The Cliterati

Health Reform as a Queer Issue - Word!

2009-10-22T10:24:00.008-05:00

Check out this awesome post at the similarly awesome blog RH Reality Check! Blogger Katherine Franke gives the quick & dirty version of why a health care system that ties insurance to employment and marriage status isn't so queer-friendly.

This just makes me think about how important genuine systemic change is if we really want healthier people (and not just more people with health insurance, although that would be great too!). Studies show that simply having universal access to care alone does NOT fix the disparities in health that people of color, those of "low socioeconomic status," and others experience. As you can imagine, there is a sad lack of data about these disparities for various segments of the LGBTQ community, but I've got a hunch the same is true for us. You know how they say that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of the cure? Access to healthcare is like the cure. It's great, and when you're sick, of course you want it - but maybe what we really need is prevention, to change the messed up, homophobic, sexist, racist world that's making us sick to begin with. And while I still have a lot of love for Obama, it seems to me right now that the health care debate has been stuck in the same rut for months and we'll be lucky if we even get an ounce of the cure out of it.

(And btw, RH Reality Check is a fabulous source of information & analysis related to reproductive health that is refreshingly not too heterocentric. Highly recommended!)

Ho Your Garden: Tending the Sexual Soul

2009-10-01T10:43:00.005-05:00

Feeling metaphysical at the change of the seasons, I could not help but ask my sister-girl-sister friends over a bottle of red wine: What is a soul anyway? And what does it have to do with sex?

An excellent conversation, especially when the lady-friends work for sexual justice. The abortion rights activist descends from a long line of progressive Protestant ministers, and the public health scientist comes from a family of conservative Italian Catholics. For the record, my family is Sicilian Catholic. My mother, however, when asked why she did not raise me in the church, said, “Because I had a daughter. And I loved her.” Plus, for a place founded on a birth by a single teenage mother, it felt ironically hostile to her at the time.

By the end of the bottle, we concluded, more or less, the soul is the essential part of ourselves that is somehow internal, ethereal and transcendent. Sexuality, being an essential part of every person—a normal and natural part of being human— is part of each soul. Sexual acts or expression can be infused with our souls. Maria adds that asexuality must be included in the spectrum of sexuality, what we express and enact and what or who attracts us.

I had found a book of writers interviewing writers, The World Within, and it offered us this passage:

Rikki Ducornet: I think the sexual soul has to do with sexuality informing one’s entire being. I always think of sexuality as the heart of who one is. I think the sexual soul means one delights in the natural world and isn’t frightened of other bodies or new experiences. A sexual soul is intrigued by other cultures, delighted by new music, by the sensuous experiences of language.

Naming this sexual soul or soulful aspect to sexuality bridges a soul/body disconnect perpetrated by our Western* philosophy and religion, the traditional deliberators of the soul. Many people of faith and those in the HIV and AIDS community have rejected this artificial dichotomy, arguing that it damages individuals and our communities.

To wit, we’ve been double-f***ed: from Judeo-Christian narratives of earthly suffering as a pathway to heaven to Descartes, “I think therefore I am.” If you include our Puritan heritage, we have a ménage e trios of repression. On this foundation, informed by (dare I say) patriarchy, our modern cultural and institutional practices regenerate this disassociation. And we live it out.

Rev. Krishna Stone has been working for over a decade in New York City to facilitate change within faith communities to support sexual wellbeing and to support individuals in reunifying their whole selves. I went to talk with her too.

“What I do in my work is to reconnect sexuality with spirituality,” she said. She facilitates personal and cultural shifts from an idea of sexuality that is connected with disease and damage to one rooted in our personality, our essential self, our soul. The soul being this thing about us that just is; “no religion needed,” she notes.

“It’s all dislocated. Like an eyeball over here, and a vagina way over here,” and she enacts the fragmentation many of us feel, waving about her golden hands.

She gives a workshop for HIV-positive women called Spirituality: What the Hell is It? In one exercise, the group makes two lists of words, those they associate with “spirituality” and with “sexuality.” Time and again, the words for “spirituality” are Christian-centric and abstract, and the list for “sexuality” is full of painful and intensely personal words like damage, rape, and nasty. Pleasure is rarely mentioned, relegated to the realm of luxury. Hardly surprising since sex for many women is not a free choice but a transaction, security or duty. Pleasure almost always secondary.

In contrast, there is an idea of the soul as our basic goodness, the piece of God or Everything that is in us and in every living thing, creating mutuality and connection. To have sex that honors the divine in each feels like love to me. What if we (and our partners) were able to be fully present, connected to our own bodies and souls, for our partner’s ecstasy, the moment of orgasm imagined as a place beyond words in full harmony with the perfect resonance of Everything. Where you can hear the heartbeat of you, her and the universe.

In our brutal society, moments of feeling connectedness to everything can be precious and fleeting. To move soulfully through the day, to be fully present, takes tremendous courage. It makes you vulnerable. There’s a lot of static.

Krishna and I talked about inexplicably soulful sexual moments or soulful moments erotically charged. “It’s like falling in love immediately,” she snaps her fingers. An honor. When her whole body, mind and soul says, undeniably, “Yes!”

After heartbreak, barriers surround your soul at full depth and strength, feeling all the windows of your soul blow open in a moment of sexual connection, I add.

To experience yourself as having a sexual soul, perhaps, is to have done the work to be able to feel these moments, recognize them. Krishna said, “You have to believe in this kind of magic for it to work.”

So much of what we believe twists us away from our sexuality, our bodies. Many of us have experiences that break the sexual soul: sexual abuse; sexual shaming; misinformation; silence, silence and more silence.

It is easier to heal when a community supports you. Some ministers believe if faith communities had accepted and supported gay men, particularly gay men of color, we would not see the AIDS epidemic as it is today. Despite the work of such leaders, there remains much to be done to engender theologies that resonate with the bodily experiences of those of us most vulnerable to HIV infection, sexual assault and other injustices.

Although we have inherited this tradition of a soul/body divide, text and tradition can be reclaimed as tools of justice for our bodies and souls, united. At the corner coffee shop in my Brooklyn neighborhood, a local minister explained to me that the roots of the word “salvation” mean to heal the body, like a salve.

Krishna thinks part of this healing is acknowledging sexual pleasure as a sacred right. She said, “In my church, every service, we’d ask for a show of hands of everyone who orgasmed last night. Raise your hands! Hallelujah! Amen!”

