Oh hello you good looking people, hope you've had a great pride month even without your regular safe spaces. This blog has been going for 13 years, seen baby trans grow up, new babies come up assending to even greater heights, label wars come and go, mayfly trans come and flourish then disappear all in a few short hours and hearing the same scare tactics deliberately toxifying amplified across the political spectrum.
And that Nationwide adverts will always be annoying.
I wonder why they thought the Little Britain fan was a valuable demographic to chase, today they complain about it being banned despite it still being available on DVD which many better comidies aren't.
Tank fly boss walk jam nitty gritty you're listening to some trans from the big bad city.
Not everyone's in their PJs and Netflix and for most it's been bloody stressful, everyone here has tales of variously dealing with idiots who are old enough to know better, left to hang by the government, and managers hiding at home ignoring the above but finding some minor uniform infraction on the CCTV screen. So the fortnight's isolation was a relief, especially as the colleges symptoms didn't develop. I had the chance to slowly declutter, finding 20 year old pay slips from the days I kept it all and financial statements, several expired condom's, some floppy discs with my A level coursework on and a cheap bottle of "eau de cologne' I received as a Christmas gift and promptly dropped in a box and forgot about. It's not as nasty as I feared but it's not exactly great and will guarantee people stand more than 2 metres away from you.
As online dating is getting a boost at the moment, here is my brief guide to trans dating. According to a recent survey less than 18% of Americans would consider dating a trans or non-binary person. One reason why many trans eventually hook up with other trans people, the probability over time rises to 1 the longer you're looking for love. There's also still a stigma about trans attraction among cishet society due to the marginalisation and fetishisation of trans life. I'm totally against such shaming but I'm also against treating trans as a fetish and if there are any people reading this looking to date a trans person it's to leave anmy fetish at the door or in that special folder on your computer. Also don't use any language from that special folder it'll have me hitting the block button quicker than you can type s****** Its a big turn off. As are questions about tyransness like surgery's, how I put my thing away and so on. If you're curious ask Google not your date. My standards are not lower either. In short don't be a dick and , ultimately treat your date like any other person.
Happy international transgender day of visibility a day to celebrate trans, non binary and gender variant people and highlight discrimination and oppression. There's still so much terrible discrimination, harassment and violence about and so it's unsurprising that for many it's unwise and unsafe to be visible. Being anywhere on the trans spectrum requires a lot of learning and discovery which can take many years, hopefully days like these can help.
If you had only read the newspaper coverage of the Scottish Governments proposed reforms to the Gender Recognition Act of 2004 you might be led into thinking there was something really radical in the draft bill. The nation becoming innundated with people from all corners of Britain wanting to change their birth certificates, children given sex swaps, men taking over women's changing rooms, people being forced to transition by the sinister trans cabal.
The reality is that it is a modest reform which will bring Scotland up to date with international best practice. To paraphrase for those unfamiliar with the current system of changing the sex on their birth certificate across the UK it requires providing evidence over several years, be signed off by two separate doctors and convincing a panel. In essence unnecessarily time consuming and bureaucratic. Replacing all that with a legally binding declaration and a reasonable period of reflection. It's a system that works successfully in other jurisdictions without fuss and should be welcomed especially as the proposed reforms in the rest of the UK are lieing in rapidly lengthening grass.
For LGBTQ+ history month marked in the UK since 2004 to mark the the repeal of Section 28 (clause 2A in Scotland). I'm going to visit recent history, in particular the 1980s where not just casual homophobia was rife but much of it was overt. A difficult time to be very young and feel different from the cis-het world and not have any knowledge apart from crudely drawn stereotypes depicted in mass culture. Also to step away from that culture and be yourself was too scary and possibly dangerous to contemplate. Section 28 of the Local Government Act effectively legitimised this homophobia under the cry of 'wont somebody think about the children'. The reference in the section to pretend family relationships stands out and is still offensive to this day.
The repeal was not a given, although most people at the time were not anti gay it was clear that this was only if they did it behind closed doors, even if this was just a peck on the cheek and definitely not in public especially if young people were near by. Hence the long bruising battle to equalise the age of concent, followed by the repeal of section 28 and the fight to allow same sex couples to adopt. Even after schools practiced section 28 in all but name, including one academy here in Swindon and the outcry over equality lessons recently show there's a long way to go.
