When it comes to gay owned and/or operated brick and mortar businesses discriminating against transgender people, one just has to look at gay bars as having examples of the worst offenders.

Take Colorado’s Denver Wrangler. They are so brazen in their discrimination against transgender people that they’ve posted their discriminatory policy on their website:

- Gender matching I.D. required.
- I.D. must be state issued photo identification or driver license, military I.D., US passport or visa.
- I.D. must be current (not expired).

Which class of people do you imagine has identification cards where the sex marker doesn’t match the gender presentation? If you guessed transgender people — the same transgender people who are protected against public accommodation discrimination in Colorado’s new public accommodation anti-discrimination law — you guessed correctly.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that if the Wrangler’s policies were challenged by a complaint to the Denver Anti-Discrimination Office by even one potential transgender patron, the city’s ARTICLE IV (that covers public accommodation) indicates the bar is blatantly violating the law with an unlawful policy — I’m sure one potential transgender patron’s complaint would result in the city suing Wrangler’s. (And geez, that’s not even basing a complaint on the new state public accommodation law, of which Wrangler’s is also in violation of!)

Although…I guess I could ask my rocket scientist friend Zoe Brain to get a her opinion on whether or not unlawful discrimination is occurring. I’m not sure a rocket scientist’s opinion would add anything to the discussion, but I guess it couldn’t hurt to know what a rocket scientist thinks about this.

Wrapping this diary up, let me point out that Pam’s House Blend is going to Denver in late August for the Democratic National Convention. Whatever shall I do should the bar’s discriminatory policy be still in place when PHB makes the trip to the Mile High City? I’m sure my rocket scientist friend could provide y’all with some good guesses about some lawful behaviors I may engage in at the Denver Wrangler’s location.

~~~~~
Related:
* Q Of The Day: When Is It Okay For Gay Owned Businesses To Discriminate Against Transgender People?
* Pam’s House Blend tag for employment - housing - public accommodation
* I’m Going To Colorado In August With PHB; I’m Going To Make Use Of Public Accommodations
* If Dr. Dobson Were King, We’d All Be Wearing Depends
* When It Comes To Transgender People & Civil Rights, It Really Is Always About The Bathroom

Well, I’ve never seen this before. A group of trans-identified folk fundraising for a major party presidential candidate perceived to be a transgender friendly candidate.

Well, I wasn’t planning on giving to any presidential campaign this year, but I donated in response to this letter. It’s knowing that the few dollars I donated are going to be bundled with other transgender people’s donations, and identified as coming from a group of folk who identify as I do.

Frankly, it’s becoming more and more important to me that transgender people are politically visible. For the future, transgender people’s civil rights and protections will likely depend a great deal on how well we present ourselves as human beings — and as valuable constituents — to our lawmakers.

I intend to continue to stay pretty damn visible. My peers apparently feel pretty similarly.

One of the things I noticed about the An Examination of Discrimination Against Transgender Americans in the Workplace hearing is that minus the Alliance Defense Fund, there weren’t any conservative Christian organizations speaking at the hearing; minus the Traditional Values Coalition any conservative Christian organizations leaving press materials at the hearing; and minus the ranking minority member of the subcommittee (Rep. John Kline, R-MN) there were no Republicans there to ask questions of the witnesses at the hearing.

So what’s happening now there’s a conservative Christian community characterization of the hearing as if there was serious wave of opposition speaking to trans employment issues — but they didn’t actually have much presense there opposing any future gender idenity and expression inclusive legislation in person.

Some examples of online, conservative Christian commentary:

- PFOX: Congressional Hearing To Push Gender Confusion Upon All Americans

Democrat leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives have scheduled a hearing this Thursday on discrimination against “transgendered” individuals in the workplace.

“Homosexuals and their transgender activist allies hope to use this hearing as a way of forcing the imposition of gender confusion upon all Americans,” said Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays & Gays (PFOX) Executive Director Regina Griggs today. “Instead of treating transsexualism and cross-dressing behaviors as Gender Identity Disorders (GID) as defined by the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Democrats seem determined to make these behaviors into federally-protected minorities.”

“Why should Congress force Americans to provide workplace accommodations for people who are confused about whether they’re male or female? How can Congress force us to make believe that a man is really a woman or a woman is really a man?”

“If Democrats were truly concerned about these gender confused individuals, they’d push for expanded mental health services for GID. A person can’t change his or her sex – and many of these individuals think they’re a woman one day and a man the next day. Why is Congress catering to such insanity?”

[OneNewsNow/American Family Association, Peter LaBarbera, Focus On The Family/CitizenLink, Concerned Women For America, and Traditional Values Coalition commentaries below the fold.]
Read the rest of this entry »

1:45 PM EDT

The last few minutes were highlighted for me by Sabrina Tarabolleti’s disclosure that she’s been fired (again) from a job patching potholes by the Florida Dept. of Transportation … and by Rep. Andrews’ closing remarks about “progress is glacial … and it can be even slower than that … ” and his comments about the need to help the forgotten or neglected, who have few votes and little money or power.

We’ll be posting as much news and commentary as we can at Transgender News on the hearing today.

* Sigh * — From OneNewsNow/’s Moral debate now a public safety issue:

Citizens in Gainesville, Florida, are trying to repeal an ordinance that lets anyone reject their biological sex simply by stating that they “feel like” a member of the opposite sex. At least one citizen argues that introduces some serious safety concerns for the public.

…In fact, Davis’ group has been collecting reports of such incidents, including one in which an elderly woman using a wheelchair complained when an adult male followed her into the women’s restroom at a local grocery store.

“And the manager said, ‘He can legally do it,’” Davis relates. “The manager didn’t even ask this person if he had a sexual or gender identity issue. So just by having this law, men are walking in — and managers, because of the liability associated with questioning people who are protected by the law, they don’t even ask questions.”

The difficulty with the public safety aspect of this argument is that there have been no news stories — no documentation to support the premise — that predators have ever tried to use a public accommodation law in an attempt to cover sexually predatory behavior in a women’s restroom — despite this undocumented, factually bare anecdote given in this article.

What we’re really discussing here is a fear of predatory behavior by cross-dressed males in public restrooms vice actual, documented examples of predatory males actually engaging in any otherwise unlawful behavior in public restrooms — while at the same time being cross-dressed when they attempt to use public accommodation laws as cover for their predatory behavior.

Let’s be frank, here. If there had ever been any documented examples of cross-dressed individuals attempting to use public accommodation laws in an attempt to cover unlawful predatory behavior, I’m absolutely sure we’d have heard about it — it would be a very, very newsworthy story.

The burden of proof that this happens at all — that crossdressing males going into women’s restrooms constitute a real, documentable public safety issue in municipalities, counties, or states that have passed public accommodation laws, and that these allegedly existing predators used public accommodation laws as legal cover for their allegedly predatory behavior — should be on the conservative Christians who claim it as fact, vice falling on us transgender people and allies to prove the negative; vice falling on transgender people to prove that this scenario has never been adequately documented.

Names, dates and times, incident reports and police reports — If conservative Christians want to claim gender identity and expression specific public accommodation laws facilitate predatory behavior and constitute a real, public safety issue, they need to show us palpable evidence that indicates this really is a public safety issue. Otherwise, it’s just transgender bashing based completely on hearsay and/or fear.

