Thursday, April 11, 2013

Trans Exterminationalists In Their Own Words

One of the things that mystifies me is why The Southern Poverty Law Center hasn't declared Trans Exterminationalist Radical Feminism as a hate group.   Could it be because the rumor may be true that a TERF works for SPLC and squashes the subject every time it comes up in SPLC circles? 

So if you think I being harsh when I call this group of rad fems Whyte Womyn Gone Wyld, trans oppressors or wonder why I have zero tolerance for their hate speech, I've learned from my people's history that you can't ignore vanillacentric privileged rabid haters that loudly and repeatedly call for your extermination from the planet.   You take them at their word they're serious

The TERF's have to be confronted, called out, and their crap exposed at every opportunity.  They started the War on Transwomen back in the 70's, and we have no choice but to fight them tooth and nail and end it with victory on our terms. 

And to borrow a line from former Sen. Trent Lott (R-MS), I’m a firm believer in feeding people their own words back to them, when it’s appropriate.”

Time to feed their own words back to them on a platter.   Bon appetit, TERF's. 

And now...the Trans Exterminationalists

"All transsexuals rape women’s bodies by reducing the real female form to an artifact, and appropriating this body for themselves. "

The transsexually constructed lesbian-feminist feeds off woman’s true energy source, i.e. her woman-identified self. It is he who recognizes that if female spirit, mind, creativity and sexuality exist anywhere in a powerful way it is here, among lesbian-feminists

I hope to see the very concept of Jewry completely obliterated.

That last one is from Heinrich Himmler, Memo March 23, 1941. Quoted in "Murderous Science" - Page 48 - by Benno Müller-Hill - History - 1998.  Just wanted to give you peeps something to compare it to.    Back to the post.:

I contend that the problem with transsexualism would best be served by morally mandating it out of existence

Those are all from Professor of Ethics (?) Janice Raymond's work "The Transsexual Empire: the making of the She-male"

From a book by Janice Raymond's PhD Supervisor Mary Daly

"Today the Frankenstein phenomenon is omnipresent not only in religious myth, but in its offspring, phallocratic technology. The insane desire for power, the madness of boundary violation, is the mark of necrophiliacs who sense the lack of soul/spirit/life-loving principle with themselves and therefore try to invade and kill off all spirit, substituting conglomerates of corpses. This necrophilic invasion/elimination takes a variety of forms. Transsexualism is an example ..."

“Dionysus sometimes assumed a girl-like form. The phenomenon of the drag queen dramatically demonstrates such boundary violation... As ethicist Janice Raymond has pointed out, the majority of transsexuals are “male to female,” while transsexed females basically function as tokens, and are used by the rulers of the transsexual empire to hide the real nature of the game. In transsexualism, males put on “female” bodies (which are in fact pseudofemale).... The Dionysian solution... is The Final Solution."
Gloria Steinem's five page transphobic scribblings from her 1983 book Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions which heavily cited Janice Raymond's waste of trees.  
In other words, transsexuals are paying an extreme tribute to the power of sex roles. In order to set their real human personalities free, they surgically mutilate their own bodies...
Instead of serving more lifesaving but often less lucrative needs for their surgical and hormone-therapy skills, some physicians are aiding individuals who are desperately trying to conform to an unjust society. It’s a small group of successful physicians she [Janice Raymond] names ‘the transsexual empire’
Here's the verbal grenade she launched at Renee Richards in 1977. 

"At a minimum, it was a diversion from the widespread problems of sexual inequality." She writes that, while she supports the right of individuals to identify as they choose, she claims that, in many cases, transsexuals "surgically mutilate their own bodies" in order to conform to a gender role that is inexorably tied to physical body parts. She concludes that "feminists are right to feel uncomfortable about the need for and uses of transsexualism."

Julie Bindel, who in a delicious piece of irony is now being hated on by the TERF's she was in lock step with.

"Those who ‘transition' seem to become stereotypical in their appearance — f**k-me shoes and birds' nest hair for the boys; beards, muscles and tattoos for the girls. Think about a world inhabited just by transsexuals. It would look like the set of Grease."
Gender dysphoria (GD) was invented in the 1950s by reactionary male psychiatrists in an era when men were men and women were doormats. It is a term used to describe someone who feels strongly that they should belong to the opposite sex and that they were born in the wrong body. GD has no proven genetic or physiological basis.

Germaine Greer (which is why she got glitterbombed )

Nowadays we are all likely to meet people who think they are women, have women’s names, and feminine clothes and lots of eyeshadow, who seem to us to be some kind of ghastly parody, though it isn’t polite to say so. We pretend that all the people passing for female really are. Other delusions may be challenged, but not a man’s delusion that he is female.


From Pantomime Dames

"The only way a man can get rid of healthy genitals is to say that he is convinced that he is a woman. Then another man will remove them and gladly. In order to justify sex-change surgery a new disorder called gender dysphoria has come into being. The disease has no biological marker; its presence is discerned by a history of inappropriately gendered behaviour, social disability and affective disorder.  . . .



Governments that consist of very few women have hurried to recognize as women men who believe that they are women and have had themselves castrated to prove it, because they see women not as another sex but as a non-sex. No so-called sex-change has ever begged for a uterus-and-ovaries transplant; if uterus-and-ovaries transplants were made mandatory for wannabe women they would disappear overnight. The insistence that manmade women be accepted as women is the institutional expression of the mistaken conviction that women are defective males. The biological truth is the opposite; all biologists know that males are defective females. Though external genitalia are the expression of the chromosomal defect, their removal will not alter the chromosomal fact, any more than removal of the tails of puppies will produce a tailless breed. "Sex-change operations" can only be carried out in Swift's Laputa. As Dwight D. Billings and Robert Urban argued in 1982:

Transsexualism is a relational process sustained in medical practice and marketed in public testimony ... The legitimization, rationalization and commodification of sex-change operations have produced an identity category transsexual for a diverse group of sexual deviants and victims of severe gender role distress.

As sufferers from gender role distress themselves, women must sympathize with transsexuals but a feminist must argue that the treatment for gender role distress is not mutilation of the sufferer but radical change of gender roles. Throughout their history women who could not carry out their prescribed gender roles have suffered all kinds of ghastly gynecological procedures and, like transsexuals, they have been grateful to their abusers. Women could hardly now condone the elaborate mutilations practised on individuals of both sexes, even though the victims argue that such mutilations are their right.



Sex-change surgery is profoundly conservative in that it reinforces sharply contrasting gender roles by shaping individuals to fit them.  . . .



