Tag: transgender

Annie Lennox has been interviewed several times lately and expressed some ideas worth noting.

We’re coming to a place where [feminism] needs to be inclusive.

I think the LGBTQ community are a part of that movement and we’re all sort of connected on this particular level and it’s very exciting – watch that space.

I am so happy to see now that transgender women and men are able to come out of the shadows finally and say ‘Look we’re here. Why do we need to pretend we don’t exist?’

It’s a very interesting time.

–Lennox

For many transgender people the hardest thing is maintaining or finding employment.

Today I focus on three cases.

Personally i transitioned as a tenured college mathematics professor at the University of Central Arkansas.  So while I feared the university might seek to fire me, I definitely had more leverage than most people.

In fact, when I was approached the Chair of my Department, who sought to bait me into violating my contract, I told him,

The University cannot hire me based on my gender, nor can it fire me based on my gender, so my gender is no business of yours.

So on to the case studies, in New York City, Oregon, and Florida.

Closed Circuit TV cameras show  PFC Joseph Scott Pemberton, 19, and three other  Marines  were drunk when they entered a Ambyanz Disco in Olongapo City around 11pm  on Saturday, October 11.  They show Pemberton leaving the bar a few minutes later with Jennifer Laude and three friends.  Pemberton is seen holding hands with Jennifer’s friend Barbie as they left Ambyanz for Celzone Lodge.

At around 11:35 Pemberton’s buddies were seen returning to the bar, looking for him.  They asked the bar employees if they might know where he was.  They had midnight curfew and had to get back to the ship.

One witness identified Pemberton from a photo line-up by Philippine National Police.  That witness also identified the 26-year-old Barbie as a witness of interest.  Both witnesses have asked for government protection.  Barbie also identified Pemberton.

Barbie has told investigators that she was sent away by Jennifer, who sensed there might be danger because they were transgender, so she and another friend went to another room in the lodge.  Barbie said that a room attendant (Elias Gallamos) knocked on their door around 11:45 to tell them that Pemberton had left, leaving the door ajar and Jennifer “passed out” in the bathroom of her room.

Jennifer was, in fact, dead.  She had been strangled and drowned in the toilet.  Autopsy listed the cause of death as asphyxiation by drowning.

Every once in awhile the stories pile up and in trying to remain current, I publish a compendium of transgender news stories.  I know that makes for a long read, but if I didn’t do this, some storries wouldn’t get any overage at all.

I hope you’ll at least scan the stories.  A better educated public is a fairer public.

Among the of current links of interest are Suggested Links between discrimination and suicide attempts by transgender people, which delves into a Williams Institute study from much earlier in the year and the Movement Advancement Project’s A Broken Bargain for Transgender Workers, which was published about a year ago.

These were woven together in the story of the recent suicide of Kate Von Roeder

One of the most commonly voiced perceptions about transgender people is that because we are transgender we are of necessity also mentally deficient.

This is not a new belief.

When an individual fails to mature according to his (or her) proper biological and sexological status, such an individual is psychologically (mentall deficient).  The psychological condition is in reality the disease.

When an individual who is unfavorably affected psychologically determines to live and appear as a member of the sex to which he or she does not belong, such an individual is what may be called a psychopathic transexual.

–David O. Caldwell, Psychopathis Transexualis, Sexology: Sex Science Magazine vol. 16 (1949)

Some people refer to it as Thursday morning.  To others it was Wednesday night.  At 2:30 am in East Hollywood..a transgender woman was shot one time…in the head.

She did not survive.

During the robbery, there was a struggle, and there were shots fired, and the victim was struck one time.  It appears they were struck in the head.

–LAPD Lt. Joe Losorelli

It’s really, really frightening for all of us, especially out here in the streets and stuff because discrimination is still very high in our community,

–Karina Samala of the Transgender Advisory Board of West Hollywood

R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes of Garden City, Michigan and Lakeland Eye Clinic of Lakeland, Florida have been found to have much in common by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

In 2013 Aimee Stephens, an embalmer and Funeral Director told her boss at Harris that she was transitioning from male to female.  Two weeks after that the owner of the funeral home chain fired here…telling her that what she proposed to do was “unacceptable.”

In 2011 Brandi Branson was fired from her job as director of hearing services at Lakeland Eye Clinic after informing her employer that she was transitioning to female and beginning to wear makeup and women’s tailored clothing.

Branson observed that co-workers snickered, rolled their eyes and withdrew from social interactions with her.

EEOC says the companies violated federal law by discriminating based on gender stereotypes. and has filed suit against them.

A few days ago one of the Daily Kos membership wrote a diary proclaiming the need for “a new gay rights platform,” presumably because the fight for marriage equality was over and done.

I have to say that the diary disappointed me at first…and the comments made by the author in response to comments made by myself and MargaretPOA proceeded to really piss me off.

First off I was sure that those LGBT people who live in states where marriage equality is still not a legal fact would be very concerned about am attitude that suggests ceasing to work for their rights, too…an attitude that suggests that if they want to get married, all they have to do is move to somewhere it is legal.  We all know that the wounded evil monster that is the denial of our rights will not die if we just walk away and tun our attention elsewhere.  When you have the monster on the ropes, it is time to make a concerted effort to drive a stake through its crusty hide into its black heart.

And even after that it will be necessary to hang around for a bit to make sure it doesn’t rise from the dead.

But secondly what really frustrated me was the exclusion from the discussion of any concern for the rights of transgender people…the T in LGBT was treated as if it was silent.

The Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law has released a new study, this time concerning the affects of Voter ID.  The Potential Impact of Voter Identification Laws on Transgender Voters in 2014 General Election, written by Jody Herman, concludes that there could be over 24000 eligible transgender voters across ten states who will not be able to vote because of Voter ID laws.  

The Institute finds that there are approximately 84000 eligible transgender voters in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Mississippi, Tennessee, Virginia, and Wisconsin.  All those states have photo voter ID laws except Wisconsin…which might have one come election time.  The study estimates that 28% of those eligible voters do not have valid photo ID that reflects their gender and name sufficient to the standards of the laws.  

Lawmakers should not overlook the consequences of enacting stricter voter ID laws on transgender voters.  Election officials must consider the potential impact of these laws in the upcoming November elections.  Voter ID laws create a unique barrier for transgender people who would otherwise be eligible to vote.

–Herman

Last March Chase Culpepper, 16, applied for a South Carolina driver’s license.  Chase is gender non-conforming but still uses male pronouns.  At the DMV Chase was told that he could not have his  license photo taken unless he removed the make-up he uses on a daily basis.

I covered the story at the time:  Disguise and Deception, complete with the basic concept:

The government should not be in the business of telling men and women how we are supposed to look as men and women.

–Michael Silverman, executive director of the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund (TLDEF)

On Tuesday TLDEF filed a federal lawsuit against the South Carolina Department of Motor Vehicles brought by Theresa Culpepper on behalf of her minor child, asking the court to rule that denying Chase the freedom to wear his everyday makeup in his license photo constitutes sex discrimination and violates his right to free speech and expression under the United States Constitution.  The suit also seeks a ruling that the DMV’s policy (roughly, that it cannot take the photo of anyone who is “in disguise”) is unconstitutionally vague, too broad, and allows DMV employees to “police gender” (i.e. to arbitrarily decide how a driver’s license applicant should look without regard to the rights of the people they are supposed to serve).