Vitale Letter #249, January 1, 2003 Anne Vitale PhD, Editor
- Archives of back issues
- Notes on Gender Transition
I want to wish you all a very Happy New Year....Anne
COMMENTARY Life After SONDA Richard Goldstein
When Harry Became Sally Charlotte Allen
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Re: Transsexuals must be allowed to marry From: Bernadette Rogers, Woodford Halse, Northhants
- ============///========///======///======///==========///==========/
ANNOUNCMENTS
[1][USA: San Francisco Bay Area--Two Male-to-Female Groups Reforming:
Advanced transition / Recent post-op and Early Stage / Questioning
Facilitater---Anne Vitale PhD
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The Advance Group is for MTF's who are either in an advanced stage of transition (living full time in the female gender role) or
has had SRS in the last year. The group has been meeting for the last 20 weeks and is well established. But due to natural attrition,
there is room for two new members.
The Early / Questioning Group is for genetic males who have either decided to transition but are still living in the male
gender role or genetic males who are trying to get a handle on their gender issues. The group has been meeting for the last 20 weeks and is well established. But due to natural attrition,
there is room for two new members.
Call Anne Vitale PhD at 415-456-4452 or send an email to Group@avitale.com for more information.
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[2] USA: Califonia--SCHOLARSHIP: eQuality Scholarship
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The eQuality Scholarship Collaborative awards scholarships to graduating
high-school seniors in northern and central California who have promoted
understanding of and equality for the lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender
community. In 2002, the Collaborative awarded $18,000 to 12 courageous youths.
The Collaborative is the joint effort of a group of organizations based in
the San Francisco Bay Area (see list at left). It began in 1989 as a
scholarship program by PG&E's lesbian and gay employee association, now
PG&E PrideNetwork. The following year, the Bay Area Network of Gay and
Lesbian (BANGLE) - now the
Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network, San Francisco-East Bay -
joined the effort. Additional sponsors have joined the Collaborative in
recent years, and more are always welcome. The Collaborative is an
all-volunteer effort with representatives from each of the sponsoring
organizations.
Eligibility
Applicants must:
* be graduating from a high school in northern or central California (see
website for specific counties)
* be in good academic standing
* have applied to a two- or four-year post-secondary institution, including
trade schools
* have promoted understanding of and equality for the
lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender community
Selection Criteria
The criteria by which recipients will be selected include:
* Service to the LGBTQ community
* Leadership
* Academic achievement
* Hardship or special circumstances
Deadline
Completed applications, including transcripts and letter of recommendation,
must be postmarked no later than March 10, 2003. Applicants will be
notified of their application status by April 25.
For more information or to apply, visit
<http://www.glsen-sfeb.org/eindex.htm>http://www.glsen-sfeb.org/eindex.<http://www.glsen-sfeb.org/eindex.htm>htm
or e-mail
<mailto:eQualityScholarship@planetoutcast.net>mailto:eQualityScholarship@planetoutcast<mailto:eQualityScholarship@planetoutcast.net>.net.
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[3] USA: A Call to the National Gay Menâ•ús Health Summit 2003
in Raleigh, North Carolina, from May 7-11, 2003
Top
[thanks to JIMAT41 via marriage 11 Dec 2002] and Rica
PLEASE CIRCULATE WIDELY. Join with us as we continue to build a multi-issue,
multi-racial Gay Menâ•ús Health Movement!
We are a group of people working to support the development of a strong,
visible, politicized gay men's health movement in the United States and we
invite you to join us from May 7-11, 2003 in Raleigh, North Carolina to
continue to launch this ambitious effort.
Our motivations for calling on you to join in this effort are diverse.
Some of us worked to create the initial national gay menâ•ús health
summits, in Boulder, in 1999 and 2000. Others of us took on leadership
roles in organizing local and regional gay menâ•ús health summits in
2001; still others participated in the recent LGBTI Health Summit 2002
in Boulder in July. We embrace and welcome to this work all who support
the health and well being of men who are gay, bisexual, queer, or have
sex with men. This gathering's events will encompass the needs of all
queer men, including those who are FTM or transgender-identified.
Some of us have been working in AIDS or health issues for several decades and
are interested in creating a stronger, more visible grassroots movement among
gay men focused on strengthening our communities and tackling a range of
health concerns. While HIV/AIDS remains a central focus for our energies,
we maintain other central concerns such as substance use, cancer, heart
disease, other sexually transmitted diseases, and mental health issues.
Others of us are drawn to this summit because we hope to re-energize gay men
in our communities to be actively engaged in political activism,
volunteerism, community life, and health promotion efforts. We want to spend
a few days of intense focus on the health of our communities with colleagues
from all over the nation who confront similar challenges and draw on similar
community strengths.
We come from different locations, cultures, generations, and professions, but
we share common concerns about improving gay men's health and wellness,
strengthening our local communities and subcultures, and enlisting service
providers, activists, health professionals, researchers, writers and cultural
workers in our efforts.
The summit will include speakers, panels, workshops, and organizing meetings
on a range of topics including, though not limited to:
o health promotion for gay men of color
o the hidden assets and strengths of our communities
o upswings in syphilis among urban men who have sex with men
o self-care, holistic and complimentary health, and creating sustainable
community organizations
o substance use and abuse
o same-sex marriage, polyamory, monogamy, domestic partnerships, and
communal living
o issues facing poor, homeless, and indigent gay, bisexual, queer, and trans
men
o the implications which gender and masculinity have for gay men's health
o health issues facing middle-age and old men
o the politics and health issues emerging from circuit parties
o making young gay men into health advocates
o model community health projects
o changes in gay cultures in response to the increasing centrality of
cyberspace
o sex debates in gay male communities and community health implications
o the politics and health issues emerging from barebacking
o a new generation of HIV prevention for gay men
o rural gay men's health needs
o countering racism, sexism, and classism in gay menâ•ús communities
o tensions between various gay generations
o mental health issues facing gay men of all colors
o activism focused on gay men's sexual health and access to technologies
This is a humble, grassroots organizing effort with ambitious aims. Our
summit starts off with no big-money sponsors and no large organizations
leading the effort. It is being organized by concerned men and women in
various parts of the country who are handling logistics, program planning,
publicity, and housing. We are already excited by the support and interest
which has been generated. We welcome all people motivated to improve the
well-being of our communities to participate and we invite programming ideas
focused on any population or subculture identifying as gay, bisexual, queer,
or trans men. Please consider submitting a workshop proposal today (see
information below).
Plan now to be an active participant in the Raleigh summit. We aim to limit
the summit to 300 registrants and expect to be at capacity by April. Please
register after January 15th and avoid disappointment. And make your housing
reservations very soon as we have been able to reserve only a limited number
of rooms and can expand our group reservation once we have commitments from
our core participants.
For information about REGISTRATION or HOUSING, download materials after
January 15th from the web site at www.gmhs2003.org. The conference site
is the Sheraton Capital Center in Raleigh at 1-800-834-2105 or
www.sheratoncapital.com. Reefer to â•þGay Menâ•ús Health Summit.â•ÿ The
Summit will be signed for the hearing-impaired and the site is
wheelchair accessible.
For GENERAL INFORMATION and QUESTIONS about the Summit, contact Jim and Ian
at (919) 829-3981 or email: gmhsummit@yahoo.com. The postal address is Gay
Menâ•ús Health Summit 2003, PO Box 25642, Raleigh, NC 27611.
For information about the PROGRAM at the Summit, visit the web site at
www.gmhs2003.org. The web site will tell you what information you must send
in with your proposal. Workshop proposals are due by January 15. Contact
Eric at gmhs3@aol.com or 415-255-6210 with program-related questions.
This statement was developed by the National Organizing Collective and signed
by other supporters of the Summit who intend to be present in Raleigh and
continue our work of building a multi-racial, multi-issue gay menâ•ús health
movement.
GMHS 2003 National Organizing Collective:
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[4]USA: Washington DC--Whitman-Walker adds trans clinic
Top
Source: Washington Blade (GLBT weekly, DC)
Author: Rhonda Smith
URL: http://www.washblade.com/local/021220whitman.php3
Date: December 20, 2002
Project to include hormone therapy; hepatitis vaccinations for gay men
also expanded
Whitman-Walker Clinic officials plan early next year to offer hormone
therapy maintenance and more primary health care services for
transgender residents who have limited access to care.
The "transgendered hormonotherapy clinics" will operate at the AIDS
service organization's Elizabeth Taylor Medical Center and at the Max
Robinson Center, in Northwest and Southeast Washington, respectively.
These are Whitman-Walker's two largest sites.
Philippe Chiliade, the clinic's medical director, said the "risk-
reduction" initiative came about in part because some transgender
residents routinely put themselves at risk for contracting HIV by
illegally buying hormones, such as estrogen or testosterone, and sharing
syringes to inject them.
"If they are using hormones without medical supervision," he said, "we
would prefer they use our services."
Clinic officials also plan early next year to expand their hepatitis A
and B vaccination outreach efforts for gay men. Chiliade said the clinic
now vaccinates 35 to 50 men per month against hepatitis.
The new initiative involves vaccinating up to 2,000 men a year and
charging them a sliding-scale fee, based on their ability to pay.
Patients who are HIV-positive are not charged for the vaccinations.
Michael Cover, clinic spokesperson, said the transgender project is
specifically designed to meet the health care requirements of those
patients who have the greatest needs. He also said hormone therapy
services would not routinely be offered to individuals involved in the
gender-reassignment process.
The pilot project will begin during the first three months of 2003.
Chiliade said clinic officials hope to see 50 patients in the first year.
Earline Budd, program manager at Us Helping Us for transgender support
services, said the initiative is desperately needed. Male-to- female
transgender individuals often illegally buy estrogen and silicone on the
street and inject it to change the appearance of their hips, breasts and
face, she said.
"It's detrimental," Budd said. "Folks have died from silicone poisoning
by having it injected into their arteries."
Dawn Harbatkin, medical director at the Michael Callen-Audre Lorde
Community Health Center in New York, said people buy estrogen,
progesterone and testosterone illegally from pharmacy employees or from
patients who obtain the hormones with a prescription from their private
medical doctor and then sell them.
"It's very hard to find care where a physician or a nurse practitioner
is willing to prescribe hormones," she said.
Another challenge, Harbatkin said, is that transgender people have been
"incredibly disconnected" from medical care in general because of bad
experiences they faced at the hands of insensitive doctors.
Whitman-Walker officials are using the Callen-Lorde model as an example
of what they could do to assist transgender patients in metropolitan
Washington, D.C.
The Callen-Lorde center provided medical care for about 500 transgender
patients in the past 18 months, officials said.
"Our goal is to get them to become involved in their entire health
care," Harbatkin said, noting that this would include discussions that
ranged from calcium intake and safer sex to tuberculosis and HIV prevention.
She said that 15 out of 90 medical appointments at the Callen-Lorde
center each week are geared toward transgender care.
"Our waiting list involves waiting months and months for [transgender
health] services," she said. "We cannot keep up with the demand for care."
- From primary care to STDs
Like Harbatkin, Chiliade said transgender patients do not always have
other safe and appropriate places they can go for compassionate health care.
The clinic's pilot project for transgender patients will include
offering primary care, HIV-prevention programs, screening for sexually
transmitted diseases and HIV, as well as providing hepatitis A and
hepatitis B vaccinations. It also will include access to mental health
services and case management.