No one ever asked women if they recognized sex-change males as belonging to their sex or considered whether being obliged to accept MTF transsexuals as women was at all damaging to their identity or self-esteem. As far as anyone could tell, women did not mind calling sex-change males "she." Perhaps this development should have been resisted, because it was part of the definition of the female as "other," as simply the "not-male." Femaleness is not the other side of the Rorschach blot of maleness, but a sex of its own, with a sexuality of its own and a whole spectrum of possible expressions, many of which take no account of maleness at all. Woman is not placed on earth for the use of man any more than men are placed on earth for the use of women. Both could do without each other if it were not for the pesky business of sexual reproduction. . . .



A good-hearted woman is not supposed to mind that her sex is the catch-all for all cases of gender ambiguity, but her tolerance of spurious femaleness, her consent to treat it as if it is the same as her own gender identity weakens her claim to have a sex of her own and tacitly supports the Freudian stereotype of women as incomplete beings defined by their lack of a penis. Women's lack of choosiness about who may be called a woman strengthens the impression that women do not see their sex as quite real, and suggests that perhaps they too identify themselves as the not-male, the other, any other.  . . .



The transsexual is identified as such solely on his/her own script, which can be as learned as any sex-typed behavior 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 behavior 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."


Tracey, A Young Transkid With A Wonderful Family

I'm happy and have been for years to see young trans kids like Kim Petras (who is now a stunning twentysomething young woman) Jazz and Sadie (who are transteens headed in that direction), Nicole, Bobbi, Coy, and others we may not be aware of yet as a community being able to transition before puberty sets in.

One of the things that made me go hmm is why we haven't seen as yet a young African-descended trans kid or trans teen.  I thought that was odd considering one of the things I know about trans persons of color is that we tend to transition at earlier ages with Janet Mock being a prime example of that.

Well peeps, meet Tracy and her parents Garfield and Michelle.   Thanks to one of my long time readers Dominique Storni she sent me this link to an AM/BC interview with this amazing trans teen and her parents.

Tracy and other kids like her in the Great White North is why activists up there are fighting so hard to get the federal Trans Rights Bill passed and do the same in their various provinces. 

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

DC Comics To Introduce First Reality Based Trans Character

Batgirl #19 interior pages
I've talked in the blog about the Archie Comics having storylines in which they have done 'what if' gender bending with their hero Archie and reimagined his life twice as a girl in issues 516 and 636.  In Archie 636 they took it a step further and gender swapped Betty and Veronica as well as Archie.      

Gender fluidity has been present in the comic world for decades but only through fantasy based methods such as magic, shape-shifting, brain-swapping, and cloning via adult or independent published comics or websites such as the adult-themed TG Comics.

But DC Comics, which has also done its share of fantasy based gender bending with its line of superheroes, and over the last few years has introduced not only ethnically diverse characters, but started adding ones who are gay or lesbian after once being banned by the Comics Code Authority.

DC is about to take a major leap forward and introduce a reality based trans character.

Introducing Alysia Yeoh, the roommate of Barbara Gordon, AKA Batgirl.   In the rebooted Batgirl series Barbara is a lesbian, and in Batgirl #19 Alysia will reveal to Barbara that she's a girl like us in a conversation with her roommate in the same conversation in which Barbara reveals she's Batgirl.  

Writer Gail Simone also revealed that Alysia's sexual orientation is bi.

She also attributes the idea of a trans character to a Wondercon convention conversation she had with comic writer Greg Ruska after a fan asked why there were fewer gay male superheroes than lesbian ones.

Rucka, who co-created (and rebooted) Batwoman as a lesbian character, replied that it would be a real sign of change for a gay male character to appear on a comic book cover — and an even bigger step for a transgender character to do the same.

While Simone is aware of the trans characters that exist in various comic book universes through fantasy based means, she wanted to create one that was reality basedAlysia will be “a character, not a public service announcement … being trans is just part of her story. If someone loved her before, and doesn’t love her after, well — that’s a shame, but we can’t let that kind of thinking keep comics in the 1950s forever.”

She also talked to people in the trans community before creating Alysia. 

BG_19_5
Simone suggested the Alysia Yeoh story to DC Comics Co-Publisher Dan DiDio at lunch one day, prepared to offer a passionate defense for the idea of a transgender character. ”I thought I might have to sell it, so to speak,” said Simone in the Wired interview. “But he just paused for a moment, asked how this would affect Barbara’s story, and immediately approved it. And we went back to our excellent nachos.”

Simone according to the Wired story will be adding another trans character to a story she's working on.   She also thinks it's time for a trans superhero character, especially since many of of the loyal comic book fans and people who attend comic conventions around the country also happen to be from the trans community.

“It’s time for a trans hero in a mainstream comic. I think it’s time to make that thing happen that Greg [Rucka] mentioned years ago. And it’s going to happen … I’m sure it’s controversial on some level to some people, but honest to God, I just could not care less about that. If someone gets upset, so be it; there are a thousand other comics out there for those people.”

And as a comic book fan, I couldn't agree more.

LA Times Meets With Local Trans Activists and GLAAD Over Transphobic Coverage

Been keeping an eye on Los Angeles and the unfolding story since February concerning the local trans community's outrage over a transphobic LA Times story featuring murdered transwoman Cassidy Vickers.

The story triggered a petition drive spearheaded by Gender Justice LA seeking a face to face meeting with LA Times officials to air grievances over the Vickers and  past misgendering articles.  They also wished to have the dialogue to suggest ways of improving coverage of the Los Angeles trans community and ensure transphobic reporting from their paper of record doesn't happen again.

The Times agreed to meet with the local activists, GJLA and GLAAD over the problematic coverage, and the meeting took place yesterday.  Hannah Howard was kind enough to send me a report of the meeting that she compiled.

