Will The Philippine's Geraldine Roman Become The World's Sixth Trans National Legislator?

In November 1999 Georgina Beyer made news that electrified trans kind and gave hope to trans people dreaming of holding elective office in their respective nations across the globe when she was elected to the New Zealand Parliament.   The Labour party member served until September 2005 representing the Wairarapa electorate, and was the world's first ever trans parliamentarian.

Beyer was followed by Italy's Vladimir Luxuria in 2006, Poland's Anna Grodzka in 2011, Uruguay's Michelle Suarez Bertora in 2014 and last year Tamara Adrian in Venezuela.

It's an exclusive sorority of trans national legislators, and we have news coming out of the Philippines that another trans feminine politician on the verge of making history in 49 year old Geraldine Roman..

National elections are taking place in the Philippines on Tuesday, May 10 (Monday, May 9 on our side of the IDL), and Roman is running for a congressional seat in the 1st district in Bataan where she grew up.

But Roman is not your average political candidate. Besides being a proud transpinay, she has some advantages that make her an odds on favorite to become the first trans person elected to national public office in the Philippines.   Roman is not only a member of current President Benigno Aquino's ruling Liberal Party, but she comes from a powerful dynastic political family.   Her mother has represented Bataan's 1st district in the Philippine Congress for nine years, and her father was a powerful politician in that predominately rural province.

Roman transitioned over two decades ago, speaks three European languages, holds two masters degrees and worked in Spain as senior editor of the Spanish News Agency before she returned home to the Philippines four years ago to care for her ailing father.

'My life has not been a secret. I grew up here. People know me. (Gender) only becomes an issue when you try to keep it a secret," Roman said in a recent interview.  "It's nothing bad. I never hurt anyone in the process. I'm so happy so why should I be ashamed?"

She hopes that her election if it happens, will send a powerful message that aids in the Philippine fight for TBLG human rights.  

"My loyalty is to the first district of Bataan.  But that somebody of my condition is going to enter Congress for the first time is a statement that even transgender people can serve our country and should not be discriminated against."

Should Roman win her race, she would not only become the first trans person elected to office in the Philippines and the sixth worldwide, she would be the second in the Asia-Pacific region after Georgina Beyer.

Best of luck to Ms. Roman, and hope she's successful in making Philippine and international trans history on Tuesday. (Monday our time)

Dr. Jillian Weiss Talks About The DOJ HB 2 Challenge On CNN

Earlier today on CNN attorney Dr. Jillian T. Weiss was on CNN's Legal View With Ashleigh Banfield to discuss the unjust HB 2 and the ramifications on the DOJ letter sent to Gov McCrory and the University of North Carolina.

I've been saying for a while that HB 2 was unconstitutional and a violation of Romer v. Evans., but I'm going to defer to my friends in the legal profession to let me know whether I'm on the right legal path here and if HB 2 could be the trans version of that landmark Romer v Evans case.

And now, for those of you who missed it earlier today, here's the video from Dr. Jillian Weiss' appearance on Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield.

 

NC Facing Monday Deadline To Repeal HB 2

Got another wonderful birthday present on Wednesday when the US Department of Justice finally dropped the hammer on  North Carolina by declaring in a letter sent to NC Governor Pat McCrory (R) that the unjust HB 2 was in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Title IX.  

A letter was also sent yesterday by the DOJ to Margaret Spellings, the new president of the University of North Carolina,  W. Louis Bissette, the Chairman of the UNC Board of Governors, and Thomas Shanahan, the Senior Vice President and Senior Counsel for UNC.   Spellings indicated that UNC would comply with the unjust HB 2.

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act bars employment discrimination, and Title IX bars education discrimination based on sex..  Recent EEOC and federal court rulings have affirmed that 'sex' included transgender people.

That repudiation of HB2 by the Department of Justice puts billions of federal funds in question, and the DOJ gave the state until Monday to 'confirm that the state will not comply with or implement HB 2'.

“The letter confirms what we’ve already known – that HB2 is deeply discriminatory, violates federal civil rights law, and needs to be repealed as soon as possible,” said Rep. Chris Sgro, a Democrat who is also the  executive director of Equality NC. “We’ve already lost $500 million in economic impact, and now we are violating federal civil rights law and risking Title IX funding.”

North Carolina public schools received $861 billion in federal funds for the 2015-16 school year, and the 17 campus University of North Carolina system received $1.4 billion in 2014-15.

