Take a look at these beautiful women. Since the beauty conversation doesn't include or ignores black transwomen, it's time we jump start our own.
Thanks to Frank Leon Roberts, aka Frank Mizrahi for graciously allowing me to use his photos. Check out his wonderful blog that not only chronicles the ballroom community, but gives you some sharp commentary on a wide array of subjects from this learned brother. And I'm looking forward to the day when I finally get a chance to chat with him and we try to figure out whether we're related or not.
One of the frequent themes that pops up in any conversation between me and my Canadian friends besides waxing poetic about all things 'Timmys' is them dissing Alberta.
As some of you may or may not know, Alberta is frequently compared to my home state of Texas because of the wealth, the oil industry ties, the rampant conservatism on steroids both there and my birth state, and conservative national leaders from Alberta and Texas despised by the rest of the nation's citizens.
One of the jokes I frequently hear from Canadians living in the eastern end of the country is 'we'll trade you Alberta for Minnesota' (or whatever deal they can get for it).
Sorry, we ain't giving up Minnesota. What would I do without Prince, the Minnesota Vikings, the Minnesota Twins, and when I'm griping about what passes for cold weather here in Da Ville, thanking my lucky stars I'm not there or in Palin-run Alaska?
The Oil Sands, Edmonton, Banff National Park and Calgary make it a tempting offer, but until we can turn Texas back to its progressive roots, we can't risk having Stephen Harper and his conservafriends in Wild Rose Country linking up with the Republican idiots they admire.
We just got a Democratic president in the White House who is quite busy cleaning up the Chernobylesque mess that Bushie boy left behind.
So, in the words of the latest game show craze south of the border, No Deal!
Feminism, according to a popular bumper sticker is the radical notion that women are people, too. Many feminists have forgotten over the years that the word 'people' also includes their Black, Latina, Asian and native sisters as well as their transgender ones.
While I wholeheartedly agree and support as a transwoman equality for women, I also noted the gulf between the predominately white feminist movement and women of color. I noted how they loudly and zealously rallied to the defense of Hillary Clinton for perceived sexist comments during last year's primary, but were deafeningly silent when Michelle Obama was attacked.
I also remembered the radical feminist anti-transgender BS from their patron saints Janice Raymond and Germaine Greer and follow on books by transphobe feminists Mary Daly, Catherine MacKinnon, Robin Morgan and Sheila Jeffreys.
Raymond once stated that 'transsexuality must be morally mandated out of existence' and it didn't get much better in her 1979 book The Transsexual Empire-The Making of The She-Male.
"All transsexuals rape women's bodies by reducing the real female form to an artifact, appropriating this body for themselves .... Transsexuals merely cut off the most obvious means of invading women, so that they seem non-invasive." (Raymond, 1979)
In fact, Janice Raymond for transwomen that transitioned during the 70s and 80's along with the ones who grew up in my era was the most hated person in the transgender community until HRC's Elizabeth Birch took away her title in the late 90's with her anti-transgender inclusion rhetoric.
Germaine Greer isn't liked by some transwomen either, and cosigned with Raymond when she made this comment comparing transwomen to the character Norman Bates in the movie Psycho:
The transsexual is identified as such solely on his/her own script, which can be as learned as any sex-typed behaviour and as editorialized as autobiographies usually are. The lack of insight that MTF transsexuals usually show about the extent of their acceptance as females should be an indication that their behaviour is less rational than it seems. There is a witness to the transsexual’s script, a witness who is never consulted. She is the person who built the transsexual’s body of her own flesh and brought it up as her son or daughter, the transsexual’s worst enemy, his/her mother.
Whatever else it is gender reassignment is an exorcism of the mother. When a man decides to spend his life impersonating his mother (like Norman Bates in Psycho) it is as if he murders her and gets away with it, proving at a stroke that there was nothing to her. His intentions are no more honourable than any female impersonator’s; his achievement is to gag all those who would call his bluff. When he forces his way into the few private spaces women may enjoy and shouts down their objections, and bombards the women who will not accept him with threats and hate mail, he does as rapists have always done.”