~~~~~
Related:
* White Male Privilege & Women’s Fear Of Crime Intersecting With Gender Expression & Public Restrooms
* When It Comes To Transgender People & Civil Rights, It Really Is Always About The Bathroom
* The Predator Argument Doesn’t Work With Transgender Fifth Graders
* Kevin Moore’s Take On Colorado’s “Bathroom Police”
* I’m Going To Colorado In August With PHB; I’m Going To Make Use Of Public Accommodations
* If Dr. Dobson Were King, We’d All Be Wearing Depends
* The Non-Trans Woman Thrown Out Of A NY Women’s Restroom Sues
* Outing #2: When You Endanger A Child For The Sensationalism Of It
* Latest Attacks Of Teh HomoSEXual Agenda’s Transgenderededs’s Bullet Points

Egads.

My flight today to cover the U.S. House Education and Labor Subcommittee on Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions scheduled hearing on discrimination against transgender employees in the workplace was a no-go. And wow, what a craptacular story goes with that failure to take flight!

To begin with, I had two different itineraries from Travelocity for this trip. The first one had me leaving today — but apparently Travelocity changed my travel day, and sent a second itinerary I thought was a duplicate of the first one. So basically, I was actually scheduled to travel on the 25th (tomorrow) per the second itinerary, vice today as I thought.

Good thing too, as I lost my wallet this morning!