That funding is in jeopardy if NC state legislators continue to refuse to comply with US law..

Read more here: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/politics-government/article75601912.html#storylink=cpy

Hate Bill 2, as it was dubbed by NC NAACP head the Rev. Dr. William Barber II, was hastily passed in 12 hours by the GOP controlled legislature in response to Charlotte passing a trans inclusive human rights law.

Republican officials are defiantly saying they will not comply with the DOJ deadline, claiming that 'they need more time' to respond to the letter, but their transphobic azzes proposed and blitzed through the legislature and Gov McCrory signed HB 2 in 12 hours.

We'll see what happens Monday.

RIP Tyreece Walker

One of the things I've been afraid of with all the anti-trans hatred being pushed by Republican politicians and the conservative movement, that it will result in a spike in anti-trans hate crimes, assaults and murders.

We've lost another of our trans sisters this week when 32 year old Tyreece Walker was stabbed to death in Wichita, KS  on Sunday after an altercation in her apartment complex in SW Wichita with a 16 year old.

The 16 year old boy was arrested and charged with second degree murder, and Wichita police have ruled out hate crime charges.  Meanwhile, the mother of the arrested teen is claiming that the deceased tried to sexually assault her child.

Gee, wonder where she got that idea from?

According to Walker's friend Victoria, she told KAKE-TV that not only was that allegation false, Reecey dreamed of one day becoming a counselor so that she could help other people going through the same trans related drama she was dealing with.

"(She) wanted to get a degree in psychology or social work to try to become a counselor to help other people try to get through some of the same struggles (she) had been through," Victoria said.

Unfortunately, a 16 year old transphobe ended those dreams for her.  

And once again we have another Black trans woman under 40 who has had her life cut short due to anti-trans ignorance and hatred.  .I'm so tired of my young trans sisters being killed and the ongoing silence from mianstream Black orgs about it.   Don't our Black lives matter, too?   
Rest in power and peace Reecey!  Your trans brothers and sisters will do what we can to ensure that justice is served in this case, because your Black trans life mattered..

NYC Trans Woman Attacked For Riding While Trans

Anti-trans hate thoughts + anti-trans hate speech = anti-trans hate violence/murders.  That is the equation that unfortunately adds up to anti-trans violence aimed at our community

The Republican Party and the conservative movement has been putting unchecked anti-trans hatred in the air, and as I and other trans leaders have been warning, it's just a matter of time before the ignorati seize on that hate speech they put out there and turn into anti-trans hate violence aimed at us.

Here's video recorded by Translatina Network outreach social worker Pearl Love while she was minding her own business on the subway back on April 28.

This member of the ignorati began flinging unsolicited bigoted and transphobic comments at her, and then became agitated as she realized she was being videotaped and subsequently attacked Love.

Love is okay, but  it's just a taste of what we trans folks are increasingly seeing no thanks to the Republican Party gleefully spewing anti-trans hate for fun and political advantage.

And oh yeah, New York State, when are you going to add gender identity to the list of categories in your state's hate crimes law?  This video is more evidence that adding coverage for transgender New Yorkers is sorely needed.

May The 4th Be With You On Star Wars Day!

In addition to noting some of the famous peeps who share my birthday like the late Audrey Hepburn, sportscaster Erin Andrews and Kimora Lee Simmons, my May 4 birthday has also become synonymous with Star Wars Day.

I'm a huge Star Wars fan and have been since i got to watch the original movie debut in 1977.   Many of the Star Wars trilogy movies also have in common they were released in the month of May.

In fact, one of my activist nicknames is Darth Maul because of my love for the movies and my take no prisoners attitude towards our not so esteemed trans human rights opposition.  I also got the nickname because my activist mentor at the time was nicknamed Darth Vader.   The fact she likes to fence only cemented the nickname into our consciousness.

Personally I think it should have been Emperor Palpatine, but (cough, cough, hack wheeze...)

Oh yeah, where was I in this post?

The unofficial day to celebrate all things Star Wars became May 4 because the date easily could be used to create a pun filled version of the movie's catchphrase 'May The Force be with you."., and the first organized celebration of it took place in Toronto in 2011.

Social media and the purchase of the Star wars franchise by Disney helped drive this fandom based day into a quasi official day celebrating everything Star Wars related, and now my birthday  is associated in the mids of Star Wars fans with the movie.

