Questioning Transphobia

To mark this year’s International Day against Homophobia and Transphobia, the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA-Europe) has published its Rainbow Europe Map and Index in which it rates each European country’s laws and administrative practices according to 24 categories and ranks them on a scale between 17 (highest score: respect of human rights and full legal equality of LGBT people) and -7 (lowest score: gross violations of human rights and discrimination of LGBT people).

While the publication of this kind of research is broadly to be welcomed, and as eye-catching as the rainbow map is, it may be considered problematic in its conflation of LGB and TS/TG issues. As Justus Eisfeld (co-director GATE – Global Action for Trans* Equality) points out:

There are 5 possible positive points to be gained for gender identity issues vs. 13 possible points in the sexual orientation categories (I counted freedom of assembly and freedom of association under sexual orientation because trans groups generally have not had the organizational capacity to even run into issues in this category yet). The negative points are similarly unequally spread: two possible negative points for gender identity (two negative points are mutually exclusive, I therefore counted them as one) and four for sexual orientation. This means that a country that scores well for sexual orientation will automatically be in the ‘best’ group, no matter what their human rights record is for trans people.

In the light of this, the separate indexes for gender identity and sexual orientation may perhaps be of more use.

Note that intersections of race, class, disability, etc, are not mentioned in the report; nor is it recorded whether subjects are binary or non-binary identified. It should also be remembered that some TS/TG people are also LGB, and vice versa. Last but by no means least, it should be noted that – as is so often the case with research of this nature – the situation of intersex people seems to have been entirely ignored.

Click the thumbnail image above for full-size PDF

By way of a counterpoint, Trans Murder Monitoring has launched an interactive map for IDAHOT 2011. The new interactive map for the first time visualises the 604 reported murders of trans people that the Trans Murder Monitoring (TMM) project has documented since January 2008. The interactive TMM map can be accessed on the TvT website here.

In the first four and a half months of 2011, 55 reported murders of trans people have been registered in 19 countries. While the actual circumstances of the killings often remain obscure, due to a lack of investigations and reports, many of the documented cases involve extreme aggression, including torture and mutilation.

Click the thumbnail image above to visit the interaactive map at the TMM website

Although it may seem that sexual orientation and gender identity is less of an issue it becomes clear that homophobia and transphobia exists, and may be increasing, in many places. If today’s International Day against Homophobia and Transphobia serves one purpose, it is to raise awareness regarding the ongoing discrimination and violence committed by states, societies and individuals against lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and queer people on various scales, from homophobic and transphobic legislations and forms of state repression to hate crimes including insults, attacks and murders.

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The ILGA Rainbow Europe Map may be downloaded as two PDF files from here (map) and here (index).

Separate indexes for sexual orientation and gender identity may be downloaded here (gender identity) and here (sexual orientation).

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Thanks to Juris Lavrikovs and Silvan Agius (ILGA-Europe), Justus Eisfeld (co-director GATE – Global Action for Trans* Equality) and Carla LaGata (Research and Coordination, TvT project)

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Cross-posted at Bird of Paradox

A couple of posts by Gemma Seymour on the tumblrs:

The first one  is The Continuing Erasure of Trans Women: The Murder of Victoria Carmen White and the Suicide of Tyler Clementi:

WARNING: What I have to say here may seriously piss you off, so don’t say I didn’t warn you. This post is intentionally designed to be extremely inflammatory.

As I’m sure most everyone has heard, this past week, a young man by the name of Tyler Clementi, who was an 18-year-old freshman student at Rutgers University in New Jersey, committed suicide by jumping from the George Washington Bridge after his roommate publicized Clementi’s sexual relationship with another man. The sordid details of this event have been widespread and do not need repetition. This is a terrible tragedy that absolutely deserves the coverage it has received.

What has gone largely unnoticed, however, is that two weeks prior to Clementi’s suicide, a young woman by the name of Victoria Carmen White, who was a 28-year-old fashion model and by all available accounts a wonderful person, was murdered in Maplewood, NJ, not 30 miles away from Clementi’s family home in Ridgewood, NJ.

