I missed the debate last night, but have had multiple folks email me this morning with this very importantpoint.

When questioned about inclusiveness of the LGBTQ community in the City, the mayoral candidates were asked to specifically state their positions on "gay unions" and "gay marriage."

Luke Ravenstahl stated that he does not support gay unions or gay marriage.  He said he was proud to participate in gay events and that he would like gay people to participate in City goverment. 

Mark DeSantis, the Republican, is in favor of civil unions AND stated that he would appoint someone in his Adminstration to serve as a liaison to the gay community.

Ravenstahl puts the onus on us to participate, dismissing the responsibility of his Administration to create a culture that respects and values the contributions of City residents who are gay.  However, he is willing to come to our events. 

Read this very carefully all you who lauded Luke for showing up at PrideFest:  that's all he's gonna do -- show up.  He's not gonna walk the walk.  He's given us ample evidence of that. 

Luke Ravenstahl didn't take the time to complete a questionnaire from the Gertrude Stein Club during the primary race. 

Luke Ravenstahl didn't take the time to attend the first ever LGBTQ forum sponsored by the Allegheny County Democratic Committee. 

Luke Ravenstahl doesn't think we have the right to get married.  This is a litmus test question, people, even if it is not a local issue. 

And you delude yourselves if you think helping get a permit for a street party is going to translate into anything more concrete for gay City residents.  He doesn't care about us and he isn't moving forward with us to build a more inclusive community. 

Ask yourselves this on Tuesday morning ... do you want your Mayor to be there for us as PrideFest or to be there for us in City Hall?

Mark DeSantis is the candidate who will walk the walk when it comes to local LGBTQ issues.

Vote DeSantis and vote for the gay community to move forward.

Dear Friends,

Steel-City Stonewall Democrats and Congressman Mike Doyle would like to invite you to a Special Event with Representative Barney Frank of the 4th Congressional District of Massachusetts.

This is a casual meet and greet event with the Founder of the Stonewall Democrats, Rep. Barney Frank.

Please join us at the home of Christine Donohue* on Saturday, November 3, 2007 beginning at 3:00 p.m.

Event Details:When: November 3, 2007
Time: 3:00 p.m.
Cost: Free and open to the public, Light refreshments will be served
Address: 6568 Fifth Avenue, Pittsburgh, 15206, at the corner of Fifth & Beechwood
Parking: Best option is parking along Beechwood

We look forward to seeing you on Saturday, November 3, 2007 at 3:00 pm.

*Christine Donohue is a candidate for the Superior Court of Pennsylvania and has graciously offered to lend her home for this event!

**************************************

Barney Frank is not the most popular gay legislators due to his role in stripping protections based on gender identity and gender presentation from the Employment Non Discrimination Act (ENDA).  His version of the bill is opposed by just about every national LGBTQ organization, but he perseveres.  Why?  He argues that ENDA light is better than no ENDA at all.  I don't understand how he so blithely sacrifice so many members of our community. 

But I would go to see him speak.  Except that I have to work and then attend the birthday of a lovely four year old girl who has no problem whatsoever hanging out with lesbian grownups.  That's pretty restorative. 

The Post-Gazette has a nice story on the impact of Gay Straight Alliances (GSA's) on local youth.  My favorite quote:

"Prejudice begins at home, but I truly believe people can be educated."

The City Paper's Melissa Meinzer explores what H.B. 1400 could mean for Pennsylvanians.  This legislation expands discrimination protections to sexual orientation, gender identity and gender presentation.  She asks some difficult questions about religious exemptions. 

The Pittsburgh International Lesbian and Gay Film Festival kicks off this weekend.  I was a little disappointed to read a recent email from the Film Society President accusing lesbians of being unsupportive of the festival because the lesbian turnout is lower than the turnout of gay men.  Frankly, no one has ever asked me why I don't turn out for many movies. I wonder if they've asked you? Lesbians?