The injection of transphobic hatred and the logic defying justifications of it across the first and second waves of feminist thought was passed on to the new school of feminists who continue to eagerly drink the 'hate on transwomen' Kool Aid.
While we transwomen have had a contentious thirty-six years of drama with the feminist community, it pales in comparison with the ongoing parallel struggle that women of color have with them. They have fought the ongoing silencing of their voices in the feminist movement, got tired of being dissed, ignored and being accused of or being labeled as 'crazy' or 'racist' anytime they critiqued their treatment.
Black women finally said to hell with them and began calling themselves womanists, a term which was coined by author Alice Walker and comes from her 1983 book In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens: Womanist Prose. Womanists focus on issues that are broader based that what feminism focuses on, and include issues of race and class that feminism shies away from.
Over the last few years I've gotten to know a few womanists, become friends with them and discovered to my great pleasure that they are light years more enlightened on transgender issues and are serious about supporting their transsisters.
So if you wonder why myself and some transwomen aren't feeling feminism or have a detached ambivalence to it, now you know.
It took almost 12 years to bring him to justice, but James Hopkins was sentenced to life on January 6 for the 1997 murder of transwoman Robyn Browne.
23 year old Robyn Browne's body was discovered in her Central London apartment by her roommate Natasha Brentwood on February 28, 1997 with multiple stab wounds to her neck, chest, heart and torso. At the time she was undergoing gender transition and was doing sex work to pay the bills with a local agency.
Brentwood had been out on a dinner date with her boyfriend and discovered the apartment door was locked, she climbed through the window and discovered Robyn's body on the bed covered in blood. There were no sighs of forced entry, but a drawer had been pulled out and pages torn from Robyn's personal organizer.
Reportedly her client list had some high profile people on it and some of those people when the trial started were concerned they would have to testify.
In June 2007 Hopkins was arrested in Leeds after his palm print matched the bloodstained palm prints found on the bedroom door of Browne's apartment and on two newspapers found there dated February 28. When arrested Hopkins denied killing her, but admitted that he was paid £500 to steal an address book.
According to the Metropolitan Police, advancements in DNA and forensic techniques allowed them to bring this case to trial.
He'll have to serve a minimum of 17 years in jail.
In a statement to the court, Ms. Browne's sister Louise said in a statement to the court that "Now there can be some sort of closure. Her death impacts on those who knew her."
Too bad the family of Kellie Telesford won't get to feel the satisfied feeling of knowing their loved one's killer was brought to justice.
One of my guilty television pleasures is watching Kim, Ron, Wade, and Monique negotiate the travails of high school life while jetting around the world to fight evildoers such as Dr. Drakken, Shego, Monkey Fist, Duff Killian, Senor Senior, Sr. and Senor Senior, Jr.
Oh yeah, and it does has a catchy theme song, too.
While I have a major beef with how it was heavily promoted by Disney vis a vis The Proud Family, I still like the cartoon.
Like 'errbody' else who watched it I was happy to see lifelong friends Kim and Ron kissing each other at the prom and becoming a couple. It's been interesting to see not only how their relationship develops, but how Kim deals with her twin brothers Jim and Tim, AKA 'the tweebs' being skipped to the 9th grade and now attending Middleton High during her and Ron's senior year.
It's also nice to see supergenius Wade get out of his room (voiced by Tahj Mowry). Wade is the youngest member of Team Possible and graduated from high school and college at age 10. He also creates much of the high-tech wizardry Kim and Ron use on their missions and keeps her up to date with a constant stream of intel filtered through the computer in his room.
Monique (voiced by Raven) is Kim's best female friend. She works at Club Banana, has become its assistant manager and even convinced Kim to work there.
Monique not only keeps the jet setting Kim cognizant of the Middleton High School happenings, she gives Kim sage advice when she's sorting out various problems in her non crime fighting life. She like Wade even helps Kim and Ron on an occasional crime fighting mission sometimes as well.
