Archive for December, 2005
Sunday, December 25th, 2005
This past nine months have been a blast.
All thanks go to you, my dear readers. Hat tips to Ona Marae, Jennifer Gee and Nick Kiddle for your words on this blog.
2006 will be even better.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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Friday, December 23rd, 2005
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[1] http://jaysennett.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/snow-man.JPG
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Friday, December 23rd, 2005
I've felt for months not so busy, and then in this last two weeks I feel like I've been treading just above water. Maybe it's the time of year, or working with excellent editors and fabulous writers to publish [1] a book [2] early next year. I also bought a Crack, I mean, Blackberry. This thing is my new favorite toy but ironing out the kinks took a few days. All the busyness and no blogging for two days. Alas, strange thoughts leapt through my mind. "All my readers will leave me." Strange. This insistence on blogging every day, just so I can get ahead of the 19 trillion blogs out there.Whatever. I'll be blogging here and there for the next several days. What with the holidays and a trip to Toronto to see good friends, plus a fifteen mile hike on New Year's eve, I'm not sure how close I'll be to a computer.I wish everyone on of my dear readers, a Happy New Year. 2006 is going to be very, very busy.
[1] http://jaysennett.com/cgi-bin/mt/www.homofactuspress.com
[2] http://www.jaysennett.com/blog/2005/06/call_for_submissions.htm
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Tuesday, December 20th, 2005
[1]
I have apparently been singled out for praise by two transphobic radical feminists.
piny, a frequent commenter here, brought this to my attention yesterday.
Gentle Spirit is a women-only (how to police that online!) of the hardcore, MtF hating, radical feminist variety.
Imagine my surprise when I click over to the site to find these words of praise, from none other than Hearrrrt.
Here is a link to a blog written by an FTM involved in something called the "Ordinary Man Project." There are links to others involved in it. The blog entries are interesting, especiallys ince we don't often hear the FTM perspective on things.
http://jaysennett.typepad.com/jay_sennetts_blog/2005/03/manifesto.html [2]
Heart
The crap-posing-as-faux praise takes off in Sophia's response to Heart.
I went. I looked. I read. I link-hopped.
I ended up at a site wherein the writer was urging MTF trans to study Halle Berry's sexual scene in Monster Ball to see how women's orgasm. For fuck's sake.
Has it never occured to Sophia that women like herself, you know, REAL WOMEN, might watch movies to figure out sex? Last time I checked, sex education fell to the sub-basement on America's priorities. And I guess I missed the memo about girls and women getting great messages from our society about their bodies and sexuality. Who knew?!
I went back to FTM sites.
Oh joy.
What I really liked was reading how their experiences seem to, on the whole, made them more sensitive to how being a man was so not about the whole power-over, macho dynamic. I don't know, it just seemed more genuine...more about honesty than many of the MTF's I've read.
Considering Sophia and Heart hate MtFs, how can she claim to know genuiness from dishonesty? Please.
It's as if these folks had no desire to persuade everyone and their grandmother that they really, really are Real Men, they're who they are, period and the things they've done to their bodies were simply needed FOR THEM to reconcile their bodies with their minds and identities. But there just doesn't seem to be any big insistence that others treat them as men, dammit, or else. Very different feeling/voice/vibe I get from those sites and it was a good one.
Wretched stuff, this is. Like I give a shit that she thinks I'm nice, or the folks who answered my questions are nice. Nice, of course, represents a short-hand for, "Well, gee, they don't call me out when I say their just women on hormones!" She likes to believe MtFs are rude to her and her friends because it is a function of their residual male privilege.
No, Sophia. MtFs call you on your shit because you makes hateful, rude, and just downright stupid comments about their lives.
Kiss. My. Transsexual. Ass. I'm not your pet.
