Colorado GLBT Peeps Flying High Over SB200 Signing

TransGriot Note: Our GLBT brothers and sisters in Colorado are flying as high as the Rockies today thanks to Gov. Bill Ritter (D). In the home state of Unfocused On The Family, it is now illegal to discriminate against GLBT people when buying a home, renting an apartment or using public accommodations. And yes Barney and HRC, we transgender people are included in this bill. So I ask again, what's keeping the Feds from doing the same thing?


Ritter signs bill giving gays equal access to accommodations
By MARK BARNA
THE COLORADO SPRINGS GAZETTE
CONTACT THE WRITER: 636-0367 or mark.barna@gazette. com
May 29, 2008

Gov. Bill Ritter on Thursday signed a bill that makes it illegal in Colorado to discriminate against gays, bisexuals and transgendered people when buying a home, renting an apartment or using public accommodations.

"The governor felt that this bill, SB200, was about fairness and treating people equally," said Evan Dreyer, spokesman for the governor's office. "It essentially updates anti-discrimination laws that in some cases have not been updated for 50 years."

Bruce DeBoskey, regional director of Denver's Anti-Defamation League, a civil rights organization, said the law is a step forward for Coloradans.

"No one should be denied housing or public accommodations solely because of his or her sexual preference," DeBoskey said.

One aspect of the law enables transgenders - those who were born one gender but identify with the other - to use public restrooms in which they feel most comfortable.

Beginning May 21, Focus on the Family and Colorado Family Action began sponsoring radio advertisements on four radio stations in Colorado Springs and Denver denouncing the bill.

The ads warned that cross-dressing predators could endanger children
by using restrooms designated for the opposite sex.

Focus founder James Dobson said Thursday:

"Who would believe that the Colorado state Legislature and its governor would have made it legal for men to enter and use women's restrooms and locker room facilities without notice or explanation?

"Henceforth, every woman and little girl will have to fear that a predator, bisexual, cross-dresser or even a homosexual or heterosexual male might walk in and relieve himself in their presence."

DeBoskey denounced Dobson's view.

"It is unfortunate that they feel they have to exaggerate the dangers and play on people's fears," DeBoskey said. "This law is about fairness and justice for all people living in this state."

Last May, Sen. Jennifer Veiga, D-Denver, introduced the forerunner to SB200 known as SB25, a bill that prohibits employment discrimination against gays, bisexuals and transgendered people. Ritter signed it into law. SB200, which Veiga also introduced,
extends the rights of these people to housing and public accommodations.

"This is a law whose time has come," said Ryan Acker, executive director of the Pikes Peak Gay and Lesbian Community Center in Colorado Springs.

"The passing of this bill shows that Colorado is a progressive state."

Copyright C 2008 Freedom Communications

Feeling Left Out

Don't get me wrong, I was just as happy as many of you when the California Supreme Court came down on the side of justice Thursday. You have every right to be happy, excited, proud, party hearty or whatever emotion you're feeling as the reality of this historic day and historic decision sinks in.

But the emotions I'm feeling are akin to someone who's not part of the cool kids clique getting to watch from their bedroom window a cool kid clique member neighbor throwing a slammin' party that the non-cool kid outsider can see and hear boisterously blaring next door.

My mood is tempered because I'm thinking about Christie Lee Littleton. She's a Latina transwoman who in 1999 had her 1989 marriage to Mark Littleton tragically invalidated thanks to a retroactive application of DOMA to it by insurance company attorneys. Her name and gender change was invalidated as well.

Why did it happen? To keep her from winning a share of a $2.5 million wrongful death malpractice lawsuit she filed as her late spouse's widow.

I'm bringing this up to remind my GLB bretheren that this landmark victory has come at the cost of the marriage rights for transgender people. Our religious right friends started attacking our legal marriages once they realized that we transgender people blow a Mack truck sized hole in their bogus 'marriage equals a man and a woman' argument they use as a baton to beat up on marriage equality with.

The Law of Unintended Consequences effect of the push for marriage equality has been that some of the anti-marriage equality constitutional amendments that various states hurriedly passed during and after the 2004 election cycle contain prohibitions for transgender people to get married. It also has many transgender people who are in male-female marriages nervously wondering if their own marriages will be the next ones to be invalidated.

Many of us in the transgender community have noted that when it comes to marriage equality, some of you GLB peeps are not accepting 'incremental progress' when it comes to a civil rights issue you desire to have become a reality as expeditiously as possible, but you don't share our urgency to have the same thing happen for a transgender-inclusive ENDA.

In my time working for the passage of inclusive ENDA and hate crimes legislation, I've had the pleasure of meeting and observing many same gender couples. They have been together in loving, long term, stable relationships decades longer than some hetero couples I knew who were 'so in love' back in high school.

It's a travesty that those same gender couples don't have the equivalent access to the thousands of rights that married hetero couples have conferred upon them and take for granted. It's not fair to be penalized tax wise because you love and are spending the rest of your life (hopefully) with someone who just happens to share the same gender as you.

Don't get it twisted. Congratulations! I'm happy for the GLB community and I ain't mad at you. Thursday was a historic day for civil rights.

But I still feel left out of the celebration.

Transgender Marriage Rattles Mexico

Mario del Scororro and Diana Guerrero, a transgendered couple, prepare for their wedding ceremony in Mexico City yesterday. Mario and Diana are the first Mexican transgendered couple to marry in a public ceremony. The couple said they hoped media coverage would pressure Mexico's Congress to pass a law that would let people get sex-change operations in public hospitals and then be able to change their names and genders in public records.

Photograph by : Tomas Bravo, Reuters]


Couple Hopes Publicity Will Spur Law To Allow Sex-Change Operations

Mica Rosenberg, Reuters
Published: Sunday, May 18, 2008
(c) Times Colonist (Victoria) 2008

MEXICO CITY -- A couple who both changed their sex married yesterday in Mexico's first transgender wedding, as the traditionally conservative country loses some of its inhibitions.

