Pam Spaulding's Blog, page 69
March 28, 2011
What kind of society will the next generation of Americans inherit?
During my visit this past weekend to visit family in Delaware -- and to see my new nephew Mr. C. for the first time (he's about 8 weeks old now), I reminisce about my own childhood.Mr. E. is three years old; I was his age in 1966, a very different time. I was born before the first Surgeon General's report on smoking; my mother (and her family and contemporaries) all smoked -- before, during and after pregnancy.
The were few books parents turned to in those days and if you went into any home you were likely to find Dr. Benjamin Spock's Baby and Child Care; I don't know what to glean from that for my generation. Today there are hundreds of books, maybe thousands, with myriad ways to teach parents about raising children, a good number in conflict with one another. What kind of children come out of these various certainties about child care and rearing?
It was also a time where mom down here in the South (I am a Durham, NC native), let their kids out to play unsupervised -- without a fenced in yard, no less, when we were about 6 and up. My brother Tim and I (he's 5 years younger) used to go into the woods next to our house, which were quite dense, for hours at a time, go to little drainage ditches where there were tadpoles to catch, etc. If we explored past the end of the wooded area, there was a highway. Nevertheless, we'd come back home tired and hungry, but safe and sound.
I'm pretty sure few parents would do that nowadays.
I was also a latchkey kid. At 11-12, I came home to an empty house since my mom was working, and I usually started working on dinner and my homework. I was pretty left to my own devices, but the sense of independence was instilled in me because of need, not as an abstract concept.
Anyway, most kids like Mr. C and Mr. E will likely not have that experience of freedom to roam or be given that much responsibility. Perhaps the marker of that era of freedom ended with the publicity surrounding Etan Patz (1979)/Adam Walsh (1981) abduction cases. Parents then felt they had to keep their kids within eyeshot at all times, managed because of "the danger out there." And not a lot of kids feel it's possible to have that kind of freedom because they are told that danger lurks everywhere.
But does it? I guess my question is reality vs. perception. Has our society become more violent and amoral? Based on what I see on TV news, I cannot help but believe that some societal code has crumbled, but we've also created a culture of fear that surely escalates it. We have overcrowded prisons, many filled with sociopathic inmates, some with untreated mental illness, others there because of bias and socioeconomic despair. Were there fewer of these inmates back in the 1960s, or did adults just not hear enough about the problems of our criminal justice system? Were children being abducted and because there was no digitally connected network of law enforcement agencies that could find patterns of the criminal activity?
More below the fold.
On the bright side, the generation of Mr. C and Mr. E. will no doubtedly be more conscious about the environment - recycling is the norm, there are hybrid cars on the roads in abundance, municipal efforts to be green, etc. While there is constant pushback on the right to deny climate change, it has already been embedded into society's norms to try to do the right thing when it comes to simple principles of being better stewards of the planet.
Crude, rude, and cold strangers. Public displays of Southern hospitality still exist in large part due to, in some ways, a less-fast-paced environment. But that fades in places that have become more metropolitan (read: Yankee), with more transplants and the development of Research Triangle Park and the many companies that put roots down here. I certainly missed my Southern culture during my years in NYC (1976-1989). I loved the energy of NY and enjoyed my time at Stuyvesant HS (I miss Frank McCourt), but it was a bad time as a low-wealth kid to grow up in that cesspool of violence, crime (can you say NYC Blackout of 1977?) and literal filth in the city. The crime situation was so bad that crimes like chain and purse snatchings were ignored, and riding the subway at night was almost asking to be robbed or assaulted. I won't go into detail, but teen thugs with a hammer threatened me on one ride. I'm glad my head wasn't bashed in.
Thankfully the city is no longer like that, but it's still a place that still requires a bit of a hard shell and good coping mechanisms if you're an average person. NYC is a great place to live if you've got decent money in your pocket.
Race still matters. I do have to say that during my years in NYC I experienced personally and via daily news, that it is a very color-aroused place. When I lived there it was made quite clear to us that you better not find yourself in Brooklyn's Bay Ridge, Bensonhurst or Howard Beach at any time, day or night. The hostility toward blacks at that time wasn't your imagination - these were northern "Sundown Towns." People were killed, stomped to death for being "in the wrong place at the wrong time." Neighborhoods were definitely well-defined racially and ethnically.
Is it that way now? I can't attest to what has changed since I no longer live there, but my old neighborhood, Bed-Stuy, has undergone gentrification (due to the cost of living in Manhattan), and many young white families are regularly seen strolling down streets that were formerly filled in the 80s with crack dens, burnt-out brownstones etc., joining the middle class black population that continues renovating and living in the massive brownstones and houses in the historic district. That helps blur the culture lines to interact with diverse neighbors, always a good thing. After all, when my mother grew up in the same neighborhood in the 30s, Bed-Stuy was diverse - everyone was poor; it was the Great Depression.
But down South, moving back there in 1989 and through to today, the issue of race is still present in the politics of towns, but in general society I've not experienced any of the race-based hostility that I did in NYC. Most neighborhoods are not divided by race, so much as class, which explains the problems going on in the Wake County School system. The board's attempts to reconfigure the system for "neighborhood schools" has been viewed as a racist attempt by the (northern transplant) conservative board members to keep their precious white children away from the low-wealth black and brown kids. Honestly, I'm sure there are middle-class black and brown parents who would prefer the same.
The socioeconomic component of these moves cannot be ignored. If allowed to proceed, what will the effect be on children, the leaders of tomorrow, who only know other kids just like them?
And what about biracial and multiracial kids like Mr. E. and Mr. C? How will they be seen by their peers? Will race matter as much? Will our current limited thinking and biases about placing people in identifiable be passed along, continuing discrimination?
Politics. Sad to say, I don't see most of the political "reforms" playing themselves out as positives compared to when I was growing up, watching, say the Watergate Hearings. On the one hand, we still have pols on the take; on the other hand, we are electing more women to public office. Back then we had plenty of racial hypocrites on the ballot (Strom Thurmond to name one) as race matters took front and center stage; god knows the number of GOP sexual hypocrites have been outed as LGBT rights issues have taken flight.
The fact is that the next generation will continue to deal with bad legislation, politicians who will try to convince people to support policies against their own interests. Will it be just as challenging to get the next generation to be interested in public service, to aim high for principles over the almighty dollar? Even shooting lower, will we leave them a society that places a higher value on getting out to vote as a citizen's duty? We already know Americans basically tune out to state and local voting, and only wake up from their slumber during a Presidential election (if that). Surely we can do better in educating the next gen.
I'm sure I'll have more to say about this, but I wanted to launch this off to receive feedback from your perspective.
Religious right using Exodus/Apple controversy to make money, settle old scores
crossposted on Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters
Actress Olivia DeHavilland once remarked in a movie that "you just can't keep hogs away from the trough."
That statement is definitely one which sprung in my mind during the Exodus International/Apple controversy.
Last week, the organization Truth Wins Out led the charge to get Apple to dump Exodus International's "gay cure" phone app through a petition which over 150,000 people signed.
Now there has been some controversy over this, including in the lgbt community, because some felt that Truth Wins Out violated Exodus's International's free speech.
Nonsense. Apple is a private company and freely chose to remove that app after the complaints. Also, Apple shouldn't have approved the app in the first place. The ex-gay methodology is junk science and leads folks to down a primrose path of lies in thinking that their God-given sexual orientation is something they should be ashamed of. That sort of thing causes more harm than good by sowing self-hatred and repression.
If Apple wants to approve apps for junk science, then why not one for lobotomy or phrenology?
Naturally the reactions to controversy have been varied. The Family Research Council wasn't even involved, but has the temerity to raise money from the situation:
A story in the news this week proves once again what we’ve been saying for years. Liberals want to silence pro-family conservatives like you and me. In a stunning decision, Apple withered under pressure from homosexual activists and censored an application that offers help to people struggling with homosexuality. The app for ex-gays was created by Exodus International–and before this week, it had a 4+ rating from the iTunes store. Exodus is another victim of the growing campaign to silence Christianity in America. As a reader of my emails, you know that the Southern Poverty Law Center falsely labeled FRC a “hate group” for standing for biblical norms regarding sexuality. Liberal activists use this label and demand that media outlets censor FRC staff and research.