Can We Talk 4 Real Podcast Tonight Featuring BTAC

Later tonight myself and BTAC CEO Carter Brown will be chatting with the award winning Can We Talk 4 Real podcast duo of Michelle and Terri Boi about the just completed Black Trans Advocacy Conference in Dallas.

BTAC just celebrated its fifth anniversary and an amazing week in the Lone Star State, and we'll be discussing what happened at #BTAC2016   To become part of the conversation, you can dial 347-215-8985 and press 1 to take part in tonight's conversation.

The Can We Talk 4 real podcast featuring Carter and the birthday girl will start at 8:30 PM EDT-7:30 PM CDT, and hope you will join us for this sure to be informative and amazing conversation. 

The Conservafools Are Losing World War T

Ever since they lost the Obergefell SCOTUS case last year, the conservative movement has decided to take out their anger about losing that marriage case on the transgender community.  Right wing hate radio, the Southern Baptists and Republican Party have declared war on our community along with their longtime professional gay-baiting hate orgs like the Family Research Council, retooling their rhetoric to attack us as our longtime TERF enemies gleefully egged them on.

Even FOX Noise joined World War T, deploying longtime trans haters Keith Ablow and Paul McHugh to join their pundits in unleashing on-air facts free attacks denigrating the trans community.  The anti-trans haters successfully tested to my disgust their anti-trans talking points in their successful campaign to repeal the trans inclusive Houston Equal Rights Ordinance.

But despite their early successes, the bottom line is that the conservafools are losing World War T as they call it.  You might say the preponderance of evidence indicates the conservative movement was already losing to the trans community even before they fired the first ramped up shots of anti-trans hatred in this trans culture war..

Trans folks were already getting unprecedented media attention thanks to Janet Mock and her New York Times best selling memoir, Laverne Cox, Geena Rocero's well received coming out TED Talk and later Caitlyn Jenner.

We were already an increasing presence on reality shows, with movies like The Danish Girl and television shows like Orange Is The New Black, Transparent and groundbreaking trans characters like Maya Avant on the CBS soap The Bold And The Beautiful.

We were already winning in the courts and with federal regulatory agencies on various trans human rights issues thanks to Vandy Beth Glenn, Nikki Araguz Loyd, Mia Macy and most recently, Gavin Grimm's 4th Circuit court win that may be the death blow to Hate Bill 2.   Trans human rights protections are included in laws in 16 states, the District of Columbia and over 200 jurisdictions, with more jurisdictions considering doing so for their areas every day.

Colleges and universities are starting to create trans inclusive policies, although we still have much work to do in academia and the school settings to make them less hostile for trans students. . .

Those trans human rights court wins even continued on an international level with Ms W in Hong Kong and Joanne Cassar in Malta   Several nations allow trans people to change their identification documents without the prerequisite of requiring expensive genital surgery.

And thanks to trans youth around the country like Jazz Jennings and her award winning reality show I Am Jazz, our trans kids in many cases have been the front line advocates that have helped kill anti-trans legislation while emphatically pointing out in various ways that trans folks are part of our diverse mosaic of human life.

Even the preponderance of medical science is increasingly lining up with what we have asserted for decades and the medical care protocols for trans people and manuals like the DSM-V and ICD-11 are changing in response to the updated medical research about us..

North Carolina's Hate Bill 2 has resulted in an international backlash aimed at the Tarheel State. GOP controlled state legislatures in Missouri, Kansas, Tennessee and South Carolina that have pushed anti- trans laws have found out they have gotten ferocious opposition to them, and anti-trans measures passed in South Dakota and Georgia were vetoed by their Republican governors. .

And in a broken clock FOX Noise moment, FOX's Megyn Kelly jacked up North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R) over the transphobic HB 2.

And yesterday transphobic Ted Cruz ended his campaign after trying to deploy anti-trans hatred as a wedge issue in his campaign against Donald Trump and got his butt kicked in Indiana last night.

The coordinated attacks upon our community are not only forcing us to close ranks and work together to repel them, it's also resulting in us in Trans World stepping up our activism game.

In addition to building coalitions with cis people and groups to help fight the anti-trans attacks, other trans folks like Danni Askini and Kristin Beck have stepped up to run for office.   It's past time we were in these legislatures helping to write the legislation that governs us, not be on the legislative menu.