Kim Possible has garnered an international following and thanks to YouTube, yours truly gets the chance to catch up on whatever episodes she's missed.
One little noticed event that happened while 'errbody' was focused on the inauguration was that the White House website switched over at 12:01 PM with the change of administrations.
If you needed another indicator that this isn't a dream and we are indeed a far different nation than we were on Monday and the last 8 years, check out this website.
We transwomen on a daily basis face so many serious issues and threats to our simple right to exist. We have people that fear us, that refuse to understand what we deal with in our lives, hate us to the point that they want to kill us, keep us unemployed, or even deny us the opportunity to go to the gender appropriate bathroom.
But just as my peeps have learned over the centuries to take dire situations and turn them into humor, transwomen for the sake of our own sanity either have or will need to learn how to do the same thing.
Like the Playboy transgender themed cartoons that are part of this post, while they are examples of some serious moments in transgender people's lives, I look at them and take a moment to chuckle. It helps remind me to stand down just for a few moments from the Defcon 1 life-or-death game face I have to put on sometimes just to live my life in a world that can be hostile to transgender people.
At times I think back to some of the more embarrassing moments I went through early in my transition that make me laugh now, but were mortifying events at the time they happened. I forgot to lock the bathroom door while non revving home during a 1999 San Francisco-Houston flight and fortunately I was in a sitting position when the door popped open. I got teased about it at work for a month and Lisa Bronte, the first class flight attendant who witnessed it, needled me about it for a year.
I take time to find humor in my situation and allow it into my life because even though I'm committed to seeing transgender rights laws become a reality and do my small part to make it happen, it can be depression inducing and frustrating work. But even out of some of those journeys to lobby have come humorous moments that I treasure to this day.
There have been times when I've gone to conventions and been one of the few African-Americans in the room, but have observed or experienced things that made me double over in laughter.
I still have fond memories of the first time I showed up at a planning meeting for my 20th high school reunion. While some of my high school classmates had heard I'd transitioned, others hadn't. The joke I cracked for the next year and a half leading up to that October 2000 reunion weekend was, "Well, we know who has a lock on the 'Most Changed Award' for this reunion."
I know we are tackling some serious and seemingly intractable problems, especially as transpeople of color. But just as we need to stop, take a look around and thank God for the blessings that we have in our lives such as good friends, good health and allies who get it, we should at the same time try to find ways to inject more humor in our lives as well.
TransGriot Note: cartoons were transgender themed recaptions by Lorna Samuels
Back in the BI (before Internet) days I was searching for any information I could get on transgender people. If I spotted a newspaper article on a transperson, I clipped it out and stuck it in an envelope to peruse later. I saved, but eventually lost in the process of moving from my parents house to my apartment the JET magazine issues that chronicled the stories of transsistahs Justina Williams and Sharon Davis.
But one unlikely source of info for me came from a glossy magazine called Female Mimics International, or FMI for short.
I ended up getting dragged into the Bellaire News adult store one day by a friend who was looking for adult movies to rent. While he was perusing the movies, I was hanging around the magazine racks and spotted an issue of FMI that had an African-American transwoman on the cover. Since I was with my homeboy and wasn't even remotely ready to tell him that I was hanging out in Montrose but dressing a bit differently when I did so, I couldn't purchase it at that moment. I came back a few day later and picked up it because I was curious about the magazine and its contents.
FMI was part of Kim Christy's adult publishing world. While part of each issue served to promote whatever adult transgender themed video she had just produced or some of her regular Kim Christy starlets such as Heather Fontaine, Dana Douglas, and Summer St. Cerly, there were in many FMI magazines short fiction stories, transition tips, coverage of the California transgender pageant scene and San Francisco and LA transgender events. There was also one Kim published when her longtime friend and New York transgender icon International Chrysis died that had a tribute article.
I ended up with a large collection of them before an ex-girlfriend found them in the box I kept them in while rummaging through my apartment closet. She unilaterally took them to the dumpster while I was at work. I was royally pissed about it when I found out about it later not only because they were my property, now it's hard to even find FMI magazines and the collection I'd built up over several years would have made a nice addition to some GLBT archive.
