The Vagabonders Tackle Queen and Dundas Streetcars

That’s right folks! In a long awaited advocacy campaign, The Vagabonders, er, brandon, is going to plaster the Queen and Dundas streetcars in Toronto with little bits of provocative wisdom. And by plaster, we mean place a single “Hello My Name Is” sticker on each of the cars we ride.

The messages on the stickers all, obviously, start with “Hello My Name Is” and end with the following:

• my own
• more than a name you say
• abused
• a survivor
• stabbed
• killed
• almost killed
• shot
• hit, for fun
• attacked, for what?
• raped
• drugged
• for nothing
• stitched-up, sewn-up, shut-up
• tortured
• sliced, cut, stabbed
• silenced
• brutalized
• beat-up
• beat-down
• banned
• “at-risk”
• profiled
• ashamed
• reliable
• hurt
• pregnant
• dead
• assaulted
• broken
• bent
• trashed
• bashed
• vandalized
• romanticised
• a license
• tokenized
• a story
• a poem
• more than who i am
• more than my life
• more than how i act
• more than who i may become
• more than who i love
• more than what i say
• more than what i wear
• more than who i fuck
• more than annomosity
• revolution
• made of superstition
• made of bravery
• made of audacity
• made of fluidity
• made of history
• made of ancestry
• made of knowledge
• made of learning
• made of passion
• made of experience
• my story
• made of story
• made of song
• made of monologue
• made of courage
• made of movement
• made of dance
• made of spirit
• awaiting gov’t approval
• made of play-doh
• none of your business
• overdrawn
• restricting my freedom
• fucking up my healthcare
• sarajevo (do you remember me?)
• bosnia (do you remember me?)
• Kosovo
• Ingushetia
• temprorary
• Desire
• little
• mine
• uncomfortable
• peeling
• lost in translation
• changing
• not a toy
• disposable
• slippery
• mud
• jack/jane
• queer eye candy
• not ‘it’
• getting old
• gonna make you smile
• more than a tool
• out of order
• not in service
• parading in your pants
• regretting last night

In the future, you can look forward to blank ones left on streetcars for you to write your own!

In the News

I’m going to rant. You might want to prepare yourself. This might mean getting up now, while you can, to get a hot water bottle, put on a good tear-jerking movie, call your brother, put on a little Norah Jones, whatever “preparing yourself” means to you. Do it.

I’m fucking tired of the way the media treats trans people. I give up. I can’t just sit back anymore and say, “well, you know, they’re just trying to please people and talk on a level everyone will understand.” Or, “well they have to say that or the rednecks will get mad.” I can’t say that anymore.  I cannot keep making excuse after excuse after excuse for how my brotherhood is treated. And my sisterhood. There are no more excuses I can make that will make me feel any less that what the media and reporters and newspapers are doing is wrong. In case you have not seen the kinds of things the media likes to say about trans people, I’ve prepared a list of examples. They’re all about Brandon Teena (aka Teena Brandon, Teena Ray Brandon, Brandon) because, since the release of the feature film about his life, Boys Don’t Cry, his life and death have received a lot of media coverage. Also because we have the same name and so his death, for some reason, hits me harder.

These are some of the things that papers have said about Brandon Tenna over the years:

“Riding the Iraq roundabout.” Canberra Times [Canberra, Australia] 9 Aug. 2008: 8.

• “When Boys Don’t Cry was released in 1999 it was a sensation, with Hilary Swank in cropped hair as Brandon Teena, a girl who preferred a male identity until found out as biologically female.”
• I don’t know any girls named Brandon. I know butches and boys named Brandon, I don’t know any girls named Brandon. And, quite frankly, I don’t know any girls who prefer a male identity. Female-bodied people who prefer male identities, sure. But girls who prefer to be boys? I just call those people boys…unless they tell me not to. That’s all pretty petty though. My main disgust about this sentence lies in the “who preferred a male identity until found out as biologically female”. It should really read, “who preferred a male identity until found out as biologically female and was raped, beaten, and then killed.” Because really, I’m pretty sure he never stopped identifying as male, so really it should just be “until he was killed”.
  

Dwyer, Michael. “Stop-Loss.” Irish Times 25 Apr. 2008, sec. Film Reviews: 12.

• “IN 1999 Kimberly Peirce made an arresting feature-film debut with the emotionally wrenching Boys Don’t Cry, a factually based drama unflinchingly exploring the life and death of Teena Brandon, a young woman who felt more comfortable in a male identity, reversed her name to Brandon Teena, and was murdered in Nebraska.”
• Not going to mention the ‘woman in a male identity’ thing again, because I’ve done that already. If a person reverses their name so that their feminine-sounding first name is now their last name and their masculine last name is now their first name, I think they might be hinting at something.

