Women Born Transsexual

I’ve been sort of watching the Olympics, more Women’s Football (Soccer) and the running events than most of the others.

I’m thrilled by the performance of women athletes. We have come a long way, baby, in the years since Title IX leveled the playing field.

We are still having to fight racism, as witness by the racist right wing Republi-Nazi attacks on President Obama and his family.

The gender fascism on the part of the über Reich wing Christo-Fascists is still with us.

They still live in a world of manly macho men and ultra dainty submissive girls who grow up to provide quiver fulls of white Christian baby warriors.

All the bullshit about who is a real woman or how some women Olympians aren’t feminine enough.  Enough for what?

The sexist pigs made all sorts of disparaging dickish comments about  British Olympic weightlifter Zoe Smith. See (Olympic Weightlifter Responds To Sexist Tweets: ‘We Don’t Lift Weights…For The Likes Of Men Like That’)

Zoe Smith responded on her own blog with: Thanks (but no thanks…)

“The obvious choice of slander when talking about female weightlifting is “how unfeminine, girls shouldn’t be strong or have muscles, this is wrong”. And maybe they’re right… in the Victorian era. To think people still think like this is laughable, we’re in 2012! This may sound like a sweeping generalisation, but most of the people that do think like this seem to be chauvinistic, pigheaded blokes who feel emasculated by the fact that we, three small, fairly feminine girls, are stronger than them. Simple as that. I confronted one guy that said “we’re probably all lesbians and look like blokes”, purely to explain the fact that his opinion is invalid cause he’s a moron. And wrong. He came up with the original comeback that I should get back in the kitchen. I laughed.

As Hannah pointed out earlier, we don’t lift weights in order to look hot, especially for the likes of men like that. What makes them think that we even WANT them to find us attractive? If you do, thanks very much, we’re flattered. But if you don’t, why do you really need to voice this opinion in the first place, and what makes you think we actually give a toss that you, personally, do not find us attractive? What do you want us to do? Shall we stop weightlifting, amend our diet in order to completely get rid of our ‘manly’ muscles, and become housewives in the sheer hope that one day you will look more favourably upon us and we might actually have a shot with you?! Cause you are clearly the kindest, most attractive type of man to grace the earth with your presence.

Oh but wait, you aren’t. This may be shocking to you, but we actually would rather be attractive to people who aren’t closed-minded and ignorant. Crazy, eh?! We, as any women with an ounce of self-confidence would, prefer our men to be confident enough in themselves to not feel emasculated by the fact that we aren’t weak and feeble.
And here’s some food for thought – maybe you should broaden your criteria for what you consider ‘attractive’ anyway, because these perfect, feminine women you speak of probably have no interest in you either.”

Then Think Progress had an article: NBC’s Bizarre Attempt to Turn Female Olympians Into Eye Candy

Forget the tape delay. Forget the weird cutting of certain events. Forget the obsessive focus on American athletes at the expense of covering the whole games. Forget the substanceless pool- and track-side interviews. From a sheer editorial judgement perspective, the biggest question about NBC’s coverage of the 2012 London Olympics has got to be how this video, “Bodies in Motion,” (NBC has, perhaps wisely, declined to make it embeddable), which features slow-motion shots of female athletes’ bodies set to music so cheesily porn-like it’s hard to believe that this isn’t a video someone made to parody the focus on female Olympians’ bodies.

The cluelessness of it even extends to the written description for the video: “Check out these bodies in motion during the Olympic Games,” as if the women it’s portraying, none of whom are identified by name, or country, which might have been a petty distraction from ogling, are inanimate objects rather than people. This utterly contentless video, which communicates nothing about the events these women are participating in or what it takes to perform them, might meet the editorial standards at Maxim, though the video quality isn’t even particularly impressive. There is no way it should pass the editorial standards for a news organization.

But sexist dickwaddery isn’t the only coin of the realm for the misogynists of the insane world of Conservatism, oh no they also love to deal in naked as well as coded racism.

