Transgender American Veterans Association Salutes the Repeal Vote of DADT

TransGriot Note:  The press release from TAVA concerning the DADT repeal

Transgender American Veterans Association Salutes the Repeal Vote of DADT

Contact: Monica Helms: president@tavausa.org
Denny Meyer: media@tavausa.org / (718) 849-5665

We are proud of our democracy that Congress passed this monumental repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell. Even though transgender people are still going to be separated from military service, Transgender American Veterans Association salutes this passage. We who have served our nation proudly now anticipate our own progress to freedom and equality.

Monica Helms, President of TAVA said, "For 17 years the US has made their gay lesbian and bisexual service members second class citizens and caused them to have to lie about who they are and who they love. No longer will that be the case. We now turn our attention to allowing transgender people to serve openly."

"It should be recognized that DADT has never included directives concerning Transgender people serving in the military." Angela Brightfeather, TAVA's Vice President stated, "Therefore, there was no call from Transgender Americans to equally serve in the military of their country, without persecution and discrimination. However, Transgender people who have and still do serve under the same pre-DADT conditions, still find it necessary to lie and hide who they are, contrary to the best traditions of the military. We now press our GLB brothers and sisters to finish the job and help provide the means for Transgender people to be able to serve their country openly and equally as do all Americans."

Many of America's allied nations have long since allowed open transgender service along with the service of those with alternate sexual orientation. The next frontier is for the United States is to progress to full and complete inclusion of the right to serve our nation. It is TAVA's expectation that now that DADT has been repealed that all those involved in achieving the repeal will now turn their attention to help transgender Americans also be able serve openly.

Founded in 2003, the Transgender American Veterans Association (TAVA) is a 501 (c) 3 organization that acts proactively with other concerned civil rights and human rights organizations to ensure that transgender veterans will receive appropriate care for their medical conditions in accordance with the Veterans Health Administration's Customer Service Standards promise to "treat you with courtesy and dignity . . . as the first class citizen that you are."

Further, TAVA will help in educating the Department of Veterans Affairs (DVA) and the Department of Defense (DoD) on issues regarding fair and equal treatment of transgender individuals. Also, TAVA will help the general transgender community when deemed appropriate and within the IRS guidelines.

If I Had To Choose.....

Between keeping either a gay soldier or a bigoted one....I'd say goodbye to the bigot.

At least the gay one won't embarrass the country, cause drama in the ranks or create international incidents that inflame the populace our units are stationed in on overseas deployments like the bigoted one would.

Remember Abu Ghirab?    The idiot in Iraq that used a Holy Quran for target practice?   A white soldier that deliberately shoots a fellow Black soldier in his unit.     Sgt. Dwayne Cole was shot in the neck and survived it, but is paralyzed him from the chest down.

So yeah, keep the gay ones, kick out the bigoted ones.

Repeat DADT.   Let everybody in the GLBT community who wishes to serve the country do so openly and honestly, including our trans brothers and sisters.

John McCain Done Told Me So!

TransGriot Note: Guest Post by the wonderful Maura Hennessey

Wednesday, September 22, 2010
at 19:27:06 PM EDT

We are clearly losing the war in Afghanistan, and there is a good possibility that Iraq will slip first into chaos and then into the hands of Iranian Shiite clerics. How could we lose the war? How could the greatest nation on earth, with the most sophisticated weapons and a professional army lose?

Simple: Because of the gays. I know, 'cause John McCain done told me so.

Gays break up unit cohesion, out gays create sexual tensions that distract from battle. Gays sap morale out of an army, weaken the resolve of fighting men.

How do I know? 'cause John McCain done told me so.

Now, all of you liberal tree hugging Obama-Socialist sodomitic Al Gore acolytes like HRC and that gay and lesbian servicemen's advocacy group or dating service or whatever are going to tell me that our military gays are safely closeted where they cannot do this kind of damage. Well, they aren't that closeted; they seem to be out all of the time since they are getting thrown out for being gay and we know that the military isn't doing witch hunts.

How do I know? John McCain done told me so.

But, that said, the biggest factor, the greatest danger and contaminant to our brave fighting men and women, the Christian Crusaders of the 21st century, isn't our gays, who remain closeted or we sweep their contagion out of the purified army of Christ. No, the real danger is those nations' forces who have real, honest to god out lesbians and homosexuals serving shamelessly and creating tension every time that their "social experiment" armed forces and our brave, real military men and women are tragically forced to work together. When that happens, their weakened, sex laden and perversion driven hopefuls for a Village People video infect our armed forces with their malaise, their unit division and their poor morale and combat readiness. It has to be so, there could be no other outcome from that kind of contamination.

