Transgender rights targeted in twice as many bills this year versus 2015 – report | World news | The Guardian

State lawmakers have introduced twice as many bills targeting transgender rights since the start of the 2016 legislative session as in all of 2015, according to a new report from the Human Rights Campaign (HRC).

HRC has identified 44 anti-transgender bills, in 16 states, out of more than 175 pieces of legislation that attempt to curtail lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights. Of those 44 bills, 23 are aimed at transgender children, with most proposing to bar transgender students from using girls’ or boys’ locker rooms and bathrooms or from participating in men’s and women’s sports teams if not assigned that gender at birth.

Other proposals would allow individuals and organizations to discriminate against transgender people for religious reasons.

“This deeply disturbing trend is a stark reminder of just how vicious and deplorable opponents of equality are in their relentless attacks against our community,” Chad Griffin, president of HRC, said in a statement.
,,,
The fight for transgender rights has attracted unprecedented visibility. A growing number of courts and federal agencies have recognized that laws passed to protect women from gender bias also protect the rights of transgender people.

Transgender rights targeted in twice as many bills this year versus 2015 – report | World news | The Guardian

WATCH: Trans Woman Ashley Diamond Reaches Settlement with Georgia Department of Corrections | Advocate.com

The black trans woman who was denied medically necessary care and allegedly subjected to repeated sexual assaults while incarcerated with men has reached a settlement in her lawsuit against the Georgia Department of Corrections.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which has been representing 37-year-old Ashley Diamond in her federal lawsuit filed in February of last year, announced the historic settlement (for an undisclosed amount) in Diamond's favor today.

“We’re pleased that we were able to favorably resolve this case on behalf of Ashley Diamond and bring international attention to the plight of transgender prisoners,” said Chinyere Ezie, Diamond's attorney, in a statement today. “Our lawsuit and Ashley Diamond’s bravery brought about important changes in Georgia and have put prison officials across the country on notice about the constitutional rights of transgender persons.”

Diamond, a trans woman of color, was denied medically necessary treatment and forced into solitary confinement, and she alleges that she was repeatedly sexually assaulted by other prisoners in all-male Georgia state prisons while she was incarcerated for three years for a nonviolent burglary and theft conviction. She was released from Augusta State Medical Prison last August and received judicial approval to pursue her lawsuit alleging anti-trans discrimination just two weeks later.

WATCH: Trans Woman Ashley Diamond Reaches Settlement with Georgia Department of Corrections | Advocate.com

Mother poses in General Assembly bathroom with trans son to protest bathroom bill – LGBTQ Nation

 

Michelle Chapman and her transgender son Xander are ready for a fight.

The two, along with Xander’s girlfriend Taylor, are at the Virginia General Assembly right now ready to speak out against a proposed bill that would make it illegal for transgender students and adults to use the restroom aligned with their gender identity in public buildings, including schools.

“He had a huge amount of anxiety about even being in there,” said Chapman about her son in an email sent to GayRVA. “This ridiculous bill will effect these kids. So we fight.”

Mother poses in General Assembly bathroom with trans son to protest bathroom bill – LGBTQ Nation

Transgender Texas prison inmates can start hormone therapy – LGBTQ Nation

Seriously. "Advocates welcomed the policy change, but raised concerns that the TDCJ process is onerous enough that transgender inmates could have to wait months, even years, to receive treatment."

I'm going to be a class-A asshole.  They are in fucking prison and I have a very harsh view on what prison  should be like.  It ain't like what it is, although I do advocate for job training and education (and no, I don't believe in the death penalty except in extreme, rare cases.)

My gut reaction aside, I am not transgender and I have no clue as to what these inmates face or faced prior to incarceration.  If this is as "conservative" a process as the article states, I am not sure as to what issues may be faced.  Such a learning curve.

A change in Texas prison system policy means transgender inmates who hadn’t started hormone therapy before incarceration can do so behind bars if they go through a thorough process to confirm the diagnosis.

Previously, Texas Department of Criminal Justice policy said only transgender inmates who were already taking hormones when they entered the system could continue to do so, the Houston Chronicle reported Thursday.

TDCJ spokesman Jason Clark played down the change, saying Texas’ policy remained among the most conservative in the nation.

“Offenders are prescribed hormone therapy only after going through a rigorous process that includes being reviewed by a gender dysphoria specialist, an endocrinologist, and having an affirmative diagnosis,” Clark said. “Only then would it be considered medically necessary and require the minimum level of treatment which is hormone therapy.”

