of a prison-industrial complex unprepared for its LGBT population, and the appropriation of the civil rights movement by the right.  This conference seeks to make visible and critically engage the points of convergence and divergence between these two historic, overlapping, yet distinct social movements that continue to transform civil society, law, and the academy.

We encourage paper and panel proposals on a wide range of topics including, but not exclusively encompassing, the following:         

• The legacy of the Civil Rights Movement
• Identifications and disidentifications with “movements”
• Black LGBT leaders and popular figures, historical and contemporary
• Literary, artistic and popular culture engagements with Black LGBT identities
• Inclusion and marginalization of transgender and bisexual identities in Black LGBT communities/politics
• Intersections with other post-1960s civil rights movements (other racial groups, people with disabilities, women, etc.)
• Black LGBT activism in relation to work in other LGBT communities of color
• Racial diversity in White-led LGBT organizations
• Law and politics
• Black queer politics of space
• Public health
• Memory, mourning, trauma, and resilience
• Black LGBT families
• Marriage equality movements
• Sexuality and respectability
• Class and elitism
• Sexism, classism, and other “isms” in the Black LGBT movement
• Black masculinity in LGBT communities
• Black feminism in LGBT communities
• Intergenerational issues
• Intersections between public advocacy/policy and academia
• Intersections of U.S. Civil Rights with Black queer Atlantic political movements
• The future of Black queer studies
• Teaching Black LGBT history, Black queer studies, etc.
• Black LGBT university populations
• LGBT issues and Historically Black Colleges and Universities

Each submission must include a cover page with paper titles, presenters, their affiliations, and a current email contact, along with a maximum two-page c.v. of each presenter.  For individual papers, please submit an abstract of no more than 250 words. For panels, submit an overall abstract of no more than 500 words and individual paper descriptions of no more than 250 words each. Please submit materials via email to Whose.beloved.community@emory.edu.

This conference is generously supported by the Arcus Foundation and Emory University

Janet Mock Appearing On Sunday's Melissa Harris Perry Show!

So when will trans persons of color be invited to participate in a Melissa Harris Perry show discussion?  Will that happen sometime before this decade is over? 

TransGriot February 13, 2013 'When Will POC Transpeople Be Invited To MHP?' 

As you TransGriot readers are aware of I've been quite vocal about the lack of trans POC people appearing on this GLAAD award nominated show (and countless others) to talk about trans issues (and other issues of the day including LGBT community ones) from our perspective.

So I was beyond happy to read that Janet Mock will be in the #nerdland studios tomorrow morning taking part in the discussion on what lies beyond the marriage equality fight.

Alright Janet!   So deliriously happy that you'll be our POC trans community's first representative on the Melissa Harris Perry show   I know you'll do a wonderful job.  

Now MHP show, was that so hard?    All us trans POC folks were asking for is the visibility and the opportunity to show that trans persons of color are more than just 'tragic transsexuals'.

Trans masculine and trans feminine POC peeps are more than capable of holding our own in a policy discussion.    We trans persons of color not only needed to see ourselves represented on the MHP set and television screens across America, so did our LGBT peers and the cis people inside and outside our communities who don't believe that thoughtful, intelligent talking head trans persons of color exist..

Looking forward to tuning in tomorrow with the rest of America to check out the latest edition of #nerdland and see a beautiful and talented girl like me as part of the panel.  I also hope that we see more trans POC's on future #nerdland shows as well

2013 Black Transmen, Inc Conference Keynote Speech

This is the text of the keynote speech I just delivered to the 2013 Black Transmen, Inc Conference in Dallas, TX.   If some video pops up of me I'll add it to this post later.

***

2013 Black Transmen Conference Keynote Speech
March 15, Dallas, TX.

Giving honor to God, Carter Brown, The Black Transmen, Inc. board of directors, Dr. Oliver Blumer, Esperanza Brown, Rev. Carmarion Anderson, my transbrothers and transsisters, BTMI conference attendees, organizers, sponsors and volunteers, distinguished civic leaders and guests, family, friends, and our allies and supporters.