All of these conversations drew me back to the following passage from Alice Walker’s The Color Purple, where I first remember hearing the call for healing the disassociation of sexuality from our souls and God-talk:

Here’s the thing, said Shug, the thing I believe. God is inside you and inside everybody else. … She say, My first step from the [idea of God as an] old white man was trees. Then air. Then birds. Then other people. But one day when I was sitting quiet and feeling like a motherless child, which I was, it come to me: that feeling of being part of everything, not separate at all. I knew that if I cut a tree my arm would bleed. And I laughed and I cried and I ran all around the house. I knew just what it was. In fact, when it happens, you can’t miss it. It sort of like you know what, she say, grinning and rubbing high up on my thigh.

Shug! I say.

Oh, she say. God love all them feelings. That’s some of the best stuff God did. And when you know God loves ‘em you enjoys ‘em a lot more. You can just relax, go with everything that’s going, and praise God by liking what you like. … God made it. Listen, God love everything you love—and a mess of stuff you don’t.

God loves a mess of stuff you don’t love or understand. She loves our wildly variant bodies, tangles of addictions and fears, and struggles to thrive. Perhaps if voices like these from the faith community seized the values political platform, we would see federal funding for needle exchange, dissolution of the racist imprisonment system, and health care for all.

In my own faith tradition of offering yet more reading, here’s some good ones to illuminate and heal the sexual soul:

Sensuous Spirituality: Out from Fundamentalism by Virginia Ramey Mollenkot
The Survivor’s Guide to Sex by Staci Haines
Wanderlust by Rebecca Solnit (seems off point, but it’s not, swear.)

* I focus on Western traditions here because that is where my roots live, though this piece weaves in some Buddhist thought. When I manage to get a hold of my friends the experts, I will let you know where Muslims and other traditions fall in this mess. Not far, I am afraid. I believe when asked something similar, Waheedah responded, about Muslims, "Oh, you know, we just wanna kneel on the mat..."

Coming Out About My Friend Craig

2009-09-24T09:40:00.000-05:00

When asked about how my girlfriend and I met, we can never seem to get our story straight. “At a concert” and “through a friend” are some of the common explanations that we use to avoid the horrified reaction we anticipate from people when we reveal the truth: we met online… more specifically, on Craigslist.

Having lived in 4 cities and 9 apartments over the past 3 years, I’ve found numerous rooms, appliances, and home furnishings on the site. However, until about 6 months ago, using Craigslist as a venue for meeting people seemed utterly terrifying. Not only was I afraid of what was lurking in the ‘bargain basement’ of online dating, but in the wake of news coverage about the Craigslist killer I also had reason to fear for my own safety.

What changed? I had just moved from Canada to San Francisco for an internship that left me surrounded by women in their 50s and I was desperate to break into the lesbian party scene with ladies in my age bracket. Not wanting to face the bars alone, in spite of my fears, I turned to my old friend Craig for help.

I started by posting a few “strictly platonic ads”; I carefully filtered responses to weed out potential creeps, did a little Facebook stalking to confirm people’s identities, and secured a busy social life in a matter of weeks. By the time I was ready to date in my new city, I had gained enough confidence in Craig to let him be my matchmaker. I trolled through the W4W section and posted some ads of my own (my personal favorite entitled “I love cupcakes and making out”). One ad was catchy enough to generate close to 30 responses over night, including: 1 from an unknowing friend, 2 that were interesting/normal enough for a first date, and 1 that resulted in a few dates and remains a friend today.

Since recently coming out to some trusted friends about my own Craigslist relationship, I have discovered 3 other couples who have kept their Craigslist roots on the down low. Despite the internet changing the nature of dating and relationships, social norms have yet to embrace online dating and Craigslist, in particular, remains a major taboo. Sure, the vast majority of responses you get on Craigslist will not be worth your while, but, then again, that’s not far off from real life encounters. And just like real life, you might even find love where you’re not looking: oddly enough, despite my extensive W4W search, I ended up meeting my girlfriend through an ad for a concert ticket.

Before you pass judgment on Craig, keep this in mind: You never know what you’re going to find in the ‘bargain basement’, but if you’re lucky you might just find that Prada bag that you were looking for, even if it’s hanging in the wrong department.

The Eastern Corridor Bus Service and the Great American Media Perversion

2009-09-23T14:20:00.001-05:00

I thought I had been to the pinnacle of bus-trapped insanity last summer, when I sat pinioned between adolescent girls popping jewel like jelly candies and chattering on cell phones about big city shopping shopping shopping, half drowning out the Chinese dubbed Tom & Jerry cartoons with Japanese subtitles but not the little butterball boy pin-balling up and down the aisle, burning off the giant soda and fries mama fed him at the rest stop. Oh yes, and oh—only to be topped by my most recent trip, coming home to Brooklyn breezes after an ill-timed vacation into the sweltering swamp that is our nation’s capitol in August.

I bought a ticket with a new company for some hope of not watching a movie, because the passengers vote whether or not to have one. I enjoy bus trips, even long ones, especially long ones, except for two things: the bad manners of fellow riders and forced media. I typically bring earplugs, but sometimes I forget and sometimes they’re inadequate. I’ve yet to acquire any nifty music playing/earphone device. So, I am compelled to at least listen which leads to watching whatever Hollywood swill they foist upon me.

As we’re departing, the bus is only three quarters full. There is a salt and pepper haired, tattooed dyke a row ahead of me, who delves immediately into her book. A Caribbean family with several small children make their way to the back. The white guy across the aisle helps me figure out how to work the seats and offers me a Ritz cracker before wrapping himself in wires and hunkering down behind his laptop.

Overall, the passengers vote to watch a movie. “Tyranny of the majority,” I mutter.

I cannot remember the options now, but the group also voted for A Bronx Tale. “Good choice,” the bus driver approves. “It’s good for kids,” he adds. “There’s some swearing. And some violence. But no sex.”
And pops in the cd.

Some swearing, apparently, means the F-word as punctuation. And the N-word as an integral part of dialogue. This is a Robert De Niro film, and the violence is graphic. Mafia-style shootings. Threats and bullying. Racist brutality.

Excellent, edifying movies for children, no?

This is the great American perversion. Creation and tolerance of visceral violent imagery alongside puritanical veiling of sexuality.

Oh my God! Breasts! Cover the children’s eyes!