It's also past time that funders give our trans led organizations what we have needed for decades, the money and grants to build permanent trans human rights infrastructure and services.


While World War T is one that has been raging that we trans peeps didn't ask for, we had no choice but to fight it tooth and nail to a successful conclusion for trans kind.

So far we are doing that.  We are building community and the intersectional connections necessary to fight off the right wing attacks on us.

We will have wins like Rockwall, and some losses like North Carolina.  The trans suicide rate is unacceptably high, and it is ridiculous that people who kill us get a legal slap on the wrist fro doing so.

The overall trajectory is positive for us and trans human rights in general.. We still have much work to do in Trans World in order to vanquish the Conservative Forces of Anti-Trans Intolerance and win World War T.

Moni's Birthday Musings

It's my favorite day on the calendar next to Christmas, Thanksgiving and to opening day of the NFL season.

It's Cuatro de Mayo, aka my birthday that I have been blessed to celebrate for now 54 years and counting.

I thank you for blowing up my Facebook page with birthday greetings from around the world, and I'm not kidding when I say that.  I'm blessed to know people around the world and call them my friends, and that list is expanding as time moves on.

My birthday can be bittersweet at times.   I'm realizing that there are several trans people who have been murdered this year that will never know what it is like to live 50+ years on this planet, and we just got word we lost another young Black trans sister in Wichita, KS just 48 hours ago.  .We have been robbed of their talents and potential contribution to building our community and society at large.

And I'm tired of that crap.  I'm also seeing with increasing frequency the artists that provided the musical soundtrack to different points of my life are leaving us, as Prince's untimely death drove home two weeks ago.

And as the just concluded BTAC pointed out, I am now a seasoned elder in the community and not a neophyte thirtysomething activist in awe of my elders I'm encountering in a large convention shared space.  Now it's me that frequently has the experience of awestruck trans people approaching her.

Hey people, I'm human.  The only people whose heads I bite off are people who wish to oppress us.

But I'm blessed to be a year older, celebrating 22 years being my authentic self, and still don't know what I'm going to do to celebrate it.   It is Cheap Chicken Day at Frenchy's, so I'll probably be destroying some of that later.

Will be nice to see how this day plays out...

 

Transphobic Ted Cruz Suspends Campaign!

Aww yeah!   Got an early birthday present when I got to watch Damien Thorn the junior senator from Alberta suspend his campaign after getting his azz whipped in the Indiana GOP primary by Donald Trump.

Y'all know as a Texan I have no love for Ted Cruz, and his flinging transphobia on the campaign trail in a desperate attempt to stay relevant in this GOP presidential nomination race has made me like his behind even less.

While  Donald Trump being the presumptive Republican presidential nominee is a WTF inducing prospect in its own right, the one candidate that gave me nightmares out of all the 2016 GOP presidential candidates was Cruz

So hearing the words 'I'm suspending my campaign" coming out of his transphobic mouth was wonderful to hear and a happy dance inducing great start to my birthday celebration..

Now liberal-progressive Texans, can we work on kicking him out of his senate seat in 2018?.

Why BTAC Is Necessary

We weren't even 24 hours past the end of a megasuccessful BTAC 2016 conference when some loud and wrong trans feminine agent provocateur who shall remain nameless attacked the event.

I don't believe in saying nothing to ignorant trolls, I believe in confronting their idiocy head on because not confronting their ignorance leads to the incorrect assumption in the court of public opinion there is a grain of truth in their loud and wrong assertions.

I get the opportunity to go to many national and regional conferences throughout the year, and the one I look forward to every year ever since I first attended it in 2013 is the Black Trans Advocacy Conference when I was tapped to be its first ever trans feminine keynote speaker.

I have been blessed to watch this conference grow exponentially to the point that it is starting to get the attention it deserves as a major conference and draw interest from international attendees as a result.

BTAC is necessary for the same reasons that the Transsistahs-Transbrothas Conference in Louisville was necessary in 2004-2005.  In a LGBT conference world that is overwhelmingly white, grounded in and predominately caters to whiteness, and oriented toward the lesbian and gay end of the TBLGIQ alphabet, we must have spaces for trans persons of color grounded in our culture that celebrate themselves, our trans identities and discuss issues from that perspective.