I found out about Tyler Clementi through a Facebook post by Garden State Equality. Garden State Equality’s Facebook page, as of this afternoon, contains five official posts related to Tyler’s death, while it contains not a single mention of Victoria Carmen White. GSE has released an official press release about Clementi’s suicide, while they remain utterly silent about White’s murder, this despite the fact that White’s murder took place only two weeks prior to GSE’s highly publicized “Equality Walk” in Maplewood (evidence of which is no longer available at the GSE website).

While Garden State Equality quoted on their Facebook page from a Star-Ledger editorial published October 1 concerning Tyler Clementi’s suicide, the Star-Ledger’s editorial board says nothing about Victoria Carmen White’s murder, despite the fact that the Star-Ledger, a respected local New Jersey newspaper, seems to be one of the only mainstream news outlets that ever covered her murder in the first place.

The rest is at the link.

The second is Garden State Equality responds:

This morning, I received three emails via Facebook from Steven Goldstein, chairperson of Garden State Equality, in response to my criticism of their silence concerning the murder of Victoria Carmen White as opposed to their vast publicization and outrage over the suicide of Tyler Clementi.

I hope all is well. Where were we when someone transgender was murdered in Maplewood? Last month, we took to the streets in Maplewood and marched through town, and are working with public officials across the town and county. Where were we when an African-American LGBT person was killed in an Essex County park, probably 15 minutes from Maplewood, this summer? We, along with wonderful LGBT community leaders in Newark, met with public officials, and we are all developing a task force on LGBT issues, including safety issues. We also used our lawyers to get documents that shed light on the problem of police violence against LGBT people and are preparing further action. Where we were when African-American LGBT young women Sakia Gunn and Shani Baraka were murdered? We marched in several of the walks and rallies. Where were we on so many other cases of discrimination involving LGBT people of every gender, gender identity, race and heritage? We were there either leading the way or helping to lead the way with many other fine organizations. With regard to our record on transgender rights, by the way, Garden State Equality led the campaign get the legislature to enact the country’s most sweeping, progressive laws on discrimination against transgender people and to toughen sentences against those who commit hate crimes against transgender people.
I’m sorry your message was deleted from our Facebook page – many volunteers help us run that page – because I would have liked to respond there. Because when you say you will not be silenced, neither will we when criticism is wrong.

Steven Goldstein
Chair, Garden State Equality

Dear Mr. Goldstein:

Thank you for taking the time to respond. Before I continue here, I would like to point out that I consider it disrespectful of Victoria Carmen White, and of trans people in general, that you fail to acknowledge her by name, let alone your usage of the problematic terminology, “someone transgender”. There are many, many resources publicly available to you regarding the respectful reference to human beings who happen to be gender variant. I suggest you avail yourself of some.

Against, the remainder at link.

Now, I cannot disagree strongly enough with the statement in Gemma’s post Tyler chose his fate. I feel this sentence minimizes suicide significantly. I do think it is a fair point that trans women’s murders and suicides are hugely neglected while cis gay men’s deaths are kept front and center (and some trans women are redefined and misappropriated as cis gay men), but I think she makes several good points.

A couple of news stories that I’ve read about today:

Tea Party president jokes about murdering LGBTQ people:

The President of the Montana Big Sky Tea Party, Tim Ravndall, thinks it’s funny to joke about murdering gays.

A Facebook exchange:

Dennis Scranton: “I think fruits are decorative. Hang up where they can be seen and appreciated. Call Wyoming for display instructions.”

Tim Ravndal: “@Kieth, OOPS I forgot this aint(sic) America no more! @ Dennis, Where can I get that Wyoming printed instruction manual?”

(A reference to the torture and murder of Matthew Shepard in Wyoming  in 1998). Randval has apologized. But the organization has not yet met demands to remove himl from office.

Now, this is obviously a reference to Matthew Shepard and a direct reference to homophobic hate crimes, but trans women are also frequently targeted for this kind of hate crime. I doubt they’d stop to make the distinction.

