Syracuse Sucks If You're Trans And Murdered

"It's just one of those days
When you don't wanna wake up!
Everything is fucked, everybody sucks!" — Break Stuff, Limp Bizkit

How furious am I today? Let me count the ways ....

On second thought, no. Who's listening? Precious few. Yeah, cumulative things get to be a rabid bear when they're piled atop each other and compounded. Starting off the day fighting doesn't help. Nice sticky heat with none of the forecasted "cooling rain" magnifies it. Then losing water (my precious lifeline to cooling off!) for a good portion of the day added a topper to that.

But the news forthcoming wasn't anything pleasing. Quite disquieting actually – some of it, downright infuriating. As they say down here in Texas, it was enough to piss off the dead. First was word that the overwhelmingly democratic U.S. Senate, in its infinite wisdom, decided it would be a good thing to add the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act onto S. 1390: the Dept. of Defense spending bill replete with funding for F-22 fighters which are wasted spending and which Pres. Barack Obama has already vowed to veto if it makes it to his desk!

That's right. Democrats are helping kill off the trans-inclusive Hate Crimes bill in the Senate by sending a veto-ready bill for signature! And that, of course, is if it makes it past a Conference Committee with a joint-session membership (and manages to maintain all the aspects of the current Hate Crimes bill.) If something goes awry and gets cut out and passed in joint session, it goes from there to the President.

Then another headline caught my eye: "Sex-changer's suit claims bias against Parks Department." It was a headline from the New York Daily News (think FOX News in a newspaper format). Now the writer, Jose Martinez, did actually stick to the guidelines, mostly avoiding pronouns, and once referring to "her." But the screaming headline and later referencing that she had not had "a sex-change operation" lets you know where this is going.

The plantiff Chanel Birden wasn't helping her own case either, something her attorney Derek Smith should've monitored and didn't. As a result, the Daily News writer didn't focus much on the slurs and insults she was receiving and filing grievances about before her firing from the mail clerk position at New York's Central Park. Instead, the writer highlighted quotes from her self-describing herself as being "a gorgeous woman" and how she "would always go to work looking very glamorous" and similar responses. Sure, it wasn't officially out of bounds. But it's still predatory journalism looking to caricature and dismiss trans women who don't know better while sublimely covering his own tracks.

"The trans community always seems to have a knack for finding a way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory." — trans activist, Cathy Platine


Then I got the bombshell. Lateisha Green's murderer, Dwight DeLee, received his verdict in a Syracuse Courthouse. He was found innocent of second degree murder. He was convicted of first degree manslaughter. The jury determined that after DeLee had lobbed invective and epithets at Lateisha Green sitting in her brother's car, after he'd gone into the house to retrieve his rifle, and after lobbing a few more epithets and leveling the gun at point blank range into the car and shooting Teish, that he'd intended to only "seriously injure" her but had no intentions of killing her. Manslaughter, not a murder.

Any other victim killed in such a manner would expect their killer to receive a murder sentence. Ah, but Teish was murdered while Trans! And further, as my homegirl Monica Roberts would say, she was murdered while Black and Trans! As we read between the lines of this logic, it helps validate the killer's motivations. Why, having a trans person outside near his house practically requires one to go in their house and retrieve their rifle ... pop off a warning shot in their direction from a few feet away, just to make sure you don't have to fear for your life from the transsexual menace!

Certainly any average citizen in Syracuse would understand that threat, that fear! It's palpable!

Reality time: essentially this verdict actually foists some of the blame on the victim. That's right! The good people of Syracuse decided that being Trans, Lateisha Green should've known she's partially to blame for being attacked! It's kinda like women being partially to blame for being raped, Asian store owners being partially at fault for getting robbed in their stores, unarmed black men being partially understood to have been shot by police because of their potential threat – or even white men being partially culpable for getting shot while driving through a minority neighborhood! Everyone should know that's coming, and certainly expect that those who commit these crimes aren't to be fully blamed for it!

At least, that's the logic in Syracuse.

There were a number of statements in the press to note the verdict: "Today's verdict brings justice for Lateisha Green, but it can never heal the immense loss her family has experienced," said Jarrett Barrios, incoming President of the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD).

"This verdict sends a strong message that hate violence will not be condoned. How many more like Lateisha Green must spill blood before our society says no to harassment, no to discrimination and no to violence against transgender people? ... {J]ustice was served today." said Rea Carey, Exec. Dir. of National Gay & Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF)

A measure of justice, perhaps. But was absolute justice served? Is Manslaughter a strong message? It must be noted that neither Carey nor Barrios are Trans. Point of fact, only one of the statements put out yesterday on the DeLee verdict by the organizations was from a trans organization (TLDEF - the Transgender Legal Defense & Education Fund), but the statement was from their non-trans executive director.

Oddly, the lone trans person responding from any major org was from the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) who tacked on a trans voice to Exec. Dir. Joe Solmonese's statement. "I am relieved to see Lateisha’s killer brought to justice," said Allyson Robinson, HRC Associate Director of Diversity.

Both IFGE and NCTE remaining silent on this is odd. And to think that NTAC was criticized for putting out press and "drawing attention to ourselves." So leaving the attention to non-T voices and orgs is better?

Either we just don't pay attention to the details any more, or maybe it's just gotten so bad that any conviction more than simple assault of a person who murders a trans woman is a victory. Maybe it's me and all the other Trans folk around the country who are pissed at this lesser treatment by the court that are out of step?

Or maybe this is just a great way to put out a message that's consistent, celebratory and assures that there's no dissension: ensure that there's message control.

One has to wonder how the Gay & Lesbian community would react to this? If Matthew Shepard's murder drew a manslaughter conviction with a maximum 25 year sentence, would Judy Shepard feel this was justice served? If it were the Trans community declaring before press that such as sentence was justice, would the Gay & Lesbian community agree with our statements and consider it closed?

Or if not, would they speak out? After watching their responses in recent months, I believe I already know that answer.

“Compromise used to mean that half a loaf was better than no bread. Among modern statesmen it really seems to mean that half a loaf is better than a whole loaf.” English writer, Gilbert K. Chesterton

"If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation." former First Lady to the 2nd U.S. President, Abigail Smith Adams

Seeking Justice When The Empire (State) Strikes Black (Trans)

"Just waking up in the morning, gotta thank God.
I don't know but today just seems kinda odd....
Plus nobody I know got killed in South Central L.A.
... Today was a good day." – It Was A Good Day, Ice Cube

As I intermittently work on this blog the day before the trial begins for the murder of Lateisha Green (fka: Moses Cannon), I'm thankful for a few things. First of all, the District Attorneys appear to be taking an aggressive approach to prosecuting this case. This is much better than many cases where trans victims of murder are African American, or to a slightly lesser extent other ethnic minorities. The second thing I'm thankful for is that Teish, as she's referred to by friends and family, has a family that loved and supported her death after her death as well as (to what extent I can tell) before her murder as well. Teish's family are actively involved in monitoring and pressing for justice for her.

That latter fact – the family's involvement – cannot be dismissed. In all of the cases I've noted over the decade plus of hate crimes our community has lived through, the supportive family – especially parents who refuse to accept dismissive investigation and prosecution – make the most notable difference in successfully bringing these cases to light and to justice in the court system.

Additionally, I'm happy to hear that there is a good amount of pre-trial publicity getting out there, thanks to the initial work of the TransGriot blog by Monica Roberts (one of NTAC's co-founders and former board members). Additionally there's some of our folks on the ground to monitor and tweet the ongoing court proceedings: both Gay & Lesbian Alliance for Anti-Defamation (GLAAD) and especially the Transgender Legal Defense & Education Fund (TLDEF) will be there. Having our watchers there is a reminder to the court and prosecutors to keep it on the up and up.