The reason I don't attend many movies is that I just don't have the time to see more than one movie in a two week period.  It is a busy time at work.  There's also my birthday as well as the birthdays of several friends.  Halloween.  Plus, the normal day to day stuff like housework, pet care, laundry and so forth.  Throw in a random medical appointment and a trip to see a family member and you just run out of time. 

I doubt that berating lesbians will get to the heart of the problem.  Nor will it encourage women to turn out.  I certainly don't like the implied threat that if I don't see Itty Bitty Titty Committee, I'm a bad lesbian. 

And.

The stripped down version of ENDA was voted out of committee.

Give it up for Diane Gramley, prez and proponent of the American Family Association of Pennsylvania.  She works hard to get her message of hate and intolerance out into the Pennsylvania heartland , be it letter to the editor or press release. She's everywhere the homos should be.

Are you?

Gramley sent out this snarky little press release about H.B. 1400 which would extend protected class status to include sexual orientation, gender identity and gender presentation.  It is a significant piece of legislation that would give us statewide protections at our workplaces and in our housing situations.  So you couldn't be fired because you are a lesbian or because you are a lesbian who dresses in a masculine manner.  Here's how Gramley spins it:

H.B. 1400 will force all PA businesses with four or more employees to hire homosexuals, bisexuals and transgenders i.e. men who think they are women and demand to use the women's restroom.  Upon closer examination you will see that there is no exemption for churches, Christian schools or daycares.

This is a clear example of why the local lesbian community needs to get a real grip on our internalized transphobia and turn our collective attention to the many thousands of Pennsylvanias who lap up this anti-gay rhetoric. People buy into this completely distorted interpretation of the legislation and get on the phone with their legislators, terrified that they'll have skirt wearing men in their restrooms and lascivious lesbians in the daycares.

You, dear reader whomever you are, should do the same.  You should call your State Rep and let her/him know how you'v experienced discrimination.  Don't wait.  Do it now. 

Diane is hard at work tearing us down across the Commonwealth. 

Here's some good news from the Post-Gazette's wonderful L.A. Johnson < is L.A.a man or woman? does it matter other than for my pronoun selection?>

A majority of U.S. citizens support equal treatment for gay people, a recent Harris Interactive poll reports.

About 56 percent of straight Americans 18 and older believe people should be more supportive of gay equality, a number that rises to 60 percent for those polled between the ages of 18 and 44, the survey said.

Hurrah!  The survey also brings to light the value of heterosexual allies, especially those who speak out against incidents of discrimination and homophobia.

"People's minds are changed more ... by the person who isn't the minority," says Betty Hill, executive director of Persad Center (www.persadcenter.org), which offers counseling, education and advocacy for the Pittsburgh-area gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community. "When a family member speaks up, it seems to be better listened to than when a regular old gay person like myself speaks up."

Now see that's exactly why Betty Hill is a lesbian who rocks -- "regular old gay person" indeed. 

Anyway, her point is very true.  And it is a point I made oh so eloquently at The Society with regard to my good friend John McIntire, one of the staunchest allies the LGBT community is lucky to have. 

Heteros like John and that guy down the street and the lady at church and my friend Amy make all the difference b/c they normalize homosexuality. 

That being said, I was pleased to have a chance to hang out with my friend Maria when she sat in for Lynn Cullen this morning.  It ties into this little theme very nicely b/c Maria asked me to talk about my *other* blogging gig -- the Pittsburgh Women's Blogging Society.  Sure, the lesbian flavor came up a time or two, but it was an opportunity to talk about other issues that matter to me.  I'm a multi-dimensional homo!

One thing that was frustrating was our limited ability to talk about some big news -- WDUQ- FM will not allow Planned Parenthood to underwrite news segments. Why?  Because Duquesne University pulled the puppet strings of so-called public radio.  Check out Maria's well crafted post on the topic and decide for yourselves -- should NPR's flagship station in Pittsburgh have a modicum of free speech or should it be all fetus, all the time? 

