Unabashed Whoa-Oh-Oh: What's Trans Got To Do, Got To Do With It?

Ohio Transgender Woman Pleads Guilty to Homicide

Ohio Wo-Man Kills Husband With Exercise

"Woman" Exercises Husband to Death

"A sex-change woman has pleaded guilty..."

I have always had a soft spot in my heart for female killers. The lovely ladies featured on the Oxygen network's, Snapped, for instance. Aileen Wuornos--love her. Lorena Bobbit--she didn't kill but she might as well have--adore her. And now I can add Christine Newton-John to my list.

Last week, Mrs. Newton-John (more on her name in a second) , 41, pleaded guilty to reckless homicide of her 73 year-old husband by forcing him to swim in the pool of their apartment complex past exhaustion, resulting in a fatal heart attack. Security cameras caught the entire episode and police counted 43 times that Mrs. Newton-John prevented her husband from leaving the pool. Swim at your own risk, girl.

Many major media outlets played up the fact that Mrs. N-J is transgender and ran that as part of their headline. The fact that she had sexual reassignment surgery in 1993 is much less fascinating to me than the fact that she changed her surname to Newton-John in honor of Olivia. That is fierce (and not in a Tyra kind of way). Even more interesting is that she "exercised her husband to death." That's a headline. That we haven't heard before. If anything, she's creative.

People love to hate on a tranny. In a piece for the Advocate entitled, "My Sisters," Patrick Moore eloquently states that trans people are at the core of the queer struggle because they "challenge both gay and straight ideas of respectability."

The media seems to be perpetuating an idea that trans people are cuh-ray-zee and freakish. Unlike my last post about the transgender mafia boss, while it may be an interesting factoid, Mrs. N-J's gender is inconsequential to the story.

Unabashed BS: Dr. Phil Fronts Like He's Cool With Trans Children

Dr. Phil's show yesterday was "driven by letter after letter--I'm talkin' stacks of letters" from parents freaking out 'cause their sons like pink frilly shit and their daughters like flannel shirts. Reading the telepromter very carefully, Doc explained that he would be exploring "the issues of children who don't behave consistent with stereotypical gender roles." Now, you know he didn't write that -- it sounds like something I wrote. When is the last time Phil McGraw thought about stereotypical gender roles? His goofy son is married to a Playboy bunny and his wife is like Texas' version of a geisha.

The topic screen behind Dr. Phil read, "Gender-Confused Kids." The "o" in "confused" had a trans symbol coming from it (the one to the left -- some graphic designer is really proud of himself.). Could they not fit "Kids-Who-Don't-Behave-Consistent-With-Stereotypical-Gender-Roles" on the screen? I liked that much better and there's a whole world to explore there. Implying that trans children are simply "confused" is downright offensive and biased. The kids on the show, much like the ones in the Atlantic Weekly article, seemed very clear on their gender identity. If there was any confusion, it lies within the parents who face the dilemma of whether or not to honor their children's identities in a hateful society.

Sighing constantly like he was about to lose his ever-loving mind, Dr. Phil asked a couple who have accepted their eight year-old male-to-female transgender child, if they were "aware that less than 20% of transgender children grow up to be transgender adults." Of course, he provides no source for this gem of most-certainly biased, unscientific data. It probably originated from one of the other guests on the show, Glen Stanton, a research fellow, with a Christian-based organization called, "Focus on the Family." Stanton said it hurt him to view a home video of the trans child filmed by her parents (and aired during this episode) where she describes all the stereotypically feminine things she likes including "little girls' thongs." And she wasn't talking about flip-flops. "When did you first feel like you were a girl," her mom asks. "When I was three. We were shopping at Walmart, and, um, we're in the boys aisle. And then I saw a pair of, um, little girl's thongs--undies--and I said I want to buy them." All the while, haunting, gritty music is playing in the background, courtesy of the Dr. Phil editors, guiding the viewers' attitude, telling them to be concerned about this child.