Another thing I'm grateful for is that her killer was known, and quickly tracked down and arrested. Far too often, most especially in cases where it's a trans woman of color who nearly always gets the automatic presumption that "she was a sex-worker" from authorities, there is a rather lax attitude about bringing their murderers to justice.

Murders aren't only illegal if they occur to non-minority, and especially non-trans people. It's supposed to be "blind justice." We're taught to expect "equal justice" in our democratic system. Far too often, we get neither. Why is it that our community and our families are practically required to ride herd over the investigative and judicial process in order to ensure no apathy that sets in?

At least the tools are in place to make this a successful prosecution for justice. The DA's office has even filed hate crime charges against Teish's killer. That said, I'm fairly certain that hate crime violations will be sacrificed in order to get a full sentence for the murder.

It's not that I don't believe there was no hate crime committed – there was. The problem is that New York State's hate crime coverage for transgender victims. As I learned from Houston's Harris County's D.A. office years ago, prosecutors will not push for charges or convictions on laws that aren't explicitly on the book (as is the case in both Texas and New York).

The reasoning as explained to me, beyond Texas' conservative narrow-minded approach to law, is that if there is a charge and eventual conviction on a law that isn't explicitly on the books, it opens the door for challenging later in a retrial. All it takes is a sharp-eyed defense attorney (or even a jailhouse lawyer who has nothing better to do with all his incarcerated time than to file challenges, and sometimes effective ones.) Nevertheless, I see it as a good strategy to use this now at this stage of the trial, especially if they can get a solid plea deal from the defense. It indicates the D.A. in this case wants to send a message that a victim who is Trans deserves the same level of sentencing that a non-Trans victim would.

And therein lies my beef. New York has had over six years since SONDA and the infamous "promise" form Empire State Pride Agenda's then-executive director, Matt Foreman (who shortly thereafter escaped to a nice reward: Executive Director of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force - NGLTF). In the years since, that promise (to place GENDA and Hate Crimes on the forefront of ESPA's agenda) has been of as much value as a three-dollar bill.

These rights should've been extended by now in so-called "liberal" New York. But they haven't. It sends the country a clear message: their Trans citizens are less than everyone else in the Empire State. Trans people are not human (or certainly not human enough to be covered by their human rights laws)! The bottom line is this: New York's legislators are being either lazy or cowardly, or a combination of the two. And every year that passes since their executive director Foreman's promise helps further cement ESPA's legacy of unconcerned deceit.

If they don't like it, do something concrete to address it. Otherwise, live with it.

Now I'm fully aware that not all groups support Hate Crimes bills. The Sylvia Rivera Law Project came out with a statement earlier this year declaring their opposition (not a misprint) of the GENDA bill as it included hate crimes enhancement provisions, which they oppose. In one sense, I can understand their position.

However they also overlook one glaring point: there is no parity in sentencing in general. It's especially so when the victims are non-white, and most certainly so when the victims are transgender women who typically have their lives completely debased, sliced, diced and offered up to the point of virtually slanderous claims of lascivious prostitutes and sexual freaks while the defense is cross-examining and pressing the defendant's case (which is what they get paid to do). Other than the Angie Zapata trial, there has rarely if ever been equitable sentencing for those convicted of murdering Trans women. And to believe that there is no difference between a simple murder of a Trans woman (such as over a debt or a simple quarrel) and the murder of a Trans woman because of the homo- or transphobic connotations – not to mention the perception by many in society, even in New York's legislature – that we are lesser human creatures, tacitly implying that no one will care for us simply strains the limits of credibility to its break point.

Until there is equitable sentencing, until there is equal consideration for the lives of all victims regardless of race, class or Trans status, until there is demonstrated action in treating murderers of Trans women or Trans men as the murderers they are, and not allowing the a bit of leeway because, "hey! She's just a tranny, probably with a sordid past and who cares about them?" ... until we reach that day where I don't have questions about the message they send to all of society about us by their light treatment of our victims, I'm firmly standing on the side of enacting hate crime coverage for gender identity, and prosecuting to enhance it everywhere it is applicable.

And if people have problems with it, well ... there's a simpler solution! Simply work to dismantle all other coverage for hate crime enhancement based upon race, religion, gender, sexual orientation and the like! See if you don't get a rise out of them when you attempt this! And explain to them that it's an unfair law, and ask their sentiments on whether or not they feel sentencing has always been just when their own community was attacked in such incidences.

Meanwhile, we're mourning in America. Yet another young, unrealized potential ... another African-American woman who happened to be Trans ... is gone. And it's just one more name on the litany of lost lives among Trans women of color. Something needs to be done to stop this pattern of hate and violence.

Doing nothing and accepting things as they are just isn't going to cut it. I'll care about our attackers sentences or the hurt feelings of legislators or our political leaders once they first start caring about the sanctity of our lives.

"Here's another point in life you should not miss:
Don't be a fool who's prejudice,
Because we're all written down on the same list." — It's Like That, Run-D.M.C.

It's Marriage Mania In Maniacal America

"I'm goin' coconuts but least I'm goin' my way.
I'll probably be here when that sun goes down.
Goin' crazy, ooh, from the heat!" — Goin' Crazy, David Lee Roth

Maybe it's just the unending heatwave in Texas, where any day below triple digits actually feels slightly chilly, but it seems to my overcooked brain that both sides on this same-sex marriage tug-of-war are coming down with a chronic case of the wackies. Or maybe it's just a sizzling hot summer everywhere and it's not just me – everyone's losing it.

Marriage mania is in full bloom, and Pennsylvania joined the litany of states pushing for marriage recognition for same-sex couples. Amazingly marriage didn't get forced down the throat of President Barack Obama when the 300 some-odd LGBT leaders and their partners were invited to the White House for a private reception. However, just this week both Massachusetts and Oregon filed suit claiming the Feds violate their federalist states' rights by DOMA's effect on their states' ability to make independent decisions on marriage rights.

Meanwhile the California suit against the Feds has gotten interesting. Initially when this was filed (including one attorney who offered to press the issue who was also part of the Bush legal team who filed suit successfully to place Bush in the presidency post-Florida 2000 election results!) it was thought that things were looking rather rosy. Even LGBT organization heads from groups such as Lambda Legal, the ACLU's LGBT Rights Project and the National Center for Lesbian Rights all stepped up and encouraged all other groups to take a back seat in order not to complicate or jeopardize the pending suit. "Ill-timed lawsuits could set the fight for marriage back."

Well that was then. This is now. It seems these same three groups are now filing amicus briefs to intervene to allow PFLAG, Lavender Seniors of the East Bay and Our Family Coalition to file suit with the Supreme Court as well. (And they all thought we Trans folk couldn't get on the same page or being politically "realistic"!

The American Foundation for Equal Rights (AFER), who was leading the charge in Federal Court, wrote a pointed letter back to the three above mentioned groups, noting how they had all initially worked collaboratively on the project and anguishing over actions and quotes in the media from these other players that they felt "undermine" the case and the goal which they were all working towards.

Not only were they there first on this suit, AFER worries that this case "could be mired in procedurally convoluted pre-trial maneuvering for years—while and gay and lesbian individuals in California continue to suffer the daily indignity of being denied their federal constitutional right to marry the person of their choosing." I've attached a photocopy of the full letter from AFER to the parties below. It's, um, interesting:


So what are they trying to do here – out-compete each other for top attention and ego strokes? Or maybe bog it down in order to slow the process (and maybe milk more donations while it continues?) No matter! At least everyone's on the same page and it's all in the firm capable hands of our professionals in leadership of the gay and lesbian community! Lord knows if Trans people got a hold of it, it'd be a confusing mess, hmmm? Yeah, that's what they say ....

"What is important in life is life, and not the result of life." — German playwright, Johann von Goethe

Of course, not to be outdone on trying to conspicuously blunder and lose, the opposition is also working hard to snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory! It was bad enough that a FOX commentator compared the same-sex marriage issue to bestiality a la Pat Robertson and so many others. That's actually old-hat stuff now! Get the latest on the intra-species marriage issue from FOX (again)!