But in its own way, FMI not only showcased the beauty of transgender women, but actually managed to inform and open a window to another aspect of that world at the same time.
TransGriot Note: This editorial appeared in the Macon Telegraph and was written by Andrew M. Manis, an associate professor of history at Macon State College in Georgia.
When Are WE Going to Get Over It? by Andrew M. Manis
For much of the last forty years, ever since America "fixed" its race problem in the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts, we white people have been impatient with African Americans who continued to blame race for their difficulties. Often we have heard whites ask, "When are African Americans finally going to get over it? Now I want to ask: "When are we White Americans going to get over our ridiculous obsession with skin color?
Recent reports that "Election Spurs Hundreds' of Race Threats, Crimes" should frighten and infuriate every one of us. Having grown up in "Bombingham," Alabama in the 1960s, I remember overhearing an avalanche of comments about what many white classmates and their parents wanted to do to John and Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King. Eventually, as you may recall, in all three cases, someone decided to do more than "talk the talk."
Since our recent presidential election, to our eternal shame we are once again hearing the same reprehensible talk I remember from my boyhood.
We white people have controlled political life in the disunited colonies and United States for some 400 years on this continent. Conservative whites have been in power 28 of the last 40 years. Even during the eight Clinton years, conservatives in Congress blocked most of his agenda and pulled him to the right. Yet never in that period did I read any headlines suggesting that anyone was calling for the assassinations of presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan, or either of the Bushes. Criticize them, yes. Call for their impeachment, perhaps. But there were no bounties on their heads. And even when someone did try to kill Ronald Reagan, the perpetrator was non-political mental case who wanted merely to impress Jody Foster.
But elect a liberal who happens to be Black and we're back in the sixties again. At this point in our history, we should be proud that we've proven what conservatives are always saying -- that in America anything is possible, EVEN electing a black man as president. But instead we now hear that school children from Maine to California are talking about wanting to "assassinate Obama."
Fighting the urge to throw up, I can only ask, "How long?" How long before we white people realize we can't make our nation, much less the whole world, look like us? How long until we white people can - once and for all - get over this hell-conceived preoccupation with skin color? How long until we white people get over the demonic conviction that white skin makes us superior? How long before we white people get over our bitter resentments about being demoted to the status of equality with non-whites?
How long before we get over our expectations that we should be at the head of the line merely because of our white skin? How long until we white people end our silence and call out our peers when they share the latest racist jokes in the privacy of our white-only conversations?
I believe in free speech, but how long until we white people start making racist loudmouths as socially uncomfortable as we do flag burners? How long until we white people will stop insisting that blacks exercise personal responsibility, build strong families, educate themselves enough to edit the Harvard Law Review, and work hard enough to become President of the United States, only to threaten to assassinate them when they do?
How long before we starting "living out the true meaning" of our creeds, both civil and religious, that all men and women are created equal and that "red and yellow, black and white" all are precious in God's sight?
Until this past November 4, I didn't believe this country would ever elect an African American to the presidency. I still don't believe I'll live long enough to see us white people get over our racism problem. But here's my three-point plan: First, everyday that Barack Obama lives in the White House that Black Slaves Built, I'm going to pray that God (and the Secret Service) will protect him and his family from us white people.
Second, I'm going to report to the FBI any white person I overhear saying, in seriousness or in jest, anything of a threatening nature about President Obama. Third, I'm going to pray to live long enough to see America surprise the world once again, when white people can "in spirit and in truth" sing of our damnable color prejudice, "We HAVE overcome."
After dancing the night away and party hopping at ten star studded balls in celebration of a historic inauguration, accepting the congratulations of other world leaders on his historic ascension to the presidency, and having 2 million people on the mall to witness it, it's time for President Obama to get to work.
First order of business was halting all of the last minute regulations Bushie boy tried to ramrod through in the final days and hours of his misadministration, making the first moves to shut down Guantanamo Bay, enacting tough new ethics rules and making calls to world leaders in the Middle East.