Transgender Texas prison inmates can start hormone therapy – LGBTQ Nation

Maine governor stops rules for protecting transgender students – LGBTQ Nation

LePage needs to crawl back into the hole he emerged from and let the professionals do their thing.  As the article notes, "[t]he positive thing about this is most school systems are already moving in this direction anyway”.

Gov. Paul LePage is stopping the Maine Human Rights Commission and the Department of Education from issuing rules protecting transgender students. Schools instead are being given guidelines that lack the force of law.
,,,
“The governor is violating the law by refusing to let the rule-making go forward,” she said. “He’s putting our students at risk.”

Richard Durost, executive director of the Maine Principals’ Association, said the vast majority of Maine’s high schools have already addressed the points in the guidelines, such as allowing transgender students to play sports with teams corresponding with their gender identity.

Maine governor stops rules for protecting transgender students – LGBTQ Nation

What Effect Did Brandon Teena's Death Have On The Trans Community?

I constantly find myself re-evaluation my feelings concerning all that surrounds the Brandon Teena incident.  I say feelings as my mind sees this incident for what it was, violence against a member of the LGBTQI community.  My feelings on the other hand do not always match what my mind tells me and that is not always a good thing.

As Mara Keisling notes, what is important, the Brandon Teena incident "pushed advocacy forward."

"It's not, I think, lost on most of us today that this was a white, trans, masculine-identified person, and that's still not the most common story about violence in our community. But it did become a focus of activism," Keisling said. "There were a lot of folks from places like Transexual Menace and GenderPAC and others who went to Nebraska and then took that message and took that organizing to other places. And it was really a seminal moment in a lot of ways in our organized trans movement that still exists today."

A lot of the recent momentum around protecting the trans community has been in support of trans women of color who experience disproportionate rates of violence, according to Lourdes Hunter, the national director at Trans Women of Color Collective. She gave HuffPost Live a chilling first-hand account of her own experience.

 What Effect Did Brandon Teena's Death Have On The Trans Community?

How bad is the epidemic of violence against transgender women? It's hard to know. - Vox

But are these murders a growing epidemic? The answer, worryingly, is we don't know. Local, state, and federal governments don't collect much data on trans populations or violence against them, which means the 21 deaths we know about are — at best — a bare minimum, and it's unclear how big of a problem those deaths signify.

"There's very little data on violence against transgender women of color," Chai Jindasurat, the co-director of community organizing and public advocacy at the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs (NCAVP), told me. "There's so much data that needs to be collected for us to make the case that we know we can and should be making to policymakers about why this issue is so important."
,,,
That's important, because if we don't know exactly how many trans people are in the US, we can't figure out the rates of violence they face. And further demographic breakdowns could give more insight into who, exactly, is more likely to face violence — whether, for example, trans women of color are at greater risk.

But we also don't know how many trans people are victimized by violence each year. The biggest issue is that trans people often aren't correctly identified by authorities. If a homicide victim has a penis, police will assume that person is a man. If a victim has a vagina, police will assume that person is a woman. That's it. Police will rarely question if the victim identified differently — at least until family, friends, and media bring it up. (As one example of how bad this can be, the Advocate, an LGBTQ news outlet, reported that one woman, Jasmine Collins, wasn't identified as trans for two months.)

How bad is the epidemic of violence against transgender women? It's hard to know. - Vox

Transgender Woman Sues Walmart, Manager She Says Harassed And Then Fired Her | ThinkProgress

Walmart and one of its managers in a New Jersey store have been hit with a lawsuit alleging that a transgender employee was harassed and then fired over her gender identity.

Samantha Azzarano began working at Walmart store in Deptford, New Jersey as a service associate in September of 2012. In January of the next year, she informed a manager that she is transgender. Later that year, she began outwardly expressing her gender identity and had her name badge changed to Samantha. The lawsuit says that there were no problems with her coworkers or performance.

That is, until another manager, Sheena Wyckoff, joined Azzarano’s team in January of 2014. “That’s when the trouble began,” Azzarano’s lawyer, Kevin M. Costello, told ThinkProgress.
,,,
She’s right that she should be protected from workplace discrimination as a transgender woman. Thanks to a provision in New Jersey’s Law Against Discrimination that stipulates protections based on gender identity and expression, hers is one of just 19 states and Washington D.C. where transgender people are explicitly covered by anti-discrimination laws. Federal law doesn’t enumerate protections for gender identity in the workplace, although the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has ruled that it violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which bans sex-based discrimination.

