Racism, Sexism, Transism, and Privilege

I'm just as good as you - and better than them

It is as if we were all in a pit, trying to get out, and realized SOMEONE would have to be stepped on and left behind if the rest of us were going to get out. Someone has to be on the bottom. Someone has to be left behind.

I have been turned down for jobs after interviews with comments like "Our techs are all male, and men have trouble taking orders from a woman" and "We work on laser printers and you would have to move them by yourself; they're pretty heavy for a woman." As a woman, I was not good enough. I had to be a man to get the job.

After supporting a women's group for some time, a new policy was instituted allowing only womyn-born-wimmen. As a transperson, I was not good enough. I had to be cisgender to be a part of the group.

Barney Frank is afraid that protecting my right to employment and housing will lead to "men in bathrooms", and some feminists say I have a penis in my brain.  Not good enough.

Tri-Ess is only for heterosexual crossdressers. Gay and bisexual people are not good enough, nor are transsexuals.

I played a character in a play that began a workshop in transgender issues. In a breakout session, I was asked how it was possible for me to be both transgender and Lesbian. If I am transgender, it was not possible for me to be Lesbian. I guess I have to find the appropriate segregated ghetto.

These are the things the powerful want us to do: to put up walls and to fight among ourselves. They want us to spend our energy against each other so we have less left to fight them. They want to dismiss us as small groups, because they can't ignore a large group.

Until we recognize we are all people (yes, even the people who work to harm us), we will not be an inclusive community. And if we can't model inclusive community, how can we expect the powerful to create one for us?

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Claim to fame: Posted first PHB diary to be demoted

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by: cindik @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 11:25:31 AM CST

Down in the pit

"It is as if we were all in a pit, trying to get out, and realized SOMEONE would have to be stepped on and left behind if the rest of us were going to get out. Someone has to be on the bottom. Someone has to be left behind."

I am pretty sure we could just squeeze all of the crap out of this guy, and mold it into stairs -- then we'd all get out! :P

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by: TikiHead @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 11:36:56 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Well said ...

The fragmentation in our communities gets in the way of working together.  And it's a consequence of the overall oppression and the belief that there will only be enough [power, money, change, whatever] for some of us.  Inverting that assumption and starting with inclusion is the path forward.

Alas, it's much easier to say than to do ...


jon

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by: jonpincus @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 11:56:25 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Is that HR manager looking to be a target of a lawsuit?

As for the women's group, not all feminist-oriented all-women's groups or all-lesbian groups are against having transwomen members. Your group sounds like it might be dominated by the more separatist types from the 50-ish second wave generation, or simply located in a conservative area. If the latter, the members may not have any information or personal interactions with non-stealth transwomen. As a cis-gendered woman, it took me a while to wrap my mind around the concept of transgender.

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by: NancyP @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 13:49:35 PM CST

[ Parent ]

When I was interviewing for those jobs - years ago -

I was recently (last 6 months) transitioned and stealth (or, as we called it then, woodworked). I was more afraid of being outed as trans than not getting the job.

And yes, the group was "dominated by the more separatist types from the 50-ish second wave generation".

But this isn't about me; I'm just giving personal examples of the kinds of BS that happens to and within our community. We're all having to deal with the BS that comes at us, and we respond by duplicating it between us. It has to stop. And while we're working on stopping the BS others heap on us, let's first stop doing it to each other.

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Claim to fame: Posted first PHB diary to be demoted

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by: cindik @ Sat Mar 07, 2009 at 00:01:36 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Welll he sounds like a grade A...

Asshole... I'm glad everyone else ripped him open. shudders And I swear I don't trust people who do that "I Don't See Race..I see the Human Race? Geez" crap the way he did later in the thread because I've learned long time ago that those who say such things are likely to say some awful, hurtful stuff to your face and then pull the, "OMG, I didn't know I could say that, that's not me at all, Am I racist, lolz, i was just drunk  niggah!"

Anyone that doesn't get that even though there are differences in our community- differences that should be examined and discussed together and apart (and both are important because I don't knock "x-only" spaces) the similarities are way more important and larger than those differences. Obviously, this idiot lives in a comfortable lifestyle if he thinks that Trans people are the only ones who defy gender or who abuse drugs.  

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by: saywhat? @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 11:30:16 AM CST

Amen

I'm probably preaching to the choir but I wanted to give you my support for your excellent reply, Zoe.

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by: Alvin McEwen @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 11:30:51 AM CST

Classism, bigotry, internalized phobias, and sheer blindness

I am a gay white male. I have no interest in 'women issues'.
I find Ts offensive and do not want to extend any rights to them.
I find Ts offensive and do not want to extend any rights to them.