One I was especially concerned about as a transperson was the one that allowed health care personnel to deny treatment or dispense medication for religious reasons, and hopefully, that's one of the policies that's under review.
In the meantime, enjoy Will.I.Am's slammin' song that matches the title of this post.
TransGriot Note: Lost in all the loud hue and cry over Rick Warren's invocation was the fact that civil rights icon Rev. Joseph Lowery, a friend of the GLBT community was giving the benediction. Here's the text of that benediction
God of our weary years, God of our silent tears, thou, who has brought us thus far along the way, thou, who has by thy might led us into the light, keep us forever in the path we pray, lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met thee, lest our hearts drunk with the wine of the world, we forget thee.
Shadowed beneath thy hand, may we forever stand true to thee, oh God, and true to our native land.
We truly give thanks for the glorious experience we've shared this day.
We pray now, oh Lord, for your blessing upon thy servant Barack Obama, the 44th president of these United States, his family and his administration.
He has come to this high office at a low moment in the national, and indeed the global, fiscal climate. But because we know you got the whole world in your hands, we pray for not only our nation, but for the community of nations.
Our faith does not shrink though pressed by the flood of mortal ills.
For we know that, Lord, you are able and you're willing to work through faithful leadership to restore stability, mend our brokenness, heal our wounds, and deliver us from the exploitation of the poor, of the least of these, and from favoritism toward the rich, the elite of these.
We thank you for the empowering of thy servant, our 44th president, to inspire our nation to believe that yes we can work together to achieve a more perfect union.
And while we have sown the seeds of greed — the wind of greed and corruption, and even as we reap the whirlwind of social and economic disruption, we seek forgiveness and we come in a spirit of unity and solidarity to commit our support to our president by our willingness to make sacrifices, to respect your creation, to turn to each other and not on each other.
And now, Lord, in the complex arena of human relations, help us to make choices on the side of love, not hate; on the side of inclusion, not exclusion; tolerance, not intolerance.
And as we leave this mountain top, help us to hold on to the spirit of fellowship and the oneness of our family. Let us take that power back to our homes, our workplaces, our churches, our temples, our mosques, or wherever we seek your will.
Bless President Barack, First Lady Michelle. Look over our little angelic Sasha and Malia.
We go now to walk together as children, pledging that we won't get weary in the difficult days ahead. We know you will not leave us alone.
With your hands of power and your heart of love, help us then, now, Lord, to work for that day when nations shall not lift up sword against nation, when tanks will be beaten into tractors, when every man and every woman shall sit under his or her own vine and fig tree and none shall be afraid, when justice will roll down like waters and righteousness as a mighty stream.
Lord, in the memory of all the saints who from their labors rest, and in the joy of a new beginning, we ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get in back, when brown can stick around ... when yellow will be mellow ... when the red man can get ahead, man; and when white will embrace what is right. That all those who do justice and love mercy say Amen.
TransGriot Note: Y'all knew I was gonna come strong with my first song rewrite for the '09. In honor of the inauguration of our 'Brother President' and the immense pride I feel about it, here's a rewrite of the classic McFadden and Whitehead song 'Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now'
Barack's The President Now (sung to the tune of 'Ain't No Stopping Us Now' by McFadden and Whitehead
Barack's the president now! We're on the move! Barack's the president now! Things will improve!
Barack's the president now! We're on the move! Barack's the president now! Things will improve!
The last eight years has really got me down. And the Republicans have jacked this country around. I know we've got, a long tough road to hoe, But on the 20th, Bush must go. But we won't let this mess hold us back, We're getting our stuff together, Getting our troops out of Iraq! If you ever felt disenfranchised before, I know you'll refuse to be disenfranchised anymore!
Don't you let neoconservatives, Stand in your way! I want y'all to listen, listen, to every word I say, every word I say!
Barack's the president now! We're on the move! Barack's the president now! Things will improve!
Barack's the president now! We're on the move! I know, I know Barack's the president now! Things will improve! We got it.