Group backing Sally Kern calls calls her transgender opponent Brittany Novotny ‘a confused it‘:

A political action committee that supports Oklahoma State Rep. Sally Kern sent an e-mail to members this week calling Kern’s transgender opponent, Democrat Brittany Novotny, “a confused it.” The e-mail from the Oklahoma Conservative Political Action Committee, posted on Novotny’s website on Thursday, goes on to say that “Some have suggested that having a sex change operation is a person’s greatest act of rebellion and hatred toward God for His making them what they were.”

“It is truly sad to see people reject God’s love for them by being willing to mutilate themselves,” the OCPAC e-mail states. “If they would submit their life to God, they could find the true the joy in life that will forever elude them while on their path of rebellion. The hatred and rage toward Sally continues unabated in the homosexual community because Sally dared to declare their political agenda for what it truly is, more dangerous to the future of America than the threat of terrorism.”

This isn’t simply a matter of trying to defeat a political opponent, this is about annihilating not just her credibility, but her humanity. This is about presenting her as being in a fallen state, outside the grace of God and doomed to Hell. This is undiluted hatred, of the kind that breeds violence.

I hope these tactics fail, that they’re a step too far, but I suspect a lot of cis people will empathize with them.

Both of these stories relate to a larger topic I want to talk about: That the Religious Right in the United States is not interested in accommodation, acceptance, or tolerance. They have made their position clear over and over again. I do not necessarily mean the people who make up the members of the various Christian sects that compose the religious right, I mean the leadership. Look to Focus on the Family’s tactics, attacking LGBT rights in every part of the country that they appear, backing local activist organizations such as “NotMyShowers” a year or so ago, or proposition 8 in California.

But the US religious right is also doing things like going to Uganda to preach hatred of LGBT people:

KAMPALA, Uganda — Last March, three American evangelical Christians, whose teachings about “curing” homosexuals have been widely discredited in the United States, arrived here in Uganda’s capital to give a series of talks.

The theme of the event, according to Stephen Langa, its Ugandan organizer, was “the gay agenda — that whole hidden and dark agenda” — and the threat homosexuals posed to Bible-based values and the traditional African family.

For three days, according to participants and audio recordings, thousands of Ugandans, including police officers, teachers and national politicians, listened raptly to the Americans, who were presented as experts on homosexuality. The visitors discussed how to make gay people straight, how gay men often sodomized teenage boys and how “the gay movement is an evil institution” whose goal is “to defeat the marriage-based society and replace it with a culture of sexual promiscuity.”

Now the three Americans are finding themselves on the defensive, saying they had no intention of helping stoke the kind of anger that could lead to what came next: a bill to impose a death sentence for homosexual behavior.

They go to another country and spend three days preaching hatred and describing a group of human beings as evil and sexual predators just for who they are and the people there who were already sympathetic to these arguments are pushing for the death penalty for being gay, lesbian, or bisexual? No one has the right to act fucking surprised by this turn of events. They blatantly exposed their homosexual agenda.

The anti-LGBTQ activism all over the US is basically about keeping us out of work, out of restrooms, out of the public sphere. Hide who we are, never transition, never openly love who we love. When little light wrote The Sky is Falling she said exactly what this is. We are being marked as in intractably evil enemy, an enemy who hates God, who supposedly tempts children into our sinful so-called “lifestyles,” who are positioned as sexual predators and dangers to cis straight women and children. They try to keep information about us out of schools and generally out of the hands of children, despite the fact that LGBTQ teens have a high suicide rate and are more frequently bullied than cis and straight children and teens. They oppose anti-bullying measures. They do not care that this causes deaths, that this sometimes (much less often than before) drives us into hiding because we don’t learn how to cope and can’t find community. They don’t want us to exist at all. If we have to exist, we should accept their “cures” and become cis and straight.

This is, flat out, eliminationism. Cultural genocide. This is pure hatred. We aren’t the only ones targeted, but we are targeted politically, socially, and legally.

Sparkindarkness has a post listing some of the horrors that have happened recently.

Depressing line up of violence and pain

These lists and links are always depressing – the more so because I know they’re only the tip of the iceberg – not a fraction of what is reported and in turn that only a fraction of the violence that happened – and continues to happen – every day.