This guy is an ass, and probably a Cabinette. And if he can't see the relationship between "women's issues", transphobia, and homophobia, I have to question his observational skills.

And this is just pathetically insecure:

I did not matriculate with a Juris Doctor in Law so to defend transvestites

Really? How utterly utterly. Get Miss Thing with her JD and lack of typing or proofing skills.

Cause any fool knows, a dog needs a home; a shelter from pigs on the wing

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by: QueerInSoCal @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 11:32:45 AM CST

Pathetic fucks like this

Are the reason the LCRs exist. Just because this man is gay does not mean he has no vested interesting in maintaining the rich, white patriarchy that is hell-bent on oppressing, jailing, deporting, or killing everyone who isn't Just Like Them.

The inherent interconnectedness of everything is a central tenet of Buddhism, the science of ecology, and socio-cultural and political activism. Sadly, losers like this guy are too blinded by their own desperate need for privilege and their fear of being emasculated, made into a woman, and a member of the oppressed that they refuse to see that interconnectedness. They have yet to learn that they can only lift themselves up by lifting others up with them.  

God save ornery old queens! - kevinchi

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by: Keori @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 11:53:40 AM CST

[ Parent ]

I was just going to mention the LCR's

Such groups exist precisely because there is a subset that always wants to feel like part of the "majority" and won't let the fact that that majority despises them dimish their attitude toward them.

These are the gay men that believe that its their right as white men to have everything catered to them. They just refuse to believe that who they sleep with can have an impact on their god given right to rule.

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by: SciFi Geek @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:33:14 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Yeah, that (I'm late to the party, but I had to comment)

SciFi Geek hit the nail on the head.  I am Asian American, bi, and female.  I have had plenty of opportunity to witness this kind of narrow-minded thinking.  In fact, that's why I believe the original statement is a genuine comment and not just a troll response.

Male privilege is powerful, and so is white privilege.  And class privilege.  Put all that together, and it adds up to a big entitlement package.  I have heard from various white men that I should be supporting them as white men (gay, bi, straight, or transgendered) because, well, just because.  

It's something that strikes me because I don't expect to be treated equally.  I think I should be, but it doesn't happen.  So when I hear anybody who benefits from one prejudice (such as race) or another (such as gender) demanding ME to help him with his perceived inequalities, it is in equal parts fascinating, horrifying, and repulsive.  

I would take being male over dying any day.  My mind is closer to the middle, anyway.  I love sports, hate to shop, hate to cuddle, and really, really like sex.  

To wrap this up, I would also like to point out that my race voted the most against Prop 8 than any other, but there was no focus on that.  It astounded the hell out of me that Asians were the most progressive, but there you go.

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by: asiangrrl @ Sat Mar 07, 2009 at 14:52:14 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Gender is at the root of our entire fight

The inherent interconnectedness of everything is a central tenet of Buddhism, the science of ecology, and socio-cultural and political activism. Sadly, losers like this guy are too blinded by their own desperate need for privilege and their fear of being emasculated, made into a woman, and a member of the oppressed that they refuse to see that interconnectedness. They have yet to learn that they can only lift themselves up by lifting others up with them.

Truly important words. What this pathetic loser doesn't seem to realize is that gender is the sole issue in the battle for gay rights, lesbian rights, bi rights and trans rights. Every one of us, from the "straight-acting" gay men to the lipstick lesbians, to the trans community, are attacked and hated because we do not conform to arbitrary gender roles, and that is why we must fight as a unit.

And it's not just the GLBT community that suffers from our society's gender issues. Lest we forget the man killed in New York just this year for the crime of acting like a woman when he walked arm-in-arm with his brother. He was not gay, he was simply being affectionate with a family member. And let us not forget the straight man killed in Tennesee a few years back for the crime of holding his girlfriend's purse while helping a blind male friend leave a restroom. These men died because our society insists men, particularly, must remain in a very narrowly-defined gender role.

That gender role is also one that is killing our straight male brothers, sons and fathers - whether from heart disease caused by emotional repression and reluctance to seek help for mental or physical ailments or through the turf wars of various gangs that promote hyper-masculinity. Until and unless we realize how these roles undermine everyone's Constitutional rights, we will not have either true equality, or the kind of society we know will make this country great.  

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by: CPT_Doom @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:38:37 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Well, exactly.

Externally, those who wish to oppress us often can't tell a drag queen from a crossdresser, a male-to-female transsexual from an effeminate gay male, a female-to-male transsexual from a butch lesbian, or genderqueer people from bisexual people.

We're all seen essentially as gender outlaws by many in wider society, whether we know it or not; whether we acknowledge it or not.

