July 2007

Sharin’ some linkie love with our readers…’cause we all love the links…

http://www.melted-dreams.net/definition/

Definintion is a feminist blog about rejecting other’s images of who we should be and living as who we are. Lots of good reading from a different angle. Don’t delay spending some time at Definition, she’s contemplating closing it.

http://bitingbeaver.blogspot.com/

This woman writer and feminist “gnaws away at sexism and misogyny”. Excellent reading particularly on the topic of rape and the real dangers of pornography from a feminists view point. The writer has been through some tough times for speaking out, including personal and family threats. She’s got courage, give her a read.

8/22/07 update: Den of the Biting Beaver is open to invited readers only. If you can get invited, the reading is well worth your time.

http://www.feminist-reprise.org/wpblog/

Upfront blog on feminism in the broadest sense of that term. Strong opinions from a soft heart.

http://www.jenisfamous.com/blog.html

A National Society of Newspaper Columnist Award winner, comdian, blogger and runner of spelling bees

http://www.stumptuous.com/

She’s funny, educated, informational and so strong she’ll kick yer ass! Oh and since Jay Sennett recommended her I figured her blog had to be worth a read!

If you came home disabled from serving our country to a home that you could no longer use that’d be bittersweet. You’d be happy to be home, but unable to use it efectively.

But there’s hope…from an organization called “Homes for our Troops“. Let me quote from their web site about them:

Homes for Our Troops is a non-profit, non-partisan 501 (c)(3) organization founded in 2004. This organization is strongly committed to helping those who have selflessly given to their country and have returned home with serious disabilities and injuries. We assist severely injured Servicemen and Women and their immediate families by raising donations of money, building materials and professional labor and coordinating the process of building a new home or adapting an existing home for handicapped accessibility.

Best of all? All services provided by Homes for Our Troops are at no cost to the veterans they serve.

This is a couple of ways you can help ths worthy cause.

First, Homes for our Troops, in conjunction with Massachusetts radio station, WAAF, are co-sponsoring a Charity Motorcycle Run Saturday, August 4th, 2007.

Registration is $30 for one rider and $20 for an additional rider and includes:

• Texas sized breakfast in at registration
• Commemorative T-shirt (First 500 registrants)
• Live Concert by the Mill City Rockers! (America’s Favorite Biker Band!)
• Texas Roadhouse Chicken and Ribs BBQ at the end of the ride!

for more information on this worthwhile cause, visit the Homes for our Troops site at this link HERE.

The second way to help is to buy a raffle ticke to the Homes for our Troops annual Harley-Davidson raffle! Tickest are $100 each and you have a 1/500th chance to win. See more details at the Homes for our Troops link here.

Donna Rose was interviewed by Fortune magazine as part of their coverage on transgender folks in the workplace. It’s interesting reading with some very helpful references included. You can catch it at CNN by visiting their site at this link HERE.

Among the cool tidbits are:

• A bit about what Donna has been doing professionally
• A list of some companies that now include transgender protections
• Some reasons why corporate America seems to be moving to support the transgender individual

Well worth a read I’d say.

I belong to a few Yahoo Groups and most of them are pretty good. I actually belonged to more but had to cut back about a dozen as I was really not contributing very much. But a recent thread on the topic of the “true measure of a woman” was well posted in one group and has led to a wonderful discussion on this topic. While some of the excellent posts from others cannot be shared at Beck’s Cafe for reasons of confidentiality, this one, by me can be. But let me explain what I’m sharing, so that it appears less like the shameless promotion I’m so well known for ( a friend who had seen the movie, “Thank You for Smoking“ actually compared me to the PR Person for the smoking companies!)

The most valuable pieces of my post that are worth sharing on “the true measure of a woman” comes not from my keyboard but from the keyboards of two other genetic women. I think their answers may challenge you.

First let’s hear from a genetic woman, earlbecke, from who’s blog, “Definition” this piece come from:

The reality is that there is no universal, essential experience of womanhood. The mainstream American feminist movement has often and rightly been criticized for ignoring the experience of women of color, queer women, poor women. None of us have grown up or been raised the same way. None of our experiences have been exactly the same or meant the same thing to us, impacted us in the same ways.

My experience as a biracial, queer, ex-Mormon feminist can’t be compared to a straight, white, Christian woman. It can’t be compared to a woman who grew up in poverty, or another culture, or another part of the world. We are not the same. There is no unifying thread which connects us, nothing magical or spiritual binding us all in sisterhood with one another except those threads we weave ourselves, those bridges that we build, and our shared humanity, which, might I remind you, we also share with men.

What is this experience transwomen can never have or understand which makes them not “real” women in the social sense? We can’t argue it’s dependent on the presence or absence of female sex organs; there are women with birth defects and women without wombs. There are women who have been victims of Female Genital Mutilation. There can be women born with ambiguous genitalia. And, so, there can be women with male sex organs, too.