It is indeed a wonderful blessing, honor, and privilege to be standing before you this morning as the first trans woman ever to give a keynote address to this rapidly growing and eagerly anticipated conference. I was stuck in Houston when the inaugural event was held last year and I was bummed I couldn't attend or participate in it due to a previous commitment. That disappointment stung even more when I discovered Louis Mitchell was last year's esteemed keynote speaker.

While this is the first time I've had the pleasure of attending this BTMI conference, it's not my first time in the Metroplex. I have a lot of relatives in the Dallas area on my mom's side of the family and there were more than a few times when I was growing up I was bouncing up and down I-45 for some family reunion or event.

But I'm in the Black Transmen, Inc. conference house and I couldn't be happier. It was a personal goal of mine when I started the activist portion of my life in 1998 that through my work I would speed up the day that we Black trans folks not only would become more active and visible in the overall trans scheme of things, but build community to the point that we could have large conferences and conventions like this.

As Louis will tell you, I met him when a group of people on the Transsistahs-Transbrothas Yahoo list I founded organized two African-American trans conferences that were held in Louisville, KY in 2005-2006, so I have a deep appreciation of what it takes and how much time and unceasing effort goes into planning a multi-day event like the BTMI Conference.

It also takes a lot of time, sweat equity, and effort to efficiently solve whatever unforeseen problems crop up for the conference organizing team and their volunteers and make the conference attendees, panelists and presenters experiences a memorable one.

So please give the BTMI folks a well deserved round of applause for doing so.

I'm making a little personal history today as my stylishly dressed self stands before you. It's the first time I have ever done a keynote speech inside the borders of the Lone Star State.

It figures that the first time it happens it would be 262 miles up I-45 from Houston, but such are the ironies of life. I thank BTMI, Esperanza Brown and Rev. Carmarion Anderson for all the e-mails, phone calls and coordination that helped make being in your company a reality for me.

As some of you are aware, I'm delivering this speech at a time of great sorrow in my life. My father suffered a major stroke March 3. He has been gravely ill and in a hospice since Tuesday. On behalf of myself and my family I thank you, the TBLG community and our allies for all the kind words, phone calls, Facebook and e-mail messages, Tweets and lifting me and my family up in prayer during this trying time.

Welcome to the Black Transmen conference and my home state of Texas. One of the interesting things about the Lone Star State is that it has played a pivotal role in shaping trans history at the state and national level. There are four Texans who have won IFGE Trinity Awards and I'm the first African-American Texan to do so.

We started fighting our H-town oppressors in 1975 when Toni Mayes flied and won a federal lawsuit to stop the Houston Police Department from harassing arrests of her every time she used the bathroom. Phyllis Frye would cap a successful three year battle that on August 12, 1980 resulted in the takedown of the odious Houston anti-cross dressing ordinance that HPD was using to harass Toni and other Houston LGBT denizens.

Before Southern Comfort became the go-to trans conference, down I-35 south in San Antonio, Cynthia and Linda Phillips were welcoming transpeople from around the country to the Boulton and Park Society sponsored Texas T-Party in the late 80's and early 90's.

That T in this case stands for transgender, not the Tea Klux Klan.

Phyllis also made a major contribution to trans kind on a national scale by founding in 1992 ICTLEP, the International Conference on Transgender Law and Employment Policy that was held in Houston until 1996. ICTLEP laid the foundation for the modern trans rights movement by training activists with a core set of human rights priciples that were passed down to my generation of activists, opened the door to trans inclusion in the National LGBT Bar Association and that organization's subsequent pro trans rights stances.

Sarah DePalma, Tere Prasse and the late Dee McKellar were early and iconic Lone Star state and national leaders based in Houston and San Antonio. Texans were part of the team of activists that in June 1999 founded NTAC, the National Transgender Advocacy Coalition. It was the trans community's first national multicultural trans human rights organization that also had POC transpeople in its senior leadership ranks.

