Trans Actors Can Be In The Building And Still Get Ignored

Like a lot of Trans World peeps I was more than a little heated when the women of POSE were once again snubbed for Emmy consideration despite stepping up their acting games and putting in some Emmy worthy performances.

Tell me you didn't cry watching Candy's funeral?  Or laugh your azz off when Elektra read that Karen for filth in that Hamptons seafood restaurant scene.



Billy Porter was nominated for and won an Emmy last year for his Pray Tell performance and is now only lacking an Oscar to become only the 15th person ever to complete the EGOT.

What's the EGOT you ask?  An EGOT is when an entertainer during their career wins an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony Award. 

So yeah, he's mad talented.    He also said this when being interviewed last year for his historic Emmy win.   The part I'm salty about starts at the 2:51 mark of this video



That video with his 'we in the building' comment is heightening my irritation with that comment a year later.  While Porter received a second consecutive nomination for playing Pray Tell,  the POSE women got snubbed for a second consecutive year.

You can still be in the building and still be ignored.  You Mr. Porter and your fellow cis people all need to recognize that despite the 2020 Emmy nominations for Rain Valdez and Laverne Cox (and congrats to both those amazing women) the #EmmysSoCis.

Brian Michael Smith and Scott Turner Schofield are talented trans masculine actors who were not given 2020 Emmy consideration, either.   

Yes, trans actors are in the building.  But they still have to fight tooth and nail for the few roles in which trans women play trans feminine characters.  Hell, trans women have had to fight just to play a cis feminine character in Hollywood. 

Trans masculine actors have to fight just as hard to play a trans masculine character.   It took a major outcry from our community to get Halle Berry to reconsider a role in which she would be playing a trans masculine person.   Same with getting Scarlett Johansson to change her mind about playing Dante 'Tex' Ritter in the Rub and Tug movie.

Trans women actors have a problem getting trans feminine roles because studio execs and casting directors are still fixated on putting cis male actors in drag to play those roles.

And to our trans community's horror, those cis men (and a cis woman in Hilary Swank) have gallingly gone on to win the awards trans actors get routinely snubbed for by telling our trans stories..

So no, trans people aren't even close to having equity or seeing the change you claimed had come in that 2019 interview.  Your Emmy interview to our ears sounded like the dismissive 'wait your turn' crap we've been hearing from Black gay men with clout for over 50 years.

The way Black trans women are being genocidally murdered also adds a fierce urgency of now element to not only this situation, but everything we do.

POSE is one of the few productions in Hollywood in which we not only get to tell our stories, we have trans people in front of and behind the camera writing and directing them like Janet Mock and Our Lady J.  That makes it a unique and beloved show in our trans community, and we want to see MJ Rodriguez, Dominique Jackson, Angelica Ross, Hailie Sahar and Indya Moore succeed.

That means if these women's POSE performances merit Emmy recognition, we want to see them nominated for those performances.  If those nominations then turn into trans historic Emmy wins, we're good with that.

That is also the case for the trans folks working behind their camera.  If they are doing award worthy work, they need to be recognized for that.

Frankly, I love seeing all my Hollywood trans family succeed whether you are in front of the camera or behind it.  The measuring stick for how successful you are in Hollywood is winning or being nominated for major awards like Emmys, Oscars, or Golden Globes.

But to have a shot an winning an Emmy or any of those awards I mentioned, you have to be nominated for it.   This is the flaw in Billy Porter's 2019 'we in the building' speech.

You can be in the building all you want.  But if you're in the building, doing exemplary work, and are still getting ignored for unspecified reasons up to and including Hollywood transphobia and anti-Blackness, that's a problem that needs to be called out and addressed.

Lesbian Publications Take A Stand Against Transphobia

Been noting the anti-trans rhetoric being published and posted in large part without concern for our trans lives or rebuttals from the trans people that it negatively impacts. 

It was nice to see several publications geared toward the lesbian community uniting to sign on to a statement  entitled 'Not In Our Name' condemning the media driven transphobia.

It's also in reaction to the transphobic content  and tweets being posted on AfterEllen, a lesbian site that was recently bought out and since its management change has become a cesspool of TERFism. 