We are honored to serve on these frontlines, but we need your help. Please help us stand for marriage and healthy human sexuality with your gift today.
Does the Family Research really want to remind people of its hate group designation, especially in light of the fact that the organization has yet to come up with a detailed response as to how can comparing gays to pedophiles, telling lies about the supposed short gay life span, and claiming that gay parents hurt children (all of which FRC has done) can be seen as "biblical norms."
But as for religious right responses, none takes the cake like Peter LaBarbera of Americans for Truth:
In an interview with the American Family Association's One News Now, LaBarbera said the following:
"Major corporations are now openly discriminating against people of faith at the hands of radical homosexual groups like Truth Wins Out -- and don't be fooled by the name. Truth Wins Out is one of the most hateful, extremist homosexual organizations on the planet, and they're targeting ex-gays for their persecution."
And then on his own webpage, LaBarbera, who obviously never misses a chance to milk a situation, went a bit farther with a dig against Exodus International:
There are some interesting side stories and ironies to this second of two Apple cave-ins to LGBT pressure-campaigns. One is that Exodus International — a leading umbrella group for people desiring to abandon homosexual practice or resist unwanted same-sex desires – has gone out of its way (too far, in our view) NOT to offend homosexual activists. And look where it got them. In fact, a while back Exodus declared that it was disengaging from the ”Culture War” over homosexuality (in favor of ministry pursuits) – yet now it is thrust right back into it. This is a lesson for all naive Christians who think that by somehow sidestepping the cultural battle over homosexuality, it won’t rage on, with homosexual activists attempting to muzzle the Gospel.
LaBarbera's snide comment no doubt stems from a situation in 2009 when he and Exodus Vice President Randy Thomas had a very public feud over a vulgar comment made by the Liberty Counsel's Matt Barber about lgbts.
Exodus International raised an objection to the following comment made by Barber, which LaBarbera published on his webpage:
It boils down to this: there is nothing “conservative” about — as Barber inimitably puts it — “one man violently cramming his penis into another man’s lower intestine and calling it ‘love.’” Or two women awkwardly mimicking natural procreative relations or raising a child together in an intentionally fatherless home.
Exodus's objection led to an amusing flame war on Exodus's webpage between Thomas and LaBarbera which allowed us to gain a peek at the pettiness of the so-called Christian personalities fighting against the alleged gay agenda.
No doubt, LaBarbera felt the need to settle old scores in his response to the the Apple situation by, with Christian love of course, kicking Exodus International when they are down.
So the way I look at it, the Exodus/Apple controversy is a win for the lgbt community.
We demonstrated what we can get accomplished when we all are on the same wavelength and two entities who fight hard against our equality have been exposed for being money-hungry and calculating (FRC) and vindictive (Peter LaBarbera).
March 27, 2011
Rabbi Jonathan Singer: Seek equal rights, not tolerance
What a pleasure it was to sit down for an interview with Rabbi Jonathan Singer, Senior Rabbi at Seattle, Washington's Temple Beth Am. This uncompromising advocate for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people brought a new perspective to the congregation when he arrived in 1995; while his predecessor was "pretty homophobic", Rabbi Singer actively welcomed LGBT Jews into the heart of the congregation and took his LGBT advocacy to the streets.
Pastor Craig Darling of Seattle First Baptist Church (l), Rabbi Jonathan Singer of Temple Beth Am (m) and Cantor David Serkin-Poole of Temple B'nai Torah (r) demonstrating in favor of an anti-discrimination bill. Photo credit: Joshua Trujillo / Seattle P-I
To give you an idea of the kind of man we're talking about, in the Spring of 2005 Rabbi Singer joined with representatives from other local synagogues and Jewish groups to form a campaign to urge certain legislators to vote for a statewide LGBT anti-discrimination law.
"We want to make clear to all Americans that people of faith do support justice and equality for all." ~~Rabbi Jonathan SingerLater in that same year he and 30 other people of faith and clergy picketed the place where Rev. Ken Hutcherson's anti-gay church meets (right). Their goal was "to counter the very loud voices by a very few fundamentalist religious leaders". The anti-discrimination bill passed in early 2006.
Since that time, religious support for LGBT equality has grown even stronger in Washington state, and Rabbi Singer has remained in the thick of things. In 2009 he joined over 200 religious organizations and faith leaders to defend Washington's Domestic Partnership Expansion Law of 2009 against referendum repeal. "Our people, having experienced privation and oppression, know more than others what it means when a majority tries to take rights away from a minority," he said. On Election Day 2009 Washington voters became the first in the nation to ratify a same-sex relationship recognition law at the polls.
Please join me below the fold for a conversation with Rabbi Jonathan Singer.
Note: Temple Beth Am is a Jewish Reform congregation. Jewish Mosaic says that "Of the three major Jewish movements, the Reform Movement is the most fully inclusive of LGBT people in Jewish life with most Reform communities and synagogues embracing LGBT people." Details on the Reform Movement's positions on various LGBT issues are at the end of the post.
How is your LGBT advocacy informed by Judaism?
Rabbi Singer: We call the first part of the Bible the Torah. The stories there involve engaging with life to find holiness. To me, God is asking you to engage and wrestle with and try to make the world better. And to see the diversity of creation, that it's not one kind of creation, that there's this whole prism of color out there.
Our tradition teaches that God creates love, creates flowers, and also creates drives, everything. And those things are for the most part good. It's what we do with them that can be not good. It's the same thing when people think about religion. It's not religion that's bad, it's what people can do who want to have power or dominate, who use religions in that way. And I could say the same thing that no one should do math because math was used to create nuclear bombs. The worst thing ever created. Again it's not math itself that's bad, it's what we do with it.
So my religion calls me to seek justice, to love the stranger and to see the beauty in God's wonder. And when I grew up a little bit and realized how complex human sexuality is and that God made this thing called men loving men, women loving women and some people loving both - that's to me all part of what was brought into the world. And rather than belittle, see the wonder and the beauty in that. And that to me religion can be used in any part of the human experience to bring a framework of holiness and wonder to that experience.
The idea that we argue that one of the best ways of being is to be in a committed, loving relationship in which people ask God in to sanctify their relationship to say 'this is beautiful' is what I see marriage as. And the notion that one would deny that to anybody who is gay or lesbian seems absurd - that one would attack that religiously when in fact you can use religion to sanctify relationships.
I see it as a religious drive that I'm required to do weddings, and that the state should not impose its particular view in a free country upon me as a rabbinic clergy. My Movement has voted, we've all worked hard to embrace the right to perform same-sex marriages. Not being allowed to is to me an anti-religious imposition by the state, and infringement embracing one perspective at the expense of others. I think the state should get out of that business and let us do what we think is religiously meaningful.
Where is the cutting edge for Reform Jewish congregations like yours when it comes to LGBT issues?
Rabbi Singer: We're working on being welcoming congregation. We've been a welcoming congregation. I think in my 3rd year here I made it a requirement of my being willing to continue that I would be able to perform same-sex marriages with or without the consent of the state. The Board would have to accept that I would be doing that.
We had the test case of two women who asked me to do their wedding and then they invited the whole congregation. And boy people just poured out and they came and it was a huge event. People just cried afterwords. It was beautiful, and that really opened the door and I think brought a lot of change to the congregation.
We worked hard to try to be welcoming and are now joining a national group that's asked us to be a test congregation to say well, beyond the fact that you're doing these very basic things, how do you really work on making sure that you're a welcoming synagogue, that you really are treating people equally and that people feel safe here? That's something that my colleague Rabbi Beth Singer and our program director Alisa Rosen are working on with the Welcoming Synagogues Project.
The WSP's overall goal is to develop a process, tools and resources that will guide synagogues in becoming open, inclusive and welcoming to all Jews, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity.
Does every Reformed congregation decide for itself where it will be on LGBT issues?
Rabbi Singer: Rabbis and synagogues in our movement are independent. The Reformed Movement can act as a cover to give you permission to do certain things, but we weren't waiting for any kind of a national statement saying it's kosher to do this or not. But the movement did come along that way anyway.
So synagogues act independently up to a point, and rabbis are hired and fired by the synagogue board.