Mario del Socorro, formerly Maria, and Diana Guerrero, who used to be Jose, held an austere ceremony for friends and relatives in a community centre.

The couple said they hoped media coverage would pressure Mexico's congress to pass a proposed law that would let people get sex-change operations in public hospitals.


They would then be able to change their names and genders in public records.

"When you are applying for a job and your documents don't coincide with what you look like, you just don't get hired. It's that simple," said del Socorro, 55, who is balding with a wispy goatee and stands several inches shorter than his new bride.

Lawmakers behind the transgender proposal are challenging a swath of conservative customs in largely Catholic Mexico, and in recent years they have been gaining momentum.

In 2006, gay civil unions were legalized in Mexico City and the northern state of Coahuila.

Lawmakers in the capital last year legalized early-term abortions and approved a law allowing terminally ill people to refuse treatment.

The Catholic Church has strongly criticized all of these measures.

Del Socorro and Guerrero got married under their pre-sex change names because the law allowing gay civil unions does not give partners the same benefits as a traditional marriage.

At the ceremony, guests cheered the teary-eyed groom and beaming bride as they cut two tall wedding cakes before a crowd of journalists.

Members of the bride's Catholic family said the couple tried for months to find a priest who would marry them in a church.

"At the end of the day, it's a marriage between a woman and a man, so what's the problem with blessing this union in the eyes of God?" said the bride's sister, Flor Guerrero.

Confessions Of A GLBT Airline Employee

The recent Bilerico post concerning my GLBT airline brothers and sisters who've lost their jobs was a deja vu moment for me.

One of my nicknames in the transgender community is the Air Marshal because I worked for 14 years for CAL at IAH.

Oops, drifting into airline speak again.

I was the rapid response team for the transgender community during my early activist years. If we had a problem or needed someone representing us for a short notice protest or board meeting, I got called.

I miss it so much I wrote a novel in 2003 that weaves some of my airline experiences into the plot called On The Wings of Love

I started working for Continental in 1987 during the Frank Lorenzo regime. I remember telling friends after my grandfather passed away in 1984 and had worked 35 years for CAL that I wouldn't be caught dead there while he was running the place. I was upset that the 'Proud Bird with the Golden Tail's' quality reputation, as Continental's ad slogan was back in the day had been sullied by Lorenzo's union busting and heavy-handed diss the employees management style..

But since it was the Reagan years and jobs were scarce I reluctantly took it after resisting the suggestion from my dad for three years because I wanted to start in passenger service, not the ramp. I spent a miserable but fun year on the IAH ramp before I finally got the promotion to passenger service I wanted in June 1988 and subsequently ended up in Denver spending the month of July 1988 at old Stapleton Airport in training.

I loved the international and multicultural aspect of working for an airline. We had people from 40 countries and all 50 states and territories that worked at IAH. That multicultural aspect of our employee base also included GLBT peeps as well.

I also noted that it was consistent throughout the industry when I started non-revving all over the place once my pass privileges kicked in (I miss the Golden Handcuffs, too). As a gate agent and later a CSR and supervisor I got to interact with a lot of GLBT pilots, flight attendants, fellow gate emplyees and supervisors at mine and other carriers.

I also got to interact with GLBT customers, and I'll save those stories for another post.

Because I was the lone African-American on my gates for a few years with the exception of a few supervisors who became my airline mentors, I spent down time between flights in the flight attendant lounge hanging out.with my high school classmate Melanie and other Afriican-Americans. I got to meet some wonderful people and I still laugh about one visit to the company store which at that time before they moved the crew lounge to more spacious digs was down the hall.

I was grabbing snacks and was standing next to a 'family' flight attendant who was playing with a model of a DC-10. He held it in his hand like it was flying in straight level flight for a few seconds then nosedived it into a pile of t-shirts while singsonging the words "Death cruiser." It was a sarcastic nickname they had for the plane that referenced the DC-10's propensity to crash when they first entered airline fleets in the 70's before they fixed the problem. We used to call the A300 Airbus the 'Scarebus' because of the way it rattled like it was going to break apart when you revved the bird up for takeoff.

I saw the effects of the HIV/AIDS crisis reflected in the airline ranks as well. There were more than a few times I popped down in the crew lounge to say hello to some people and was greeted at the door of the crew lounge with a memorial photo and burning candle memorializing another co-worker who lost their battle with AIDS.

Before I transitioned I used to spend a lot of time in Montrose crossdressed . There were more than a few times I'd bounce into Charlie's, the gay-owned 24 hour restaurant and coffee shop in the heart of Houston's gayborhood and run into fellow employees there or at Studio 13, the Black gay hangout. There were also moments in which I had co-workers come out. Every time it happened, I had to ask myself when I was finally going to address my own gender issues and do the same thing they were doing.

I remember when one of my fellow Latina CSR's transferred to Inflight. I used to good naturedly tease Gloria because every time I saw her cute, petite self, she was standing in front of one of the floor length mirrors we had in various breakrooms around the terminal. Her makeup bag was open, not a hair out of place and she'd be applying mascara to those long eyelashes of hers that framed her wide light gray eyes

We'd become good friends over time and she came out a few months later. I was one of the first people she told because I knew her partner as well and she was worried about losing my friendship, I told her I had my own issues and that we were friends for life as she hugged me. Gloria ended up being one of the first people I told about my own transition in 1994. It was interesting to note that when I finally did so, over the next few weeks several people in various departments came out as well.

Since I worked the gates my transition was a very public one. I felt like I was in a fishbowl with 30,000 passengers a day transiting Terminal C at the time, and my co-workers got to watch me morph in front of their very eyes into the Phenomenal Transwoman.

The GLBT ones in and out of the closet welcomed me into the family. There were varying reactions from my straight counterparts. One interesting reaction was the way the guys shunned me for a few weeks, then resumed conversing with me three months later. It was as if I was beig severed from the Masculine Borg collective. The women embraced me almost immediately, and there was one memorable conversation in which I ended up in the breakroom with several sistahs and they laid out the Sistah's Rules of Femininity to me during a 45 minute break between flights. The fundies just tried to proselytize me.

