Eyes Open Wide At the Table
The energy and vibrancy of NetRoots Nation continues to reverberate through this medium. This all encompassing event of social justice and progressive politics gives this forum pause to ponder the energy level, passion and enthusiasm around local activities. Over the past year we've seen some demonstrations of rallying in the troops as folks took to the state capitol over radical legislation.
Some cite that locales or venues often preclude participation, yet I counter that if some one is truly interested in being involved, they should be able to express that concern to organizers while seeking transportation assistance or otherwise.
Case in point, during 2013's Mid-South Regional AIDS Conference, this forum suggested that greater participation of PLWH might be increased if transportation was provided. Yet with that element added to the entire scholarship offering, this did not result in "increased" participation or level of interest of those who did utilized the service. Most recently, Arkansas RAPPS sought to launch a series of "conversation starter" sessions in its outreach efforts around HIV awareness and linkage to care opportunities. As organizing began, again "transportation," was cited as an issue to participation at agreed venues. However upon further investigation, it was determined that despite perhaps offering that service, it couldn't be substantiated that offering assistance would enhance any level of attendance. Individuals expressed no interest in attending when an alternative plan of securing a pick up option was presented versus being offered a "gas card" option. Hence the sessions were derailed and are now being reassessed.
So what does all this mean if anything? Everett Rogers points out in his book, Diffusion of Innovations, once a certain critical mass of adoption of a new idea is reached, that idea becomes the norm. Once your public support reaches that critical mass, your issue will be, as one perceptive human service provider used to say, "like the fire department." No one will question that it ought to be a community priority, or that community resources ought to be devoted to addressing it. Sounds good, but does this work? Perhaps in some cases, but in trying to either bring folks to the policy table or keeping them engaged to understand why they need to be there has been challenging to say the least in these parts. Ultimately, what's missing is both committed and skilled individuals as to there responsibility to being apart of these tables.
Although we have some LGBT infrastructure, it is strained due to a lack of capacity and often times capturing viable resources to enhance their scalability of there mission's and visions. Even though we know we need a "fire house," except their are other priorities that often get in the way or cause us angst to build or maintain one. It seems that despite all the dollars and sense that has been expended across our area, we are still in a flux of trying to bring everyone to the table to decide what's the priority and if we are ever going to have a fire house.
Changing the T for LGBs
While there has been much ferment in the political arena recently, with marriage equality oral arguments at the Supreme Court and Caitlyn Jenner’s public coming out to 17 million viewers as a trans woman, there has been significant change going on beneath the surface in the evolution of the cultural landscape. This has occurred in the context of the changing perception of trans women from both the lesbian and gay male perspectives. I’ll begin with the lesbian side.
Recently Smith College — the grande dame of women’s colleges, the first female college founded by a woman, and the leader among the Seven Sisters — voted to admit trans women. The board of trustees stated:
“The board’s decision affirms Smith’s unwavering mission and identity as a women’s college, our commitment to representing the diversity of women’s lived experiences, and the college’s exceptional role in the advancement of women worldwide.”
Smith had ceded the lead to Mills College, then Mount Holyoke and a string of others, and dithered in terms of welcoming trans women as applicants, even while students who came out as trans men after admissions were allowed to stay. Such a differential within Smith’s policy had made it seem to trans activists that Smith was mired in a trans-exclusionary radical lesbian separatist philosophy, which views trans men as deluded cisgender lesbians and refuses to see trans women as real women. This very welcome action doesn’t simply add Smith to the list of the other women’s colleges; it kills that separatist argument in administrative academia once and for all.
Smith’s decision followed very closely on the decision to end the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival, a venerable lesbian institution for the past four decades, held annually on “The Land” in upper Michigan. MichFest has been mired in conflict regarding trans women since 1991, when a trans woman was escorted off the land for the first time.
The festival, like Smith, often hosted trans men who had once been lesbian women, but officially asked out trans women to stay home. While many women, including trans women living under the festival’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, experienced life-changing and life-affirming weeks during 40 Augusts past, the larger LGBT community last year had finally spoken out against the discriminatory admissions policy with a petition, created by Emily Dievendorf (then executive director of Equality Michigan), calling for a boycott of MichFest until its exclusionary policies were changed.
Maybe as a result of fatigue and the simple passage of time, or the behind-the-scenes efforts of Dievendorf, Kate Kendell of the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and Rea Carey of the National LGBTQ Task Force, as well as from trans advocates nationwide — or most probably a combination of all of the above — Lisa Vogel, the co-founder and lifetime executive director of the MWMF, chose to signal this summer’s festivities as the last. Unfortunately, rather than going out on the right side of history, Vogel has remained defiant until the end. Surviving intact as a separatist movement will be a Pyrrhic victory, and the demise of the festival, along with the increasingly public recognition by prominent national cisgender lesbians that trans women are women, is another signal that lesbian society is growing in its understanding of the meaning of gender identity and the lives of trans persons. ( to read more go to www.advocate.com )
COP 24/7 celebrates the theme, "Unity in Community," as a part of this weeks Pride in the Rock activities. We are encouraging everyone to know your status. You can get FREE HIV testing and counseling by scheduling an appointment at 877-293-6416 We want you to "get the facts, not foolishness!!"
No comments:
Post a Comment