A Passion to Understand: LGBT

Friday, 20 January 2012

Petition: End Forced Sterilisation in Sweden

If you are a transgender person in Sweden and want to legally change your gender, the government forces you to undergo surgery that will render you permanently infertile and forever unable to have children. That's right: in 2012 Swedish law still mandates forced sterilization in order to do something as simple as changing your gender on a driver's license.

Right now a reform of the law is being debated in Sweden. We need a massive show of support across Sweden and Europe against forced sterilization that will finally convince Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfledt to speak out and break the deadlock.

Whether you are straight, gay, lesbian, bi or trans, Swedish or European, will you take a moment to raise your voice and ask Prime Minister Reinfeldt to take a stand for human rights?

Take action now : http://allout.org/stop_forced_sterilization

"Hi, my name is Love, I'm from Sweden and I'm trans. That means I'm born in a female body but my heart says I'm a man. I'm speaking out today because the Swedish government is forcing thousands of people like me to make an impossible choice.

If I need to change the gender on my identity card to reflect my true self, just a small change from an "F" to an "M", my country will force me to be sterilized. I can either be represented correctly or have my basic human rights violated. That is not a fair choice. I'm at a protest today in front of the Parliament to ask for the law to be changed and this barbaric practice to end.

Your support is making a difference, please join us by signing the petition and telling your friends to do the same. Thank you!"

Sources:

Sweden: Transgender actress mourns her "forcible sterilization" - Many countries typically seen as progressive on LGBT rights continue to mandate the practice.
www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/culture-lifestyle/111101/sweden-transgender-LGBT-gay-lesbian-bisexual-sterilization

Sweden keeps sex-change sterilization law
www.thelocal.se/38466/20120112/

Human Rights Watch's Letter to the Swedish Prime Minister
www.hrw.org/node/104368

Words That Are Transphobic and Why

Click on the image below to view a full-sized, high resolution image

Transphobia is defined above as the “fear or hatred of transgender people or people who are perceived as not meeting society’s expectations around gender roles, identities and presentations. Transphobia is closely linked with homophobia and biphobia”.

I believe that human beings have the right to not be discriminated against on the grounds of age, race, religion, gender identity, sexual preference, creed, ethnicity, political affiliation or any other basis.

I first experienced an additional awareness of the challenges facing transgender people towards the end of last year. I discovered that transwomen were not allowed to take part in the Reclaim the Night women’s march in London. On account of them being born men, the feminists claimed that they were by nature privileged who were by nature in a position of power over women.

It was then that I learned the definition of the term cissexism which is "the belief that transsexuals' identified genders are inferior to, or less authentic than, those of cissexuals" [source: Julia Serrano quoted in Wikipedia].

I don’t claim to understand all of the issues facing transgendered people today but I do believe that cissexism is harmful, unnecessary and above all dangerous.

The poster above was designed by Clinton Andor, a graphic design intern at the UC Davis Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Resource Center. You can see his original post here [source]. I discovered it at the blog of Jussie Hay.

The Triangle Project responds to Anti-Corrective Rape Petitions

The Triangle Project is a South African organisation that seeks to challenge homophobia and to eradicate discrimination against and within the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex community. In their mission statement, they state their aim to educate, lobby and advocate against harmful stereotypes, attitudes and behaviours towards LGBTI people and to provide services, build confidence and strive for better understanding of the community.

Since the beginning of the year, several online petitions have been circulating the Internet, highlighting what was labelled the “corrective rape” of lesbian women in South Africa. The Triangle Project was notably silent in response to the petitions and did not sign or endorse them.

On Friday 18 February, the Triangle Project issued a statement in which they condemned several aspects of the petitions and explained their reluctance to associate the organisation with these petitions. The absence of survivors’ voices and testimonies in the petitions is noted and it is stated that “once again black women in Africa are being cast as voiceless victims, as voiceless faces”. The false division between “corrective rape” and rape perpetrated against women in general is questioned, as is the call for rape to be declared a hate crime and a minimum sentence of 25 years imposed. Specifically, the statement states that the petitions seem silent on other forms of violence experienced by lesbians, including harassment, assault and murder as well as violence targeted against transgendered persons, gay men and other marginalised groups.