You know Faux News and friends will push that negative vibe And when things improve they'll all want to imbibe Hatin' on him is the way they wanna go Sarah Palin in 2012? Oh hell no But we won't let this mess hold us back, We're getting our stuff together, Getting our troops out of Iraq! If you ever felt disenfranchised before, I know you'll refuse to be disenfranchised anymore!
Don't you let neoconservatives, Stand in your way! I want y'all to listen, listen, to every word I say, every word I say!
Barack's the president now! Yo Yo Yo We're on the move! We're moving, improving
Barack's the president now! Moving improving moving improving Barack's the president now! I know things will improve!
Barack's the president now! We're on the move! I know things really, really will improve
The GOP's lying But I ain't buying
We're leaving the negative people Way behind
Because our turn has finally come around
Barack's the president now! We're on the move! Barack's the president now! Things will improve!
Barack's the president now! We're on the move! Barack's the president now! Things will improve!
And so begins the day that our people have been waiting ages for, the inauguration of the 44th president of the United States.
The best part to me is that Barack Hussein Obama II not only shares my ethnic heritage along with the First Lady, we are sharing with the nation the best of our community.
I can't even begin to express my joy, elation and immense pride over what is about to transpire in just a few hours. The fact it's happening on my niece's birthday makes this day even more special. My niece will now spend the next 4-8 years of her life with her first cognizant presidential memories being of Barack Obama's administration.
Yeah he's walking into a mess. Yeah, some of you are probably so cynical about politics that you aren't going to even allow yourself the chance to believe that maybe we finally do have the right guy in the Oval Office to inspire us in this country to do great things, tackle tough problems and solve them together.
I have seen Black men of all ages for the first time in a long time express not only a resurgent interest in politics and doing things in the community, but chest thumping patriotic pride in the fact that the incoming president is a 'brother'.
Michelle Obama as the First Lady will hopefully give us the opportunity to forever blow away misconceptions, stereotypes and myths that have arisen about African American women across a wide array of issues. It is also a major point of pride to African-American women that the First Lady is 'one of us' as well.
It's also a joy to see the Obama's beautiful girls Malia and Sasha. I have been heartened to see young Black boys and girls across this country stand up a little taller since November 4. The younglings now believe it when their elders tell them that they can be anything their heart desires in this country. Conversely, their elders don't have to feel anymore as if they are lying to their kids or feel that sharp sting of historical pain when they say it.
John Thompson, Sr. said it best in a recent interview when he stated, 'The Emancipation Proclamation freed our bodies from slavery, the election of Barack Obama freed our minds.'
While what ails Black America won't be magically cured in 24 hours, a week, a month or maybe even during the four to eight years of this presidency, it's a start. It's also nice to know that with this presidential inauguration it shows us and more importantly our kids what is possible when you dare to dream, and then go after it.
This day is not just one for my community, but for all Americans. It's also cool to note that this historic day for our country is also resonating with people all over the world and across the African Diaspora.
It is also my hope and prayer that the afterglow from this day will last long after the music has faded from the parade and the last inaugural ball and the real work begins for the Obama administration.
Today is the day we've all been impatiently waiting for since November 4. Inauguration Day!
Today, five days after Dr. Martin Luther King's 80th birthday, President Obama takes the oath of office and we signaled to the world that the United States is under new management.
Out with the old tired, non-compassionate conservatism and paralyzing partisanship, in with the new school bipartisanship and return of reality based decision making to national politics.
The inaugural balls and parties will be going on until the wee hours of the morning, and when the sun rises on January 21, 2009, the work begins on restoring our country.
TransGriot Note: Well, unfortunately Rev. Gene Robinson's prayer mysteriously failed to make it on air for the HBO broadcast of this event. (I'm waiting with baited breath to see if the rainbow Obama haters blame him for HBO's frackup, too)
Anyway, for those of you who missed it, here's the Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson's wonderful prayer with a hat tip to Episcopal Cafe for posting it.