Here’s this story — I went to my local 7/11’s ATM this morning at a quarter of four to get some cash (again, thought I was flying today) for tips and such. Following that stop I drove directly to a long term airport parking lot in plenty of time to make it for the 6:30 AM flight. I got in the shuttle bus with my two pieces of luggage, and off the driver and I went to the appropriate terminal.

When I was checking my handbag for a tip for the shuttle driver, I found I had no wallet in my handbag — my wallet wasn’t on the floor of the shuttle either. We drove back to the lot: My wallet wasn’t in my car, and it wasn’t under my car. I started freaking out.

I took my luggage out of the shuttle, loaded the pieces back in my car, and then drove back to the 7/11. There I found out my wallet wasn’t at the 7/11 where the ATM was located either. Now I was really freaking out, and actually tearing.

At 7:00 AM, the manager was going to be in, and then could check the surveillance tapes to see if anyone grabbed my wallet — assuming I left it accidentally by the ATM. I left the clerk my cell phone number to call me with what they discovered when they reviewed the surveillance tapes.

So, I drove the block-and-a-half back to my apartment and called up Travelocity to explain my travel problem. After talking to them on the phone for a half-an-hour, I found out about that second itinerary — at least no $150.00 fee for changing my flight for a later flight.

I started destressing. I called up all of my credit card and banking card holders, and cancelled all my plastic. Then I crashed on my living room couch for three hours.

I checked my cell phone messages when I woke up. After a surveillance tape at the 7/11 clearly showed that I’d placed my wallet into my handbag after getting the cash, I got confused. So, I drove back to the parking lot, — my wallet wasn’t under the car in the space I’d parked in this morning, but it was well under the car that was parked next to where I’d parked in the long term lot that morning — it was far enough under that other car that I had to lay on the ground to reach my wallet.

* Whew. * The morning sucked sucktasticly, but it could have been much, much worse. The only lasting frustration is I’m traveling now without plastic. However, my credit union has branches in DC if I turn out not to have traveled with enough cash on hand — but it means I have to go to a branch in person during bank hours if I need to withdraw cash.