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~~Autumn~~

As if there were safety in stupidity alone.
--Henry David Thoreau

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by: Autumn Sandeen @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 13:00:41 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I did not matriculate with an LLB, LLM and a PhD(Law)

to have to defend Barebacking, Bugchasing, Bathhouses, and Meth at sex parties.

Notwithstanding, as an attorney and an activist I've done it...

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

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by: MauraHennessey @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 18:03:05 PM CST

[ Parent ]

There is no Suffering Equality

There is no Suffering Equality in our "community", and THAT is why we are not unified.   Women in 1900 shared a common suffering; Blacks in 1940 shared a common suffering.  

Gays are a random sample; no unity.   Rich gays (like the piece of doo-doo in article) are clueless; they can afford rights piecemeal.

For many of those "leading" our movement, the harm they've experienced from inequalty is akin to the feeling you get when someone cuts you off in traffic. For others, the harm they've experienced from inequalty is akin to watching a violent criminal cut out the eyes of your spouse in front of you and your children, and then he forces all of you to watch the slow, painful, bloody death of your loved one.

Some of us are "ticked off"; others are so angry we want to see blood, and we will do ANYTHING within the law (and use civil disobedience) to fight.

Unfortunately, many queers will wait until they experience a horrific trauma in their lives due to legal inequity before they get in touch with REAL anger. I waited until it was too late; that's why I am screaming TAX REVOLT every moment until I die. I will continue to do this despite the ocassional bitchy queen who ridicules my own mental health issues and welfare recipient status as if they are a weakness instead of a medical condition brought on my legal inequality - I do wonder if these folks also crack jokes about AIDS and Cancer patients?

As to naysayers of tax revolt - sometimes history is MADE, and cannot be based exclusively on the past. The only thing we lack is the collective DIGNITY to unite and refuse unfair taxation until we have the same marriage rights that are DOLED OUT LIKE CANDY to other Americans.

Sure, in a lot of ways I could give a rat's ass if any queer pays taxes - I can't make anyone stop paying taxes - but I sure as hell do not have to comply in any way with this "government" or I.R.S. - and will defend my right to live free with liberty.  

I'm afraid only those who have been involved in a violent hate crime, or those who have been prevented from seeing their spouse while dying, or those who have lost everything due to legal inequity understand true RAGE.

Decades MORE of Psychological Abuse? - OR - Stonewall.  Nationwide.  NOW!

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by: John Bisceglia @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 11:54:17 AM CST

Pretty astonishing ...

Thanks Zoe for posting (and Pam for promoting).  It's interesting reading the other comments on the thread as well.

As always when I see something like this, my first reaction is "I wonder if this is for real ..."  Alas, it probably is.  I know other guys with similar attitudes.

Great reply, Zoe!


jon

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by: jonpincus @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 11:54:21 AM CST

Thanks

Thanks also to Autumn, who requested that I cross-post, as she thought this item would be of significant interest to PHB readers.

There is no situation so complex it can't get even worse

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by: ZoeB @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 22:01:03 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Not that I doubt that such gays exist, but...

when I read unattributed comments like that on a blog, my "concern troll" sirens go off.  Such comments are quite as likely written by anti-LGBT bigots trying to divide us as by one of our own.

Click HERE and sign up: Campaign For Military Partners.

Lurleen on Twitter.

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by: Lurleen @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 11:56:40 AM CST

I don't know

I run into a pretty good number of gay men with attitudes like that in the real meat world.  

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by: Valatan @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:21:54 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Me too

Some of the references just smell of fundiness, especially the use of the terms transgender, crossdresser and transvestite interchangably.  This is something that very few educated gay men would do even if they did have a problem with the "T".

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by: sammyseattle @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 13:07:51 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Me three.

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by: Pollyanna @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 14:18:15 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Oh no, love, they exist

I've run into plenty of them. They are just as loathsome to be around as any straight white wealthy male fundie xtian bigot. More often than not they secretly hate themselves for being gay because it's the one thing that separates them from the aforementioned superior majority they so desperately want to be.

Pitiful jerkoffs like this give credence to the meme that all white gay people are racist. Their insecure bullshit supports the trend of not qualifying as a "real gay" unless you are a white, wealthy, educated, cisgender, binary-masculine-presenting (no nellies allowed!), upper-middle-class clone of the Queer As Folk Brian Kinney character. Rampantly slutty behavior is optional.

God save ornery old queens! - kevinchi

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by: Keori @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 14:31:33 PM CST

[ Parent ]

The type definitely exists

But the text seems off.  It reads as bating to me.