First the right wing trolls attacked Serena Williams, calling her a disgrace to the US because of her impromptu victory celebration after defeating Maria Sharapova for the gold medal.  Serena Williams is one of the most awesome women tennis players ever, definitely has to be one of the top ten women tennis players of all time and these right wing racist assholes describe her little victory celebration as the “Crip Walk” reducing her to the level of a Los Angeles black gang member.

Even more shamefully it is as though no one dares call this naked racism for what it is.

Then there is sweet little Gabby Douglas.  She’s only a child and yet she is also an extremely talented athlete, an African American in a sport where one sees very few African Americans and it seems like some people have nothing better to do than criticize her hair.

“Nappy hair” has a nasty history as a racist slur, one that many African American women have internalized to the point of using as an insult against each other.

So we were treated to people making nasty comments, bullying almost about Gabby’s hair instead of what an incredible performance this sweet young athlete was giving the world. See (Gabby Douglas Hair Comments Confuse The Olympic Gymnast)

Then we have Faux News, propaganda arm of the racist right wing loony Republican Party weighing in:  Fox Complains Gabby Douglas And Other American Olympians Not Showing Enough Patriotism

The duty of calling out the racists and misogynists should be one accepted by all progressive people of every race.  Progressive people should also call out the misogynists on their sexism

The duty should never fall just on the shoulders of the oppressed.  People of good will should unite and raise their voices saying, “This is wrong and we do not want this sort of bigotry in our world.”

From The Root see: Gabby Douglas: Impact Far Beyond Sports

I’m an atheist not a pagan, nonetheless I have a warmer feeling towards pagans and gods/goddess and earth based religions than I have towards the patriarchal big three.

That said if you are going to give a religious based tax exemption to one religion you damn well have to give it to all religions.

Cathy Platine and I disagree about a lot of stuff but their screwing with her on this one sucks big time.

They are screwing her over because her religion is pagan and because she is transsexual and her religion involves others who are TS as wel as lesbian.

From Watershed Post: http://www.watershedpost.com/2012/palenville’s-pagans-lose-religious-tax-exemption-case

By Julia Reischel
8/9/12

A group of self-described pagans in Palenville has lost its bid for a religious exemption from property taxes.

Last Thursday, a New York State Supreme Court judge issued a decision in the trial of a case filed by the Maetreum of Cybele against the town of Catskill. (You can read the decision below.)

Catskill’s assessor has repeatedly denied requests by the group to take its property, a three-story former inn on a three-acre parcel in Palenville, off the tax rolls. (For an in-depth look at the controversy behind the lawsuit, see our 2010 feature story, “The Pagan Exemption.“)

The Maetreum, led by Reverend Mother Battakes Cathryn Platine, argued that the property is the worldwide religious headquarters of the Cybeline Revival, a pagan faith. The town of Catskill contends that the property is mainly used for non-religious residential purposes.

In his ruling, Judge Richard M. Platkin sided squarely with the town of Catskill.

Platine wrote to the Watershed Post with her reaction.

“The judge ruled against our exemptions while upholding our legitimacy as a religion,” she wrote. “I am devastated … Despite Catskill granting full exemption to over a dozen parsonages and even a Catholic picnic ground, they ruled against us.”

Daniel Vincelette, the lawyer who represented the town of Catskill (and who took some heat from another judge about his tactics in the case), said that the town officials were pleased.

Continue reading at:  http://www.watershedpost.com/2012/palenville’s-pagans-lose-religious-tax-exemption-case

From Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/courtney-odonnell/national-association-of-the-deaf-dennis-daugaard_b_1749798.html

Courtney O’Donnell
08/08/2012

The surprise thumbing of the nose at us by the National Association of the Deaf (NAD) during their national conference last month amounts to yet another slap in the face for LGBT people. This time, however, we’ve learned three crucial lessons that can be used to reverse these conditions.

Earlier this year I wrote on The Huffington Post about the NAD’s announcement that an anti-LGBT-rights governor would speak at their national conference. During the ensuing uproar on social media, the governor, Dennis Daugaard, of South Dakota, notified the NAD that he wouldn’t be able to attend the conference after all. As a result, the NAD never had to make a final decision on whether or not to pull the invitation. The governor, of course, likely made a purely political decision not to attend because, as a sitting governor, there was no upside for him. So a victory for us? As it turned out, our end-zone celebration was a bit premature.