An appeal to blood is useless here for the reasons stated above: not all women, even cisgendered women, bleed. Some women have reproductive health issues. Some women have been through menopause. Not all of us bleed the same way. I can hardly relate to women for whom menstruation is a horrible, agonizing ordeal — for me, it is something I hardly even think about. Given the huge amount of physical variation, the ultimately subjective nature of our interactions with our own bodies, I hardly think a woman born with a penis can be much different from me than a woman with endometriosis. Both are foreign. Both are certainly women.

There is no biological congruence. There is no identical socialization. Even women who have endured the same event will process it differently, come to different conclusions. Nobody is an island, but neither are any of us the same. It’s been argued that no one can ever truly understand another person, and I agree. Given that, how can anyone really believe there’s anything essential that ties all women together? Even if we all emerged from the same common background, I don’t think that would be true. [ed. - you can read the full post at Definition blog by visiting this link here].

And now a word on this topic from my wife, partner and best friend. This is what she had to say when I ran this by her:

If you really want to know the true measure of a woman is, it’s being a friend and looking out for each other. It’s making sure you are all safe and don’t have to go to places like you described. If you really want to be a friend, make a safe path for other transgender friends. For example, my seven closest friends are all there for each other when we need it. Two of us have had cancer, another numerous family deaths, and all of us deal with daily life. If any of us needed something we would call each other and stick together. Even a potato! We come from all
walks of life and yet we help each other out”.

If you plan on going to Fantasia Fair in Provincetown, MA, October 10 -14, but are facing a little pinch in your pocketbook, you can apply for a scholarship See details at this link: http://www.fanasiafair.org/scholarships.asp

Here’s the full press release:

July 1, 2007

For Immediate Release

Scholarships Available for Fantasia Fair 2007

http://www.fantasiafair.org/Press.asp

The Fantasia Fair Planning Committee will be awarding scholarships to the 33rd annual Fantasia Fair, to be held October 14 - 21 in historic Provincetown, Massachusetts. Scholarship recipients will receive free tuition to the Fair, including all seminars, workshops, and events, 12 meals, and shared room accommodations for seven nights. Recipients will be responsible for their own transportation to and from Provincetown.

“We’re proud to make this announcement,” said Fair Director Dallas Denny. “Fantasia Fair is a wonderful conference. We want to reach out especially to the young people who will be the future leaders of our community, and especially to FTMs. We’ve worked hard to keep Fair prices low, but we understand some people can’t afford to go to any conference. These awards are just one way to make our conference accessible to some who could benefit from attending but couldn’t otherwise come.”

Scholarships are open to individuals of all ages who demonstrate financial need.

Applicants should submit a statement of financial need and a letter explaining why they want to attend Fantasia Fair. Applicants will be selected to receive awards by the Fantasia Fair Planning Committee.

Eligibility Requirements

* Age over 18 (or parental permission if under 18) * Demonstrated financial need (applications will be considered on an individual basis) * Submission of a “Why I Want to Come to Fantasia Fair” letter * Receipt of materials by 31 July, 2007

Fantasia Fair Planning Committee Members and their families and friends are not eligible for scholarships.

Rules for Scholarship Awards

1) Submit a letter entitled “Why I Want to Come to Fantasia Fair.” There are no limitations for length or style. You can be creative just as long as you are convincing.

2) Submit a letter, note, or other materials demonstrating your financial need; in other words, tell the committee how your financial situation prevents you from coming to Fantasia Fair.

3) Applicants under 18 years of age must include a document giving parental consent.

4) Following the 31 July deadline, the Fantasia Fair Planning Committee will evaluate all submissions. Those who have not, in the Committee’s judgment, demonstrated financial need will be excluded from further consideration. “Why I Want to Come to Fantasia Fair” letters will then be read and rated. Awards will be given to the candidates who, in the judgment of the Committee, most convincingly demonstrate their desire to attend Fantasia Fair.

5) Contest winners will be notified on or about 15 August, 2007.

6) An announcement that the awards have been made will be released to transgender news sources on 15 August, 2007 and will be posted on the www.fantasiafair.org website although the names of scholarship recipients will not be made public.

7) In the event that a winner is not able to attend Fantasia Fair or declines the scholarship, the first runner-up will be notified immediately.

Please submit your materials by the July 31st deadline to:

scholarships@fantasfair.org

or

Fantasia Fair

P.O. Box 33724

Decatur, GA 30033-0724

When you submit your materials, please make sure to include a postal address, email address, or phone number for the Fantasia Fair Planning Committee to use to contact you. If you provide a phone number, please mention what name to ask for.

Dr. Jillian Todd Weiss has posted an aritcle on her blog, “Transgender Workplace Diversity” that is sobering. Entitled, “National statistics on Transgender Unemployment”, the article has some chilling facts for all of us:

• There is a 35% unemployment rate among transgender persons due to discrimination
• Of those employed, 60% are earning below $15,000 per year.
• Unemployment runs about eight times higher than the national average and the poverty rate is five times higher

But Dr. Weiss wisely asks the question, “how was the data collected”. Let’s face it, even in the transgender community the massaging of numbers and the tilting of data is not above some activists approaches. And Dr. Weiss is asking the hard question, “how did you find your subjects”? Her question is valid and her conclusions are well worth a read. You can read the full article to see what is going on at her Blog, “Transgender Workplace Diversity” at this link on her site HERE. You can read the full study, as done by Richard M. Juang at “Trans Group Blog” by visiting the story at this link HERE.