Whitman-Walker officials have enlisted help with establishing the pilot
project from the Sexual Minority Youth Assistance League and Us Helping
Us, People Into Living Inc. Both community-based organizations work with
transgender residents throughout this region.
Chiliade said clinic officials also hope to collaborate with a network
of mental health providers willing to offer pro-bono services for
transgender patients.
"It's really an expansion of services targeted at a specific community
to meet many more of their needs," said Arthur Padilla, executive
director of the Sexual Minority Youth Assistance League.
SMYAL is a service agency that works with lesbian, gay, bisexual and
transgender youths between the ages of 13 and 21 who might have
questions about their sexual orientation.
"We're really interested in being able to provide a more healthy,
structured environment for young transgender youth -- specifically
male-to-female," Padilla said, noting that members of this population
tend to be more visible during their teen-age years than their female-
to-male counterparts.
FOR MORE INFO
Whitman-Walker Clinic
1407 S St., NW
Washington, D.C. 20009
202-797-3500
www.wwc.org
SMYAL
410 7th St., SE
Washington DC 20003-2707
202-546-5940
www.smyal.org
Us Helping Us, People Into Living Inc.
811 L St., SE
Washington, D.C. 20003
202-546-4042
www.ushelpingus.org
Officials at SMYAL plan to refer transgender youths and young adults to
Whitman-Walker's program for various health services and work closely
with their case managers, he said. SMYAL will provide social and mental
health services for transgender youths as part of this effort.
Of SMYAL's 1,100 members, Padilla said about 10 percent consider
themselves male-to-female transgender individuals.
Us Helping Us, which primarily addresses the needs of black gay,
bisexual and transgender individuals, has agreed to provide transgender
clients who participate in the Whitman-Walker pilot project with
HIV-prevention, mental health, and case management services.
Budd said many of the transgender clients who visit Us Helping Us often
struggle simultaneously with being homeless, HIV-positive and having
mental illness and substance abuse challenges.
She credited Jessica Xavier, a longtime transgender activist and
Whitman-Walker employee, for encouraging clinic officials in the past
year to expand the amount of health care services for this population.
"This has been a long time coming," Budd said. "For the first time the
transgender community is not as invisible as we have been."
Top
GENERAL INFORMATION
[5] India's Eunuchs End Weeklong Congregation
Top
Source Brenda Lana Smith R.af D.
WorldNews: India's Eunuchs End Weeklong Congr...
http://cgi.worldnews.com/?action=display&article=17619911&template=worldnews
/search.txt&index=recent
Sun, 29 Dec 2002
The Associated Press
VARANASI, India (AP) &emdash; Thousands of eunuchs ended a weeklong congregation in
this temple city on Sunday, demanding greater access to jobs in universities
and government.
``We are sexually handicapped and should be treated like any other
physically handicapped person,'' said Renee Kapoor of the All India Eunuch
Conference.
A committee will present the demand to the government early next year,
Kapoor said.
India has tens of thousands of eunuchs, who typically dress like women, wear
gaudy jewelry and live on tips for dancing at weddings and Hindu festivals
and blessing newborn babies.
Eunuchs are often discriminated against in education and barred from
government and other high-level jobs. Most are illiterate.
After independence from Britain in 1947, India launched an affirmative
action plan, setting aside places for members of the lowest social castes in
universities and government. But eunuchs weren't included in the program.
Nearly 5,000 eunuchs from across India attended the weeklong gathering in
Varanasi, about 445 miles southeast of New Delhi, to discuss their problems
and demands.
Most of the country's eunuchs are castrated as babies, though a few are born
without male genitalia. Some were elected to city councils and state
legislatures three years ago by voters expressing frustration with corrupt
politicians.
Asha Devi, a eunuch mayor of a north Indian town, said participation in
politics will help eunuchs improve their status.
``Winning elections gives us the platform to raise our voices,'' Devi said.
``People didn't take me seriously at first ... but now they expect a lot
from me.''
©2002 WN.com
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[6a] USA: Yakima WA - Deputy shoots, kills man
(This article pertains to the death of Sarah Mayhugh.)
Top
http://www.kvnews.com/articles/2002/12/24/news/news01.txt
Deputy shoots, kills man
Traffic wreck turns into lethal situation
By ANDREA PASCOE
MANASTASH RIDGE - A Kittitas County Sheriff's Office deputy shot and
killed a man after being attacked Monday afternoon.
Around 3:30 p.m., Washington State Patrol Trooper Bart Olson
responded to a rear-end collision on Interstate 82 at westbound
milepost 11 - near an exit connecting to the Yakima Training Center.
Arriving on scene, Olson discovered a driver in one of the cars
involved in the collision was unwilling to leave his passenger car,
Undersheriff Rob DeGroot said.
DeGroot said the man, who had breast implants and was dressed in
women's clothing, was unresponsive to Olson's commands and then
displayed a knife to Olson.
"The trooper attempted to forcibly remove the driver but was pepper
sprayed in the face by the assailant," DeGroot said.
Following a brief struggle, the driver fled into nearby sagebrush,
DeGroot said.
On his way back from Yakima after performing a prisoner transport,
Deputy Tom Gow heard Olson's radio traffic asking for officer
assistance.
At about the same time Gow arrived, Ellensburg Fire Department
paramedics Gary Burrows and Dan Johnson were arriving on scene to
assist with potential patients from the collision.
DeGroot said Gow, from the highway, barked orders at the white male,
believed to be in his late 30s.
The man turned and began approaching Gow with a hammer raised,
DeGroot said.
"The deputy attempted to intercede and the driver this time produced
a large claw-style hammer from within a coat and then rushed the
deputy," DeGroot said. "The deputy attempted to utilize pepper spray
against the assailant, however this did not stop the subject, who
continued to rush at and threaten the deputy with a raised hammer."
Chief Criminal Deputy Clay Myers said this morning the suspect
ignored all of Gow's commands and refused to communicate with Gow.
The pepper spray failed to affect the man.
With the suspect coming at him, hammer raised, Gow fired the first
round, Myers said. Myers said the two men were within eight feet of
each other. The man didn't stop approaching. The suspect continued
to come at Gow, who then fired additional rounds - estimated at
five - at close range with his .40 caliber service sidearm, Myers
said.
Myers said he did not know the exact number of times the suspect was
shot. The investigation into the shooting, being conducted by the
Yakima Police Department, will reveal the answer. It is routine for
outside agencies to investigate when officers use lethal force.
Though pepper spray was used on the man, Gow's only other option was
his gun since he was not carrying a taser, Myers said.
"This had escalated beyond a pepper spray situation," Myers
said. "It reached a different level when he went after Tom with a
hammer."
"Based on the information we have at this point the shooting was
justified," Myers said. "But there is still a process we have to go
through."
Medical personnel on scene were at first able to find a pulse on the
man and attempted life-saving measures but were unsuccessful. The
suspect was pronounced dead at the scene. It was in the ambulance it
was discovered the man was indeed a man, and not a woman.
Neither Gow nor Olson sustained serious injuries. Gow has since been
placed on paid administrative leave during the investigation,
DeGroot said.
State Patrol public information officer Trooper Rich Magnussen said
Olson is "doing fine. A little shaken up, but fine." Olson will not
be placed on leave, Magnussen said.
Myers said an autopsy will be performed on the man sometime this
morning. During the examination, Yakima detectives will take
fingerprints and submit them for identity confirmation through an
automated fingerprint identification system. He said the Kittitas
County Sheriff's Office has turned over all aspects of the
investigation to Yakima and are "keeping ourselves separate."
Myers did say Yakima police officers "have a good idea" who the man
was and said he was not a resident of Kittitas County. He did say
the man perhaps was a resident of Wenatchee.
Authorities said they will release the name of the man pending
confirmation and notification of next of kin.
Authorities were unable to give a specific date as to when the last
time an officer discharged a firearm at a suspect. Sheriff Gene Dana
said he was unaware of lethal force being used during his
administration but said he had heard of an incident that occurred
about 15 years ago, though he was unaware of the specifics around
the case.
E-mail Andrea Pascoe at: apascoe@kvnews.com
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[6b] Deputy fatally shoots trans-gendered Portland man
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Date: Sat, 28 Dec 2002 21:03:10 -0000
From: "Claire Ashton" <claire@c-ashton.fsnet.co.uk>
http://www.kfxo.com/global/story.asp?s=1062658&ClientType=Printable
YAKIMA -- The man killed by a Kittitas County sheriff's deputy on I-82 has
been identified as a Portland man who was in the process of changing gender.
Authorities say 49-year-old Tim Mayhugh, who also went by the name Sarah,
was shot five times by Deputy Tom Gow. Undersheriff Rob DeGroot says it was
the first fatal shooting by a Kittitas deputy in 15 years.
Yakima police are investigating Monday's shooting. Authorities say the
deputy fired as Mayhugh was attacking him with a hammer. They say he had
sprayed a state trooper with pepper spray after being involved in a minor
traffic accident about 12 miles south of Ellensburg.
Authorities described Mayhugh as pre-operative transsexual. He was dressed
as a woman and had shoulder-length hair and breast implants. Officials
didn't know he was a man until he was in an ambulance. Gow is a four-year
veteran of the sheriff's office and was previously a city of Kittitas police
officer.
(Copyright 2002 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
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[7] UK: Homophobic crime in Norwich soars
Top
Source Brenda Lana Smith R.af D.
EveningNews24: News
http://www.eveningnews24.co.uk/content/News/story.asp?datetime=28+Dec+2002+1
1%3A05&tbrand=ENOnline&tCategory=NEWS&category=News&brand=ENOnline&itemid=NO
ED28+Dec+2002+11%3A06%3A18%3A483
December 28, 2002 11:05
THE NUMBER of reported homophobic crimes in Norwich has increased by 40 per
cent this year, Norfolk Police said today.
The announcement came in the wake of news that gay, lesbian and bisexual
couples may be given the same rights as married people and that transsexuals
are about to be given many new rights including the right to marry and
change their sex on their birth certificate.
According to a national social survey, Britons have a more tolerant attitude
towards homosexuality than ever before.
But Det Insp Nick Day said the crime figures showed that the war against
homophobia is still far from over.
An increasing number of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people are
"coming out" but this can, he said, make them open targets to homophobic
attackers.
The number of reported crimes rose from 26 last year to 35 so far this year.
These ranged from verbal abuse to assaults and threats to kill &endash; violence
police warn will not be tolerated.
"The rise in numbers could reflect the fact that more people are prepared to
report these crimes thanks to the work we've been doing," said Det Insp Day,
explaining that every district has at least two liaison officers who
specialise in dealing with homophobic crimes.
"In many cases people haven't come out to their family and friends so they
keep it to themselves.
"We reassure them that we treat every case very sensitively and will not
tell family, friends or employers without their permission.
"Inevitably there will be some cases that come to court but prosecution
isn't always the appropriate action. It is very much an education issue. You
will always get the ignorant hard core who will perpetrate these kind of
crimes. "We have to let them know that it will not be tolerated."
A minority may be to blame for the crimes but what about the attitudes of
the general public?
The 19th British Social Attitudes survey published this week says that 47
per cent of Britons believe homosexuality is "always" or "mostly" wrong,
compared with 70 per cent in 1985. A third now say it is "not wrong at all".
Out of nearly 3,000 Nearly two-thirds of over-60s thought homosexuality was
"always wrong", compared with less than a quarter of under-30s and one in
five graduates. Fifty-four per cent of those with no qualifications believed
it was always wrong.
Despite opposition from some family and church groups, the government looks
set to offer gay men, lesbians and bisexuals the same rights as married
couples.