Catching LGBT advocates by surprise, delegates at the following NAD conference moved to extend another invitation to Gov. Daugaard to speak at the next conference. The second surprise: This motion passed unanimously! Any progress made in educating the NAD on LGBT-equality needs amounted only to an elaborate illusion of our own making. The supposed support for gay marriage by the NAD revealed itself to be a ruse to distract us. When it comes to action, the NAD have shown that they’re going in a different direction.

Lesson 1: Being reactive is not enough. While the response from the LGBT community was sufficient to pressure the governor into cancelling his trip, we’ve made no actual progress within the NAD. The NAD remains a solid, archaic block of concrete when it comes to all things LGBT. Not one single delegate gave consideration to LGBT people during the vote on the Daugaard re-invitation. Not one. We’ve got to be proactive and get inside the NAD ourselves.

Continue reading at:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/courtney-odonnell/national-association-of-the-deaf-dennis-daugaard_b_1749798.html

From The Advocate:  http://www.advocate.com/politics/transgender/2012/08/08/illinois-city-settles-historic-transgender-lawsuit

BY Diane Anderson-Minshall
August 08 2012

The city of Cicero, Ill. has settled a civil rights lawsuit brought by a transgender Latino woman who had been illegally searched and harassed by the city’s police offers. Bianca Feliciano alleged in her suit, according to ChicagoPride, that Cicero police officers verbally abused, harassed, and taunted her on the basis of her gender-identity on February 6, 2011, when she and another trans woman were walking down a street in Cicero. She says officers wrongfully accused them of engaging in sex work and after seeing her identification with her female gender and name, the officers “claimed that if Feliciano was properly disciplined and punished she would not be the way she is right now. The officers also insulted her by denying her gender-identity, stating ‘You are not female, you have a dick between your legs,’ and threatened her with jail claiming she was committing an act of fraud because her ID said she was female.”

Continue reading at:  http://www.advocate.com/politics/transgender/2012/08/08/illinois-city-settles-historic-transgender-lawsuit

From The Advocate:  http://www.advocate.com/youth/2012/08/08/op-ed-lgbt-youth-struggle-survive-detroit-winters

Just because the summer is upon us doesn’t mean we can leave homeless LGBT youth out in the cold.

BY Laura Hughes
August 08 2012

Jessica, a 21-year-old African American transgender woman in Detroit, has lived a hard life.  At the age of 13, she became homeless when her family kicked her out for not conforming to gender norms. Instead of a warm home, she had to find shelter in one unsafe and abandoned building after another. In one building, filled with drug users and located in a high-crime area, Jessica had to sleep on top of the stairs. But after increased security made using that building far too risky, she moved to an abandoned house on Arizona Street, sharing it with other homeless LGBTQ youth. The house has no running water or electricity. It is filthy; the house is strewn with garbage, and the second floor is covered in dog feces, yet many of the youth are forced to sleep there after a recent fire on the first floor. In a cruel irony, the local humane society came for the dogs, yet made no attempt to refer Jessica or her friends to any kind of services for them.

Continue reading at:  http://www.advocate.com/youth/2012/08/08/op-ed-lgbt-youth-struggle-survive-detroit-winters

From The Gazette Montreal:  http://www.globalmontreal.com/queer+bar+firebombed+in+montreal/6442693107/story.html

The Gazette
Monday, August 06, 2012

MONTREAL – An arson investigation is ongoing in the Mile End after a suspicious fire broke out on Parc Ave. between St. Viateur St. and Bernard St. late Sunday evening.

Firefighters believe the fire was started around 9 p.m. when a suspect was seen fleeing the scene after pouring a fire accelerant into the stairwell of local dive bar The Playhouse, located at 5656 Parc Ave.

The bar is a venue for the queer dance fundraising party Faggity Ass Friday.

The building is also home to Yuukai Japanese restaurant, which also suffered damage from the blaze.

There were no reported injuries, as the commercial area was closed at the time of the incident.

The fire department estimates $100,000 worth of damage to the building.