This was actually reporting on a story of a Swedish study that found that marriage was good for couples in that it kept them from dementia and Alzheimer's disease with absolutely not connotations on same-sex couplings at all. Yet their own Freudian mentality just keeps slipping out as on FOX & Friends morning show, we heard this from one of their triad of morning hosts, Brian Kilmeade:

BRIAN KILMEADE: I'm just amazed that they thought about doing this study in the – by interviewing people in the 1970s and the 1980s.

DAVE BRIGGS: A little dated, you think?

KILMEADE: The average is 50, and they see that they keep it together. I find this – I find this somewhat ....

BRIGGS: Go ahead.

KILMEADE: Different. Leave it to the Finns and Swedes to some up with something. They literally –

GRETCHEN CARLSON: Don't look at me, pal.

KILMEADE: Because that's a – we are – we're – we're a – we're – we keep marrying other species and other ethnics and other....

CARLSON: Are you sure they're not suffering from some of the causes of dementia right now?

KILMEADE: I mean, the Swedes ....

BRIGGS: What are you getting at?

KILMEADE: See, the problem is, the Swedes have pure genes.

BRIGGS: OK.

KILMEADE: Because they marry other Swedes because that's the rule. Finland – Finns marry other Finns, so they have a pure society. In America, we marry everybody.

That's right folks! Intra-species marriage is already here in America! As Kilmeade noted: "we keep marrying other species and other ethnics ... the problem is the Swedes have pure genes (ah! gotta watch them! the Master Race people!) ... Because they marry other Swedes because that's the rule. Finland – Finns marry other Finns, so they have a pure society. In America, we marry everybody." This is rife with alarmist xenophobia!

And marrying "other species"? Really? Are they buying that Georgia freak's Obama-as-Curious-George-the-Chimp T-shirt fetish as scientific fact? What a serious media outlet FOX has turned out to be, huh? It sure sorta hearkens back to the old miscenegation days from what I can see, all this concern about America's "intra-species" marriage and breeding! Wow.

"The most perfidious way of harming a cause consists of defending it with faulty arguments." — Friedrich Nietzsche

But if that's not wacky enough, it gets crazier! From no less than Washington DC, home of Marion Barry who supports everything EXCEPT for his staunch disapproval of same-sex marriage (and subsequent arrest this week for stalking – way to drive home the point of morals, Mr. Ex-Mayor!), we have testimony on the DC consideration of accepting same-sex marriage as law of the district from Rev. Leroy Swailes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFFYYjWjVuE


This one has to be seen to be believed. I can't make this stuff up, folks! Some of the reverend's philosophical proferrings are:

"You have human rights and you have inhuman rights. When a man dealing with a man and a woman dealing with another man, that's inhuman." Make sense of that logic!

Discrimination's a negative and a postive. ... I came out of my mama's womb like I didn't have a choice. That was a negative discrimination." Yeah, I guess you didn't have a choice ... unless you managed to self-abort! Is this an advertisement for abortion?

"If you discriminate against a homosexual that's a positive. Why? Because of children. You've got people they call pedophiles.... When you look in the eyes of a child and tell them "sex is between Adam and Adam, and Eve and Eve," that's a pedophile." Wow, it's that simple? And all this time I thought it was about something physical, like molestation or at least child nudity. What was I thinking!

"This book here talk [sic] about 'All Families Are Different' has to do with what? You have God's family, which is a natural family, and you have Antichrist's family." Yeah, all Godly families have to "be like us." That's exactly what the racist white families used to think during the days of Jim Crow, too, and they believed that the Bible told them where everyone else's family fell. It must be said that Rev. Swailes is African-American though his logic is eerily familiar, harkening back to those bad old days.

One child grows up to be
Somebody that just loves to learn.
And another child grows up to be
Somebody you'd just love to burn.
Mom loves the both of them.
You see it's in the blood.
Both kids are good to Mom:
'Blood's thicker than mud'
It's a family affair...." — Family Affair, Sly & The Family Stone

"Everybody should have human rights, but you have to be human! Human means you deal with the opposite sex...." Meaning that, what? All Trans people have tails? All gays are sick little monkeys? And I'm sure he meant it in the best way possible, no offense and all!

"Homosexuality destroys (life), it'll be the extinction of the human race.... Eighty-six civilized cultures, it was the death of their cultures why? Because they gave into ... strange flesh: the same sex, which is a form of bestiality. Why is that a form of bestiality? Because a beast has four legs and one gender! If you put two men together, you have four legs and two penises. That's one gender. That's a form of bestiality." Ah! Well that explains it! Four legs and one gender is animal! So if there's a three-legged dog, or a couple who are same-sex, but one partner only has one leg, then they'd be semi-bestial, right? Or if both partners are one-legged, then same-sex marriage would be okay because they'd be human! I recalled a show on Oprah once that showed a dog born with no front legs, and it literally taught itself to walk on it's hind legs, upright! That would make him human, not animal! So then a woman could then marry that dog and not be engaging in bestiality per Swailesian logic! But what about "eunuchs, which were so born from [their] mother's womb?" Vexing! Or for that matter, how about "eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men?" Hmm ... clear as mud!

"When you separate something, you have discrimination. When I put a glass of water here and a glass of poison, which one are you going to choose? You're going to choose a glass of water. That's a form of discrimination!" Ah! I'm getting it! We discriminate against poison every time there's a glass of it on the table and we avoid drinking it! Shame on us anti-poison bigots!

"I cannot look into the eyes of a child and tell them "you have a choice to be heterosexual or homosexual." That would make me a sadist! So what is a sadist? A sadist is the one who destroyed sex! ... and I don't practice Satanism." Not sure where the satanism thing came into play – a Freudian slip? And all this time I thought sadism, named after the Marquis De Sade, was all about inflicting physical or mental cruelty! Then again, I can see how some would get confused and think it cruel to tell kids they have choices in life. Better to eliminate all choices and just pre-destine everyone's life for them from inception! It eliminates all the guesswork! Just hand them an assignment sheet saying "here is your life – don't think, just live what we tell you." Hey look, I'm supposed to be a garbageman ...!

It's a wonderful world out there, kiddies. Yes indeed, batshit crazy.

Meanwhile, halfway across the globe, Iranians are protesting and taking to the streets, risking incarceration and even their lives for defying the Ahmadinejad Administration! And here in the U.S, that saga sure fell off of the radar screen fast! What's a country got to do to get a little media time over life-and-death issues like marriage? Iran's free people need a strong advocate here – someone like Mary Cheney: she who couldn't be bothered to bring up same-sex marriage or gay rights issues in her dad & Bush's campaign, and supported her daddy and the GOP (even with the antagonistic approach the Bush Admin took on her issues) because "there are terrorists who will stop at nothing to hurt this country ... I had to support the candidate who was going to do the best job to protect this country. And no offense to John Kerry, but it wasn't him."


So now that the people of Iran are trying to oust one of the heads of Bush's Axis of Evil, and folks in America are focusing on that less important stuff like same-sex marriage, where is Mary Cheney these days?

"...things get confused out there: power, ideals, the old morality...." — G. D. Spradlin as Gen. Corman from "Apocalypse Now."

Pride 2009: We Yelled, They Screamed. But Did Anyone 'Hear' Us?

"When you're drowning, you don't say 'I would be incredibly pleased if someone would have the foresight to notice me drowning and come and help me,' you just scream.” — John Lennon

It was one for the ages. Forty years after Stonewall, to the day (with an additional 12 hours added) ... we found ourselves marching down Fifth Avenue through downtown New York and cutting a path directly through Greenwich Village and right down Christopher Street in front of the Stonewall Inn where the riots – the flashpoint for the organized Gay Rights Movement around the world – began.


