O-H-I-O

There is transgender hope in the heartland of the United States in Ohio. (My home state.)

This post is from Salon:

"Columbus, Ohio struck down conversion therapy on Monday night when its City Council voted unanimously to pass an ordinance banning the discredited practice. Also known as “ex-gay therapy” or “reparative therapy,” Columbus is just one of a handful of municipalities across the United States to ban mental health professionals from seeking to change the sexual orientation or gender identity of LGBT youth.

The capital, however, is actually the third city in Ohio to outlaw conversion therapy in the past two years. Cincinnati became the first city in the U.S. to prohibit “pray the gay away” clinics back in 2015. Toledo followed suit in February.

The decision by the Columbus City Council is the latest in a surprising wave of legislation passed in support of the LGBT community in Ohio, a state with a Republican governor and a GOP-controlled legislature. The Buckeye State could become just the second Red State in the nation to pass nondiscrimination protections to prohibit bias in housing and employment against LGBT people. As Arkansas, Tennessee, and Texas move to the extreme right on LGBT issues, Ohio offers a tiny glimmer of hope from the heartland.

Rep. Nickie Antonio, the state’s first openly gay legislator, introduced the nondiscrimination bill last Thursday, and Gov. John Kasich signaled that he could be persuaded to back it.

“I don’t want anybody to be discriminated against because they happen to be gay,” Kasich said when approached by press last week. “I don’t favor discrimination in any way. I haven’t heard much about this but if it’s happening we have to deal with it.”

Ohio is currently one of 28 states in the nation where it is perfectly legal to be fired for being LGBT. But in recent years, cities across the state have moved to either pass affirming legislation or strengthen their existing statutes."

For more, go here.

More on Trans Feminism

Connie commented:

"I think that gender identity should have nothing to do with feminism, as a concept. If one is a humanist, s/he is a feminist by default. Problems evolve from the agendas people attach to the concept. For some, their approach to feminism may be centered on anti-misogyny, which is valid, but antagonistic nonetheless. Still, the concept of feminism remains available for anyone to follow - man, woman, or trans. The fact that it is women, cis or trans, who most often have a chip in the game may well lead to having a chip on their shoulders, as well. I look at feminism as inclusive rather than anti-anything, though, so a radical feminist would probably not view me so favorably. On a human level, we should all be considered to be equal, but our differences - as they correspond to our gender identities - should be celebrated at the same time. If there were not those differences, after all, there would be no trans people!

As far as a military draft goes, God forbid that we ever need to have one again. If we do, though, I wonder just how those radical feminists would react to the drafting of women (in equal numbers, of course), along with men. Thanks, again, for your service, btw, even if you might have been both at the same time.;-)"

Great points! Especially the one about the draft. I still carry some resentment towards the young women back in the day who said, they would go fight if they could. Knowing full well they couldn't back then. It was easy enough for them to hide behind their gender during a very unpopular war (conflict). I was (and am) a proponent of an universal draft where everyone has to do something. Male, female or transgender, there are enough major problems in our country to keep everyone busy.

Thanks for thanking me for my service :). At the least the three years gave me more time to run from the realization of who I really was. I knew somehow I was transgender and wanted to live as a woman, just had no idea of a good way to do it back in the early to mid 1970's.

Maybe a topic for another blog post: When I put my cross dressing toys aside!"

Jazz Returns

Jazz Jenning's show on the "TLC" is returning this June with Jazz facing the thoughts of gender realignment surgery. Check this video for more:

Transgender Feminism

Cyrsti's Condo archive post from August 2013:

:Have you ever considered how feminism effects us as transgender women? Does it at all and are we accepted if we try to participate?

On some levels we are met with a resounding NO by the more radical of the feminists who view us as little more than impostors. On other levels YES by those who need whatever political clout we can offer.

Truly over the years I have believed in total equality between the genders. Back in the day when men of my age bracket were being drafted to fight in the non war no one wants to remember, I perceived the process of blatant gender discrimination. Men and women both should have been drafted! All in all though the process turned out to be another dose of my wonderful male privilege!

Of course I read loads of the feminist posts and do believe in equality but I wonder if once again as a trans woman how much really effects me? I just don't read much from genetic feminists mentioning the enormous injustices we are subjected to. Regardless of our birth genders the rift seems too wide to cross. Certainly we deserve the same amount of money as men for the same job...if we can get one at all.

Recently I received an invitation to a dinner/speaker local "Women in Government" meeting. The invite gave me a chance to consider if I wanted to shell out the 25 dollars to hear the speaker and the possible consequences if I went.  Per norm I certainly would have been the "one of a kind" person in the room with a chance to network the transgender culture. All the warm and fuzzies to be sure but would it have been the time to ask the women in government about their views of transgender feminism? Undoubtedly not what the participants would have expected I'm sure.

So, I didn't go and in some senses felt bad about not doing it. I do however have a couple other avenues I'm considering such as an youth LGBT group in town.  They of course are always looking for help.

In today's world, everyone tries to protect and build their own little hill of sand including the genetic feminists. It's another part of the girls sandbox I'm not sure of wanting to play in."

Damn Mailbox

As I have written numerous times here in Cyrsti's Condo, the trip to the mailbox was one of my first ventures into the world as a cross dressed boy. Of course I stressed forever it seemed to be able to make that trip into the world.