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by: sammyseattle @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 14:57:22 PM CST

[ Parent ]

As I said, I don't doubt they exist (I know some).

What I doubt is that the commenter is the genuine article.

Click HERE and sign up: Campaign For Military Partners.

Lurleen on Twitter.

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by: Lurleen @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 23:43:54 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I'll throw in with this

It doesn't read as genuine. It reads with troly purpose.

Electricity's for light bulbs!

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by: n8nyc @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 15:35:34 PM CST

[ Parent ]

"It reads with troly purpose."

I'm enjoying the poeticality of that sentence. :)

Click HERE and sign up: Campaign For Military Partners.

Lurleen on Twitter.

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by: Lurleen @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 23:42:30 PM CST

[ Parent ]

True confession here

My sexism, transphobia, and classism has always been a difficult thing for me to work on, but I continue to do it. It's not all gone.  

The Blend has helped me a LOT with these issues. I didn't even have any female friends or associates until I was in my late 20's and (I have to say) in conflicts with women, I have been very quick on the trigger when it comes to the b-word and the c-word.

So, yeah, one onehand i want to be quick to call the above Queerty poster an asshole but I know that in this case when I point a finger, 3 point back at me. I have to be honest about that.

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by: kevinchi @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:03:10 PM CST

We all have our demons

But I don't think it's hypocritical to point out someone else's blatant displays if you're acknowledging your own. You've named yours, mine are racism and misogyny. I know I have them, I constantly fight against them, and some days I'm more successful with that fight than other days. But, at least in my case, the attitude I was raised with, the one that says women are less capable, less mature, less talented than men is also what made the connection for me between the others.

I used to spend too much energy worrying about being seen as effeminate. Drag queens were maybe the scariest thing in the world - they were everything I was terrified to see in myself. I got over it, and the funny thing is, people I've known for most of my life tell me I'm a lot more straight-acting since I did that than I ever used to be. I feel sad when I look at guys still screaming to the world that they're normal gays, and if all those fruity queers would just go away and stop making all the fuss, things would be fine. We're all queer together, even if the angle of our queerness differs slightly. We'll either pull ourselves up together, or we'll fall separately. I don't see much else that might work.

Cause any fool knows, a dog needs a home; a shelter from pigs on the wing

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by: QueerInSoCal @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:26:22 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Our experiences on

are exactly the same, queerinsocal.  

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by: kevinchi @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:35:56 PM CST

[ Parent ]

We are all products of our culture

And we have to realize that. Our culture promotes the ideas that light-skinned is better than dark, that masculine is better than feminine, that strong is better than weak and rich is better than poor. No matter how much we work on ourselves to change those attitudes, we have to acknowledge the myriad ways they permeate our very air.

Those attitudes are changing, slowly but surely, as parents consciously refrain from teaching them to their children, and the impact of the culture is lessened, but it will take generations before they are gone completely.  

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by: CPT_Doom @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:45:03 PM CST

[ Parent ]

OMFG...

I can talk a goood game around gender, race, and class, but I swear my head is full of the the most racist, classist, transphobic things that I sometmes wonder where did that even come from- as if James Dobson vacations in my skull or some sh*t.

But again, its working on it.

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by: saywhat? @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:31:32 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I'll say this...

from the wee morning hours on Nov. 5th til the infamous West Hollywood protests on Nov 7th, three guesses as to the first word that came to mind about the 70% of AAs that reportedly voted for Prop 8.

Yeah, I got issues. I feel you there.

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by: kevinchi @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:39:37 PM CST

[ Parent ]

i'll never forget

when i was a kid my mom telling me that she had to fight every day to blot out the turrettes-like racist thoughts that popped into her head undesired and uninvited. she attributed them to being raised by vocally racist parents, her dad in particular, who came from kentucky and had been a klan member at one point.  the same shit popps into my head too sometimes, but then so does my mom's comment right on its heels.  she did more for me than she ever knew by telling me about her ongoing struggle with the demons.

Click HERE and sign up: Campaign For Military Partners.

Lurleen on Twitter.

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by: Lurleen @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:41:39 PM CST

[ Parent ]

So Common

This is unfourtunately common. Also the lack of any reall attempt to make change, the GLBTQ community in most places Ive lived, especially those privlidged ones, seem very selfishly motivated to sit by, do nothing and be devisive.
Ive seen and heard the snickers of GLB people even at Pro GLBTQ gatherings regading the transgendered. While I am a Gay Man, I do not understand how we as a group who face such prejudice, can in good concience sleep at night when we are often the perpatraters as well as the victems.