1. The LA Times acknowledged mistakes in terminology and pronoun usage in the article about Cassidy Vickers
2. They acknowledged and apologized for harm this caused the community
3. They also acknowledge the need to provide context about trans discrimination when writing about crimes involving trans victims.
4. They acknowledged the need to attribute any terminology used by family members that doesn't match a person's chosen gender identity as their perspective and not representative of a neutral viewpoint.
5. They acknowledged they need to learn more about the community to accurately report on it
6. They committed to a trans sensitivity training for their staff
7. They gave us their internal style guide for talking about transgender issues for us to review and edit. Following edits, they committed to distributing it to their entire staff
8. They committed to distributing GLAADs updated style guide for talking about transgender issues when it is released next month to their staff.
9. They committed to using Gender Justice LA, GLAAD, and the TEEP program as a resources to check in with before publishing articles about trans issues.
10. We pitched to them a number of stories they might also consider writing about the LA trans community, including writing about GJLA's Theatre Of The Oppressed program and Transgender Leadership Development Program, profiling Trans 100 members and LA residents Bamby Salcedo or Michelle Enfield, documenting the state of talks between the trans community and LA County Sheriffs and incorporating it into ongoing coverage on the sheriff's department, and writing about the success of the TEEP program that serves as a model for trans-employment programs around the country and the world. Although they didn't definitively say they would do each of these, they were very enthusiastic about the stories in general, and they eager for us to help them dissever more stories they could write about the trans community.
Overall, I think it was productive meeting and they seemed very receptive. As with all these types of meetings, it is only a start and hopefully dialogue will continue over the coming months and years. But I think was a good start, and there is no way it could have happened without the grassroots response of so many amazing activists and allies over the past couple months. Everyone who signed the petition, came to the delivery event, publicized the issue, or otherwise contributed should consider themselves a true trans hero!

GLAAD is also publishing an article about the meeting and I will send the link when they do.
Thanks Hannah.  Will be interested to hear GLAAD's perspective on what took place yesterday. 

Your community fight was also important because like the New York Times, the LA Times is read far beyond the boundaries of your city and is an opinion shaping paper of record .  It's also why I was keeping up with what was transpiring on the Left Coast in these electronic pages.

It's important for our trans stores to be told in the media.  But HOW they are told matters.


I hope the Times does stay committed to what they outlined in yesterday's meeting and it does result in better coverage for trans people in Southern California and nationally  

The 'I Don't Know Any Black Trans People' Excuse Doesn't Fly

I've done a lot of posts about the subject of erasure of trans people of color.   In the process of combating the media invisibility I've taken to task media outlets in our chocolate media world that put these LGBT's list together that either had no trans persons on it or conflated drag queen with trans persons. 

One of the excuses I heard attempting to defend the indefensible was someone who claimed that 'they didn't know of any Black transpeople, much less Black trans activists.; 

Well, as of 10:00 AM EDT on April 9, that excuse doesn't fly anymore, not that it ever had the credibility in the first place    I've been writing about the trans community with an Afrocentric slant since 2006.

We have other African-American transpeople stepping up to leadership roles and providing positive visibility for our community.   We have growing organizations such as BTMI, BTWI, TPOCC and the National Black Justice Coalition advocating for us, helping us own our power and being the change we want to see in the world. 

We have conferences such as the BTMI event and Trans Faith In Color in which we can gather, talk about issues, honor our people doing the work and build community amongst ourselves and with the groups we intersect and interact with.  As Kwame Ture once said, 'In order to participate in the greater society, you must first close ranks.'

A stronger and more cohesive Black trans community means a stronger one which can be a better, more potent ally to the groups we intersect, interact and have mutual interests with.   

Black legacy orgs such as the NAACP are realizing not only that Black trans community issues are Black community issues, we Black trans peeps are part of the kente cloth fabric of the community and deserve our seat at the family table.  

So no, the publication of this initial Trans 100 List eliminates that excuse that you don't know any Black transpeople along with our increasing visibility across all media platforms.   We have people in various professions who are Black, trans and are attorneys, doctors, college professors, writers, homemakers, models, fashion designers, entrepreneurs...well, you get the drift 

And we didn't just pop up in the second decade of the 21st century either.  We've helped shape and mold not only trans history, but made some Black history of our own in addition to doing our part to uplift ourselves and our people.  

If you don't know any Black trans folks, you either aren't trying to get to know us, or have some of my trans brothers or trans sisters right under your nose living their everyday lives without you realizing it. 

But the days of people dismissively saying that they don't know any Black trans people are over.  . 
 

Trans History Moment: The Anti-Trans Michigan Womyn's Music Festival

If you're wondering why  this issue between girls like us and the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival keep popping up repeatedly, it's time for another trans history moment. 

Cristan Williams has a Transadvocate post up in which Nancy Burkholder tells the story about the 1991 night in which she was thrown off 'The Land'.

Here's an excerpt from it.

While I waited for Laura to return I was approached by two women, Chris Coyote and Del Kelleher. Chris said that she needed to speak with me regarding a serious and difficult matter. Sensing her urgency I suggested we move away from the women near the fire pit in order to talk privately. Chris said that the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival was a woman-only event and she wanted to know if I was a man. I replied that I was a woman and I showed her my NH picture ID driver’s license. Then she asked me if I was a transsexual. I asked her what was the point of her questioning and she replied that transsexuals were not permitted to attend the festival. She said that MWMF policy was that the festival was open to “natural, women-born-women” only. I replied that nowhere, in any festival literature or the program guide was that policy stated. I asked Chris to please verify that policy and she went to the office to contact the festival producers, Lisa Vogel and Boo Price. Sometime during this conversation I waved Laura to come over and she witnessed much of what transpired.
I continued speaking with Del. Del stated that the reason the policy was not in any literature was because the issue of transsexuals had never come up as a problem before. Del added that the policy was for the benefit of the transsexuals’ safety and the safety of the women attending the festival. When I pointed out that there were other transsexuals on the land she acknowledged that this was true. Then she added, ‘We haven’t caught them yet, but we did catch you.”

I could care less about the MWMF and have no desire to sitting in the woods in Hart, MI swatting mosquitoes for a concert.  But neither am I going to stand idly by and allow the rabid TERF ideological driven ignorance and transphobia of MWMF and its not anywhere in print anti-trans exclusion policy to keep transwomen who do want to experience the event away from it.

You can read the rest of the post here.

Tuesday, April 09, 2013

Making (Negative) Things Happen

Katrina Rose drops more TBLG history and gives us an idea just how much work the Equal Sign Org is going to have to do to expunge the transphobia embedded in its organizational DNA (assuming it actually wants to do so) with this latest ENDAblog 2.0 post entitled 'Making Things Happen'.

Here's a taste of it:

The HRC anti-flag incident occurred less than a week before the twentieth anniversary of the signing of the first legitimate (read: trans-inclusive) state gay rights law.

Heard anything about that from HRC?

Considering that the governor who signed it was a Republican, one might think that HRC would have touted it to the far-flung winds then and now (or does HRC only privilege Republicans over Democrats in New York?). 

Oh, but wait…

Then, as now, it is one of the laws that conclusively disproved the ‘incremental progress is absolutely necessary’ claim that HRC and its defenders not only still mainline themselves but also fraudulently claim to others is not only acceptable but also necessary.