I can recall being at Southern Comfort in 1999, 2000 and 2004, and you could count the number of Black trans people on two hands.  That's unacceptable in a city like Atlanta that prides itself on being the Black GLBT Mecca and lonely.   While I appreciated the opportunity to meet many of the trans leaders at the time, there were still times I needed to talk about Trailblazing Transitioning While Black with others going through what I was experiencing.

Being a Black trans person is a different transition road and set of circumstances to travel to be our authentic selves, and comes with a set of problems that our white trans counterparts in many cases don't have to contemplate.

When we toss in the issues of Black trans people across the African Diaspora, those issues become even more complex as we American based Black folks now have to expand our horizons beyond our own borders to factor in the issues that affect our African descended trans siblings in the Caribbean, Latin America, Europe and the African continent.

In addition to having a conference like the Black Trans Advocacy Conference that is positioning itself to be that bridge over the Diaspora, it's nice to be in a space that celebrates all aspects of your Afrocentric personality and is an unapologetically Black one.  It's one in which intergenerational and intersectional learning takes place not only in our seminars, but in our rooms, the hospitality suites, and when we have lunch or dinner.  .

It's also cathartic and vital that we be able to have family no holds barred conversations in which we don't have to feel as if we have to censor ourselves because white allies are in the room.  

BTAC has the feel of a family reunion because frankly, it IS one.  Besides the fact it falls on or close to my birthday, I know it's going to be one of the few conferences I attend in which my culture is embraced, centered and celebrated  (NBJC's OUT On The Hill is the other one).

I have heard and seen in my last four years people who enter the BTAC host hotel with skepticism, and leave it crying after the closing brunch or upset because they can't stay for the whole event.  It's one in which I got introduced to many of my Black trans brothers, and it's one of the few spaces in which I walk around and they spoil me and the other trans sisters rotten.  .

BTAC has spawned relationships and now two marriages, and fostered the growth of solid friendships and working relationships.  It honors people for their work to advance the rights of our entire community when they have yet to get that recognition from the trans community at large.

And BTAC is a conference that affirms daily that you are loved, worthy of being loved, and have much to contribute to our community and the world.

As Kwame Ture once stated, 'In order to participate in the greater society, you must first close ranks'  What that means is in order for Black trans people to become a stronger and more potent intersectional partner, we have collective internal community building work we have to do to make us the best people we can be individually and collectively. The Black Trans Advocacy Conference is one of the places where we do that collective community building work, with the idea that it will lead to a better, stronger, more cohesive trans community.

And that's why BTAC is needed and necessary. .  .

Rockwall TX Attempt To Pass Anti-Trans Ordinance Fails

While I was in the Dallas area for BTAC, the Teapublican mayor of the nearby suburb of Rockwall, TX decided to indulge his oppressor gene and jump on the GOP Hate The T******s bandwagon and proposed another unjust ordinance targeting us.

What Jim Pruitt didn't count on was the resistance and negative reaction to it that swiftly came.

None of the Rockwall City Council members supported it proposed hate legislation, and neither did one of the city's largest employer in the Hilton Lake Ray Hubbard.

The proposed hate ordinance drew the largest crowd for a Rockwall City Council meeting in several years with the main council chamber at standing room only capacity and every seat in the overflow room quickly being taken.  There were also 100 trans people from the DFW metro area in full effect protesting and commenting against Pruitt's proposed trans hate ordinance.

When Pruitt called for the vote at 9:35 PM after the public comment period, it did not receive a second from the five council members present, and died at that point.

While this is a win for the Texas trans community, we know that our lieutenant governor is already proposing that Texas pass a statewide anti-trans hate bill when our legislature reconvenes in January.  

So we Texas trans peeps get to celebrate this Rockwall win, and go back to trashing the Texas Republican Party and their like minded allies for pimping anti trans hatred for political advantage..

Congrats Rockwall for demonstrating to the entire nation that there are reasonable, thoughtful people that live inside the borders of the Lone Star State.

ConGRADulations Trans Class of 2016!

TransGriot Note:  The graduation photo is of Sharron Cooks, who is graduating from college later this month.  Thanks Sharron for allowing your photo to grace this post and congrats to you and all out 2016 trans grads for achieving a major life goal. 

With the calendar page flipping to May, it also means that in addition to prom season, we will soon see the invites going out for high school and collegiate graduations around the country and hearing bands play Pomp and Circumstance as grads walk across the stage in their caps and gowns..

