Friendly Fire!

Since homsoexuality and transgender rights are a social and human rights issue, as an advocate for the human rights of the pink community, I would like nothing better than to leave religion out of things altogether. 

 

Oh, if only it were so simple!

When Pancakes Aren't

According to my girlfriend, who is from Finland - the Suomi (Finnish) equivalent for 'pancake' is Pannukakku. Now like me, you might think that means your standard winter evening delicacy with cinnamon sugar or syrup and maybe a dash of lemon. 

I couldn't've been more wrong.

He Who Wounds Me Deepest Is Closest To Me

It is the people that are supposed to love us that hurt us the most when they cannot or will not accept us for who we are. Gay and trans people need to be very strong as people to be able to cope with the rejection they often experience from family.

Every trans person knows that if you are young then it is really the best time to start transitioning because the results are so much better. The body simply is more receptive to hormonal treatments if you start off when you are in your teens or early twenties. There is simply so much less cross-gender damage to undo. The downside of this of course, is that when you are young and still living with your parents, you cannot support yourself - and your welfare is in someone else's hands. If parents are loving and understanding enough to accept the truth about their children, and to help them instead of standing in their way - or worse, rejecting them and subjecting them to emotional abuse and blackmail, then these are very lucky people indeed.

Hate Speech Kills

Homosexuality is secularly legal in Iraq but is condemned by religious leaders. Recently, two gay men were murdered in March, in so-called "honor killings", and four more were found dead in the Baghdad Shiite slum of Sadr City in April. Both incidents closely followed condemnations of homosexuality by leading local clerics. In Iraq, despite the legal status of homosexuality, Amnesty International reports that twenty five boys and men were killed in Baghdad between March and April because they were gay, or were perceived to be gay.

Freeze - FPI!

Once again, as a human rights activist for the pink community I run the risk of offending people who identify as Christian as well as gay, trans or pro-equality through targeting the matter of religious persecution of gender and sexual diversity and bigotry.

Please rest assured that this is not my intention. My intention is to highlight the actions and words of a minority of fundamentalists who use religion as a weapon against people for their own selfish ends. This is the offense - and not just against loving tolerant Christians, but against everyone who loves democracy, freedom and equality. We trust that Christians who support freedom of thought and the ideals of democracy and equality will take this into account wherever we engage bigotry espoused by those who claim to speak against the pink community for them as well.

Shuffling A Pack Of Lies

On Friday I received notification that a hate crime had taken place in a small town in New York State. Rachel Roo, an 18 year old teen mentor on a popular transgender forum had been brutally murdered.

It was reported that Rachel who had transitioned quite young, had been involved in a car accident in which her mother had lost an arm. Upon testifying in court, the lawyer for the opposing party outed her - apparently her townsfolk did not take kindly to this revelation and she and her family now faced numerous death threats on a daily basis. It was reported that while riding to a nearby store on Friday evening, she disappeared. Her bicycle was found in a dumpster and some hours later she had been found lying at the side of the road. She was reported to have been gang-raped, and so badly assaulted that even her knee caps had been shattered by what was assumed to have been a sledgehammer. Apparently she was supposed to have been left for dead in a shallow grave, but supposedly managed to crawl out and towards the roadway, and collapsed where she was later found. She was taken to ICU where she died in the early hours of the next morning.

 

Like many others around the world, I was incensed on reading this, not to mention upset. Quite honestly I was shattered. I felt that I had lost somebody I had known and it actually brought tears to my eyes. After all, hate crimes like this are the reason I became an activist for gay and trans rights.

Imagine my shock and disappointment upon finding out that it was all a lie.

Infernal Affairs

Many people, including some in the transgender community have been heavily criticizing the Beatty couple for deciding to rear their first child themselves. The latest, second pregnancy in which Mister Beatty has also opted to carry their second child has raised the ire of the transphobic bigots and trans community alike.

Although the negative response is much, much less than the first time round, I cannot help but be saddened by the irony and paradox in all this.

Doctors For ...What?

One would expect on seeing the name "Doctors For Life" that it would be some medical reference, a respectable medical group perhaps - but upon closer inspection of their website and internet trail, you begin to see a trail full of footprints - worrying footprints. A paw-print of anti-abortion activism here, a paw-print of anti-gay activism there - and all the way the menacing sign that the tail of Christian fundamentalism has been dragged through between them.

What Comes Out Makes Us Unclean, Not What Goes In

What does gender have to do with sexual orientation? The questions bigots ask again and again reveal their ignorance about the subject - and the fact that try as you may to explain it to them - even by referring them to expert sites on the matter, they just won't get it - shows contempt for diversity.

They continue to ask sarcastically "what makes gays physically different or is it a spiritual thing? Or is it a mental condition that convinces them that they are not men and women, but rather homosexual men and lesbian woman?" - So after all the long explanations - and even some really short ones - according to them a gay man is not a man? Gay people are "physically different"? LOL.

Here is the short version:

Government Service - African Style

There is only one thing worse than spending three hours sitting in a queue that doesn't move - spending three hours STANDING in a queue that doesn't move. In South Africa's government departments, this is getting beyond a joke.