Read Kat's post by clicking on the link.

The Inaugural Trans 100 List (US)

Photo: Sneak peek of the 2013 Inaugural Trans 100 (US Edition)

We're going to ask that the photo not be tagged until after the list is officially released on Tuesday morning. Thanks!
Well peeps, this is the moment everyone's anxiously been waiting for, the unveiling of the inaugural Trans 100 List (US).   This one is going to be US centric because as Toni D'orsay, the visionary person behind it says:

It all comes down to something I have said before: it is not my place to step in and decide for other nations who the best people doing the hardest work are. I am an unabashed citizen of the US, and while I have some cultural competence with other cultures and countries, it is still an outsider’s perspective and flawed and it can’t possibly be as decent as the ideas of those who are living there locally.
So international trans folks, while the TransGriot and others in the States do try to keep up with the trans activists in other regions of the world doing trans human rights work and in many cases they are our friends,  you would still know better than us who is doing the work in your various nations and the trans persons inside your borders worthy of recognition. 

Besides, I'd love to see a British Trans 100, an Australasian, Canadian or other national ones.  I'd even like to see regional ones such as an Asian-Pacific Rim, African, Caribbean, Latin American, African or South American ones.

The process of putting your national or regional specific lists can also serve as a community building exercise and facilitate fostering contacts across borders that will help with future trans human rights work..


But as Mr. T would say, enough jibber-jabber..  Here's The 2013 Trans 100 List with some award winning blogger y'all know on it.  

The Trans 100:

Abigail Jensen
Aidan Key
Alexis Martinez
Allyson Robinson
Andre Perez
Andy Karol
Andy Marra
Anna Anthropy
Asher Kolieboi
Avory Faucette
Bamby Salcedo
Baylie Roth
Ben Hudson
Blake Alford
Bree Sutherland
Carter Brown
Cecilia Chung
Channyn Lynne Parker
Charlie Solidum
Che Gossett
Christina Kahrl
Cristina Herrera
Claire Swinford
Diego Sanchez
Drago Renteria
Dru Levasseur
Earline Budd
Eli Erlick
ellie june navidson
Elliot Fukui
Erin Armstrong
Harmony Santana
Harper Jean Tobin
Ida Hammer
Ignacio Rivera
Ja-briel Walthour
Jaan Williams
Janet Mock
Jenn Burleton
Jenny Boylan
Justus Eisfeld
Kate Bornstein
Kate Sosin
Katherine Cross
Katie Burgess
Katy Stewart
Kay Barrett
Kelley Winters
KOKUMO
Dr. Kortney Ryan Ziegler
Kylar Broadus
Laverne Cox
Lincoln Rose
Loan Tran
Mara Keisling
Marisa Richmond
Marsha Botzer
Masen Davis
Matt Kailey
Mel Goodwin
Mia Tu Mutch
Michelle Enfield
Miss Major Griffin-Gacy
Monica Roberts
Monika Mhz
Namoli Brennet
Nicholas Love
Nick Teich
Niko Kowell
Nino Dorenzo
Ola Osaze
Owen Daniel-McCarter
Paisley Currah
Pauline Park
Phyllis Frye
Qwo-Li Driskill
Rebecca Allison
Rebecca Kling
Reina Gossett
Ruby Corado
Ryan Blackhawke
Ryka Aoki
S. Bear Bergman
Sadie Baker
Sasha Alexander Goldberg
Sassafras Lowrey
Sean-Michael Gettys
Shane Morgan
Shawn Demmons
Spencer Bergstedt
Stephen Ira
Susan Stryker
Tei Okamato
Tracie O'Brien
Trisha Lee Holloway
Trudie Jackson
Van Binfa
Van Nguyen
Yoseñio V. Lewis
Zander Keig

And thanks Toni and Jen and the curators for all the hard work you engaged in as you put this together the list and all the people who busted their butts to make the Trans 100 event in Chicago last Sunday an unqualified success.

     

Transphobic Bigot Eruption Earns UFC Fighter A Suspension

UFC heavyweight boxer Matt Mitrione ended a two match losing streak by knocking out in 19 seconds Philip De Fries in their bout in Sweden Saturday night to push his record to 6-2.

He went on the MMA Today show and got knocked out yesterday by his own big mouth

Mitrione has been suspended and is under investigation for launching into a vicious transphobic tirade near the end of his interview on MMA Today with Ariel Helwani aimed at Fallon Fox.. 

"She's not a he. He's a he. He's chromosomally a man. He had a gender change, not a sex change. He's still a man. He was a man for thirty-one years. Thirty-one years! That's a couple years younger than I am. He's a man. Six years of taking performance de-hancing drugs, you think is going to change all that? That's ridiculous…. That is a lying, sick, sociopathic, disgusting freak."

Matt, I don't see MD behind you name, so how the hell would you know what Fallon Fox's chromosomes are unless you ran the tests?   And BTW, hormone replacement therapy sure does work those kind of wonders on our bodies in less time than you think.  The science and medical evidence back that up and are on Fox's side.  

But Mitrione kept going with the tirade that would have made the womyn at certain TERF hate websites proud.

"It's an embarrassment to us as fighters, as a sport, and we all should protest that," he said in his interview. "The woman that's fighting him, props to you. I hope you beat his ass, and I hope he gets blackballed and never fights again because that's disgusting and I'm appalled by that." 

The UFC is appalled and embarrassed by your nekulturny behavior and is about to call your azz on it. 

Back in January the UFC announced a code of conduct for its fighters under contract to it which they indicated in a statement they released  that Mitrione was in significant breach of
"The UFC was appalled by the transphobic comments made by heavyweight Matt Mitrione today in an interview on 'The MMA Hour,'" the statement read.  The organization finds Mr. Mitrione's comments offensive and wholly unacceptable and – as a direct result of this significant breach of the UFC's code of conduct – Mr. Mitrione's UFC contract has been suspended and the incident is being investigated. The UFC is a friend and ally of the (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) community, and expects and requires all 450 of its athletes to treat others with dignity and respect."

The MMA fans may not like it and are whining about 'free speech' in the comment threads along with their transphobic science-deficient commentary.   But free speech comes with consequences, especially if you have a UFC contract with a Code of Conduct in it and you let your transphobic bigotry run wild during a televised interview. 

While you're on suspension Matt, may I suggest you actually do some reading (if you're capable of doing that) on how HRT works and what the International Olympic Committee and other international sporting organizations who allow trans people to compete have to say about it.