Representatives of DIVA, Curve, Autostraddle, LOTL, Tagg and Lez Spread The Word have so far signed the statement.
*** 

Following further vitriolic attacks on trans people in our media, the world’s leading publications for lesbians are coming together to send an unapologetic message of support and solidarity to the trans community.

DIVA, Curve, Autostraddle, LOTL, Tagg and Lez Spread The Word believe that trans women are women and that trans people belong in our community. We do not think supporting trans women erases our lesbian identities; rather we are enriched by trans friends and lovers, parents, children, colleagues and siblings.

‘We do not think supporting trans women erases our lesbian identities; rather we are enriched by trans friends and lovers, parents, children, colleagues and siblings.’

We strongly condemn writers and editors who seek to foster division and hate within the LGBTQI community with trans misogynistic content, and who believe “lesbian” is an identity for them alone to define. We condemn male-owned media companies who profit from the traffic generated by these controversies. 

We also strongly condemn the current narrative peddled by some feminists, painting trans people as bullies and aggressors – one which reinforces transphobia and which must be challenged so that feminism can move forward.

We are really concerned about the message these so-called lesbian publications are sending to trans women and to young lesbians – including trans lesbians – and we want to make in clear this is not in our name.

 As the leading publications for queer women, we believe it is our responsibility to call out scaremongering conspiracy theories leveled at the trans community, and make it clear that DIVA, Curve, Autostraddle, LOTL, Tagg and Lez Spread The Word will always be safe spaces for the trans community.  

 Forty years ago, to be a lesbian was to be questioned and persecuted. Today things are better for cis lesbians but there are still places where to be a lesbian is impossible.

 So it is for trans men and women, as well as non-binary people, many of whom identify as lesbian, bisexual, gay or queer. We know something of these struggles. And just as they and other allies have supported us, so we must support those among us who are trans, or risk ending up on the wrong side of history.

 The sooner we stop focusing on what divides us and instead focus on our commonalities, the stronger we will be to confront the other injustices imposed on us.

We won’t be divided.

Signed…

Carrie Lyell

Editor, DIVA magazine

Linda Riley

Publisher, DIVA magazine

Riese Bernard

Co-founder and editor-in-chief, Autostraddle

Merryn Johns, 

Editor, Curve 

Silke Bader

Publisher, Curve and LOTL

Eboné F. Bell

Editor-in-chief, Tagg Magazine

Florence Gagnon

Founder and publisher, Lez Spread The Word

I hope more sign on to the statement.in the coming day so that we in the trans community unequivocally know who stands with us.

Black Media Transphobia Is Not Humorous To Black Trans Women

One of the things I'm really getting sick of along with the Black trans community and the parents of Black trans kids is the ongoing pattern in the Black community of our Black oriented media outlets, be they radio, television or on social media, spouting hate speech aimed at the transgender community.

It is anti-trans hate speech like this that results in Black trans women getting beat up or murdered.

The latest sorry instance of what I'm talking about happened on the New York based Power 105.1 FM radio show The Breakfast Club that is syndicated to 50 markets including Houston's KQBT-FM to an audience of 4 million people.

It is hosted by DJ Envy, Angela Yee and Charlamagne Tha God, and has has a problematic relationship with the TBLGQ community and a long history since the show premiered in 2010 of anti-TBLGQ commentary  

This latest episode of Black media transphobia started when Janet Mock appeared on the show last Tuesday to promote her new book Surpassing Certainty.

While the Breakfast Club team managed to actually do a respectful and informative interview with Janet on that day, it was painfully obvious they hadn't learned anything on Friday when they hosted the 'comedian' Lil Duval on the show.



The show went off the transphobic rails quickly starting at the 6:28 mark    In addition to Lil Duval using the t-slur, he then compounded his ignorance fueled descent down the transphobic rabbit hole by expressing the sentiment of killing a trans woman if he found out he was dating one, repeated the trans deception lie, and then topped it all off by dissing Janet Mock for laughs as the Breakfast Club hosts egged him on.

We have so far in 2017 lost 15 trans women to anti-trans violence, and 13 of those women are Black. Even more infuriating to me is many of those Black trans women we lost were under age 40.

I am sick and tired of along with the Black trans community and the parents of Black trans women, of cis Black folks peddling transphobia for laughs, ratings or your monetary gain.