Marching through this parade, in the very same New York, with a banner for the contingent noting "Sons and Daughters of Sylvia Rivera" on this anniversary was inspiring. The roar of the crowd as we passed, especially throughout Greenwich Village, was absolutely deafening! My ears were literally ringing afterwards.

In so many ways this was an event to remember! As Sylvia Rivera recalled saying that night of the riots, "I'm not missing this for the world!"

Privately, it was also a trying and disappointing result. I knew it would be a logistical task coordinating something in a locale hundreds or thousands of miles away. But this one was a bit more "Murphy's Law"-like than most others. Everything that could go wrong ....


The banner people were nothing but a mass of confusion, and the banner had to be sent to Mona Rae's house in Yonkers NY as I was afraid I wouldn't receive it until after my flight to NYC. I literally picked up the banner at a drop off point on Friday in Manhattan just a few minutes before the Trans Day of Action after criss-crossing the town to pick up poster boards (which were shipped late) after a speech out in far East New York, and dropping those off in Hoboken where I was staying! Between that, crossed wires, lost items, help arriving too late to be of any good, a subway weekly pass that arbitrarily stopped working and family and personal issues to deal with long-distance while in New York, it was, um, interesting!

Coordinating things in your back yard is simply stressful. Coordinating things 1500 miles away tends to border on madness.


We were also unsuccessful in getting the Stonewall Girls to the 40th anniversary. One showed interest but the other two didn't. As one noted, there was far too much bad blood over how she and the other trans folk were treated to gloss over it. For a lot of old-line trans members, there's nothing to really celebrate and much more to mourn or stew over.


We had participants cancelling due to health reasons (theirs and their spouses), even a group cancelling while en route due to a communter train's power outage! We had a number of confirmed attendees who simply didn't make it; no idea why, just no-shows. Locally, even though I made the circuit to promote, we didn't draw any from those, save for five from Mid-Hudson Valley Trans Assn. up in the Kingston / Poughkeepsie region.


That said, we did get Alyssa Harley (who's taken pains to remember Sylvia Rivera every year by attaching red roses to the lamppost at Sylvia Rivera Way.) Both she and Breanna Smith helped lead our contingent and worked their asses off to stir the crowd. Jamie Dailey who made it down from Connecticut also gets props for working the crowd and for her help on the banner preparation on Pride day.

We also brought in a couple of the old Transy House crew: Rusty Mae Moore and Jamie Hunter. It was great seeing them again and especially marching as the Sons & Daughters of Sylvia Rivera. In fact, Jamie even brought her boyfriend Michael Gredowski, a brand new straight ally. Rusty originally wasn't sure that she could make it through the entire length of the parade route, but I noted admirably that she was just as energetic, holding her sign high above her head and stirring the crowd even at the very end of Christopher Street! Meanwhile Jamie did her own tribute to Sylvia Rivera by marching the entire route in heels (amazingly!) and was leading our contingent running and stirring the crowd herself. Michael, who stood in as our "Son" portion of the "Sons & Daughters" absolutely kicked butt and really got into the march himself.


Special thanks go out to both Jamie Hunter and Michael for all their help during and especially before and after the parade. They were indefatigable assistants that really helped make this succeed. In fact, with all the complications and potential to fall flat on our face, our team made it look effortless and successful!

We later had another older latino man (not even sure that he was gay) who joined us from the sidelines on the banner as our second "adopted" son of Sylvia, ha! We even had a couple other latinas join us as well! We were pulling people in from the crowd – it seemed everyone wanted to be part of the Sons & Daughters of Sylvia Rivera!


The Sons & Daughters of Sylvia Rivera garnered a lot of attention from photo journalists and the crowd itself! However, I believe I overestimated its importance to the Trans Community. While Sylvia herself was around and had her voice, people listened. However, she's been gone for over seven years now. Most of the newer trans community members either don't know of her or the history, or they are busy making their own individual history and doing and participating in their own ventures. Rather than one group, we're now spreading out into hundreds of groups and individually expressing our own perspectives.

"I just can't do what I done before,
I just can't beg you any more.
I'm gonna let you pass and I'll go last.
Then time will tell just who fell
And who's been left behind,
When you go your way and I go mine." — Most Likely You'll Go Your Way And I'll Go Mine, Bob Dylan

This is a good thing. However there is also a downside to that dispersal. As we all know after hearing it from Barney Frank or other gay and lesbian critics of the Trans movement, people "don't know" us, and we're "a very small segment" of the community. The message has always been that Trans people are an infinitesimally small portion of the greater Queer (originally Gay) movement. Between the stigma of Trans and being out about it, and the compulsion to do our own thing, it's tough to gather trans folks in numbers adequate enough to make a statement to gay and lesbian leaders and the world that we're not tiny, insignificant and doomed to utter obscurity.

At the risk of sounding like a skipping record, I can't stress the need for quantifying numbers of us. We need to establish our population and our income (especially lack thereof). Its needed not just for demographics for political attention, but even afterwards to establish our market share (the key to corporate funding for things Trans the way even the gay and lesbian and all other segments are able to draw.)


And again, these numbers will help us actually steal back our own voice (which is incresingly being co-opted and capitalized on of late). It's about the only thing we ever really had in the Trans community was our voice and it appears others think we've abdicated it. When you sit back and let anyone represent you, you end up with the type of governance or oversight you deserve.

Even while I was up in New York, there was an apparent dust up between trans folks and others on Pam's House Blend which ended up resulting in a number of people being censored or banned (I'm not sure which). There was a noticeable hue and cry over it all with folks complaining about the list's owner and the uneven treatment. But a reminder: it's Pam Spaulding's list, she's not a trans person and she can do whatever the hell she feels like with her blog (emphasis on "her blog"). If she wishes to ban trans people, it's her blog! She has the autonomy to do so.

If we trans readers disagree, well then, start your own. Nobody should think that anything trans that's valid must come from an entity that is always led and/or created by a gay or lesbian. Similarly anything that was created and that provides autonomy to trans people should not be quashed simply because it isn't led or created by gay or lesbian leaders who then choose the agenda and represent the de facto face of the trans community. TransAdvocate is attempting to do that right now.


Yet too many of us end up contributing to building up gay and lesbian-led institutions as "they're our allies" and end up watering down or thwarting our own voice in order for some perceived considerations or reward. Maybe that worked adequately for Mara Keisling or a few select folks from the NCTE ilk. For the rest of us there is absolutely nothing gained — it's an absolute net loss. All we do is water down our own numbers, our own voice and our own efficacy. We must get out there and actively take control of our own fate, lest we end up not even being the face of our own community.

"You know, with all the press releases you do, people think that it's just NTAC — or just you – drawing attention to yourself." — Mara Keisling of NCTE in a conversation to me in August 2004


Taking back the Trans community's voice is a must. It is more than needed, it's urgent. The original hope was that this would hopefully serve as a catalyst to begin earnestly to re-seize our destiny and our voice.

Is it possible? Well, after seeing the response on the march in New York and how easily separable we are from our own community, it's not likely. Far too many of us have no desire for the involvement (much less the work getting it done). The few of us with such desire for involvement or working to make things happen will be going our individual directions in things such as Pride parades. The solution to this still needs some rethinking.


We've got to find a way to take a Trans movement that's dying on the vine and get it spurred in the ass into some forward motion. We have people dropping out of the movement in frustration, fatigue and dreams of wanting to have a "real life" away from being "the tranny" or "the activist" and on point constantly. I've even had numerous others ask me how I'm doing this still after 14 years with the obvious burn-out and the high, high cost that it's come with. Certainly it would seem better to just admit it's fruitless and walk away. But that only makes certain defeat.

We need to bear in mind trans history, with all our forebearers efforts ending in absolutely nothing for those who gave all. We need to recognize there's nothing ever to gain from relinquishing our destiny to the trust of others who have no full understanding of our needs, much less the urgency. And I fully keep in mind that with no future or hope, I certainly have nothing to gain by giving in, and in fact nothing to lose (save for my life, which we all lose in the end) by anything I do. As I noted to the most recent activist stepping away asking how I continue this, I just put myself on auto-pilot – or more precisely auto-battle mode. As I had on one side, "when hope is gone, fight like Sylvia! (fiercely and to the very end!)"