Barbara Roche, the minister for social exclusion and equalities, says there
is a strong case for allowing same-sex couples the chance to register their
relationships.
So-called "civil partnerships" would confer property and inheritance rights
on homosexual men and women for the first time.
© 2002 Archant Regional. All rights reserved.
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[8] NEW ZEALAND--Last rites for slain 'Georgie Girl'
Top
Date: Fri, 27 Dec 2002
From: "tgnews_moderator <tgnews_moderator@yahoo.com>"
<tgnews_moderator@yahoo.com>
Source: New Zealand Herald
Via: QNA mail list
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?storyid=3048884
The funeral of a cross-dresser beaten to death with a softball bat
took place yesterday while the gang member wanted in connection with
the attack continued to evade police.
The tangi for George "Georgie Girl" Matehaere was held atthe Taamaki
Makaurau marae near Auckland Airport.
Mr Matehaere, who preferred to be known as a woman, was bashed in an
Otahuhu state housing complex 11 days ago. He died in hospital six
days later.
Police have been hunting Black Power gang member Joe Coleman. The 39-
year-old grandfather, known as "Bucket", has refused to give himself
up. His wife and 12-year-old son are believed to be with him.
Coleman is described as "fat", 1.8m tall with the words "Mangu Kaha" -
a chapter of Black Power - and a fist tattooed on his forehead.
©Copyright 2002, New Zealand Herald
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[9] USA: The Federal Trade Commission case over "breast enhancement" product settled
Top
Reuters Health Information (2002-12-27): FTC ...
http://www.reutershealth.com/archive/2002/12/27/eline/links/20021227elin019.
html
Last Updated: 2002-12-27 16:25:27 -0400 (Reuters Health)
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) settled a
complaint Friday against the makers of a "breast enhancement product" called
The Isis System.
The FTC named the California-based company, Vital Dynamics, Inc., and its
three officers in the complaint.
The Isis System, which consisted of a dietary supplement and a topical
cream, was advertised extensively through radio, print and television ads
and was available on the Internet.
In the advertisements, the makers "deceptively represented that Isis would
increase a woman's breast size safely and with no negative side effects,"
according to the FTC. Advertisements included statements such as: "Fuller,
firmer breasts in as little as a few weeks...Guaranteed," according to the
FTC.
In addition, women were depicted in the ads with captions that read: "I went
from wearing an 'A' cup to a 'B' cup--without surgery!"
The product sold for between $199 and $599 for a six-month supply.
What's more, according to the FTC, the advertisements specifically stated
that Isis was safe. In fact, the makers of The Isis System "had received
hundreds of complaints about side effects, including headache, nausea, and
allergic reactions," according to the FTC.
The FTC settlement requires Vital Dynamics to have "competent and reliable
scientific evidence before making any claims about the benefits,
performance, efficacy, safety, or side effects of any service, therapy,
dietary supplement, food, drug, cosmetic, or device."
The settlement also prevents the company from "misrepresenting" any refund
policy in the future, since it was found that Vital Dynamics inaccurately
claimed that unhappy customers could easily obtain full refunds.
Tens of thousands of dollars in fines were levied against the company and
the three officers personally.
"Consumers need to be very suspicious about any product making very
hard-to-believe claims--especially for such a low price," said Janet Evans,
a senior attorney at the FTC in Washington, DC, who worked on The Isis case.
"Think twice before you spend and keep in mind that most testimonials by the
company are usually made up," she told Reuters Health.
"You really have to do your own research and find someone you know who has
used the product and see if it worked for them. And don't automatically
believe you'll get your money back either if the product doesn't work,"
Evans added.
A telephone listing for Vital Dynamics in California could not be located,
and it is believed the company went out of business earlier this year,
according to Evans.
© 2002 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
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[10] USA: New Mexico--Lawsuit Alleges Hospital Bias Against Transsexual
Woman Says She Was Bleeding Heavily But Ignored For 2 Hours
Top
POSTED: 9:05 a.m. MST December 27, 2002
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- An Albuquerque woman says University of New Mexico Hospital discriminated against her because she's a transsexual.
Christine Anders, 54, says she was bleeding heavily but was ignored for more than two hours in June 2000.
The hospital denied her allegations in its answer to her lawsuit. Anders' lawsuit in federal court says hospital workers put her in a room and forgot her.
She says she was given nothing to control bleeding and was told a doctor would see her when he could.
Anders says that after two-and-a-half hours, she drove herself to another hospital emergency room and was seen within minutes.
She alleges negligence or medical malpractice and violations of federal law governing how hospitals may refuse treatment.
Copyright 2002 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Top
[11]INDIA--Eunuchs warn Pak against cross-border terrorism
Top
Eunuchs warn Pak against cross-border terrori...
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?artid=324
96794
FRIDAY, DECEMBER 27, 2002
THE TIMES OF INDIA
CITIES: LUCKNOW
ANI [ THURSDAY, DECEMBER 26, 2002 11:01:59 PM ]
VARANASI: The eunuchs from across the country have warned Pakistan against
instigating cross-border terrorism in the country.
They also resolved to lay down their lives for the country while fighting
against the neighbouring nation in case the latter continued with its evil
designs.
This declaration was made while they participated in the weeklong All-India
Eunuch Conference which concluded on Christmas Day.
On the last day, the eunuchs paid homage to their Guru, Intzar Bai 'Kinnar'.
They also prayed for peace and tranquillity world over.
Challenging Pakistan to have a direct fight with them, the eunchs said, "we
are enough to give a befitting reply to the Pakistani forces and their
ammunition".
Hirabai Kinnar, municipal councillor from Jabalpur, said, "Pakistan should
budge from instigating cross-border terrorism in the country". In a lighter
vein, the councillor claimed that they can shoo away the Pakistani forces by
their typical clapping style.
To mark the concluding ceremony, thousands of eunuchs bathed in Ganga and
then proceeded to the Durga Mandir to pay homage to their Guru.
Soon the eunuchs formed into a huge procession as they moved singing and
dancing. Once the procession culminated at the temple, the eunuchs offered
two huge bells as rhymes were chanted in homage to the goddess.
The conference, where at least 30,000 eunuchs from across the country, took
part coincided with the death anniversary of their Guru.
Entry to the meet was prohibited for common men and women since the eunuchs
themselves organised the conference with no monetary help from any quarter.
During this conference, eunuchs normally pray for the welfare of human
beings. Eunuchs are the most neglected and unprivilaged members of society.
But this has not prevented from being alive to problems like terrorism and
AIDS.
For the conference a tent is erected on a piece of land measuring 15 acres.
Outside the pandal, eunuchs themselves sell commodities like tea, beetal and
even beauty products.
END
© 2002 Times Internet Limited. All rights reserved.
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[12] USA California--Raped by other inmates, two transsexuals say
Top
The Sacramento Bee -- sacbee.com -- Raped by ...
http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/story/5705827p-6679012c.html
One contends that she wasn't isolated as required under jail policy.
By Ramon Coronado
Bee Staff Writer
Published 2:15 a.m. PST Wednesday, December 25, 2002
Two transsexuals are alleging they were raped as inmates at the Sacramento
County main jail by other inmates, Sheriff's Department officials confirmed
this week.
"We are currently investigating allegations of sexual abuse," Sgt. James
Lewis said Monday.
One incident has been under investigation for the past three months as a
criminal matter and is expected to be forwarded to the Sacramento County
district attorney for possible charges, Lewis said.
The second incident supposedly took place more than a year ago, but
allegations surfaced for the first time earlier this month.
So far, that incident is being reviewed internally by Sheriff's Department
officials, Lewis said.
"Any allegations that jail staff facilitated assaults will be thoroughly
investigated internally. I am confident that the results of the
investigation will show the allegations are not true," Lewis said.
Last week, one person filed a claim with the county, which is a precursor to
a lawsuit, alleging that she had been raped in September. Another came
forward earlier this month with an allegation that she was raped a year ago.
The Bee does not disclose the names of victims of alleged sexual assaults.
"What is important is that neither... know(s) each other or of each other's
attacks," said Sacramento lawyer Dean Robert Johansson, who represents the
two.
"There appears to be a pattern of gross injustice here. At worst you have
guards setting up rapes of transgenders. At best you have flagrant disregard
for the rights of fellow human beings," Johansson said.
According to the claim, jail officials knew that the September victim, who
was in custody on assault charges, was a transsexual. Despite her status she
was placed in a cell with a male inmate.
Sheriff's officials deny they were notified that she was a transsexual who
identifies herself as a woman. The department's policy is to house
transsexuals in total isolation from other inmates, Lewis said. Officials
were informed that she was homosexual, and because of that she was housed in
protective custody but not in isolation, Lewis said.
The second complainant, who is awaiting trial on felony charges of making a
death threat against Gov. Gray Davis, said jail staffers moved her attacker
to a cell next door and then unlocked the cells, which allowed her attacker
to gain entry into her cell.
Both of them said jail staff initially ignored their complaints. They were
finally taken seriously after their family, friends and others began to
demand to know why the attacks were not being looked into, they allege.
"Who do you report a crime to when the law officer is the one who is
allowing it to happen," the second complainant wrote in a letter to The Bee.
The first complainant said her complaint was met "with taunts and degrading
responses." Her face was swollen and she had bite marks on her body, the
claim states. "She was placed in the cell with a male inmate much taller,
heavier and stronger than herself," the claim says.
Johansson said that when his client was finally taken seriously she was
taken to UC Davis Medical Center, where medical tests confirmed she was the
victim of a sexual assault.
Despite the confirmation, jail staffers accused her of making up the
incident, the claim states.
That complainant, who still has a related resisting-arrest charge pending
for trial in January, was released soon after and given credit for time
served in jail. Her claim does not specify monetary damages other than to
say she is seeking damages in excess of $10,000.
About the Writer
The Bee's Ramon Coronado can be reached at (916) 321-1191 or
rcoronado@sacbee.com.
© The Sacramento Bee / ver. 4
Top
MEDIA WATCH
[13] USA: Key West makes move to protect civil rights of transgender people
Top
The Miami Herald | 12/30/2002 | Key West make...
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/local/4837074.htm
Posted on Mon, Dec. 30, 2002
BY JENNIFER BABSON
jbabson@herald.com
KEY WEST - They say they continue to face bias and ridicule even as gays and
lesbians are now winning civil-rights battles in many communities.
Transgender people -- who may range from drag queens to straight
cross-dressers to those born as one sex who live as another or who have
changed their sex through surgery -- are ''the most oppressed and
discriminated-against portion of the community,'' says Karen Doering, an
attorney with Equality Florida and the National Center for Lesbian Rights.
For those men and women whose deeply rooted conception of self shatters
traditional definitions, the fight has in many ways just begun. Round One in
their battle is focused on four words that civil rights advocates believe
make all the difference: ``Gender identity or expression.''
Earlier this month, Key West's city commission unanimously agreed to add the
phrase to the city's human rights ordinance, which already protects people
from discrimination based on race, gender, religion and sexual orientation.
If the change receives final approval next month as expected, Key West will
be the first city in Florida and the 44th in the United States to offer the
protection. Eight counties and two states -- Minnesota and Rhode Island --
also have added similar language to their anti-discrimination laws.
BASIC RIGHTS
Supporters say those words provide employment and housing protection to the
transgender community.
For example, employers would be banned from firing a female worker because
she dresses in a masculine fashion or is in the process of changing gender,
a landlord could not evict a male tenant because he wears makeup, and a
restaurant host could not deny service to individuals who express their
gender in these ways.