But hey! Tomorrow, my friends, is a brand new day! Tomorrow, I fly!

~~~~~
Related:
* Permanent Guest Barista Autumn On The Road This Week

The U.S. House Education and Labor Subcommittee on Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions has scheduled a hearing for June 26th on discrimination against transgender employees in the workplace. Early tomorrow, I’m taking flight to DC to cover the hearing for Pam’s House Blend.

My roundtrip airline ticket has been arranged by the Transgender American Veterans Association (TAVA), and my housing has been arranged by the National Center For Transgender Equality (NCTE). Besides TAVA and NCTE, the Transgender Law Center (TLC) and some individuals within the transgender community also offered to contribute to financing this trip — I directed TLC and these individuals to coordinate donations for the trip with NCTE, as originally they were going to be the single organization to cover my trip related expenses.

My personal agenda issue of civil rights and protections for transgender people –as well as others for whom society deems as not conforming to societal gender norms — is shared by TAVA, NCTE, and TLC, as well as many, many individuals within the broader LGBT community, and of course within the more narrowly defined transgender community. Frankly, I’m very concerned about what the future will look like for transyouth, as well as for transgender adults who haven’t yet come out of the closet — these hearings really do need to be covered by someone from the transgender community that has a personal perspective — a personal stake — regarding transgender legislative issues. Apparently, TAVA, NCTE, and TLC, as well as a number of individual, trans identified folk feel strongly enough about this that they’re sponsoring my trip to DC.

I’m going to be sticking to the GLAAD, NLGJA, and Associated Press guidelines for covering transgender people — as well as for transgender terminology — as much as possible. I stick to these guidelines most of the time, actually, but am pointing this out for the blog readership who want to know whether I’m referring to a person’s natal sex or to a person’s target sex when I use terms like transwoman or transman (always by target sex of the individual referenced, by the way), and for those who think I’m blurring gender lines in inappropriate or unacceptable ways in the choice of terms I use to refer to people of trans experience.

Anywho, I expect I’ll have a lot to write about from DC. I’m hoping to get in some interviews with DC based activists and “non-profiteers” this week too — my guess is that it’ll take me a few weeks to post all of the stories I gather during this trip.

Transgender people were thrown out of the Gay Liberation Movement in part because newly out transwomen aren’t photogenic — transwomen are often perceived to photograph as “freaks” — Is the desire to appear mainstream becoming more key in the LGBT push for marriage equality than it already has been? Could the “mainstreaming” approach to LGBT issues again negatively impact basic civil rights and protections for transgender people?

When I look at myself in the mirror, I see that my only two piercings are centered in my two earlobes; my hair is dyed a dirty blond (close to my old, natural color) to cover my gray; I get manicures and pedicures that are finished with “work-friendly” nail polish shades; my clothing is usually age appropriate; and my written opinions at Pam’s House Blend are usually made with a soft touch…with my opinions being pretty much within the norms of progressive politics. My therapist reminded me last week, as she has frequently, that I appear to be pretty mainstream.

What isn’t mainstream about me? Maybe the one, large tattoo on my back isn’t that mainstream, but frankly tattoos have pretty much entered mainstream society. The only other thing is I’m a very out transsexual — who very much for political reasons identifies as transgender. But even with that, I’m not an angry transwoman who often whines about my fate, or frequently and militantly rails against perceived societal injustices towards transgender people. Apparently, I’m about as close to mainstream in appearance and attitude as an out transwoman can be — so I imagine it’s safe to identify me as mainstream transgender.

So if I’m so mainstream, why am so I chafing at the Los Angeles Times‘ story Gay couples are emphasizing low-key weddings? I’m concerned about the “unsolicited advice” to same sex couples is don’t be flamboyant even if you are flamboyant (emphasis added):

The gay and lesbian couples who packed a Hollywood auditorium last week had come seeking information about California’s new marriage policies. But they also got some unsolicited advice.

Be aware.

Images from gay weddings, said Lorri L. Jean, chief executive of the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center, could be used by opponents in a campaign designed to persuade California voters that gays and lesbians should not have the right to marry. Those getting married, she cautioned, should never lose sight of what they might be supplying to the other side.

Sitting close to his husband-to-be in the audience, hairstylist Kendall Hamilton nodded and said he knew just what she meant. No “guys showing up in gowns,” he said.

“It’s a weird subject,” added Hamilton, 39, who plans to wed his partner of five years, Ray Paolantonio. “We want everybody to be free, but the image does matter. . . . They are going to try to make us look like freaks.”

[After the fold, transgender inclusion in LGBT civil rights legislation tied to how transgender women are often less than photogenic.]

Read the rest of this entry »

I received an email from Equality California’s Geoff Kors yesterday, identifying a major contribution to the opposition protect marriage campaign. From the Equality California email on the major donation (Equality California being one of Equality For All’s coalition organizations):

“I … discovered the unhappy news that Focus on the Family just donated $250,000 to ban marriage for same-sex couples in California. After this morning’s celebration of love and commitment, this only makes me more determined to ensure that all couples continue have the opportunity to celebrate their marriages.”

If we want marriage equality in California to last past this November, we’re going to have to, as a broad community, work for it — and we’re going to have to donate for it. Are opponents are going to be very well funded.

Select the Equality For All logo below if you wish to donate to California’s marriage equality continuing past this November election.

~~~~~
Further reading:
* Los Angeles Times: Gay marriages begin with a day of hope and hoopla; Although protests are low-key, a constitutional battle is gathering behind the scenes

My transactivist friends and I have had some discussion about drag shows over the years, and a significant portion of these transgender folk consider drag shows as a kind of blackface. The reasoning behind that is that there is presumed to be a cissexual privilege*, and that people who have cissexual privilege aren’t fully aware of how cissexual people are often engaged in oppressing transsexual and intersexual people, much as those who experience white privilege aren’t fully aware of how white people in western society are often engaged in oppressing ethnic minorities.

I don’t personally buy into the idea that all drag shows are exercises in cissexual privilege. This is because I’m very aware that although sexual orientation and gender identity and expression are separate structural concepts, there is certain amount of spill over between the two concepts related to gender norms. There are gender norms that gay, lesbian, and bisexual people don’t conform to regarding sexual partners; there are gender norms that feminine/effeminate gay men, masculine/emasculate lesbian women, crossdressing men, genderqueer people, and transsexual people don’t conform to regarding movement, speech, and other behaviors.

And, on top of that is layered a belief among many transgender people and allies that gender is a continuum: male and female are on the end points of a spectrum of gender which includes people who understand themselves to be neither male or female, both male and female, or somewhere between male and female, as well as those who understand themselves to be male but were born female-bodied, those who understand themselves to be female but were born male bodied, and those who consider themselves to be male or female but were born with ambiguous genitalia, or were born with sex chromosomes or sex related genetics that don’t conform to the standard XX or XY dichotomy of sexes. Drag queens and drag kings often express on a personal level how LGBTQQIA (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex, ally) folk are all, to some extent, gender outlaws.