In years down the road, Trans folks will realize we must re-seize our movement. Until then, I'll just be the crazy, quixotic old tranny, screaming in the wind about our need to own our voice, our movement and our destiny. Sylvia said the same thing years ago, and nobody much listened to her while she was around either. They may not hear, but we should continue speaking truth to power and never stop screaming it.

Maybe it's the roar of the crowd drowning us all out.


"Lift every voice and sing,
'Til earth and heaven ring,
Ring with the harmonies of liberty." — Lift Every Voice And Sing, James Weldon Johnson

"Ain't no one gonna listen if you haven't made a sound." — Filthy Gorgeous, the Scissor Sisters

Lift Your Voices In Pride -- And Outrage!

“I think I was just fed up with the image that had been created around me, which I sometimes consciously, most of the time unconsciously cooperated with. It just got too much for me to really stomach and so I put an end to it one glorious evening.” — singer, Jim Morrison

"Scream 'til you feel it!
Scream 'til you believe it!
Scream and when it hurts you,
Scream it out loud." — Scream, Tokio Hotel

"Evil prospers when good men do nothing." — Irish politician, author, philosopher, Edmund Burke

This will be a short post. Actually I shouldn't even be awake, but it's one of those sultry, sticky nights following nine days of temps of 100 or over (save for last Monday's 99). Yes, for those of us without A/C, it's tailor-made for regular irregular sleep patterns.

Beyond the personal, it's Pride week for many of us. As I'm on an 11AM flight to New York (thank God for frequent flyer miles!), I'm looking forward to doing Pride where the movement both galvanized and mobilized the community. Pride in New York falls exactly 40 years and about 11 hours after the beginning of the Stonewall Riots.

Since that time, we've seen massive change – some good, some bad. One thing that strikes me though is that we as a nation have become imminently more docile. You look at the election fraud in Iran and what that's produced in mass demonstration, then compare it to the U.S. where we went through two shady election cycles to begin the millennium: virtually nothing. We just took it.

Similarly there's a strong sense of of many in America falling through the cracks into destitution. Nowhere is this more urgent than in the Trans community and Queer community of color.

So where's the outrage? Even with things moving toward marriage equality in many states, including what may be an imminent passage in New York state, there is no hate crime protection nor virtually any job opportunities (much less equality) for these mentioned segments of our community. Yet even for an event such as raising the visibility of this in Pride this year, we're more content to divide into camps and stay on the sidelines.

Meanwhile, the business opportunists take de facto dominion over our voice and seeming power of attorney of our decision making on how and when and what needs to be addressed. And as a result, we find ourselves jobless, often under attack and without hope ... but in some of these same locales, able to marry!

The time has come. We need to seize our voices back. Yes, this is a celebratory event, but keep in mind we are *marching* in the parade not much different than our LGBT forebearers in a much more active, much more responsible and much less docile time. Forget the commercialism, opulence and flash. Think of what it would've been like back before it became this big party if those early marches after Stonewall never occurred because Sylvia Rivera or Bob Kohler or Marsha P. Johnson or even Randolfe Wicker had decided, "no, I can't be bothered, too much work."

You have a voice. Use it or lose it. If you're outraged, if you feel manipulated, used and thrown away and disgruntled, then express yourself! And if you don't, then someone else will capitalize on your voice and you'll end up, to paraphrase Thomas Jefferson, we'll get the governance we deserve due to our apathy.

"I know that my children in later years, my transgender community will understand: We have to stand up and speak for ourselves! We have to fight for ourselves! We save their lives. We were the front line of the so-called 1969 rebellion of the Stonewall." — Sylvia Rivera from the documentary: Sylvia Rivera, A Trans Life Story

"Time has come today.
Young hearts can go their way.
Can't put it off another day.
I don't care what others say.
They say we don't listen anyway." — Time Has Come Today, the Chambers Brothers

Remembering Stonewall, Forty Years Hence

"It's time to laugh, it's time to cry
It's time to be what you need to be!
It won't be long 'til they are gone
And we can be what we want to be!
I wanna run from everything,
Everything that holds me down!
Nothing to win, nothing to lose." — Free, V.A.S.T.

This is rearranged transcript from "Remembering Stonewall" which premiered July 1, 1989. The show itself interviewed both people at the scene of Stonewall as well as others who related how they felt hearing about Stonewall and what it meant to their lives. Rather than simply reposting, I took the liberty of culling the portions of it that had specific relevance to what happened in the early morning hours of Saturday, June 28, 1969 at the Stonewall Inn. Those relevant to the riot were left in and organized a bit better, rather than the cut and paste snippets of the original in order to give more of a feel for the sentiment of the night, especially from Dep. Inspector Seymour Pine and Sylvia Rivera – the nights two main players in this documentary.

COMMENTATOR: On Friday evening, June 27, 1969, at about 11:45, eight officers from New York City's public morals squad loaded into four unmarked police cars and headed to the Stonewall Inn here at 7th Avenue and Christopher Street. The local precinct had just received a new commanding officer, who kicked off his tenure by initiating a series of raids on gay bars. The Stonewall was an inviting target – operated by the Gambino crime family without a liquor license, the dance bar drew a crowd of drag queens, hustlers, and minors. A number of the bar's patrons had spent the early part of the day outside the Frank Campbell Funeral Home, where Judy Garland's funeral was held. She had died the Sunday before. It was almost precisely at midnight that the morals squad pulled up to the Stonewall Inn, led by Deputy Inspector, Seymour Pine.

SEYMOUR PINE: My name is Seymour Pine. In 1968, I was assigned as Deputy Inspector in charge of public morals in the first division in the police department, which covered the Greenwich Village area. It was the duty of Public Morals to enforce all laws concerning vice and gambling, including prostitution, narcotics, and laws and regulations concerning homosexuality. The part of the penal code which applied to drag queens was Section 240.35, section 4: "Being masked or in any manner disguised by unusual or unnatural attire or facial alteration; loiters, remains, or congregates in a public place with other persons so masked . . ."

You felt, well, two guys -- and that's very often all we sent in would be two men -- could handle two hundred people. I mean, you tell them to leave and they leave, and you say show me your identification and they all take out their identification and file out and that's it. And you say, okay, you're not a man, you're a woman, or you're vice versa and you wait over there. I mean, this was a kind of power that you have and you never gave it a second thought.

There was never any reason to feel that anything of any unusual situation would occur that night.

For some reason, things were different this night. As we were bringing the prisoners out, they were resisting. One drag queen, as we put her in the car, opened the door on the other side and jumped out. At which time we had to chase that person and he was caught, put back into the car, he made another attempt to get out the same door, the other door, and at that point we had to handcuff the person. From this point on, things really began to get crazy. [T]hat's when all hell broke loose at that point. And then we had to get back into Stonewall.

We noticed a group of persons attempting to uproot one of the parking meters, at which they did succeed. And they then used that parking meter as a battering ram to break down the door. And they did in fact open the door -- they crashed it in -- and at that point was when they began throwing Molotov cocktails into the place. It was a situation that we didn't know how we were going to be able control.

Remember these were pros, but everybody was frightened. There's no question about that. I know I was frightened, and I'd been in combat situations, and there was never any time that I felt more scared than I felt that night. And, I mean, you know there was no place to run.

For those of us in Public Morals, after the Stonewall incident things were completely changed from what they had previously been. They suddenly were not submissive anymore. They now suddenly had gained a new type of courage. And it seemed as if they didn't care anymore about whether their identities were made known. We were now dealing with human beings.