Activists began pushing for the clause after a series of legal rulings said
''sexual orientation'' protections don't necessarily cover transgender
people.
'What the courts have done is they have defined sex and gender narrowly --
that's why we have tried to put `gender expression and identity' into the
law, because it's more broad,'' said Lisa Mottet, legislative lawyer for the
Transgender Civil Rights Project of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force
in Washington, D.C.
''A transsexual falls into this very gray area,'' said openly gay Key West
commissioner Tom Oosterhoudt, explaining why he sponsored the ordinance
change.
Scott Fraser, administrator of Key West's Gay & Lesbian Community Center,
hopes it will be ``a model ordinance for other communities in Florida.''
''We are the stepping stone, which is why we were so careful about choosing
the proper language,'' he said.
The ordinance defines gender identity or expression as ``having or being
perceived as having a gender-related self-identity, self-image, appearance,
expression or behavior whether or not such gender-related characteristics
differ from those associated with the person's assigned sex at birth.''
Says Doering, the Equality Florida lawyer: ``If a gay or lesbian person can
pass as straight, they are much less likely to experience discrimination on
a daily basis. But if it's a very effeminate man or a masculine-appearing or
acting female, or a transsexual or cross-dresser -- these are the folks who
are going to be the targets of most of the discrimination.''
Not surprisingly, gay-rights opponents view the new anti-discrimination
protections as just more bad news.
''This is an organized, well-financed group, which is operating throughout
the country and moving in, community by community,'' said Eladio José
Armesto, spokesman for Take Back Miami-Dade, a group that lost a bitter
battle this fall to overturn Miami-Dade's gay rights amendment. ``It's the
same problem. It's all the same problem.''
NO STATE PROTECTION
Currently, Florida's state civil rights act does not protect people on the
basis of sexual orientation, much less gender identity or expression. Only
13 municipalities in the state, including Key West, have ordinances that
protect people on the basis of sexual orientation.
But a number of corporations have opted to explicitly protect not only gays
and lesbians but also the transgendered. Among them: OneSource, which staffs
Florida theme parks, and Lucent Technologies, according to Doering.
Those advocating the broader anti-discrimination protections say it's the
least that can be done for a population unfairly isolated by its gender
identity.
''This is something we are born with, and if we don't accept it, it's like
suicide,'' says Michelle Wisniewski -- a 57-year-old Vietnam veteran who now
lives as a woman in the Lower Keys. Life isn't easy, she says, when ``your
brain is sort of wired for the gender you are not in.''
In the 10 years since Wisniewski ''made the switch,'' she has had no
communication from her relatives.
''My family shunned me,'' she said. ``I send letters and stuff, and . . .
nothing.''
Complicating matters -- and gender identity is a complex equation -- even
some of those who would stand in some circumstances to benefit from ''gender
identity or expression'' protection aren't sure whether they need it.
''We are drag queens -- we are men who wear dresses for money. You don't see
us running around in drag unless it's an event. We don't lay around our
apartments in negligee,'' says Sushi, a 35-year-old performer at 801
Bourbon, one of Key West's premier drag venues.
Adds Sushi: ''I have three transsexuals working for me'' as drag queens.
``People think we are all the same, but we are not.''
One of those transsexuals is blonde Baby D., who at age 20 is one of the
youngest drag queens in Key West.
Baby D. is taking hormones that fill out her breasts and give her more
womanly curves. She's no stranger to unfriendly taunts.
''I have lived in New Orleans, Fort Lauderdale, Tennessee,'' Baby D. says.
``Everywhere everybody like me gets grief -- no matter where they go, no
matter how passable they are. It's just a fact.''
Still, she says, ``I don't see why I should be treated any different than
anybody else.''
Top
[14] INDIA: Frolicking eunuchs get momentary acceptance in Varanasi
Top
Source Brenda Lana Smith R.af D.
Eunuchs get momentary acceptance in Varanasi ...
http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_128740,0008.htm
Agence France-Presse
Varanasi, December 30
By night they dance, by day they discuss the war on terrorism. For some
30,000 eunuchs, their boisterous annual convention is a chance to chat,
party and perhaps find a stepmother.
For two weeks, Gurudham Colony, a usually quiet neighbourhood in Varanasi,
buzzed with excitement as eunuchs rejoiced in the company of the only others
who accept them.
Temporary shops sprung up selling everything from bangles to electronics.
"The idea of such meets is to revive old ties and build new ones," explained
Bashir Nayak, a prominent eunuch in Varanasi who spent a year preparing for
the 12-day annual conference that closed on Sunday.
The forum is officially a chance to discuss the state of eunuch and
delegates included such eminent community members as Shabnam Mausi, who in
1999 became the first eunuch elected to the legislature of Madhya Pradesh.
The eunuchs said their discussions went from the practical, such as how to
increase their political clout, to the philosophical, such as the meaning of
patriotism.
"In our meetings we also spoke at length about terrorism and methods to
counter it," said Dhirabai, another eunuch from Madhya Pradesh.
Non-eunuchs were barred from listening in.
"Nobody can go inside," said Dhirabai, guarding the main tent.
"Look, we too love our privacy, and allowing people inside means disrupting
our schedule," Dhirabai said.
Eunuchs, known as "hijras," are generally not actually castrated, but are
transsexuals, transvestites or hermaphrodites who fall into the community
after being rejected by their families.
Eunuchs are traditionally reviled in Indian society. They are known for
their aggressive begging and make extra money through prostitution and
singing and dancing at weddings and other festive occasions.
"Unlike other times when we go door to door commemorating happy moments for
others, here we've gathered under one roof to share happiness with one
another," said Rekha Bai, before showing a quick dance move gleaned from
Hindi films.
"And we're having great fun, too!" added Suraiya Nayak, revered as "Miss
India" for winning a eunuch beauty contest three years in a row. (Many
eunuchs share the last name Nayak, which means actor.)
As they partied at night, the eunuchs would not have seemed out of place at
a lavish Indian wedding. Their faces were painted brightly, their ankles
were clapsed by heavy silver, and their foreheads, necks and arms weighed
down by ornate gold jewellery.
Despite the abuse often inflicted on eunuchs, the delegates said they have
had little problem with robbery and enjoyed police protection.
"Besides, we've earned this jewellery sheerly through hard work," said
Bashir Nayak.
Monu, who came to Varanasi all the way from Nepal, showed off a prized
possession: a thick gold chain with an emerald locket.
"My mother has gifted this to me," Monu said.
Like many eunuchs, particularly those in their teens and 20s, the conference
is a chance to find surrogate parents, as their biological families have
rejected them.
"We have no weddings and don't have children, so it's at these meetings that
we adopt daughters and nieces and even grandchildren," explained Angoori
Nayak.
"There are serious and holy ceremonies at which lots of gifts are
exchanged," Nayak said.
While they are treated as outcasts by society at large, the eunuchs believe
their convention could teach something to other Indians.
"We want our political leaders and our countrymen to learn a lesson from us
on how to maintain unity," said Bashir Nayak.
"We eunuchs have always understood the language of love and humanity. Castes
and religion have never played a role in our lives."
FIN
--
To Express your views/To see other views on this story, Click here »
http://www.hindustantimes.com/onlineCDA/general/HTOtherHaveYourSay.jsp
© Hindustan Times Ltd. 2002.
Top
[15] UK: Male teacher to return as woman
Top
Date: Sun, 29 Dec 2002
From: "tgnews_moderator <tgnews_moderator@yahoo.com>"
<tgnews_moderator@yahoo.com>
Source: Edgware and Mill Hill Times
http://www.edgwaretimes.co.uk/news/display.var.679934.index.male_teach
er_to_return_as_woman.html
Pupils at a Stanmore high school have been told one of their male
teachers will be returning as a woman in the new year.
In a letter sent to parents last week, headmaster of Park High in
Thistlecroft Gardens, Tony Barnes, explained that Stuart Raymond, a
senior science teacher who has been at school since 1986, would
become Alison Raymond.
"For some years, Stuart Raymond has been undergoing treatment at
Charing Cross Hospital for a medical condition known as gender
identity disorder," said Mr Barnes.
"Stuart Raymond has now reached the stage where he will return to
school as a female member of staff.
"If you know Stuart, you will know that during the last few years his
appearance and style of dress have changed considerably. To begin
with, in the new year, things will continue in much the same way.
"However, he will, to all intents and purposes, be a female member of
staff. For those of you who know Stuart Raymond this might not be a
complete surprise, but for others it will be.
"You will understand that the transition is not without problems for
the person concerned, which is why Stuart Raymond must have our
complete support. There is no reason to suppose that the transition
will affect the high quality of teaching and learning we have come to
expect in Stuart's classes.
"Naturally there will be a little embarrassment by some people at the
beginning but I am confident in the school's ability to manage this
well."
Mr Barnes said he hoped that by being open with parents, they would
respect Mr Raymond's decision and understand that his change of
gender would not affect his ability as a teacher.
He said: "If parents have any concerns we would, of course, be more
than happy to discuss them. I know this has been a very difficult and
courageous decision for Stuart to make and we applaud him for it. I
look forward to working with Alison in the new year."
Dr John Wise, chairman of governors, said: "Park High has a very
strong commitment towards valuing all of its pupils and staff. I know
that this will strengthen the support Alison Raymond will undoubtedly
receive."
© Copyright 2002 Newsquest Media Group - A Gannett Company
Top
[16] USA: A Tender Woman and a Tough Advocate
Top
Date: Fri, 27 Dec 2002 17:40:02 -0500
From: tgnews_moderator <tgnews_moderator@yahoo.com>
Source: The New York Times
Author: JOYCE WADLER
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/27/nyregion/27PROF.html?ex=1041656400&en=66ce274c45628401&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE
LET us now meditate on the errant black bra strap, slipped over the
plump upper arm of Melissa Sklarz, a middle-aged woman who for much of
her life was a man.
Is it significant that the bra strap, for an hour or more, will be so
exposed? Does it signify a person harried or distracted or with larger
things on her mind? A reminder, lest you forget, of femininity?
Though she has a deep mannish voice, Ms. Sklarz is a very feminine
woman: long lavender nails, shining red hair, those soft upper arms that
are the bane of the 50-plus. A rather good-looking woman, if she says so
herself -- and she will, shortly, in order to make a point.
Ms. Sklarz is an advocate for transgender rights, a member of the New
York Transgender Coalition. While many, last week, were celebrating the
passage of the Sexual Orientation Nondiscrimination Act in Albany, Ms.
Sklarz's group, which includes 61 organizations and individuals
throughout New York State, felt excluded. They argued that the bill,
which addresses sexual orientation, should not be passed without banning
discrimination on the basis of "gender identity and expression." (New
York City's gay rights statute was amended this spring to protect
transgendered people, an umbrella term that, according to Ms. Sklarz,
includes transsexuals and others who "transgress our cultural gender
clues.")
But what of the argument that the new bill -- and legislation already on
the books -- protects the rights of transgendered people?
"Think about somebody who's 6-3, 230 pounds with a full beard, working
for the post office, carrying a sack of mail. One day he goes to the
boss and says, `I've decided I'm a woman, and so I'm going to come to
work wearing a dress.' This person has no protection. You're seeing me
at the end of the process, after being Melissa for 15 years. What was I
like at six months, eight months? Would I have had civil rights then?
What would have happened to my job then?"