In those early transition days I did a Terminal C listening tour in which I made it clear that anybody who wanted to ask me questions could pull me aside on our breaks and as long as the question wasn't too personal, I'd answer it. I made that same offer to the pilots, Inflight, the mechanics and the ramp as well. It seems like during that first six weeks I had more honest one on one or group conversations with people than I'd had with folks in the previous six years I'd been employed there..

The funniest one was when I had one female co-worker trying to ascertain what my sexual orientation was and asked me if I asked me if I liked women. I brushed her question off by joking, "Yeah, I like women. I like women so much I want to be one." When that led to one of my gay male supervisors pulling me aside after a flight and asking it I was transitioning to become a lesbian, I quickly had to do damage control on that comment.

Another humorous moment was when the late Jerry Falwell made his infamous attack on Teletubbie Tinky-Winky. and every out GLBT pilot and flight attendant in the system responded by putting Tinky Winky key fobs on their roller bags.

There were also not so humorous moments. I flew to DCA in 1998 for my first lobby trip with Vanessa Edwards Foster traveling with me on a buddy pass. I was still in the process of getting my work records changed to reflect my new name and my company ID already had Monica on it. I was in a great mood because it was my first trip to DC and I was feeling good after being on the Hill for two days (before i found out we'd been sabotaged by HRC a year later).

The African-American gate agent I showed my ID to, when it was time for me to pick up our seats for the return trip to Houston embarrassed and angered me by using my old name on the PA in a crowded gate lounge, in effect outing me to the entire lobby. He ended up issuing a written apology to me a few days later when i wrote up the incident for my supervisor and his GM.

The same thing happened to me in LA in 1999. This one exposed me to some jerks on the flight walking by my aisle seat and repeatedly calling me 'faggot' as I was still fuming about not only being outed again, but this time being erroneously bumped off the 7 AM PDT LAX-IAH trip. I couldn't retaliate because I was in uniform and heading back to work when I arrived at IAH.

I also used my passes to check out GLBT venues in other cities. I hung out at Club Peanuts on Santa Monica Blvd at Club Peanuts one Tuesday night and ran into a few actors enjoying on the down low the company of the T-girls hanging out there. So I wasn't surprised by the news of a certain comedian being pulled over on that street with a T-girl in his vehicle.

There was one night I was in the Village with Dana Turner and we were talking about transgender related community business during a drag show at One Potato, Two Potato. The manager actually walked over to us and asked us to be quiet because we 'were disturbing the (lousy) drag performer on stage. Me and Dana did double takes, then she replied to the manager, "Since when did this become Lincoln mother----ing Center?"

One thing I do miss about my airline days besides the travel, the flexible schedule, the money and the other perks that go along with it is that every workday was different. One day you'd be checking in a celebrity or politician, the next some sweet senior citizen taking a trip to see her grandkids, a couple on their honeymoon.or a kid heading off to college or military boot camp.

We were a family, no matter if you worked in LAX, EWR, CLE, ORD, IAH or some outstation with four flights a day. You were also connected to other airline people internationally as well not only at your own carrier, but others worldwide. We had airlne specific softball, volleyball and basketball tournaments, 5 and 10K runs in various spots on the globe and picnics in various places. The world was basically your playground and with airline passes, you could see any concert, attend any sporting event and any conference no matter where it was held. All you had to do was trade for the days off.

Oh yeah, we also had some slammin' parties, too. Some airline peeps can drink and eat twice their weight in food and alcoholic beverages. I also noted the irony that as many hetero airline couples marriages were crumbling because of AIDS (Airline Induced Divorce Syndrome) the GLBT airline couples I knew had been together up to a decade or more.

But yeah, I do miss the airline industry and I'm saddened that it's going through another round of consolidation and contraction that's going to cost a lot of good people some very nice well paying jobs.

But mine was fun while it lasted.

TLDEF Settles Landmark Farmer v. Caliente Cab Restaurant Lawsuit

I've talked from time to time about Khadijah Farmer, and I've received word from the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund that there's been a settlement in the case. The New York based TLDEF has been diligently working on her landmark lawsuit against Caliente Cab Restaurant Company.

As part of the settlement, Caliente has agreed to:

*Add gender, including gender identity and expression, to its corporate non-discrimination policy;

*Amend its employee handbook to state that "persons patronizing or employed at Caliente have the right to use the bathroom facilities consistent with their gender identity and expression;"

*Adopt a gender-neutral dress code for its employees;

*Institute personnel training programs regarding its new policies;

*Pay $35,000 in damages to Khadijah.

Just to refresh 'errbody's' memory banks about what happened, after the conclusion of the New York GLBT Pride March on June 24, 2007, Khadijah, her girlfriend and another friend went to dine at the Caliente Cab restaurant.

When Khadijah went to use the women's restroom, the restaurant's bouncer followed her in, pounded on the door of the stall she was using and proceeded to throw her out of the bathroom and the restaurant because of the bouncer's misguided perception because of her short haircut that she was either male or transgender. (are you listening HRC and Barney Frank?) She attempted to show him her NY state ID demonstrating that she is female, but was rebuffed.

This was a crystal clear example of why we transpeople have been arguing ad nauseum for over a decade that 'gender or perceived gender' language needs to remain in ENDA in order to protect ALL members of the GLBT community. Many transgender and gender non-conforming people experience harassment and discrimination when trying to access sex-segregated facilities such as bathrooms.

Khadijah's case highlights one of the major intersections between the transgender, GLB rights movements and our straight allies. Gender expression discrimination can affect anyone, be they transgender, lesbian, gay, bisexual or straight. The settlement also sends a message that discrimination on the basis of gender expression will not be tolerated.

"I'm very happy that the restaurant has taken appropriate steps to ensure that all patrons, regardless of how masculine or feminine they appear, are treated with dignity and respect," Khadijah said of the settlement. "People come in all shapes and sizes, and they shouldn't be discriminated against because they don't match someone's expectations of how masculine or feminine they should be."