What would have been the same audience’s reaction had the driver shown, say, Boys on the Side or Philadelphia? I’ll admit it would probably be very uncomfortable to watch Shortbus or Fire with my busmates. Given the types of special gentlemen who often seat themselves beside me, it would be awkward at best.

What about Bend It Like Beckham? Wasn’t that rated G? I’d be fine to be trapped with a G movie to accommodate the most sensitive audience members. Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, Akeelah and the Bee—bring them on.

Really, though, can’t we all just read a book or something? Here are some good ones for your last long rides at the end of vacation season:

Ultimate Lesbian Erotica 2009 by Nicole Foster
Baby Remember My Name: An Anthology of New Queer Girl Writing‎ by Michelle Tea
The Fan-Maker’s Inquisition by Rikki Ducornet
The Art of Simple Food by Alice Waters (not about sex, but in my opinion, very sexy and what I was reading or trying to read on this trip!)

Just in time for back to school

2009-08-31T12:00:00.001-05:00

Sharpen your pencils. Press your pleated skirt.
And PROTECT YOURSELF!

Unlike many urban located colleges and universities, my campus was its own area with it's own zip code. The campus itself, while beautiful during all types of days, proved to be a nightmare for young women upon sundown, laced with high pillars, dark corners and an underground for traveling in inclemited weather, as centeral New York is know to have.

Many of us would arrange our classes according to the seasons, knowing that it was not safe for us to sign up for a 3 hour evening class in the fall when it will be cold and dark by 7pm. The industrial underground tunnels, which were rumored to house the untold stories of many young women who chose to utilize them on those below zero kind of nights, were not an option, unless you were very brave, very stupid, or male.

I am sure that my experience is not unique. Regardless of location, college campuses are not the safest place for young women. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, young women (ages 16-24) are the most at risk of being raped. While we do know that the majority of sex crimes are perpetrated by known offenders, I am all for women learning ways to protect ourselves, against anyone who tries to violate, harm, or disrespect.

So, here is some Self-Defense Basics posted by Cherry Grrl.

#1: You gotta believe!
No matter what and under the most severe circumstances, we must always believe we will survive. It’s got to be our most steadfast thought, even in the midst of a horrible situation. Thinking strong, positive thoughts and being committed to saving ourselves is one of the best ways to ensure self-preservation, even in a worst-case scenario. In many self-defense courses, you will take the time to discuss what in your life is worth fighting for. Why do you need to live? Why do you need to fight? For some it’s the people they love, for others it’s a principle or goal they are committed to. Regardless of the reason, we all need to make a commitment to our own survival.

#2: Act quickly.
The way men attack women is extremely predatory – pouncing when we least expect it. Sometimes they attack us in our homes, even while we’re sleeping. Others wait until they have trusting friendships or relationships with us and then make their move. The first few moments of any violent confrontation tend to set the tone for how the situation will go down. If your immediate reaction is one of intolerance, boundary settings and physical resistance, you will spend less time thinking and more time reacting. Learning self-defense has been proven to shorten the freeze response, making it possible to act as soon as possible.

#3: Embrace your fear.
It sounds odd, but many people fear their own fear. They become frightened of the intoxicating feeling that encompasses their entire body with a sense of urgency and action. Remember that adrenaline is power and allowing yourself to experience fear does not equate to being helpless. Adrenaline helps you feel no pain and become capable of strength you never knew possible. Harness your fear and it will make you stronger.

#4: Avoid the second crime scene.
Ever thought how you might handle a situation in which a van pulls up next to you and a person in it demands you come inside? If you resist or run, there’s the risk of being attacked, shot or killed. Comply, and you may have to endure the realities that many police officers refer to as the “second crime scene.” Nearly all safety experts agree that you should run or fight to escape. If anyone ever pulls up next to you on the street or tries to force or manipulate you into going somewhere unfamiliar, it’s time to resist or run like the dickens. In most cases, it’s bound to become more violent and chances of escape decrease as the area becomes more secluded.

#5: Fight in threes.
By fighting using various series of three moves, you will be more likely to escape a confrontation because you’ll do triple the damage you would have accomplished with just one strike. We can never be too confident that one jab to the eyes or strike to the face is going to end the fight, so we must always follow up.

#6: Breathe.
Ironically, it’s one of the hardest things to do during a fight but also the most important. Sometimes a response to fear is the sucking in of breath and holding it in. For example, have you ever been in a near-miss car accident? Right after you realize that you’re not actually going to hit someone, all of a sudden you let out an enormous sigh of relief. Though you didn’t realize it, you had taken in that deep breath and didn’t let go. Hold the breath long enough and you will surely pass out. Unfortunately, I don’t teach unconscious self-defense, so you’ll just need to obey the breathing rule. A great way to do this is by yelling “no” with every strike to keep air flowing.
#7: Escape.
Your responsibility in a self-defense scenario is to defend yourself until the bad guy is no longer a threat. In many self-defense schools, they refer to this theory as “Stun and Run.” Sticking around and fighting to the point where you can make sure he’s down could lead to “overkill” and consequently legal problems. If someone attacks you, the safest thing to do is execute techniques necessary to open up an opportunity to get the hell away from this person, and escape to a safe place.

I'd also like to add a few of my own:

#8: Be aggressive, B-E aggressive.
By this I mean, walk with confidence. Head up, shoulders broad, standing tall and taking up space. It then becomes your space. It is yours to defend.

#9: Be Loud.
Your voice is often your best weapon and line of defense. Use it to intimidate, defend and alert others.

#10: Be Safe.
Follow your gut. If you don't think a certain situation is safe, try to avoid it. When you can't, be prepared.

Now go get your education ladies! It's time to take over the world! = )

Back to School with Gardasil

2009-08-26T18:10:00.010-05:00

It’s that time of year: millions of adolescents are going back to school, and news coverage regarding “whether your daughter should get the HPV vaccine” is on the rise.

Unfounded concerns about the vaccine “making girls more promiscuous” aside, the majority of press coverage I have seen on Gardasil and the prospect of the mass vaccination of adolescent girls has been overwhelmingly positive. That was until last week, when the media picked up 2 studies published in the Journal of the American Medical Association highlighting the vaccine’s safety risks and the questionable promotional strategies used to convince women and girls to get vaccinated.