RED MAHONEY: My name is Red Mahoney. I've been hanging out drinking, partying, and working in the gay bars for the last thirty years. In the era before Stonewall, all of the bars, 90% of the bars, were Mafia controlled. There wasn't that many gay bars. You'd have maybe one, two uptown on the Upper East Side. They would get closed down. Then there'd be one or two on the west side, they'd get closed down. In midtown there'd be one, two, three, maybe open. As they would get closed down they would move around. And they were dumps.

The Stonewall? Oh, that was a good bar. That was. Just to get into the Stonewall, you'd walk up and you'd knock on the front door. You'd knock and the little door would open and "What do you want?" "A Mary sent me." "Good, come on in girls." You know. The Stonewall, like all gay bars at that time, were painted black. Charcoal black. And what was the funny part, the place would be so dimly lit -- but as soon as the cops were gonna come in to collect their percentage or whatever they were coming in for, from it being a nice, dimly-lit dump, the place was lit up like Luna Park.

SYLVIA RIVERA: My name is Sylvia Rivera. My name before that was Ray Rivera, until I started dressing in drag in 1961.

The era before Stonewall was a hard era. There was always the gay bashings on the drag queens by heterosexual men, women, and the police. We learned to live with it because it was part of the lifestyle at that time, I guess, but none of us were very happy about it.

At that time we lived at the Arista Hotel. We used to sit around, just try to figure out when this harassment would come to an end. And we would always dream that one day it would come to an end. And we prayed and we looked for it. We wanted to be human beings.

The drag queens took a lot of oppression and we had to . . . we were at a point where I guess nothing would have stopped us. I guess, as they say, or as Shakespeare says, we were ladies in waiting, just waiting for the thing to happen. And when it did happen, we were there.

You could actually feel it in the air. You really could. I guess Judy Garland's death just really helped us really hit the fan. People started gathering in front of the Sheridan Square Park right across the street from Stonewall. People were upset -- "No, we're not going to go!" and people started screaming and hollering.

"Call out the instigators
Because there's something in the air.
We've got to get together sooner or later
Because the revolution's here, and you know it's right." — Something In The Air, Thunderclap Newman

SYLVIA RIVERA: I remember someone throwing a Molotov cocktail. I don't know who the person was, but I mean I saw that and I just said to myself in Spanish, I said. oh my God, the revolution is finally here! And I just like started screaming "Freedom! We're free at last!" You know. It felt really good.

Once the tactical police force showed up, I think that really incited us a little bit more.

BIRDY RIVERA: My name is Robert Rivera and my nickname is Birdy, and I've been cross-dressing all of my life. I remember the night of the riots, the police were escorting queens out of the bar and into the paddy wagon and there was this one particularly outrageously beautiful queen, with stacks and stacks of Elizabeth style, Elizabeth Taylor style hair, and she was asking them not to push her. And they continued to push her, and she turned around and she mashed the cop with her high heel. She knocked him down and then she proceeded to frisk him for the keys to the handcuffs that were on her. She got them and she undid herself and passed them to another queen that was behind her.

HOWARD SMITH: My name is Howard Smith. On the night of the Stonewall riots I was a reporter for the Village Voice, locked inside with the police, covering it for my column. It really did appear that that crowd – because we could look through little peepholes in the plywood windows, we could look out and we could see that the crowd – well, my guess was within five, ten minutes it was probably several thousand people. Two thousand easy. And they were yelling "Kill the cops! Police brutality! Let's get 'em! We're not going to take this anymore! Let's get 'em!"

There were a couple of cops stationed on either side of the door with their pistols, like in combat stance, aimed in the door area. A couple of others were stationed in other places, behind like a pole, another one behind the bar. All of them with their guns ready. I don't think up to that point I had ever seen cops that scared.

"Hand out the arms and ammo
We're going to blast our way through here
We've got to get together sooner or later
Because the revolution's here, and you know it's right." — Something In The Air, Thunderclap Newman

MISS MARTIN BOYCE: My name is Martin Boyce and in 1969 I was a drag queen known as Miss Martin. I remember on that night when we saw the riot police, all of us drag queens, we linked arms, like the Rockettes, and sang this song we used to sing. (singing) "We are the Village girls, we wear our hair in curls. We wear our dungarees above our nelly knees." And the police went crazy hearing that and they just immediately rushed us. We gave one kick and fled.


RUDY: My name is Rudy and the night of the Stonewall I was 18 and to tell you the truth, that night I was doing more running than fighting. I remember looking back from 10th Street, and there on Waverly Street there was a police, I believe on his . . . a cop and he is on his stomach in his tactical uniform and his helmet and everything else, with a drag queen straddling him. She was beating the hell out of him with her shoe. Whether it was a high heel or not, I don't know. But she was beating the hell out of him. It was hysterical.

SYLVIA RIVERA: Here this queen is going completely bananas, you know jumping on, hitting the windshield. The next thing you know, the taxicab was being turned over. The cars were being turned over, windows were shattering all over the place, fires were burning around the place. It was beautiful, it really was. It was really beautiful.

I wanted to do every destructive thing that I could think of at that time to hurt anyone that had hurt us through the years.

A lot of heads were bashed. But it didn't hurt their true feelings -- they all came back for more and more. Nothing -- that's when you could tell that nothing could stop us at that time or any time in the future.

MAMA JEAN: My name is Mama Jean. I'm a lesbian. I remember on that night I was in the gay bar, a woman's bar, called Cookies. We were coming out of the gay bar going toward 8th Street, and that's when we saw everything happening. Blasting away. People getting beat up. Police coming from every direction -- hitting women as well as men with their nightsticks. Gay men running down the street with blood all over their face. We decided right then and there, whether we're scared or not we didn't think about, we just jumped in.

I remember one cop coming at me, hitting me with the nightstick on the back of my legs. I broke loose and I went after him. I grabbed his nightstick. My girlfriend went behind him – she was a strong son of a gun. I wanted him to feel the same pain that I felt. And I kept saying to him, "How do you like the pain? Do you like it? Do you like it?" And I kept on hitting him and hitting him. I was angry. I wanted to kill him. At that particular minute I wanted to kill him.

COMMENTATOR: The riots were well covered in the media. The New York Daily News featured it on the front page. There were reports on all of the local television and radio stations. By the next day, graffiti calling for gay power had started to show up all over the West Village. The next night, thousands of men and women came back to the Stonewall to see what would happen next. While a couple of trashcans were set on fire and some stones were thrown, the four-hundred riot police milling around outside the bar ensured that the previous evening's violence would not be repeated. But on this night, gay couples could be spotted walking hand in hand and kissing in the streets. Just by being at the Stonewall -- surrounded by reporters, photographers, and onlookers -- thousands of men and women were proclaiming that they were gay. The crowds grew and came back the next night and for one more night the following week. What happened at the Stonewall on those nights helped to usher in a new era for gay men and lesbians.

SEYMOUR PINE: Well, I retired from the police department in 1976. Twenty years have passed. I'm going to be 70 in a few months. I still don't know the answers. I would still like to know the answers. I would like to know whether I was wrong or whether I was right in ever thinking that there was a difference, in ever thinking that maybe you shouldn't trust a homosexual because something is missing in his personality.

MAMA JEAN: It's like just when you see a man protecting his own life. They weren't the "queens" that people call them, they were men fighting for their lives. And I'd fight along side them any day, no matter how old I was.


SYLVIA RIVERA: Today I'm a 38-year-old drag queen. I can keep my long hair, I can pluck my eyebrows, and I can work wherever the hell I want. And I'm not going to change for anybody. If I changed, then I feel that I'm losing what 1969 brought into my life, and that was to be totally free.

"We have got to get it together now" — Something In The Air, Thunderclap Newman

"You can't tell me what to do anymore
Now I'm free, now I'm free, now I'm free!" — Free, V.A.S.T.