She is 51, female vice president -- the actual title -- of the Gay and
Lesbian Independent Democrats, and the first transgendered person in the
city, she believes, to hold an elected position, albeit minor, as a
delegate to the Democratic Party's Manhattan judicial convention in 1999.
Ms. Sklarz's day job is director of the collections department of the
Actors Federal Credit Union. This, you might think, demands an
intimidating presence, but though she is going to get her money, Ms.
Sklarz is tender, even maternal. When people came to her office when it
was on the 16th floor, she'd walk them over to the window. Not because
she was one of the Sopranos, but to show them the lovely view, she says,
to help them relax.
Her style is down to earth, breezy. "Me-LISS-ah," she sings, picking up
the office phone, "like Melissa Etheridge."
"I'm familiar with your name," she tells one caller, "which is not
necessarily a good thing."
It's no surprise, visiting a female activist, to see a Wonder Woman
calendar. The surprise is Ms. Sklarz commenting on a story in which
Wonder Woman is changed into a gorilla. "This brings up a lot of
issues," Ms. Sklarz says.
Great Hera! A sexual activist with a sense of humor!
Ms. Sklarz grew up in Hicksville, N.Y. Her father was a high school
teacher. She will not reveal her name as a boy. When she went to a high
school reunion, she says, her classmates saw her as a beautiful
middle-aged woman; the old identity no longer exists. She will tell you
she was a varsity soccer player at Hicksville High. She dated girls to
fit in. She wore her sister's clothing in secret, until her mother
finally locked her sister's room. The only time she felt happy was when
she was playing ball.
SHE graduated from SUNY Buffalo with a degree in political science,
worked as truck driver, office manager, accountant. She also was hanging
out with a transgender group around Times Square in the 1970's, at the
Gilded Grape and the Barnum Room, in "an endless swirl of sex and
alcohol-induced insanity." It was only there that she did not feel
freakish, alone. She also had a problem with substance abuse, which led
to loss of home and job.
She began what she calls her "change" in her late 30's. Two weeks after
starting female hormones, she was fired from a job she had held for
eight years. Ms. Sklarz does not know if it was because of transgender
issues.
She was hard to be around in those days, she says, because of the
substance abuse. There were certainly transgender issues later. One job
interviewer asked when she had had her surgery. "I'm not in the habit of
discussing my genitals in job interviews," Ms. Sklarz said.
Currently she is chairwoman of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and
Transgender Committee of Community Board 2 in Greenwich Village, where
she lives. Last summer, as West Village residents cracked down on
prostitutes and drug addicts, she argued that they were not
differentiating between prostitutes and transgendered persons and that
it was important to "create a safe place for people on the fringe of the
problem."
"It seemed to me that the younger transgenders were going to jail," Ms.
Sklarz says. "You didn't see other people in New York going to jail for
being obnoxious."
Top
[17]USA: California --Sister Mary Elizabeth Clark Shares Her AIDS Archive With the World
Top
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-goodturns29dec29.story
Sunday, December 29, 2002
GOOD TURNS
She Shares Her AIDS Archive With the World
A nun built a Web site that has become the definitive information source on
the disease.
By Jeff Gottlieb, Times Staff Writer
In a San Juan Capistrano mobile home, Sister Mary Elizabeth Clark has
labored for a dozen years on a homemade computer network creating what AIDS
experts say is the most definitive -- and perhaps the most accessible --
source of information on the disease.
The 24-by-60-foot trailer a few blocks from the beach is the headquarters of
the AIDS Education Global Information System, a free Web site with 750,000
documents on the pandemic.
The vast archive, which Clark and her staff of two update daily with
articles from medical journals, magazines, news services and newspapers from
around the globe, has had more than 7 million hits this year. AEGIS lists
court decisions, fact sheets and treatment information at www.aegis.org. If
anyone has come close to collecting the definitive AIDS library, it is the
64-year-old Clark.
She has built the computer network, negotiated with publishers for
permission to use their material and has worked on average 18 hours a day
for years updating the database.
"She provides incredible and important information for my daily life, and I
couldn't get along without it," playwright and AIDS activist Larry Kramer
said. "I want to know everything about AIDS and the politics of it and the
treatment of it and the research of it. And in one Web site, she combines it
all with such incredible skill and speed and accuracy that the mind
boggles."
Users include the afflicted and the powerful.
During the Clinton administration, Clark said, AEGIS software showed that
each day at 9:30 a.m. Eastern time someone would access the Web site from
the executive office of the president of the United States to check the
latest postings.
For people in isolated areas who have access to a computer, AEGIS can be
invaluable. Its "Ask the Doc" project, started in January, has fielded 170
questions from six continents, such as a recent one from an Ethiopian whose
HIV-positive son is 4 1/2. The man wondered if his son would live long
enough to go to college.
"To be able to write a medical doctor in the U.S. and get an answer to a
question for free is really phenomenal," said Dr. Mark Katz, who directs HIV
care for Kaiser Permanente of Southern California and is AEGIS' medical
advisor.
AEGIS recently was nominated for inclusion in UNESCO's Memory of the World
Programme, which is dedicated to preserving valuable holdings of all types
in archives and libraries around the world. The United Nations Educational,
Scientific and Cultural Organization's principal aims are to promote
collaboration among nations, to fight intolerance and further human rights.
Kramer has suggested Clark for an award from the American Foundation for
AIDS Research.
AEGIS, which has a budget of about $200,000, survives on grants, mostly from
Connecticut drug manufacturer Boehringer Ingelheim.
Inside the trailer, the loud hum of a computer cooling system provides a
24-hour-a-day soundtrack to the work. Luckily for neighbors, there is plenty
of soundproofing. AEGIS has taken over the dining room and living room.
Clark has turned her bedroom into an office she calls her "command post."
Long before she started AEGIS, Clark had a penchant for drawing attention.
That's what happens when you enlist in the Navy as a man and in the Army as
a woman, then try to become an Episcopal nun.
She spent 17 years in the Navy as Michael Clark, where she learned
electronics and scuba diving and rose to the rank of chief petty officer
before being honorably discharged in 1974. Clark had been married twice by
then and fathered a son. She underwent a sex change in 1975 and moved to
Orange County to take care of her aging parents.
She enlisted in the Army Reserves in 1976, and her recruiter later said
Clark had never hidden the fact that she was a transsexual. After 19 months
of service, though, higher-ups voided her enlistment. The sex change, the
Army said, disqualified her for enlistment. She sued with help from the
American Civil Liberties Union, winning a $25,000 settlement and an
honorable discharge.
Then she got religion, and controversy quickly followed. Clark had been
reared in Pontiac, Mich., as a Southern Baptist -- a "right-wing religious
zealot," she called herself. But she said she fell away from religion
because of racist churches she saw when stationed in the South.
In Orange County, she felt a pull back toward religion and began searching
for a religious order dedicated to social justice. "I was interested in
becoming a nun from when I was 8 years old," she said.
Clark formed her own order and took vows of poverty, chastity and obedience
at St. Clement's By-the-Sea Episcopal Church in San Clemente. The bishop
rejected them within the week. The Episcopal Diocese said she had not met
the requirements for forming a new order, that she needed more sisters and
more time.
Undeterred, Clark continues to consider herself a nun.
"I made my vows to God, not to a church," she said.
In January 1989, she headed to Missouri to herd cows. The plan -- not a
well-thought-out one, she now concedes -- was to make enough money ranching
to donate beef to homeless shelters and the needy. It didn't work out, but
her time there led to her life's work.
"I can safely say that if I hadn't gone to Missouri, AEGIS wouldn't have
happened," Clark said.
In the town of Stover, southwest of Jefferson City, a circuit-riding doctor
showed up once a week for four hours. At the local Wal-Mart, she noticed a
young man she thought had AIDS. In those days, an AIDS diagnosis meant death
was imminent.
The man was terrified neighbors would learn of his disease and treat him as
an outcast. It got her thinking about AIDS sufferers living isolated and
apart from people who could provide emotional support and information on
their condition.
She remembered her 1986 gallbladder surgery in Orange County, and the
doctors and nurses who were fearful of her because of her sex change. She
thought the emerging AIDS epidemic might have been behind their attitudes.
In fact, she was HIV-negative. "It was a good object lesson showing me how
vulnerable an HIV-positive person was," she said.
When Clark moved to her parents' mobile home in San Juan Capistrano, she
built a computer. Then she launched the electronic bulletin board that
became AEGIS as the Internet blossomed.
"I didn't think too far into the future," she said. "It just started to ...
grow."
Clark still lives in the mobile home with her 91-year-old father, who is
blind. The American Catholic Church, a small religious group that doesn't
require that clergy be celibate, has recognized her as a nun. Occasionally,
she attends a Roman Catholic church.
"I think everyone has to ... [learn] it's not the religion, but the
spiritual relationship you have with God that's important," she said.
Clark has two full-time assistants and an accountant who is trying to put
the organization on solid financial footing. She still rises at 5 a.m. and
peruses the Web for items AEGIS should pick up. But her role these days is
to ensure that the computers keep running.
"I'm in the background," she said, at which her helpers laughed.
Clark knows she must train others so AEGIS can continue without her.
"We are in effect the de facto history of the epidemic," she said. "I never
knew we'd grow this big."
If you want other stories on this topic, search the Archives at
http://www.latimes.com/archives.
Copyright 2002 Los Angeles Times
Top
[18]UK: Scotland--Transsexual hails plans for privacy protection
Top
Source: The Press and Journal
Author: SUE RESTAN
http://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/displayNode.jsp?nodeId=84092&command=displayContent&sourceNode=83929&contentPK=3341861
Date: Dec. 23, 2002
A SEX-CHANGE former Highland soldier yesterday welcomed the Government's
proposed measures to protect the rights of trans-sexual people.
But Kaye Campbell, who was forced to publicly reveal that she used to be
a man after she was assaulted by her "wife", said she did not believe
the measures went far enough to ensure that trans-sexual people were
able to maintain their privacy.
She also said she hoped that the changes might lead to her Army
discharge book being reissued in her new name.
The Government recently said that it plans to introduce legislation
which will enable trans-sexuals to be issued with a new record from the
Registrar General which will be indistinguishable from a birth certificate.
The original birth certificate will remain in existence and the link
between the two documents will remain confidential within the Registrar
General's office.
The new legislation will also give trans-sexuals - of which there are
around 5,000 in the UK - the right to marry in their acquired gender.
Ms Campbell, 49, of Freswick, in Caithness, gave evidence on her
trans-sexuality when she appeared as a witness for the Crown at Wick
Sheriff Court against former partner, Joanne Campbell, 38.
Joanne Campbell was convicted of assaulting Kaye Campbell by grabbing
her by the hair, pulling her to the floor and repeatedly striking her
head off the fireplace at their home on January 13 last year. Sentence
was deferred until January 9, 2003, for background, community service
and psychiatric reports.
The couple married in Cornwall in 1998 and their marriage certificate is
believed to be the only current documentary evidence of a same-sex
marriage in the UK. They are now awaiting listing for an annulment hearing.
Kaye Campbell yesterday said she was delighted that she would soon be
able to obtain a duplicate birth certificate in her new name.
But she pointed out that the fact that trans-sexuals' original birth
certificates in their old names remain on record means that they could
be discovered and "outed" at any time.
"If there is something lying around then, sooner or later, someone is
going to find it by accident. There will still be that bit of worry in
people's minds, but it's much better than we had before.
"It is a massive step forward and, while it doesn't go far enough, it
does show that the Government has got heart and recognises that we, as
people, are equal in society.
