The 40th And Last MichFest

The 40th and last Michigan Womyn's Music Festival starts today and runs in the Hart, MI area until August 9.   After 40 years, it is being shut down by its founder, longtime TERF oppressor Lisa Vogel with rivers of white womyn tears being shed over its self inflicted demise.

People have asked me as a longtime critic of the Trans Exterminationalist (Exclusionary) Radical Feminists and MichFest in general how do I feel about that.

As a trans woman targeted by people indoctrinated on '''The Land' who leave after the Hate On Trans Womyn Convening to take that transphobia they honed there into the real world, all I have to say is this

So long!  See ya!  Adios!  Good riddance to transphobic rubbish! 

Makes me so happy to see it happening after 40 years I feel like popping open that bottle of champagne I was saving for a special occasion and dancing.

But let's be real for a moment.   It didn't have to happen this way.   All Lisa Vogel and MichFest had to do was evolve.  They hypocritically let trans men in the gates, but refused to do so for trans women, and they paid the price for their lack of inclusive vision. 

Women who believed that ALL women should be on The Land tried and failed to get that policy changed, and eventually stopped coming.  Many artists because of the blatant transphobia like the Indigo Girls, Nona Hendryx and Lea DeLaria stopped coming or refused to play MichFest.

Through it all, Vogel denied there was a trans feminine exclusion policy and obstinately clung to those transphobic disco era ways like a wino clutching her last bottle of MD20/20.

So when you womyn-born-womyn are crying those rivers of vanillacentric privileged tears and looking for somebody to blame for your little anti-trans hate party shutting down forever in a few days, look in the mirror first, and then at Lisa Vogel. .   .  

Y'all have fun being stuck in the 70's for the last time on The Land.

MichFest Dead After This 40th Anniversary Year

I'm one of the peeps in Trans World who could care less about the cesspool of transphobia known as the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival, but I do support the people in our community who would like to have a chance to go to MichFest if the hypocritically transphobic 'womyn born womyn' policy weren't in effect.

The so called 'unofficial' policy allows trans men on 'The Land', but trans women aren't welcome.

But MichFest was co-founded and is owned by one of the trans community's long time oppressors in Lisa Vogel, a TERF who was one of the peeps who signed the 1977 Olivia Records Letter demanding the ouster of Sandy Stone from that feminist record label.

A petition initiated by Equality Michigan has called for a boycott of the festival until they end the policy, and artists such as the Indigo Girls and Nona Hendryx have joined that boycott.

The Equality Michigan petition contains these bullet points:

1. Demanding you end the "womyn-born-womyn" intention at Michigan Womyn's Music Festival.
2. Request that Lisa Vogel, as co-founder and owner, meet with leaders of the transgender community and enter the space with an open mind to the notion that transgender womyn are womyn too, and have shared in their experiences.
3. Asking artists, attendees, and vendors to act in harmony with their equal rights values and NOT attend the festival until the transgender discrimination ends, and instead support other women's events which are creating a safe space for transgender women so they can join as well.
4. Requesting that any artists participating this year speak against the policy while on stage.

One of the organizations that stepped up to call for MichFest to end their transphobic ways was the National Black Justice Coalition.

“Our transgender sisters are simply women and deserve to be treated as such. It is baffling that at MWMF -- an event organized by and built exclusively for women -- imposes such blatant discrimination against one of the most marginalized groups of women in our society,” said Sharon Lettman-Hicks, NBJC Executive Director and CEO. “NBJC joins with Equality Michigan and the host of other advocacy organizations calling on the organizers of MWMF to immediately end their policy of not welcoming transgender women. This unjust policy only perpetuates hate and stigma, and has no place in a space meant to empower women.”

The MichFest is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year and Lisa Vogel has announced this year will be the last

"I am writing to tell you that the 40th Festival will be the last Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival. The spirit of this community will live on forever, the friends and family we have found on the Land are eternal. Everything we have created together will feed the inspiration for what comes next. It’s possible that I will come back with something else, or that other sisters will take the inspiration of the Michigan community and create the next expression of our Amazon culture. What is true for me is that now is the time to bring this 40-year cycle to a close, stepping out on joy at our most incredible anniversary celebration."

Yep, 40 years of anti-trans discrimination on 'The Land'.  Whoopee.  Good riddance.

The TERF's can whine the boycott killed MichFest all they want, but that would be a lie like everything else they have said about trans people since the 1970's has been. 

Lisa Vogel's stubborn insistence to cling to disco era racist and transphobic TERF hatred of trans women in a world that is rapidly evolving toward acceptance of trans women, is the reason MichFest is dying and will soon be on the ash heap of history.

