From All Over: GenderNews
  • British Lesbians Win Equal Rights by Marrying
  • Second Transgender Teacher Comes Out in Minnesota
  • Edinburgh Weddings
  • Transwoman Chanel Chandler Murdered In California
  • German TG Mayor Recalled

  • Posted
    December 10
    1998




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    British Lesbians Win
    Equal Rights by Marrying

    A news release from Christine Burns c_burns@email.msn.com of Press For Change, http://www.pfc.org.uk/pfclists/

    A lesbian couple will wed on Tuesday morning (10th November) at Camden Registry office at 10.30am.

    Earlier this year Dr Tracie O'Keefe, 43, a psychotherapist, and her partner Katrina Fox, 32, a journalist, hit the headlines when the chief registrar of Westminster refused to marry the couple, even though O'Keefe's birth certificate records her as male. The original ceremony was cancelled at the eleventh hour by the registrar who said he could not allow two women to marry.

    It has taken 8 months for the Government to concede and allow the couple to marry as man and wife, even though Dr O'Keefe, a transsexual, has lived as female since the age of 15.

    Both Fox and O'Keefe, authors of the highly acclaimed book on transsexualism Trans-X-U-All: The Naked Difference, are marrying out of protest for the inequality shown to lesbian, gay and transgendered people by the UK government.

    O'Keefe and Fox are angry that they have to suffer the humiliation of going through this ceremony in order to secure pension, inheritance and other rights automatic to heterosexual couples.

    O'Keefe says: "It is insulting, after having lived all my adult life as a woman, to be forced to stand in front of bureaucrats and be referred to as 'he', 'Mr' 'the groom' and 'husband' just to protect our financial and contractual futures. It is nothing less than abuse and an attack on my core identity as a lesbian woman. Many other countries no longer allow this kind of discrimination against transsexuals."

    Fox adds, "We feel let down by the Government, which has backtracked on all its pre-election promises to gay people - the age of consent, the decision not to overturn Section 28 or support the Sexual Orientation Discrimination Bill, which would outlaw discrimination against gays in the workplace. All Tracie and I want is the right for our relationship to be recognised in law - but for what it is - a lesbian relationship, not a heterosexual one. It is ludicrous that we have to go to these lengths and Tony Blair should be ashamed of himself."

    Although the ceremony itself is private, O'Keefe and Fox are inviting lesbians, gay men and transgendered people to come and protest outside Camden Registry office and demand their equal rights from the Government.


     
     




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    Second Transgender Teacher
    Comes Out in Minnesota

    Via Gender Advocacy Internet News(GAIN), a free Internet news service, brought to you courtesty of American Educational Gender Information Service and It's Time, America! Contact Editor-in-Chief Penni Ashe, at gain@gender.org

    According to a November 7 story by Rosalind Bentley in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, only six months ago Debra Davis, a media-center director at Southwest High School in Minneapolis, blazed trails by becoming the first transgender teacher in the state to come out. Now the students at Roosevelt Middle School in Blaine have learned that their music teacher is transgender. On Friday, November 6, Alyssa Williams told her story before 120 teachers, staff members, and a small number of parents. According to the story, the school district had sent a letter to parents the day before.

    Williams interviewed in August as a woman for a job as music instructor at the high school. According to state law, she was not required to reveal her gender status, although she had taught in public schools in South Dakota and Minnesota as a man for seven years.

    According to the story, transgender people are protected against discrimination under Minnesota 's 1993 Human Rights Act, and remains the only state that affords legislative protection to transgenders. However, there have not been many claims filed with the state, resulting in little case law regarding how employers should handle a worker's decision to transition on the job.

    The entire story may be found at http://www.youth.org/loco/PERSONProject/Alerts/States/Minnesota/teacher.html

    .     .     .

    In a related November 10 story, also by Rosalind Bentley in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, Alyssa Williams told her story before a November 9 meeting of nearly 400 parents, teachers and school district officials. With the support of psychologists and district administrators, Williams spoke before an audience that was at times supportive, at other times hostile.

