Today is World AIDS Day, and over at The Guardian Peter Tatchell complains about blood donation rules. It sounds like the UK restrictions are not quite as stupid as those in California, but they are still quite daft. It is no wonder that the fundies still get away with labeling AIDS a “gay plague”.
Feminism
More Genetics Nonsense
Today’s Guardian has another of those articles about finding a “genetic” cause for homosexuality. To be fair to whoever wrote it, it doesn’t claim that genetics is the whole cause of sexual orientation, and it does quote views that suggest that things are much more complex. However, us humans have a tendency to see such things in binary terms, and that can be very dangerous. So sure, having a biological component to sexual preference could help enshrine legal protections for LGBT people. But ideas about “genetic” causes can also lead to parents wanting their children screen for “gayness” prior to birth, and you can bet that would be one case where the fundies would suddenly become all in favor of abortion.
So before you take any of this seriously, you may want to read Ekaterina Sedia’s post on twin studies. You should also note that, this being The Guardian, the article gives a lot of space to J. Michael Bailey, who is possibly the last person on the planet who should be trusted to pronounce on issues of sexuality (see here for more about him).
Women in IT
A UK-based IT magazine that I follow has been doing a survey of the state of the industry. One of the questions that it asked was, “Does the IT industry discriminate against women?”
Personally I thought this was a no-brainer, but apparently the largest number of respondents was in the “don’t know” category. Amongst female respondents, 41% were in the “agree” or “strongly agree” categories, while amongst male respondents 46% were in the “disagree” or “strongly disagree” categories. Gee, I wonder why that could be?
Mostly, however, I am depressed to see a supposedly professional piece of journalism in which 44% is described as “a majority”. This does not exactly fill me with confidence in the survey.
Thank You, Google
Nice to see that one big company really does care.
In Memoriam
Today is the International Transgender Day of Remembrance – a day devoted remembering the many people who are killed each year simply for being transgender.
You can find this year’s memorial list here. It isn’t obvious from that list as few of the entries give more than the basic cause of death, but many of those killings were executions. And I don’t mean state executions like the one in Iraq, I mean vigilante executions carried out in cold blood by people who believe that transgender people do not deserve to live.
Unfortunately things are unlikely to change in the short term. Social attitudes take a long time to shift. There are still too many people in the police who can’t be bothered investigating the killing of transgender people, and too many people in the judiciary and on juries who are happy to let the killers off if a case comes to trial. But we can at least spread the word. If you care about this issue, please make a post of your own today. The more people who speak out, the quicker social attitudes will change.
An Evening in San Francisco
Yesterday San Francisco was full of people demonstrating against Proposition 8. Kevin and I could not be there because we had to attend the SFSFC Board Meeting. However, we did arrive in The City at around 4:00pm to do some shopping at attend SF in SF. By some miracle of synchronicity, the readers for the evening happened to be Geoff Ryman, Ellen Klages and Nalo Hopkinson. We couldn’t have done better if we had tried.
As it happened, however, there was little about gay politics in the readings (though Geoff did manage to read one except about a lesbian couple and one about a gay couple). The discussion afterwards concentrated mainly on the craft of writing, with much being said about how to give information without doing obvious infodumps, how to make sure each character has their own voice in dialog, and how to convey character emotions without actually writing things like “she felt sad”. It was one of the best sessions we’ve had (and the place was packed out). There will be no more events this year, but a schedule for 2009 will be released soon.
Ships in the Night
While Gary and I were in the university bookshop in Chicago a woman came in to sign a few books. It wasn’t a public event, though Gary recognized the guy with her as a professional driver who often takes authors around the city. The staff were clearly delighted to get to meet this person, and from snatches of conversation I got the impression that she was signing graphic novels. From her clothes and hair I guessed she was probably a lesbian. I had a suspicion as to who it might be, and a search of Google images suggests that it probably was this lady.
It is probably just as well I didn’t try to talk to her. I would have been embarrassingly fangirlish.
Cat Fanciers Strike Back
A quick follow-up to this.
On a Happier Note
From the Obama-Biden Administration’s employment policy:
The Obama-Biden Transition Project does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, age, national origin, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, or any other basis of discrimination prohibited by law.
(Their emphasis)
Fortunately for Julie Bindel, it does look like they are still prepared to discriminate against cat-fanciers. She might have to put up with Obama hiring people who are androgynous, transgender or Satanists though.
Was She Drunk?
Well, I did expect Julie Bindel to come out with something utterly stupid in response to the protests about her Stonewall Award, but she has managed to exceed my wildest imaginings. Not content with having another go at the transgendered people we already knew she hates, she has launched an attack on all forms of sexuality that she finds repulsive:
I for one do not wish to be lumped in with an ever-increasing list of folk defined by “odd” sexual habits or characteristics. Shall we just start with A and work our way through the alphabet? A, androgynous, b, bisexual, c, cat-fancying d, devil worshipping. Where will it ever end?
So there you are, people. Thankfully she didn’t get as far as P in the alphabet, but I’m sure we all know what she would have chosen there, don’t we.
Really, was she drunk when she wrote this? Maybe a little to much champers in celebration of the award? For once I’m not going to complain about The Guardian giving her a platform, because this petulant and selfish outburst has done more to damage her cause than anything I could have said.
Understanding Numbers
I’d hoped that Colleen’s post yesterday would have been the final word on this, but this morning I find The Guardian, of all places, blaming black people for the passage of Proposition 8. Even John Scalzi appears to have given the idea some credence. So let’s look at some numbers, shall we?