I’m just going to take this time to say I love Kimberly Pierce’s work. Stop-Loss and Boys Don’t Cry were both fantastic movies. My intention is to point out the reporters’ gross (as in large) ignorance around trans issues even though there have been many attempts to inform journalists and the media world about how to approach trans-ness.

“Cry, beloved country – New Film.” The Economist 05 Apr. 2008.

• “NINE years ago Kimberly Peirce’s first feature film, “Boys Don’t Cry”, won Hilary Swank an Academy Award for her portrayal of Brandon Teena, a young woman who is murdered for living as a man. The hero of Ms Peirce’s poignantsecond film, “Stop-Loss”, is also called Brandon, but is different in every otherrespect. A man’s man, this Brandon (Brandon King, played by Ryan Phillippe) is a decorated veteran of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq who returns at the beginning of the film to a hero’s welcome from his hometown in Texas.”
• At first, I thought this was a step-up, because the author of this article did, at least, recognize that Brandon Teena was killed for living as a man (read: for living as a trans person). But then the author goes on to say that the Brandon King character, in Stop-Loss, is a “man’s man”. Which, to me, signifies that Brandon Teena is not? From what I gather, Brandon Teena wasn’t a misogynist pig, but was definitely a man. I mean, I’d probably have called him a “man’s man”, if I was the kind of person who said that kind of thing. I’m not though.

Lepage, Mark. “Hilary Swank Homeroom Hero.” The Globe and Mail [Toronto] 5 Jan. 2007.

• “To become transsexual Brandon Teena for Boys Don’t Cry, Hilary Swank spent four weeks “strapping and packing” — her breasts and crotch — to pass as a man. She got double-takes in public, and her first Oscar.”
• This is very nice.
  

I want to hear your comments. What do you think of the way the media treats trans people?

I meant to write. I really, really did. But I think part of me hoped someone else would, when they realized I was on vacation *coughcough*. Alas, they didn’t. And I was on vacation. The internet connection at the hotel I was staying at in the Dominican was not fast. It usually took about three or four vodkas before it would load a page. No, no. Seriously, I could have made a paper mache dead horse in the length of time it took to load Gmail. It didn’t even try to load WordPress. It just quipped at me in Spanish that there was no connection. Fair enough. So this, my friends, is why I have not posted since before New Year’s.

I hope you had a happy one.

So, right now, I’m working on planning a performance night. To bring in a little much-needed cash because the search for a job has turned up transphobic. So I’m working in the arts.

And actually, on that note, I think I’m going to talk about jobhunting.

During these “tough economic times”, this “Global Economic Uncertainty”, this “Global Economic How-Could-We-Have-Seen-It-Coming?” (I’ll tell you how!), many people are losing their jobs. Sure, Shoppers Drugmart employees are safe because their wage can’t be lowered and people will always need Tylenol, but in general, a lot of people are losing their jobs. Given this situation, it strikes me that trans and queer people are probably having an even harder time finding employment (of the minimum-wage sort or otherwise). Everybody who has lost/is losing their job will now, or eventually, turn to minimum wage jobs and will be “better qualified” and will, in most cases, probably be straight and non-trans. The people that unemployed trans and queer people rely on for survival – their parents who they call monthly for a small loan; their partner(s) who they promise will get paid back as soon as they have a job; their brothers, sisters, cousins, aunts, and anyone else who hasn’t disowned them, who they call when they’re about to lose their apartment again – are feeling the effects of this economic bullshit, too. It is getting harder on them to say ‘yes’, harder on them to lend away some of their money. It’s harder for them to justify to the rest of the family why they are feeding the black sheep. And this does not bode well for us. Us transpeople and queer people who already work so hard to get what little we can get to survive. And at the end of the day, the people we’re depending on may very well be saying to us now, like they always have, “Why can’t you just get a job?”. Maybe, in a few months, if the economy continues as it is going, we will be able to turn our heads to face them and ask, “What happened to yours?”

2009

It’s the first day of 2009. What the fuck, seriously. I didn’t think I’d live this long.

Have a happy new year everyone!

I’m taking off for a week because I’ve been working on everything way too hard and it’ll give me some time to philosophisisisize and write and mull over the world so that I have doubly-interesting things to post when I get back. Maybe someone will post whilst I’m gone. I’m not sure. Happy new year though.