Again, I personally just don’t buy into the idea that within the LGBT community, drag performances are exercises in cissexual privilege — or excercises in a kind of transgender blackface — instead I believe our community’s diversity is often beautifully expressed in drag shows. I strongly believe in the embracing and owning of community expressions of gender variance.

So when would, in my opinion, a drag show become like a blackface show?

Well, I don’t know in every case; I can’t tell you exactly all of the elements of when drag performance crosses the line to become an exercise in cissexual privilege. I can; however, give you an example from this past week of a drag show which, in my opinion, was such an exercise.

On June 12, 2008 there was a drag show/benefit for seniors organized by Westchester County legislator Bernice Spreckman. It took place at the Polish Center in Yonkers. There, county legislators Ken Jenkins (in a bra, tutu and something looking like butterfly wings), Vito Pinto (in a blonde wig black bra with white fur, furry miniskirt), and Jose Alvarado (in a bra and a Roman Helmet) appeared to the laughter of an audience of seniors. Per the Lower Hudson Journal News:

Already under siege by gadflys who would abolish their jobs and a district attorney investigating alleged misspending among their staff, Westchester County legislators found another constituency to provoke yesterday: transgenders, who rallied outside county offices today to protest a drag show starring three male legislators the day before.

Dressed in boas, skirts, lace, falsies and twinkling lights, the legislators staged “You Gotta Have a Gimmick” from the Broadway legend “Gypsy” as part of a musical review before about 400 senior citizens at the Polish Community Center in Yonkers.

…Jenkins added that the performance was honest to “Gypsy” as it was written, which he said - incorrectly - featured “cross-dressing men” as female strippers in “You Gotta Have a Gimmick.”

The number traditionally includes only women.

In a quote from a New York Transgender Rights Organization [NYTRO] press release, spokesperson Joann Prinzivalli stated:

“The Westchester County legislature has failed for nearly eight years to amend the county human rights law to explicitly protect transgender people … It is shocking to see county legislators who have dragged their feet on this vital issue doing the equivalent of a KKK blackface show to mock my people.”

[Below the fold, some comparisons between how African-Americans were portrayed in relevant news media and popular entertainment in the Jim Crow south and transgender people are portrayed by conservative Christian news media — as well as in this recent drag show.]

Read the rest of this entry »

In a 5-4 decision today, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that Guantanamo Bay detainees have the right to habeas corpus challenges of their detention. The New York Times reported:

The ruling on Thursday focused in large part on the centuries old writ of habeas corpus (“you have the body,” in Latin), a means by which prisoners can challenge their incarceration. Noting that the Constitution provides for suspension of the writ only in times of rebellion or invasion, Justice Kennedy called it “an indispensable mechanism for monitoring the separation of powers.”

In the years-long debate over the treatment of detainees, some critics of administration policy have asserted that those held at Guantánamo have fewer rights than people accused of crimes under American civilian and military law and that they are trapped in a sort of legal limbo.

Justice Kennedy wrote that the cases involving the detainees “lack any precise historical parallel. They involve individuals detained by executive order for the duration of a conflict that, if measure from September 11, 2001, to the present, is already among the longest wars in American history.”

The Los Angeles Times reports in their article Supreme Court again says Guantanamo prisoners should have rights:

About 270 prisoners are now being held at Guantanamo. A small number of them, perhaps as many as 40, are likely to face trial. But today’s decision concerned only detention, not the rules for trial.

With a 5-4 decision, one gets dissenting opinions. Again from the Los Angeles Times:

Read the rest of this entry »

I feel like I’ve been talking about public restrooms way too much of late. Blame the news cycles; blame conservative Christians — LGBT civil rights and public accommodation issues seem to be boiling down to which public restrooms transpeople are going to be using. It’s of special concern, it seems, which public restrooms transwomen are going to use.

It’s the perpetrator thing. Frankly, many women look at men who are strangers to them as potential predators, and these same women (along with their male protectors) perceive visibly transgender women who use women’s public restrooms as potential male rapists. And if these same women (and their male protectors) have female children, they perceive visibly transgender women who use women’s public restrooms as potential pedophiles. There’s hasn’t been any studies that have substantiated or unsubstantiated this fear of crossdressed males abusing women and children in women’s public restrooms, but this fear of crossdressed, male, public restroom perpetrators is being used in an attempt to shape public policy on LGBT civil rights and public accommodation legislation — most recently in Montgomery County, Maryland and Colorado.