Amen, sister. Now only if the Homosexual Rights Corporation and a certain congressman from Massachusetts would remember that and introduce an ENDA bill that not only protects everyone, the entire GLBT community can work together to get passed.

Lucas County, Ohio Leads The Way

TransGriot Note: A few years ago I flew up to Toledo, OH to take my friend Sonia Watson and her then one year old daughter Jasmine on one of my buddy passes to visit her mother. It was an interesting visit with her parents. Her mom is from Jamaica and Sonia jokingly calls herself a 'Jamerican', a term which expresses pride in her Jamaican and her American roots. I also got to see where Sonia got her flawless beauty from. She's the spitting image of her mother. She also teased me for a year after that trip about the Jamaican white rum I drank that knocked me on my azz.

Unfortunately I was only there on my three days off and burned two of them flying up and back to Houston via Cleveland. so I didn't get to spend more time there to see the city.

So knowing the state of Ohio's anti-GLBT rep thanks to ten years of GOP rule and hearing the stories of my transgender friends who used to live there, this recent news out of Toledo and Lucas County is underscoring the fact that the landscape is indeed changing for Ohio GLBT residents, and that Toledo and Lucas County are leading the way.

Lucas bans job bias for county workers
Commission joins Toledo council in backing state bill

by Anthony Glassman
Gay People's Chronicle - OH,USA
May 9, 2008

http://www.gaypeopl eschronicle. com/stories08/ may/0509081. htm

Toledo--Northwest Ohio has delivered a one-two punch for LGBT equality, with Lucas County extending nondiscrimination protections to its LGBT employees and joining the city of Toledo in supporting the state Equal Housing and Employment Act.

Toledo City Council unanimously approved a resolution endorsing EHEA on April 29. The bill, in the state legislature, would prohibit employment and housing discrimination by sexual orientation or gender identity. The Lucas County Commission followed on May 6 with a 3-0 vote to endorse the measure.

At the same meeting, commissioners unanimously passed the county worker non-discrimination measure.

During the meeting, Lucas commissioner Ben Konop pointed to Richard Florida's book Who's Your City. The follow-up to Florida's Rise of the Creative Class, it repeats the author's arguments that creativity bolsters economic development, and Florida firmly believes that protections for LGBT people help attract the "creative class" to an area.

"I think it was the right thing to do from two perspectives," Konop told the Gay People's Chronicle. "Number one, I think morally it's hard to argue. People should be judged for the job they're doing instead of their sexual orientation or gender identity, so it protects county employees from being judged unfairly."

"There's an economic benefit to our community from this, too," he ontinued. "There's been substantial social science research showing the more a community is diverse and accepting of sexual orientation and gender identities, the better the community does economically. We in Toledo are in very difficult economic times, so we need all
the help we can get."

"I think we need to establish ourselves as one of the premier communities in the country in terms of diversity and tolerance of people of all different views and backgrounds, " he concluded. "We going to take it very seriously and make sure it's abided by."

Michelle Stecker, interim executive director of Equality Toledo, noted that the welfare of the LGBT community is "tied to the economic development of northwest Ohio," but also said that the area enjoys an embarrassment of riches in terms of forward-thinking elected officials.

Franklin County, which includes Columbus, also protects county employees on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, while Cuyahoga and Summit counties (containing Cleveland and Akron) protect for sexual orientation alone, according to Kim Welter of Equality Ohio.

The four counties join 11 Ohio cities that include sexual orientation in their public worker job policies. Eight of these cities also protect private employees, and four of those include gender identity. The state of Ohio also bars discrimination in state employment by sexual orientation or gender identity.

Franklin County has also passed a resolution supporting EHEA, which was introduced in the Ohio House in March by Democrat Dan Stewart and Republican Jon Peterson, and in the Senate by Democrat Dale Miller.

Lucas County Commission president Tina Skeldon Wozniak told the Toledo Blade, "I don't believe we practice discrimination, but I think it's important to make it recognizable within the policy. I think it's the right thing to do, but I also believe communities that are progressive in their policies toward protection of people's rights have stronger communities. "

Stecker was pleased with the three unanimous decisions.

"We're so fortunate," she said. "In Toledo, our leaders are really supportive of LGBT civil rights, and Toledo has become a model city in Ohio in terms of reaching out to the LGBT community."

She enumerated the ways in which LGBT citizens are protected in Toledo.

"We have a domestic partnership registry, we have cutting-edge transgender protections, our large employers offer protections for LGBT employees," she said. "It came as no surprise that the county commissioners and city council were unanimous, because they are our allies."

"I'm thrilled they went on the record to support EHEA and I'm thankful for their leadership," she concluded. "It's because we have such wonderful political allies. When we go to them with our issues, we know they're going to say yes to us, we know they're going to be supportive."

"They don't just give it lip service, they show us by their actions that LGBT people are truly welcome here in northwest Ohio," she posited. "That's why Toledo is such a good place to live for LGBT people."

"We've been getting phone calls from people in other areas asking, tell us about Toledo, should we be moving there, and that's exciting as well," Stecker noted.

C 2008 KWIR Publications

Tellin' Our Stories

One of the things that is desperately needed in the wake of the repeated attempts by the HRC-Frank neo-Mattachine cabal to cut transpeople out of ENDA is African-American transpeople willing to tell our stories to not only our community, but our legislative representatives as well.

Thanks to the Democrats regaining control of congress in the 2006 midterm elections and the addition of members, the Congressional Black caucus is not only larger than its ever been in its history, it is now wielding historic levels of power with several members chairing committees, Rep. Clyburn being majority whip and a certain senator from Illinois running for president.

That fact hasn't been lost on our white fundamentalist enemies in the Traditional Values Coalition and the Religious Reich. They have sent their faith-based flunkies in the Hi Impact Leadership Coalition to do their browbeating for them. They know from historical trends that any progressive legislation doesn't pass the House without the support of 'The Conscience of the Congress'.