A Month Shy Of The 40th Anniversary Of Stonewall And A Pride Parade Is Boycotted

"We've been working our whole lives to make things equal. And we still got nothing. They don't care about trans people. ... But we will come back. We will fight back." — Sylvia Rivera from an interview on KPFT, June 9, 2001

As we come upon June 28, 2009 – the 40th Anniversary of the Stonewall Riots in New York City which catalyzed the public push for rights among GLBT people – we will see any number of events popping up to remember the occasion. While it may not have begun the actual behind-the-scenes work for rights, it arguably was the key moment to bring gay rights into the lexicon and consciousness of the rest of the world.

However, it became gay rights only shortly thereafter when those same behind-the-scenes, shadowy leaders in high places with memberships in the Mattachine or the Daughters of Bilitis commandeered the rough cut protests and tailored into a palatable visual for the inception of rights attainment.

This was a boon for the gay and lesbian community, but for those molotov-throwing "queens" and the "stone butch dykes" that began the physical confrontation and spontaneously organized the resistance, it was an opportunity quickly stripped from them. Any of them who would identify as the opposite gender, such as our movement's forebearers Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson and the like, would find themselves squarely on the primrose path to hell. Many of them would never live to see the day when they are equal.

Fast forward forty years: there has been much progress on the GLBT front. However, there is disparate levels of progress between the G or L portion as opposed to the T. Marriage rights is on everyone lips these days and enjoys a hearty push and the most recent victories in a few states. And as soon as these victorious laws are enacted, couples begin lining up immediately for the nuptials.

At the same time, employment is tenuous for everyone – but especially so for the trans community. We're seeing our folks losing work, and worse, losing homes to foreclosure and going homeless at startling levels. Even once non discrimination laws are enacted, it could be years before society wraps it's brain around it enough to actually hire trans people – hell, even gay and lesbian groups don't have faith enough in trans people to hire them beyond the rare instance.

In a sense, it is Dickensian: the best of times for some, the worst of times for the rest.


As we enter into Pride month and begin our marches and rallies, let's keep in mind the many of our pioneers who fought for equal rights for all, even after they were denied those same rights by actions of some of those very people they fought for. As the gay and lesbian community had their Bayard Rustin, so do we trans people have our Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson.

"Goodbye to the summer.
Sold down the river.
Unhappy ever after.
Well did you ever? ...
Burns are red, bruises blue.
Out with the old. Cheated by the new.
Do you suffer from long-term memory loss?
I don't remember ...." — Amnesia, Chumbawamba

And if you think we're rounding the corner into getting everyone in our collective Queer community on the same page, I've attached a press blurb below in its entirety from the more progressive (at least much more so than the U.S!) environs of the U.K., where London's Pride is exhibiting the community stress fractures as well.

http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=87458034207&h=KYuc9&u=af_fr&ref=mf

TransLondon announces boycott of Pride London, 2009

In a busy meeting on May 19th, members of TransLondon, London's largest support group for all trans-identified and genderqueer people, voted overwhelmingly for a boycott of the Pride London 2009 march and rally. As a result, for the first time since the group was formed, TransLondon will have no presence in the parade, nor at the rally.

This is part of an ongoing estrangement from Pride. Last year, a successful Pride march was marred at the rally in Trafalgar Square when a number of trans women were denied access to the women's toilets by Pride security stewards. One woman was subsequently sexually assaulted after being told to use the male toilets. Roz Kaveney, one of the women targeted in the 2008 "ToiletGate" incident, explained how she felt Pride London had only ever provided a grudging apology under threat of legal action, and that she felt they had never taken the discrimination against trans women in the 2008 rally seriously.

During the meeting on May 19th 2009, members heard how the democratic and transparent structure used in 2008 to co-ordinate participation of trans groups and the funds made available for transgender attendees, through the elected Trans@Pride committee, has been abolished by Pride London for 2009. Instead, Pride London have imposed their own unelected "representative" for the trans strand. Furthermore, requests for information about funding, how decisions were made and who participated in the decision-making process, have been rebuffed.

Last year, the elected Trans@Pride Committee consulted repeatedly with over a dozen groups and hundreds of individuals over before arranging travel bursaries for trans people to attend from around the country, hosting a breakfast for marchers on the day, commissioning artwork from a local queer artist as a rallying point for trans marchers, producing banners and bunting, arranging trans performers for all of the Pride stages including the main stage in Trafalgar Square and publicising the arrangements widely. In stark contrast, the meeting heard of how Pride London's appointed trans "representative" for 2009 has simply imposed Pride’s vision for trans participation in the march and rally.

The 2009 pride participation is, so we are told, to consist of a float at the very back of the parade which would pander to the most tired and inaccurate media stereotypes of trans people. Trans women would, in Pride's vision, be dressed in sequins, high heels and fairy wings and, apparently as an afterthought, a few trans men would be invited to pose in football strips. The Pride representative explained that the trans float would complement a float at the front of the march with members of the cast of the West End musical, "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert". In her vision, onlookers would be delighted to see "Priscilla at the front and Priscilla at the back". As a coup de grace, a visible cordon of security stewards would surround the trans float, ostensibly "for our own protection".


Rather than address the true diversity of the trans community, members of TransLondon felt that participating in such an event would serve only to bolster the kind of negative media stereotypes which portray trans people as "the cast of Grease", and that these undemocratic plans constitute an insult to London's diverse trans community. Sarah Brown, a member of TransLondon, an elected member of Trans@Pride 2008 and co-founder of the London Transfeminist Group said, "If I am to march at Pride, it would be as the lesbian woman I am, not dressed up as a corporate parody".

To determine TransLondon's official position on participation in Pride London 2009, three options were put to the vote:

Option one, to participate in the march under the terms we felt were being dictated by the Pride London board, received no votes.

Option two, to participate in the march independently of the "official" trans strand, as a form of direct action to show our dissatisfaction, received 31% of the votes cast.

Option three, to boycott the parade and rally received 65% of the votes cast.

There were some abstentions from members who wanted to see what their friends in other groups were doing before making a decision.

The democratic decision of the membership of TransLondon is therefore that the organisation will have no official presence or banner at Pride London, 2009.


Christina Alley, co-organiser of TransLondon and elected member of Trans@Pride 2008 said, "Volunteers from a dozen trans groups worked incredibly hard for Pride last year. Members of TransLondon are extremely disappointed at being betrayed, marginalised and stereotyped in this way by Pride. Members have made their disappointment clear in a democratic vote to boycott this year’s march and rally."

TransLondon is keen to hear from other trans groups, allies and any groups from other parts of the LGBTQ community who also feel disenfranchised by Pride London this year. We would like to discuss alternative arrangements for a celebration of the diversity of the LGBTQ community, free from cynical corporate politics, where we can enjoy the true spirit of Pride.

Reactions to TransLondon’s announcement:

We were extremely proud to march with TransLondon in the parade last year along with dozens of other groups and individuals of all ages and backgrounds. As a result of this announcement we are devastated this display of unity won’t be repeated this year. The only official offer of “support” from Pride this year has an offer to send a selection of our own members to be part of their separate and official “Trans Float” which we have already objected to on the same grounds as TransLondon. So we’ve had to seek funding for banner-making and costumes elsewhere as Pride London seem unwilling to hand any over.

We are currently reviewing our involvement in the parade pending the outcome of further consultation with our membership. Regardless of the outcome we remain committed to supporting safe, inclusive spaces for ALL trans young people even if many of our individual members decide to support a boycott.
Statement from Trans Youth Network http://www.transyouth.org

Contact: Joey McKillop (red_chimera@hotmail.co.uk)

Queer Youth Network members are still committed to participating in the parade because pride is often the first time they have had the chance to actually be out in public as a group so we will support anyone who wishes to do that. Some of our volunteers who have previously taken a break from their duties in order to assist Pride have decided not to offer their services as stewards this year. We appreciate the level of hard work that has gone in to organising the youth at pride activities and events, however we also accept they won’t appeal to everyone so our main focus will be supporting inclusive, grass roots events that bring all of our community together regardless of their identity. We have decided not to take part in the rally in Trafalgar Square and we will not be having a stall as we can’t afford the fees and most of us will be heading to Hyde Park instead.