How about gender identity in the congregation or in the Reformed Movement?
Rabbi Singer: The language used by the LGBT community has been adopted by most communities that have advocated for equal rights, so it's brought into the same sense of advocacy.
I'm not sure we're talking about the same thing when it comes to homosexuality and transgender stuff. It's a different issue. But in the end, the desire that we are respectful of people's personal choices, and that people are also respectful of what the community's comfortable with. Somebody can't come walking through our sanctuary wearing a bikini. Even though you can say that's the most important thing to me to find my connection to God, that I'm going to wear a bikini on Yom Kippur? No, that doesn't work for our community.
But if somebody says I'm going through a gender transformation because this is the real me, then that's something that's considered to be someone's private business and we want to make that person feel welcome. I've done weddings of transgender folks, but again ultimately I want to get beyond gender and deal with the person.
I think it's important for your readers to know that we started, there was a gathering here about 10 years ago, that was just using our meeting space - people trying to work on gay and lesbian rights. And there was a mix of clergy who were here. And I went in and said you know we shouldn't just be here gathering and talking amongst ourselves, but as the anti-gay rights clergy were out there publicly bashing, that we should be out there publicly marching. There should be a march that would show that there are people from across the religious spectrum who want the right to do gay marriage, who believe from a religious view that they should be welcoming, that there's not a monolithic religious perspective. There's a huge religious perspective that embraces equal rights and wants people to be members to our communities.
And it was out of that meeting that we had the first march downtown (news stories here and here), and it grew into Equal Rights Washington. That's how it got started.
I was so moved by how many people joined us. It was a huge group that marched downtown, and it got important coverage. We were carrying our chuppah, our wedding canopy and our Beth Am sign saying this is what we promote and advocate.
So I think it's very important that people - to me everyone has a religious drive. Some people connect with it, other don't. But you should not see that your gender or your sexual orientation blocking you from connecting to a spiritual community. But like anything else, you have to find the right community.
Was this in answer to Rev. Ken Hutcherson's anti-equality Mayday for Marriage?
Rabbi Singer: It was around the same time, saying he is not speaking for me, that there is a silent, maybe not majority, but that disagrees and sees its religious connection in a different way. And wants to sanctify these relationships and be welcoming.
You're part of the Religious Coalition for Equality. I wonder if you've seen that grow from a minority to something larger?
Rabbi Singer: Yeah. We've gone and participated in Equality Days down in Olympia, and I do believe that people are starting to get it, and that having religious leaders speak out is very important because it gave and showed a different ethical perspective, and that the next generation is starting to make that change.
I think my predecessor was pretty homophobic. It's an interesting change for our community to have a rabbi come and take a very different perspective.
What was that process like with your congregation?
Rabbi Singer: I think it went against all of the value systems that were a part of his life. It was this one sticking point that I attribute to his age.
But to me Judaism is radically egalitarian. It's ironic that you'll meet Orthodox Jews who don't believe women and men have the same responsibilities, but in their system they argue they're the same. But I think the call for justice and for women and men to be able to participate in carry Torah together is really powerful. The idea that we as a Jewish people who have experienced oppression should be on the front lines speaking up for equal rights is really also a religious imperative.
Because you had such a different viewpoint than your predecessor on these issues, did there need to be a structured process you needed to take your congregation through?
Rabbi Singer: Change cannot be structured. I had to just, this is a stand, that's it. That's it. This is the way it's going to be going forward. That couple getting married is when people actually saw it.
Reinhold Niebuhr argued in his book Moral Man, Immoral Society -- Jews cancan learn from Protestants too -- that when you start to see the person and not just the concept, you change.
Seeing these two women, so beautiful, under this chuppah in our sanctuary changed a lot of people. Who in all other respects were for equal rights and yet had this sticking point, where it makes no sense.
When I started doing Equal Rights Washington I called the -- you know people make assumptions -- I called an African American church in town, a well-know church, and I got the clergy secretary. I said, hi this is Rabbi Jonathan Singer, I want to talk to this person about the marriage rights issues going on. She said, oh yes! The clergy isn't here but I know he'll want to talk and meet with you. And I said, I want to be clear that I'm pushing for equal rights for gays and lesbians. And she said, oh, that's not his perspective at all. She hung up! So you know, people make assumptions about religion on both sides.
And yet, people change. We can use the good in these systems that call for change. That'll bring about change.
Parting thoughts?
Rabbi Singer: When Jews celebrate being part of America, there's a document we turn to where George Washington replies to a letter from the [Jewish] congregation from Newport, RI. He writes that we will not just tolerate you, but you are our equal here in America, and America needs to be a place where we will give bigotry no sanction.
The Citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for giving to Mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy: a policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship. It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights. For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection, should demean themselves as good citizens.
I think that gays, lesbians, transgenders cannot just try to approach the religious community to be tolerated, but see its equal role in the spiritual life of the community. And not give up on this great gift that's spirituality because of the bigotry of the few. But to either form our own congregations or join congregations and influence them.
This is a tremendous spiritual gift to have in one's life, and to the religious traditions to say that they cannot give bigotry any kind of sanction, that's really imperative. Our congregation is lifted up by anybody who helps carry Torah - it's the bible for us -- and we have wonderful singles and couples who are here who are very very engaged in being the leaders of our community. And we're a better community because of it.
And one should not seek tolerance in the state, one should seek equal rights. So I think that's why Jews especially should be part of this journey.
*
Related Posts:
* Maryland faith leaders stand up for transgender equality
* Leadership through listening: Rev. Dr.Melvin Woodworth, First United Methodist Church of Tacoma, WA
* Conversation with a straight Presbyterian ally
* Orthodox Jewish Rabbi Steven Burg says "There's no place for bullying in God's world"
* Dutch Christian schools start teaching respect and empathy for gays
* Pro-equality clergy greatly outnumber the anti-gay variety in Washington, D.C.
The Jewish Reform Movement's stance on LGBT issues
Temple Beth Am is a Reform congregation. Jewish Mosaic says that "Of the three major Jewish movements, the Reform Movement is the most fully inclusive of LGBT people in Jewish life with most Reform communities and synagogues embracing LGBT people." The following is an excerpt of the article "The Reform Movement on LGBT Issues" published by Jewish Mosaic.