From RH Reality Check:  http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/article/2012/08/07/voter-id-struggle-in-pennsylvania-losing-far-more-than-right-to-vote

by Hannah Jane Sassaman, Media Mobilizing Project
August 8, 2012

We’re taking up a collection at my office, here at the Media Mobilizing Project in Philadelphia, PA, for some of our radio producers and campaigners.

For six years, we’ve believed that the right to speak means little without the right to be heard–and hundreds of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania residents have agreed with us.  We’re poor and working people producing media that tells the untold stories of people in Pennsylvania–and developing those people into leaders united to change our city and state. We’re a tight crew, so when folks are having trouble, we come together to help each other out. One young man, Marco (not his real name), is a producer at Radio Unidad, Philadelphia’s only Spanish-language community news show. Andres and Paulita (not their real names) are leaders in another immigrant rights campaign that’s been meeting since January. Even though they work hard, support families, and in many cases own homes and pay taxes–the state has unceremoniously cancelled their drivers’ licenses, saying that the Tax ID numbers they used to get their licenses aren’t proof enough of their right to live in the US.

But they have families to support, and work to do. So they get in their cars and drive– hoping for the best. But they were stopped by the police, and charged fines of several hundred, up to a thousand dollars, for driving without licenses. They need to drive to work, to pay those fees. And they might get stopped again, and again–and their hard-earned money will go to filling the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation’s coffers. And that’s what gets me.

As Charlene Carruthers said in her powerful piece on the relationship between voter suppression and reproductive rights, the current fight to make sure that thousands of Pennsylvanians without ID get to vote is important–vital–to making sure that our communities get to the polls to make important decisions on the direction of our state and country. Recent data from the Pennsylvania Department of State, processed and analyzed by the labor federation AFL-CIO, shows that 20 percent of Pennsylvania voters–and 43 percent of Philadelphia voters–might not possess ID valid enough to get them into the voting booth. But we need to understand two things.

Continue reading at:  http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/article/2012/08/07/voter-id-struggle-in-pennsylvania-losing-far-more-than-right-to-vote

From The Guardian UK:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/aug/10/voter-id-laws-republican-ruse-disenfranchise

Under the guise of fighting nonexistent voter fraud, the GOP is attempting the greatest election-stealing conspiracy in US history

Alex Slater
guardian.co.uk, Friday 10 August 2012

In Washington, conventional wisdom is everything. It’s the driver of perceptions, and often of self-fulfilling political prophecies. That’s why you might notice a guarded confidence amongst the Obama campaign these past few weeks: generally speaking, most realistic experts predict a victory for the president in this November’s election.

This perception is reinforced by current polling, some of the most recent being published by Quinnipiac University, the New York Times and CBS News, giving President Obama an edge over Romney in key states like Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida. Certainly, it will be a tight race, but by any realistic standard, the money is on Obama to pull out a victory, even narrowly.

But it’s exactly the likely closeness of the race that may turn Washington’s conventional wisdom on its head on election day. That’s because, until relatively recently, political experts and journalists have been oblivious to a widespread and pernicious phenomenon occurring in many critical swing states – one that, unless checked, could erase Obama’s electoral edge.

This phenomenon takes the form of a spate of new voter laws: efforts by Republican governors and Republican-controlled state legislatures to pass restrictive new voting rules just in time for election day. As a result, at least 5 million Americans could essentially lose their right to vote, according to the non-partisan Brennan Center in New York.

It’s no surprise that these laws are almost uniformly designed to disenfranchise young people and minorities – the very demographics that make up part of Obama’s base. And 5 million votes flagrantly stolen from the Democrats, especially in the swing states where Obama currently has the edge, could easily spell a Romney victory.

Continue reading at:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/aug/10/voter-id-laws-republican-ruse-disenfranchise

From The New Civil Rights Movement:  http://thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/2-kill-the-gays-architect-pushes-claim-obama-may-be-gay-and-previously-married-to-a-man/politics/2012/08/10/46102

by David Badash
on August 10, 2012

Uganda “Kill The Gays“ bill architect Scott Lively, currently being sued in U.S. federal court, accused of violating international law by inciting the persecution of gays, is pushing a fallacious claim (image, top,) that President Obama ”may be gay” and was “previously married to a man.” This story, as The New Civil Rights Movement was one of the first to break, centers on birther and conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi, who released a video Monday suggesting President Obama is hiding that he’s gay or bisexual, and further suggests Obama may have been married to his college roommate, a Pakistani.