[1] http://jaysennett.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/favorite-pet.JPG
[2] http://jaysennett.typepad.com/jay_sennetts_blog/2005/03/manifesto.html
Posted in Uncategorized | 12 Comments »
Monday, December 19th, 2005
The accumulation and dissemation of our histories and cultures remains a vital project at any time. Please see below. _____________________We (Jordy Jones and Susan Stryker) are compiling information for a proposed book on San Francisco's subcultural gender scenes in the 1990s. If you lived, worked, or played in San Francisco between January 1, 1990 and December 31, 1999, or had significant connections there, and were part of any of the various cultural or activist scenes that were waging gender revolution, or were making or programming gender-y art or film or wereinvolved in trans or genderqueer activism, or into club or theater drag, you are invited to join this group. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/genderatti/ [1]Be strange but don't be a stranger...:J2
[1] http://www.jaysennett.com:2095/horde/services/go.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fgroups.yahoo.com%2Fgroup%2Fgenderatti%2F
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Saturday, December 17th, 2005
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[1] http://jaysennett.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/jay-in-the-world1.GIF
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Friday, December 16th, 2005
[1]
[1] http://jaysennett.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/i-cant-believe.GIF
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Thursday, December 15th, 2005
Great trans website: Numbers in 1080 [1].Gulf Coast Recontruction Watch [2].Gulf Coast Reconstruction Watch is a new project to document and investigate the rebuilding of the Southern Gulf in the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Through original reporting, in-depth features, voices from community leaders, and other unique coverage, Watch aims to promote a more democratic and accountable reconstruction in the South. Gulf Coast Reconstruction Watch is a project of the Institute for Southern Studies [3], a non-profit research and education center, and the Institute’s flagship magazine, Southern Exposure [4].Check out their article about the more than 6600 [5] people still missing after Katrina.Official Shrub.com blog [6], which has a great post: Transphobia to the left of me, Anti-feminism to the Right [7]
[1] http://www.queerdyke.com/
[2] http://www.reconstructionwatch.org/index.php
[3] http://www.southernstudies.org/
[4] http://www.southernstudies.org/southernexposure/
[5] http://www.reconstructionwatch.org/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=39
[6] http://blog.shrub.com/
[7] http://blog.shrub.com/archives/tekanji/2005-11-01_64
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Wednesday, December 14th, 2005
[1]
How hot is this drag king?
[1] http://jaysennett.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/orange_2.jpg
Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments »
Tuesday, December 13th, 2005
My gender identity [1] is a search for all people in our society about their own gender identity. This project is a new initiative of Planet Gender [2]. Helen (left)Gender identity: down-to-earth femmeBiggest taboo and what to do about it: Silence & invisibility – more, diverse, complex, fun, good… representations in mediaSuggestions for a more tolerant society: education for all – adequate health care access for trans peopleKam Wai (right)Gender identity: relaxed ftm (but NOT during the festival)Biggest taboo and what to do about it: The notion that gender is fluid and not fixed. Solution: be* out* there! (visibility).Suggestions for a more tolerant society: Make a TV comedy series about transgender community.
[1] http://planetgender.webgui.s-dreams.com/index.pl/en/my_gender_identity
[2] http://planetgender.webgui.s-dreams.com/index.pl/en/home
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Tuesday, December 13th, 2005
Blog Carnivals create connections and conversations that might otherwise be absent from the blog world. A carnival is hosted by a particular blogger, who compiles all the submitted blog posts for a particular month.Maria, over at Daily Dose of Queer, hosts the premiere [1] edition of the Carnival of Bent Attractions [2].Go and read some awesome posts. And link [3] to the Carnival page to find out who will be hosting in the upcoming months. I'm hosting in April 2006.
[1] http://www.dailydoseofqueer.com/2005/12/10/welcome-to-the-premier-edition-of-the-carnival-of-bent-attractions/
[2] http://blogcarnival.com/bc/cprof_132.html
[3] http://blogcarnival.com/bc/cprof_132.html
Posted in Queer, Weblogs | 1 Comment »
Saturday, December 10th, 2005
[1]
piny asked for the dish on this piece.
_________________________
A while back I spent some time chatting with a new FtM. You know, one of the ones with less than a year's time on hormones.
So I'm sitting in my chair, clicking off in my head all the physical changes he's showing, and he's talking about how hard everything is, and people don't understand, and it's bad, bad, bad. Then he riffs for awhile on the LGBT panel circuit gig. How much that sucks, what with no pay and all. And I'm thinking about all the babes who are now drawn to him as he transitions, etc., the ones that stand near him at events, etc. The one's I've seen touch him, and fawn over him, etc.