"But I still think the original birth certificate should be disposed of
after the person has gone through final and irreversible surgery.
"I think the Government should take the big bite, be brave and go for
complete change of birth records for people like me," she said.
Ms Campbell underwent a gender reassignment operation in 1990 after
leaving the Army, where she served with the Royal Electrical Mechanical
Engineers and was responsible for the maintenance of Chieftain tanks.
She said she had reluctantly destroyed her Army discharge book to get
rid of the evidence of her past life.
"I would like to see discharge books reissued in our new names.
"It would be harsh to say they will issue facsimile birth certificates
and not change our service records.
"If they do not change them, we cannot use our discharge books as a
reference without coming out to prospective employers.
"My discharge book was all I had to show for my 12 years in the Army. I
am disabled, but anyone looking for work may be better off saying they
had been inside (prison) rather than having to come out.
"Once my documentation is complete, I would hope to be able to approach
the records office of my old corps to have my discharge book reissued,"
said Ms Campbell.
She added that it was a pity that Government action on the protection of
trans-sexual people has came too late to protect her privacy.
Top
LEGISLATIVE ACTION
[19] USA: A victory for Boston's transgender population
Top
Date: Sat, 28 Dec 2002
From: "Meryl Sizemore <merylsizemore@hotmail.com>"
<merylsizemore@hotmail.com>
From: glbt-workplace@groups.queernet.org
Boston Globe, December 21, 2002
http://www.boston.com/globe
A victory for Boston's transgender population
By Libby Adler
While local and national elections seized the limelight last month,
Mayor Thomas Menino quietly signed a new city ordinance that propels
Boston to the forefront of protecting its citizens from
discrimination on the basis of gender identity and expression.
As a result of this forward-thinking decision on the part of the
mayor and nine members of the City Council, Boston becomes the 50th
jurisdiction in the country, including 42 cities, six counties, and
two states that have recognized the irrationality of prejudice on
the basis of gender identity and expression and acted unequivocally
to stop it. Gender identity refers to one's internal sense of
oneself as a man or a woman while gender expression refers to the
external characteristics (dress, hair, mannerisms) that manifest
that identity. Transgender people are those who were born
anatomically female but identify as men or born anatomically male
but identify as women. Some seek surgical interventions
to bring their anatomy into conformance with their identity, while
others just choose new names and clothing that correspond to their
sense of themselves as male or female.
Even non-transgender people may be victims of discrimination because
they defy commonly held expectations about masculinity and
femininity, such as the man who is fired because he is "effeminate"
or the woman denied a promotion because she is "too masculine."
The ordinance protects everyone who lives in or visits Boston from
discrimination on the basis of gender identity in housing,
employment, public accommodations, educational opportunities, and
lending. Its provisions implicitly recognize, that like
discrimination based on race, national origin, religion, sex, and
sexual orientation, discrimination based on gender identity or
expression is senseless and hurtful.
The one member of the Boston City Council who manifested an
underdeveloped sense of humanity was James Kelly. After losing the
vote, 9-1, the mystified councilor asked, "If I put on a dress and
heels and lipstick, am I a woman?" But Kelly misses the point. The
question is whether, if he puts on a dress, heels, and lipstick, he
should be discriminated against in housing, employment, public
accommodations, and so on.
Gender identity is not typically a casual matter of mood or whimsy,
but something that people feel deeply - a point that members of the
transgender community appreciate perhaps more than anyone else.
Putting on a dress might seem absurd to the compassion-challenged
councilor, but when a person is willing to risk familial and social
rejection, discrimination, and even personal safety to do it,
doesn't it make sense that the inclination must be sincerely and
profoundly felt?
Fortunately, nine members of the City Council and the mayor agree.
They acted swiftly and unambiguously to ensure that businesses,
universities, and other local institutions in our city do not
discriminate.
As with all measures that combat prejudice and promote diversity,
the ordinance promises to benefit local institutions by enhancing
their ability to attract the best candidates for work and study,
including those to whom it is important to live in a place known for
its broad acceptance of difference. In this way, the ordinance
serves not only transgender Bostonians, but all members of our
community.
Libby Adler is an assistant professor of law at Northeastern
University.
Top
LEGAL ACTION
[20] USA: New York --Gender Change Insurance Nixed
Federal appeals court upholds ruling that sex change surgery is merely "cosmetic"
Top
Source: Gay City News
Author: ARTHUR S. LEONARD
http://www.gaycitynews.com/gcn31/genderchange.html
Date: Dec. 27, 2002
Finding that gender-reassignment surgery is merely "cosmetic" and not
"medically necessary," a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court
of Appeals for the Second Circuit, in New York, upheld on December 20
the refusal of an employee benefits plan to cover the costs of such
procedures.
Born female in 1955, Margo Mario began working for P & C Food Markets in
1992 as a supervising pharmacist. Beginning in the mid-1990s, Mario, who
had been diagnosed as having gender dysphoria, decided to begin the
process of transforming from female to male. Mario advised P & C of this
decision, and was given permission to begin dressing as a male and
presenting himself as male at work, using the name Marc Mario. Mario
began hormone therapy, and underwent two surgeries in support of his
transformation, a bilateral mastectomy in September 1996 and a
hysterectomy in October 1997.
P & C has a self-insured employee health plan, so the company pays
directly for all the benefits it provides. Mario sought reimbursement
from the plan for his hormone therapy and mastectomy. The plan provides
coverage only for "medically necessary" treatments. P & C concluded,
after some investigation of the issue, that medical treatments for
gender dysphoria, including hormone therapy and surgery, were elective,
not mandated, and thus not covered by the plan. His claims were denied,
and he was advised that any future claims for services or procedures
related to the gender-reassignment would also be denied.
Mario sued in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New
York in Buffalo, alleging violations of the Employment Retirement Income
Security Act (ERISA), the federal law that governs employee benefit
programs, the federal Civil Rights Act's sex discrimination provisions,
and New York State laws forbidding discrimination against persons with
disabilities.
In the district court, a magistrate judge found that ERISA provided for
only limited review of a benefits plan's decisions, which must be upheld
unless it was found to be "arbitrary and capricious." Under federal law,
plan administrators are given considerable discretion in making
decisions about benefits coverage.
The magistrate concluded that the plan administrator had gathered
information from doctors, medical institutions, and insurance carriers
that supported the conclusion that gender reassignment surgery was not
medically necessary.
The magistrate judge also concluded that there was no valid federal
civil rights sex discrimination claim, since discrimination on account
of gender dysphoria or transsexualism are not covered. The magistrate
also found no basis for a discrimination claim.
A federal district judge approved the magistrate's decision, and Mario
appealed.
Writing for the appellate court, Judge Guido Calabresi found that it was
not clear cut that the "arbitrary and capricious" standard was the
appropriate one to follow on the ERISA claim, but nonetheless found that
the plan administrator's decision would survive even more demanding
levels of judicial review. The plan administrator had presented the
magistrate with "sufficient evidence to show that a treatment is not
medically necessary in the usual case," the court found, so it was up to
Mario to show that he was unusual in requiring this procedure.
Calabresi's opinion specifically noted the testimony of Dr. Ivan Fras,
who told the court that "the surgical removal of healthy organs, for no
purpose other than gender dysphoria, would fall into the category of
cosmetic surgery and would therefore not be 'medically necessary.'"
P & C's plan administrator, Bernadette Barber, concluded based on her
research that there was "substantial disagreement" in the medical
community about whether gender dysphoria was a "legitimate illness" and
"uncertainty as to the efficacy of reassignment surgery."
Finding that Mario had not come forth with any evidence that his case
differed in a relevant way from the "ordinary one," Calabresi ruled that
the plan administrator's determination was final.
As to the federal sex discrimination claim, Calabresi noted the doubts
about whether transsexuals are covered, and sounded a skeptical note
about Mario's argument that he was a victim of gender stereotyping
because his employer was denying him coverage for operations that would
be covered for women. But Calabresi based his rejection of Mario's civil
rights claim on the grounds that the facts raised no inference that
there was any discrimination. The court found that P & C had a
legitimate, non-discriminatory reason for rejecting the benefits
claim--its conclusion that the procedures involved were not medically
necessary.
This decision is an anomaly in light of the many recent developments
signaling a growing acceptance of the reality of transsexualism. A
recent European Court of Human Rights decision compelled the British
government to introduce legislation recognizing sex changes and allowing
transgendered people to marry. Even in the United States, the Medicaid
program in many jurisdictions, sometimes in response to litigation, has
begun to cover sex-reassignment surgery, under regulations that limit
coverage to medically necessary procedures. Given current developments
in the legal treatment of transsexuals, this decision is out of step.
Top
[21] Japan: Court rejects gender change request in resident registry
Top
Source: Kyodo News
Via: Japan Today
http://www.japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=1&id=243708
Date: December 22, 2002
TOKYO -- The Tokyo Family Court has rejected an appeal from a plaintiff,
who underwent a sex change operation, to change his gender entry in a
resident registry from female to male, the second such court rejection
in Japan, sources familiar with the case said Saturday.
In a recent decision, the court, touching on the biological aspect of
sex, said there was no reason to effect a change in line with the Family
Registration Law. The law provides for such a change when there is an
"error" at the time of birth.
"It is evident that (the plaintiff) was a woman at the time of birth not
only in terms of sex organs but also chromosomes," a judge said in the
decision.
The plaintiff, whose identity is withheld for privacy reasons, said the
decision fails to consider the psychological and social aspects of
gender and wondered if the case was thoroughly examined. There was, for
instance, no interview by the judge, said the plaintiff who is in his 30s.
A sex change operation for a person diagnosed as having gender identity
disorder was first conducted in Japan four years ago at Saitama Medical
College in Kawagoe, Saitama Prefecture, in conformity with Japanese
Society of Psychiatry and Neurology guidelines.
A total of six people, including the plaintiff filed appeals with family
courts in various parts of the country last year seeking to change their
resident registry gender entry, saying they cannot otherwise marry or
get jobs
In August, another family court in the Kanto region of eastern Japan
rejected a similar appeal, the first rejection of a gender change in a
resident registry. The case has been appealed.
In September, the municipal assembly in Koganei, Tokyo, approved a
motion seeking to enable a change in the gender entry of a resident
registry for those diagnosed as having gender identity disorder.
Top
ARTS AND ENTERTAINMENT
[22] UK: LIFE OF A DRAMA QUEEN--Profile of Danny La Rue
Top
Source Brenda Lana Smith R.af D.
The Stage | Profile Danny La Rue
http://www.thestage.co.uk/paper/0252/0301.shtml
Friday, December 27, 2002
Profile: Danny La Rue
Patrick Newley meets the man who made dressing in drag respectable and who -
after 50 years in showbusiness - has no plans to stop performing
"I have always looked upon myself as a character actor, or as an
illusionist. I create glamorous illusions and shatter them. I'm a puppeteer.
I manipulate my 'ladies' but I am never destructive. The 'ladies' that I
have created have been flamboyant, elegant and glorious. When people come to
see Danny La Rue, they come to see glamour."
At the height of his fame in the seventies and eighties La Rue was the most
famous female impersonator in the world. Now aged 74 he is still working. He
may walk more slowly onstage and there are no high kicks but the costumes
and razzmatazz are as bold as ever. He has been 50 odd years in the business
and says that he will never stop.
Credited as the performer who made drag respectable, before he came along
there were only pantomime dames or revue artists who dressed up. No man had
ever become a top star in a frock.