A man in Florida has a killed his lesbian daughter’s girlfriend. Friends of the daughter have said that he hated that he did it because he didn’t like lesbians. I cannot even begin to contemplate the pain of this or the hate that would drive ytou to do such a thing.

I should be beyond  being shocked by homophobiuc violence by now, but this chilled me. the mayor of Paris has claimed that the killing of 2 men – by burying them alive – was an example of a homophobic hate crime. Buried alive? My mind refuses to go there, absolutely not.

In Scotland, openly gay teenager Jack Frew has been stabbed to death A 16 year old…

In Ipswich, UK, Rodney Greenland explains to us that he stabbed Simon Amers to death because Simon Amers touched him. The gay panic defence, again aired in the court room.

Neil McMillan is now on trial for the murder of trans woman Andrea Waddell

These are just some of the instances listed there. Go look.

Article here:

Bita Ghaedi is an Iranian UK-based asylum seeker. On May 5th she will be dragged back against her will into a brutal regime and family situation that will very likely lead to her murder.She is at very high risk from an honour killing because she fled an unhappy marriage with a lover. Bita’s links with the People’s Mujahedin of Iran (PMOI) also put her at even more risk if she is deported. Supporters of the PMOI are punishable by death according to the current Iranian regime.

To underestimate danger of being deported to Iran under these circumstances, and the risk of  being targeted by an honour-crime, would be a fatal mistake. However this mistake has been made many times before in the UK, including cases where police did not believe women who came to them with strong reason to believe their family would murder them for so-called honour. When the women’s dead bodies were eventually found, the police were ashamed.

Bita Ghaedi endured beatings and mental torture at the hands of her family. There is no reason to deny her asylum claim, but the British government has refused her case.

What the British government are doing to Bita is illegal according to UN guidelines.

She has four days before the British government send her back to Iran, where she will most likely face the death penalty.

This isn’t the first case like this recently, although Fatime’s situation was based on a mismatch between documentation and the realities of her life. At least Fatime’s deportation was delayed (as far as I can tell), even though it even became an issue because her passport didn’t (in the authority’s eyes) match who she was.

Via IDAHO:

Each year, the International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (the “IDAHO”, as it is usually called), will see actions and initiatives take place in many countries and contexts and on many different issues.

All these activities and initiatives are a very strong signal to all, decisions makers, public opinion, civil rights movements, human rights defenders, etc. throughout the world that our fights for our Rights as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, transsexual, queer, intersex, etc… is vibrant!

The Day provides all different kind of actors with a very powerful opportunity to express their demands and to advocate for their case. Each year also, the IDAHO aims at using the extra public, political and media attention that it provides at all levels to highlight one specific aspect of the struggle for sexual rights.

This year, we chose to highlight the often neglected but important issue of Transphobia.

Read the Appeal in English (PDF)

SIGN THE APPEAL

See the list of personalities already supporting the Appeal (PDF)

See the list of organisations that already support the Appeal (PDF)

Read our full media briefing (Word document)

Read our Media Release (PDF)

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Cross-posted at Bird of Paradox

Sokari at Black Looks has posted a paper by Audrey Mbugua called Human Rights Violations on Kenya’s Transgender Community.

It’s a solidly-researched and impassioned piece which includes a request by the Kenyan TS&TG community to the government there to make suitable provisions in the New Constitution. I recommend reading the whole thing, but here are a couple of quotes that particularly struck me.

Because of the conflation of transgenderism and homosexuality, the common fallacies that come out when we look into the history of “transgender hate” oppression is that it’s mostly labeled as “gay hate” oppression. But, on a closer look, a vast majority of these “gay hate” crimes are actually atrocities done on Kenya’s transgender community.

Transgendered people in Kenya have always been part of the Kenyan society since time immemorial. Transgenderism and transsexualism like homosexuality are a source of great phobia in our society. Although the Kenyan Constitution does not criminalize transsexualism and transgenderism, there are both institutionalized and non-institutionalize forms of discrimination pervading in Kenya.

When we don’t raise our voice against these thoughtless acts of human degradation, we knowingly allow perpetual oppression of transgender individuals.