How do I know? John McCain done told me so.

We must face two choices. Either we pack up and leave both nations to the armed forces of Sodom and Gomorrah or we inform our 'allies' that they must leave, and immediately. They must swish their way out of the war and let REAL, straight, Christian American men and women do battle against the forces of evil. Because, for as long as out armed forces are exposed to theirs, we cannot triumph, we cannot succeed and our military might will just wither like an aging Senator's phallus after the Viagra runs out.

We must act, and now, for every day, every hour that passes that we expose our own outstanding forces to these weakening and malicious influences, these GAYS, our potential to defend our nation turns to dust and we risk the Afghani desert looking like the Arizona desert, filled with headless corpses.

How do I know? What makes me so sure? What makes my position irrefutable and inerrant?

John McCain done told me so.

Shut Up Fool! Awards-DADT's Going Down Edition

It's Memorial Day weekend, and fittingly the House voted late last night to begin the process to repeal DADT with the Senate on course to do the same.

I'm glad to see that unjust law being erased from our legal books, nut there are more than a few others Congress needs to work on.

It's Friday, and that means it's time to shine an unblinking spotlight on the fool, fools or group of fools who have distinguished themselves by exhibiting mind numbing levels of stupidity this week.

As usual we had many worthy candidates this week. The usual triumvirate of O'Reilly, Hannity and Palin. Megyn Kelly of Faux News. Michelle Malkin, Cliff Kincaid of the Orwellian-named Accuracy in Media for this falsehood filled May 25 column attacking gays in the military. Ann Coulter...

But this week's winner is Glenn Beck. Yeah, yeah I know. He says something stupid and disgusting on an almost hourly basis.

But I had to whack him for attacking and mocking Malia and Sasha Obama's intelligence.



Malia and Sasha collectively have more intelligence and common sense that all of Beck's viewers.

Glenn Beck, shut the HELL up fool.

Lt. Choi, Join The Club

DADT repeal activist and founder of the West Point GLBT group Knights Out Lt. Dan Choi was recently quoted in a Newsweek interview as saying he felt "so betrayed" by HRC.

I have great respect for her (Kathy Griffin) as an advocate. But if [the Human Rights Campaign] thinks that having a rally at Freedom Plaza with a comedienne is the right approach, I have to wonder. Don't Ask, Don't Tell is not a joking matter to me. To be at Freedom Plaza and not at the White House or Congress? Who are they trying to influence? I felt like they were just trying to speak to themselves. If that's the best the lobbying groups and HRC can do, then I don't know how these powerful groups are supposed to represent our community. Kathy Griffin and [HRC president] Joe Solmonese said they would march with me to the White House but didn't. I feel so betrayed by them.

Join the club, Lt. Choi.

I experienced the same disappointment and moment of epiphany about HRC in 1999. It led me to join other transpeople who had the same moment of clarity to found NTAC over a decade ago.

It also led me to the conclusion that African American transpeople need to do more for ourselves in terms of fighting for our rights since white run and led organizations could not be trusted to effectively advocate for us and our issues.

You have not only discovered how your trans brothers and sisters feel about the Human Rights Campaign, you've echoed some of the same concerns, complaints and comments LGBT people of color have articulated about HRC for over two decades.

And by failing to support you at your White House protest, HRC once again has reinforced the perception that people of color are only welcome in the GLBT movement to provide melanin for photo ops, not determine policy or set the agenda for the movement.

One thing we people of color know all too well as Frederick Douglass reminds us, power concedes nothing without a demand. If the people leading your movement are too busy sucking up to the same powers instead of confronting them on behalf of the powerless people you purport to represent, it leads to an ineffective movement.

It also manifests itself in leaders that are resistant to doing anything that may put their own comfortable position at risk or engage in "tough minded" confrontational strategies that anger the defenders of the status quo they so desperately want to be a part of.

Lt. Choi, thank you for speaking your mind. You have now joined the expanding ranks of people across this nation who are seriously questioning the fitness of HRC to lead the GLBT community toward achieving the goals of full societal equality and fairness for our people.


Crossposted from The Bilerico Project