A Prayer for the Nation and Our Next President, Barack Obama
By The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire
Opening Inaugural Event Lincoln Memorial, Washington, DC January 18, 2009
Welcome to Washington! The fun is about to begin, but first, please join me in pausing for a moment, to ask God’s blessing upon our nation and our next president.
O God of our many understandings, we pray that you will…
Bless us with tears – for a world in which over a billion people exist on less than a dollar a day, where young women from many lands are beaten and raped for wanting an education, and thousands die daily from malnutrition, malaria, and AIDS.
Bless us with anger – at discrimination, at home and abroad, against refugees and immigrants, women, people of color, gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.
Bless us with discomfort – at the easy, simplistic “answers” we’ve preferred to hear from our politicians, instead of the truth, about ourselves and the world, which we need to face if we are going to rise to the challenges of the future.
Bless us with patience – and the knowledge that none of what ails us will be “fixed” anytime soon, and the understanding that our new president is a human being, not a messiah.
Bless us with humility – open to understanding that our own needs must always be balanced with those of the world.
Bless us with freedom from mere tolerance – replacing it with a genuine respect and warm embrace of our differences, and an understanding that in our diversity, we are stronger.
Bless us with compassion and generosity – remembering that every religion’s God judges us by the way we care for the most vulnerable in the human community, whether across town or across the world.
And God, we give you thanks for your child Barack, as he assumes the office of President of the United States.
Give him wisdom beyond his years, and inspire him with Lincoln’s reconciling leadership style, President Kennedy’s ability to enlist our best efforts, and Dr. King’s dream of a nation for ALL the people.
Give him a quiet heart, for our Ship of State needs a steady, calm captain in these times.
Give him stirring words, for we will need to be inspired and motivated to make the personal and common sacrifices necessary to facing the challenges ahead.
Make him color-blind, reminding him of his own words that under his leadership, there will be neither red nor blue states, but the United States.
Help him remember his own oppression as a minority, drawing on that experience of discrimination, that he might seek to change the lives of those who are still its victims.
Give him the strength to find family time and privacy, and help him remember that even though he is president, a father only gets one shot at his daughters’ childhoods.
And please, God, keep him safe. We know we ask too much of our presidents, and we’re asking FAR too much of this one. We know the risk he and his wife are taking for all of us, and we implore you, O good and great God, to keep him safe. Hold him in the palm of your hand – that he might do the work we have called him to do, that he might find joy in this impossible calling, and that in the end, he might lead us as a nation to a place of integrity, prosperity and peace.
The Electronic Villager has released the January 2009 edition of the Black Blog rankings, so let's check them out and see how TransGriot fared.
The rankings continue to grow with 1575 blogs now ranked, an increase of 59 blogs since the December 20 holiday edition of the BBR rankings.
The Number One BBR ranked blog is still Pam's House Blend, who was nominated as a Weblog Awards Best LGBT Blog finalist for the fourth straight year.
I fell short of my goal of having a 150 Technorati ranking by January 1, but I did achieve my goal of being in the BBR Top 50 blogs before that date.
My new goal is to be in the BBR Top 25 blogs and have a Technorati ranking of 200 by my May 4 birthday. One unexpected pleasure was being nominated for and becoming a 2008 Weblog Awards finalist for Best GLBT blog.
So how did I do?
As of the January 1 compilation date for this edition of the BBR's TransGriot gained one spot since the holiday rankings. I was sitting at Number 46 with a 144 Technorati ranking.
My Technorati ranking is still tripping, but I'm still in the BBR Top 50 Blogs. Hopefully by next month's rankings whatever drams happening with my Technorati ranking will straighten itself out and begin to actually reflect the progress I've made toward building this into a quality blog.
During and after the wake of the racist attacks on me from the Queerty commenters over my Obama post, my mind kept drifting back to a quote attributed to the late poet Gwendolyn Brooks.