While you cannot force people to love you, you have the right to be treated with dignity and respect by those around you irrespective of any condition you might find yourself in.

Link: Human Rights Violations on Kenya’s Transgender Community

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(Cross-posted at Bird of Paradox)

It looks like HBS advocates want to join transphobic radical feminists in accusing the so-called “transgender movement” of ruining things for everyone else.

It really helps to read some of the HBS writings to see where they’re coming from with regards to transsexualism and transgenderism. It also helps to read some quotations from actual online discussions. Yes, Drakyn does refer to some HBS advocates as bigots, but look at what they write about transgenderism in general, as well as those who continue to identify as transsexual:

Many of course will continue to see our condition as being transsexualism and many others, for whatever their reasons, will list transsexualism as a sub-set of transgender. Of course that is not correct and never was but for some they found comfort in not being linked to any term with ‘sex’ in it. Now they, those with true HBS, have no reason to make any claim but that they were born with the syndrome. We ask that a competent psychiatrist or therapist dealing with the condition to make a reasonable confirmation that the patient has Harry Benjamin Syndrome. It should not simply be a claim made by someone that they suffer from HBS as has often been done in the past with transsexualism. It should be a verifiable medical condition as is the proper procedure with almost all physical maladies. 

Of course there will be some who will continue to use transsexualism and transgenderism to cover and mask what they really might be, sexual fetishists, sex merchants, exhibitionist, cross-dressers, delusional transvestites who ‘go the extra step’ and opt to have a ‘sex change’ so as to enhance their fetishism. They wish to mimic women but do not have the inborn need to be women physically reflective of the brain. Many call themselves lifelong pre-ops and even non-ops and never desire the affirmation surgery. To refer to them as having HBS is not only a misnomer but also an insult to those who actually have the syndrome and to those who have had corrective surgery that affirmed their body to their brains.

HBS advocacy is also tied up in some degree of heterosexism:

Harry Benjamin Syndrome is not in any way connected to sexual orientation nor should it be ever be compared to any deviance. It is a medical anomaly that often is compared to other conditions wrongly thereby causing great stress upon those with the syndrome being put into categories in which they do not and should not be placed. Those with HBS do not change gender and do not suffer from what had been commonly classified as transsexualism. Their brain gender at birth was not in need of correction even if that were possible. And, in reality, those born with HBS do not need to trans their sex since the brain sex was already set and only the genital sex needed correction so as to be affirmed with the brain.

Of course, this stuff is pretty tame as compared to a particular HBS-oriented blog. For example, the blog author sought to criticize a two-part article I wrote back in November:

Recently, while surfing the web I came across a blog in which the author posted a treatise entitled Sex, Lies, Transmisogyny, and the Heteronormativity of BDSM, pt 2.  It was placed by the writer under her following blog categories: BDSM,  MWMF,  Oppression Olympics,  anti-transgender feminism,  feminism,  horizontal oppression,  lesbian,  transmisogyny,  transphobia, and  transsexual. 

Yeah…that’s what I thought too.

Having no interest whatsoever in reading what is clearly psuedointellectual rubbish, to put it kindly, I did find myself wondering what type of person would read something so contrived and meaningless.  Skimming to the bottom of the page, I found to my surprise there were no less than 32 comments by readers who evidently did find the epic worth the effort.  I also found out who might be interested.

The author dismisses the article on the basis of the title (based on the article I was fisking, “Sex, Lies, and Feminism” from the Questioning Transgender Politics website) and the tags and categories I used. A casual reading of “Enough Non-Sense” shows that many of the posts show little more thought than this – aimed as they are at attacking the “transgender movement,” delegitimizing it, and presenting it as a pack of pretenders, deviants, and perverts. Read the comments in the above quoted post, where several HBS advocates blame the LGBT movement for society viewing trans women as invalid women:

You are absolutely right when you say that men often leave HBS (Harry Benjamin Syndrome) women “because heterosexual society teaches him that transsexual women aren’t real women, and that being one makes him somehow gay.” I really don’t think anyone would argue that point.