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by: ravenscrafte @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:34:20 PM CST

didn't something just happen in Washington DC

where 2(?) lesbians beat up two FTM guys in front of a gay bar? Just found it yesterday somewhere on the Washington Blade. Simply atrocious.

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by: avocado @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 13:00:22 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Yes, that happened

The article is at http://www.washblade.com/thela... .  There's a huge amount of discussion about it on the DCATS list (I'm not on the list, but I learned about the article from someone on the list).  I'm surprised it hasn't gotten more attention in the LGBT blogosphere.

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by: LauraG @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 20:28:16 PM CST

[ Parent ]

DAFLEP

"While I'm not opposed to sporadic and infrequent attention to lesbians, I do not want this blog devoting any more time to their cause....Simply because I am gay does not mean I care about lesbians, bisexuals or transgender persons. I don't even know why some people try and group us together as one cause - GLBT - because we are not. I can see some purpose to grouping G + L and even Bs together, but not Ts."

I wanted to gauge my eyes put as I was reading it.

Anyway, I added you to my blogroll at http://stuffqueerpeopleneedtok...

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by: Stuff Queer People Need To Know @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:34:40 PM CST

You're comment on why so many of us...

...end up in the military hit a little too close to home.

A death wish wasn't the sole -- or even the main -- reason I ended up in the military, but being in the military was very much a way of attempting to give my life some meaning.

I knews I wasn't a stereotypical male, but part of why I joined was an attempt to try to become that man I never was, and never could be no matter what I did. If I'd died for a cause larger than me in the process, I felt that would have meant I lived up to an ideal:

If a man hasn't discovered something that he would die for, he isn't fit to live.
--Martin Luther King, Jr.

The problem, of course, is dying for a government's cause isn't exactly the same thing as dying for something meaningful. But then again, my life still would have had some meaning by proxy.

When it's all said and done, another quote by MLK Jr. fits better, I believe, with a bit of extention...

God is not merely interestd in the freedom of brown men, yellow men, red men and black men.He is interested in the freedom of the whole human race.

I would restate this quote as...

God is not merely interestd in the freedom of brown people, yellow people, red people, black people, disabled people, gay people, lesbian people, bisexual people, transgender people, male people, female people, intersex people, and genderqueer people, as well as people who are soldiers, sailors, marines, and military veterans. God is interested instead in the freedom of the whole human race.

When lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people understand that when we live and work together as a broad, LGBT community, we become a force that's so much greater in capability than our individual subcommunities working separately, and far, far greater in capability than as individual gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender people.

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~~Autumn~~

As if there were safety in stupidity alone.
--Henry David Thoreau

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by: Autumn Sandeen @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 12:37:58 PM CST

Exactly

Each of us brings unique talents and weaknesses to the table. By making use of the talents, and shoring each other up through the weaknesses, we have the potential to unstoppable.

Cause any fool knows, a dog needs a home; a shelter from pigs on the wing

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by: QueerInSoCal @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 13:08:14 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I was just trying to pay for Law School

when I went to sea, but I stayed on as an Advocate and occasional patrol commander in the Reserve on weekends( a twisted streak in me, I liked annoying Soviet trawlers and attack boats trying to tag along after the USN boomers coming out of Rota-Cadiz)

A more serious note: When I was admitted to the Bar in some US states, they REQUIRED us to do some pro bono work. This fellow mentioned that he doesn't do it. Wonder if he is breaking his Bar rules?

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

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by: MauraHennessey @ Sat Mar 07, 2009 at 11:58:12 AM CST

[ Parent ]

I guess we could say all gay men are

Shallow

Sex obsessed

Popper/drug taking

Lesbian hating

Obsessed about clothes, upscale cars, money, status.

Spends more on vacations than most people make in a year.

Being an arrogant snob.

We could say that but we know it's not true. Just as the stereotypes he aims at the LBT side of the house.

This ass needs to grow some compassion in his dead heart.

Dena

Cisgender. Because "Genetic" (or non) is so 2006.

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by: Denabeth @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 13:02:00 PM CST

One more thing

To arrogant Gay guy.

Re: Stonewall

You're welcome.

Dena (an angry transwoman)

Cisgender. Because "Genetic" (or non) is so 2006.

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by: Denabeth @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 13:06:50 PM CST

I could use his own logic and say

That since the most virulent homophobia is directed at gay men, partly because of the belief that they are child molesters, sodomites and recruiters, then the LBTQ would have all our rights yesterday if we dropped the "G's"
..........But I think all humans are deserving of equal protection under the law, so I won't.

