The importance of true names and true pronouns

This should be a very simple concept.

The soldier once known as Bradley Manning has come out as a trans* woman and would henceforth like to be called Chelsea.

People change their names all the time. Or start going by a nickname. We listen, we learn, we use the new, preferred name. Easy.

For reasons of long-held and very misguided cultural norms and biases, however, when a person comes to terms with being trans* and wishes to be addressed in a way that validates their correct gender identity, a great hew and cry goes up from the masses.

In the Manning case, even many of the major media outlets can't even seem to handle this most basic of requests. FOX News I expected, though it is still sad. When I read a statement from an NPR spokeswoman that "Until Bradley Manning’s desire to have his gender changed actually physically happens, we will be using male-related pronouns to identify him,” however, I was dismayed.

If even this, one of those most stalwartly neutral news outfits in the country, can't get it right? We really are in trouble.

It doesn't matter how you feel about Manning's actions in the Wikileaks case. That's almost an entirely separate issue (though there may be something to the defense's pointing out that the military's attitudes toward trans* people probably didn't help her depression and sense of isolation).

Words matter. They represent our attitudes toward an entire section of the population that is still largely marginalized, dehumanized, abused, and worse.

And this should be simple. It does no one a bit of harm to do a quick mental recalibration and begin referring to someone by their preferred pronouns. And guess what? It does that person a world of good. Why do anything else, then?

New York Magazine was one of the few outlets that not only got it right, but seems to really get it:

"Why is it so hard for people to type an extra s when they write about Manning? We updated our nomenclature for "Snoop Lion" and "the Artist Formerly Known as Prince." "Ali Lohan" and "Lil' Bow Wow" became "Aliana" and "Bow Wow" to reflect personal growth. We accept typographical requests from branded products like iPhone, PowerPoint, and eHarmony — and from branded humans like Ke$ha, A$AP Rocky, and 'N Sync. (The last being unusual even without the asterisk.) The idiosyncrasies of capitalism, apparently, are more compelling than a human's self-professed gender."

What does qualify as a problem, of course, is our society's continued insistence on erasing trans* identities or, worse, causing violence to them.

These are our neighbors, friends, family members, co-workers. There is nothing threatening about their identity. There is something threatening about a culture that still holds such ignorance and disdain for them.

I hope others will join me in calling on outlets like NPR to change their attitudes and policies immediately. This isn't acceptable, and silence is complicity.

The end is the beginning: Winter (2013) is coming

2012. Well damn. This is traditionally the time to reflect on the year that was, and make plans / resolutions / angry faces at the one that's about to barrel drunkenly through your door.

All I'll say about 2012, though, for the sake of brevity (you have better things to do, right? like make those snacks for the party tomorrow night) is that it was a big one for me - full of invaluable learning experiences, frustrating setbacks, and incredible transitions.

I've just started my ridiculously cool new job as the editor of Our Lives magazine, for instance, and my thumbprint will be fully on the March/April issue (god willing and the creek don't rise).

That combines with another major change, in that my longtime collaborator/partner-in-crime Jesse Russell, one of the founders of Dane101.com and an all-around stand-up gent, is heading off to the West Coast for greener pastures come February.

Fire Ball V, then, will likely be the last big event I help produce for some time, as well as Jesse's going away party. There are still some really sweet VIP hotel/ticket package deals available for sale, by the way, and regular ol' tickets, too. It's going to be a ridiculously fun weekend and you should come for one night at least, if not both. Seriously, I mean it. You'll be so sad if you miss it. So sad.

I'm not giving up on entertainment entirely, of course: I'll be throwing a monthly queer dance party starting January 19 at the Inferno, called REAL QUEER (natch). This is a project I've been mulling for several years and I am ridiculously excited to see it finally come to fruition (ehehe, "fruit"). You don't have to be queer to come check it out, but it helps.

And then there's roller derby. The new/old love of my life. I hope to be doing a lot of that in the coming year. Strange to be starting a brand new sport at 31, but goddamn is it fun.

So I hope the year has been, overall, good to you - and if it hasn't, fuck it - 2013 is still entirely unwritten. Shoulders back, chin up, and make it happen.