Geez oh man.  Anyway, because it was about a rival station and we are supposed to have the courtesy of not talking about other stations, we had to low key it because saying "another local station" without the whole MacDaddy Catholic Church thing was pointless. I hope we were successful and Maria gets to go back. 

I wrote some emails to Scott Hanley and the big kahuna Dr. Doughertry at Duquesne.  I even filed a complaint with the NPR ombudsman.  Do they seriously not realize how much of their local listening audience are liberal do-gooder yuppies who support organizations that promote women's health and try to keep kids from contracting the clap?  Seriously?

Here's something amusing -- take a look at the list of local companies that accept the membership Q-card.  Disclaimer or not, the station is willing to promote these folks in exchange for a little love to the members. Let's see who can identity the most companies that have some business practice which violates Catholic principles.  You go first ...all I'm gonna do is remind you of the entire Rolling Stones exhibit at the Andy Warhol Museum and call it a day.  :-)

All fetus, all the time. I just like the sound of that.

From today's Post-Gazette, a letter written by Kurt Colborn of Swisshelm Park:

I have to agree with Sen. Larry Craig's claim that he is not gay. People have forgotten that "gay" is a term of liberation. Being gay means having the maturity to accept yourself as you are. It also means having the courage to represent yourself honestly to the world. Not all homosexual men are deserving of the term "gay."

Sen. Craig is not gay. He's just a coward. He should spare us bearing witness to his thousand deaths by reversed pleas and canceled resignations ("Craig Vows to Remain in Senate," Oct. 5). He should slink quietly away to be forgotten.

While I agree that Craig is a coward, the gay v homosexual debate is the interesting point.  Homosexual is the preferred term utilized by the right wingnuts (especially the Christian wingnuts) to demonize persons who are LGBTQ.  They've taken a rather scientific term, skipped right over the "human" syllables and loaded it with all sorts of sexually inappropriate connotations to make us less human and more "other."

In reclaiming the terms "gay" and "queer", the LGBTQ community has made tremendous strides liberating ourselves from a heteronormative society that does often, in fact, demonize us.  Being gay is different that identifying as gay.  I've heard this theme pop up in quite a few different contexts in the recent past here in my day to day queer life.

Hipster heterosexuals appropriating the term queer when queer identity does not include heterosexuals.  Queer is not about being hip (or ironic).  It is politco-cultural identity. 

A related issue is heterosexual women identifying as bisexual for the purposes of fitting in (and hooking up) with queer women.  This blurs the lines for actual bisexual women (see below).  However, there is also the issues around using women for sexual gratification and/or exploration which is a patriarchal tool especially icky in the hands of other women.

Bisexual women have a tough time laying claim to being part of the LGBTQ community because of our long-standing division into the gay men and the lesbians.  There's a suspicion that bisexual women partnered with a man (straight or bisexual identified themselves) are just "playing" at being gay or trying to have their cake and eat it, too.  I'm not sure if gay men feel the same way about bisexual men, but I suspect it is not so much an issue.

Read a few recent posts for an example of the challenges of gay identity for transgender men and women. 

The battle over amending ENDA to eliminate gender identity and gender orientation goes far beyond political expediency to tap into notions of who "deserves" to be part of the gay club.

For our local community, the inherent issue truly is about identity and there's a heightened scrutiny of the motives and even the legitimacy of assuming gay identity solely based on sexual preferences. 

Personally, I haven't been victimized in any sense by someone pretending to be gay.  The closest I came was one date with a bisexual woman who decided she had to date a man to please her parents.  I have no clue about the "validity" of her identity as bi and, frankly, didn't care b/c she was a double-dipper <gross!> and that meant no second date from my point of view anyway.  I have three friends who are bisexual - two are with men and one with a woman.  It never occurs to me to question their gay identity and knowing them makes me a bit more sensitive to making sure of the B in titles and terms.  As for the men, the only thing that bothers me is their reluctance to accept the whole bisexual identity thing. That only happens in one case.  That makes me feel sad, but it doesn't impact the authenticity of the woman. Nor does it make me feel like the dates I had with her were less than authentic.

