Employment and the Trans Woman

A friend and I recently were discussing finding and retaining employment as a transgender woman or man. Which I know is extremely difficult. I saw a good educational video on You Tube on the subject to pass along on the Cyrsti's Condo big screen:

Cyrsti's Condo Quote of the Day

"There is a fine line between being sarcastic and being a bitch." Let's see, where is that damn line?
                                                                                                    Cyrsti Hart

Transitioning with Strangers

It's hard for me to believe, but I have been going to three of the same places for over four years now. Yes they are straight venues and yes I am talking about going in there as me. At the risk of sounding like an alcoholic, all of these places are pubs or taverns of sorts.

All three are very civilized of course and I'm not talking about a bunch of redneck bars in Ohio. Along the way, I became a regular and began to know some of the other regulars.  I'm sure at the beginning most of them didn't really know much except that's a guy dressed as a girl but I was harmless.   On occasion I did run into a rest room problem and the typical snickers (and not the candy bar).  But life went on and actually all the employees have been exceptionally nice to me over the whole time.

Early in my experience though,  the most jaded of some of the male regulars were never really mean or negative but they always had to slide in the man word into our conversations.  A couple of them even went  out of their way to shorten my name to "Chris" (which isn't my male name anyway).

If nothing, I was persistent and ignored it all. Slowly but surely times started to change.  The effect of HRT and wearing my own hair was huge of course but perhaps the bigger change had to do with meeting my friends there..they validated me as a real person,. I wasn't just a guy dressed as a girl, I had a life. All of the sudden, I moved from "man or Chris" to a person.

For sure, I do get discouraged at the timing of all of this. I'm an impatient person and four years is an eternity! On the other hand, essentially I am transitioning in front of their eyes.

 Who knows, a few of them may even look up the transgender word. In the meantime,  I really enjoy the friendly acceptance I get. Even though I'm their token trans girl.

Have You Seen?

A letter written from a dad to his gay son Nate is going viral on the Internet because of its simple, hopeful message of love. “I overheard your phone conversation with Mike last night about your plans to come out to me,” it reads. “The only thing I need you to plan is to bring home OJ and bread after class. We are out, like you now. I’ve known you were gay since you were six, I’ve loved you since you were born.” He signs it “Dad” and finishes with a post script: “Your mom and I think you and Mike make a cute couple.”


Aaawgh! Now I'm crying just a bit...damn hormones!!!

"Alternative Model"

From Sweden, Victoria Eriksson walks the gender line by using the "alternative" tag!
Here's a link to Victoria's Blog which presents an exiting gender line from androgyny to feminine.
Victoria was also on Sweden's Next Top Model, is also a make up artist and designer!

Transgender "Glee"

This is not a new story except for here in Cyrsti's Condo. Last season the hit television show "Glee" introduced a part time transgender character "Unique" :

"Wade Unique Adams"

"After dealing heavily with gay themes since its debut, ‘Glee‘ is finally taking on the issues that transgender teens face. In the episode, ‘Saturday Night Glee-ver,’ we were introduced to Unique: a transgender character who is coming to terms with her identity. Unique, part of the show choir Vocal Adrenaline, approaches Mercedes and Kurt as a young man named Wade (played by Alex from ‘The Glee Project‘) who wants to wear a dress on stage and unveil his flashy alter ego. It appears at first that he came to the right place, to take advice from two of the show’s bravest characters. But even Kurt, it seems, has a lot to learn. When Kurt advises Wade not to become Unique on stage, it is evident that he doesn’t understand what trans people go through. “You identify as a man,” Wade tells him, and when Unique takes the stage, it’s obvious that this is who Wade is. Unique is the true identity, and Wade is the fiction. Unique, of course, brings the house down with her moves. It’s about time ‘Glee’ tackled some of these issues!"

The reason I brought it up is I'm not a regular Glee viewer but I did see a brief part of the show recently which included a performance by Unique and and a discussion with a guy I assume was Kurt.  He was complaining about Unique being a boy one day and a girl the next and by the way which restroom would be used.
This story line is exactly what our transgender culture needs to educate the public about who we are.

Go here for more.

A Different View

Many of the YouTube videos I view and even present on our Cyrsti's Condo big screen give us all a wonderful finished transition. Speaking for me alone, I am amazed and happy for most of the transgender girls but have seen much of their process an impossible dream of sorts.  The video I'm presenting now though   is different in that the trans woman had not as of yet started any HRT:

Winning in Columbus

Columbus, Ohio is very close to me geographically and a couple years ago was ranked as one of the top ten Gay cities in the country. In many ways the outcome of  Savanna DeLong's (pictured right) story didn't surprise me as much as it happening at all. This story comes from the LGBTQ Nation:

"A municipal court judge in Columbus, Ohio, has ordered owners of a private dining and business networking club to pay a $1,000 fine in the city’s first-ever transgender discrimination case. Franklin County Municipal Court Judge H. William Pollitt Jr., on Monday levied the fine against Columbus Hospitality Management, owners of the Capital Club, for retaliating against Savanna DeLong and denying her work at the downtown club. Savanna DeLong Image via WBNS-TV It’s the first-ever case brought by city prosecutors against a Columbus business for discriminating against someone who’s transgender, since gender identity was added in 2008 to local anti-discrimination laws."

I wondered though if DeLong had retained her job after all of this and a 1000 dollars is very much a slap on the wrist. Read more:

" Chief Prosecutor Lara Baker-Morrish said DeLong’s status as a contractor prevented the city from fully pursuing a discrimination case against the company. Columbus Hospitality Management was fined for retaliating against DeLong by denying her work after she filed a federal equal-opportunity complaint. That complaint was dismissed because federal anti-discrimination laws don’t cover LGBT Americans. Without the 2008 addition of gender identity to Columbus’ anti-discrimination laws, though, DeLong would have had no standing to pursue her case, Baker-Morrish said. The $1,000 fine against Capital Club will be paid to the city, not to DeLong. But, she said, she has gained something from her involvement in Columbus’ first transgender discrimination case. “It gave me a lot more self-confidence. It made me realize Columbus is a pretty good place,” she said. “I feel like I contributed something to the community.”

That is a better ending!

R.I.P. Erica Andrews

Erica Andrews, a nationally known trans woman and drag diva who headlined the Dallas-filmed indie flick Ticked Off Trannies with Knives, died last night in Chicago from a lung infection, according to reports. Andrews was in her 40s.

For more go here.