Josephine Tittsworth founded the now five year old Texas Transgender Nondiscrimination Summit in 2009, which has the mission of getting non discrimination policies enacted in Texas school districts, community college and university campuses. This year it will happen on the University of Houston campus July 19-21. And here in Dallas, you have Carter Brown and Rev. Carmarion Anderson who are getting well-deserved national attention

Even some of the precedent setting legal cases and ones we discuss in the trans community have a Texas twang to them such as Littleton v. Prange, Kantaras v. Kantaras, Lopez vs. River Oaks Imaging and the ongoing Delgado vs Araguz one.
And when it's time for thought provoking commentary, education, needing to get something done, providing visionary leadership or have someone bluntly tell you in print, on the radio, the Net, in a podcast or to your face you're all hat and no cattle, call up Cristan Williams, Katrina Rose, Meghan Stabler, Vanessa Edwards Foster, Josephine Tittsworth, Katy Stewart, Lou Weaver, Rev. Carmarion Anderson, Carter Brown or a certain award winning African descended Houston based trans blogger y'all all know and love.

We also have peeps who may not have been born in the Lone Star State, but got here as fast as they could and have made tremendous contributions to their local communities and statewide.
As I was enroute to Dallas I thought about the fact last month marked the 60^th anniversary of Christine Jorgensen's return to the United States after spending two years undergoing the hormonal part of her transition in Denmark. In October it will have been 20 years since I started the chain of events that led to me beginning my own transition in 1994 by writing the letter asking the nearby Rosenberg Clinic for their first open date for an appointment.

When I took that first step to transition, My own life not only finally began, I jumpstarted a process that 20 years later has led to some amazing changes in my own life. It has also led to me witnessing two decades of marvelous changes for the trans community.

I also thought about on the trip here the theme for this year's conference which is 'The Power of You'. It dovetails nicely with the motto of Black Transmen, Inc which is 'Become the change you want to see in the world.'

One of my Houston sheroes Barbara Jordan stated in 1992 'It is a burden of Black people that we have to do more than just talk.' That is also true of those of us who are African descended trans people.

But I don't really see having to do more than talk as a burden. It's a pain in the butt at times, but the constant challenges of being Black in America force us to be ever vigilant of our precious human rights that were paid for in our ancestors 246 years of unpaid labor, sweat equity, the shed blood of fallen soldiers and civil rights warriors and rivers of tears.
It's why we African-Americans continue to fight fiercely to protect them against any attempt to roll them back.

Having us needing to do more than just talk led to the civil rights movement of the 50s and 60's and being involved with the human rights struggles of all the communities we interact and intersect with. Having to do more than just talk ensures that we are constantly learning how to make a way out of no way. We calmly and creatively deal with crises. It stimulates our creativity and fuels the passionate way in which we live our lives.

It keeps us from getting stagnant as a people because our oppressors are constantly looking for new ways to shift the human rights goalposts, roll back our hard won rights and continue to erect roadblocks to retard our progress.

And for us trans persons of color, we not only have that legacy of progress and struggle to live up to, it compels us to as I borrow a line from the National Black Justice Coalition's powerhouse Executive Director and CEO Sharon Lettman-Hicks, to Own Our Power.

Yes, you peeps sitting in the audience have power and express it in multiple ways. You do so by registering to vote and doping so in each and every election you can participate in. You do so by educating yourself about the issues facing you and coming to conferences like this one. You do so by staying in tune with your spiritual selves by whatever means necessary and way you choose to do so. You do so by stepping outside the doors of your domiciles and living your out and proud lives as trans men and trans women. You do so by working hard to make a reality the positive change you want to see in Dallas, the state of Texas, your hometowns, your home states, this nation and the world.

Being trans men and trans women is not an impediment to us owning our power, nor should we see it that way. We are simply being the beautifully made trans masculine and trans feminine persons that God created us to be.
The cool thing about the 'being the change you wish to be in the world' concept is that change can start with little old you standing up for yourself and inspiring like minded people around you to collective action. It also doesn't have to be just trans specific either. We intersect and interact with many different communities, and the more people see us transpeople out and about, getting involved and doing things intersectionally, the better it is for the trans community at large. We make friends, break down misconceptions about us and build allies and political capital for the day when we'll need to ask them for help with issue concerns of vital importance to our community.

We know the Power of You and the value of collective action to be true by perusing the countless examples in Black history. We also have examples in Black trans history to look at and glean lessons from. There's the powerful 1965 example of African descended gender variant kids at Philadelphia's Dewey's Lunch Counter standing up, saying no to transphobic bigotry and staging a sit in to protest it. There's Alexander John Goodrum helping to pass trans inclusive human rights laws in Tucson. There's the legions of Black trans men and trans women toiling away in their local areas who unfortunately don't get recognition for doing so.