According the the Chronicle, 52% of Californians voted for Prop. 8. According to The Guardian, 10% of Californian voters were black, and two thirds of them voted for Prop 8. So how come the passage of the measure is the fault of the 7% of Yes voters that were black, and not of the 45% of Yes voters who were not black?
Now granted, black people turned out in greater numbers this year because of Mr. Obama, but are you going to say that they shouldn’t be allowed to vote because they don’t support the same causes as you do? Isn’t that a bit Rethuglican?
Besides, there is more to it than that.
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A Litte Ray of Sunshine
In amongst all of the anti-LGBT measures passed in the US this week, the little town of Silverton, OR has done something that is just as remarkable as Barack Obama’s presidency – they have elected America’s first openly transgender mayor. And not just any transgender person either. I’d rather expected that this honor would go to a handsome transsexual man who is clearly “one of the boys”, but Stu Rasmussen is an avowedly heterosexual man who takes his cross-dressing so seriously that he has had breast implants.
Thank you, people of Silverton, for giving us all a bit ef encouragement.
Victims of Hate
A press release from COLAGE just appeared in my in box. Here’s an extract:
The morning before the election, COLAGE heard from a parent in our community. Her 7 year old son had approached her, upset, in a concerned voice said, “Mama, I hope Prop 8 doesn’t win.” I agreed with him, and then he said, “Because if it does, you and Mommy will be split up and our family won’t be together.”
While we at COLAGE all identify with the fear and sadness that Emmett expressed, we want to tell him and all the other COLAGErs around the country that nothing and no one can take away or split up your family. We know the truth; Love makes a family. Our families deserve equal respect and rights.
In case you have forgotten, COLAGE is an organization made of up kids who have LGBT parents. They are our future. Your help is appreciated.
Yes
Such a little word, so loaded with emotion.
Yes, the USA has done the supposedly unthinkable and put a black man in the white house, and the symbolic impact of that cannot be underestimated. But as for any further “yes we can”, we will have to wait and see. Mr. Scalzi has already made the necessary points, so all I need say is that Obama is taking charge at a particularly difficult time in his country’s history and he is going to find it hard to live up to his supporters expectations.
Yes, on the other hand, is also what the people of California (well, 52% of them, which is enough) are saying to Proposition 8, and as a result bigotry and hatred will be enshrined in the state’s constitution for many years to come. Several other states are also on their way to passing similar legislation. And this is where it becomes clear that effecting change is hard and slow.
One of the things you don’t get with election results is a breakdown by age band, but all of the polls suggest that if the vote had been left up to people under the age of 30 then Prop. 8 would have sunk without trace. Equally it was clear that one of the things that really motivated the Yes on 8 crowd was a desire to “protect” children, by which they meant stopping kids from growing up with a fair and open mind. It won’t work. In 30 years time, all of this will seem like a bad dream, and the USA will be celebrating the election of its first openly lesbian president.
For now, however, there are around 36,000 people whose marriages will be under threat from religious extremists determined to have those marriages retroactively annulled. Back to the barricades. Can we stop them? Yes, we can.
Update: The Chronicle has exit poll data. They say that 60% of voters under 30 opposed Prop. 8, while 60% of voters over 65 were in favor of it. That’s a demographic trend if ever I saw one.
Update 2: Fixed the typo in Update 1 (thanks Marcia!). Also Kameron Hurley has some wise things to say about why people voted Yes on 8.
A Message of Hope
We found this wine in our local Safeway and this evening we presented it to Kevin Roche and Andy Trembley in the hope that they will be able to use it to celebrate on Tuesday night.
Tsk, Tsk
The Bay Area Reporter has news of a distributed denial of service attack on the No on Prop 8 web site. The attack was launched from computers in California, Texas, New Jersey and Georgia. The No on 8 site was down for several hours last night (Wed 28th) but is now up and running again. The matter is now in the hands of the FBI and the Secret Service who, one hopes, will catch and prosecute whoever is responsible.
Am I surprised? No. We are, after all, dealing with people who are in the grip of unreasoning hatred, and who are probably scared shitless that the Great Sky Fairy will smite us all dead if Prop 8 fails. I’m mildly surprised that they haven’t done anything worse.
Science Is Not Enough
Two news stories have appeared in the past few days on the subject of genetics and sexuality/gender. The first was a piece in The Economist that looks at possible evolutionary advantages for non-conformant gender behavior. The other was a story about some research in Australia that claims to have found a genetic component to transsexuality (reported here and here, amongst many other places outside of the US where the story appears to have sunk without trace).
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In Which Cheryl Commits Fiction
While I was composing the post for Twilight yesterday I was suddenly struck by The Muse. As a consequence I have written a short story. In theory it is a cautionary tale about the dangers of trying to impose gender identity on children. In practice it is a comedy about some Greek heroes in the days before they became famous. It is called “The Search for Achilles” and you can read it here.
A Little Ray of Sunshine
Having a lot of online friends, I get asked to support a lot of different causes. One of those I signed up for was the case of Prossy Kakooza, a lesbian woman who had fled Uganda for Britain after being very badly treated by the Ugandan authorities, and by her own family. The Home Office, in its stupid, bureaucratic way, wanted to send her back. So there was a campaign to get her asylum in the UK, and a court case. That case was heard on Friday, and the result is that Prossy will be allowed to stay in Britain. And there is one further twist to the story. The campaign to help Prossy stay in the UK was organized by the Metropolitan Community Church of Manchester. So congratulations to Prossy, and a very warm Thank You! to the Reverend Andy Braunston and his congregation, who clearly understand a lot more about love than certain “Christians” I could mention.
On No, Here We Go Again
This is for Twilight, who asked an interesting question yesterday and deserves a better answer than the one I gave her last night. The rest of you can skip this if you are tired of gender politics.
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