However, though it’s not because the very vast majority of transgender activist use big words, it is because of what they say and their political position. And, I think many people would argue that.

It is all but impossible to find a transgender activist blog or web site that does not make it perfectly clear they fully support the GLB and the associated T. And THE issue is that association of the GLB with the T. It is that association that teaches, to use your term, the heterosexual mainstream.

Of course, looking at the quote in Drakyn’s blog post about “HBS bigots,” you can see an HBS advocate basically laying the blame for any discrimination or bigotry that trans people face at those trans people’s feet – it’s not because society really views trans people as invalid in our proper gender, it’s because we bring it upon ourselves. Transphobia and transmisogyny apparently didn’t exist prior to adding the T to LGBT.

But read the posts on “Enough Non-Sense” and see what HBS advocates bring to the table, and then read Cathryn’s lament on why there’s so much friction between HBS advocates and those of us who do not identify as HBS. For my part, I have little sympathy for HBS advocates because their definitions are restrictive and often bigoted. I have seen HBS advocates describe trans women who have not had surgery as “penis people,” and similar dehumanizing terms. They play gender gatekeepers, trying to establish a “trans hierarchy,” with them at the top as the only legitimate “women.” They insist that any true trans person (defined as HBS) will be able to pay for every aspect of transition – hormones, psychiatrist, surgery, electrolysis, etc – without any serious trouble, and those who cannot are simply not genuine.

Do I hate them? No, but I view them as categorically wrong and selfish. Uninformed and strangely unaware of the realities of living as a trans person, especially a trans person of color, or with low income, or with health issues that make surgery risky. Their viewpoint is black and white: You’re either exactly like them, or you’re a cross-dressing pervert.

And, of course, they’ve provided Heart with inspiration to yet again blog about how horrible trans people are. As is usual, Heart is quick to agree with anyone who is willing to say horrible things about trans people.*

Heart makes it clear she doesn’t even understand the debate she’s trying to comment on:

Evidently the objections of post-op transwomen are resulting in the kinds of no-holds-barred attacks from non-op transpersons (who never intend to “op” nor even live as women most of the time) with which some of us are all too familiar.  I mean, what’s wrong with you. 

Ignoring the fact that I absolutely loathe “non-op.” “post-op” and “pre-op” because of what they mean (“This is what my crotch looks like”), Heart simply assumes that Cathryn’s characterization is correct – that all trans people who disagree with HBS advocacy are automatically men who wear dresses and nothing more – no hormones, no surgery, and apparently no men who were born female-bodied. This is remarkably convenient for her to believe, since it lets her rush into bathroom panic scenarios, and discussion about how trans women are not and can never really be women like cis women are:

Being a woman is about being mistreated by patriarchy because of our female bodies.    That mistreatment — in whatever its form — is what female persons know and share as women.  It’s what those who have not lived as female persons and women do not know and so they dismiss what we, as women, say about our lives, our realities, our fears, what we need.  Sometimes they don’t just dismiss, they steamroll over us, and so far, there has been little we could do about that.

This paragraph is ironic because Heart talks about trans women dismissing and sometimes steamrollering over her. This is the same cis woman who implied another blogger was guilty of plagiarism because said blogger used goddess imagery and is a trans woman, and who would not allow this blogger to respond on womensspace. She also aggressively moderates her blog to keep dissenting viewpoints to a minimum, and has been known to aggressively edit some of those dissenting viewpoints.

In my opinion, Heart presumes too much. She believes that it is impossible for trans women to understand womanhood, but is also more than willing to describe every aspect of a trans woman’s experience – this is a contradiction, but one inherent to privilege. It’s normal for people with white privilege to tell people of color what their lives are like, for able-bodied people to tell people with disabilities what their lives are like, for heterosexual people to tell gay men and lesbian women what their lives are like, and for cissexual people to tell transsexual people what their lives are like.

But this is a contradiction, a paradox. If a cis woman’s life is completely opaque to me as a trans woman, then I fail to see how a cis woman could possibly understand my life. If Heart wants to make sense, she should either stop describing what she thinks trans lives are like (considering that she’s so tied up in her prejudices, she’s pretty much always wrong), or she should accept that trans women experience more of womanhood than many radical feminists are willing to admit.