Finally, the petition questions the inflated figures and statistics in the petitions and notes that there is no specific hate crime legislation in South Africa. It is noted that “a context such as South Africa, where progressive legislation and extreme levels of gender violence co-exist, poses particular challenges and hard questions to LGBTI and gender activists”.

I must admit that when I first noticed the petitions in question, I did feel that they were specifically sensationalist but I wonder about this statement too. I saw the petition on the Change.org website which has reported success in various petitions in the past. It must be considered that anyone can post a petition about any issue they feel strongly about. Many of these people are not directors of organisations such as The Triangle Project and they are often neither educated or educators. They are simply lay people like myself who want to make a difference. Many websites for organisations such as The Triangle Project encourage people to volunteer but beyond that, few give concrete advice as to how one can make a real difference by spreading knowledge, adopting certain practices and beliefs and being an ambassador for social responsibility in general.

I will say just one final thing though. I went to university in Johannesburg, South Africa. I will never forget sitting in the courtyard of our residence when a black man approached a black, lesbian woman and stated, in front of about fifty onlookers, that he would like to “rape the lezzie out of” her. I’m not being specifically naive or privileged, nor am I trying to portray that woman as a voiceless victim but the one thing these petitions did do in the past couple of months is to illustrate that these types of attitudes are alive and well in South Africa years after I witnessed them.

Joel Burns Tell His Story: It Gets Better

It has been a crazy couple of weeks as we’ve uncovered the terrible news of teenagers across America that have taken their own lives because of bullying. The video above is an incredible and passionate speech by Fort Worth city councilman Joel Burns about the bullying that he encountered as a gay teen and how it does get better. Wearing a pink shirt in aid of breast cancer awareness, Burns explains that this is the first time he has ever told the story of his bullying and near-suicide to anyone. Almost a million people have watched this video since it was uploaded on Joel’s YouTube channel just three days ago and many people have posted it across Twitter and Facebook daring others to try watch it without breaking down crying.

I found it incredibly difficult to watch as it unexpectedly touched a very deep nerve within me. After moving to South Africa from England at the age of 9, I was subject to relentless bullying that lasted until I moved to high school at the age of 12. There was no ‘reason’ for my bullying other than the fact that I was different and foreign but I began to make serious and concrete plans for suicide by the age of 11. That first year of high school was still hard but by the end of that year I began to make friends and am still friends with them to this day. I absolutely agree sympathise with Joel as it is never easy to tell you parents that yes, you contemplated suicide but the fact is that we need to be open. We need to tell people, no matter how it might hurt them, that the successful, happy, vivacious person standing before them was once on the verge of ending it all. With this openness, perhaps we can move on and communicate to the children of today that it gets better.

You can see more videos from the It Gets Better Project or visit The Trevor Project for more information about suicide prevention amongst LGBT teens.

Prom is For Everyone

One of the cognitive errors people often make is to assume that others are in agreement with them in terms of their morals and beliefs. I am guilty of that because when I read this story, I simply couldn’t believe that backwards people like this still existed in schools and campuses in the USA.

I’m sure many of you know about this story already, especially if you live in the US but I didn’t until I saw this banner on the blog Earth to Holly. So without further ado, here is the story…

Link: ACLU Sues Mississippi School That Canceled Prom Rather Than Let Lesbian Couple Attend [ACLU]

Link: Fulton, MS Prom Discrimination [ACLU]

Itawamba Agricultural High School in Fulton, Mississippi told a student that she could not enter the school prom with her girlfriend and that she could not wear a tuxedo. She was also told that if she arrived separately but slow-danced with her girlfriend, they might be thrown out.

The student, Constance McMillen, reported the matter to the ACLU and they issued a letter demanding that she be allowed to attend the prom with her girlfriend. The school board responded by saying that the prom was cancelled for all students and the ACLU then filed a suit against them. In the complaint, Constance McMillen v. Itawamba County School District, et al., the ACLU asked the school board to reinstate prom for all students and charged Itawamba County School District officials with violating Constance McMillen’s First Amendment right to freedom of expression. The hearing on the motion for a preliminary injunction will be held on this coming Monday 22 March.