But, the predator argument doesn’t work very when we’re talking about male-to-female transgender fifth graders. A ten or eleven year old who knows her gender identity doesn’t match her* natal sex isn’t going through the process of a social transition for sexual reasons. And, whether or not adults accept the idea that a fifth grader is self aware enough to understand when her gender identity and natal sex may not match, most are aware that fifth graders aren’t public restroom predators. Shannon Garcia and Kim Pearson of TransYouth Family Allies have frequently reminded me that transyouth really are the future key to public understanding of how gender identity in transsexuals isn’t directly correlated to sexuality.

So, since the scream of predator won’t work for a fifth grander, Mike Heath (of the Christian Civic League (CCL) Of Maine) and his conservative Christian surrogates are now trying to employ a privacy related strategy. Paul Melanson, a grandfather to a student in the same class as the transyouth, has announced he’s filing a complaint with the Maine Human Rights Commission (MHRC) — which is seen as a first step prior to filing a civil suit in U.S. District Court at Bangor. From the Bangor Daily News article on the lawsuit announcement press conference:

Jasmine Smith, 13, is concerned that next year the fifth-grader at Asa Adams Elementary School who identifies as a girl will be changing in the girls locker room.

At a press conference Monday night in front of the municipal building, the seventh-grader said that because she has seen the fifth-grader in the girls bathroom after school she assumes the student will be allowed to use the girls facilities at Orono Middle School.

“That would be an invasion of the girls’ privacy and of my privacy,” she said.

Smith acknowledged that no teachers or administrators have told students the fifth-grader would be changing in the girls locker room or using the girls bathrooms at the middle school.

Smith appeared at the press conference called by Paul Melanson of Orono, who formally has objected to the practice of allowing a boy to use the girls bathroom at the school. Melanson said he asked Smith to speak at the press conference to show that although school officials had told him the fifth-grader was using a teachers bathroom, he was using the girls bathroom.

The constitutional right to privacy is the basis right that found abortion legal in Roe v. Wade, so it’s an interesting choice of argument for conservative Christians to employ. But even past that it’s an interesting argument, the CCL choise to employ a privacy argument against this transyouth just doesn’t appear to resonate well with the public in the same way as a predator argument does with regards to older transgender people.

(Below the fold: Excerpts of comments left for the Bangor Daily News article Grandfather plans rights suit over boy using girls bathroom)

Read the rest of this entry »

As we enter the Pride month I for one hope the community takes a moment to reflect back on all the effort put forth by gay men and women in the past to secure the freedom and acceptance we currently enjoy today. Fighting during a period in time where it was hazardous to one’s physical health to be on the forefront. Stonewall was not simply an activist protest where they went home afterwards and partied. They were beaten and dragged away to jail by the police. It was a time when fag bashing was an accepted method of controlling homos and keeping them out of the neighborhood. There were no drag queens there at all. It was gay human beings simply standing up for being who they were. Making a stand even though they fully knew the dangers of doing so. That’s true courage no different than that on a battlefield.
–Joseph DaBrow, Metroline (Late May, 2008)

Some of the “broad us” at Stonewall were drag queens; some of the “broad us” at Stonewall were transgender and/or transsexual people (even if those words weren’t terms used to describe gender variant people at the time); and some of the “broad us” at Stonewall didn’t publicly identify as gay women, but as lesbians. It’s been well documented that the “broad us” of Stonewall protestors included a broad swath of LGBT people.

Joseph DaBrow’s commentary on Pride Month is an objectionable to those of us who are proud that it wasn’t only gay human beings simply standing up for being who they were, but instead know it was LGBT people standing up for who they were and who we are. As a term, gay isn’t always seen as inclusive of us all, and in this case gay isn’t an adequate description of who was there at Stonewall.

So in this case, my peers and I are also making a stand: we will not stand by to be quietly homogenized away from the civil rights and social justice implications of Stonewall; we don’t accept being hidden behind a non-inclusive use of the term gay.

Frankly, it’s not in the best interest of those of us whose civil rights depend on the language of gender identity and expression being included in civil rights legislation to accept it when our members’ contributions to our broad community’s history are being in any way minimized or erased.

~~~~~
H/t: Connecticut TransAdvocacy Coalition