Finally, such an article as this begs the question, what do I do about being employed if I’m trans? Well, there are a number of strategies, but one that pops to mind is the Career Expo being held at Southern Comfort Conference. Companies such as Microsoft, Deloitte, JP Morgan, Starbuck and Turner among many other national firms will be there exhibiting at the Career Fair. It’s well worth a look see. You can visit the Southern Comfort Conference web site at this link here.

I was watching C-SPAN2 live coverage of Senate speeches the other day and walking to the podium comes none other than the honorable Senator from West Virginia, Robert Byrd. At first, I thought he was delirious as he started on this bizarre speech denouncing the rise of Dog Fighting.

Dog Fighting….wtf?? I thought that went out with the middle ages.

Apparently not.

Seeing that I am covered these days in plaster, html and php trying to re-furb Beck’s Cafe I haven’t really been paying attention to the news. But I’ll be darned right there in prime time was a report on Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick, himself involved in a dog-fighting ring (see story on Vic by clicking to Yahoo News here) . Friends, we have now reached a time in history where the bizarre is commonplace.

Senator Byrd went on to say that this truly horrendous bloodsport is on the rise. Clearly some people have WAY too much disposable income and FAR too much disposable time on their hands. But is it really on the rise in general and how about here in Boston?

On the national front, it is just sad. We pulled up an article from CBS that did an expose in Chicago on dog fighting on July 19th, 2007. You can visit CBS2 in Chicago at this link HERE to read the full story, but just read this quote by a “trainer” of dogs for dogfighting…this is just one method they use to get those dogs “ready” to fight:

“We’d get 17, 18 bumblebees and put them in his food so that when he ate it, it would sting his gums he went nuts, driving him berserk,” Chico said.

Well now that’s a way to train an innocent domestic animal that is 95% of the time docile and man’s best friend. It’s nice to see the human race has reached the pinnacle of civilization and is now de-evolving.

I did a little snooping around over coffee on this heinous practice and thought I’d share the linkie love with you all. Diane Jessup, who started the Law Dogs program, has a gruesome piece on what dogfighting is all about, you can read her article at her site, “Working PitBull” at this link here.. It made my skin crawl. I’m not sure what kind of “men” dogfighting kinda guys are but it’ll make you scratch your head.

But what about the hard numbers on this “sport”. Is this on the rise or was this just an eye catching feature story for a slow July news month? Sadly, according to a CNN report during an interview with John Goodwin, an expert on animal fighting with the Humane Society, there are an estimated 40,000 professional dogfighters in the United States and purses for such fights can reach $100,000.00. Follow the money and you’ll find something. Sometimes what you find is good, this time what you find is bad. You can read the full CNN report on dogfighting at this link here.

What about here in Boston? Surely we are more “sophisticated”? Well, maybe not. Beck’s Cafe had an email exchange with Joanne Mainiero, Director of the Massachusetts Humane Society on this topic. She told us that Massachusetts does indeed have some illegal dogfighting rings around but that they don’t generally last very long. Usually they are caught quickly. But, she told us, the evidence of dogfighting is here even on an amateur basis with dead dogs found in yards. Pretty gruesome.

We asked Ms. Mainiero what could be done to help combat this practice and she had this advice. First, she suggested that all of us contact the NFL to suspend Michael Vick. The Humane Society even has a quick mailer set up so that you can send your sentiments on this subject over to The NFL Commish. You can reach the Humane Society web page with the “NFL, Throw the Book at Michael Vick” emailer at their site at this link here. Second, be on the lookout. The Humane Society has a fact sheet on this subject and you can reach it by clicking to the Human Society “dogfighting fact sheet” as this link here.

Lots of changes are coming to the cafe all of them caffeine charged and good, I assure you! You’ll notice lots of theme morphing going on as we continue to screw with, hack the code for the site and give the Cafe a nice new paint job, some new upholstery, and, umm, finally clean the toilets (where the hell is that toilet brush anyway). We’ll be doing some collaboration too with others and unleash some new content areas that came over wayyy to many Cosmo’s with Boston’s own celebrity Diva, June C.

Thanks for hanging with us and probing our ample archives….thanks to YOU our readers we get 8,000 hits per month on average! And, thanks to YOU all we’ve won the following awards:

• Best of the Web Blogs: Transgender Category
• Spirit Magazine (Boston based GLBT magazine), Transgender Blog to Read

First and foremost though, Beck’s Cafe is not a “transgender” blog per se. It’s a virtual place to share ideas, get some love, tell a story, learn something new, and have a laugh and best of all, do it over a cup of coffee