Its easy to see the same playbook being used to attack trans rights exploiting the involvement of children and young people exploiting fears and telling lies with many now calling for a trans section 28 in all but name.
Going down the EPG one evening I came across a channel showing Just Like A Woman (1992), which I had not seen since the early 1990's. To the young viewer I was excited to see trans representation on screen and in a sympathetic manor, the transformation scene was particularly memorable.
The film was based on a real life story, turned into a book with a sub plot about corporate intrigue added into the script. Gerald played by Adrian Pasdar is divorced by his wife after she discovers women's underwear not knowing they're his ending up renting a room at Monica's (Julie Walters) home. Where gradually Monica finds out about Geraldine and unfortunately so does Gerald's boss who promptly sacks our hero. Leading to a climatic showdown between the two featuring some Japanese businessmen straight from central casting.
Watching it recently, you notice the use of the term "transvestite" dates the film and there's a constant feel of heteronormality, throughout. There's no caption on screen saying "not a gay, only likes doing it with women" or indeed something like the opening voice-over to Glen or Glenda there doesn't need to be you're very much beaten about the head with it. Also, apart from the make-up department Adrian Pasdar is not convincing or I would argue that he looks that comfortable as a transvestite.
That said the basic story is fine, the corporate intrigue bits less so, anything with Julie Walters is worth watching and the makers had good intentions, even consulting a trans group during the making.
So J K Rowling made some TERF'y tweets, to the surprise of no-one. Well no one trans who had seen her Twitter account over the last few years anyway. It won't be surprising when another outs themselves as a self appointed defender of teh women next week. They all have freedom of speech to make such comments, as recent employment rulings have affirmed they don't have freedom from consequences, whether that be people calling out their bigotry or employers showing them the door.
Happy winter solstice. I've had one of those nights where it was nearly impossible to switch off my mind and settle down, thankfully I haven't had a night like that for a while and thankfully it wasn't a school night. Elsewhere I had a few packages arrive which quite idelly led me to rediscover the therapeutic joys of popping bubble wrap. I feel it could become a quite expensive habit.
"Britain's First Transgender Parents" ran the headline which was news to me and the many trans parents I've met over the years, but its in the newspapers, so it must be true. Anyway congrats to them and as I've written recently there have been trans parents since time began and there will be many more to come.
I spoke to someone recently who attended a job interview in an office that had a casual Friday policy which was on a Friday so he was formally dressed while the interviewers were in jeans and t-shirts. He thought this was deeply unprofessional, where as I thought you're stuck and them's the rule's. Although they really should schedule interviews on other days. I'd be interested what the brains trust reading this think.
One more week to go and I'm getting sentimental listening to David Essex crooning A Winters Tale. I'm also someone who's a whizz on Excel, can manage the moribund database system and understand how Winthrop and Valentine made all that money at the end of Trading Places but I'm blown if I can understand this new holiday booking system.
By the way here's an explaination, nothing can explain the sadist who came up with the holiday booking system.
If you think you're having a bad day. Scott Boswell's infamous over at Lords in the 2001 C&G Cup final, ironically it was his bowling display in the semi-final that got his team to the final but nerves and a sweaty palm got to him on the big day and his playing career was finished. In a Guardian interview a few years ago he said that moment took him ten years to get over.
Chances are you've been given gifts that you don't want. Perhaps you're at that age where everyone decided to buy you a pair of slippers and now you've got a dozen pairs, maybe it's another bath set, a gag gift that leaves you gagging or its just plain horrible and now you're cupboard is full.
You could hire me as a sort of half arsed trans Marie Kondo or you could regift it yourself. Hopefully you've kept a note of who gave what to avoid embarrassingly giving that gift back and unlike all those slipper buyers you've put some thought into what they actually would like and hopefully they like slippers. Gag gifts are generally a terrible no no. Only regift if you are 100 percent sure they'd see the funny side. If your item had become worn or faded, the packaging bashed or torn, it's time to donate it away. After all you need that space for this year's slippers.