Appropriately, during the commercial break, an ad for a state proposition aired showing mythically maybe/maybe-not intersex Jamie Lee Curtis fake directing a children's choir with a fucking pencil (can't they spring for a baton? I'll buy it.). The rainbow sea of children's faces sings "Imagine" in a professional music studio, very out of tune. At least have the decency to dub that shit with a pre-pubescent boys choir or some ugly kids with good voices like they did in the last Olympics' opening ceremony. Just an aside...Cue Dr. Phil in a sit-down session with the eight year-old trans girl. Her face is not shown but you can see her sweet pigtails and red glasses. My favorite moment was when Phil asked her how she knew at such a young age how a girl or boy was supposed to feel. "Boys feel, like, hyper, and they always wanna fight and all that. I just wanted to sit down, relax, and all that." Me too, girl, me too. Let's us just rest our weary queer asses down for a moment and let the boys be crazy.

"Well," Dr. Phil challenges, "that could just be a boy who likes to sit down and relax." I don't think she meant that literally, Phil. She's a child, she's ineloquent, but you get the fucking picture. She wanted to wear a thong at age three, for Christ's sakes. Sounds like a tranny to me.

Thank Gawd, Philly brings in professor and clinical psychiatrist, Dr. Daniel Seigel (no relation, different spelling), from UCLA to explain gender identity vs. plain ol' gender in lay-person's terms. "How you're born with your genitals doesn't necessarily correspond with your brain's development, so you should accept your child for how they're born...It's on a spectrum, so you can be feeling fully male or fully female or somewhere in between."
Okay? Thank you. Spell it out for the people, Dr. Seigs.
Dr. Phil, I suppose, representing the voice of his audience, then asks, "Are their tests you can do to find out if that's going on?" Yes, Phil, there's a brain scan called a tranny-scanny that enables us to see that shit, you fool.

The next guest was a mother whose 16 year-old son says he used to feel transgender but is no longer "that way." His feelings allegedly changed when his mom relocated the family to a more accepting town in order to allow him to be trans, but during his first day of school he was harassed. To my pleasure, the boy was interviewed (face blacked out) and what I thought might have been a voice distortion to keep his anonymity was his actual real gayest of all gay voice. Imagine Richard Simmons' voice. Then imagine Richard Simmons' voice claiming to be hetero now, complete with a girlfriend. Dr. Phil even clarified with the mother, "So he has girlfriends," to which she giggled, saying "he has many." Well, I have girlfriends, too, they're called fag hags. In the words of our intelligent trans 8 year-old girl, this boy obviously wants to sit down, relax, and all that. Someone get him a reclining chair, please. It must be exhausting to be monitoring himself at all times to make sure he's performing his version of masculinity, thinking he's pulling the wool over anyone's eyes. Mmm mmm mmmph (head shake).

In the last ten seconds of the show, Phil asks the parents of the 8 year-old to promise him that they won't give her hormones anytime soon. "I really hope you don't consider hormone therapy at this point, but you continue to let this evolve. That would be a wrong, wrong thing to do in my opinion. I want to be very clear about that." And what's the right, right thing to do, Dr. Phil? Force this child to go through a traumatizing puberty where her outsides don't match her insides? She's been living as a girl since she was three. What is the likelihood of her gender identity shifting back to male? I'd say it's about as likely as that 16 year-old former trans girl being a straight male with a girlfriend.

Unabashed Queers of the Week: Eight year-old Brandon/Bridget Simms and his mother, Tina

He spoke his first full sentence at a local Italian restaurant: “I like your high heels,” he told a woman in a fancy red dress.

The November 2008 issue of The Atlantic features a fascinating article by Hanna Rosin about the growing number of transgender children, some of whom are transitioning before puberty. The touching article is centered around eight-year-old Brandon and his mother, Tina, a courageous woman, who, in the face of much adversity, is determined to allow her child to grow up in a gratifying, unabashed way. The Simms' do not live in Manhattan and Tina does not have a degree from Brown in sociology. They live in a double-wide trailer in a "small southern town...where confederate flags line the main street," and Tina used to operate heavy machinery in the army. I thought growing up in metropolitan Atlanta with a basket-case mother was difficult.

Rosin follows the Simms', including Brandon's step-father, Bill, to a conference in Pennsylvania for transgender children and their families where Bill and Tina buy Brandon a two-piece bathing suit for a pool party. Two months after the conference, Rosin checks in on Brandon who is now going by "Bridget," and Tina, who has given away all of his boy clothes, is complying. Brandon's ears are pierced and his hair is slowly growing out. “If it doesn’t move any faster, I’ll have to get [Brandon/Bridget] extensions!” Tina says.

That's a good mother.