This a round up of news stories affecting people in the transgender community.
I've never been sure about which comes first, the good news or the bad news, so this time the mishmash ended up good, bad, bad, bad, good. But remember that every bright cloud has its potential to turn into a thunderstorm and every dark cloud can have a silver lining.
1
According to the Social Security Administration, gender verification has been removed from the Social Security Number Verification Service. Gender verification has supposedly been an optional part of SSNVS since June of 2005, but in reality has resulted in millions of "gender no-match" letters to be sent to employers (711,488 in 2010 alone, according to a FOIA request), a practice which often has outed a transperson to the employer…and a subsequent loss of job.
Alerting employers about differences in someone’s gender threatened people’s jobs and did not accomplish what this verification system was designed for. There was absolutely no reason for it and it was extremely dangerous for transgender people, who still face significant disrespect, discrimination and violence in the workplace.
--Mara Keisling, executive director of the National Center for Transgender Equality
It's bad enough when the government won't pass laws to protect us from discrimination in the workplace. How many times worse is it to know that the government has actually been complicit in that discrimination
The Social Security Administration still requires proof of reassignment surgery to change gender markers on their records. This practice is the same as that of the Netherlands that Human Rights Watch recently condemned, stating
The requirements violate transgender people’s rights to personal autonomy and physical integrity and deny them the ability to define their own gender identity.
We have a couple of anger-producing stories out of Washington DC in the wake of this past summer's seeming campaign of violence against transwomen in the nation's capital.
2
In the aftermath of the murder of Lashai McLean in July, Earline Budd of Transgender Health Empowerment created and helped maintain a memorial to Lashai on the corner of 61st and Dix Street NE, where Lashai was shot.
Friends and supporters adorned a tree near the scene of her murder with a big teddy bear and flowers -- a memorial to that victim.
That was then. In an act of supreme hatred, the memorial has been destroyed.
The only thing that remains are charred flowers and some parts of a teddy bear.
I'm just torn. I'm just grief-stricken. Just the thought that somebody would do something to desecrate a monument, it sends a clear message of such hatred to our community,
--Earline Budd
The police are considering whether to treat this as a bias-related crime.
3
Darryl Willard, 20, of Northeast Washington appeared before a judge with his attorney yesterday, facing a count of assault with intent to kill with a handgun for shooting a transwoman in the neck on 23rd and Savannah Streets SE because she would not perform oral sex on him or give him her cash.
Charging documents abused the victim further by referring to her as a "transgender male", even though the police indent report correctly identified her as a "transgender female".
Assistant U.S. Attorney Justin Dillon informed the court that the government was offering Willard a plea bargain, in which he would plead guilty to one count of aggravated assault while armed, in exchange for the government agreeing not to indict him on more serious charges. The plea deal of aggravated assault carries a minimum five-year sentence.
Such is the value of a black transwoman's life in this country, I guess. If you missed it, read this.
Maybe the following had something to do with it:
[Jeffrey] Light [attorney for DC Trans Coalition] said he thought the inclusion of prior sex encounters between the victim and Willard was unnecessary to gain an affidavit and did not support probable cause because evidence of past encounters was not related to the commission of the crime. He also said that the inclusion of such information could discourage transgender sex workers from coming forward for fear that their history could be accessed by the public via court documents.
4
They've got a problem in McIntosh County, Georgia. They have a 7-year-old child, born a girl but who identifies as and looks and acts like a boy…who they have refused use of the boy's restroom in his elementary school. Because, you know, it would be so much less disruptive to have someone who to all outward appearances is a boy using the girl's restroom in the school.
Tommy Theollyn, 28, of Townsend, was the biological mother of the child, identified as D in papers, and transitioned to male about a year after giving birth.
Theollyn said he was forced to withdraw his son, nicknamed D, from Todd Grant Elementary School because McIntosh County schools Superintendent William “Al” Hunter refused to allow the child to use the boys' bathroom.
A Change.org petition was started, which collected 41,000 signatures in support that Theollyn presented to the school board.
D is physically a girl but lives as a boy. The youngster came out as a boy last year by his own choice. At that time, the family was living in the Atlanta area and D attended a private school. The family then moved to McIntosh County, which has about 14,000 residents.
The family apparently also includes a grandmother.
The child’s grandmother, who identified herself only as “Granny,” indicated she hoped the matter would be resolved quickly.
“He needs to get back to school,” she said.
The question will be whether the school board really believes that education is for everyone.
Forcing him to use a bathroom that does not match his presentation effectively discloses his status as a transgender child and thus endangers him. My child very much wants to go to school and interact with other children at a normal school setting. He deserves the same opportunities that any child in this county should have.
--Tommy Theollyn
5
The Illinois Human Rights Commission has ordered Universal Taxi Dispatch to pay up to a former employee who was maltreated…to the tune of $104, 711. At issue was transwoman Venessa Fitzsimmons, who worked for Universal from 2004 - 2008. Owner Gordon Simic called her a "freak", a "queer", and an "abomination" during her time there. But he made the mistake of of requiring Fitzsimmons to pay for repairs to her taxi, which was not required of other drivers.
Fitzsimmons’s lawyer, Joanie Rae Wimmer, further claims that Simic threatened to fire her client because she is transgender — he said he was losing business because of her — and that the company refused to aid Fitzsimmons when her taxi broke down.
The award was likely the first one to a transperson under the Human Rights Act since it was expanded to include transpeople in 2006.
This award sends a message to all corporations doing business in the State of Illinois that discrimination based on gender identity will not be tolerated any longer.
--Wimmer
Message delivered. whether it was heard, understood and acted upon shall remain to be seen.