Happy Birthday Carmen Xtravaganza!

Photo: okay today is April 7th in 2 days (April 9th) will be my sister Carmen Xtrava's birthday... she will be almost as young as I am.. LOL... A special time of year to have a birthday, because it's the start of spring and a fresh renewal of life and spirit!!!!!
If you go deep into my archives you'll see this series of Women I Admire posts.  It was my way of paying homage to the women trans and non-trans who had qualities that I was looking for and admired and wanted to emulate in my own life in terms of the type of woman i wanted to project to the world.   

One of the persons I wrote a post about was Carmen Xtravaganza.   

She is strikingly beautiful (still is) and one of the many people I looked up to during that 80's time period I was in trans information gathering mode and weighing the decision to transition. 

In the wake of this post I wrote, I realized that I wanted to lead by example and get to know, have regular conversations with and hopefully form lasting friendships with my sisters in the ballroom and pageant worlds.  

I was thrilled to get a FB friends request from this ballroom legend recently, and we've been chatting from time to time.   It's been a blast getting to know her and I am so looking forward to meeting her the next time I'm in the New York area or wherever our paths cross. 

Anyway, she told me during our chat yesterday that April 9 is her birthday, so I'm giving her TransGriot birthday shoutout treatment .

Happy birthday Carmen!   May you have many more!.

Monday, April 08, 2013

Black Transmen Are Part Of This Community, Too

One of the things I've long been aware of in my 15 years as an activist is visibility matters. 

One of the long conversations I had with Kortney, Carter, Sean, Lawrence, Diwa and many of the brothers during my trek to Dallas last month for the Black Transmen Conference dealt with the subject concerning their frustration about the lack of Black transmasculine visibility in the trans community. 

Just as we've had to deal with in the Black trans feminine community about the trans narrative being dominated by white trans women for the last 60 years, the transmasculine narrative has also been dominated by its focus on white transmen as well. 

We don't get to see them represented or talked about in the overall transmasculine narrative, much less have regular discussions about what their issues are.  That needs to change.

One of the things I was extremely happy about was seeing that my transbrothers are working diligently to address that visibility problem.  Kortney's award winning 2008 movie :Still Black: A Portrait of Black Transmen  was a major step in that direction (and is still available for purchase) . 

And yeah, you have to check out Kortney's blog Blac(k)ademic for thoughtful posts on trans and other issues from a Black transmasculine perspective.

As the founding executive director of TPOCC Kylar Broadus has been an increasingly visible role model for the Black transmasculine community along with Rev  Louis Mitchell and Carter Brown of BTMI. 

BTMI is cultivating a group of leaders that you will be hearing from in the near future on many levels around the country as they do their parts to become the change they want to see in the world.

They are introducing the world to a group of intelligent, thoughtful (and handsome) Black transmen who are defining what it is to be a man on their own terms and in addition letting people inside and outside this community know they exist.

And as their sister I couldn't be happier to see my brothers stand tall and own their power..       

Chrysalis: Lingerie For Girls Like Us


This news broke while I was offline, but I was excited to hear about a first ever line of linerie designed by a girl like us entrepreneur for girls like us.

CyHeadShotThe perfectly named Chrysalis Lingerie is the first ever lingerie line that is designed for transwomen.   Co-founder Cy Lauz remembered when she had a hard time during her transition finding lingerie and undergarments that suited her particular needs and made her feel pretty, confident and feminine.

“There was nothing that made me feel good about being a trans woman and who I was as a professional and most importantly, who I was as a person,” Lauz says.

Lauz put her fashion styling and interior design talents to work and founded Chrysalis, which is getting major positive buzz inside and outside the trans community. 

It's starting with a basic line of bra and panty ensembles in five colors.   The power-mesh panty is designed to create a seamless look by using a special panel that “tucks us in,” Cy said, while the bra comes with hidden pockets that hold full-cup inserts to create the appearance of a natural bustline.  

tstrign2The initial product line is versatile enough to work with all body shapes while still the look and feel of traditional feminine lingerie lines. 

Chrysalis Lingerie for now will only be available online and in progressive lingerie outlets that welcome the business of trans women. 

Beyond the basic product line there are long range plans to not only open a brick and mortar store in the New York area but create a Chrysalis Lingerie couture line that incorporates the Chrysalis technical innovations into a line of teddies, shapewear, lingerie and swimwear.





chrysalisChrysalis Lingerie has been around since 2010 and is grateful for the fresh round of media exposure and attention.  

Chrysalis Lingerie does have a company Facebook page that you can like and check out for all sorts of fashion and TBLG related posts as we anxiously await the May 1 launch of the e-commerce site.

Hmm, that's just in time for my birthday.   

TransGriot Update: link for the Chrysalis Lingerie website.

Why The Trans Community Loathes HRC


Back in 2007 I wrote a post entitled 'Why The Transgender Community Hates HRC' that chronicles the history of the animosity between HRC and the transgender community that I've had a ringside seat for.

It's been one of the most widely read and popular posts that I've ever written on TransGriot since I started the blog back in 2006. 

I realized we are now past the five year anniversary of the time when trans community anger over Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), on September 28, 2007 cutting us out of an inclusive ENDA (Employment and Non Discrimination Act) and HRC's deafening silence about it blew up in mushroom cloud fashion.  

It happened in the wake of Joe Solmonese's Big ENDA Lie and HRC walking away from the ATL and the Southern Comfort Conference with $20,000 of the trans community fraudulently obtained money in their coffers.  Solmonese stated during his 2007 SCC speech HRC wouldn't support any ENDA bill unless it was absolutely inclusive, then afterwards claimed he 'misspoke'.

You can also see that anger seep into the posts I wrote about the issue and the controversy that blew up in the wake of it if you peruse my TransGriot post archives starting in late September 2007 and continuing through early 2008.

At the time I ended the 'Hates HRC' post the subsequent drama over the ENDA betrayal was starting.  Now that it's five years since that watershed event, I thought it was past time for me to move forward from September 2007 and continue the story to where we are in the second decade of the 21st century.  My goal at the conclusion of this post is to give a snapshot look at where the trans community is now concerning their feelings for HRC and the overall TBLG rights movement.

But I need to start this sequel to the original post by going back to the November 2006 midterms and the overwhelming November 7 Democratic victory in which they picked up 31 seats to regain control of the US House.  It not only resulted in a 233-202 Democratic House majority but the Democrats regaining control of the Senate with the help of two independents who joined their caucus for a 51-49 edge after they picked up 6 senate seats.  More importantly, it resulted in Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), whose congressional district covers San Francisco, becoming the first female Speaker of the House.  