It isn't funny. And I'm sick and tired of the fragile cis Black masculinity reflected in their anti-trans commentary.

When we have the Republican Party at the state and federal levels openly pushing harmful anti-trans legislation like SB 3 that we're having to fight tooth and nail in my home state and the POTUS peddling anti- trans policies, your jokes are leading to Black trans women being assaulted and murdered.

So no Breakfast Club, not tolerating your so called transphobic jokes or any upcoming weak azz apology for them, especially in light of the fact you have a long history of anti-TBLGQ commentary.  #BoycottBreakfastClub

It's past time for Black media outfits, whether they are Internet gossip blogs, TV talk show hosts who used transphobia to build their brand (Wendy Williams) or syndicated FM radio shows like the Breakfast Club to please chill with the Black media transphobia  .

It is getting Black trans women assaulted and killed.

Why The Erasure of Black Texans Voices In SB 3 Coverage?

One of the things I thought about on the plane ride home and has been bothering me as I observe the media coverage in this fight to kill SB 3 is that as of yet, I have not seen ANY media outlet attempt to talk to Texas Black trans people, the Dallas based Black Trans Advocacy or even Black legislators in Austin concerning their thoughts about this unjust legislation.

And why is that Texas media?   Have you bought into the myth that the only time mine or the opinions of Black trans people are valid is when we are murdered, and that only white TBLGQ people or leaders of white led organizations are qualified to talk about pending legislation?

As Kandice Webber, a BLM-Houston organizer said to me in a recent conversation about the start of the Special Oppression Session and the anti-trans legislation, "I am not surprised at all. They create these horrible bills that rip our lives apart and then talk to everyone but us about it." "They talk around us as if our blackness doesn't matter. Black trans women are under full scale attack by Dan Patrick. SB3 threatens black lives too but all we see is white trans women I've never heard of and the occasional Latino person. This state constantly reinforces what we already know. They do not care about Black people. That's why it's so important for us to care about ourselves and stand together against this legislative oppression, " she continued.


And yes, Texas media, did you also not consider or even think about the fact that 18 members of the Texas Legislature share my ethnic heritage?  

The Texas Legislative Black Caucus, chaired by Rep Helen Giddings, (D-Dallas) is comprised of 16 members of the Texas House representing Austin, Beaumont, Dallas, Ft. Worth, Houston, and two senators in Royce West (D-Dallas) and Borris Miles (D-Houston)

The Texas Legislative Black Caucus also has the longest serving member of the Texas House in Rep. Senfronia Thompson (D-Houston) as a member, and TLBC chair Rep Helen Giddings is vice chair of the House State Affairs Committee, where SB 3 will probably land once it has cleared the Texas Senate.

Translation:  Many of these Texas Black legislators are or will be key players in this special session.

So yes,  as a fourth generation transgender Texan, I'd like to know and believe Texans would like to know where the Texas Black community's legislative representatives in Austin stand, and what their thoughts and opinions are concerning SB 3.

We damned sure hear far too much from Dan Patrick, his assorted white evangelical haters and any unknown kneegrow sellout Black minister that agrees with them  

How about the novel approach of actually talking to Texas Black trans people like myself?  How about talking to our Black Texas state reps and senators?   How about interviewing the parents of Black trans children, the people of Black Transmen, Inc (BTMI) and Black Transwomen, Inc. (BTWI) who are in the crosshairs of this oppressive legislation?  

Last tome I checked, BTMI and BTWI were based in Dallas, and have an annual convention every April in Dallas.

How about ending the media erasure of Black Texans voices concerning this unjust legislation period?

Vittoria Schisano Gets A Playboy Cover

There have been three trans women who have done photographic spreads for Playboy magazine in Brazil's Roberta Close, Caroline Cossey and Ines Rau.

This month actress Vittoria Schisano joins that list with her appearance in the February issue of Italian Playboy.   She may also be the first out trans woman to appear on the cover of Playboy.

You may recall that Vittoria announced at a 2011 press conference that she was transitioning, and ever since then the folks in Italy have gotten to watch her evolution into her true and beautiful self.

Another day, another interesting groundbreaking moment for trans women.