Changes

My co-author, Saoirse, and I have met to discuss goals for the Vagabonders site. We both  agree that we would like to see it grow into something more awesome and that benefits the communities we aim to serve. Having said that, we realize that we are doing this in our spare time and that there is only so much we can do. Now, having said THAT, here is a list of goals that we feel we would like to accomplish in 2009. If you like what you’re reading or have suggestions, or anything, please leave a comment.

- 1000 hits by April (if you like this blog and want to help us reach that goal, you can continue to pass on the URL to friends of yours, word of mouth helps us so much)

- Minimum of 1 more author by May

- Some sort of steady funding (private? corporate? donations?)

- A feminist/queer/trans read-in fundraiser at the Concord Cafe (possibly a spoken word/performance/storytelling night?) to raise money for a website, webmaster and honorrariams (a word I cannot spell) for interviewees and guest authors

- Daily posts/multiple posts per day by multiple people (no more Brandon Brandon Brandon)

- Interviews!

- Vlog set up by April

What do you think? What would you like to see?

Ivan E. Coyote

Sorry everyone, but we took a short break from intellectual posting, but we’ve now returned to our regular schedule of shit that’s actually interesting and matters. Today we’re hitting you up with some Canadian stuff.

I first heard about Ivan E. Coyote on the blog Queer Eye Candy (by Sinclair, who also does the Sugarbutch Chronicles) and sort of fell in love.  Ivan’s style is fucking rad, and her way of speaking sometimes makes it hard to discern what’s story and what’s just general garble. Which I mark as a good thing. I’m going to alternate pronouns, because I’m actually not sure which pronouns Ivan uses and would rather be half-wrong than whole-wrong. So his style kicks ass, as I said, but today I got a copy of one of her award-winning volumes of short stories, The Slow Fix. I’ve read a few pages, and I’m already in love and telling people they have to borrow it.

So, here’s some Ivan for you. Enjoy.

Vagabonders 3.0

On behalf of the Vagabonders team; I now unveil to you The Vagabonders 3.0.

Please let us know what you think about the stylistic changes.

A New Thing

For a while, I have wanted to do a photography series phocused (haha…) around queer, old, young and otherwise sexually marginalized couples kissing.

So if you’re interested in having your photo taken as part of this series, could you pleeeease let me know? And/or pass this on to anyone you know who may be interested? Thanks.

Rick Warren

U.S. President-Elect Barack Obama has chosen evangelical pastor, Rick Warren, to do the official prayers at Obama’s inauguration in January. Many people are pissed off over this, and rightly so. He’s been known to say many misogynist things, many bigoted things, and many homophobic things, which has gotten many LGB groups pissed off. Obama doesn’t care that people are pissed off. Rick Warren made a speech about his role at the inauguration, in which he said “I love Democrats and Republicans. And, for the media’s purposes, I love gays and straights.”

For the media’s purposes? Are you fucking kidding me? A simpleton could figure out that if you have to actually say, “for the media’s purproses”, everything after that is not actually sincere. At all. If you acknowledge that what you’re saying is only being said to please the media, you are also saying that it is not actually heart-felt and true.

Thoughts?

Sometimes

I feel so sad about the world. This Christmas, though I want to feel warm and happy, though I want so badly to focus on the good, I can’t help but constantly remember that there are terrible things going on around the world.

In Johannesburg, a 35 year old woman named Takelah Chakamza is able to buy only two things for Christmas for her family. Her family lives in Harare, Zimbabwe and much of the country relies on people like Takelah to live. The economic situation in Zimbabwe is unimaginable. People navigate wheelbarrows full of money through crowded streets to buy a loaf of bread. Sometimes, entire families of five or six carry thousands of bills in whatever they can find, sacks, wheelbarrows, barrels, just to buy a roll of toilet paper. Inflation is going up by massive amounts per year. I don’t remember the number, but we studied it in World Issues and it was astronomical. If you have cash one day, you spend it because it may be worth nothing the next day. If you need something, you get it, because the next day it could be ten times the price. Takelah makes $80 a month working for a family in Johannesburg, and I am so, so sad that all she can send home is cooking oil and corn meal.

I have spent just under $200 on gifts this Christmas. The total cost of presents that people will buy from me will probably average out to be between $500-$1000. I have tried not to spend money. I have told my parents that I wish to make things this Christmas, instead of buying into the commercialism of it all. I really don’t have $200. Between trying to buy food, clothes and save for surgery, $200 is hard to part with. I do not want people to spend $500-$1000 on me. Next year, I will not give my parents an option. I will not ask them if I can make things. I will not seek their permission. Next year, all money will be spent on either buying materials to make things or will be sent to a charity, or even on gifts for kids in this city who won’t otherwise get them. Or perhaps I’ll go see my street friends and buy them stuff. We can make a day of it.