12/22/11

ABC Don't Tell me Your "Work It" Picture Isn't about Me. Its Killing Me.

Things are so desperate, I am wondering am I strong enough to keep my new job after only three months .My mind and soul hurt. I break down often when I get home. So much damage has been done.

Italic paragraphs from the New York Times For Transgender Detainees, a Jail Policy Offers Some Security “They are more likely to interact with police because they are more likely to be victims of violent crime, because they are more likely to be on the street due to homelessness and/or being unwelcome at home, because their circumstances often force them to work in the underground economy, and even because many face harassment and arrest simply because they are out in public while being transgender.”

Flip to my life in bold: Today as I exited a stall in the women's room the ten ladies waiting suddenly ceased their light hearted banter. As I washed my hands I could literally feel the hate boring into my back. Dead silence.

Seven percent of respondents reported being arrested or detained in jail due only to their gender identity.(myself being one of that 7% who responded we had been arrested simply for being transgender on the Task Force's survey.

The bathroom was so crowded because the shipping department meeting just ended. The one that the vice president of my company assured me the subject of sexual harassment (they do not have gender protections) would be raised. It was not, again.


Today the cumulative effect of the 3 months of harassment, ostracization, physical assaults and just evil vitriol gossip made me wonder, why am I working? My kitty stripy baby and my first apartment in 20 years?


If I went back to the streets what then? Nothing certain but one thing. I would rid myself of this hateful place and people once and for all. I would also lose all of my self respect and dignity. Why even breath then?

And it all started with a rumor on my very first day of employment. It spread like wildfire that I was using the men's room. That sort of hateful rumor is given visual conformation by this image published by ABC "Work It". So ABC don't tell me your picture isn't about me. Its killing me.

12/19/11

ABC Suburgatory Charity Case Episode Subjugates and Humiliates Transgender People

Watch the full episode of Charity Case
SUBURGATORY “Charity Case” Episode 6 airs Wednesday, November 2 (8:30-9:00 p.m., ET) on ABC.

Episode Synopsis: Irritated by all the cafeteria waste at school, Tessa motivates the student body to get involved with giving back. Unfortunately their charity of choice involves helping residents of Florida improve their complexions. When Tessa introduces a homeless transsexual to the student body as part of a lesson, they decide that Tessa is really the person in need. Meanwhile George receives a large dental bill from Noah, which puts a strain on their relationship, on “Suburgatory,” WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 2 (8:30-9:00 p.m., ET) on the ABC Television Network.

The main character introduses the charity case "This is Gladys a man who lives on my street" introducing a transsexual woman. "One of her class mates asks "A Man?" Gladys says "Let me take it from here, I tuck it in."
This is the systemic misrepresentation of transgender people ABC is showing the world. After watching this clip please join with the thousands who have signed the petition asking ABC not to show another one of its transexpolitive shows "Work It"

12/16/11

HRC Starts ABC "Work It" Petition leaving Trans Activists in the Lurch


The Human Rights campaign true to form once again ignores grassroots advocacy and commits to an action without even as much as contacting the people it portends to advocate for.

We saw that recently with DADT. HRC didn't repeal DADT the people who chained themselves to the White House fence did. HRC was acquiescenting to political pressure and would have remained silent if not for Get Equal and friends.

Just like they did when Barney Frank divided ENDA into two separate bills one sexual orientation the other gender expression. HRC would have remained silently complaisant if not for us protesting on their doorsteps.

HRC has unilaterally begun a separate petition to ABC after Joe Solmonese' request to moderate Work IT were ignored. Maybe that was fortunate because the very idea that Solmonese could be in a position to create social conscripts regarding the treatment of transgender people in television sends a shiver down my back.

A well intentioned cisgender friend alerted me to the HRC petition. She posted on my facebook wall
"Thanx Kelli Anne Busey for getting the ball rolling on petitioning ABC about this disgusting show. Now HRC has a petition as well please sign let people know that mocking women is not funny."
We didn't just "get the ball rolling" so gay.com could bulldoze our efforts at self empowerment for the sake of self promotion!
We are the ones who are directly suffering from the images ABC is promoting. We are the activists who have a successful petition without so much as a peep from gay.com's media mafia.

As divisive as HRC's efforts are I am not discouraging anyone from signing HRC's petition but I ask you if you do so, sign the petition from the transgender community also.

HRC's petition probably will no more stop ABC from showing Work it than our's will but its about a whole lot more than that. Regardless of the outcome its about transgender empowerment. Its about us taking responsibility for our community. Its about our gay and lesbian allie's support. Its about a world of cisgender people who object to the dehumanizing effects of Work it's images.

It's not about this battle specifically. Its about transgender people joining the world to do the right thing.

12/13/11

ABC Work It Ups the Hate with Men Peeing in Dresses

ABC president Paul Lee baited the transgender community into action and when he saw that the Dallas Transgender Advocates and Allies petition
ABC do Not Air Work It had gained some mainstream media attention Lee put into gear a nefarious plan with two objectives. Lee wanted to hurt transgender people as badly as he could, the payoff being massive publicity for Work It.

But Lee had to patiently wait while the toxicity of the "Work It" trailer and his foul comments percolated into the transgender community. Then he took to social media with a faux look alike twitter account that said what he would have been held accountable for had the verified account said it.

Paul Lee then twisted the knife with this tweet.



Then when when the condemnation of his show escalated to a new leval the coup de grace. That picture.

Hate pure and simple personified in this vile little 'man' Paul Lee.