"They say that time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself." - Andy Warhol



"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction" - Blaise Pascal

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by: TruthandLove @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 13:20:16 PM CST

i was just

about to say that. I have read multiple opinions on the internet that put forth the argument that if lesbians separated themselves from the rest of the LGBTQ community they would get the right to marry a lot faster. And they were based on what you said, the most virulent homophobia is directed at gay men. I don't think I've ever heard any of my die hard feminist lesbian friends say things as vile as this guy. he pretty much sucks!

"They drew a circle that shut me out Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout. But love and I had the wit to win; We drew a circle that took them in." -Edwin Markham

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by: kara1215 @ Sat Mar 07, 2009 at 12:02:21 PM CST

[ Parent ]

That letter

...is so beyond sickening to me, I got a headache just reading it. Unfortunately as a gay white male exposed to a wide variety of other gay white males, I don't think it's fake.
This guy and the insecure idiots I meet who share similar views are the only 'group' that I am truly always embarrassed by in the LGBT community. I agree with Autumn, the LGBT struggle is almost entirely about gender and oppressing of the feminine, no matter how you see or define yourself. If you don't understand that, you don't understand anything, including why you are being oppressed.
I also have to take note of QueerInSoCal's comments: It is SO TRUE, as I peruse the dating world here in rural Maine, that the men obsessed with masculinity (the shallow type that allows for fitting in at a sports bar, not the kind that includes character traits like courage and honesty,) are almost always visibly uncomfortable; their natural femininity which we all possess to some degree comes shooting out from behind their desperate defenses in the most awkward and creepy ways. They become what they fear, just like the fundies who 'get caught'. I see it every day. Once you lose this fear (ignorance) in yourself, (and fear of the judgment of people even dumber than you are,) it becomes so easy to spot the people in our community, whether they are LGB or T, who have come to terms with and accepted their own special blend of male and female energy. They are the ones worth knowing!

(And on a petty note, how incredibly ultra mega gay is it that this guy is getting all of his information and stereotypes from the Tyra Banks show?? This well-educated fellow needs to actually read a book, or better yet, leave his myopic pre-approved plastic gay media bubble and meet some real people. He might even discover that he is the one who has no humanity.)

____________________

Donate to Carmen's Place

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by: jackalope @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 14:04:11 PM CST

LOL on the sports bar comment

because I have gotten grief from other gay men about my love for watching sports.  

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by: kevinchi @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 14:12:23 PM CST

[ Parent ]

If you ever make it to SoCal...

...we so have to do my "outdoorsman" thing of going fishing at Lake Cuyamaca.

I'm so not going to hid my love of a "testosterone driven" outdoor activity to prove I'm a "real woman" -- whatever the hell a "real woman" might be. :)

I just know I'm a woman who loves freshwater fishing. :) No worries here about my gender identity being in question because I love to fish. :)

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~~Autumn~~

As if there were safety in stupidity alone.
--Henry David Thoreau

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by: Autumn Sandeen @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 14:14:27 PM CST

[ Parent ]

There's only one word for this guy-

ASSHOLE. If there's ANYONE hindering the LGBT movement, it's ASSHOLES like him. He needs to shut the fuck up, and let the rest of us get on with fighting for equality.  

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by: Mindyinlongbeach @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 14:31:56 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Oh-and this JERK refuses to remember this....

Harvey Milk ENCOURAGED gay men and lesbians to fight TOGETHER. That's why everyone in the '70's referred to themselves as GAY rather than the separatist BS.  

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by: Mindyinlongbeach @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 14:34:11 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Symposium

And on a petty note, how incredibly ultra mega gay is it that this guy is getting all of his information and stereotypes from the Tyra Banks show?? This well-educated fellow needs to actually read a book, or better yet, leave his myopic pre-approved plastic gay media bubble and meet some real people. He might even discover that he is the one who has no humanity.

I recommend he begin with this translation of part of Plato's Symposium. If his brain can cope with the genderfuck, that is:

In the first place, let me treat of the nature of man and what has happened to it; for the original human nature was not like the present, but different. The sexes were not two as they are now, but originally three in number; there was man, woman, and the union of the two, having a name corresponding to this double nature, which had once a real existence, but is now lost, and the word "Androgynous" is only preserved as a term of reproach. In the second place, the primeval man was round, his back and sides forming a circle; and he had four hands and four feet, one head with two faces, looking opposite ways, set on a round neck and precisely alike; also four ears, two privy members, and the remainder to correspond. He could walk upright as men now do, backwards or forwards as he pleased, and he could also roll over and over at a great pace, turning on his four hands and four feet, eight in all, like tumblers going over and over with their legs in the air; this was when he wanted to run fast. Now the sexes were three, and such as I have described them; because the sun, moon, and earth are three;-and the man was originally the child of the sun, the woman of the earth, and the man-woman of the moon, which is made up of sun and earth, and they were all round and moved round and round: like their parents. Terrible was their might and strength, and the thoughts of their hearts were great, and they made an attack upon the gods; of them is told the tale of Otys and Ephialtes who, as Homer says, dared to scale heaven, and would have laid hands upon the gods. Doubt reigned in the celestial councils. Should they kill them and annihilate the race with thunderbolts, as they had done the giants, then there would be an end of the sacrifices and worship which men offered to them; but, on the other hand, the gods could not suffer their insolence to be unrestrained.