How do you solve a problem like a gay bar?

It's Friday night at the local gay club and the dance floor is bumping. A touring DJ throws down beats and revs up the crowd of happy people, who grind groove in the flash of laser lights.

I move onto the dance floor myself, ready to unwind after a long week and get my dance on among my fellow queers, unencumbered by the threat of wayward dudes looking to accost unattended ladies with their arrhythmic gyrations. I want to cut loose to the thumpa thumpa thumpa of Robyn and Gaga, enjoy the sight of ladies with ladies, men with men, and the smattering of straight allies who are happy to blend in and play along.

Something isn't quite right, though. Within a song or two I notice that the dance floor is positively teeming with straight couples in full-on make-out mode, and clutches of bros awkwardly trying to avoid the notice of the few gay boys on the floor while simultaneously cruising for women. A couple of them even try it with me - though I pride myself on being one of the most unapproachable people on the dance floor, simply by dint of my dance style being heavily reliant on contained flailing.

It is, I realize, the first time I've noticed that the number of identifiably straight people clearly outnumbers the identifiably queer people - at a gay club.

It's not the first time I've run into problems at this particular venue - or any of the ostensibly LGBT-specific establishments in this admittedly small city. A certain amount of population overlap is inevitable when there are all of 250,000 people total in your liberal Midwestern berg. That's all right, that's OK, that's even encouraged - but what is up with this total takeover?

Straight bars don't have to advertise themselves as straight bars because the default in our hetero-centric culture is still "straight." You have to call it out when you're labeling yourself as a gay establishment, just as you still have to come out as gay because not-gay is still, for better or worse, the unspoken starting point.

In a perfect world it wouldn't matter what your sexual orientation was, of course, or where you chose to go dance/drink/hang outside of the home - and you could safely hit on someone, fly your freak flag, dress and act how you wanted, regardless of the gender make-up, without fear of verbal or physical harassment.

We do not yet live in that world, however, and so LGBT-friendly and/or specific businesses are still a crucial part of our community. They are supposed to provide a safe space to be yourself, regardless of how flaming or button-up you might be. To connect with other members of your community. To let loose.

And yet...and yet...

Straight bachelorette parties think it's the bees knees to hit up the gay bar and ogle or even grope the male go-go dancers, to take over dance floors with their little penis hats and glittery sashes, essentially proclaiming loud and proud that WE HAVE STRAIGHT PRIVILEGE AND YOU DON'T.

Straight men (or heck, sexually insecure men trying to convince themselves of something that may not be true) think it's the best idea ever to cruise gay bars for women, circling dance floors in hopes of finding that rare unicorn of a woman who goes to a gay club to pick up dudes (then again, the very trend I'm whining about here may be what's emboldening them).

My Friday night ended in me leaving the dance floor in a bit of a huff, pissily wondering why the hell straight people felt the need to co-opt all of our safe spaces. There are plenty of options in this city for people looking to don their finest preppy apparel and bump and grind with members of the opposite sex. There are precious few spots where queers can go to do the same, with the same level of comfort.

I can barely begin to imagine how all of this feels for the transgender community, who run into discrimination even among their fellow queers - let alone straight cisgendered people.

I've been having this conversation with friends on der Facebook ever since, and the various reactions have been incredibly interesting. First of all, I am definitely not the lone queer in the wilderness bemoaning the perceived straight takeover of LGBT establishments in Madison. And this venue in particular is not the only one suffering from the problem.

Secondly, the question of whether or not straight people should go to gay establishments - in general, but more specifically to celebrate marriage-related events - is supremely fraught.

I'm all for straight folks coming to gay clubs. Hell, I'm a queer woman in a straight relationship, and benefiting from straight privilege as a result. This is an issue to which I give a considerable amount of thought. It's why I generally prefer to go out to these places without my S.O., and why we keep the PDA to the barest minimum when we do go together.

And I would never, ever go to a gay establishment as part of a straight bachelor/ette or anniversary party, just as I generally don't go to the bear bar downtown at all, unless specifically invited.

Basic respect.

I'm waiting for the day when none of this matters, but until then, it does. It just does. And even our allies need to check themselves when they decide to celebrate straight weddings or go cruising for straight tail at gay clubs. At the barest minimum, it's your turn to keep things on the down-low.