The Reform Movement has a long tradition of supporting LGBT people. In 1977, the Central Conference of American Rabbis (or CCAR, the movement's rabbinical organization) passed a resolution calling for the decriminalization of homosexual acts between consenting adults and an end to discrimination against gays and lesbians. Since then, the movement has continually supported the rights of LGBT people, both in civil and Jewish society. The earliest resolution on homosexuality issued by the Reform Movement was resolved at the 25th Biennial Assembly in 1965 by the Women of Reform Judaism National Federation of Temple Sisterhoods. The statement read, in part: "We...deplore the tendency on the part of community authorities to harass homosexuals. We associate ourselves with those religious leaders and legal experts who urge revision in the criminal code as it relates to homosexuality, especially when it exists between consenting adults." At the 1987 Biennial, the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (or UAHC, now known as the Union for Reform Judaism, it is the movement's national body) firmly stated its commitment to welcoming LGBT Jews into Jewish communal life in the movement. In 1993, UAHC passed a resolution recognizing gay and lesbian partnerships.Rabbinate
In 1990, the CCAR endorsed a report by its Ad Hoc Committee on Homosexuality and the Rabbinate, which formally endorsed the equality of all Jews and the acceptance of gay and lesbian Jews into Hebrew Union College (the movement's seminary, with campuses in New York City, Los Angeles, Cincinnati, and Jerusalem) and the rabbinate, although a number of gay and lesbian rabbis received ordination prior to this 1990 decision, or came out as gay after ordination. Rabbi Eric Weiss was the first openly gay man to be accepted to the Reform Movement's rabbinical school. He was accepted to Hebrew Union College in 1983.Congregations and Leadership
In 1987, UAHC passed a resolution stating that gay and lesbian Jews should be granted full inclusion in synagogue life. It urged congregations to " encourage lesbian and gay Jews to share and participate in the worship, leadership, and general congregational life of all synagogues." In the same resolution, UAHC also encouraged Reform congregation to, "continue to develop educational programs in the synagogue and community which promote understanding and respect for lesbians and gays, [and to] employ people without regard to sexual orientation." The Reform Movement is also home to a number of LGBT-outreach synagogues whose specific mission it is to be welcoming to the LGBT Jewish community. The world's first LGBT-outreach synagogue, Beth Chayim Chadashim, located in Los Angeles and founded in 1972, is affiliated with the Reform Movement.Same-Sex Marriage
Since 1996, the Reform Movement has become progressively more accepting of same-sex marriage. In that year, the CCAR passed a resolution supporting the rights of gay and lesbian couples "to share fully and equally in the rights of civil marriage". In 1998, the CCAR's Ad Hoc Committee on Human Sexuality reported that, "kedushah [holiness/sanctity] may be present in committed same gender relationships between two Jews and that these relationships can serve as the foundation of stable Jewish families, thus adding strength to the Jewish Community." Finally, in March 2000, CCAR passed a resolution allowing Reform rabbis to officiate at same-sex commitment ceremonies. However, the resolution leaves the decision of whether or not to officiate up to each individual rabbi, out of recognition of the diverse opinions on the issue. The resolution also leaves it up to each rabbi to consider a same-sex union kiddushin or not, thus allowing for some diversity within the movement on treating same-sex unions as equal to male-female marriage, or as a separate category of union.Today, most, but not all, Reform clergy officiate at same-sex unions. The Reform Movement, however, universally supports civil unions for same-sex couples. In 1997, the Union of American Hebrew Congregations passed a resolution in support of "secular efforts to promote legislation which would provide through civil marriage equal opportunity for gay men and lesbians," while, at the same time, resolved to "encourage its constituent congregations to honor monogamous domestic relationships formed by gay men or lesbians." The Reform Movement has also strongly opposed the Federal Marriage Amendment, as well as state amendments that aim to ban same-sex marriage. In 2006, the president of the Union for Reform Judaism, Eric Yoffie, stated, "Gay Americans pose no threat to their friends, neighbors, or co-workers, and when two people make a lifelong commitment to each other, we believe it is wrong to deny them the legal guarantees that protect them and their children and benefit the broader society."
Transgender
In a 1978 CCAR Responsa, approval was given for a rabbi to officiate at the marriage of two Jews, one of whom has undergone sex reassignment surgery. In 2003, Hebrew Union College accepted its first openly transgender rabbinical student, Reuben Zellman.AIDS
The Reform movement has been strongly supportive of people with HIV/AIDS since the early days of the epidemic. In the early 1980s, Reform leaders denounced the ostracization of people living with AIDS, along with their families and friends. Notably, during the 1980s and early 1990s, when the gay community in the United States was devastated by the epidemic, Reform-affiliated LGBT-outreach synagogues, such as San Francisco's Congregation Sha'ar Zahav, took very proactive roles in supporting people with AIDS at a time when so many people turned their backs. In 1989, the Union of American Hebrew Congregations created a commemorative poster, the image on it was of a tallit symbolizing the Jewish commitment to fighting AIDS. The poster was distributed to Reform congregations nationwide.
Guest Post By Sadie Ryanne Vashti: An Anarchist in the White House
The following is a crosspost from the distant panic . Crossposted with permission.
An Anarchist in the White House: Thoughts on Lobbying, Trans Liberation and the Nonprofit Industrial Complex
I spent the past month or so working with the National Center for Transgender Equality. I helped coordinate logistics for their annual Policy Conference and Lobby Day. It was a wonderful (if at times stressful!) opportunity to gain useful skills while doing meaningful work with an organization I respect. I also met lots of great people!
I'm back to being marginally-employed again, but I've been thinking a lot lately about the nonprofit industrial complex (NPIC -- see below for explanation) and my involvement in it. It became a pretty extensive post!
I didn't enter "the workforce" until I was 21. (Before that, I was mostly involved in black/grey market economies of various sorts.) When I have been formally employed, it has mostly been within nonprofit industries -- first, as a case manager on the abortion hotline, briefly as a client advocate for sex workers, and then at NCTE.
While I am definitely part of and implicated in the NPIC, I have tried to remain critical about the strengths and weaknesses of the nonprofit model, and what nonprofit work can and cannot do. In short, nonprofit work can be valuable, but ultimately it can't bring the truly revolutionary change this planet needs to survive.
[More below the fold.]
Idealism
This story begins at age 13: The year I discovered punk rock. In a generalized rebellion against conformity (mostly in regards to enforced sexual, religious and gender norms), I drew circle-A's all over everything... including myself. My Grade 8 West Virginia Studies teacher, a totally butch dyke, read me (correctly) as a baby queer feminist and potential eco-radical.
She gave me two books: Emma Goldman's Living My Life and Henry David Thoreau's Walden Pond and Resistance to Civil Government. (She later also introduced me to Walt Whitman and Ursula K. Le Guin ... I so totally owe her!)
I also committed my first theft: I stole a copy of Daniel Gu?rin's history of anarchism ... from the public library. (Hey, I was 13. I'm not saying I had a mature political analysis. )
These experiences, and others, exposed me to the idea that the dominant political and legal system primarily benefits the wealthy and powerful -- and that, in order for justice to prevail, those systems should be abolished, not merely amended. My anarchist heroes criticized the failures of what contemporary radicals refer to broadly as "liberalism" -- the idea that meaningful social and economic change can be accomplished within existing political structures or through legislative reform.
Dominant human cultures are wrecking whole ecosystems; turning billions of people into a disposable workforce with precarious access to housing, health care, food and other basic necessities; creating vast disparities in wealth and power; disenfranchising whole populations; forcing people not perceived as "normal" to live in constant fear and anxiety; tolerating rape and emotional abuse; changing the climate of our planet; poisoning whole nations. From Afghanistan to DC, people kill each other over resources and constructed differences every day.
In the face of such widespread violence (much of which has touched me on a very personal level), the promise of "gradual, incremental reform" has always sounded like a farce used by the ruling class to appease and distract the oppressed. For most of my life, I've believed that our world is profoundly wrong, and that we need profound (i.e., revolutionary) change to make it better.
Disillusionment
Through high school, I got more into radical political theory. I watched black blocs take on neoliberal summit after neoliberal summit, read about the EZLN and the IWW, began attending demonstrations against the coal industry. When my family first kicked me out and I became a crusty homeless traveler kid, it was the anarchists who taught me how to find food, squat abandoned buildings, hop trains, and evade arrest.
I wore my black bandannas and marched into the clouds of tear gas and riot police at global justice protests. I sincerely believed that our low-level street warfare, propaganda and vandalism would ignite a spontaneous insurrection. Somehow, we would topple the government and the oppressed would suddenly rise up and organically reorganize social relations to create a more egalitarian world.
Guess what? That didn't happen.
It was empowering and personally liberating, and I still think mass demonstrations and militant self-defense have a place in struggles for social justice. But the destruction of the earth and most of its inhabitants continues unabated.
Like a lot of radicals, I got really bitter and burnt out. And unlike a lot of self-described anarchists, I had nowhere to go "home" to after that. I didn't eat trash just to make a political statement, and I didn't sleep under bridges just because it was fun.[*]
So when I didn't have a family to go back to, I got tired of living like a hermit, constantly fearing arrest, and living in situations where (especially as an undocumented queer trans woman with panic disorder) I was always in heightened danger of physical violence and deportation.
I just want a job and a house and health care and a family and the basic shit that most working-class people want. Fuck the revolution.
The Politics of the Possible
By this time in my life, I had landed in the mecca of nonprofit-dom: Washington, DC. (That's not why I came here, though. I chose DC as my home because I had friends here, there are organized trans communities and accompanying health care infrastructures, it's bike-friendly, and because I fucking love the DIY hardcore scene.)
I spent the first few months here doing what I had been doing for years: shoplifting, scamming, and dumpster-diving. But I knew I couldn't afford all the things I needed -- hormones, mental health care, laser, etc -- doing this. So, like a lot of radicals, I saw nonprofit careers as a good compromise: I could continue doing work that benefited my communities, but also get paid for it so that I could take care of myself.