Many of the folks walking across those stages later this month to get their diplomas are members of our trans family.  Some are making the jump from middle school to high school.  Others are taking the next evolutionary educational step from high school to college, and others like Sharron and Monica Jones are in the collegiate ranks about to earn their bachelors, masters or other post graduate degrees.

Some made history during their senior year like Landon Patterson, who became Missouri's first ever transfeminine homecoming queen, and Capri Culpepper, who won a 2014 lawsuit against the South Carolina DMV allowing her to take her femme drivers license picture.

She was a finalist for homecoming queen at her high school and Culpepper recently testified last month in opposition against South Carolina's anti-trans potty hate bill.

So proud of our trans younglings.  The trans kids are in many cases the ones successfully fighting the oppressors tooth and nail for their own trans liberation.

On the way to those graduation ceremonies celebrating their academic and other accomplishments, some of our trans family members endured drama inside and outside the classrooms in addition to hitting the books to get that knowledge. I also know of a few who dropped out of high school because they were fed up with the bullying, but decided to go back and finish what they started and get their GED's.

Congratulations to those of you who went that route and successfully passed the tests to do so.

It's not easy getting an education while trans, and our haters are trying to make it harder for you to do so. You deserve the utmost love and respect for making the investment in yourselves to do so.

The best revenge you can get on your tormentors is to if possible, live your life out and proud in the school setting while getting your education.  If that's not possible for you and your preference is the non disclosed route so that you can get your paper in peace, then handle your educational business.

Lambda Legal and the ACLU are standing by if you have haters trying to prevent you from expressing yourself at your prom, your graduation ceremony, or object to your same gender prom date.  The law is on your side, so call the local chapters of these orgs in enough time to help you out and defend your rights..

Congrats to you Trans Class of 2016 members .  Your trans family is immensely proud of you, and will be standing by to ensure that you get through this month with minimal drama.  .

ConGRADulations, Trans Class of 2016!

Indiana Presidential Primary Election Today

The Hoosier State gets a chance today to weigh in on the contentious Democratic Primary race between former Sec. of State Hillary Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders.

And just as a reminder who I'm supporting in this Democratic presidential primary race and why I made that decision, it's the real Democrat, not the DINO..

But back to the post concerning this Indiana primary that kicks off in a few hours.

There are 92 delegates up for grabs on the Democratic side, and after Clinton took four out of five Northeastern states last week to pump up her already sizable delegate lead, she needs only 221 more delegates to reach the 2394 delegates necessary to clinch the 2016 Democratic Party presidential nomination and sing the 'It's over' aria for the Sanders campaign..

She's more than ready to pivot to the general election and get to whacking on the presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump, but Sanders is still trying to hang on until the June 7 California primary.

But first we have to handle our electoral business in Indiana, and the Democratic race is close Clinton leads by 4% points over Sanders, but that is within the margin of poll error in a state that not only has an open primary, but is predominately white (72%). but has a 17% Latino population and a 13% Black one.

Handle your electoral business Indiana, and we'll check out the results later tonight.

Moni's Post BTAC 2016 Thoughts

I'm back at Casa de Monica after spending an amazing week hanging with my chosen family at the 2016 edition of the Black Trans Advocacy Conference in Dallas.

It was the fifth anniversary edition of this event, and it was a week in which I got to share the same space with old friends and make acquaintances with new cis and trans friends from around the country and increasingly the world.  This year we had attendees from Brazil and Jamaica, and I hope we continue to draw more people from the African Diaspora to the Black Trans Advocacy Conference..

It's an event that has the feel of a giant family reunion, but it's one in which we get to learn, laugh and love each other in a world that is being stirred up for crass political reasons to become more irrationally hostile to all trans people.  

It was sad we had to spend time putting out a press release condemning Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick (R) for pimping anti-trans hate in the Lone Star State mere hours before our conference kicked off..

But we refused to let the transphobic devils suck the joy out of this conference.

BTAC is a gigantic raised clenched Black fist debunking the notion that Black trans people don't exist.  It is the middle finger to all those who would seek to harm and oppress us.  It is an unapologetically Black trans focused space and conference that is also welcome to all who wish to attend and hang with us.  

BTAC is your family beckoning to those of you to come, get your hug and the welcoming love you deserve that the world and at times your own blood families fail to properly give you at times.  It's having fun and enjoying each other's company whether we are in the host hotel or out and about in the world trying to legislate us out of existence.