No one knows if Gardasil prevents cancer, or for how long, or even whether it is safe. Research has shown that the vaccine can prevent precancerous lesions, but the testing period has been far too short to prove that it will actually prevent cervical cancer. As the disease typically affects women in their 40s, it will be decades before Gardasil’s effectiveness will be known. Moreover, given that the vaccine promises to protect against only 70% of cervical cancers, it will never eliminate the need for regular testing and Pap screening.

Now, I am pro HPV and cervical cancer prevention and am not, by any means, anti-vaccination or even anti-Gardasil. However, I do have serious issues with the way that I have seen Gardasil promoted in both Canada and the United States. Mainstream news has framed Gardasil as a “magic bullet” for HPV and cervical cancer prevention, favoring mass-vaccination programs and underplaying non-vaccine related alternatives to for prevention. Most notably, the arguments have failed to appreciate the historical success associated with pap screening for cervical cancer which, if ignored, could potentially cause a decline in screening rates in the future.

Perhaps Gardasil will prove to be influential for reducing the prevalence of certain strains of HPV and cervical cancer, but in the presence of safety and efficacy concerns we have to ask ourselves: What if it doesn’t? What if years down the line, after we have vaccinated an entire generation of teenage girls, we find out that the side effects associated with Gardasil outweigh the benefits? Let’s face it, the uncertainty associated with the vaccine and its mass administration to young girls is a large-scale public health experiment.

I have received negative reactions to my views on Gardasil in the past, accused of not being concerned about cervical cancer and not caring about women’s health. Unfortunately, the devastating side effects associated with women’s medical “breakthroughs” remain fresh in my mind and have left me anxious about embracing Gardasil on a large scale. Remember the devastation caused by silicone breast implants, Thalidomide, and hormone replacement therapy? In the wake of such medical disasters I am not saying don’t get vaccinated. What I am advocating for is being aware of vaccine’s potential benefits and risks and making an informed and individual choice whether or not to get yourself or your daughter vaccinated. And, of course, don't skimp on regular pap smears.

Beginning from the Rear or Ass Demon

2009-08-15T10:24:00.014-05:00

After a fraught week, my beautiful friend Maria and I decided to spend a Friday afternoon licking our wounds in the marble womb of the Metropolitan Museum of Art off Central Park. The steps were thronged with tourists. I scooped Maria out of the crowd and arm-n-arm we ascended into the venerable halls of esteemed artists. The cherry on our culture sundae: Michelangelo’s first painting.

The priceless piece, a diminutive copy of a German print titled “St. Anthony Tormented by Demons,” has undergone painstaking, expensive renovations. We slid through the cluster of serious faced admirers, huddling around the painting in a small gallery. The haloed Saint is encircled by demons, brilliantly fish scaled and monsterous; the first kinda looks like it is humping his leg, and the last…

I slid out of the crowd towards the back of the room. Reunited with Maria and whispered aside, “Did you look at that last demon?”

“Oh yah- I looked at that demon three times and thought, ‘oh! he so went there!’”

At which point, we had to leave the room, collapsing in hysterical laughter against each other. Because that last demon can only be described as the Ass Demon, with a winking, gaping pink butthole worthy of all the gay porn in LA.

Perhaps he was just faithfully copying the original print, but I prefer to think he understood the taboo confronting his audience. It’s profoundly satisfying, imagining an adolescent Michelangelo meticulously painting each wrinkle around the anus, cracking himself up with the audacity of it. This is the spirit of the same genius artist who would later defy Church law by secretly dissecting cadavers to learn muscle structure to paint the truth of the human body.

And part of the truth of the human body is a zillion pleasurable nerve endings in all our pink parts, including our assholes. The great equalizer, I believe Tristan Taormino once called it.

Yet the taboo remains, tangled up with fear of gayness for many man and out of bounds, seemingly irrelevant, for many women. Of course, the whole shebang is associated with poop, so it can be literally dirty, which is high on the ookie scale for many folks. The good news, my friends, is that this is nothing a shower cannot remedy, and for the fastidious, enemas.

When the behind has been ignored as a potential erogenous zone, the pleasure from touching, rimming and penetration can take us by surprise. Ladies- spread the good word - it’s not just about the prostrate! Anal play also tends to require a slow hand (or tongue or toy) and a level of relaxing and presence that can be intense in bed.

While there is a lot to be said for normalizing (liberating!) anal sex for the masses, the transgressiveness of the act can be a turn on. Exploring new or disputed territory with a partner makes us vulnerable together, and the trust, gentleness and desire we can show each other through this process…also a big turn on!

So – look to the old masters for inspiration. Begin by looking the ass demon in the eye with Michelangelo then check out some of these excellent resources:

Luscious, stories of anal eroticism Edited by Alison Tyler Forward by Tristan Taormino
Anal Pleasure & Health: A Guide for Men and Women by Jack Morin
Bend Over Boyfriend video by Carol Queen

And add your own to the list, por favor!

PS...the secret is lube lube and more lube.

A Bill that I Can Stand Behind...

2009-08-14T14:05:00.001-05:00

and, no. I don't mean Clinton.

Just a few months back, March 26th to be exact, two female House Representatives, introduced the Breast Cancer Education and Awareness Requires Learning Young, EARLY, Act of 2009. In a bra cup, it's object of this Act is "to increase awareness of the risks of breast cancer in young women, and to provide support for those diagnosed with breast cancer."

Women fighting for the lives, education, health and empowerment of other women. Of course there was much controversy over it! Let the 'experts,' protests, and breast health myths begin.

One such 'expert' was quoted as stating,

"I leave politics to the politicians, why can't they leave science to the scientists? Except for family history, there are no important risks ... for women younger than 40."

What?!?!?!

:::Rubs eyes:::

Did I just read that? There are no important risks for younger women other than family history?!?! Have we learned nothing in all these years of breast cancer research? Are we really still at the place in thinking that our behaviors place no impact on our long term health. Scary!

Look. Speaking as someone with a family history, one that was a young diagnosis as well, I also have taken the time to educate myself and acknowledge the fact that it is not family history alone that dictates a woman's risk for breast cancer. Alcohol consumption, diet, tobacco use, and exercise are just some of the other known behavioral factors, not to mention environmental factors. No, these aren't fun to think about...in fact, they are all huge bummers. How fun would it be to not give two thoughts about what we eat, drink, smoke, and breathe? But the fact of the matter is, we have to. Well, we don't HAVE to...but I do, because I wanna stick around to be queer and fabulous for as long as possible! So, please don't let these uninformed, woman-hating 'leaders' fool you. And more importantly, don't let them dictate your health care policy!