Transgender Woman Sues Walmart, Manager She Says Harassed And Then Fired Her | ThinkProgress

This Cartoon Shows Just How Little Conservative Christians Understand Transgender People

So Michael Brown (PhD, Near Eastern Languages and Literatures) is one of those idiots I like to dislike.  He hasn't quite reached the pinnacle of Scott Lively's status, but he is close.  He is, in my mind, a misguided soul who needs to STFU about things (LGBTQ issues) he knows nothing about.

That aside, Hemant Mehta is someone I like and his criticism of the meme Brown posted is spot on.  Mehta is correct, "Dr. Michael Brown, a columnist for Charisma, is one of many Christians who puts on this guise of compassion while ignoring what scientists and psychologists say on the subject of sexuality. He says gay and transgender identities can be “cured.” He says he’s not transphobic, but misgenders them all the time. He also calls them predators.

What I find "comical" and it is a point Hemant notes - It’s telling that the character who most resembles Brown’s own view is the child — the one person who’s expected to not get what’s happening and who can be forgiven for not understanding the complexities of gender. Brown, on the other hand, should know better - I can relate to.  To this day, even with 44DDs, people still misgender me based on appearance.

Growing up I was not the most feminine of creatures (I'm still not but don't mess with my hair products or lotions).  I was a tom-boy through and through; hell, I still am, even though my body says otherwise. (It's all in the mind,,,hehe,,,I would still be playing hockey if I was physically able.)  Bizarre thing is, up until my 11th birthday my hair was butt length.  By age 12, it was blatantly obvious I was not male.  But because I didn't always look or act the part, I was notoriously sent to the little boys room. Even as recent as 5 years ago I would have little kids ask if I was a boy or girl, especially if I was wearing one of my ball-caps.  But as Hemant notes, a child "can be forgiven for not understanding the complexities of gender."

That is what Brown and his ilk don't get, it is not a matter that is simple.  I will be the first to admit that for many years, when younger, I sometimes questioned whether I was in the "wrong body".  But as I grew older, both in age and maturity, I learned to accept my differences and embrace that "I am woman".  I am, who I am.  Just because I love (and sometimes fuck) someone of the same gender assignment only means that the heart chooses whom it chooses.  It says nothing else, period.

To degrade a segment of the population that Brown does, only shows me that Brown is not comfortable with who he has become; who he is at the core.  He tries to fit himself into an ideal that is flawed.  A man made construct (the theological notion of complementarianism) based a stagnant and dead text written 2000+ yeas ago.  I mean seriously dude, you're getting you sexual ethics from a "book" that doesn't even science.  Think about it, Adam and Eve where not distinct creations but fucking clones; how does that work exactly?  It's a book that condemns a man for "spilling his seed".  Or worse isolates a woman because of a natural process.

Do you send your wife to the doghouse when she is on her period?  If you don't then,,,well,,,STFU!!

This Cartoon Shows Just How Little Conservative Christians Understand Transgender People

UPDATE::Suspect Arrested In Murder Of Transgender Woman India Clarke

Police in Tampa, Florida, have arrested a man they believe murdered India Clarke, whose death put her on a growing list of transgender woman killed violently in the U.S. this year.

DNA evidence linked 18-year-old Keith Lamayne Gaillard to Clarke's death, according to a Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office press release. Investigators found Gaillard's DNA under Clarke's fingernails, as well as on a condom containing fluid in her car. Police said the suspect's fingerprint was found on a cigar wrapper in the car.
Clarke had died at a family-friendly park in Tampa on July 21. Detectives initially reported that the cause of death was blunt force trauma, but revealed this week that she'd been shot in the head and arm.

A maintenance worker found Clarke's body on the morning of July 21 in the park at the University Area Community Center.

[,,,]

Meanwhile, her parents and authorities refused to call her by her preferred pronouns.

"We are not going to categorize him as a transgender. We can just tell you he had women's clothing on at the time," detective Larry McKinnon told BuzzFeed News. "What his lifestyle was prior to that we don't know -- whether he was a cross-dresser, we don't know."

Suspect Arrested In Murder Of Transgender Woman India Clarke

The Quest for Transgender Equality - NYTimes.com

A generation ago, transgender Americans were widely regarded as deviants, unfit for dignified workplaces, a disgrace for families. Those who confided in relatives were, by and large, pitied and shunned. For most, transitioning on the job was tantamount to career suicide. Medical procedures to align a person’s body with that person’s gender identity — an internal sense of being male, female or something else — were a fringe specialty, available only to a few who paid out of pocket.

Coming out meant going through life as a pariah.