If I couldn't change the whole world, I thought, I might as well try to help as many people as possible along the way. And if I can pay my bills at the same time, that's great.
My own experiences perhaps mirror what happened to north american social justice movements more broadly. Radical mass movements once proactively shaped national political discussions in a fury of euphoric uprisings. Then, the Left was so fiercely beaten down by repression and reactionary movements that we now settle for whatever narrow change we can accomplish via piecemeal institutional reforms - a "politics of the possible."
Defining the NPIC
It was also around this time that I first encountered a sustained critique of the nonprofit industrial complex, in the form of INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence's anthology The Revolution Will Not Be Funded. (A really amazing book that I think everyone should read.)
INCITE! writes:
The non-profit industrial complex (or the NPIC) is a system of relationships between the State (or local and federal governments), the owning classes, foundations, and non-profit/NGO social service & social justice organizations that results in the surveillance, control, derailment, and everyday management of political movements.
As Lisa Duggan explains in The Twilight of Equality?: Neoliberalism, Cultural Politics and the Attack on Democracy, organizations dedicated to litigation, lobbying, media education, and community service provision had existed as the "practical wing" of mass social movements (but still very much embedded in a "movement culture") since at least the 1950s.
For example, feminists established grassroots women's health clinics and lobbied for abortion rights. The Panthers had community meal programs. The gay liberation movement tried to reform anti-crossdressing laws.
But during the 1980s, social movements receded and gave way to a resurgence in neoconservative / neoliberal agendas. These groups fragmented and disengaged from class/economic struggles. Instead of demanding the downward redistribution of wealth in order to achieve economic justice for all marginalized people, they began focusing only on cultural/identity politics and settled for a "multicultural" capitalism.
The mutual struggle by all oppressed people for economic equality became replaced by the reformist goal of cultural equality between different groups. Revolutionary politics gave way to single-issue identity politics.
The underground clinics went into business with government money, the meal programs became funded by corporations and divorced from politics, and the gays decided that all injustice would end once they could get married. Feminism, Black power, and gay liberation declined, and we were left with NARAL, the NAACP and the HRC.
Further Unpacking the NPIC
The NPIC was able to "de-fang" social movements and national liberation struggles in a few different ways:
(1) In exchange for the ability to receive tax-exempt donations, the State/NPIC forces social service/social justice organizations to adopt a capitalist structure modeled after corporations. Making grassroots groups adopt corporate structures removes the threat they had once posed by demonstrating the existence of more egalitarian counter-models.
(2) The NPIC creates organizations that require a great deal of specialization and education to manage, making them less accessible to poor and working-class people. Leadership becomes centralized in professional activists and service providers, and decision-making becomes undemocratically top-down.
(3) Accepting money from wealthy donors, governments and corporations gives them the ability to say "we care about social/environmental/racial/etc justice", effectively giving them propaganda to draw public attention away from the inequalities and atrocities they regularly perpetuate and profit from.
(4) The NPIC ensures that social movements are accountable to their funders, even at the expense of the communities for whom they claim to be working. I have seen firsthand how much authority "philanthropists" have over the day-to-day operations and political priorities of the organizations they fund.
(5) Nonprofits all have to write constant reports to funders explaining our "realistically achievable" goals and to quantify how close we are to achieving them. This encourages us to stop dreaming grand schemes to transform the world, and to focus on pleasing board members.
Or, as INCITE! explains:
The state uses non-profits to:
Monitor and control social justice movements;
Divert public monies into private hands through foundations;
Manage and control dissent in order to make the world safe for capitalism;
Redirect activist energies into career-based modes of organizing instead of mass-based organizing capable of actually transforming society;
Allow corporations to mask their exploitative and colonial work practices through "philanthropic" work;
Encourage social movements to model themselves after capitalist structures rather than to challenge them
The once-threatening mass social justice movement that sought to achieve broad revolutionary change became fragmented into numerous corporate-sponsored, hierarchical organizations. Each organization is made up of educated, upwardly-mobile professional activists. They each work only on their "issue" (abortion access, trans equality, union organizing, domestic violence, sex work, prisoner rights, etc) and constantly have to make reports to the rich and to the state.
This is why the DC Trans Coalition has affirmed our commitment to voluntary action. According to our Guiding Principles, we do not accept funding from corporations, governments or foundations of any kind, because we strive to be accountable only to our communities. (But neither do we attack those organizations who do accept grant money, because we recognize that a lot of important work wouldn't get done without it -- see below.)
The NPIC and Queer/Trans Politics
In the context of queer liberation, the NPIC also has a lot to do with the assimilationist bent that mainstream LGBT movements have adopted.
Not too long ago, Gay Liberationists were being led by queer people who were trans, working-class, of color, and gender non-conforming. They held as their goal the complete transformation of society. They critiqued the nuclear family, sexism, war, religion, normative masculinity/femininity, and saw themselves as allied with all liberation struggles. (For examples, read the book "Smash the Church, Smash the State: The Early Years of Gay Liberation.")
Now, our "leaders" (at the least the ones recognized by the NPIC and the corporate media) are wealthy, white, cis, homonormative men who seek only equality with their straight counterparts within the existing capitalist / patriarchal / white supremacist / cis supremacist order of things. In an effort to assimilate into straight culture and show mainstream america that they are "just like them", they are quick to distance themselves from poor trans folks of color and other marginalized queers.
Thus, we get a "movement" that has spent decades fighting for inclusion within an imperialist army. Gay Pride, once a celebration of queer and trans resistance to police brutality and state violence, now is funded by and profitable for beer companies, tourism agencies, and municipal governments. Where we once dreamed of the end of coercive gender systems, we now dream of shopping at "gay-friendly" corporations.
(By the way: The always-brilliant co-founder of the Sylvia Rivera Law Project, Dean Spade, has an interview out where he discusses, among other things, the place of nonprofit work within a critical trans politics.)
Inside the System
So how did I end up working for nonprofits? First and foremost because, like all working-class people, I need a way to make money. Given my hippie education, skillset, various marginalized identities, and where I live (DC), nonprofit work is the easiest kind of work for me to find outside of the black market and/or service economies.
Unlike porn or coffee shops, nonprofits pay living wages. (I often encounter the assumption that everyone who works for a nonprofit, especially for political ones in DC, are well-to-do "Washington Insiders" who have no idea what being poor is like. That describes a lot of DC nonprofit workers, but clearly not all. Like most people, we're just trying to get by.)
But also, I really do believe that nonprofits can achieve worthwhile goals. A lot of people depend on direct service nonprofits for basic survival tools like condoms and food. Even the policy-oriented nonprofits have achieved a lot of important changes that have tangibly improved people's lives.
Just to name one example, trans activists all across the country (including both paid and volunteer organizers) have amended laws to allow trans people to change the gender marker on our ID documents.
Will this bring about a radically different society in which all people treat each other with love and respect? No. Will it dismantle the gender binary and allow trans people to self-determine our genders without having to select from an arbitrarily imposed binary? No.
Will it help a whole lot of binary-presenting trans people live safer, more fulfilling lives where they don't constantly have to worry about being outed or fired? Yes.
Another example is the policy work I've done in DC around the incarceration of trans people. The u.s. and canadian penal systems are essentially warehousing entire marginalized populations. Reforming jail policies to ensure that trans people have access to hormone therapy and safer housing within the prison system hardly does anything to address the underlying economic inequalities that have produced our swollen prison populations. However, that certainly doesn't mean that such policies are valueless.
Although I respect the fierce anti-authoritarianism of the north american radical left, the thing I am most often frustrated by (besides the tendency toward machismo and hetereosexism throughout the anarchist milieu) is the purist attitude that we should never engage with the state. I often encounter a nearly dogmatic assumption that "revolution = good" and "reform = bad", as though these concepts are easily delineated and mutually exclusive.
I don't think this is at all helpful; reforms can help people live better lives here and now, and not merely in some hypothetical post-revolutionary future. None of us are "outside the system" anyway. If I learned anything from my college cultural studies education, it's that even our very agency and subjectivity (self-awareness) is simultaneously constructed by and constitutive of "the system."