And amazingly this hate mirrors my life experiences. Not three months ago I finally secured a full time job, the first since going full time 5 years ago. It was perfect, only a mile from the Walmart where I am loved and accepted and still work at part time. I thought I could slip seamlessly into production at my new job.

The second day a co worker unintentionally let it slip there was a rumor started the day before I was using the men's room. My head began to spin and my sight clouded over in shock. I bypassed all of my supervisors and went to Human Relations. It seems that 'rumor' had already made it to her except one thing. She took it more as a truth than a rumor and demanded that I refute this claim made by so many of the employees.

She said she was afraid that she falsely assumed I was female when she hired me. To make a long story short she called a meeting with people that were known to have spread the rumor and told them that this sort of thing was unacceptable and if any of them were heard to be spreading that rumor again they might get written up.

Officially that was the end of the rumor however I was ostracised and made a outcast. Whole tables would get up if I sat down. And that was just the beginning of the hate after hateful acts culminating in the last one when I was unlawfully physically detained by a fellow worker.

After I complained to my supervisor I was never contacted again about it. Then I demanded to see a vice president and got the same victim blaming even a pitiful attempt to establish I was instigating false incidents. I blew that up. They didn't know who they were dealing with. I'm blond but I'm not a fucking idiot.

All of this began with a rumor vsiually validated by this picture.

Stay tuned for the action alert "Fire ABC Paul Lee".

12/11/11

Jamie Madison Shamelessly Promotes ABC Work IT

Jamie Madison claiming to be the newest cast member of the ABC Sitcom "Work It" Tweeted this picture. Madison says she feels no remorse at promoting "Work It" and for some reason thought it necessary to tell the world.



And so does the ABC president Paul Lee as he stated he wouldn't make any excuses for his decision to air Work It.

I am curious, why are the cast of Work It and the president of ABC are so defensive about their roles in "Work IT"?

Could they be aware of it's potentially damaging effects to the transgender community? Is it that they are aware Work It might cause a back lash against transgender people. Could it be that they know Work It dehumanizes cross dressers, drag queens and physically endangers those just beginning transition in the work place?

Could it be that they know the world of Cisgender (Woman born into the body congruent with their gender identity) are revolted by your patronizing the misogynists with the patriarchal concept of a "Mancession" when in truth we are paid less, promoted less and employed less?

Could it be they know Work It is just so wrong on so many levels?

Well, I'm here to confirm Paul Lee and Jamie Madison's suspicions. Just yesterday a Twitter account craftily created to appear as if it was the official "Work It" account tried to bait me into an angry response with this tweet:



But being a seasoned human rights advocate I didn't take the bait. I wasn't even aware that the origin of that tweet was not the verified ABC Work IT account (@ABC_WorkIt) until a friend alerted me.

So here's the proof Lee and Madison. And it's just the beginning of the added hate transgender people will be forced to endure by "Work IT". Lee You should be ashamed and Jamie Madison, this is the best part of your very nice anatomy and what Lee brought in to promote "Work It".

Lee brougt your cheap ass in to sell this obnoxious transtoxic piece of crap. Looks like he got a spokes model with the right body parts that speak to Work It..

You say you are a shameless woman Jamie Madison? So I am I. But I am shameless because I am a human rights advocate. Get some class will you? Stop promoting shamelessly the degradation of your own gender. And Madison? Work That.

12/8/11

In the days of Bosom Buddies I was called a Hippyfreak Commie, Faggot

I grew up during the 60' and 70's during and just after Vietnam. As a youth I was able to wear my hair long and wear women's clothing because I looked like the war protesters. People just assumed I was a hippy. And since my political views were in line with that, it was a fit. I was also able to be bi sexual because just as it is today, sexual orientation is not a attribute openly discernible unless one is comfortable putting it on display.

But those who were closest to me, those who delighted in my discomfort, some of my family members who knew better and foes alike used to call me hippy commie freak, fag. Yes faggot. because in those days that's what society viewed all gender variant people as. A fag, a poof. Of no worth.


Sorry for the Audio Lag.

And I was happy with that because as harmful as the word faggot is it meant they recognized my gender was somehow different from how they were. So I remained quietly acquiescent to the defamation. Because then the very ides of living and especially working authentically was absurd. So outrageously absurd a network capitalized on gender diversity by making a comedy series about it, Bosom Buddies.

The outrageous situational "comedy" of Bosom Buddies was indisputably accepted as representative of what would happen if anyone dared to present in a gender not congruent with the one on there birth certificate.

Back then transgender people were isolated by shear numbers being less than 1% of the population and with no Internet to connect. No social media to present our agenda. But times have changed thanks to society's awakening to diversity.

However there is one man of consequence who is still living in the days of Bosom Buddy . One man who unrepentantly laughs at our suffering. A man would be perfectly happy seeing those Bosom Buddies days return.

That man is Paul Lee, president of ABC.

In fact, without anything to suggest otherwise, Paul Lee hopes for a return to those days when in hopelessness we turned to alcohol and drugs for escape. Back to the days when our lives became so unlivable we had no option to go out clumsily dressed as the woman who we KNEW we were only to face ridicule, ostracisation, violence and even death.

Back to the days when finding work as our true selves was simply absurd but as demanded by our souls, our only choice.

Not any more MR Paul Lee. We are no longer silent victims. And as the Huffington Post article stated you will probably continue ignore our outcry. In fact, you are probably basking in the attention your pitiful mockery of gender diverse is receiving. But in the long run you will be remembered as a bully and bigot you truly are.

Please sign the Petition ABC Do Not Air Work It