"I suppose I paved the way for people like Paul O'Grady," La Rue says,
swigging a beer in his luxury flat in London's West End. "It took me 20
years to make something that wasn't acceptable, acceptable. And I'm still
learning. I mean, it's not funny just to put on a frock and a wig. It takes
a lot of time to develop a character that is inoffensive and can be played
to all age groups. But the one thing that has surprised me about my success
is that I've never really thought that I was that good. I suppose I must
have been doing something right otherwise I wouldn't have lasted. What was
good about it all was that it wasn't sudden. It took time."
La Rue was born Daniel Patrick Carroll in Cork, Ireland, the fifth of six
children. His father died when he was two and his mother brought the family
to London seven years later. He first donned a wig and eyelashes at a naval
concert party, later progressing to all-male touring revues. Spotted in the
mid-fifties by the producer Ted Gatty, he made his London debut in a tiny
drag revue at the Irving Theatre off Leicester Square.
"It was Ted who gave me the name La Rue," he says. "He said that when I was
all dressed up in drag I looked as long as a street. People used to laugh at
me in those days because I spent all my money on having things written for
me and clothes made."
>From the Irvings, La Rue moved to Churchill's Club and later Winstons, where
he appeared night after night, presenting a gallery of brassy ladies in
lacquered pagoda wigs and extravagant gowns.
By the mid-sixties he was a major name, a man who, with an exaggerated
flutter of the eyelashes and a modest foam rubber bosom, became the biggest
box office draw in London. Described as 'Max Miller in sequins', his risque
material would seem tame by today's standards but audiences loved him. He
walked the tightrope of glamour with the safety net of sending himself up
all the time.
BBC producer John Fisher suggested that if La Rue's pre-eminence in the
field of female impersonation proved anything, it was probably that the
general public is prepared to accept one and only one performer of this kind
at any given time.
Part of the attraction with La Rue's shows has always been the magnificent
costumes, many of them created by Mark Canter and costing thousands. La Rue
himself has always refused to be seen making up before a show and has often
refused to appear in costume for rehearsals.
"I've always been pretty cool about the costumes. If I liked wearing them
too much I wouldn't be good at it. No one has ever seen me making up and no
one can take pictures of me making up, because Dan walks into the dressing
room and various beautiful women walk out. Then I put them to bed and I walk
out. I think that's what keeps me sane. I've never taken a frock home. Not
once. When I did Through the Keyhole, some young TV girl asked me if I would
come to the door wearing a frock and I told her to fuck off.
"I think when I'm in a dressing room what happens is that I subconsciously
change when I'm making up. It sounds Freudian but unconsciously I become
someone else. I never take the wig off at the end of the pantomime either. I
hate that. We had to do that in the forces shows. I think it looks awful, a
man's face full of make-up and you're all sweaty anyway."
La Rue cannot quite explain why he has proved so popular. "Drag is a
peculiarly English tradition," he says. "It's very strange. When you go to
holiday camps or on the cruises, big butch fellas can't wait to get into a
frock for a fancy dress party or a competition. I played Wakefield once and
all these rugby players came into the club and wanted to wear drag. They
were all built like brick shithouses and I lent them some costumes and
they're saying thing's like: 'Oh, red isn't my colour &endash; I want blue.' But
there's no sleaze in it at all.
"The only thing I don't like is mime drag but that's probably because I
couldn't do it myself. When I'm on stage singing a song I can stop in the
middle and crack a gag. You can't do that with a mime act."
La Rue toured the world with his act in the seventies and starred in
record-breaking West End shows before eventually investing his earnings into
Walton Hall, a stately home in Warwickshire. It became a mecca for showbiz
friends, dubbed 'Danny's Castle' by Liberace but in 1983 he misguidedly sold
it to two Canadian businessmen, although he remained the business
figurehead. Later, La Rue was left with a string of bills he knew nothing
about.
"When I found out how much I had lost I was amazed," he says. "I didn't know
a fellow in a frock could make so much money."
Shattered, he plunged himself into work and he opened in the West End as
Dolly Levi in the musical Hello, Dolly! It was the first time the role had
been played by a man but it was not a success.
"I loved playing Dolly," he says. "She was an exciting woman and slightly
eccentric. I found there was a lot of my personality in the character. It
was a very demanding role and took me over completely. Unfortunately the
critics did not share my enthusiasm and it was mauled by the press.
"Critics are funny. They criticise you for doing the same thing all the
time, invite you to do something different and when you do it, tell you to
stick at what you were doing before."
For many years La Rue's career had been guided by his manager and long-time
partner Jack Hanson who, it was widely said, shielded the entertainer from
the outside world. Tragedy struck in 1985 when Hanson collapsed with a brain
haemorrhage and died at the age of 64.
"It was the lowest point of my life," says La Rue. "I was in a very bad way.
I got very, very drunk for about a year. I was appearing at the Prince
Edward Theatre in pantomime. I never drank during the show but afterwards I
got through a bottle of brandy every night on my own. People used to have to
walk me back to my flat I was in such a state. But one night I had a vision
of Jack and so I stopped. I had to."
Although regarded as a 'comic in a frock', La Rue has often voiced
aspirations to appear in the legit theatre. "Peter Nichols offered me the
role of Captain Terri Dennis in Privates on Parade but I couldn't do it
because I was booked up for two years ahead," he says. "I was suggested for
the part of Quentin Crisp in The Naked Civil Servant also. What I would love
to do is a revival of Charles Dyer's Staircase. The late Michael Elphick
wanted to do it with me. I think it's a play that would stand a revival. I
also think I would be wonderful as a zany old lady in a Harry Potter film.
And I would genuflect on my hands and knees if Lynda La Plante wrote a cameo
for me in a drama."
La Rue is currently starring in Cinderella at the Swan, High Wycombe. After
50 years on stage, does it still feel the same?
"Listen," he says, "when I go out on a stage I always pretend it's for the
very first time. Fifty years is a long time but I've had a blessed life.
I've made millions and I've lost millions. I've picked myself up and dusted
myself down. And I'm still here.".
END
Updated 28 December, 2002
© The Stage Newspaper Ltd
Top
[23] THAILAND--Scintillating smorgasbord
Top
Source Brenda Lana Smith R.af D.
Bangkok Post Wednesday 25 December 2002 - Sci...
http://www.bangkokpost.com/en/Outlook/25Dec2002_out89.html
OUTLOOK - Wednesday 25 December 2002
Scintillating smorgasbord
Despite all the odds, the local entertainment scene fared well in the Year
of the Horse. A host of new movies, stage dramas, TV shows, concerts by
local and visiting musicians and international festivals kept culture
vultures busy. `Outlook' takes an A to Z look at noteworthy events and
emerging trends in popular culture and the arts over the past 12 months
A &emdash;
(SNIP)
Q &emdash; Q U E E R
It looks like 2003 will be a queer year in the celluloid world. The
phenomenal success of transvestite-themed Satree Lek seems to have
encouraged local film-makers to be more daring in their portrayal of TV/TS
and gay people. Previously, dainty stereotypes were inserted into plots
merely for laughs but this year cinema-goers got to see more realistic
characters treated in a more understanding fashion.
Released in November was Prang Chompoo (Saving Private Tootsie), a
well-received film which avoided typecasting its transgendered characters.
And due for release next year are no less than three local productions with
gay/TV/TS content: Poj Arnon's Wai Boom Cheer Krahuem Lok, Yongyoot
Thongkongtoon's Satree Lek 2 (Iron Ladies 2), and GMM Grammy Film's
long-awaited Beautiful Boxer.
Gays also thrived on both home-grown and cable TV programmes. Amidst the
usual homosexual stereotypes in various local soap operas and comedies,
Jaosao Song Ngao (Bride with Two Shadows) and Tud Tu gave us realistic
portrayals of TV/TS characters in lead roles.
On cable TV, Emmy Award-winning sitcom Will And Grace, now into its fifth
season in the US, debuted on UBC in November. But the real talk-of-the-town
was definitely Six Feet Under, a thoughtful drama series featuring a gay man
in one of the leading roles, which wound up earlier this month. And many
viewers are hoping that UBC will include Queer As Folk in its 2003 schedule.
The visibility of gays and transgendered people was also boosted by the
colourful 4th Bangkok Gay Parade held in November and, ironically, by a ban
on TV/TS students wearing female uniforms at state-run universities.
(SNIP)
Z &emdash; Z YA THIS TIME NEXT YEAR !
© Copyright The Post Publishing Public Co., Ltd. 2002
Top
COMMENTARY
Life After SONDA
Richard Goldstein
Top
From: tgnews_moderator <tgnews_moderator@yahoo.com>
Source: The Village Voice
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0252/goldstein.php
Date: December 25 - 31, 2002
Item: Commentary
[photo credit: Jay Muhlin]
[caption: Tom Duane, hero or demagogue? It Depends on where you stand
within the queer movement.] here was no photo op when George Pataki
signed the state gay rights bill in the privacy of his office last week.
It struck some activists as telling that the governor kept his promise
to the gay community with such a lack of ceremony. But no one was in a
mood to quibble. After a 31-year struggle, SONDA, the Sexual Orientation
Non-Discrimination Act, was finally law.
If you are a homo from Herkimer, a county nestled in the Adirondacks,
SONDA should make a real difference. Before the bill passed, only 20
jurisdictions in the state offered legal protections to lesbians and gay
men, and Herkimer County was not among them. But in New York City, which
has had a gay rights law since 1986, SONDA's greatest impact is likely
to be on politics. The bill's passage, against the wishes of the
powerful Conservative Party, affirms that the queer movement has become
a force. Now the struggle is over who gets to speak for it, who
determines the issues that get raised, and who decides how public money
entering the community will be spent.
Before SONDA, the major gay players in Albany were two progressive
Democrats, Senator Tom Duane and Assembly Member Deborah Glick. Now
there is a new power base. The Empire State Pride Agenda's crucial role
in lobbying for SONDA and getting it passed has made ESPA the state's
most influential gay group. But in order to get its work on this and
other legislation done, ESPA has bypassed Duane and Glick, turned its
back on faithful allies, and made deals with newly simpatico
Republicans. ESPA's authority is changing the rules of state gay
politics. Elected officials have essentially run the show. Now power is
shifting from party-affiliated pols to an independent lobby.
But the conflict that surrounded SONDA is more than just a pissing
contest. It is also a struggle between haves and have-nots, between
warring definitions of what it means to be queer, and between very
different styles of activism. Under its baffling surface, the battle of
SONDA was a clash over the future of liberation politics.
The hostilities began in 1997, when ESPA concluded that Duane, then a
councilmember, would be unable to move the city domestic-partner
benefits act. Speaker Peter Vallone was antsy about it, and Duane was
hardly the person to ease his mind. So ESPA approached Rudy Giuliani. By
agreeing to sponsor the legislation, he gave Vallone political cover,
and the bill was eventually passed. In exchange, ESPA stayed neutral in
the '97 mayoral race, abandoning Democratic challenger Ruth Messinger, a
pioneering advocate of gay rights. Duane, like other progressives, was
enraged, but he was even angrier about being cut out of negotiations
over his own bill. Fast forward to 2002. ESPA endorses George Pataki,
and, mirabile dictu, Joe Bruno, the senate Republican leader, agrees to
let SONDA come to the floor, ending a decade-old logjam. Once again,
Duane is sideswiped. Once again, ESPA concludes that he is unable to
maneuver beyond the Democratic leadership, as passing SONDA will
require. As one insider notes, "Tom had nothing to offer Pataki or
Bruno"--but ESPA and its 25,000 members did.
