Eric Holder has filed a lawsuit putting the federal government behind the discrimination claim of a transwoman against a Texas RV park.

On October 3 the suit was filed in the Eastern District of Texas (Tyler Division) against George Toone and his company, In Toone Services.  In Toone Services owns Texas RV Park in Athens, TX.

Roxanne Joganik filed a complaint with the US Department of Housing and Urban Development in June 2012, alleging that Toone discriminated against her on the basis of sex, violating the federal Fair Housing Act.  Joganik and her roommate, Darlina Anthony, moved into the park on a month-to-month lease in April of 2011.  In Toone Services acquired the property in May of 2012, 5 days after Joganik had paid her rent through the month of June.  Joganik informed Toone that she was transgender and asked him if he would have a problem with her wearing female clothing in the common areas of the RV park.  Toone said it would be a problem because “there are children around the pool.”  So Joganik refrained from doing so.

A week later Toone distributed copies of the new park rules, requiring residents to sign them along with their service agreements.  The rules said that management “reserved the right to refuse entrance to anyone for any reason other than ‘race, religion, handicapped (sic), color or national origin.'”  The new rules did not include sex or family status, which are protected classes under the FHA.  So Joganik refused to sign the rules.

In late September TransGriot writer Monica Roberts took Gloria Steinem to task for her writings in the 1980s about transpeople.

You long time TransGriot readers know I’m not a feminist and I cringe when I hear Black women even say the term because of its history of marginalizing women of color to the point they left the movement.

And don’t even get me started on its outright hostility to trans women, which is why I identify as a womanist.

And yes, it’s time to unmask another one of the feminist icons, Gloria Steinem as a transphobe.

–Roberts

Steinem wrote at the time, “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.”

–Roberts

Steinem concluded the article with the famous quote:

If the shoe doesn’t fit, must we change the foot?