While I don't mind telling our stories to our congressmembers, I can't be the only one. Our enemies are damnded sure firing up the buses full of faith-based sheeple to spread lies about us and rolling them to Washington. The Lo Impact 'ministers' are using their TVC provided talking points to convince them NOT to include us. But all their talking points with their carefully selected negative scriptures can't compare to a transgender constituent telling their story of how a lack of employment protections led to them losing a job.

Yes, now is not the time to burrow deeper into the closet, but to take bold, decisive action like our brothers and sisters did back in 1965. If you want an inclusive ENDA and Hhte crimes law passed and signed next year, then we're gonna have to fight tooth and nail for it.

Hey, we come from people who are used to fighting against long odds with the deck and the power structure stacked against them and prevailing. This battle is nothing different. The HRC-Frank 'incremental progress' cabal that opposes our inclusion or hollers 'wait your turn' is similar to Rev J.H. Jackson and his supporters.

We have the moral high ground on our side. For all the bluster coming from the sacreligious right, they are the ideological and spiritual heirs of the same anti-progressive forces of Intolerance that Dr. King an his contemporaries faced 40 years ago.

But we can't sit idly by and twiddle our thumbs, then gripe that our concerns aren't being addressed. We have to speak truth to power, talk to our legislators and tell them our stories.

RuPaul Hospitalized After Being 'Drop Squaded'

RuPaul was admittted to a New York psychiatric hospital after being found on a Manhattan street corner repeatedly singing James Brown's "Say It Loud (I'm Black and I'm Proud)", wearing an Afro wig, black leather with a black beret and claiming he'd been 'drop squaded.'

'Drop squaded' refers to a 1994 Spike Lee movie in which sellout African-Americans are kidnapped, taken to a secret location and through various methods are reminded of their ethnicity, history and coached to have pride in themselves.

They were only thought to be a fictional group, but with the recent comments of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the rumors of the real time existence of the Drop Squad have only gone stronger.

A videotaped message left at a New York television station confirmed the group exists and claimed responsibility for the RuPaul and Condoleezza Rice 'reprogrammings'. They also warned other 'sellout' African-Americans that they would face the same fate.

RuPaul has earned the ire of GLBT African-Americans over the years with his lonely and unwavering support for Chuck Knipp. Knipp's Shirley Q. Liquor character is considered insulting by many GLBT people of color and RuPaul has lost credibility in the African-American community for supporting him. Knipp released a statement on his website that expressed his hopes for a speedy recovery for RuPaul.

The security was increased around Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas in response to the Drop Squad's threat and copies of the tape were forwarded to the FBI and Homeland Security.

This post also on the Bilerico Project

Escape From Louisville

TransGriot Note: This was originally posted to the Bilerico Project. Photo from the Courier-Journal

As many of you who've been monitoring the progress of the winter storm that's been shellacking the Ohio River Valley this weekend know, Louisville got whacked with a foot of snow.

But yours truly wasn't here to watch all the fun. I took a road trip to Chicago.

Actually, there was a reason for my seeming madness. I hit the road with Dawn Wilson early Friday morning to watch her fence in the North American Cup tournament in Chicago. Dawn is a competitive fencer and has been doing it for four years. She knows I love a good road trip, so I tag along to watch her when my schedule allows.

Dawn's no slouch as a saber fencer. In Vet 40 she was ranked number 16 in the nation and 24th in the combined rankings before we hit I-65 north for this event . She was eager to continue her push to the top of the Veteran's rankings in this tournament being held at the Rosemont Convention Center.

I had to work until 7 AM EST, so when my shift was mercifully over I headed straight home to finish packing. As I was driving hone from the airport area the first flurries were starting. By the time I'd gotten home, packed and put my bags in the car those flurries had rapidly changed into large, wet flakes.

Dawn was on her computer getting directions to our hotel in Rosemont. Usually she's badgering me to get moving because I'm the slowpoke when it comes to starting our road trips in a timely manner. This time she was the one holding up progress. I looked out the living room window at 8 AM and noticed the two inches of accumulated snow on my car. I'd only had it parked in the driveway for 20 minutes, so I knew we had to get moving soon or else we risked getting trapped in town.

We finally got moving northward ten minutes later and were dogged by snow and high winds all the way to Indianapolis. (sorry Bil, we'll catch ya next time). Once we got to the northwest side of Indy we broke into brilliant sunshine for the rest of our 165 mile run to Chicagoland through the picturesque northwest Indiana farm country. We arrived in Chicago about 1 PM CST and got her fencing equipment inspected after checking into our hotel which was right across the street from the venue .

After we finished, we walked around the center and ran into her LFC teammate Lou Felty and a few of Dawn's Vet 40 fencing buddies. They discussed the 'Baby Vets' nickname some of the Vet 50 fencers jokingly gave them. You have to be 40 to compete in the Veterans division and some of them just recently passed that milestone birthday.

But many of these Vet 50's aren't laughing tonight. A 'Baby Vet' won it, and Dawn and the rest of the 'Baby Vets' served notice with the beatdowns they adminstered that they were forces to be reckoned with in the Veterans Women's Saber Division.

Dawn and the 'Baby Vets' are part of the over 90,000 people in the United States that participate in this fast-paced Olympic sport. They range in age from 12 to 70 and some of those participants are also GLBT people as well. Even though I'm not a fencer, since I'm an FOD (friend of Dawn's) and have been to numerous tournaments with her, they show me just as much love as they show her in the fencing world.

Dawn's competition started at 7 AM CST this morning, so I decided to stay in bed for an extra two hours before checking out of our room since I'd been up a grand total of 32 hours since Thursday.

I woke up to Chicago being dusted with 2 inches of snow. By the time I sauntered over to the convention center, her pool bouts were over. She'd gone 5-1 in her pool and received a bye into the direct eliminations. She got through her first two DE matches before losing her third one 10-5 and missing out on a medal. After hanging around to watch the gold medal match and the medal ceremony, we headed back to Louisville.

Once again, just as we did on the trip up, we ran in and out of snow all the way to Indy, then had a clean 100 mile run to Louisville. Fortunately our driveway had been cleared when we arrived home at 7 PM EST since we weren't looking forward to shovelling 12 inches of show.