That example of what the Power of You can do and being the change you wish to be in the world continues in the person of our previous keynote speaker Kylar Broadus who is the founder and executive director of the Trans Persons of Color Coalition and Carter Brown's founding of Black Transmen, Inc.
Being the change we want to be in this world can sometimes seem as though for us transpeople of color to be a daunting and impossible task. But as our ancestors would tell you if they were in this room, no it isn't.

When our ancestors were emancipated from slavery after the Civil War, we Texans didn't find out about the Emancipation Proclamation until June 19, 1865 because we were the westernmost outpost of the Confederacy. After those initial Juneteenth celebrations ended the newly emancipated freedmen faced odds even more daunting than the ones we trans folks do grappling with a mere gender transition.

Our ancestors rolled up their sleeves and handled it the best way they knew how. They organized and registered to vote. They used that power to get themselves elected to public offices ranging from city councils to state legislators. They built churches, formed cohesive neighborhoods and raised their literacy rate from 15% to 85% within 20 years. They pooled their money in Houston, Austin, and Mexia to buy land on which to host their subsequent Juneteenth celebrations that later became public parks in those cities and founded schools and colleges to educate our people. They did all this while facing Klan terrorist attacks, lynchings, virulent hatred and bigotry.

So when I look at this legacy of struggle and progress, I know deep down in my soul that we early 21^st century transpeople can, will and should draw inspiration from their example. We can and should find ways in 2013 and beyond to excel and provide the leadership our people inside and outside the trans community need.

A transition is different for Black transpeople. We catch hell not only for being trans, but have to contend with faith-based or outright ignorance from people inside and outside our community about trans issues and their impact on us. Then throw in good old fashioned racism into the mix on top of that.

As Carter Brown said in a 2011 Dallas Voice interview, “Our lives, the path we feel we have to take is a challenge. We are voluntarily accepting the role of Public Enemy No. 1: The black man is the most feared man in America.”

“When we transition from female to male, we are accepting all the challenges that black men in this country face, from society, from our families and from ourselves. It’s a lot to bear.”

That it is. The cross we Black trans women voluntarily have to bear is not only dealing with the repercussions of walking Planet Earth in a feminine body, we get the fun of wrestling with sexism, being walking targets for sexual and physical assault and being considered ugly no matter how stunningly attractive we are courtesy of the Black unwoman meme.

Black trans women discover that what the late Dr. Dorothy I. Height said about Black womanhood is resoundingly true for girls like us as well. 'When you're a Black woman, you seldom get to do just what you want to do; You always do what you have to do.'

And what we have to do is from the moment we take our first estrogen shots, we have to prepare ourselves to step up to leadership roles in order to push back against the virulent hatred we get aimed at us from multiple sides in this ongoing War on Trans Women.

It's a war we didn't start, and it's propagated by people that range from garden variety transphobes to radical feminists, right wing legislators and fundamentalist Christians.

Unfortunately those haters also include gay and lesbian folks who loudly express the misguided belief that transpeople aren't part of 'their movement'. Sadly some of the people spouting that claptrap are same gender loving people who share our ethnic heritage.

Hell, if it weren't for transpeople like Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson raising hell at Stonewall back in 1969 and being involved in the early days of New York's Gay Liberation Front before they were forced out of it, you wouldn't have a movement. I also must point out the reality to my same gender loving brothers and sisters that some of us trans peeps are also part of bi, lesbian and gay end of the rainbow community in addition to belonging to the trans end.

That negativity aimed at trans women has fed into the horrific level of anti-trans violence and discrimination aimed at us and our Latina sisters and it's way past time it stopped in the LGBT community ranks. We need to be better than our oppressors,and this is one place we can be an example to the straight community in that regard.

While I briefly touched on why Black trans women have stepped up to leadership roles, I'm ecstatic to see more transbrothers step up to be community leaders as well. I'm happy to see the Trans Latina Coalition highlighting the issues concerns of importance of trans Latinas. It's gratifying to see our allies from the TBLG and straight communities in the Dallas-Fort Worth metro area and elsewhere in the country gathered here and participating in his conference.