Corsi’s “proof”? Obama supposedly wore a wedding ring while in college, and in a few photographs — which Corsi doesn’t show in the video – “Obama seems to be siting about on the guy’s lap.”

Which, of course, is proof Obama is gay or bisexual, or, lived in a small dorm room, or, wore a wedding ring to fend off women because he was, well, who the hell knows — or cares.

Back to Scott Lively. For those readers who aren’t that familiar with him, here’s the top of Lively’s bio on Wikipedia:

Scott Douglas Lively is an American author, attorney and activist, noted for his opposition to LGBT rights and his involvement in the ex-gay movement. Lively is the president of Abiding Truth Ministries, a conservative Christian organization located in Temecula, California. Lively has called for the criminalization of “the public advocacy of homosexuality” as far back as 2007. He is also directly linked to pending anti-gay legislation in Uganda, which would, if passed, make homosexual conduct punishable by a lengthy prison sentence or death.

Continue reading at:  http://thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/2-kill-the-gays-architect-pushes-claim-obama-may-be-gay-and-previously-married-to-a-man/politics/2012/08/10/46102

From Crooks and Liars:  http://crooksandliars.com/karoli/romney-bain-oligarchs-and-death-squads

By karoli
August 09, 2012

Back in July, I wrote a post about Romney and Bain, and how he will never tell the truth. In that post, I mentioned his connection to Latin American oligarchs and how they funded a substantial chunk of his initial Bain ventures.

Now the Huffington Post has picked up that thread and run with it. What they’ve uncovered is ugly and violent. It layers on another layer of taint to Bain Capital’s founding, Romney’s offshore accounts, and his equally unsavory offshore associations.

In The Real Romney, the author mentions Romney’s trip to Latin America to raise money for the initial Bain Capital funding rounds. Romney and his partners had been encountering difficulties raising funds for that initial round and had agreed not to approach existing Bain investors. So Romney reached out to his Latin American friends for help. The family mentioned in the book is the Poma family, but the Huffington Post article has much more.

“I owe a great deal to Americans of Latin American descent,” he said at a dinner in Miami in 2007. “When I was starting my business, I came to Miami to find partners that would believe in me and that would finance my enterprise. My partners were Ricardo Poma, Miguel Dueñas, Pancho Soler, Frank Kardonski, and Diego Ribadeneira.”

Romney could also have thanked investors from two other wealthy and powerful Central American clans — the de Sola and Salaverria families, who the Los Angeles Times and Boston Globe have reported were founding investors in Bain Capital.

While they were on the lookout for investments in the United States, members of some of these prominent families — including the Salaverria, Poma, de Sola and Dueñas clans — were also at the time financing, either directly or through political parties, death squads in El Salvador. The ruling classes were deploying the death squads to beat back left-wing guerrillas and reformers during El Salvador’s civil war.

Great pains were taken to make sure The Real Romney readers understood that Romney and Bain vetted these investors to make sure they were not becoming an investment vehicle for illegal drug money or other ventures which might not look so great.

Continue reading at:  http://crooksandliars.com/karoli/romney-bain-oligarchs-and-death-squads

From Huffington Post:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/10/the-jefferson-lies-david-barton-factual-errors_n_1766040.html?utm_hp_ref=religion

By Meredith Bennett-Smith
Posted: 08/10/2012

Following widespread criticism from a diverse group of scholars, as well as the threat of a boycott by Cincinnati pastors and church leaders, publisher Thomas Nelson has decided to stop selling David Barton’s “The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You’ve Always Believed About Thomas Jefferson” due to factual errors.

Casey Francis Harrell, director of corporate communications for the Christian publishing house, told the Tennessean that the publisher had received several complaints about the book and ultimately confirmed the existence of enough errors to cancel it.

“Because of these deficiencies, we decided that it was in the best interest of our readers to cease its publication and distribution,” Harrell said.