What Dawn is looking forward to is an upcoming July trip to San Jose, CA for the Summer Nationals. I'm just looking forward to the next time I get to hit the road.

The TransGriot's On Bilerico!

During my recent New Year's Day Internet radio interview with Ethan St. Pierre, he congratulated me for becoming a contributing poster to The Bilerico Project blog.

At the time I hadn't been notified by Bil or anyone connected with it that I was being considered, but that changed on Thursday afternoon.

Say congrats to the newest contributor to The Bilerico Project.

It's a huge honor. It's invitation only and they only add a certain number of new bloggers to their roster every year, so I'm thrilled to get the call since I'm a Bilerico Project fan as well.

It's a diverse crowd. I'm happy to be associated with some of the folks who post there such as Pam Spaulding (Pam's House Blend), Terrence Heath (Republic of T), fellow transgender bloggers like Rebecca Juro and Marti Abernathey, and other people I've come to admire like Rev. Irene Monroe and Nadine Smith. I'm looking forward to getting to know them better as the year moves along.

One of my resolutions this year was to focus more of my creative energy into my writing and my novels, and two weeks into 2008 it looks like that's already starting to pay some dividends for me.

I'm going to write original pieces for The Project on African-American transgender issues, and we'll see what transpires from there.

Why I'm STILL Boycotting Jamaica

I wrote a post a few months ago in the wake of hearing about the ugly wave of anti-GLBT violence in Jamaica that called for a boycott of Jamaican products and tourism to the island until they clean up their act down there.

As I checked my comments this morning I discovered one from 19 year old Shellie-Ann Anderson. Seems like the homegirl from Jamaica didn't like that post and left this comment on it.

batty bwoy fi get buss ass fi true.
unnu too raasclaat nasty and friggin fool.

if unnu nuh waan nobody lick unnu dung unnu keep unnu homo self to unnu self and mek peace remain as much as possible.

Yo Shellie-Ann, are they teaching y'all how to hate on GLBT peeps as part of the high school technology curriculum in Jamaica these days?

And how would you like it if I disrespected you and posted some BS like that on YOUR blog?

Ever since those Southern Baptist missionaries went to Jamaica and several African nations in the 90's, things have been jacked up in those countries ever since.

Maybe you should reread the last paragraph of the winning essay you wrote for that contest the Gleaner published.

We should simply be given guidelines for Internet use that we may choose wisely and ensure that our online experiences are healthy, productive and safe.

Was what you posted in the comment section on my blog healthy or productive?

First lesson to you little girl, is never piss off an activist. Especially an activist that has a blog with an international readership.

I am repeating my call to boycott all Jamaican products. If you're on a cruise and the ship stops at a Jamaican port, stay on the boat. If you wish to vacation in the Caribbean, travel to some destination other than Jamaica.

Shellie-Ann, you can hate on me or any other GLBT person either in your homeland, your hometown of May Pen or elsewhere online. But you and your country are the ones who'll lose in the end. I can afford to take international vacations, and I'll be damned if I spend one penny of my hard earned cash in a country that doesn't respect the lives of my fellow GLBT people.

The bottom line is that we are human beings just like you. Not only are we not going away, we are tired of the homophobic and transphobic BS coming from you and your fellow countrybigots, and it needs to stop.

Lambda Legal Announces Garner Fellowship

Lambda Legal announces the Garner Fellowship as it prepares to celebrate the fifth anniversary of Lawrence and Garner v. Texas, the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision, in June 2008.'

New York, January 8, 2008
Lambda Legal is proud to announce the establishment of the Tyron Garner Memorial Fellowship for African-American Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Civil Rights, named for one of the men in Lambda Legal's landmark lawsuit that overturned existing sodomy laws across the United States.

Through the program, Lambda Legal hopes to extend its current work serving people of color, and to increase the diversity of attorneys working in the movement for LGBT rights by mentoring law students who intend to focus on those issues within the African-American community. The Garner Fellowship will address the intersection of LGBT discrimination and racism, sexism, and poverty that affects African-American LGBT communities.

The fellowship committee is looking for candidates who have first-hand understanding of the issues that affect communities of color and have experience working with LGBT and HIV issues within the African-American communities.

"Tyron Garner didn't set out to be an activist," said Lambda Legal Executive Director Kevin Cathcart. "But he had the courage and conviction to stand up to an unjust law. Because of his challenge to the Texas sodomy law, the U.S. Supreme Court recognized that love, sexuality, and family play the same role in gay people's lives as they do for everyone else. His struggle will have a lasting impact for all of us, gay or straight, who value our constitutional rights."

The fellowship is a tribute to Garner, an fellow Arican-American man and Houstonian who died in 2006 at the age of 39.

For more information on the fellowship, go to: http://www.lambdalegal.org/about-us/jobs/attorney/tyron-garner-memorial-fellow.html

***

Some Lawrence and Garner v. Texas Background:

On September 17, 1998, Harris County sheriff's deputies burst into a Houston apartment and discovered Garner getting intimate with John Lawrence.

The arrests stemmed from neighbor Roger David Nance's false report of a "weapons disturbance" in their home — that because of a domestic disturbance or robbery, there was a man with a gun "going crazy." Nance had earlier been accused of harassing the plaintiffs.

Both men were arrested and charged with violating Chapter 21, Sec. 21.06 of the Texas Penal Code, the 'Homosexual Conduct' Law. They eventually appealed their case, Lawrence and Garner v. Texas, to the U.S. Supreme Court, where Lambda Legal's victory swept away sodomy laws remaining in 13 states, and vindicated the constitutional right to privacy between consenting adults.

Another Giant Leap For GLBT Rights In Nepal

AFP - France
December 21, 2007
[12/21/07]

Nepal Supreme Court Orders Government To Guarantee Gay Rights

KATHMANDU (AFP) -- Nepal's Supreme Court Friday ordered the government to enact laws to guarantee the rights of gays and lesbians, who have long complained of discrimination in the highly conservative Himalayan nation.