House Minority Leader John Boehner, right, hands the gavel to newly elected Speak of the House Nancy Pelosi in the House Chamber of the U.S. Capitol in Washington Thursday, Jan. 4, 2007. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) Photo: PABLO MARTINEZ MONSIVAISOptimism was high in the LGB and trans community during that historic moment on January 4, 2007 when Nancy Pelosi was handed the speakers gavel by John Boehner for the start of the 110th Congress and when HR 2015, that session's version of ENDA was introduced with gender identity protections for the first time on April 24, 2007 by Rep. Frank (D-MA), Rep Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Chris Shays (R-CT) and Deborah Pryce (R-OH). 

The trans community's stratospheric level optimism was fueled by the knowledge that HRC became in 2004 the last civil rights organization to endorse a fully inclusive ENDA.  The HRC Board unanimously voted as policy at the time that they would not support any version of ENDA that didn’t include gender identity as a protected class.

When the TransGriot and my NTAC (National Transgender Advocacy Coalition) cohorts showed up on Capitol Hill to lobby for HR 2015 from May 15-17, we started hearing the first ominous signs that something shady was about to happen inside I-495 concerning trans inclusion in ENDA.  First we were hearing that Sen. Ted Kennedy's (D-MA) S.717 version of the bill didn't include us.   Mine and Dawn Wilson's continued forays into Congressional Black Caucus offices in the House and Senate (remember Barack Obama was the junior senator from Illinois at the time) began to confirm the ugly picture that was developing, and I wrote this July 2007 TransGriot print column sounding the alarm to the trans community that we weren't included in ENDA 

And what was the National Center for Trans Equality (NCTE) and its founding Executive Director Mara Keisling's reaction to it?   Calling those of us who sounded the alarm 'crazy' at a Seattle trans conference and claiming that trans inclusion in ENDA was a 'slam dunk'   Well, that slam dunk as Keisling characterized it clanked off the rim and the trans inclusion basketball dribbled out of bounds on the civil rights basketball court on September 27.

Bear in mind that this is the same Mara Keisling (of the same NCTE) which a few years earlier had magically appeared out of nowhere, fully funded, to provide a Gay, Inc.-approved alternative to the willing-to-critique-Gay, Inc. and make trans rights a reality NTAC. 

Barely three months before
the ENDA betrayal, she had played apologist for Gay, Inc., in a serious discussion of the egregious disparity between the numbers of gainfully-employed trans men and trans women within even those portions of Gay, Inc. that will hire any trans people at all. 

Defending the employment practices of Gay, Inc, which were then (as now) resulting in, for all practical purposes, no trans women being employed by Gay, Inc.organizations while plenty of trans men were getting paid to do trans advocacy work, Keisling asserted that such discrimination is "mostly not overt or conscious."


Those who are best able to get away with discrimination know how to avoid doing it overtly. 

Rant alert::

And putting HRC aside for a second, what does it say about the purported 'national trans organization' when its founding ED refuses to stand up and call out the disparity and acts as an apologist for those who consciously and continually piss on trans women when we seek employment, by telling us that the piss is just unconscious rain?

Rant over, back to the rest of the story.  

Based on a questionable whip count conference call that was conducted while much of the Congressional Black Caucus and several congressmembers including Sen. Ted Kennedy and Majority Whip Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) were occupied at the Walter E. Williams Convention Center for the 2007 edition of the CBCF-Annual Legislative Conference that ran from September 26-29, it was claimed there were not enough votes to pass a trans inclusive ENDA. 

No credible activist believes that George W. Bush would have signed ENDA into law had either version of the bill passed Congress and hit his Oval Office desk.   Since the gay-only ones failed in 1994, 1995 and 1996, why not run the trans inclusive ENDA one and see what happens?   

Instead Frank used that whip count excuse to split the inclusive HR 2015 into two separate bills that had the effect of throwing the trans community under the ENDA civil rights bus.  HR 3685, the gay-only bill the Democratic majority began legislatively moving forward at his behest, triggered the nuclear explosion of anger from the trans community which, in turn, was backed up by our allies. The only group in favor of Frank's action?   You guessed it- HRC. 

The betrayal triggered an unprecedented reaction in the trans community. Donna Rose, the first trans person on the HRC Board of Directors resigned from it on October 8, 2007.   She was replaced by Meghan Stabler in 2008.  In addition to the formation of a progressive coalition of over 300 LGBT organizations entitled United ENDA calling on the Democratic congressional majority to pass the inclusive HR 2015,  the trans community resumed an old strategy of picketing HRC leaders and dinners around the nation, starting with their October 2007 one in Washington DC.   The HRC dinner pickets continued well into 2008.

The lone organization that wasn't part of United ENDA?   Can you say HRC?  I knew you could.. 

HRC tried to mend fences during this period of white hot anti-HRC sentiment with the trans community by flying Joe Solmonese to San Francisco for a tense two hour January 5, 2008 meeting with 30-40 Bay Area trans leaders over ENDA and apologize for 'misspeaking' at SCC.  But those Bay Area trans leaders, like just about every transperson in the country at the time were still angry at HRC and extremely pissed about being legislatively left behind. .  

At that contentious meeting, Theresa Sparks, the president of the San Francisco Police Commission returned the 2004 Equality Award she received from the Human Rights Campaign.

Sparks stated she could no longer stand to even look at the etched glass award when it was on her credenza. 'It no longer symbolized equality to me," she told the Bay Area Reporter's Cynthia Laird as she exited the meeting at the time.  "It's a matter of their integrity and not following through and my own integrity."

The dawn of 2008 also meant that it was a presidential election year.  HRC endorsed then Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) who was one of the three front runners for the nomination.   The trans community, still majorly pissed at HRC, was split at the time about who to support in the upcoming presidential election.   Many trans people backed Sen. Clinton, but because of the early HRC endorsement of her and his support of an inclusive ENDA elements of the community (myself included) decided to support then Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) in the Democratic presidential primary. 

The trans community also did something else politically unprecedented with the help of Helen Boyd and the Stonewall Democrats in that 2008 election cycle.  They publicly put their t-bills behind a presidential candidate and set up an ActBlue page that raised over $10,000 for the Obama campaign.  
 
The trans community moves once again validated their savvy national political instincts as Sen. Obama not only went on to become the first African-American to win the Democratic presidential nomination, he and his running mate Sen. Joe Biden went on to claim the presidency later that year over Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin in an 365-173 electoral landslide.   