I find myself agreeing with the concept of "non-reformist reforms" in the Points of Unity laid out by the Organization for a Free Society:
While establishing grassroots organizations and institutions capable of challenging elites for power is of the utmost importance, we must also fight together with people in their struggles to transform the conditions of their day-to-day existence within the confines of the present system. Reformists view a change within the existing social system as an end-in-itself, while revolutionaries view reform struggles as one step towards the radical transformation of our society's dominant values and governing institutions.A reform can be characterized as "non-reformist" if it:
Addresses the needs that people currently experience.
Propels the development of revolutionary consciousness.
Empowers people to continue to seek further gains.
Galvanizes people to win sought gains and simultaneously advance the encompassing broader program it is a component of.
The Politics of the Impossible
I no longer view revolution as an event, but rather as a process. This process must include people working on a variety of levels to build power, improve our lives, create alternative infrastructures of mutual aid and develop smart critiques of the dominant culture.
Lobbying to change laws is useful and important. But the really revolutionary act is bringing together a group of people who have been historically silenced, institutionally discriminated against, and culturally marginalized to speak out and demand to be heard. So many of us have internalized messages of our own weakness and irrelevance that it truly is powerful to demand any change -- even a small legislative reform.
My day job doesn't define me or the limits of my politics. I can accomplish many things both in an office and on the streets. If nothing else, having a steady paycheck (if I ever have one) will allow me to engage in other forms of political action. I tend to think that the most revolutionary work I do is emotionally supporting my housemates, lovers, friends and comrades through the difficulties of living in a world that is designed to suppress our existence.
Me taking to the streets with the pink block at Vancouver Trans Pride
I'm sure my time with the NPIC is far from over. And that's okay with me; some of the most satisfying work I've ever done has been with nonprofits.
I have to admit, on several occasions I have found myself wearing fancy clothes (that I almost certainly bought from a thrift store) and schmoozing with crowds of mostly white, wealthy, "important" people and felt extremely alienated from the work I was doing. Especially because of my age and class background, I often feel like I am looked down on in those spaces.
And anyway, my heart is with the girls on the strolls and the streets, in the high schools, lock-ups and health clinics. I'm willing to suck up to politicians and I'm happy working in office buildings. I know how to be a diplomat in order to get what is best for me and my communities; but I know where I'm most comfortable.
Reform, for me, is mostly about the opportunity to organize my community. We might get together over one small point (say, to lobby for the government to add trans people to the human rights law, or holding the police accountable after a cop beats up a trans woman). But the truly revolutionary act occurs when I can get a group of oppressed people in one place -- whether at an informal DIY potluck, a grassroots community Town Hall, in a social service clinic, or even in the halls of Congress -- to realize our common struggles and start believing that we are stronger when we act together.
But, in the meantime, I also think those of us working within reformist nonprofits need to be more aware and transparent about the limitations of our work, the histories of appropriation that gave birth to the NPIC, and our relative privileges as paid organizers. I also believe that we must actively work to rebuild coalitional, confrontational politics that are not afraid to dream for the total transformation of our world.
We must rediscover our imaginations, our truly grand visions for a new world.
The end!
* By the way, there's nothing wrong with having a family to go home to, and I don't think any of the radicals who had financial resources should feel guilty about it. I wish I had had that. The only thing I find annoying are the people who were homeless/jobless "by choice" (the folks who didn't want to work because they didn't want to be part of capitalism, or whatever) and then acted all self-righteous or judgmental toward people who did have jobs/homes. (In my experience, these people were usually white/cis/straight dudes who didn't have medical bills, transition needs, etc.)
** If you're wondering about the title: One of the speakers for NCTE's Policy Conference works at the White House, and he gave a couple of us from the office a private tour of the West Wing -- the part of the White House that most people don't get to see. I stuck my head in the Oval Office, looked at the hallway leading to the Situation Room and saw where the Beer Summit happened. (I'm not a big fan of the u.s. government, but I am a huge history buff, so I was totally thrilled and intrigued!)
And, by the way, yes I do still consider myself an anarchist. At least in the sense that I think economic/political power should be decentralized and radically democraticized. Although these days, I'm more likely to find inspiration from critical feminist, queer, trans and woman of color writers and poets. I can get into some Chomsky or Bookchin, but I'm more interested in an Audre Lorde or a Susan Stryker. And I find affinity with all oppressed communities who are struggling to improve their living conditions, regardless of how they are doing it or whether or not they are affiliated with any particular political tradition.
.
March 26, 2011
Guest Post By Grace Alexis: "Tra**ies Thrown Under The Bus", A New "FILM" by Israel Luna
If anyone has any question regarding whether Israel Luna, the producer of Ticked Off Tra**ies With Knives , has transphobic tendencies, then one should read this post.
Crossposted from
The Queen Of Media with permission.
"Tra**ies Thrown Under The Bus", A New "FILM" by Israel Luna
By Grace Alexis
Ok, here it goes, I was wrong.
I was wrong for believing that Israel Luna genuinely supported the Transsexual community.
I was wrong for believing Israel's motivation behind the film "Ticked Off Tra**ies With Knives" was to empower the Transsexual community.
I was wrong for being a sucker and putting myself on the front lines defending Israel's character and intentions.
I was wrong for dismissing legitimate concerns from rational and valued friends who objected to the content of "Ticked Off Tra**ies With Knives".
Let the chorus of a thousand Transsexuals begin;
"I TOLD YOU SO, I TOLD YOU SO, I TOLD YOU SO!"
Now that I got those painful admissions out of the way, let me start by saying; This is not written with glee. It is written with disappointment. I like Israel Luna (very much), and I still fully support the right for his movie to be seen, and voice to be heard. Hopefully this will enlighten and encourage his thoughts on the issues concerning the Transsexual Community to evolve, and in the process redeem his character in my eyes (if he even values my opinion).
Thursday afternoon as I was plotting The Queenz Of Media's future domination of the planet (go ahead and laugh), I decided to turn off Judge Judy and instead listen to Israel Luna's online radio show on RationalBroadcasting.org, called "The 10%". I listened and giggled for the first 8 minutes and 44 seconds of the show as they memorialized Elizabeth Taylor. Then the discussion took a very sharp turn to a topic about a recent lawsuit against NYC by three trans citizens: Joann Prinzivalli, Patricia Harrington, and Sam Berkly, who is a female To male Transsexual. The lawsuit is an effort to change the policy in NYC that prevents Transsexual people who have transitioned with out opting for sexual reassignment surgery to have their birth documentation changed.
(to read the full story about this law suit click the link below)
http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2011/03/22/Trans_Lawsuit_Challenges_NYC_Surgery_Requirement/
[More below the fold.]
The factual debate over this topic is legitimate, and reasonable people can disagree while maintaining their personal integrity. Unfortunately, that is not the discussion that took place between Israel Luna, and his guest hosts, John De Los Santos and Allyn Carrell. John De Los Santos is a gay ballerina and Allyn Carrell is an actress who has appeared in gay themed films. ( I used the word "ballerina" for a reason that will make sense in a moment)
Before I discuss the vulgar conversation that took place between Israel and his guests, let me lay out the rational and factual reasons behind this law suit and the need for REAL Transsexual people, like me, who don't opt for SRS to have our Identification and birth documentation changed.
This need is not an effort to "revise history" or erase our past, it is to correct history and realize our future. Despite the comments made in the video conversation above, we do not "choose" to be transsexual, just like gay men don't choose to be homosexual. There are extensive ground breaking scientific studies and preliminary results showing that Transsexualism is inherent genetically and neurologically. The following links are articles further explaining the groundbreaking research and results:
a. Oxford Journals published neurological studiesb. BBC News "Transsexual genetic link identified"
One more time. If we are born this way, we aren't revising our birth history we are correcting it.
Without this correction taking place, the ability for Transsexual women and men to become contributing members of society is greatly limited. Employment and education are the great equalizers in our society. Transsexual women are the most marginalized citizens in our country when it comes to obtaining both, and in many cases, it's because our identification and birth documentation do not line up with our visible gender. Denying these corrections will only prevent Transsexual people from realizing their future and full equality in our society. I would think this point would be common sense to most.
Yes, John De Los Santos, Transsexual people like to obtain passports and travel abroad with out being put through humiliating scrutiny, or denied access on a plane because we are told "you are not allowed to wear a disguise on an airplane". That's right, many trans people have been turned away because their required identification did not match their visible gender.