All these years later, some days it seems nothing has changed. Even now I think I have to make sure I apply the basics of makeup just to go to the mailbox. The difference these days is I have several very close neighbors (most know I am transgender I am sure by now.)

How odd is it the more things change, the more they stay the same!

Gender Identity Conceptions and Misconceptions

Recently, CBSN weighed in on the difference in genders: This post may be a bit wonky...but if you follow the CBSN link to the video it will be worthwhile. (At the bottom of the page.) Here is a quick intro:

"It’s a common misconception that gender identity and sexual orientation are connected. If someone is transgender, for example, many people automatically assume that they must also be gay. That, however, is not the case. Gender and sexuality are different, and it’s an important distinction to understand.

“People often perceive that they intersect. But many of us are working very hard to unhinge one from the other,” said sj Miller, deputy director at NYU’s Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and the Transformation of Schools. “They’ve been conflated for so long, and they’re completely different.” 

Play VIDEO

Gender - The Space Between

Could I...Would I?

Around here, it's the time of the year when Girl Scouts jump up everywhere it seems to peddle their ubiquitous cookies. Including my granddaughter.

As I see them do it, I wonder how it must have been to have been able to join the Girl Scouts. Instead of my exceedingly short miserable stay in the Boy Scouts. Of course I will never know, just like not being able to take Home Economics in high school and learning to cook and sew, etc. Way before transgender, and LGBT were even words for the most part.

I believe now, the most important lesson I would have learned is how girls/young women interacted among themselves when boys were not present. Back in those days where I went to school, the genders were pretty much segregated. Girls to Home Ec, boys to Auto Mechanics. So of course I wanted to be in with the girls as a girl, not as a boy cross dressed as one.

Closets being what they were (and are still) I evaded much of the derision and bullying I would have had to put up with. I played sports, followed the college prep studies and went to proms. Or, I played the game enough to get by, get home and steal away some precious time to cross dress alone.

As time has a way of doing, it went so slow back then and seems like a blur now. Time though does not heal all, as I still wonder "what if." What if I had done more to express myself and had the courage to at least try to step out of the closet. I do know then, the life I had would have been seriously impacted under the harsh lights of an ignorant world.

So on and on I went and here I am finally where I wanted to be...almost. Yesterday was a good example of being called a "he" at one stop and treated like a star by a millennial at another.

Overall the "could" came true and the "would" provided me all I could ask for so far!

When Will They Ever Learn?

RALEIGH, North Carolina --

Despite Republican assurances that North Carolina's "bathroom bill" isn't hurting the economy, the law limiting LGBT protections will cost the state more than $3.76 billion in lost business over a dozen years, according to an Associated Press analysis.

Over the past year, North Carolina has suffered financial hits ranging from scuttled plans for a PayPal facility that would have added an estimated $2.66 billion to the state's economy to a canceled Ringo Starr concert that deprived a town's amphitheater of about $33,000 in revenue. The blows have landed in the state's biggest cities as well as towns surrounding its flagship university, and from the mountains to the coast.

North Carolina could lose hundreds of millions more because the NCAA is avoiding the state, usually a favored host. The group is set to announce sites for various championships through 2022, and North Carolina won't be among them as long as the law is on the books. The NAACP also has initiated a national economic boycott.

The AP analysis - compiled through interviews and public records requests - represents the largest reckoning yet of how much the law, passed one year ago, could cost the state. The law excludes gender identity and sexual orientation from statewide antidiscrimination protections, and requires transgender people to use restrooms corresponding to the sex on their birth certificates in many public buildings.

Still, AP's tally is likely an underestimation of the law's true costs.

For more, go here:

Christianity?

A very dear transgender woman friend of mine recently posted this and I thought it was worth repeating, and for once I had nothing to add. She said it all:

"My parents both graduated from Cedarville University. It is a Christian school. They teach a literal interpretation of the Bible. And they follow the Fundamentalist tradition of ignoring the message of Christ while focusing on small snippets of the Bible which they can take out of context and cite while preaching their message of bigotry.

My mother, God bless her ignorant soul, always updates Cedarville U. with my current address so that they can send me their quarterly newsletter. The Spring 2017 issue of Cedarville Magazine has an article about gender. It's a disturbing read.

And here is Greg Couser's sermon on the subject:
https://www.cedarville.edu/Chapel/Archive.aspx…

He says, "Here we turn to Matthew and Christ's teaching on sex and gender in Matthew 19:1-11 for some guidance."

Here is the passage:
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/…

This disgusts me. Greg Couser takes a passage about divorce and argues that it supports his anti-trans message simply because Matthew 19:4 says, "He which made them at the beginning made them male and female."

Are you kidding me? It says God "made them male and female."

It doesn't say, "Males are all born with a penis and having a penis is what determines whether or not you're male."

It doesn't say, "All females must accept that if they weren't born with a vagina then they aren't really female."

If you're a Christian, you believe that God created women as women and men as men.

You must also believe that God created all birth defects. God created conjoined twins. God created intersex babies. God created 0.2% of women with the wrong parts. And God created 0.2% of men with the wrong parts.

How dare anyone tell trans people they're not really the person they are because of the body they were born with?

What a sad, hateful human being."

Noth