While we've had some issues with him on a few subjects like DADT repeal not covering the trans community and ENDA, for the most part President Obama has validated the wisdom of the trans community supporting him in 2008 and his re-election in 2012 by becoming one of the most trans friendly presidents ever in US history. 

For a large inside the Beltway based organization, HRC can be politically tone deaf at times.  HRC's tendency to back Republicans in political campaigns over qualified gay and lesbian candidates or GLBT friendly allies has caused embarrassing problems for them.  In 1998 during the 'Angry Black Vote' midterm election they backed controversial New York GOP incumbent senator Al D'Amato over Democratic nominee Chuck Schumer despite protests from a broad spectrum of local NY gay organizations and Richard Socarides, the Clinton administration White House liaison to the gay community.

HRC compounded their D'Amato endorsement fiasco when then HRC executive director Elizabeth Birch tried to justify it via The New York Times by arrogantly asserting New Yorkers “didn’t know D’Amato’s record.”  It was the opposite that was true.  HRC overlooked D'Amato's history of gay-bashing that was part of that record while New York's gay community didn't.  They voted in 4 to 1 numbers to send the incumbent senator packing as Schumer won the seat. 

Just two years later HRC pissed off the African-American LGBT community by backing Rep. Mary Bono over telegenic openly gay African-American Palm Springs, CA councilmember Ron Oden despite the fact that Bono had a '25' rating on HRC's congressional scorecards during the 105th Congress.  Oden lost that race, but became in 2003 the first African-American mayor of Palm Springs, CA.  

HRC stubbed its toe in Palm Springs again last year.  They pissed off gay and lesbian peeps in the area when they declined to endorse either candidate in the redrawn California 36th Congressional District race between Democratic candidate Dr. Raul Ruiz and their longtime favorite GOP Rep. Mary Bono Mack despite Ruiz's repeated support of marriage equality and Mack's refusing to take a stand on it. 

Latinos make up a quarter of the new 36th Congressional District's voters and 47% of its population.  That fact alone should have pushed them in the direction of endorsing Ruiz along with his solidifying support in polling data in the months before the election.  A 2006 e-mail that surfaced in which Bono Mack agreed with a conservative talk show radio host that the heavily Latino part of the district was a 'Third World toilet' along with her voting for Rep. Paul Ryan's Social Security killing budget also contributed mightily to Ruiz going on to beat Bono Mack 52.9%-47.1% on election night and HRC being on the wrong side of an election result.  


In the wake of the 2004 presidential election and 11 states passing same gender marriage bans after being warned by trans community leaders like NTAC chair Vanessa Edwards Foster not to push for marriage equality in advance of those elections, in December 2004 HRC considered selling out seniors and uncoupled people in the community.  They considered striking a deal with the George W. Bush administration to support Social Security privatization in return for allowing domestic partners to receive Social Security benefits. 

Even when they tried to do something right for the trans community, it got messed up by their diversity blind spot.  HRC trumpeted the fact they helped set up the historic first ever June 26, 2008 all-trans panel for a House subcommittee hearing discussing trans unemployment issues.

Unfortunately it was a trans panel that had no African-American representation on it. Since the African-American trans community suffers with a 26% unemployment rate double the overall trans unemployment rate they were justifiably pissed off about the erasure and the lost opportunity to tell congressional reps their stories.   


There was the head spinning 2011 HRC decision to honor Goldman Sachs with a 2011 Workplace Equality Innovation Award followed up in February 2012 with an HRC Workplace Equality Award. 

Never mind that Goldman Sachs is the same investment banking firm
that has outraged Americans inside and outside the LGBT community for being one of the securities firms at the epicenter of the October 2008 economic meltdown that wrecked the economies of the United States and several other nations.
  
The pattern of backing Republicans over Democrats was shifting slowly as the GOP got more intolerant on LGBT issues, but old habits die hard. 

In 2010 HRC was slow in taking Best Buy and Target to task over a $250,000 donation made to anti-gay Minnesota Republican gubernatorial candidate Tom Emmer who lost to former Democratic Senator Mark Dayton.. 

They didn't join the DADT repeal effort until it appeared it was well on its way to becoming a reality thanks to Dan Choi giving the issue a recognizable face along with transwoman Autumn Sandeen, Choi publicly calling out HRC in the process and cadres of grassroots activists and organizations such as GetEqual doing the grunt work to push the Obama administration into getting behind the repeal effort.


The 2011 Road To Equality Bus Tour is another glaring example of the political tone deafness, cluelessness and arrogance they operate with at times.  The folks in Louisville and Lexington, KY. have longstanding animus with HRC over being called a 'civil rights backwater' before the cities passed the trans inclusive Fairness laws in 1999.

louisville1_251172648_stdThey were shocked and angered to discover by press release they were on the bus tour's list of 17 cities in 11 states and D.C. to visit on September 23-25.  HRC not only didn't bother to ask the Kentucky LGBT community if they wanted to be a stop on the tour, long time activists still haven't forgiven or forgotten the insulting comment hurled in their direction.   They reacted accordingly to not roll out the welcome mat for it. 

The Kentucky activists threatened to picket the bus if they went ahead with their planned stops in Louisville and Lexington.  A meeting HRC arranged in Louisville led to their finding out firsthand how viscerally negative the reaction was to HRC's bus making a stop there.  They were also shocked to discover the broad diversity of Louisville's LGBT community leaders included trans people in powerful and influential positions and trans and same gender loving people of color.  


If they had bothered to ask the Kentucky activist community before they set up the bus tour schedule, HRC would have discovered the Kentuckians were dealing with a contentious gubernatorial election between incumbent Democratic governor Steve Beshear and longtime anti-LGBT rights foe and Republican Senate President David L. Williams.

While Gov. Beshear at the time had a healthy 52%-30% lead in the opinion polls at the time the tour was announced in late June, the last thing Kentucky activists wanted was HRC's yellow and blue bus rolling into the two largest LGBT friendly cities in the state less than five weeks before the November 8 election.  

The Kentucky TBLG leaders didn't want that visual galvanizing the Tea Party haters to bumrush the polls and potentially cause electoral problems for a GLBT community friendly Democratic governor and friendly legislators in the Kentucky House and Senate they would need to pass a statewide pro-BTLG Fairness bill. 

So now we come to the latest incident in a long sorry history of HRC disrespecting trans people with the March 27 SCOTUS rally in Washington DC.