"The government of Nepal should formulate new laws and amend existing laws in order to safeguard the rights of these people," the judges said in their ruling.

"Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual and intersex are natural persons irrespective of their masculine and feminine gender and they have the right to exercise their rights and live an independent life in society," the judges said in the ruling, a copy of which was obtained by AFP.

The court also ordered the government to form a committee to study existing laws and provisions of foreign countries on same-sex marriage and prepare laws to give it legal recognition in Nepal.

Rights activists hailed the ruling as a landmark decision.

"It's a very encouraging and progressive decision. We all feel we are liberated today," Sunil Babu Pant, president of the Blue Diamond Society which works on behalf of sexual minorities in Nepal, told AFP.

The society along with three other groups had filed a joint petition at the Supreme Court seeking legal status and rights for sexual minorities in April 2007.

"There were no specific laws to protect the rights of sexual minorities but the Supreme Court's decision has opened the doors to enjoy our rights," said Pant.

There are no official figures on sexual minorities but rights group estimate that homosexuals and transgender people account for nearly 10 percent of Nepal's 27 million population.

Although homosexuality is not listed as a crime under Nepali law, "unnatural sex acts" can be punished by up to a year in prison.

"Now it's the government's responsibility to make new laws to guarantee our rights and we will put pressure on the government to act on the decision," Pant said.

His organisation was founded in 2001 to address the needs of sexual minorities, and has received financial support from singer Elton John and other celebrities.

Batty Boys

TransGriot Note: This one is dedicated to all my Jamaican brothers and sisters who are fighting to survive murderous anti-GLBT hatred there

An MKR poem

Batty boys
Antimen
Kill 'em haff dead for their wages of sin

Batty boys
Antimen
Hate speech hurled at us from Jamaican citizens

Batty boys
Antimen
Where's the 'One Love' for my GLBT friends?

Batty boys
Antimen
Jamaican GLBT peeps risking life and limb

Batty Boys
Antimen
Killed 'cause who you love is different from them

Batty boys
Antimen
Transpeeps beat down for being too feminine

Batty boys
Antimen
Don't want us on your island? You can have it, then

Batty boys
Antimen
Not visiting 'till all Jamaicans are respected citizens

Manifesto Calls for ANC Opposition To Homophobia

TransGriot Note: This is another example of South Africa leading the way on the African continent when it comes to GLBT rights issues.

Manifesto Calls For ANC Opposition to Homophobia

from the Mail & Guardian Online
Johannesburg, South Africa

13 December 2007 04:05

The African National Congress (ANC) must make the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people a "living reality" at its upcoming national conference.

In a statement on Thursday, the Lesbian and Gay Equality Project and the Triangle Project said an open manifesto demanding these rights will be sent to the ANC ahead of the conference, which starts on Sunday in Polokwane.

Phumi Mtetwa, director of the Lesbian and Gay Equality Project, said South Africa faces a "social crisis", visible in the difference between the rights enshrined in the Constitution and what is happening in practice.

She said the ANC needs to "recommit" itself to upholding those rights, and its watershed national conference provides an opportunity to do so.

Mtetwa said sexism and homophobia that have emerged, particularly during ANC deputy president Jacob Zuma's rape trial, indicate a need for the party to make a renewed commitment to human rights.

The manifesto calls on the conference to "fully and publicly affirm the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people as full and equal citizens" -- and make those rights a living reality.

It also calls for access to medical rights for these groups, a commitment of state resources for their needs, the integration of sexual-orientation education in all schools and for "effective and consistent" action to be taken against hate crimes against these groups.

It wants the ANC to "take decisive disciplinary action and other sanctions against homophobes and others who violate the Constitution who are ANC members and leaders". -- Sapa

HRC The Fake Civil Rights Org

TransGriot Note: Once again, in the spirit of the Christmas season, another one of my infamous song rewrites. Grab some egg nog, Christmas cookies, sing along and celebrate the lump of coal that HRC and Barney put in your civil rights Christmas stocking. Merry Christmas!


HRC The Fake Civil Rights Org
(sung to the tune of Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer)


HRC, the fake civil rights org
Plays inside the Beltway games
And if you ever saw them
You'd be appalled, shocked and ashamed

United ENDA and Tammy Baldwin
Pleaded with HRC in vain
To keep all of us poor transpeeps
Included in the ENDA game

Then one muggy DC eve
Barney came to say
"You transpeople don't desetve your rights"
"I'm cutting you out of ENDA tonight"

Aravosis and Chris Crain loved it
Rich white gays shouted out with glee
"Thanks HRC and Barney"
For keeping ENDA gay only

Go Canada!

TransGriot Note: It's sad that once again we in the United States, the so-called 'leading democracy in the world' are about to be left in the dust on transgender rights issues. Our British cousins passed the Gender Recognition Act in 2004, now this positive news out of Orrawa.

SIKSAY INTRODUCES BILL TO ADD GENDER IDENTITY AND EXPRESSION TO HATE PROVISIONS OF THE CRIMINAL CODE

OTTAWA – NDP MP Bill Siksay (Burnaby-Douglas) introduced a Bill in the House of Commons today that would add gender identity and gender expression as distinguishing characteristics protected under the hate propaganda section of the Criminal Code. The Bill also adds gender identity and expression as aggravating factors to be considered at the time of sentencing an offender.

"Transgender and transsexual people are regularly victims of abuse, harassment and physical violence", said Siksay, "this Bill will ensure that transphobic violence against transgender and transsexual people is clearly identified as a hate crime."

Siksay's Bill addresses the lack of explicit protection for transsexual and transgender people under the current hate provisions of the Criminal Code. It will also allow judges to take into account whether crimes committed were motivated by hatred of transgender or transsexual people when they are determining the sentence of an offender.

"I believe the inclusion of gender identity and expression in the hate provisions and the sentencing provisions in the Criminal Code will send a strong signal that targeting people for their gender identity or expression will not be tolerated in Canada," said Siksay.