It is NOT unprecedented to have this information changed. Every state and many localities have varying policies regarding this matter. The complications surrounding this particular law suit have to do with not having surgery to alter your genitalia. Many if not most Transsexual women do not have SRS , some desire it, other's don't. The lack of surgical status does not alter our genetic predisposition nor our visible gender. It especially does not invalidate our "realness" as Transsexual women.
a. General guidelines currently used when changing your birth documentation from Andrea James' extremely informational site TSROADMAP.COM.
This is the perfect time to get into details of the ignorant, factually inaccurate, and offensive discussion that took place on Israel's show.
I ask you to please watch the video again and pay close attention to these key phrases ,and especially the expressions of the person speaking (pay close attention to Miss De Los Santos -- see the video at the top of the post).
"I don't agree with her" by John De Los santos
"I think i'm with you" by Israel Luna
"Other than what, getting a passport (snarky spitting sound) What Does It Matter?" by John De Los Santos
"No matter what kind of surgeries she's had, no matter what she wears, or who she's in a relationship with, You used to be a MAN, you were born a MAN. by John De Los Santos
"Sorry Charlie, I don't agree with that" by John De los Santos
"I don't think she'll win that though" by John De Los Santos
"You'd like to think she wouldn't" by Allyn Carrell
*sound of disgust* by John De Los Santos
"I don"t know her situation, IT REALLY DOESN'T MATTER, I don't agree with that" by John De Los Santos *blank stare* by me.
"Snowballing into a lot of other stuff" by John De Los Santos (interesting choice of words)
"We're getting to be a LITTLE more open minded to these transgender issues" by Israel Luna (thanks for being a little more open minded)
"silliness" by Allyn Carrell
"she needs to get over it, she needs to get over it" by John De Los Santos
"She lives in a country where she can have her sex change, and be legally recognized as the sex she CHOOSES, and live the life she CHOOSES, THAT'S ENOUGH".
"Right" by Israel Luna
"I can't say that's enough because I'm Not fighting for it, but that's Ridiculous" by John De Los Santos
"She hasn't technically had the surgery yet" by Israel luna (notice John De Los Santos extraordinary look of disgust)
"She sees her self as a woman" by Israel Luna
"Well She's Crazy,(laughter) Sorry that's NUTTY," by John De Los Santos (notice a pattern here)
"Obscene" by the producer off camera comparing our life to the lies and distortions of George W. Bush. *blank stare*
"She isn't even a true Transgender yet" by the one and only John De Los Santos.
Most if not all of the above quotes from the video discussion have been and are currently being used against the Gay community to marginalize them and prevent them from gaining equality in this country, where you can legally have sex and "snowball" semen or vaginal fluid with someone of the same sex. Now Israel Luna, a member of that marginalized gay community, has co-opted those ignorant talking points to marginalize the Transsexual community.
I ask, isn't that enough? What more do you want? Now you want to get married? This could potentially SNOWBALL into incestuous marriages and the legalization of pedophilia. You're not a real man! You have a swish, a lisp, you wear tights and a tutu as you pirouette and plie' across a stage. One more time, WHAT MORE DO YOU WANT...GET OVER IT.
Get my drift?
Note from Autumn: A comment left for the original blog entry by Israel Luna:
Hi, Grace...thank you for listening to the show and blogging about what you heard. My show is about different opinions and in this one, I had a different one from you and others have.I feel that a transperson changing their identification (id, license, passport, etc.) is a must to do. It helps with job interviews, those embarrassing harassments in airport lines, but most importantly it shows the sex you feel you are inside...but to me, a birth certificate is an official document issued to record someone's birth. If someone is born a certain sex and the certificate states that, then that's what happened.
If you later in life decide to physically change your sex to match your inner being, then that's wonderful...but that doesn't change the biological sex you were born.
Thanks for listening to my show. I'd love to have you on and discuss it! Let me know, thanks!
israel luna
NC: right wing poll misleads about content of anti-LGBT constitutional amendment
A right-wing think tank today released a new poll that uses misleading language to falsely inflate support for Senate Bill 106, the proposed anti-LGBT constitutional amendment. According to the poll by the Civitas Institute, a purported "large majority" of North Carolina voters support holding a vote to rewrite our state constitution and define marriage as only between a man and a woman. However, the poll carefully avoids telling voters that this type of discriminatory revision to our state's most fundamental document would also ban civll union and domestic partnership, recognition which most North Carolina voters clearly support.The Civitas Institute says it polled 600 general election voters in North Carolina using the following question:
"The North Carolina legislature is considering a bill that would allow North Carolina voters to vote on amending the state constitution to say marriage is only between a man and a woman. Do you support or oppose allowing North Carolina voters to vote on this constitutional amendment?"
This deceiving query neglects many of the amendment's most egregious harms, including much of what makes this proposed constitutional revision the most extreme version of an anti-LGBT amendment, including:
not only limiting marriage to opposite sex couples, as state
statute already does, but also prohibiting any other form of relationship
recognition, such as civil union or domestic partnership--forms of recognition that a majority of North Carolinians clearly support;
potentially taking away private benefits such as health insurance for LGBT couples, unmarried opposite-sex couples, and their children and challenging private contracts between couples; and
writing bigotry and discrimination into our state's founding document, and, with the same stroke, removing the rights and responsibilities that are currently available to some couples.
"Besides misleading voters, the very premise of this Civitas poll is wrong," said Ian Palmquist, Equality North Carolina's Executive Director. "It is always wrong to put the civil rights of a minority up for a popular vote. The reason we have a constitution is to protect the rights of all citizens, not to take them away."
Click here for more information about the proposed anti-LGBT constitutional amendment
TAKE ACTION NOW: Join other fair-minded North Carolinians who believe basic rights are not up for vote!Join Us on the EQUALITY IN ACTION Tour.
Following the success of our Winston-Salem, Durham and Charlotte events, Equality North Carolina invites you to get informed and involved through a series of statewide town hall meetings devoted to discussing the proposed anti-LGBT constitutional amendment. Upcoming stops on the tour include Greenville, Raleigh, Wilmington and Asheville. Supporters who cannot attend a local stop on the EQUALITY IN ACTION Tour can follow the @equalitync action on Twitter at the hashtag: #equalityaction.
Saturday night open thread - share a childhood photo
[image error] 
Mr. C is on the left; he's about six weeks old now. Mr E is three and has an enormous vocabulary for a kid his age. Tim and I were also big conversationalists and early readers (before kindergarten). E is already reading simple things.
The difference I noticed right away is that the brothers don't look alike at all. Mr. C has straight brown hair and features like his mom; Mr. E, as you can see in the photo on the right, has blond curly hair and looks a lot like Tim as a child. The color is from me (no blonds on Miranda's side), and the loose curls from Tim. My blond hair was always much kinkier, and around 6 turned brown. Tim's hair departed when he was in his 20s, and just went chrome dome after that.
Anyone have some pics of themselves that they are willing to share? I'll go first, lol....
[image error]
With my brother Tim, 1974, in Hollis, Queens, NY.
My hair was braided so tight to hold back the kink that the braids stood out from my head as you can see in the pic. My poor mom, who had straight hair, didn't know what to do with it other than tie it down/constrain it in some form or fashion.
Former VP candidate Geraldine Ferraro passes at the age of 75
Geraldine A. Ferraro, the savvy New York Democrat who was embraced as a symbol of women's equality in 1984 when she became the first woman nominated for vice president by a major party, died Saturday at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. She was 75.The lightning rod status refers to her comments during the 2008 campaign in support of Clinton. She said Obama had an advantage because of his race, and said:Ferraro was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, an incurable form of blood cancer, in 1998. She did not disclose her illness publicly until 2001, when she went on NBC-TV's "Today" show and said she had beaten the cancer into remission with thalidomide, the once-banned drug that had proven effective with some end-stage cancers. The cancer recurred, but she again went into remission after therapy with a new drug.
Initially told that she had three to five years to live, she survived for more than 12 years, long enough to witness the historic candidacy of another woman, Hillary Rodham Clinton, the former first lady and current secretary of State.