    Some parents questioned the wisdom of explaining transgenderism to pre-adolescants, even though Sharon Satterfield, a child psychologist who works with transgender adults, assured the audience that "kids 12 and younter are not negatively affected." Some, like Karla Casey, disagreed. "I believe all people deserve respect," she said, "but I don't like being forced into deal with this with my kid at age 12. I don't even know if I'm going to let her come to school tomorrow."

    The entire story may be found at http://www.youth.org/loco/PERSONProject/Alerts/States/Minnesota/teacher2.html


     
     




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    Edinburgh Weddings

    From the Press For Change Newsletter No. 11, November 1998. Available on the web at http://www.pfc.org.uk/newsltr/nwsltr11.htm

    A Scottish Church has gone on the Internet to advertise homosexual, bisexual and transgendered weddings.

    The Holy Trinity Metropolitan Community Church in Edinburgh is the first in Scotland to offer religious blessings to same-sex couples. Its Web page says: "We offer relationship blessings to couples irrespective of gender identification or sexuality." The Church claims in its advertising that "some of the earliest recorded Christian marriages were between people of the same gender". It includes in its rites and sacraments Holy Union and Holy Matrimony for people of the same gender and argues that the Old Testament has been misinterpreted.


     
     




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    Transwoman Chanel Chandler
    Murdered In California

    From InYourFace on-line news. For prior press releases, check the GenderPAC website at: http://www.gpac.org

    [Clovis, CA: 17 Nov 98] Transwoman Chanel Chandler, 22, was found murdered in her burning apartment on 20 Sep 98. Police think the blaze was set to disguise the murder.

    Friends of Chanel expressed shock and amazement upon hearing that she had male genitals. "I'm surprised as hell," said Charlie Gilbert, a close friend and father figure to her. "It's almost like you're putting me on." Even Chandler's roommate, a woman with whom she worked, was unaware of her biological gender.

    Police have identified no suspects, nor have they determined a motive. As to her transgenderism being a motive, Police spokeswoman Micheline Golden said, "In a situation like this, that's the first motive you jump on, obviously, but you don't want to let that keep you from exploring other options. The impression we have is that she pretty much lived the life of a normal, single 22- year-old woman."

    Chandler was born into a conservative Montana family. From an early age, it was apparent that she considered herself a female. Said her aunt, Carla Coronado, "Whatever transition he had to go through, I don't think it was difficult. In his mind, she was a female. There was no two ways about it..."

    Chanel quit high school in Montana and moved to San Francisco to start a new life. She had just started a wholesale perfume business with her roommate. Said Charlie Gilbert, "She was really excited. She said there's no limit to what she could do. I wouldn't be surprised if she was wealthy in 10 years. She had that energy and drive."


     
     




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    German TG Mayor Recalled

    Copyright © 1995-1998 PlanetOut Corporation. Story at http://www.planetout.com:80/pno/news/article.html?1998/11/30/3

    November 30, 1998

    Summary: The German village of Quellendorf has voted to oust the man it elected in 1996 since he announced his plans to live as a woman.

    Voters in the village of Quellendorf, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany on November 29 by a 2 - 1 margin recalled Mayor Norbert Michael Lindner, who earlier this year announced his intention to live as "Michaela" and undergo sex reassignment surgery. Transgendered people from Germany and France gathered in Quellendorf to demonstrate support.

    Lindner had been elected in 1996 to a seven-year term, but a petition was circulated for his recall almost as soon as he revealed his transgender nature, and 175 signatures were quickly collected in the town of 1,048. In September, the Quellendorf council approved a recall referendum by 6 - 2 at a meeting Lindner was not allowed to attend.

    Lindner is scheduled to begin surgery on December 3. She may file a legal challenge; she intends to leave the village and possibly the nation, saying, "I see the result [of the vote] as a chance to start up somewhere else. I don't think there is any village in Germany that would have no problems with a transsexual mayor." Lindner's wife and two children have remained solidly supportive of her. Lindner heads an environmental company.

    Lindner's opponents say she neglected her mayoral duties and they object to the media's intrusion into the village since she came out, but Lindner believes the issue is transphobia. "Eighty percent of transsexuals in Germany are unemployed," she told reporters, "and of course that is never because they are transsexuals."


     
     
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