Siksay also has tabled another Private Member's Bill (C-326), which would add gender identity and gender expression as prohibited grounds of discrimination in the Canadian Human Rights Act.

Siksay is the NDP spokesperson for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender and Transsexual Issues.

Schoolin' Rev. Coleman

Guest commentary by Jaison Gardiner
This was printed in the Louisville Courier journal November 27, 2007


Rev. Louis Coleman of the Justice Resource Center was quoted in the November 16 issue of the Courier-Journal that 'he worries that expanding our school district's harassment and employment policies to protect against sexual orientation discrimination will open the door for gay and lesbian employees to push their beliefs onto students.

"I just don't think policies should be put in place to protect habits or behaviors."

That's news to me since he was a Fairness supporter back in the day.

Fellow Frank Simon-flunkie Rev. Charles Elliott said that the fight for equal rights for LGBT people is nothing like the struggles of black folks during the civil rights movement. "We were fighting a race problem back then, not a habit or behavioral problem… Being (gay) is a choice. We didn't have a choice to be black, we were born that way,” he insists.

Being LGBT isn't a 'choice' as he disrespectfully put it either.

Mike Slaton, organizer for the Fairness Campaign of Louisville, said no one is suggesting that anti-gay bias is the same as racism. "Hate hurts no matter who it is directed at. We all deserve fairness regardless of our race, sex, creed, sexual orinetation or gender identity. No one chooses to be the object of discrimination."

While Mr. Slaton’s attempts at mitigating the gay rights movement are admirable, he is only half right.

Anti-gay bias is indeed the same as racism, sexism and the other isms. The fact is that all oppressions are linked and injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

In our society, the heterosexual, middle-class, white Christian male is the benchmark against wich all others are measured. Generally speaking, the less one of us measures up to this standard, the lower we find ourselves on the totem pole of social justice and public opinion.

As long as some people believe its okay and have the misguided idea that their religion makes it's okay to discriminate against people, then it will be necessary for political leaders to pass civil rights protections for the low people on the societal totem pole.

Changing this negative paradigm demands that we all work in coalition with others (yes, even gay folks) in the social justice movement without leaving anyone behind.

LGBT people have no more of a choice in deciding our identity than black folks, heterosexuals or women. The only 'choice' we make is either to hide who we are or to live openly as gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. Religion and political affiliation are choices that are currently protected by JCPS nondiscrimination policies, so why are Coleman and crew getting upset about the proposed addition of sexual orientation and gender identity to those policies?

I’d like to point out to Rev. Coleman and those who think like him the story of Bayard Rustin, an influential black civil rights activist who did much of his work behind the scenes. Rustin was the principal organizer of the 1963 March on Washington in which Dr. King delivered his famous 'I Have A Dream' speech.

Bayard Rustin injected Gandhi’s non violent protest techniques to the Black civil rights movement and helped sculpt Dr. King into the iconic Nobel prize winning national symbol of peace and nonviolence that he would became.

Only one problem. Bayard Rustin was gay.

Some of Rustin’s contemporaries in Dr. King's inner circle decided that Rustin’s audacity to be true to himself as an openly gay man overrode his blackness and diligent work for the movement and was a liability. Then-Senator Strom Thurmond and the FBI attempted to raise public awareness of Rustin’s sexuality and even circulated false stories that Rustin and King were romantically involved -- all inan effort to undermine the civil rights movement.

Those scare tactics worked in 1963. NAACP Chair Roy Wilkins wouldn’t allow Rustin to receive any public credit for his major role in planning the March.

It’s time that black LGBT people stand up and refuse to be the Rustin to Frank Simon’s Thurmond and Louis Coleman’s Wilkins. It’s time that black LGBT people
refuse to be silenced, bullied, overlooked disrespected or disregarded simply because we have the audacity to live in our own truth.

Black LGBT people need to recognize our individual and collective power as a community. Gay and straight folks alike need to recognize that black LGBT people have always played and will continue to play important and indispensable roles in the struggle for the rights of all people, whether it be the labor movement, women's liberation and, even for the rights of blacks and Latinos in America.

It’s time that religious conservatives stop skewing the Bible to justify their hatred, fear and loathing of LGBT people.

And time’s up for all the cowards who sit idly by and don’t speak up against injustice and bigotry in our country. After all, as Edmund Burke eloquently said, the only thing necessary for evil to triumph is that good men do nothing.

A year before Bayard Rustin died in 1987 he said, "The barometer of where one is on human rights questions is no longer the black community, it's the gay community because it is the community which is most easily mistreated."

Actually, I think it’s both communities that are human rights barometers, and there are more similarities in their struggles than either would care to admit.

An Ugly Win

And I do mean ugly.

There were 50 speakers on both sides of the issue, a cantankerous overflow crowd of 400 people and hostile comments from both sides, but in the end a little after midnight the sexual orientation addition to JCPS policy passed on a 4-3 vote.

While I'm not happy we got cut out of it, I still got my shots in for gender identity coverage and some snide shots at the Reichers as well.

This was a long day for me. I went to the Fairness office to participate in a 3 PM EST press conference, then headed over to the Van Hoose Education Center to prepare to do battle with the Forces of Intolerance and their faith-based hatred.

Hater Tots were on the menu for the anti side, washed down with 55 gallon drums of Hateraid. Rev. Jerry Stephenson slithered out of his cave along with several other Black ministers on the anti side. Of course I got my chance to speak 40 people into it and laid the verbal smackdown on the anti side and their selective use of scripture. I also pointed to the irony that the kids were more enlightened on the issue than the adults were.

The anti sides speeches were the usual gaybaiting Reicher talking points that I won't waste valuable bandwith repeating. Every time I heard on the anti speakers, I closed my eyes and imagined that I probably would have heard these people say the same thing about Black people 40 years ago.

Strike that. Many of this crew were the 'necks from deepest darkest Okolona and the South End of Louisville. Many of them forgot their pointy hooded choir robes.

This was more entertaining than some of the reality shows on TV, but sadder still because the raw hatred and ignorance of many peeps was on display tonight.