The Abbey, a famous West Coast watering hole for the gays, recently went so far as to place an outright ban on bachelorette parties. It's sad that this is what things have come to, but I don't blame them in the least for making the decision. As the folks over at Unicorn Booty commented:

Ladies, we LOVE you. My foster mother, sister, and mother-in-law are three of the most brilliant, most beautiful women on the planet. The Unicorn Booty team is neither women-phobic or afraid of lady parts. There are far more important women in our lives than men.

But with that said, there is a right way and a wrong way to behave in a gay bar. And celebrating your marital rights while we possess none of our own is lowdown, dirty, mean-spirited and ignorant. Don’t do it. Ever.

I would suggest this extends to the bros who feel it necessary to troll gay bars for ladies. It's one thing for a straight or bi guy to go to the club and casually meet, chat up, and then dance with a woman - it's another thing entirely for you to go for the sole purpose of aggressively seeking action. Especially when the women are making clear indications that you should GTFO.

And yet that's exactly what happened out on the dance floor Friday night: to my straight, femme-looking friend, but also to my super queer soft-butch self.

It must be a tricky thing for the owners of these places to address. It's a business, and turning customers away for whatever reason is generally not preferred. But I would think that, in any establishment, there should be basic standards of respect and decorum enforced. The longer you let this shit go unchecked, the more prevalent it's going to become.

But I don't run a club, so I don't get to tell folks how to run theirs. What I can do--and intend to do--is organize our own queer-centric dance parties with those rules of respect and decorum being politely and strictly enforced by the community.

I can also encourage everyone to do a little something those of us in the non-white-Christian-straight male community like to call "check your privilege" - not just in regards to LGBT people, but when you're trying to relate to any community to which you don't entirely belong. Think about how your attitude and actions impacts them, and ask questions, get an idea for what their experience is like.

That's the start of positive change. Even for something as seemingly small as gay bar etiquette.

Overdue Milestone

I remembered to check the little application that tracks visits to this here blog just now, and was very happy to see that we've far exceeded 1,000 visits. There are millions of blogs out there, and I recognize that my little slice of the 'sphere is pretty insignificant in the grand scheme of things. But it's cool to know that a few people have taken the time to stop by for a visit, so thanks very much for that.

My grandest, most egotistical hopes for this blog are just that I'm adding something small of merit to the public discourse. The really important stuff, thankfully, still happens out there in the real world.

Also of note is that today is the start of Transgender Awareness Week right here in town on the UW Campus. The LGBT Campus Center is hosting a series of events all week, both educational and recreational, to highlight the issue. If you're well-aware of the issues or totally in the dark, be sure to check out at least one or two of the events.

Happy Coming Out Day!

Today is National Coming Out Day, an internationally celebrated holiday of sorts set aside for LGBT folks and their allies to foster discussions about issues surrounding the LGBT community and the difficulty some people face in coming out to their friends and families. It's also a day that some people use to actually come out.

Fair Wisconsin is taking the day to call for pressuring law makers into including transgendered people in the likely soon-to-be-passed Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA). The original draft of the law included "gender identity" in its list of things that would be illegal for employers to discriminate against. For various reasons, none of them good, that language has since been removed from the bill, and the Fair Wisconsin campaign is seeking to rectify that. Click over to their site for more information on how you can help support their efforts.

While we've still a long, long way to go in ensuring equal treatment of homosexuals, awareness and treatment of transgendered people is even worse off. They suffer prejudices and discrimination from even within the LGBT community, but especially from the world at large, which remains woefully uneducated about their lives and even their very existence. It is a complicated issue, but regardless of what your opinions are on the minutia of transgenderism, the right of all people in this country (not to mention world) to be treated fairly is not up for debate.

For more festive events, check out the the listings at the UW-Madison's LGBT Campus Center. Tonight they've got "Queer Games," which I won't even begin to speculate what that includes, but sounds fun.

Most importantly, be sure that you're supportive of your LGBT friends, especially the ones who may still be struggling with being open and honest about their sexuality. And if you're already out and proud, treat yourself to something fun today. You deserve it.