I would be annoyed by the hipsters, but I gotta wonder how blurry the line can be between heterosexual supporters and those questioning if they might be gay. It certainly seems blurry in the opposite direction, with plenty of women exploring life as a heterosexual women while working through our identities.  At least, that more closely mirrors my own experience, rather than saying I was simply closeted or in denial or some other explanation that solidly defines my sexual orientation during the years I lived as a heterosexual woman.   I would say hanging around gay people, spending time at their events and being supportive is completely different than soliciting sex in a bathroom stall or crawling through a bar looking for a woman to deceive. 

That being said, it makes sense that queer men and women resent their identity being co-opted.  If that were my scene, I might feel differently.  But my scene is very hetero-mixed and filled with lots of straight men. 

So, the gay identity is hotly contested even within the community.  Those of us on the inside understand how nuanced and diverse we are, but, to the larger population, it is one big mass of homosexuals - supporters and opponents alike.  I sort of like identifying Craig as a homosexual man, be he bi or gay, while stating that he has not claimed identity as a gay man (or a bi man).

You may have been keeping up, via blog or email, with the ongoing debate around the local lesbian community's acceptance and inclusion of transwomen.  It has been contentious and brought to light some long-standing fissures around gender identity that fall loosely along generation lines -- almost a second wave v third wave debate, but not quite.

What's clear is that the "T" in our homo-alphabet soup is not valued as highly as the "L" and the "G."  The Community Center includes T and B in their mission statement, but not their name.  The Gay & Lesbian Film Society changed their name, but still ignored the T and B folks.  What gives with that?

The only folks who seem to be consistently affirming persons who identify as transgender or bisexual are the Queers and Lord knows that's a whole other chapter in the book of gay inclusiveness. 

Even though I mock, I am concerned about these divides. As I discussed elsewhere on this blog, I just don't understand why so many lesbians refuse to allow a transwoman to define her own gender identity.  When is a woman woman enough to be a lesbian?  That's the heart of the matter and how on earth are we going to start a constructive dialogue among local LGBTQ leaders ...I haven't seen any "leaders" step up to the plate on this debate.  They are either laying low, afraid to take a public stance or they don't care.  Except for Ehrrin Keenan.  She has taken a stance, spoken out and she's absolutely a leader in our community.  Thank Goddess.

Its not exactly a silver lining, but Pittsburgh is right in line with a large-scale national debate about trans inclusiveness.  There's a national piece of legislation called the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) that would extend federal protections in the workplace to include sexual orientation and gender identity.  It had a good chance at passing which is great (even though Bush vowed to veto). 

This legislation was the result of much hard work on the part of national organizations, including transgender organizations, who worked with legislators to educate them about the importance of these protections.  This was a tough sell, but our national leaders worked in harmony to make it happen.

Until ...the sentiment that overriding a veto would require abandoning gender discrimination began making the rounds and Congressman Barney Frank (yes, you read that right) was prepared to introduce a stripped down version of ENDA, with the support of Speaker Pelosi.  Our national leaders began howling, knowing full well that there would be no "coming back" to the issue to include gender identity once it passed. 

Except .. fissures have begun to appear.  Pelosi and Frank agreed to postpone marking up the substitute bill to appease leaders.  Then one of the big MacDaddies in the community, the Human Rights Campaign, issued a murky statement that basically reads that while they aren't signing on to sponsor the watered-down bill they aren't going to work against it.

WTF? 

Today, the only transgender member of the HRC Board, Donna Rose, has stepped down.  Her statement is here.