At last, after a good deal of reflection, Zeus discovered a way. He said: "Methinks I have a plan which will humble their pride and improve their manners; men shall continue to exist, but I will cut them in two and then they will be diminished in strength and increased in numbers; this will have the advantage of making them more profitable to us. They shall walk upright on two legs, and if they continue insolent and will not be quiet, I will split them again and they shall hop about on a single leg." He spoke and cut men in two, like a sorb-apple which is halved for pickling, or as you might divide an egg with a hair; and as he cut them one after another, he bade Apollo give the face and the half of the neck a turn in order that the man might contemplate the section of himself: he would thus learn a lesson of humility. Apollo was also bidden to heal their wounds and compose their forms. So he gave a turn to the face and pulled the skin from the sides all over that which in our language is called the belly, like the purses which draw in, and he made one mouth at the centre, which he fastened in a knot (the same which is called the navel); he also moulded the breast and took out most of the wrinkles, much as a shoemaker might smooth leather upon a last; he left a few, however, in the region of the belly and navel, as a memorial of the primeval state. After the division the two parts of man, each desiring his other half, came together, and throwing their arms about one another, entwined in mutual embraces, longing to grow into one, they were on the point of dying from hunger and self-neglect, because they did not like to do anything apart; and when one of the halves died and the other survived, the survivor sought another mate, man or woman as we call them, being the sections of entire men or women, and clung to that. They were being destroyed, when Zeus in pity of them invented a new plan: he turned the parts of generation round to the front, for this had not been always their position and they sowed the seed no longer as hitherto like grasshoppers in the ground, but in one another; and after the transposition the male generated in the female in order that by the mutual embraces of man and woman they might breed, and the race might continue; or if man came to man they might be satisfied, and rest, and go their ways to the business of life: so ancient is the desire of one another which is implanted in us, reuniting our original nature, making one of two, and healing the state of man.

____________________________________
Cuius testiculos habes, habeas cardia et cerebellum.

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by: tavdy79 @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 15:21:23 PM CST

[ Parent ]

And for those 2 lesbians, there's Ovid

and the transgenderism of Iphis in the Metamorphosis...

tavdy, I'm a claasics major, don't do that again!

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by: kevinchi @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 15:41:47 PM CST

[ Parent ]

these 2 lesbians, that is

"where 2(?) lesbians beat up two FTM guys in front of a gay bar? "

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by: kevinchi @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 15:43:14 PM CST

[ Parent ]

As a gay white male myself...

And a regular Queerty person, I'd like to apologize. Please don't think we're all like that @sshole. In fact, as someone in a multiracial family (relatives married to Latinos, African-Americans, and Asian-Americans) and someone with many lesbian, bisexual, and transgender friends, I have to deal with sh*t from jerks like him all the time. Basically, I've come to understand that injustice for one of us means injustice for all of us. And no, none of us Ls or Gs stands any better chance of advancing our "agenda" by denying the hardships of the Bs and Ts.

Oh yes, and did he pay attention to the court hearing yesterday? Didn't he listen to Shannon Minter (a trans lawyer from the National Center for LESBIAN Rights) and Therese Stewart (an out LESBIAN) argue on our behalf? Cheese louise, the ignorance!

Act on Principles and make equality happen.  

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by: atdnext @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 15:15:32 PM CST

But didn't you hear?

He doesn't mind us lesbians, as long as we don't bother him with icky women's issues. We can even read the same blogs as he does!  

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by: one jewish dyke @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 18:42:02 PM CST

[ Parent ]

But didn't you hear?

He doesn't mind us lesbians, as long as we don't bother him with icky women's issues. We can even read the same blogs as he does!  

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by: one jewish dyke @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 18:42:03 PM CST

[ Parent ]

There's nothing to apologise for.

People like him are not typical. They're a sizeable proportion, but nowhere near a majority.

Trans people know about them, we can't help it. But we also know about the wonderful work that's been done by Lambda Legal and other GLB groups in support of us, the T's.