Thanks for letting me rant. =)

What Kind of Leadership Do We Need?

2009-08-13T10:00:00.001-05:00

OK - as a Gen X-er I have absolutely no vested interest in an intergenerational dialogue: I'm too skeptical, independent and don't have the critical mass for it matter anyway (both the Baby Boomer generation and the Gen Y generation are each double the size of the Gen X generation).

But a sunday plenary on leadership at the National LGBTI Health Summit - and where our movement needs to go on leadership - this MIGHT be interesting. Yeah, I'm facilitating it and I'm skeptical. I'm a great salesperson, right? But I'm throwing myself into it in an effort to make it something I'd want to go to. I don't know if it will be that. But I'll be working in that direction. And I'd love yall's input on it.

I think very often grassroots movements don't think intentionally about leadership - what style we are using, who we are inviting to the table, how we are structuring decision-making/vision-setting, all that kind of stuff. And how we can get leadership to be across communities (and generations) and organizations. In Chicago, we are can be petty. We fight for our piece of the pie, get lost in 30 year old feuds, and turn out crispy and bitter before we even started (or worse, with cancer).

So, while I'm not idealistic enough to think that we can change this shit overnight, thinking about how times when we've seen successful leadership and leadership stuff we don't like, are places we can start.

And I think one of the steps in this direction is making this concrete: we can all be doing this stuff, regardless of the role we have.

I'd love yall's thoughts on this: what are good leadership actions you've seen? What are missed opportunities for good leadership actions you've seen?

I'll start: Good leadership I've seen modeled for me are friends I've not known so well reaching out to me to meet for coffee or cocktails and talk about our work - and having great conversations and friendships come out of it.
A missed opportunity is me not reaching out soon enough to my panelists for a conference call. The conversation could be richer - and more collaborative. (I'm really hoping its incendiary at the very least.)

Other folks?

Toddlers and Tiaras—Scary or Just Plain American Fun?

2009-08-10T17:39:00.003-05:00

I happened to catch an episode (or two) this weekend, and was struck by how, on one hand, I thought it was great that mothers were involved in their children’s lives (even if yes, it was to an unnerving degree…perhaps too much is better than neglect? Tough call). I could also get into the idea of teaching kids how to create a goal, see it through, and be the best they can be- win or lose. In theory, I think these are great lessons for kids to learn at any age. And there didn’t seem to be any of these little kids (both girls and boys) were unhappy, and being forced to participate, so again, no outright child abuse from what I could see (and my sense would be that TLC would hope for the drama of an angsty resistant kid).

But, and of course there is a but-- I found it really difficult to watch these episodes (I say this, though I made it almost through two whole episodes), because I struggled with the overt sexuality that these mothers were injecting into their “toddlers” were orchestrating into their performances. Do I need to see a three year old yank off her skirt to reveal her little bathing suit, and then twirl it around like a burlesque performer? And what’s with the copious amounts of hair and make-up? Does a toddler need to do anything more than toddle to be considered beautiful? It seems unnerving that a little girl or boy should spend their free time working on how to be sexier so as to appeal to a bunch of adults. And what, exactly, are those adults looking for?

So, what are we really teaching our kids? Are we teaching them to go for gold when they are passionate about something? Or are we continuing to perpetuate the stereotype that a person is only valuable based on their looks and sexuality (which, of course, are of the hetero-norm type)?

And in my defense, I was only trying to LEARN something from The Learning Channel.

Assumptions, Assumptions

2009-08-10T10:41:00.005-05:00

Ok folks, I know many of us have been here before, so I thought I’d create a space to rant and rave about it. Here’s the situation:

I was at the doctor last week for my yearly physical exam. Which, I have to say was going pretty well, until we got to talking about sexual health. That’s when two things went terribly wrong. Number one was when my doctor said “well, you don’t have to worry about this because you are monogamous” (false, false assumption!). And after I corrected her mistake, she said, “But, the sex you engage in is low risk so it doesn’t matter anyway.”

WTF people! She made two huge assumptions here without EVER asking me a question about my relationship status, sexual history, sexual behavior, or sexual orientation. Actually, she made three assumptions:
1. That I’m in a monogamous relationship (guess I look like the “wholesome” type??)
2. That I only sleep with other female bodied people and
3. That I only engage in sex that is at “low risk” for STI transmission.

And then of course, she made a decision on what types of screenings I should have based entirely on these assumptions. Way to go, Doc!

Sad thing is, it didn’t surprise me all that much. Because this isn’t the first time this has happened. Providers have been making assumptions about my sexual behavior and practices (or lack thereof) since my first GYN visit when I was 18. But still, it’s really disheartening every single time it happens.

So, friends, I want to know your stories. When this happens to you, how do you deal with it? Do you just let it go or say something to correct their mistakes? I know my reaction tends to vary – from just sort of giving up and letting it slide to confronting them right on the spot. In this instance, I was brave and spoke up – explained to her that her assumptions were not all correct and made it clear I wanted to have a more honest conversation about my sexual health.

I’d love to hear any stories involving “re-educating” your health care provider. So, what do you say?

Happy Trails?

2009-07-27T10:00:00.000-05:00

Dear Cliteratians, I am preparing to depart for a month-long road trip. I've studied the maps, swallowed my guilt about the carbon emissions, and even packed the car (characteristically haphazardly).

So, I'm curious - what are your tips for safe travel? Yeah, yeah, I won't walk alone down a dark alley peopled by vampires and other shady spirits in the middle of the night...that's not what I meant. I mean, what do you do to keep yourself feeling safe, comfortable, and happy? Even at it's best, travel can be stressful and usually necessitates changes to how we eat and to exercise routines if you have one. So how do you keep an even keel, feel your best and get the most out of it? Is there a particular part of your routine you like to stick with? A gadget you just can't live without? Are there places you tend to avoid, or places you "tone down" a bit? (I can remember more than once regretting some pretty, shall we say, unabashed bumper stickers on camping trips to rural areas.) How do you find the queer communities in places you visit? Let us know in the comments!

Lu’s: A Pharmacy for [Some] Women

2009-07-24T10:32:00.000-05:00

July 7th marked a milestone for women’s health: the Vancouver Women’s Health Collective opened North America’s first women’s-only pharmacy in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. It couldn’t be situated in a more needed area: well known to be the ‘poorest postal code’ in Canada, the neighborhood is notorious for it’s high incidence of drug use, sex trade, and crime. Amidst the slew of local pharmacies primarily dispensing methadone to heroine addicts, Lu’s Pharmacy aims to provide an inviting and safe environment for women-centered care.