NBJC Calls Out Transphobic Michigan Womyn's Music Festival

The Michigan Transphobic Womyn's Music Festival started on August 5 and is in its final day in Hart,. MI. 

While I prefer my concerts indoors and have no desire to swat mosquitoes in Michigan's summer heat, I know people that love going to 'The Land' every year.  Some of those women who like going are my transsisters.

But what I don't love about MichFest  is its transphobic 'womyn born womyn' policy that hypocritically excludes transwomen from attending it, but lets transmen in..

MichFest has been getting increased pushback and pressure from artists to end the policy   This year they  released a long bull feces laden statement trying to to spin their way out of the fact it is transphobic in the wake of calls by boycotting artists, trans allies, Equality Michigan and HRC to end the policy.  

Equality Michigan also initiated an online petition calling for the end of the policy.

While I was enroute to San Marcos for the just concluded TTNS,  the National Black Justice Coalition  (NBJC) joined the call of Equality Michigan to end their nearly quarter century old anti-trans women exclusionary policy.  

Here's NBJC's statement.

Washington, DC -- The National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC) joins the call for the organizers of the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival (MWMF) to end their informal policy of not welcoming transgender women to participate in the international, all women music festival.

Birthed out of the feminist movement of the late twentieth century, MWMF has provided an exclusive space built by and for women since 1976. This weeklong music and community festival, located in a small wooded area of Hart, Michigan, has maintained a policy that only women who were assigned female at birth should attend. This policy, known as the 'Womyn Born Womyn' intention, was first enforced during the 1991 MWMF when a transgender woman was asked to leave the festival because of her trans identity. It has been maintained by MWMF organizers every year since this initial incident.


“Our transgender sisters are simply women and deserve to be treated as such. It is baffling that at MWMF -- an event organized by and built exclusively for women -- imposes such blatant discrimination against one of the most marginalized groups of women in our society,” said Sharon Lettman-Hicks, NBJC Executive Director and CEO. “NBJC joins with Equality Michigan and the host of other advocacy organizations calling on the organizers of MWMF to immediately end their policy of not welcoming transgender women. This unjust policy only perpetuates hate and stigma, and has no place in a space meant to empower women.”

As Michigan’s only statewide anti-violence and advocacy organization working primarily for Michigan’s LGBT communities, Equality Michigan led the effort against the MWMF’s discriminatory policy by launching an online petition against it last week. “[W]e reject the premise that transgender women are lesser than, we reject that this belief is a tenet of feminism, and we will no longer respect the 'intention' or that 'leaving the onus on each individual to choose whether or how to respect it' equates to inclusion,” Equality Michigan wrote.

“NBJC urges its entire constituency and all supporters to sign the Equality Michigan petition and show the organizers of MWMF that no form of discrimination against our transgender sisters is acceptable in 2014,” added Lettman-Hicks.

To sign the Equality Michigan online petition to end the transgender exclusion at MWMF click HERE.

Nona Hendryx Ain't Playing MichFest

Well well, the Michigan Transphobic Womyn's Music Festival has one more artist not coming to The Land this year, and it's one of my favorite singers.

I have loved Nona Hendryx since her days with LaBelle and when she became a solo artist in the late 70's.   In 1983 she wrote a song called 'Transformation' which got me through some rough times during the mid-80's when I was wrestling with the 'should I or should I not transition?' dilemma and the early part of my transition in 1994.     

Today I have an even bigger reason to love her. She became the third artist to announce she wasn't playing MichFest this year due to their anti-trans policy.

'I will not play the Mich Fest this year.   My head and heart can't exclude fans or friends who are transgender & the policy of this festival hasn't changed.  "The only constant in life is...change"
XO, Nona

Nona, on behalf of myself and other #girlslikeus who share your ethnic heritage and out entire trans community, thank you. 

So we now have three artists that definitely aren't coming, two that said this is their last year performing on The Land if they don't change their transphobic policy, and four more who said they would make a statement from the stage

Moni's SistersTalk Radio Interview

Genia and I have tried to set up an interview on her and Andrea's SistersTalk Radio show on BlogTalkRadio for at least a year but haven't been able to make the timing work for both of us until last night  

With TERF's and transphobic comments running wild on her MichFest thread, she contacted me for my very definite opinions on MichFest.

During the interview I gave some of the historical context and backstory that expresses itself in the frequent transphobic eruptions and virulent hatred the white supremacist TERF's have for girls like us.

Enough jibber-jabber, here's the link to the SistersTalk Radio interview with Genia.

Hope you enjoy it.