The book is currently still available through Amazon.com, but Harrell told the newspaper that Thomas Nelson has stopped new shipments and is recalling the book from retailers. Online retailers have also been asked to stop selling the ebook.

The best seller was controversial from the get go.

Barton, who was named one of Time magazine’s top-25 evangelicals in 2005, is a popular Christian history writer and a favorite guest on Glenn Beck’s show. Beck also wrote the book’s introduction.

In his latest tome, Barton claimed to debunk myths about Thomas Jefferson and the founding the United States perpetrated by the left. As the author of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson is generally regarded as a champion of the separation of church and state, as well as an empiricist scholar. Barton however said Jefferson was actually part of the religious establishment, and a vocal supporter of Christianity.

Continue reading at:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/10/the-jefferson-lies-david-barton-factual-errors_n_1766040.html?utm_hp_ref=religion

See also: NPR Looks Into David Barton’s Bunk History, Refusal to Respond to Criticism

From The Guardian UK:   http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/aug/10/us-corn-production-forecast-drought

Severe drought affecting midwest adds to fears of global food crisis and sends some commodity prices to record levels

Terry Macalister
guardian.co.uk, Friday 10 August 2012

The US government slashed its forecast for drought-hit corn production by 17% on Friday, raising fears of a new global food crisis and sending some commodity prices to record levels.

The US department of agriculture said corn output would only reach 10.8bn bushels for 2012-13, while yields were likely to be 123.4 bushels per acre – the lowest return for 17 years.

Predicted soybean production has also been slashed from 3.05bn bushels four weeks ago to 2.7bn on Friday as farmers see crops devastated by the country’s worst drought in more than half a century.

The latest reduction in estimates propelled corn futures on the Chicago commodity exchange to $8.30 a bushel and accelerated a 60% increase in prices over the last two months.

The US is the biggest producer of corn, soybeans and wheat in the world and a poor harvest means prices will rise and stockpiles will remain depleted.

The key midwest growing area has been hit by the worst drought in 56 years. The department of agriculture earlier this week said that half of the nation’s corn crop was rated poor to very poor while the latest US drought monitor map showed conditions continuing to worsen.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reported on Wednesday that the first seven months of 2012 were the warmest on record for the nation; temperatures in July broke a record high that was set in the Dust Bowl of the 1930s.

Continue reading at:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/aug/10/us-corn-production-forecast-drought

From Waging Non-Violence:  http://wagingnonviolence.org/2012/08/montanans-prepare-to-harness-direct-action-in-coal-fight/

by Nick Engelfried
August 10, 2012

On Sunday, people from across Montana, and the larger area affected by coal export projects, will start converging in the state capitol of Helena. They’re coming for what will likely be the largest act of nonviolent direct action related to energy policy the Northern Rockies region has ever seen.

We’re calling it the Coal Export Action. By tapping into the type of nonviolent protests in other parts of the country this summer — such as the fights against mountaintop removal and fracking — our coalition of groups plans to challenge an energy project that threatens the health of communities across the Northwest: coal mine-for-export projects.

Organizations involved in the action include grassroots groups like the Blue Skies Campaign (with which I’m an organizer), Bozeman Climate Alliance and Montana Women For; Occupy groups from Missoula, Helena and Bozeman; and local affiliates from national organizations like 350.org and Greenpeace. We’re coming together not only to address local health concerns related to coal exports, but to protect the global climate from one of the biggest carbon bombs moving forward anywhere in the world.

A lynchpin in Montana governor Brian Schweitzer’s plan to shift the Big Sky State from an agricultural economy to energy extraction, coal exports center around energy companies’ bid to open vast new areas in Montana to mining. This has implications for communities along the Northwest’s rail line system, as well the planetary climate.

If coal exports go through rural areas in eastern Montana, now dominated by agriculture, those areas would become industrial mine zones. Open-top trains carrying coal from mines would pass through towns in Montana, Idaho, Oregon and Washington on their way to proposed ports on the West Coast. From there, coal would be shipped to markets abroad.

Continue reading at:  http://wagingnonviolence.org/2012/08/montanans-prepare-to-harness-direct-action-in-coal-fight/