Full article at The Guardian.
Two Spirits: A Map of Gender-Diverse Cultures
September 15, 2011
On nearly every continent, and for all of recorded history, thriving cultures have recognized, revered, and integrated more than two genders. Terms such as transgender and gay are strictly new constructs that assume three things: that there are only two sexes (male/female), as many as two sexualities (gay/straight), and only two genders (man/woman).
Yet hundreds of distinct societies around the globe have their own long-established traditions for third, fourth, fifth, or more genders. Fred Martinez, for example, was not a boy who wanted to be a girl, but both a boy and a girl — an identity his Navajo culture recognized and revered as nádleehí. Most Western societies have no direct correlation for this Native “two-spirit” tradition, nor for the many other communities without strict either/or conceptions of sex, sexuality, and gender. Worldwide, the sheer variety of gender expression is almost limitless. Take a tour and learn how other cultures see gender diversity.
This is so rad! I haven’t seen the film, though I would love to attend a NYC screening if there was one. Regardless, I totally recommend just clicking around on this map for a few minutes, because as a stand alone, it is really interesting and awesome.
Seattle, 1983.
August 29, 2011
on ‘fighting back’
Doesn’t just mean clawing or grappling or other forms of physical resistance.
Resisting takes many forms, some of which get discounted because they don’t appear on the surface as resistance. Sometimes resistance is just doing what you need to do to get through. Which is what I did. Which is what so many others have done. Do what you need to do. Self-preservation is resistance as much as physical resistance is, as much as systemic resistance is. No one strategy is best (though I generally tend toward the peaceful and nonviolent).
Clit Fest DC: We’re Doing a Workshop
July 1, 2011
Our workshop will be on Saturday from 1:45-3:15 pm:
Call Me Out: Community Response to Abuse & The Calling Out Process with Support New York
Intimate abuse doesn’t only affect individuals, but friends, families, and communities. In the past decade, a new politic of radical accountability to confront abuse and sexual violence, that avoids using oppressive structures like the police and prison systems, is being built. The struggle of working to support survivors and transforming those who’ve caused harm is a key component in encouraging and building healthy and safe communities. While this work is riddled with complications, conflict, and dead-ends, there can also be real transformation. Join Support New York as we share some useful tools and experiences in fighting intimate abuse.
Join us for some queer fun under the midnight sun as we celebrate our many identities! Get here at 8pm! We have a full line-up, we will start on time, and the space will get packed quick!!
The 7th Annual NYC Trans Day of Action for Social and Economic Justice
Points of Unity
Initiated by TransJustice of the Audre Lorde Project, a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Two-Spirit, Trans and Gender Non-Conforming People of Color Center for Community Organizing
June 24, 2011
We call on our Trans and Gender Non-Conforming (TGNC) community and on all of our allies from many movements to join us for the 7th Annual Trans Day of Action for Social and Economic Justice. We as TGNC People of Color (POC) recognize the importance of working together alongside other movements to change the world we want to see. We live in a time when oppressed peoples including people of color, immigrants, youth and elders, people with disabilities, women and TGNC people, and poor people are underserved, face higher levels of discrimination, heightened surveillance and experience increased violence at the hands of the state. We must unite and work together towards dismantling the transphobia, racism, classism, sexism, ageism, ableism, homophobia and xenophobia that permeates our movements for social justice. Let’s come together to let the world know that TGNC rights will not be undermined and together we will not be silenced! These are the points of unity, which hold together the purpose of this important march:
What Is Rape Culture? via The World According To Nouns
June 11, 2011
There have been many great and comprehensive posts on rape culture (the classic Shakesville post springs to mind immediately), but I offer you this easy analogy:
You’re in the woods of the world, in a little garden that represents your community, examining some fallen tree trunks that represent cultural mores. You pick up what looks like a big sturdy log that has written on it the words RAPE IS A CRIME. Seems pretty definitive, doesn’t it?