It's true that 2nd wave RadFem lesbians have caused us real damage - like the accusations that transpeople were responsible for a fatal bus accident at Michfest, or the report by Janice Raymond that led to the wholesale withdrawal of medical benefits for us in the early 80's.

But for every one of them, there has been a dozen who have helped, and not just with moral support, words, they've actually done something for us.

We shouldn't have to educate GLBs in the T (and Intersex for that matter), but the reality is we do, whether that's fair or not. Only a few like this guy are unreachable.

As for the hatecrime committed by two GLBs on two Ts recently - it's a Man Bites Dog story. Yes, such things happen, this is not a "single isolated incident". It is, however, relatively unusual. T's being fired by Gay-owned businesses is not though. That really does happen a lot, I'm afraid. We need to work on that.

If you feel embarrassed by this guy just because he's Gay, I'm just as embarrassed because he's of the same species as me. Approximately. Neither of us have anything to apologise for though.

There is no situation so complex it can't get even worse

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by: ZoeB @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 21:31:49 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Bi-Genderism

I define myself more as "agender" than "bigender", but I think your point is basically correct -- though I don't think there's yet any good info on the rate of bigenderism in the population, and it could be up to 30-50%. How would you tell? By definition, those of us who are bigender don't care, so we don't devote a lot of time to worrying about it.

Note that this makes being trans much more common than it's usually presented -- trans people are a higher proportion of the monogendered than of the population as a whole.

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by: doctorscience @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 15:15:37 PM CST

A Trinary is only an approximation anyway

The Gender Binary is a good approximation. For 9 out of 10 people, you can say they either have 46xy chromosomes, are attracted to women, are born with male genitalia, or have 46xx chromosomes, are attracted to men, and are born with female genitalia.

Cut out the "sexual orientation" criterion, and it's 59 out of 60.

Dividing people up into arbitrary categories of male, bigender, female when it comes to gender identity is a better approximation than just a binary division into male and female, but it's still not completely accurate. There are degrees, and the only use a "bigender" category has is in cases where the body changes. To some it doesn't matter, male or female, "es ist egal". To most, it matters very much. To some, it matters, but not greatly. It's a continuum.

The primary evidence for this is in two areas.

The first is from accounts, the narratives of how people feel. Many women are more open about this, because they can be without social sanction. Tomboys are accepted, sissies are not.

The second is from those rare Intersex conditions where people get a "natural sex change", they look female at birth, but masculinise later. (The changes going the other way are too few in number to study).

Gender role changes were reported in 56-63% of cases with 5alpha-RD-2 and 39-64% of cases with 17beta-HSD-3 who were raised as girls. The changes were usually made in adolescence and early adulthood. In these two syndromes, the degree of external genital masculinization at birth does not seem to be related to gender role changes in a systematic way.

Basically, about a third get cured of transsexuality by the change, about a third have transsexuality induced by the change, and about a third "go with the flow".

Before anyone accuses me of dissing those who naturally change from male at birth to female later, because they're such a tiny minority, please bear in mind I'm one of them.

There is no situation so complex it can't get even worse

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by: ZoeB @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 21:58:58 PM CST

[ Parent ]

One four letter word for this idiot .....

TWIT !

Just because your voice reaches halfway around the world doesn't mean you are wiser than when it reached only to the end of the bar. - Edward R Murrow

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by: Lyndon @ Fri Mar 06, 2009 at 16:52:35 PM CST

This guy needs to get over himself.

I'm not on welfare, homeless, or drug addicted.  I'm transitioned, post op (I know, TMI) and gainfully employed.  I also want to marry another woman, someday.

Is that good enough for you, buddy?  If I weren't, why would I be anything less than good enough?

More than a few gay and lesbian youth are thrown out of their houses and families, too.   Are you saying they don't matter?

Are you forgetting the struggles of LGBT people, struggles that extend into today, not to be murdered, not to be alcoholic, not to be thrown away?

It's still out there, and if you would step out of your gilded carriage, you might just see it.

Oh, and there but for the grace of the goddess, go you, buddy.  

Hate stops a beating heart.

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by: KarenS @ Sun Mar 08, 2009 at 12:54:39 PM CDT

I'll be trans over dead, any day

I have worked too hard to make my brain what it is. When I was with my ex, I volunteered for the "trans body part exchange" which medical science will probably never complete the technology for. Being genderqueer doesn't hurt, but I am pretty comfortable as a woman. Regardless, I strongly prefer a more difficult life to none at all. And I'm fortunate that I can't think of many friends who would abandon me for the change. :)

As for the troll, I so want to mail that guy a tampon. If he's going to be childish, I'll fantasize accordingly.

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by: DC @ Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 01:16:29 AM CDT