While I have seen some amazing things happen in my own life and over the 15 years I've been a trans advocate, the reality is we POC transfolks have much hard work ahead of us to even begin to approach the level of community and organizational infrastructure and media attention that our white trans and same gender loving counterparts have enjoyed for six decades.

Sadly that has become necessary that we continue on the path of creating POC controlled organizations and events because it's painfully clear elements of our white trans counterparts are reluctant or unwilling to share room at the leadership tables of their organizations that purport to claim to speak for the entire trans community.

And it's also problematic that those organizations that claim to speak for the entire community are pushing policy agendas that don't have input from us when they compiled them.

For those of us residing in the Lone Star State, in addition to those issues, we're having to build local and statewide community in a state bigger than France and temporarily under right wing GOP control.

Note I said temporarily. Demographics are swiftly catching up to the Texas Republican Party and they will have to adapt to the looming political reality or die. The Delaymandering they pulled off in 2003 with a major assist from the GW Bush controlled Department of Justice bought them time, but will not protect them forever from seeing Texas inevitably because it is a majority-minority population state from going purple and back to blue.

But don't worry out of town visitors, you're sitting in one of the blue oasis cities in our beloved state. The city of Dallas and Dallas County not only went blue in the last two election cycles for President Obama, it has been blue since 2006. It has two lesbian elected officials of color in Sheriff Lupe Valdez and Judge Tonya Parker and an ally to the gay community in county judge in Clay Jenkins. It is one of the few areas in the state that has trans human rights protections at the city and county level. It also has protections for trans students from DISD and Fort Worth ISD to the Dallas County Community college level to SMU. Quasi governmental agencies such as the DFW airport, Parkland Hospital and the North Texas Tollway Authority also do so as well.

But in terms of stepping up our leadership game we Black transpeople can and must do better in this decade and beyond. We have issues that need to be addressed that are unique to our community. While I support marriage equality, at the same time I'm painfully aware of the fact we suffer an unemployment rate double that of the African-American cisgender community and that non-white transwoman are disproportionately bearing the brunt of unacceptable levels of violence.

We need jobs, jobs, jobs. We need to deal with the HIV/AIDS crisis in the trans ranks and the scourge of silicone pumping. I would like to see the ban on transgender military service die so that our people who wish to openly serve our nation can do so just like anyone else.

We need to continue to be the role models our trans kids sorely need in addition to arming them with the knowledge of their trans history. We have much work to do inside and outside our communities with our coalition partners to get the discussion of trans issues past Trans 101 level and get it to Trans 201, 301, 401 and beyond.

We need to make it crystal clear to friend, foe and frenemy that African-American trans people exist, we are part of the kente cloth fabric of the community, and we aren’t going away.  We also need to call out people who give mad props to RuPaul and Tyler Perry dressed as Madea, will use feminine pronouns to describe them when dressed that way, but will gleefully misgender, disrespect and sometimes assault a trans woman in their neighborhoods.

And sadly some of the peeps that refuse to acknowledge our transmasculinity or transfemininity are in our own families.

I hope that as part of exercising the Power of You and becoming the change you want to see in the world you will support TPOCC, the Trans Latina Coalition, BTMI, the National Black Justice Coalition and other organizations with your donations. Even if you don't do anything more than send them $5 or $10 from time to time or whatever you can afford, as President Obama proved in 2008 and 2012, small donations done by thousands of people can add up to nice tidy sums quickly and those organizations would deeply appreciate it.

We will also need to use that same fiscal strategy when we finally have transpeople of color step up and run for public office. I hope that some trans person in Dallas will pick up where Monica Barros-Greene left off in 2005 and run for and win a seat on the Dallas City Council. I hope some of you sitting in this room will consider running for public office in your own locales because it is the next level of being the change we want to see in the world.

The last time we had a Black trans person elected to a statewide legislature was Althea Garrison in 1992. She unfortunately only served one term in the Massachusetts House.
Don't y'all think it's past time that we have some of our people become mayors, city council members, county commissioners, school board trustees, judges, state legislators, state senators, and eventually run for Congress with the goal of writing the policies and laws that impact our lives instead of begging for inclusion in them?