I’m not really addressing Heart’s basic argument – most of my early posts already address the foundations of radical transphobia and she literally has nothing new to add on this front, and hasn’t for the six years I’ve seen her online.

The beautiful and talented Queen Emily adds this in comments, which I wish I’d thought to say:

Yeah. The patently obvious problem is this:

HBS people advocate rights for only one kind of trans* person – a post-operative trans person. They not only sneer and disrespect any other version of transgender, but actively campaign against other trans* people having rights before surgery. The comments on Transadvocate, where the HBS Leigh said she’d fire pre-operative transgendered people, report them to the police, and so on are indicative of this.

This HBS woman suggests that a transgendered world would end in paedophilia and constant rape, in the lurid terms fundamentalist Christians use to describe gays and lesbians:

http://ts-si.org/content/view/2872/995/

“Shut the hell up and don’t trouble the gender binary” is the very clear message from HBS. How exactly this fits with Heart’s brand of womyn-identified-womyn radical feminism I do not know. HBS is not progressive, indeed at worst it’s actively opposed to some pretty basic tenets of feminism. As you point out, it’s hugely homophobic.

In contrast, the transgendered organisation I work for supports rights trans* people NO MATTER their surgical status, and we have a very clear feminist ethos. But I guess, the enemy of my enemy is my friend for Heart..

* Heart should be aware that HBS advocates are fond of homophobic posturing, and Bailey has written on eugenics, and wrote a paper on why it’s morally okay to abort homosexual fetuses identified in the womb. Just being transphobic (internalized or externalized) probably shouldn’t be the best reason to rush to their side and join in on the trannie condemnation, you know?

Church Bars Trans Politician From Relative’s Wedding
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff Posted: November 8, 2007 – 5:00 pm ET

more

NexyJo points to an article about trans rights in Montgomery County, Maryland.

Specifically, right wing transphobic and homophobic groups fighting against a bill that would add gender identity to the county’s non-discrimination laws. And, of course, there’s the inane bathroom panic:

Michelle Turner, director of Citizens for a Responsible Curriculum (CRC), a parent’s group in Rockville, Md., said the bill would basically allow males to have open access to women’s restrooms.

“I am dumbfounded,” Turner told Cybercast News Service. “They are saying, ‘If you are a man but you feel like a woman, then even if you still have male genitalia, you would have access to restrooms and locker rooms and showers used by women and girls.”

Also, one opponent invokes our demographics, plus implies we’re insane:

Regina Griggs, executive director of PFOX, Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays, said she is shocked that Montgomery County is considering protected status for a very tiny portion of the population – one which suffers from a psychiatric disorder.

She goes on to demonstrate that she’s apparently a neurologist and a psychologist, as she describes in intimate detail the anatomy of the human brain and whether sane people can possibly be transsexual.

This article falls into the basic transphobic pattern: Trans women are discussed, trans men are ignored. Our gender is considered invalid (we’re described as males throughout the article, plus we’re described as mentally ill). Everyone’s an expert on who and what we really are (brains can’t be male or female, just genitals!).

The two organizations cited have their own vices, of course. The Citizens for a Responsible Curriculum homepage indicates that they’re in an apocalyptic battle to prevent their children from being exposed to sex education. PFOX is just inverted PFLAG. Their homepage says:

PFOX is not a therapeutic or counseling organization. PFOX supports families, advocates for the ex-gay community, and educates the public on sexual orientation. Each year thousands of men, women and teens with unwanted same-sex attractions make the personal decision to leave homosexuality. However, there are those who refuse to respect that decision. Consequently, formerly gay persons are reviled simply because they dare to exist! Without PFOX, ex-gays would have no voice in a hostile environment. PFOX families unconditionally love their children.  PFOX parents recognize our children for the wonderful young men and women they are.  PFOX families do not label children based on who they are attracted to –  feelings can and do change.  PFOX families allow for differences of opinion; we do not place requirements on our children nor do they place them on us.  That’s what unconditional love means — loving each other even when we do not agree.

It’s almost like satire.