'Soul Train' Creator Don Cornelius Dead

Feeling my age after hearing the news this morning that Soul Train creator Don Cornelius was found dead at his Sherman Oaks, CA home at 4 AM PST from what police and TMZ are reporting as a self inflicted gunshot wound.

The 75 year old Cornelius was a journalist who realized that there was no show like American Bandstand that featured the music of African-American artists and created the long running syndicated show in 1971.

Soul Train quickly became must see TV for African-Americans and an iconic part of my childhood and any other kid who grew up in the 70's, 80's, 90's and early 2K's and ran until 2006.

Soul Train was instrumental in getting wider television exposure to Aretha Franklin, Michael Jackson and The Jackson Five, and James Brown amongst many other acts in the R&B, and hip hop music world.

Soul Train was so popular that even Elton John and David Bowie made appearances on its stage and Spike Lee described the show as 'an urban music time capsule'.

That it is.  The TransGriot and more than a few other peeps learned the latest dances by parking ourselves in front of the TV and watching the multicultural and gracefully acrobatic Soul Train dancers execute their moves every Saturday.

And yeah, I'll admit was more than jealous of the sistahs that strutted their stuff on the show in the fashionable clothing and hairstyles of the day.

Soul Train is also responsible for something that is an iconic part of African-American culture, the Soul Train line that you see at every wedding, social gathering and party in ours and other communities..

I'm sure the story of what happened to Mr. Cornelius will continue to evolve and come out, but in the interim the only way to close this post about an iconic broadcasting pioneer is use his classic Soul Train show sign off line.

Wishing you love, peace and soul Mr. Cornelius.

Tona Talks About Racism

In her latest Vlog, Tona talks about racism.

Is Rev. Bernice King Evolving On TBLG Issues?

Like many African-American trans and SGL people I've been a vocal critic of Rev. Bernice King ever since Dr. King's baby girl made this foul 2004 statement:

“I know deep down in my sanctified soul that my father (Dr. King) did not take a bullet for same-sex marriage.”

She was also a co-organizer and participant in a December 11, 2004 anti-same gender marriage march in the ATL that started at the foot of her father's grave.at the King Center sponsored by Bishop Eddie Long's New Birth Missionary Baptist Church.

She was until last year an associate pastor and elder at New Birth until she left during the scandal to become the CEO of the King Center..

Now the GA Voice's Dyana Bagby is reporting that Rev. King made an eyebrow raising statement at a rally honoring Dr. King, Jr. in Atlanta that called for straight and TBLG people to come together to fulfill the legacy of her father.


It was reported that during Rev Bernice King’s sermon calling for unity, she said she didn’t care if people “were black or white,” she asked for “Hindu, Buddhist, Islamist” people to come together, people from the “North side or the South side,” and most surprisingly added the words “heterosexual or homosexual, or gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender.”

Say what? Is it true she sounded more like her late mother Coretta than her cookie-chomping Aunt Alveda?

“We need all of us,” Rev. Maressa Pendermon, a minister with LGBT-inclusive Unity Fellowship Church, reported King as saying in the GA Voice article..

That we do.  If Rev. Bernice King has come to that epiphany, amen!   The proof will be Rev. King's deeds over the next few years.

The onus is on her after years of anti-gay statements and actions to show an extremely skeptical African-American rainbow community and our allies to borrow her father's words, she has moved from supporting the children of darkness and come over to supporting the children of light..

Dr King On NBC's 'Meet The Press'

Since it's King Day, thought I'd share a video of him appearing in a 1965 broadcast of NBC's Meet The Press 

Melissa Harris-Perry To Get MSNBC Show

Y'all know I have much love for Tulane University professor and political analyst Melissa Harris-Perry, who has been a frequent guest on Rev. Al Sharpton's PoliticsNation show, The Rachel Maddow Show and Lawrence O'Donnell's The Last Word 

She has also guest hosted for Rachel Maddow and Lawrence O'Donnell on their respective shows and I wondered when MSNBC would finally do themselves a favor and grab her to host her own show on their network before somebody else did so.

Was watching PoliticsNation yesterday when the Rev announced that professor Harris-Perry would be getting her own show starting on February 4.  The yet to be named program will be broadcast on Saturdays and Sundays from 10 AM-12 noon Eastern time

She becomes the second African-American woman and third African-American to host a show on MSNBC, and all I can say is it's about time in her case.

Disrespect Of Black Womanhood Is Why I'm Not A Feminist

Chelsea Sayre, my fellow columnist at Transadvocate and editrix of the Trans Femmergy blog wrote an interesting post entitled It's Bigger Than Your Womanhood.

It was in her words 'a rant directed at the trans women who want absolutely nothing to do with feminism (no one in particular) because a mean, scary woman somewhere called you a name or the wrong gender.'

Well Chelsea, I'm one of those transwomen who wants nothing to do with feminism and the disrespect it aims at us.  

I'm about to tell it like it T-I-S is as to why I feel that way and expound on my reasons for saying thanks but no thanks to feminism.   They are bigger than the loud and wrong group of transphobic radical lesbian separatists still stuck in the disco era.  