An HRC staffer later identified as Karin Quimby demanded the trans pride flag be taken down.  She is also alleged to have stated 'marriage equality isn't a transgender issue'.

HRC resorted to an old public relations tactic to try to quell the growing online media firestorm that occurs when they get caught disrespecting transpeople in terms of circling the wagons, denying it happened and demonizing the messenger.

“It is not true to suggest that any person or organization was told their flag was less important than another – this did not occur and no HRC staff member would ever tolerate such behavior. To be clear, it is the position of the Human Rights Campaign that marriage is an issue that affects everyone in the LGBT community.   Michael Cole-Schwartz HRC Communications Director

But after National Stonewall Democrats Executive Director Jerame Davis blew up that spin coming from Cole-Schwartz by verifying the incident did occur along with another incident during that same rally in which a queer undocumented Latino activist was silenced, the simmering anger the trans community has had since September 2007 for the Human Rights Campaign exploded.   It blew up on the Net, in LGBT media and in social media circles until HRC Vice President of Communications and Marketing Fred Sainz apologized on April 1

An apology that came on April Fool's Day.  

While Sainz's apology may have been heartfelt, it certainly has the appearance and stench based on the date it was done of being insincere.  Karin Quimby surfaced at a San Antonio Gender Alliance (SAGA) meeting April 5 to do a mea culpa amidst increasingly loud calls from people in the trans community for her resignation or termination.

So in conclusion, things not only haven't changed since 2007 in terms of the tense, contentious relationship between HRC and the trans community, in many people's opinions it's gotten worse despite the work of many people at the local levels of HRC, trans community activists and Diego Sanchez's (who sat on their Business Council with Stabler for a year until hired by Frank) and Meghan Stabler's attempts at the board level to change that transphobic paradigm.


The self-proclaimed largest LGBT rights organization at this moment still has the same number of out and proud trans employees working at its Rhode Island Ave headquarters as it did in 2007 (zero) and that needed to change a long time ago. The HRC penchant (when you deign to do so) to hire transpeople who have no trans grassroots organizing experience or background, are newly out or aren't familiar with the history of the trans rights movement is troubling to the trans community and plays into the perception they aren't serious about advancing trans human rights.  

In the wake of the 2007 ENDA debacle HRC should have immediately started hiring (and cultivating in its ranks) a large, ethnically diverse group of trans masculine and trans feminine employees in policy making areas that cut their activist teeth in trans human rights grassroots organizing to address their glaring shortcomings in that area.  

The lack of a critical mass of trans people in the policy formation and lobbying areas combined with the failure to root out and eliminate the historic anti-trans attitudes embedded in the organizational DNA hamstrings your ability to actually advance trans rights issues on The Hill and in state legislatures. 

Or is that part of the HRC 'all marriage all the time' advocacy plan?

HRC excels at the illusion of inclusion.  They'll show up with  a representative for a Trans Day of Remembrance, sponsor a trans-related conference here or there, or even tinker with their Corporate Equality Index to have trans specific issues reflected in it and trumpet it in a press release.  But when it's time to put their money where their civil rights mouths are and actually use their Equal Sign bully pulpit, fiscal resources, political clout and influence to help push legislation that will result in human rights for trans people, they are MIA.

Not only did HRC fail to assist in helping push for GENDA's (the statewide trans rights bill) passage in New York as forcefully as they did when marriage equality was pending in the State Assembly and passed in 2011, they repeated the pattern last year in Maryland.  

This press release highlighting the support mustered and the millions spent to get marriage equality passed in Maryland stands in stark contrast to what they wouldn't do to support an effort to pass a statewide trans rights bill that was pending in the Maryland state legislature at the same time.

It lends credence to the widely held view in the trans community that HRC pays lip service to trans human rights, doesn't really care about us or our issues.  Even if there is change genuinely happening at Rhode Island Avenue, it's occurring on trans issues at a superficial level.  

Don't even get me started about what non-white trans people think about HRC, that's another post.  And the sad part is it doesn't have to be this way.

It's a disservice to the dedicated people who work for HRC, want to see it succeed and want it to have a reputation in the trans and GLB community they can be proud of.   I too, would love to see HRC live up to what it posts on its blog as working for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender human rights.  I would be thrilled to see it get past its ugly history of being more of a trans oppressor organization than a trans ally.  

But sadly, it keeps making the same stupid mistakes repeatedly with trans people and it's why the trans community loathes HRC.       

Sunday, April 07, 2013

Janet's Back On The Melissa Harris-Perry Show!



Melissa Harris-Perry wasn't kidding when she tweeted that she needed to make Janet a #nerdland regular after making a stellar March 23 appearance.

And nope, Janet wasn't there to talk trans rights issues or LGBT politics.  She was back on the MHP show in a segment talking about our favorite hit show Scandal.  

Scandal by the way is the first show helmed by an African-American female lead actress (Kerry Washington) since I spent some of my teen years watching my Houston homegirl Teresa Graves on ABC's Get Christie Love.

And yeah, if you try to call me between 9-10 PM CDT on Thursdays, it's why you're not getting an answer because I'm watching the latest exploits of Olivia Carolyn Pope and her 'Gladiators In Suits'.  

For those of you who missed the #nerdland conversation about Scandal this morning, you can check out the video with one of our fave #girlslike us in it.


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Karen Finney's New MSNBC Show Starts April 13

Karen FinneyY'all know how much I love MSNBC political analyst Karen Finney, and was happy to hear that she will be getting her own show on the cable network.

Finney has more than 20 years in national politics includes four presidential campaigns, the Clinton White House, a New York Senate race, and the first African American spokeswoman for the Democratic National Committee.

Finney's show will air on the weekends for 4-5 PM and be a lead in to Ed Schultz's show that is moving to weekends from 5-7 PM   

Happy to see this smart,, talented sister get her own show and MSNBC continue to diversify their lineup of pundits on the network, unlike CNN which is going in the opposite vanillacentric direction and getting rid of Roland Martin and Soledad O'Brien.

What I would like to see MSNBC do besides broadcast 24 hours of news and ditch Lockup and Caught on Camera (and I'm surprised they haven't done so already) is give Maria Teresa Kumar or Victoria DeFrancesco Soto their own shows.   MSNBC does seriously need Latin@ commentators on this network, and these two ladies would do a wonderful job.

But anyway, congrats to Karen Finney (who is on my people I'd love to meet list) and have no doubts your new show will be successful when it airs.

TransGriot Update: The debut of Karen Finney's mew MSNBC show has been pushed back