But then you notice something creepy moving on the underside, and you have to move your hands because they’re all slimy. And there are all kinds of worms and bugs on the underside of the log, and those worms and bugs are speaking. They’re whispering things like “What was she wearing?” and “It couldn’t happen to that person because that person is [x gender/ethnicity/sexuality/trans status/body type/class/age/ability/occupation]” and “Nobody would rape her, she’s too ugly” and “Just be quiet so that you don’t upset everyone else” and they’re telling terrible shock-humor rape jokes and making laws that don’t support survivors of sexual assault, especially survivors who are undocumented, and justifying those laws by telling us that they’re in our best interest and that really the worms and bugs are TOUGH ON CRIME.
And that’s when you notice it’s not a big sturdy log at all, it’s porous because all the worms and bugs have burrowed through it and made it their home. And you start wondering about all the other logs that represent the things you’re supposed to believe (whether or not they match up with your lived experience) – are they as porous and riddled with vermin? You step back from the log, disgusted.
Sound Wave #4: Benefit for Support NY
June 11, 2011
MORENO and MATA are just two of the people who get away with rape every day in our country. We are furious with and disheartened by the omnipresence of rape and sexual assault in our culture and society and we will NOT shut up about it. Come out and make some noise while benefiting SUPPORT NEW YORK, an organization dedicated to supporting victims when our justice system falls short.
Death by Audio
42 S. 2nd St. BROOKLYN
Thursday, June 16th
8PM
all ages
$7L to Bedford
-or-
JMZ to Marcy
-or-
G to Broadwaymusic!
::MINDTROLL – http://terribleinformation.org/MindTroll/
:::DELTA HOTEL – http://deltahotel.bandcamp.com/
::::CLINICAL TRIALS – http://www.clinicaltrialsmusic.com/
:::::CAVE CRICKET – http://www.vimeo.com/18861041baked goods for sale! (write on the facebook wall if you want to donate yours)
all proceeds from ticket sales benefit SUPPORT NEW YORK
“Support New York is a collective dedicated to healing the effects of sexual assault and abuse. Our aim is to meet the needs of the survivor, to hold accountable those who have perpetrated harm, and to maintain a larger dialogue within the community about consent, mutual aid, and our society’s narrow views of abuse.
We came together in order to create our own safe(r) space and provide support for people of all genders, races, ages and orientations, separate from the police and prison systems that perpetuate these abuses. We believe that experts are not always able to provide everything we need, and that all of us are capable of helping each other heal. This is an open call for anyone who needs support.”
Linked from Permanent Wave. We are really excited about this!
It was their uniforms that caught the eye. Dressed in traditional black and white or crisp blue, hundreds of hotel chambermaids gathered outside a courthouse on Monday to wait for the arrival of Dominique Strauss-Kahn. When the former IMF leader appeared, flanked by his billionaire wife and bodyguards, they roared their disapproval, shouting: “Shame on you.”The protesters – almost all women – had come from more than 20 hotels across the city, and were all members of the New York Hotel Workers’ Union, there to support the 32-year-old hotel worker Strauss-Kahn is accused of attempting to rape and unlawfully imprison.
California Women Prisons: Inmates Face Sexual Abuse, Lack Of Medical Care And Unsanitary Conditions via HuffPo
June 11, 2011
Over the course of 12 years, former inmate Beverly Henry watched hundreds of untreated women die in the Central California Women’s Facility, a sprawling complex in Chowchilla that comprises the largest female prison in the nation.
One woman had liver disease, with eyes “yellow as a warning sign” and two tampons stuck up her nose to stem the bleeding that poured from every orifice. Henry brought her to the prison’s clinic where, she said, the two were told to return to work. Within a week, the woman was dead.
“I watched 17 women die in one year,” said Henry, now 62, who spent 40 years cycling in and out of the state system for her drug addiction and worked as a peer health educator inside prison clinics during most of her incarceration. “I’ve seen things that make me wish the mind was not so unique that we have the ability to store memories.”
Read the rest here.
Today A Man Touched Me On The Subway And So I Hit Him
June 11, 2011
When I’ve explained sexual harassment to men in the past I’ve been struck at their confusion over why it is a big deal. How is someone whistling at you threatening, they ask? Here is what they don’t understand. Those moments, which may seem insignificant and small, create an unsafe environment in which women are forced to live.
-Kate Spencer, “Today A Man Touched Me On The Subway So I Hit Him.“
supportny.org 