But the Power of You must also manifest itself in the vitally important area of banishing the unholy trinity of shame, guilt and fear from our lives.

Mary McLeod Bethune wrote in the January 1938 Journal of Negro History, 'If our people are to fight our way out of bondage, we must arm them with the sword and the shield and the buckle of pride-belief in themselves and their possibilities based on a sure knowledge of the past. This knowledge and pride we must give them—if it breaks every back in the kingdom.”

I knew being a child and godchild of historians that connecting Black trans people to our history would have a positive transformative effect on us. So would being out, proud visible and having our own trans icons to look up to.

I wish that when I was a skinny teenager trying to sort out my gender issues while jamming to Donna Summer, Sylvester, Chic and Parliament-Funkadelic I'd had a Janet Mock, a Kye Allums, a Sharyn Grayson or a Miss Major to look up to as a trans role model. I wish that back in the day I'd known the history I'm now aware of about trans actress and August 1981 JET beauty of the week Ajita Wilson. I wish I'd been aware of the fact that the first patient of the now closed Johns Hopkins Gender Clinic in Baltimore was a girl like me named Avon Wilson or the story of Mississippi trans man Jim McHarris that was told in the pages of a 1954 EBONY magazine article.

I'm aware of that history now and eagerly pass it on to other people. I'm happy that the POC trans people of this generation have visible role models, icons and visionary leaders who share their heritage they can be proud of and I'm flattered that some of you consider me a role model.

I'm proud to do my part on my TransGriot blog and in concert with the efforts of other trans historians in getting everyone acquainted and familiar with Black trans history. I hope it results in them standing up a little taller, feeling more connected to the transpeople who walked this planet before we did, feeling they have a legacy to uphold and all of us being more willing to say it loud, I'm Black, transgender and proud!

It's no accident that since the trans community has become more visible, we have quickly made trans human rights gains. It's also no accident because of that visibility we are getting more pushback from the Forces of Intolerance. But we need to keep on pushing because we are on the correct side of the moral arc of history, our cause is just, and we will win.

As we have more trans people of color come out, tell their stories and live their lives, our communities and legacy organizations such as the NAACP are finally getting past the trans informational blackout and recognizing that we exist, but that Black trans issues are African-American community issues.

Conferences like this are also empowering events. The panel discussions, thought provoking seminars, meet and greet events and opportunities to have some fun also give us an opportunity to network with other like minded people, share information and forge those partnership that will hopefully result in change that positively affects our community and the multiple ones we intersect and interact with.

While we still have a long way to go in terms of getting the media to show us transpeople of color some of the love they've had for white trans people for six decades, we've at least gotten the process started in terms of getting more media face time for trans people of color to discuss the issues that affect us.

In conclusion, to paraphrase a famous quote from French philosopher Simone De Beauvoir, one is not born a man or woman, you become one.

However, that road to becoming a man or woman of trans experience is sometimes a bumpy one with plenty of twists, turns, and potholes you'll encounter at inopportune times.

It is a journey in which you'll need courage before you step behind the wheel and you'll have to fuel up your vehicle on high octane faith to ensure you have the ability to keep moving forward. There are times you'll get tired or driving and need to hit a rest stop along the way to relax and refresh yourself so that you can continue your journey.

There are others who start out on that transition highway who misread their GPS and lose their way or return to where they started. There are a few reckless drivers speeding past you who are texting and driving, are out of control, on drugs or drunk who eventually run off the road and either find themselves badly injured or killed from the accident they got involved in.
But if you're doing what you need to do and staying fairly close to the speed limit, the miles melt away and you'll appreciate the scenery you'll encounter as you get closer to your final destination of being a trans masculine or trans feminine person of substance.

The journey of discovery toward finding the power of you and being the change you wish to see in the world is one that is well worth taking for your own peace of mind and satisfaction.
And it's time for all of us to check the mirrors in our vehicles, put the key in the ignition, start it up, put it in gear, back the car out of the parking space and drive.

And may you have a peaceful journey toward discovering the Power of You and owning it.