As a resident of Vancouver, feminist, health promoter, and avid supporter of women-centered-services, I was thrilled to hear that this novel and much needed resource had opened in my own backyard. That was until I read the fine print of the Collective’s website and the way in which it selectively defines women: "We feel that it is essential that a woman be born a woman and have the physiology of a woman and the psychological experiences of living as a girl and a woman in order to embrace the work of the Vancouver Women’s Health Collective." In short, Lu’s will not be offering it’s services to trans women, some of the most vulnerable women in the city who are the most in need of health care and many of whom are both anatomically and legally recognized as women.

Trans women have already been rejected from having their prescriptions filled at Lu’s and local news sources have noted that while trans women will continue to be turned away, trans men will be welcome. Even as a woman-born-woman, I can easily see the flawed logic in this. Not only are trans women being discriminated against, but trans men are being treated as women based on biological determinism. This ‘logic’ governing Lu’s policies overlooks the complexities of gender, the realities of everyday life, and the fact that trans women also experience patriarchal oppression from birth.

In defense of their “born women“ policy, VWHC told Canada’s Queer news source, Xtra.ca, that “It just seemed to make sense that this was our expertise, this is what we did well and knew how to do.” I call shenanigans. Ignorance is no excuse for discrimination. Pharmacist’s at Lu’s would need no more training that any other pharmacist in the country in order to fill out prescriptions. What they do require is the sensitivity and competence to provide inclusive and trans-positive care. Perhaps instead of creating excuses for why they are unfit to serve trans women they should bring their services up to par with the needs of the community by investing in some gender sensitivity training or actively recruit trans women to join their staff.

Makeup artist Raigen D’Angelo (left) and activist Jamie Lee Hamilton hold up a prescription that was refused by the staff of Lu’s: A Pharmacy for Women.

You down with PPO?

2009-07-22T11:00:00.000-05:00

Why this video is being passed amongst healthcare settings is not lost on any of us.

It's funny, quick-witted, and is using good old-fashioned humor to make it abundantly clear how bad things have gotten. Between the recession, state-wide funding cuts, and people struggling to stay housed, health becomes less and less of a priority. And while this video, while working within and simulatneously mocking the hetero music world paradigms, is also making an excellent point-- What would you do for health insurance?

Coming out for Marijuana

2009-07-20T19:24:00.006-05:00

“Many people can smoke marijuana every day without ill effects, advocates say, just as many casually drink wine in the evening.” New York Times, July 19, 2009

When was the last time you talked about pot the way you talk about alcohol? With friends and family? Your doctor? Openly and honestly. The closet has a strange effect on information and as queer people we know this extremely well. We know that stigma around certain practices has the ability to cut us off from life saving information and support.

I had been working at a grassroots lesbian cancer organization for less than a week when I got a phone call from a cancer patient looking for marijuana. Full disclosure here, I thought my job would be mostly fundraising and public policy but as someone who has enjoyed marijuana for over 20 years I was thrilled at the idea of two of my worlds coming together.

I had known of the medical benefits of marijuana first hand with HIV positive friends who used it as an appetite stimulant. But truthfully, most of my friends with HIV were already recreational pot smokers, so they already knew of its benefits. Such has been the case with friends battling cancer. Many were already pot smokers so using it to battle the effects of chemo was a no brainer (and in some cases, a good excuse). This caller wasn't a pot smoker.

She felt she couldn't talk to her doctor about it and was more willing to make an anonymous phone call to us versus ask any of her friends or doctors for help. I introduced her to another lesbian with chronic illness who helped folks procure marijuana, recommended she use a vaporizer and no, didn't add this to my funder report.

But this isn't a blog about medical marijuana, racism and drug laws, or if marijuana is addictive. Three seriously important issues I could easily wax on about (especially when high). It's hard to talk about any of those because of the stigma attached to discussing our own marijuana use.

How many of us have worked up the courage to talk to our doctors about our sexuality and gender identity but not that we smoke pot? Sure, I fear the ramifications from it being included in my medical records but I used to feel that way about my sexuality too.

Links:
NYC Has the Most Marijuana Arrests in the World (But Don’t Worry, White People, It Won’t Be You)
Marijuana Policy Project
NYTimes: Marijuana Is Gateway Drug for Two Debates
If Marijuana Is Legal, Will Addiction Rise?
Vaporization
Why Do People With HIV Use Marijuana?
American Cancer Society and Marijuana

Just call me Judge!

2009-07-17T11:29:00.008-05:00

As a "wise latina woman," I'd like to share some of my thoughts about the recent nomination and badgering, I mean committee hearings, of Judge Sonya Sotomayor.

The hearings are an opportunity for Senators to ask Judge Sotomayor about many of the legal issues that come before the Supreme Court that impact women’s lives, including the right to privacy, equal protection under the law , anti-discrimination protections, health and safety regulations, and more.

As I had expected, she has handled the questioning and 'rituals' with pure intelligence and grace and transparency.

I have also recently discovered that Sotomayor and Myself are basically, the same person.
Riddle me this:
-we are both Puerto Rican (you know, there are so few of us)
-we are both from the Bronx (wait, puerto rican from the bronx? another rarity)
-we both graduated Cardinal Spellman High School
-we both spend the majority of our life raised by a single mother
-we both can have 'controversial' views
The similarities are endless!

On a more serious note, it excites me that we are looking towards a day, hopefully in the very near future, that we will have a Black male President and a Latina Supreme Court Judge. And while I readily admit that their respective races do not necessarily mean that they are/will be progressive in every aspect, particularly as it relates to race, class, sex, gender, orientation, immigration status, etc, I do agree with Sotomayor and would "hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life."

I will conclude with some much needed humor and insight from The Daily Show.
ps-i can't believe ms.faulkner is still at cardinal spellman!

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c

Judgmental

www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show
Full Episodes

Political Humor

Joke of the Day

Stress is a trigger for smoking? No shit, Sherlock.

2009-07-17T09:00:00.001-05:00

National Public Radio had a recent story on the power of smoking - and how women have a harder time quitting.

What is interesting about this is not that it identifies "acute emotion" as what can lead to smoking. "Acute Emotion" is what my social worker partner would say is a trigger. Yeah. That's kind of been done, Researcher.