Statement from Queer Youth Network http://www.queeryouth.org.uk
Contact: Jack Holroyde – Campaigns Officer (jack@queeryouth.net)

I fully support this boycott. I am sad to announce that Trans Ebony will not take part in Pride London this year. This would have been my first very pride in England having visited events all over the world. I was intending to enter a float for our group and was even told we could get some funding.

Pride London has the potential to offer a unique platform to showcase those normally ignored by the mainstream. As a struggling black transgendered artist I’m actually feeling incredibly angry towards those in charge of the festival. I was equally distressed to hear black and asian people have now been removed from the decision making process last week according to Pav Akhtar of UNISON and LGBT Muslim group IMAAN.

Deliberately closing so many doors on so many people does nothing but add to the multitude of prejudices trans ebony members live with every day of their lives. I accept we are a normally silent minority but that doesn’t change the fact London’s pride management have betrayed the very history it owes its existence to.

Angie Kingston (Founder) - Trans Ebony (tebony@teachers.org)

"Hey! We're just fucking 'round 'cause we've got no work, you know? ... You know what you want? Hey! You listen to me bollocks! You know what you want?!? A bloody revolution, that's what you want! Hey! Do you know what I think of you!?!" — Outsider, Chumbawamba

Testimony Time In Texas Legislature

"I need you, my witness,
To dress this up so bloodless;
To numb me and purge me now
Of thoughts of blaming you." — Testify, Rage Against The Machine

It's been quite a wild week. Sleeping in my car a couple nights near the State Capitol, staying up late into the night at one House committee testimony and waiting around for a second bill's testimony 36 hrs. later, and finally driving home, collapsing in exhaust only to wake up the next day to find my dad's hometown took a direct hit by a tornado and we don't know what happened to all our relatives there (to say nothing of the family drama here at home with my sister and brother-in-law).

Weeks like this make it hard to figure out where to begin. After getting news Friday morning from the TLIS (Texas Legislation site) that the Voter Photo ID bill which passed in the Senate was coming to the House Elections Committee on Tuesday, I braced myself for another long drive and possible long night (the Senate version of it had me waiting nearly 20 hrs. to testify). Before I left, I saw a note on the same bill from Meghan Stabler, one of HRC's two trans folks. so I dropped her a note and a phone call to let her know what was needed and what to expect.

Then after discovering on Sunday the Hate Crimes bill I'd been pushing since returning from DC in early February was hitting subcommittee about 44 hrs. later. Initially I considered leaving the Voter ID bill testimony to Meghan and just driving in Thursday for the Hate Crimes testimony, but I thought better of it. Again I dropped a note to her with the update that I'd come in Tuesday and stay over until Thursday, thinking she might hit the second one as well.


It turns out Meghan's job kept her over, she did her class presentation at University of Texas that evening, afterwards went to dinner with her mate, Erin, got tired and went home. So I never saw Meghan. Even though I didn't feel like it, I'm now glad I went for both the Voter ID and the Hate Crimes bills (which I was unaware anyone else was attending by the time I left). Now we've got the crucial last piece: testimony on the bill in both Houses of the legislature and before both authors, alerting them that their proposed legislation will be stripping the right to vote from one law-abiding, taxpaying segment of the population whose photo ID's will not match: transitioning transsexuals.

Any attempt to push through Voter ID legislation in Texas that requires matching identification without dealing with name and gender changes in the state statute will result in direct and knowing violation of our civil right to vote.

And as fate would have it, I palled around with the executive director of the ACLU Texas while sitting in testimony. She saw the whole thing as well. So a little good came with the frustration!

First thing I noted when walking into the House hearing was that color-coding was in effect again, and the committee room was a sea of red! Pro Voter Photo ID folks dominated the meeting room; many of them from a name quite familiar to the trans community: Concerned Women For America!


This version of testimony was a bit more entertaining that the Senate. We had some real lulus testifying. One elderly woman from Corpus Christi who said her husband was Ben Garza who'd died a year ago (presumably Jr. as the LULAC founder died many years ago), started a disjointed rant about a number of groups such as LULAC (corruption), the Teacher's Union (founded by communists), La Raza [Unida] (socialists) and impugning other groups and organizations on what seemed like a ten minute ramble that never really made a point, other than to slam the Democrats (fascist and corrupt).

At one point, we had counsel from the Texas Attorney General's Office admonish both the committee legislators and the audience not to discuss two ongoing investigations of fraud in Progreso TX and in Harris County! Later a group from the Rio Grande Valley (RGV) of mostly elderly women called the OWLS (Objective Watchers of the Legal System) testified individually to support the Voter ID bill due to some of the aforementioned fraud in Progreso being actively investigated by the Attorney General's Office.

Later, when one of the OWLS women were testifying, State Rep. Betty Brown (R-Kaufman) began inexplicably reading affidavits with details about Progreso during the committee, becoming part of the record of proceedings in defiance of Attorney General's instruction! It's ironic that someone supporting this legislation before us, intent of which is to end voter fraud, would then defy the Attorney General's counsel and potentially jeopardize their case on ... voter fraud! Yeah, she seriously wants to end voter fraud, hmm?


But the hits kept coming from Rep. Brown! At one point while questioning Ramey Ko, testifying on behalf of Asian-American Texas voters was questioned by the affable Ms. Brown: "well, rather than everyone here having to learn Chinese, I understand it's a difficult language, do you think it would behoove you and your citizens to adopt a name that we could more readily deal with here?" "Can't you see that this is something that...this is something that would make it easier for you and...the pollworkers if there were some means by which you could adopt a name just for identification purposes that was easier for Americans to deal with?" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9hdVUzMeDw

Dig it. We're an enlightened state here in Texas. And this comes from the same conservative party that won't do anything to make transitioning trans people identities easier for pollworkers to "readily deal with"! I wanted to scream.

Later in the testimony, I saw Randall Terrell from Equality Texas walk in and chat with folks up near the podium. It was a bit surprising as it's not a bill that effects gay and lesbian (thus not really on their radar – it wasn't on the Senate side.)


Finally I got my chance to speak well after 11PM. The first thing I noted odd was the clerk, who usually sat at his desk next to the testimony lectern with the three minute timer physically got up and sat beside the committee chair at the committee table. He returned again to his desk after I finished. The next thing was the reaction of the committee members – almost immediately stand-offish. I was the only person testifying up to that point that was not asked follow-up questions, and instead was cut off by the committee chair ensuring me that transitioning transsexuals are "part of the bill" or if not, they'll ensure that we're "covered" in it.

Yet there was no awareness of Committee Chair Todd Smith (R-Bedford) of the bill's language (nor desire to discover), and he appeared all about ensuring me we're covered and having me leave the podium as soon as possible. All in all it was a bit curious behavior on their part.

Eventually though, I actually made it out of the hearing a little before midnight! Much earlier than I was fearing initially, but too late to go anywhere. After a discussion with Randall from EQ TX after completing my testimony, I learned others would be coming in to testify on the Hate Crimes bill expanding coverage for trans Texas (which I'll save for the next blog post.)

Afterward I walked back across the campus, reflecting in the fully lit glow of the limestone Capitol Building, and back across to the parking garage where I parked. On my way back I notic0.ed two other cars parked just outside the Capital Grounds fence with people in it, apparently camping out themselves. I take it they were living in their cars, simply looking for safe places to park for the night. Fitting imagery.

Once back in the garage, I pulled my suitcase out of the trunk to bring up front and camped out in my car for the night. Not a bad spot to sleep for the night, really. The next couple days were gonna be busy, and I needed some sleep.

(To Be Continued)

"On the corner
The jury's sleepless.
We found your weakness,
And it's right outside your door!
Now testify!" — Testify, Rage Against The Machine