If you were wearing my Afrocentric shoes, explain why should I have any respect for or rush to join a movement that has repeatedly shown it has no respect for me, my cis African descended sisters and doesn't care about any woman that isn't a cis white one?  

Too many feminists fail to recognize they exist with white privilege they gleefully exercise when it suits them while ignoring how race and class issues affect non-white cis and trans women. 

It's why like many Black women who have had the same epiphany about feminism I pivoted to and eventually became a womanist

If we're 'all women' as I hear repeatedly said as a talking point  in some quarters of the feminist movement and the feminist blogosphere, why the cricket chirping silence in terms of the sexist and racist attacks on the First Lady that have been ongoing since 2008, but feminists leap to the defense of Sarah Palin or Michele Bachmann if any man even looks at them cross eyed or says a disparaging word about them?

If 'we're all women', why does a white transwoman who is beaten at a Roseland, MD McDonald's get a rally while a little over 100 miles away a Black transwoman who gets beaten outside a Fredericksburg, VA 7-Eleven doesn't?

Don't even get me started on the feminist cricket chirping silence over the nastiness, transphobia and oppression that white radical lesbian separatists and radfems have engaged in and aimed at transwomen of all ethnic backgrounds since 1979.

Respect of my humanity and femininity is a big fracking deal when I live and interact with a vanillacentric society and culture that paints women of color and especially Black women as the 'unwoman' vis a vis the white women they put on society's pedestal as its idyllic feminine ideal all women should strive to emulate.

As a transwoman of African descent disrespect aimed at my femininity and humanity is an even bigger fracking deal because it builds upon a historical four century foundation of racism, oppression and sexism.  

The unwoman meme also fuels the transphobia and anti-trans violence that disproportionately affects transwomen of color.


If it escaped your attention, working for the advancement of the human rights of transwomen is also working for women's issues because it not only improves the lives of transwomen, it expands the human rights of all women. 

Sadly cis white feminists have been major players in impeding the progress of trans human rights over the last thirty years because they lack the vision to see that granting rights to transwomen expands them for cis women.

Feminism in whatever wave it is in has consistently demonstrated it only respects, cares about and works for the advancement of only one monoracial segment of cis women. That's why Black women pulled out of the feminist movement in the late 80's-early 90's and became womanists or joined with Latinas, Asians, Native American and other women to become Radical Women of Color.

Any transwoman of color who wants to do more to be down for the big picture cause of advancing the human rights of all women cis and trans should consider becoming womanists, radical women of color or joining cis women of color organizations dedicated to doing that uplift work.

Don't waste your precious time, energy and sanity considering feminism until it cleans up its bigoted and transphobic vanillacentric act.  

Why should I as a African descended transwoman or any transwoman of color work in or for a movement that doesn't benefit us or consider the issues of cis and trans women of color important?   Nor can I in good conscience as a leader in the African-American transfeminine community recommend that transwomen of color become feminists until it does.

Thanks, but no thanks.   Disrespect of mine and cis Black womanhood is why I'm not a feminist in the first place.

It Gets Better -Tona Brown

An 'It Gets Better' video from Tona Brown.

Happy Kwanzaa Black Trans Style-The 2011 Remix

Haban gani?   What's the news?   

Monday will begin the first day of the Kwanzaa celebration, which will run until January 1. 

Over those seven days the estimated 4 million people who celebrate the 45th anniversary of the holiday will once again familiarize themselves with the seven Nguzo Saba principles of it and ponder each one of them.

They will also ponder this year's theme which is Kwanzaa and the Seven Principles:  Sharing and Sustaining the World.

Last year I wrote a series of Kwanzaa themed posts that took each one of the seven principles and explained how they applied to the chocolate trans community and our cis African descended brothers and sisters.

Just as a refresher course, here are those seven principles that are celebrated each night:

• Umoja (Unity): To strive for and to maintain unity in the family, community, nation, and race.
• Kujichagulia (Self-Determination): To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves, and speak for ourselves.
• Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility): To build and maintain our community together and make our brothers' and sisters' problems our problems, and to solve them together.
• Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics): To build and maintain our own stores, shops, and other businesses and to profit from them together.
• Nia (Purpose): To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.
• Kuumba (Creativity): To do always as much as we can, in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.
• Imani (Faith): To believe with all our heart in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders, and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.

I'm going to do another series of posts in which I focus on the Nguzo Saba, how they apply to my chocolate trans community and the GLB/SGL and cis African American ones we interact with. 

I received some positive feedback about that 2010 series of Kwanzaa posts and some of you informed me that the posts I wrote were inspiring to you as well.

Now that I've made the decision to do another seven days worth of Kwanzaa posts for 2011, I pray that I exceed the standards I set with last year's series.

I hope you enjoy what I have to say about the Nguzo Saba principles and how they apply to our African descended community taking this year's developments into account as I ponder them.

For those of you who celebrate Kwanzaa, as you light the candles on the Kinara, I hope that each post serves to illuminate positive thoughts about my chocolate transgender community and the symbiotic connection we have with you and those Nguzo Saba principles in a way you haven't contemplated them before.