Duane's response was to distinguish himself from ESPA by introducing an
amendment on transgender rights when SONDA reached the senate floor last
week. But his timing was odd, since the bill as devised by the more
liberal assembly made no mention of the T-word. Why wasn't this issue
dealt with at the get-go? Sources say Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver was
worried about his "marginals," as Democrats call their members from
swing districts. And ESPA was no friendlier to the idea of including
transpeople in SONDA. They feared it would kill the bill, but there may
have been more to their position than that. Melissa Sklarz, the state's
first transperson to hold office (she is a judicial delegate), recalls
being told by ESPA in 2000 that it was "a lesbian and gay organization"
and not a lobby for people like her.
Still, a school anti-bullying bill passed by the assembly did mention
the T-word--so why not SONDA? Sklarz says Deborah Glick, who shepherded
SONDA in the assembly, was unwilling to push her colleagues; Glick says
Sklarz is naive about the difference between creating a new bill and
amending an old one. Like ESPA, Glick had reason to believe that Bruno
might use any change in language to delay or defeat SONDA. "We didn't
want to give the senate an easy out," she explains.
Orphaned as they were, trans activists managed to win a victory of
sorts, thanks to Duane's amendment. It failed, but 19 out of 25 senate
Democrats voted for it, putting the T-word on the state political map.
And that's not all Duane unleashed. Rising on the senate floor, he took
a final swing at ESPA, decrying the "vicious and mean-spirited campaign"
against him, including "threats to withhold money." Sources say Duane
received calls from key contributors after word spread that he might
withhold his support for SONDA without the amendment. Duane insists he
had made it clear to ESPA that there was no danger of that. But by
failing to state his position publicly, Duane gave his enemies an
opening to attack him in full view of the eager media.
But then, hadn't Duane--and other gay Democrats who know
reporters--attacked ESPA for its elitism? And hadn't the assembly cut a
chunk of change from certain gay programs that had been funded (but not
permanently) by the governor? ESPA had promoted these non-HIV programs,
and now it felt smacked by the Democrats for cozying up to Pataki. The
battle was on.
Instead of buddy hugs after SONDA passed, David Paterson, the newly
elected leader of senate Democrats--and an eloquent advocate for gay
rights--got a harangue from Jeff Soref, a major gay fundraiser and
former ESPA board member. "I told [Paterson] he had lost control," says
Soref. "He sat idly by while Tom bellowed." Soref was already pissed at
Paterson for backing the amendment, and as for Duane, among the milder
epithets Soref uses to describe him are "bully" and "demagogue." Their
animosity is likely to play out in more than verbal ways. It is widely
believed that Duane would like to run for Manhattan borough president
when Virginia Fields's term expires in 2005. He will need all the help
he can get in a crowded field likely to include a lesbian candidate,
Councilmember Margarita Lopez. Duane could garner key party support by
justifying the Democrats' attack on ESPA. But when it comes to
attracting money, Soref is a serious liability, since he wields great
influence among the handful of wealthy homosexuals who give generously
to gay political campaigns.
Duane looks back on SONDA's passage with a certain irony. "The
Christians were praying for my soul," he quips, "but my allies were
telling me to go to hell."
The greatest irony is that all of these combatants are Democrats. In
fact, Soref is a member of the Democratic National Committee, reportedly
in line to become its treasurer. But sources say that after ESPA
endorsed Pataki, Soref received angry phone calls from leaders of the
national party. "I can't say people are pleased with me," he says, "but
I would support anyone who backs this agenda." So, apparently, would
ESPA's board, though it is composed entirely of Democrats, according to
executive director Matt Foreman. He, too, calls himself "a die-hard
Democrat," but adds, "I'm no longer going to stand on statements that
sound good and get us nowhere. We want deliverables."
In keeping with this show-me attitude, ESPA paid former state Republican
Party head Bill Powers more than $100,000 to push SONDA, despite the
many times Powers courted Conservative Party support for GOP candidates
by citing their opposition to gay rights. Retaining Powers shows that,
like him, ESPA prizes efficacy over ideology. More than any other
pressure group in New York's gay movement, this one knows how to play
the game. That leaves Duane and Glick at a disadvantage, since they are
loyal members of a party that controls neither the governor's office nor
the senate. The relative powerlessness of the Democrats makes it
inevitable that a gay lobby interested in "deliverables" will build
bridges to the dominant Republicans. That's what key unions did in the
last election, and the Democrats suffered their defection without
attacking them. But, as Foreman points out, "They're happy to point to
the key gay group and say, 'Oh, we're offended!' Cut me a break."
Flush with victory, ESPA has its guns set on winning "full equality
under the law within 10 years." The group's agenda includes reforming
the state's human rights code (by changing the word sex to gender) and
shortening the time it takes to adjudicate a case (more than 400 days on
average). Even same-sex marriage is not beyond Foreman's imagining, "but
we need to do this the professional way, and that involves focus groups,
polling, and testing messages with targeted subgroups of the gettable
middle." This is not Duane's idea of an effective strategy. As a product
of the gay liberation movement, his approach is to form alliances with
other minorities and move from a fired-up activist base. Transpeople are
a natural constituency for him. But most of ESPA's members are what cops
call "citizens": people of some means. They are unlikely to bear the
brunt of budget cuts, so they have little to lose from making alliances
with Pataki--and little to gain from pushing the trans agenda. For
Duane's people, it's the reverse.
The battle of SONDA raises a larger question for the queer movement. "We
still have not resolved the debate that's raged for 30 years about who
is part of our community and who gets shut out," says Charles King,
co-president of Housing Works, which advocates for people with AIDS. As
long as all homos were members of an out-group, this class conflict was
kept relatively in check. But as the movement succeeds, the division
between gay haves and queer have-nots is exploding on many fronts. The
contours of this schism were visible in the two queer groups that took
separate buses up to Albany last week: one, supporting SONDA, was mostly
well dressed and white, while the other, backing Duane's amendment, was
decked out and diverse.
Every group that enters the corridors of power goes through a clash
between those who are poised to benefit from the system and those who
are not. Success breeds struggle, and in that sense SONDA's passage
marked the moment when gay politics became typical. The left-outs have
yet to find a leader, but they will. A queer Al Sharpton is slouching
toward Stonewall to be born--and s/he will probably be a trannie.
Top
One of my favorite stories is that of the old Chinese farmer in ancient China whoses prize horse got out of the corral and ran away. All the nieghbors say, "Oh, that is just awful." And the old farmer replies, "Maybe it's awful, maybe it's good." A few days later his horse returns with a herd of wild horses so he now has more horses than even the wealthiest of his nieghbors, and everyone says, "This is wonderful, you are so lucky!" He replies, "Maybe." A few days later his number one son is thrown from one of the horses he is trying to tame and breaks his leg. The nieghbors say, "Number one son breaking a leg is a very bad omen!" the old farmer replies, "Maybe." The following day the army comes into the valley and takes every young man in the valley as soldiers for the war, except for the farmers son with the broken leg. The moral of the story of course, is that things aren't always what they seem, and I'd guess that everyone has had things happen in their lives that seemed good, but turned out not so good, and bad things that turned into good things.
With that in mind, I want say a few things about SONDA (New York's Sexual Orientation Non Discrimination Act). I'm a transsexual and gender advocate that found myself arguing against gender inclusion with gay men arguing that if it didn't include gender protections that it wasn't worth passing at all. I never imagined such an argument could even occur, so I feel a brief explanation is needed. I kept calling SONDA the "Thirty Years War." New York was the first state to introduce a bill protecting sexuality (1971, I think) when GLBTs (gays, lesbians, bisexuals,transgendered) were just a bunch of queers that were beginning to become organized into action groups, and when sexuality hadn't really been a topic very long in our society. So I just wanted to see it finally pass for gays and lesbians because I feel any group that makes gains toward equality lifts the overall level of humanity in a culture. While most of the talk is about how this has divided the gender queers and the sexual queers and caused a lot of bad feelings, I sense more important things have happened, and are happening as a result of the dispute.
What I see for gender advocates is the topic of gender getting more public exposure than perhaps ever before. Tom Duane introduced an amendment to the Republican sponsored bill to include "gender expression." which was defeated, 19-40. I think we all have a new hero in Tom Duane, New York's only openly gay Senator that fought for gender inclusion in the bill so adamantly, that it was feared he would prevent passage of the bill at all, and at a time when we all have real national concerns about some Republicans seeking to take away all our gains, or at least delay further progress. (The shift in power between the two parties isn't really very off balance or unusual, and is likely to shift back; but that is another topic.)
I think what Tom Duane did is a refreshing demonstration of heroic statesmanship and democracy in action by forcing debate, stirring things up, taking the heat, and seeing the bill through afterall. Without the conflict, it would have passed rather quietly, which is not to understate SONDAs significance in affording many more gays and lesbians rights, or demonstrating that gays can work with Republicans, and it is a real victory and cause for pride and celebration for gays and lesbians. I used the word quietly, because it's easy to forget that most people probably don't give much thought or concern about anything GLBT, except for GLBTs and our supporters, and those active haters disquising hatred as if hatred is somehow divine morality, and their supporters. But the SONDA debate was a loud one that took the discussion of sexuality and gender beyond the usual places and into the mainstream media, so the argument really is advancing both gender and sexual causes. What started as a family feud became one that anyone could join in, and people that don't read news from The Blade or the National Transgender Advocacy Coalition, were reading about our issues in the major papers like The New York Times Perhaps our family fight that saw gender advocates protesting next to the haters, and gays calling gays names, widely distributed showing of hard feelings, gave the public a picture of just how human and individual we GLBTs are. And while I define the purpose of argument is to be in love again in my personal relationships, perhaps GLBTs will reconcile and be at least a little bit more in love again like many families are after an argument. And perhaps our little fight educated and enlightened some people just a little that otherwise wouldn't have given us any thought. Maybe.
Date: Sun, 29 Dec 2002 17:44:18 -0600 From: Alyssa Jacqueline Wright <alyssajacqueline@subdimension.com> Charlotte Allen gets really confused when she goes to a symposium on the legal requirements of the transgender community. Source: Independent Women's Forum - Women's Quarterly http://www.iwf.org/pubs/twq/Summer2002c.shtml Date: Summer, 2002 Georgetown University‚s law school decided to devote its annual symposium on gender and sexuality this year to the legal problems of transsexuals. No, wait, the word "transsexual "is out of fashion these days with the political correctness police. Make that the legal problems of "transgender people. " And yes, it was that Georgetown University, the Catholic school in Washington, D.C., the one with the brouhaha a couple of years ago over whether crucifixes on the wall are oppressive. Georgetown‚s law school sponsors the Georgetown Journal of Gender and the Law, which in turn sponsors the symposia. This year‚s was titled "Crossing Boundaries, Redefining Gender: A New Front on Equality. "Oh well, I thought as I settled into a seat in Georgetown‚s moot courtroom to listen to the keynote speech, at least I‚ll see some glam drag queens. You know, Holly Woodlawn types: stiletto heels, mascara to die for. Instead, I got Phyllis Frye. Phyllis Frye had once been a male civil engineer in Houston, Texas, but now she is a female lawyer in a power suit and no-nonsense gray hair, except with a flat chest, a beer belly, and keg-shaped calves stuck into sensible lace-up brogues. This was low-church transgender, where you don‚t bother with the fancy ‚dos and the silicone. Call it the Mrs. Doubtfire look.