"Sexism is a bigger problem" than racism in the United States, Ferraro told the Daily Breeze in the March 2008 story that made her a liability for the Clinton campaign. "It's OK to be sexist in some people's minds. It's not OK to be racist."In my personal experience only, dealing with race has been more difficult than sexism, though everyone's mileage may vary. The bottom line is that it's still a man's world, and down south a good old boys network that has to be navigated, so politics is still seen as a man's game to play.
Statement from the White House:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASEMarch 26, 2011
Statement by the President on the Passing of Geraldine Ferraro
Michelle and I were saddened to learn about the passing of Geraldine Ferraro. Geraldine will forever be remembered as a trailblazer who broke down barriers for women, and Americans of all backgrounds and walks of life. Whether it was as a public school teacher, assistant district attorney, Member of Congress, or candidate for Vice President, Geraldine fought to uphold America's founding ideals of equality, justice, and opportunity for all. And as our Ambassador to the UN Human Rights Commission, she stood up for those ideals around the world. Sasha and Malia will grow up in a more equal America because of the life Geraldine Ferraro chose to live. Our thoughts and prayers go out to her husband, John Zaccaro, her children and grandchildren, and their entire family.
Maryland's gender anti-discrimination bill passes House, 86 to 52
Equality Maryland is asking bill supporters to keep the momentum going by contacting their Senator and asking them to vote 'yes' on HB 235. Press release below the fold.
Update: EQMD has posted the "yes" votes here.
EQUALITY MARYLAND CELEBRATES HOUSE PASSAGE OF GENDER IDENTITY BILL
Equality Maryland celebrates getting one step closer to securing job and housing protections for the Transgender community.
ANNAPOLIS, MD, March 26, 2011 - Today the Maryland House voted 86-52 to pass HB 235, the Gender Identity Anti-Discrimination Act, legislation that would end discrimination in employment, housing and credit for Transgender Marylanders.
A report put out in February 2011 by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and the National Center for Transgender Equality found that 1 in 5 transgender people in Maryland have lost a job due to discrimination and 12% have become homeless.
Advocates emphasize that this law is a matter of life-or-death for some Marylanders and call on supporters to help secure passage this year.
Equality Maryland, along with members of the House of Delegates, and the LGBT Caucus, celebrate this victory and acknowledge the work ahead.
Del. Joseline Pena-Melynk (D-21), Lead Sponsor:
"Every Marylander should expect to work or live in comfortable housing without fear of losing either because of who they are. HB 235 provides the protection necessary to make sure that every Marylander can live without fear of discrimination."
Del. Ariana Kelly, (D-16), Lead Sponsor:
"Transgender Marylanders face profound and often crippling discrimination in housing and employment. This bill [HB 235] is an important step towards mitigating this unjust discrimination. It will improve people's lives, and it is clearly the right thing to do."
Morgan Meneses-Sheets, Executive Director of Equality Maryland
"Today we thank Delegates Pena-Melynk and Kelly for their tremendous leadership. We are proud of the 86 Delegates who stood up for fairness today by voting to support HB 235. All hardworking people in our state, should have a chance to earn a living and provide for themselves and their families. Nobody should have to live in fear that they can be legally fired for reasons that have nothing to do with their job skills or work performance. There is still work to do, but today, we're one step closer in seeing all transgender Marylanders are treated fairly under the law.
Discrimination in jobs and housing happens a lot in Maryland and it's time we put a stop to it. Data shows that 1 in 5 transgender people in Maryland have lost a job due to discrimination and 12% have become homeless. This law is a matter of life-or-death for some Marylanders. We look to the Senate now, where we will work with proven champions Senator Jamie Raskin and Senator Rich Madaleno to see this bill through to a swift and successful passage."
LGBT Caucus members:
Del. Anne Kaiser (D-14):
"This bill will provide all Maryland citizens with the legal protections they deserve and it will also help end a lifetime of discrimination for LGBT individuals in Maryland. This bill allows transgender and transsexual individuals many of the same opportunities of growth and access to, housing and employment opportunities that are available to any other Marylander."
Del. Bonnie Cullison (D-19):
"In the committee, transgender individuals gave poignant and disturbing stories of discrimination and abuse they have experienced. This is the year to 'listen with our hearts' as one mother said and give these wonderful friends, family, and colleagues protection against further abuses in housing, employment and credit by passing HB 235."
Del. Luke Clippinger (D-46):
"Transgender citizens of Maryland have had to suffer discrimination in the realms of employment and housing for far too long. In Baltimore City, we are lucky to have an ordinance that was passed by former Mayor Martin O'Malley in 2002 that prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender identity. All transgender Marylanders, not just those living in Baltimore City, should have the same protections against discrimination."
Del. Maggie McIntosh (D-43):
"Ten years ago when anti-discrimination legislation passed the General Assembly, the transgender community was omitted from anti-discrimination protections in housing, employment, and credit. HB235 must pass to correct the wrong made 10 years ago. I am a strong supporter of HB 235 and will vote for its passage."
Del. Heather Mizeur (D-20):
"Our transgender brothers and sisters deserve every protection under the law, and that's why we're standing up and fighting for HB235. Businesses need the very best workers and landlords need the very best tenants - regardless of the employee or renter's gender identity. This bill will be a big step toward the day when transgender Marylanders can live their truth without fear of unemployment, underemployment, or homelessness."
Del. Peter Murphy (D-28):
"I will continue to support protecting and advancing civil rights for all Marylanders. Surveys show up to 68% of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender individuals have experienced discrimination in the workplace. Maryland should band together and say, 'enough'.
It's important to realize that federal housing laws do not protect individuals against discrimination based sexual orientation or gender identity. Maryland needs to join the 12 other states across the country that offers these protections. We have an opportunity to do that this legislative session with HB 235. This bill is a strong effort to move us in that direction."
Del. Mary Washington (D-43):
"These protections provided by HB235, would afford some of our most vulnerable members of our society some measure of much needed protections - protections that sometimes can be the difference between employment and poverty and shelter and homelessness. Maryland's laws against discrimination are intended to promote fundamental values underlay our political system - personal liberty, tolerance of diverse backgrounds and points of view, and respect for privacy and individual liberty...this legislation is absolutely needed to make it clear that discrimination is never acceptable."
NC: Newt pollution in the Triangle
"We need a president who would like to be president!" Gingrich said.Um, no we don't, Newt. One of the prospective GOP candidates for governor, former Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory (R), has presented himself in a pro-business, faux moderate mask. But make no mistake, he's anti-gay.And you get the sense from Gingrich he believes he's the person.
More than 900 Wake County GOP members hung on his every word, offering standing ovations while he blasted President Barack Obama.
Locally Gingrich asserted North Carolina needed a new governor, a Republican governor.
He also said the Tar Heel State is valuable to the next Republican presidential nominee, which he may hope to become.
McCrory supports adding a ban on gay marriage to the state constitution, the pet idea of several evangelical Christian groups. Perdue, like most of the state's Democratic leadership, opposes the amendment, saying the state law against gay marriage makes an amendment unnecessary.Back in 2005, then-Mayor McCrory showed his true colors in a craptastic, juvenile way. He wouldn't even write a letter of welcome to the 1,300 attendees of the HRC Carolinas dinner. Pat McCrory must have been afraid that he'd "catch teh gay" if he positively acknowledged they were spending gay dollars in his city.
The event marked the group's first trip to the area, but members say they did not receive the warm welcome they were looking for."You can welcome and embrace someone and you don't have to see eye to eye on all the issues," said HRC member Joni Madison. Charlotte lawyer Phil Wells says he requested a letter of welcome from the mayor's office - a common occurrence for convention attendees. Wells was hoping Mayor McCrory would write a couple welcoming sentiments. He was disappointed by the lack of response.
..."Here were a great number of people coming into this great city and spending money and wanting to see the best side of Charlotte, and all he had to do was say, 'Welcome to our great city and he missed that opportunity,'" Wells said.
..."I think he's pandering to what he thinks his constituents believe and it's shameful," Mitchell Gold said. Mayor Pro Tem Patrick Cannon says the mayor's office gets approximately 200 requests for welcoming letters every year. McCrory did not comment on the issue.
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