What is interesting is the road the research begins to walk down - using a gender lens. While they toss it up to hormones (which do affect us in interesting ways but is a completely separate conversation), I would also offer up that dealing with a sexist world can be a trigger. And a homophobic world. And a racist world. And a transphobic world. And a world (and most definitely the US) that doesn't know how to talk about class.

Researcher says relapse starts with a single lapse — for example, smoking a cigarette during a period of not smoking, thinking that the return to smoking is temporary ("I just need one cigarette for this moment"). Researcher says people tend to have lapses when they're emotionally upset. He also says this seems to occur more frequently with women. Which is where I would say that those institutions that impact our lives comes into play (heterosexism, sexism, racism, classism, etc.).

We know smoking is bad for our health. The connection between hypertension and racism that African-Americans experience has been well documented. And sexism has been documented as it relates to Posttraumatic Stress Disorder. But we have not walked far enough down this road. We have not made the connections between how these subconscious and overt institutional narratives dovetail to affect our mental health and physical health. As well as access to care.

We have not adequately quantified how these narratives interplay and affect us - like women of color, for example. If Judge Sonia Sotomayor picked up a cigarette for a bit of self-medication, I couldn't hate on that. Really - after seeing the ignorance this judge is facing from what will be her future colleagues from the legislative branch, I was hard pressed not to pick up a cigarette myself. I'm glad she had crazy back up.

But I do think that the research world and public health world need to start looking way more critically at how these institutional narratives impact our health - including homophobia and transphobia. Especially in this prescient moment of health care reform. It won't do any good to reform it if none of us qualify (because I smoke to deal with the fucked-up world we live in) or are cared for appropriately (because my doc thinks queers don't deserve care).

Queer Pride is Celebrated in New Delhi, India.

2009-07-15T09:00:00.007-05:00

Queer Pride is Celebrated in New Delhi, India.

On June 28th, 2009. Delhi celebrated its second annual queer pride! As the traditional pride month of June comes to a close, and so many folks I know (who live in big cities in the US) seem to take this fact for granted, I thought it important to highlight the work and ideas that went into creating this community event.

Unlike gay prides in many American cities, which have become quite commercialized and mainstream, organizers in New Delhi are forging new ground, with a very strong political and social justice focus. I was checking out the organizing website and really liked what they had to say. It was a good reminder of how we shouldn’t forget that our pride celebrations came out of grassroots community organizing and how we shouldn’t forget to celebrate and embrace all the good work that is being done by queer folks (and allies) all over the world.

Here are some highlights:

“It is also important that we –
· Celebrate each and every family, workplace and friend who have accepted their queer sisters, brothers, children, colleagues and friends for who they are.

· Celebrate the support from politicians and other significant public figures, such as writers, thinkers and artists from across India, for the struggle.

· Congratulate the untiring efforts of activists, lawyers, journalists, artists and all individuals across the country, who not only live their own lives as queer people, but fight for queer people everywhere."

This is only the second year that such a large and visible display of queer pride has taken place in New Delhi. The event brought together hundreds of queer people; lesbians, gay men, bisexual, transgender and intersex people and their friends and families - to celebrate with pride, the dignity and rights of sexually marginalized people all across India and the world. For more info on the event and the organizing ideas that went into it, check out their organizing blog here: http://delhiqueerpride.blogspot.com/

Laughing At Ourselves is Good For The Soul

2009-07-14T13:19:00.010-05:00

Not necessarily known for their sense of humor, it comes as no surprise that a certain cohort of the LGBTQ community, what I call the “HRC Gays”, are up in arms about the movie Bruno. GLAAD teamed up with HRC to cause a shitstorm all over the funniest movie I’ve seen in years.
Because Bruno, a flaming, insensitive, culturally ignorant homosexual character played by actor Sacha Baron Cohen (star of Borat and before that HBO’s Da Ali G Show), interacts with real-life people, the humor is two-fold; you are at once laughing at the silliness of the character, but mostly at how people react to him. Sometimes it takes that extreme of a character to allow people to be overt about their discrimination. Dennis Lim of Slate perfectly summarizes the film’s premise, “Brüno is less a character than a button-pushing social experiment in locating the tipping point of tolerance: How much can he get away with? What does it take to unleash the inner bigot? For his merciless ambushes to work, Brüno needs to be this flamboyant—and this moronic.” The HRC Gays say that the nuanced humor in Bruno is too sophisticated for most people to get. A spokesperson for HRC said, "We strongly feel that Sacha Baron Cohen and Universal Pictures have a responsibility to remind the viewing public right there in the theater that this is intended to expose homophobia."

Like Borat, the plot and story line of Bruno is weak, so much so that it is almost forgettable, but it's no matter because it’s the gags that make Sacha Baron Cohen’s movies. Bruno packs way more punch than Borat, giving audiences more of what they came for.

In one scene, Bruno poses as a casting director for a baby photo shoot. A stage mom agrees to unbelievable things like letting her baby pose as a Nazi, getting crucified on a cross dressed like Jesus and even promises to have her baby loose 10 pounds, even if it means her infant has to have liposuction. These are the people who look like asses in the film and for once in a movie, the butt of the joke is not always the homosexual man.

One photo from the shoot depicts Bruno holding his baby in a hot tub with three naked men. Referring to it, GLAAD said “Scenes like that don't help America understand the hundreds of thousands of gay families who get up every day, do the carpool then rush home to make dinner and be with their children.” In this respect, GLAAD is right. Bruno isn’t even trying to be a movie about helping America understand that gays can assimilate in straight world. Instead, it exposes the rampant homophobia that is ugly and not at all comfortable.

At an extreme fighting match, a rowdy crowd starts throwing chairs and chanting violent threats at Bruno and another character making out in a caged ring. It’s not meant to be funny and none of my fellow audience members laughed, we all winced as one. Bruno was #1 at the box office opening weekend. Even if people came in to laugh at their stereotype of a gay man, they left seeing what gays have to deal with in this country and somehow everyone ends up on his side.

Fairness? In Ft. Worth

2009-07-10T16:05:00.001-05:00

In case you haven't heard about it yet, an incident in Ft. Worth has recently galvanized the lgbtq community there into some action - check here for the "official" news. Apparently police officers raided the Rainbow Lounge, a local gay bar, and used excessive force to arrest some of the patrons, landing one man in the hospital with a concussion and fractured skull, and two others with a broken rib and a broken thumb. LGBTQ people in Ft. Worth have responded with rallies and demonstrations, and have created an organization called Fairness Ft. Worth to monitor investigations into the incident. You can even learn more and show your support through their Facebook group!