Truth-tellers are not always palatable. There's a preference for candy bars
One of the things about me and this blog (and any other one that I'm given the honor to post to) that won't change is that I'm blunt and to the point about calling out bullshit when I see it. It hasn't made me the most popular person sometimes in GLBT circles, but that's the cross you bear when you are striving for the higher goals of passing broad based civil rights legislation, creating an inclusive community and a better world for all.
If you're going to solve the tough problems we have in the GLBT community and beyond that revolve around race, gender, class and inequality, you have to honestly and openly talk about them, even if that discussion gets contentious at times.
As an African-American leader, I subscribe to the principles of Black leadership and try my best to role model them. In addition to as Dr. Ron Walters articulated it, the task of Black leadership being to provide the vision, resources, tactics, and strategies that facilitate the achievement of the objectives of Black people.
Those goals are freedom, integration, equality, liberation, or defined in the terms of specific public policies. It is a role that often requires and results in you as a Black leader disturbing the peace when you speak truth to power. It also make some people uncomfortable and causes controversy at times as well.
Yes, we have those problems in the GLBT community since we are a microcosm of the parent society. Ignoring those problems or candy coating them won't make them go away. Neither will viciously attacking people who bring them up in the course of fostering honest discussion or because they are expressing an opinion which runs counter to your worldview.
One of the promises I made when I started this blog that in the best traditions of my people, I will tell it like it T-I-S is. If I see something that's wrong, or feel that we can and should be doing better on an issue, I'm not going to hold my tongue or shut down the word processor to placate the folks that prefer doing nothing or chomping candy bars on tough issues.
It almost skipped by me that today is Michelle Obama's 45th birthday.
Talk about an interesting year. Watching your husband fight through a historic primary to get the nomination, and then make history by being elected president on November 4.
It's going to be fun over the next four to eight years watch her make history as well
As the first African-American First Lady she will be in a wonderful position to blow up the stereotypes and myths about Black women that have been promulgated here and around the world over the last 400 years.
So happy birthday Madame First Lady. Hope the president and the kids got you something nice for your big day.
For those of you who are Battlestar Galactica junkies, y'all know that the Dee I'm referring to is Lt. Anastasia 'Dee' Dualla. For those of you who don't, the final episodes of Battlestar Galactica are being broadcast.
They ended with a startling cliffhanger of the fleet arriving at Earth after three years of interstellar travel and discovering it's a nuked out cinder.
In this episode we find out that Earth was not only nuked 2000 years ago, but it was inhabited by Cylons. We also discover that Kara Thrace died on the planet and before you holler 'she's the fifth Cylon', she isn't.
The fifth Cylon is survey says, Ellen Tigh
But the thing that shocked me more than all those discoveries was the suicide of my fave character on the show. Seems as though Dee was very troubled by the discovery of the nuked out Earth and finding jacks buried in the scarred landscape.
We see her babysitting Hera, going out on a date with Lee after encouraging him to take the reins of colonial political leadership and then retreating to her quarters after kissing him goodnight, putting a pistol to her head and pulling the trigger.
Even though Battlestar Galactica's my favorite show, one of the things I griped about when it first was reimagined was the lack of main African-descended characters on the show. Elosha, the priestess and spiritual adviser to President Roslin was killed off in the second season, and with Dee's suicide, the only African-American character left on the show is the Cylon Simon.
But one of the things I've always hated about sci-fi is that it seems as though if there's an African-American character on the show or an episode of it, they'll be killed off.
One of the few exceptions to that rule has been Lt. Uhura on Star Trek, Capt. Benjamin Sisko on Star Trek DS9, Lt. Tuvok from Star Trek Voyager and Lando Calrissian from Star Wars.
But unfortunately Lt. Anastasia Dualla won't be one of those characters.
Downtown Louisville to be precise. About to jet out of the house and make a short run to downtown Louisville and the Kentucky International Convention Center to watch Dawn compete in a major fencing tournament here.
The NAC D is one of eight major fencing tournaments for competitive fencing in the United States. For US based fencers wishing to represent our country in the 2012 London Games, this is a first step to making the national team from which our Olympians will be chosen.
The competition will be fast, furious and high level.