Pam Spaulding writes:

To turn on one another advances nothing. HRC, no matter what opinion one holds of the org, these folks do the work on the Hill. Where did the gauging of ENDA as a do-able priority (say over DADT repeal, which seems much more do-able), gain traction?

In any case, this whole "family fight," is undermining the long view of equality. There are no winners in this kind of a backstabbing event, where LGBs can be seen doling out horrible anti-T bigotry in the comments of blogs. I can only hope that Donna will reconsider this decision, but I have great respect for her efforts to represent the T perspective to the HRC board.

It does seem that repealing "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" would be more politically viable, so Pam asks a good question.

Can the national organizations wade through this?  I'm on a national LGBT email list with some pretty heavy hitters and I have to admit I'm a little concerned.

Pam also flips the local cries of "foul" on their head.  Here in da Burgh, I've experienced multiple incidents of LGB's decrying the publicity of our "family fight" or airing the dirty laundry as a few have put it.  Many women are absolutely incensed, even livid, that other women are criticizing Celebrate the Night, accusing us (yep, I've been included) of hurting the lesbian community.  Others, such as myself, are appalled when women insist on referring to a transwoman as "he."

The local debate has quickly escalated into a polarizing L v T situation, even though most of the T defenders are, in fact, Ls.  Confusing, no?  I think there are far more women who support CTN's decision to exclude Jessi as well as their understanding of transwomen than there are those who support the views I espouse.  I wish it weren't so. 

There is some good news, namely that discussion and conversation continue.  Emilia is organizing a podcast.  Another local woman set up an email list to encourage ontological exploration of gender identity issues (I have to admit the level of discourse left me in the dust about four posts into the discussion so I stopped reading ...).  While some women aren't comfortable having some transwomen attend women-only spaces, they acknowledge that these same transwomen shouldn't lose their jobs because of gender identity.

I've been feeling a bit discouraged this whole situation.  No one attacks me with the venom and deadly aim of local lesbians.  Not the Christians, the right wing nuts, the Ice Cream twin defenders, the Santorum lovers. Not even the Anarchists with whom I am often at odds.  No one does nasty condescension and disrespect like a lesbian, especially one taking the time to post a comment informing me that no one gives a shit what I have to say.  :-)     The comments don't get me down. It is the fear that most lesbians share those views about trans inclusion that is so discouraging.  If they share those views about people giving a shit about me, its all good. Blog hits are blog hits.

Pam's post has me ruminating about my discouragement and I am vowing to turn my attitude around.  There's good stuff happening.  I'm hangin with some cool chicks on Saturday night.  People are writing letters to the editor in the City Paper that will clarify the fissure described above and I gotta think that sort of exposure to the light can only help heal the wound.  I'm going to rededicate myself to covering trans issues and highlighting the impact of overarching issues on transmen and transwomen. 

In fact, I've been asked to submit a question or two as part of an interesting new blogger debate, focusing on the Mayoral race.  Maybe that's the opportunity to put my money where my keyboard is ...

As for ENDA, it would be a tragedy if we left our trans sisters and brother behind.  Easy for me to say because I live in a City where employment protections exist for me and state protections may not be far behind (see earlier post about Frankel).  I personally believe it is better to pull back on the legislation and educate, educate, educate on gender identity while perhaps putting some energy into passing DADT.  

Hopefully, Pittsburgh and ENDA will move forward to create a community that values everyone in the alphabet soup.

An open letter from one very cool chick with the Women's Law Project ... please use the email link or pick up your phone to speak up on this issue.  Especially those of you who live outside of the City of Pittsburgh. 

Note:  this legislation includes sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression.  I would hope that regardless of your position in the recent CTN discussion, you would agree that a transwoman should not lose her job no matter where she is in her transition. 

We gotta pick up the phones, folks, if we want to build a better society for ourselves.

I am very proud of my State Rep, Chelsa Wagner, for co-sponsoring the legislation.  So this my public thank you as requested by Tara.

Here's Tara's letter ...