It's easy for a young'un like me to, well, not forget, but just not think as much about the days when this used to be the norm for how police interacted with queer establishments. Thankfully, most of my frolicking about the community has been free of such harassment and violence. But this is a powerful reminder to me of a couple things: Firstly, those days are not that far behind us! And secondly, police brutality and harassment is still a very real threat to lgbtq folks and many others. It's so crucial to stand in solidarity with other groups to resist this kind of abuse.

I think it is awesome how the Ft. Worth community has organized, and unlike in those days of yore, it seems at least possible that there will be some kind of appropriate official response. But the bottom line is that people were harassed and injured. They won't get back the nights of their lives that they spent in jail or in the hospital, and no kind of redress will stop the pain and the long healing process of their broken bones. In the end, what we really need is for this kind of thing not to happen in the first place to anyone - not someone who's having a drink in a gay bar, not someone who's "driving while black," not anyone. And for that to be realized, we'll need broader changes for a police force that protects people's safety rather than threatening it.

Pop!

2009-07-06T11:00:00.004-05:00

So, this article about a Swedish couple who is keeping their baby's gender secret, has been making the rounds. And to those of us interested in non-gender conforming identities, and what it means to raise kids in a world where no one is forced into a box, this article raises some interesting ideas.

However, even MORE interesting are the heated posts from folks with all sorts of opinions about what these parents should or should not be doing with their child. Responses range all over the spectrum. But what fascinates me most is how people assume that by not sharing the child's sex with the general population, this then means that this child doesn't have a gender identity. How commentors made this leap is easy to see-- we should all be privy to one another's gender identity all the time, right? Wrong. Good for this couple, to take a stand, and affording their child far more privacy than most of us, in this age of internet blogging.

This level of progressiveness forces us all to look a little more closely at our own baggage, eh?

BMI ain't all its cracked up to be

2009-07-03T09:00:00.001-05:00

The Body Mass Index (BMI) is problematic. BMI is basically the ratio between your height and weight. Then, providers, websites, hell your next door neighbor, can subscribe a whole host is health problems (or lack of them) to your weight categorization (BMI categorizations include underweight, normal weight, overweight, and obese). It isolates weight from the rest of your life activities. It also does not distinguish between fat and muscle. Several examples that make BMI problematic are:
• Muscle weighs more than fat
• Folks who stay skinny through smoking, drug use and/or have an eating disorder
• Postmenopausal women have decreased muscle mass
And most problematically, BMI rates are used as a factor for insurers: if I have a BMI over 30, I might have a higher rate or be denied insurance all together.

Not mention that all of this data is skewed around race, as Shapely Prose points out.

Enter the New York Times Blog post "Excess Pounds, but Not Too Many, May Lead to Longer Life". It suggests that having some junk in your trunk might help you to live a longer life. As someone who fits into that overweight category, I also like to think that I live life fuller and more celebratory – the scoop of mint chocolate chip, pint of Oberon, and donut from the local bakery are all small treats I wouldn’t do without. That’s not living, baby. Granted, they are indulgences– not norms. Otherwise I wouldn’t appreciate them as much. No donut should ever be taken for granted.

So I’d add an addendum to their blog about how important joy is to my badunkadunk. I usually enjoy the more decadent things in life with loved ones – celebrating graduations, birthdays, and other markers of who we are becoming. I don’t think the BMI could ever trace that – but I’m happy to know that how I “wear” my “celebrations” are also scientifically helping me to live a longer life. This is a step in the right direction.

Shapely Prose's BMI Project

Totally gorgeous and gratuitous photo is from Leonard Nimoy's Full Body Project.

Chicago's got the STDs going on

2009-07-02T09:00:00.002-05:00

Chicago, the city that works, has been slacking off. On getting tested and treated.

We are #1 in Gonorrhea cases.
We are #2 in Chlamydia cases.

The Chicago Sun-Times reports that the Chicago Public School system will be using this opportunity to get education, testing and treatment going in high schools.

Goodbye, abstinence education. Like the popular girls in high school, you were a shallow, petty bully. And I won't miss you either.

LGBT Health Reform Bill is introduced into Congress

2009-06-25T11:40:00.012-05:00

The fabulous lesbian Rep. Tammy Baldwin from Wisconsin just introduced the Ending Health Disparities for LGBT Americans Act (ELHDA) earlier this week. Click here for Rep. Baldwin's press release on the bill.

This is so fabulous and fairly comprehensive. Here are the highlights:
• Office of LGBT Health at HHS
• Inclusion in data collection and research
• Non-discrimination policies
• Cultural competency trainings
• Recognition as a population facing health disparities

Of the priorities it talks about, getting LGBT questions into current data collection happening is INCREDIBLY important. We know so little about our health - most of the research done must create its own data sets. Which ends up skewing it: when researchers have to go out and find lesbian and bisexual women to survey, the data sets skew towards women that are more connected to community, more educated, whiter, more urban, and with a higher socio-economic status. Without a complete picture of who we as a community are - with all of our nuances and subcommunities - we do a disservice to the most marginalized and vulnerable in our community.

We must have a complete picture of what all of our health looks like. Only then can we begin to create strategies that truly improve all of our health. I want the most marginalized, queer folk to be a part of our movement - and putting health as a pillar of our movement inherently shifts who is seen and at the center.

An Alternative Top 100...

2009-06-24T09:00:00.004-05:00

OK - so Fruity Cake has already commented on AfterEllen.com's Annual Hot 100. She challenges the list to show more of what we think is hot - in terms of gender, ethnic, age and size diversity. I agree. Not just because I really think Beth Ditto should be on there, but also because there were only two or three women that looked hot to me. Most just looked like women I'd go shopping with on a good day and be jealous of on a bad day.

And, then Sinclair Sexsmith of the Sugarbutch Chronicles answers the call:

Top Hot Butches: The 100 hottest butch, masculine, androgynous, genderqueer, transmasculine, studs, AGs, dykes, queers, and transguys.

I won't diminish it by saying its merely a reaction to aforementioned list, but well it was. And boi is it hot.

I'm a fan of Sinclair Sexsmith's work.
He SERIOUSLY did a great job of picking the photographs. Its absolutely clear just how good he is at making fellow gender fuckers look good.