"I agree with you about panels," I shared and then BOOM! Right between the ears, I realize:
I was just like that, about seven or ten years ago.
I used to talk about how hard it was, especially to some hot babe, then bask in her glow as she said something like, "oh, that is so hard!" and snuggled up next to me, (where her breast might rub against my arm) or hugged me (where both her breasts might touch my chest) or touched my face (where, depending on her top, I might get a freebie peek at her cleavage).
So this realization begins to permeate my core, and then BOOM! I realize I used panel discussions to get dates. In fact, I used the whole -transitioning-is-hard-maybe-no-one-will-date-me-life-is-hard schtick on the LGBT panel circuit to get dates.
Not in any thoughtful way, mind you. But as I listened to this guy go on, I just saw myself, seven, ten years ago, using a combination of self-fetishization and pity to get the babes to date me. I thought:
What a dorky approach! How obvious!
It worked though. At least then it did, and if the babes flocking to this guy reflect today's times, it seems to be working still.
Then I just started laughing inside myself.
[1] http://jaysennett.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/the-pain.GIF
Posted in Uncategorized | 18 Comments »
Thursday, December 8th, 2005
[1]
Of course, I will probably be assasinated in people's heads for claiming that gender is branding.
But gender = label = brand.
I thought of this equation as I pondered an unfortunate cover [2] piece in Newsweek.
Very little is known about the first woman to become a suicide bomber for Al Qaeda in Iraq, except that she dressed as a man.
And it goes downhill from this opening statement.
[1] http://jaysennett.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/branding.JPG
[2] http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10315095/site/newsweek/
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Wednesday, December 7th, 2005
[1]
USA Today reported [2] that a majority of disability-related complaints filed [3] with the Department of Transportation cited airline wheelchair service as a big problem.
Failure to assist passengers in chairs was the number one complaint. Passengers:
also complained of damaged chairs, poor seating arrangements, inaccessible aircraft and excessive waits for stored chairs upon landing.
How I moved through the physical world changed as more and more hormones transitioned my body into a semblance of male. Physical deference, a sense of physical safety and an awareness that I had metamorphasized into a "big guy" solidified in my mind that significant physical changes to my body changed how much physical space the world granted me. And, that "land grant," if you will, also changed my perception of myself. The world and its inhabitants conspired to let me explore as much as I wanted to. It was my right.
[1] http://jaysennett.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/waiting.JPG
[2] http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/USAToday/932636501.html?did=932636501&FMT=ABS&FMTS=FT&date=Nov+28%2C+2005&author=Barbara+De+Lollis&pub=USA+TODAY&desc=Complaints+cite+airline+wheelchair+service
[3] http://airconsumer.ost.dot.gov/reports/cradi/ReportToCongress08302005.doc
Posted in Man, Queer, Truth | 6 Comments »
Tuesday, December 6th, 2005
[1]
By far the best part of blogging is reading the comments.
piny, a sometimes commenter here, yesterday offered one of the most astonishing definitions/schema for gender-bending/transsexual I've come across. piny responded to a statement from Nick Kiddle, who sometimes blogs here.
That link made my [Nick Kiddle's] head hurt. What does it take to get people to understand the difference between "woman-identified, not medically transitioning" and "recreational cross-dresser"?
Those distinctions are just window-dressing. There's gender-benders and there's trans. The gender-benders claim to destabilize and satirize the gender binary but really just support and worship it. The trans claim to act independently of it but actually need it to survive. Sometimes, the two categories are completely different, and sometimes they inexplicably melt into an undifferentiated whole.
That's all you need to know.
piny is absolutely right. Chuck your queer/trans theory books out the window. (Unless you want to keep them around to impress the babes.)
piny has explained the trans universe for all. Neat, tidy, and I've drawn a little cartoon as a reminder, in case you forget.
[1] http://jaysennett.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/undifferent.bmp
Posted in Queer | 1 Comment »