Being transgender today remains unreasonably and unnecessarily hard. But it is far from hopeless. More Americans who have wrestled with gender identity are transitioning openly, propelling a civil rights movement that has struggled even as gays and lesbians have reached irreversible momentum in their fight for equality. Those coming out now are doing so with trepidation, realizing that while pockets of tolerance are expanding, discriminatory policies and hostile, uninformed attitudes remain widespread.

They deserve to come out in a nation where stories of compassion and support vastly outnumber those that end with a suicide note. The tide is shifting, but far too slowly, while lives, careers and dreams hang in the balance.

[,,,]

 Three years before a police raid of the Stonewall Inn in New York in June 1969 galvanized the gay rights movement in America, transgender women rioted after being expelled from Compton’s Cafeteria in San Francisco. The restaurant had become one of the few safe gathering spots for the city’s community of transgender people, who at the time were not welcome at gay bars. That same year, physician Harry Benjamin published “The Transsexual Phenomenon,” a groundbreaking book that outlined how transgender people could transition medically. The two developments helped give rise to an arduous fight for societal acceptance.

[,,,]

 President Obama has advanced transgender rights more than any American president. But there is a glaring form of discrimination that he has the power to end. The Pentagon continues to ban openly transgender people from joining the military, even though many of America’s closest allies have integrated them seamlessly in recent years.

The Quest for Transgender Equality - NYTimes.com

Religious Right’s latest lunacy: Change the Constitution to eliminate ‘myth’ of trans people

Christian conservative activists have staked out a possibly new front in the culture wars by suggesting a constitutional amendment to regulate gender identity.

Peter Sprigg and former NFL player Craig James, who are spokesmen for the Family Research Council, said Monday on the “Washington Watch” radio program that transgender rights were the next battlefield in the religious right’s ongoing battle with LGBT people, reported Right Wing Watch.

“I think the ideal policy for government with respect to [transgender rights] is that your sex is your biological sex,” Sprigg said. “My view is, that if your biological sex is unambiguous at birth — if your internal sex organs, your external genitalia, and your chromosomal makeup all are unequivocal in declaring you to be of one sex – then that is your sex for life, and that is your only sexual identity that the government will recognize.”

Religious Right’s latest lunacy: Change the Constitution to eliminate ‘myth’ of trans people

ADDENDUM::Christian host on transgender rights: ‘Liberals demand public access to rape your girls’

Dr. “Chaps” Gordon Klingenschmitt, a Navy chaplain who turned to hosting a Christian Internet show after being court martialed, warned his followers this week that liberals wanted to visually “rape your girls” by giving transgender people equal rights.

In an email to supporters over the weekend, Klingenschmitt lashed out at a recent Maine Supreme Court ruling that said a transgender girl should be able to use the school bathroom that corresponded to her gender.

“‘Transgenders’ want your children,” he wrote in the email obtained by Right Wing Watch. “Liberals demand public access to rape your girls, at least visually in public bathrooms, or to expose themselves to your girls at school, without parental consent or protection of any kind.”

Klingenschmitt advised parents in Maine to “immediately remove their children from public schools, and teach them at home.”

Christian host on transgender rights: ‘Liberals demand public access to rape your girls’

Ex-Navy chaplain tells transgender girl: ‘Man up’ or get a ‘spanking’ and an exorcism

A Navy chaplain who turned to Internet evangelism after being court martialed said this week that a transgender girl should “man up” or face a spanking and an exorcism to rid her body of demons.

On the Wednesday broadcast of his Pray in Jesus Name show, Dr. “Chaps” Gordon Klingenschmitt expressed his outraged at a recent Maine Supreme Court ruling that said a transgender girl should be able to use the school bathroom that corresponded to her gender.

“Little girls should not be exposed to little boy parts!” Klingenschmitt explained. “Talk about mental health problems. The mental health problem is in the child who’s confused.”

The Pray in Jesus Name host argued that since the transgender girl had an identical twin brother, that she couldn’t possibly identify with another gender.

Ex-Navy chaplain tells transgender girl: ‘Man up’ or get a ‘spanking’ and an exorcism

Laverne Cox flawlessly shuts down Katie Couric’s invasive questions about transgender people - Salon.com

I do feel there is a preoccupation with that. The preoccupation with transition and surgery objectifies trans people. And then we don’t get to really deal with the real lived experiences. The reality of trans people’s lives is that so often we are targets of violence. We experience discrimination disproportionately to the rest of the community. Our unemployment rate is twice the national average; if you are a trans person of color, that rate is four times the national average. The homicide rate is highest among trans women. If we focus on transition, we don’t actually get to talk about those things.

Laverne Cox flawlessly shuts down Katie Couric’s invasive questions about transgender people - Salon.com