It's where we went to the correct bathrooms for an entire week and nothing happened in this hotel except us pooping, peeing and washing our hands when we were done.

It's remembering our ancestors who paved the way, the people we've lost, and the folks who wanted to be there but circumstances kept them away from us this time.  Know that you are loved by your BTAC family, we missed you at BTAC 2016, and hope you're blessed to be with us in 2017.

BTAC is where you can unapologetically be your fabulous Black trans selves.  It's sharing a meal with people who are like you and allies who unconditionally support us..  It's displaying your talent at TransManifest Live.  It's strutting your stuff on the Black Diamond Ball runway as you get tens across the board from the judges.  It's being crowned the king and queen of the BTIPS pageant system by last year's royalty.

It's exchanging information, hugs and heartfelt stories not only in the seminars but as you chill in each others rooms, in the hospitality suite or in the lobby area with other hotel guests and staff.  It's celebrating the start of love connections made at past and this year's BTAC conference.

It's getting dressed up for the Awards Gala and being recognized by your BTAC family for the work you do not only inside the organization, but to advance the human rights of our entire community even if the rest of the world ignores your substantive contributions to doing so.

BTAC is where your voice matters and you get to role model the change you wish to see in the world.

It's also a conference in which peeps find out I write and spit spoken word poetry, can step up my fashion game when necessary, I don't bite when you approach me to say hello, I have a wicked sense of humor, and I play a take no prisoners trash talking game of dominoes while others are doing the same thing when they play whatever card game du jour that is going on at the time.

You have been warned for next year, peeps thinking about coming to challenge the Queen of the Dominoes table. And if it hadn't been raining too hard Tuesday night, y'all would've found out I can bowl.

And trans haters, it's where we gleefully blow up your lies about what it means to be an unapologetically Black trans person or an unapologetic ally to our community..

It's also a conference in which by the time it reached the closing brunch on Sunday, I and everyone else there is sad it's over.

We are all painfully aware as we gather together one last time for that closing brunch it will be another 365 days before we're blessed to be in the company of these amazing people we've spent a fab week with in the same BTAC space

And this year I missed the brunch because I had to leave early to catch my 2:50 PM Megabus back to Houston.  I and Dee had to depressingly watch as everyone else attending it got dropped off by the hotel shuttle bus at Blue Mesa and we stayed on enroute to DART's Addison Transit Center.

So yes, while BTAC 2016 is one for the history books, already looking forward to next year, and hope those of you who missed it this year will join us for BTAC 2017. .

And when the date and location for BTAC 2017 is announced, you will definitely see it on these TransGriot pages.

President Obama Dropping The Mic At The WH Correspondent's Dinner

Last night before I headed downstairs from my room to the Black Diamond Ball, I took some time to check out the live broadcast of the White House Correspondent's Dinner because it will be the last time I'll get to see the coolest POTUS of my lifetime do so.  

It was the last appearance of President Obama at the 'Nerd Prom' as the White House Correspondents Dinner is jokingly nicknamed, and it will be one we remember for a long time because he literally dropped to mic when he was done.

He did such a bang up job it was a tough follow up act for The Daily Show's Larry Wilmore.

Yeah, we're definitely going to miss this president when he hands over the office to his successor on January 20, whoever she is..

Here's the video of his White House Correspondents Dinner speech for those of you who missed it

BTAC 2016 Final Day Highlights

Our week in Dallas for the Black Trans Advocacy Conference ended far too soon, and now we'll have to say goodbye to each other until next year.

BTAC 2016 has been an amazing event.   In its fifth anniversary year, we moved to a new hotel and broke our attendance record.  We had far more first time attendees this year and international attendees from Brazil and Jamaica..

The international attendees is a pattern I personally love and want to see continue.  The international attendees expand and add another level to the discussions we're having when it comes to being Black and trans.

For those of us who are still in the DFW area or at the hotel, we get the chance to meet up at Blue Mesa for our Farewell Brunch starting at 12 noon CDT.  We talk about the amazing week we had, share one last meal together, and lay some organizational groundwork for BTAC 2017.

Unfortunately, I'm going to have to miss it since my Megabus is leaving for Houston at 2:50 PM, but I'll be thinking about everyone on the ride back down to my end of I-45 and eagerly anticipating the dates for BTAC 2017