The difficult task of separating drag culture from transgender identity .......

A long standing tense relationship between transgender activists and some popular cross dressing or drag queen icons continue and with an egregious error made recently by a JFLAG representative at a symposium on identity where they lumped transgender individuals as drag queens, the invisibility issue with local transgender persons has been an issue for me as LGBT is conveniently used as the call letters for the struggle but the actual inclusion is far from happening just yet in all the years of pressing on-wards.

I thought it appropriate to post this entry from leading African American trans blogger Monica Roberts, where she wrote:

Trans Womanhood does not equal drag

TransGriot Note: My guest post that is up at the NBJC blog commenting on Monica Beverly Hillz's recent trans coming out announcement

With Monica Beverly Hillz coming out as trans onRuPaul's Drag Race on February 4, it was seen as a good news, bad news moment by much of the trans community.

While we celebrate our trans sister taking such a huge step in her life, the irony of the moment wasn't lost on many of us in the trans community.

She was coming out as trans on a show in which its creator has a contentious relationship with the trans community, and has repeatedly uttered problematic transphobic comments..

The trans community also has a love-hate relationship with the drag community as well for the rampant transphobia and misogny in elements of that world.

That's why many of us in the trans community (myself included) refuse to watch or support Drag Race. But I also realize there are enough people who do regularly tune in to the show to where it has now survived on LOGO for five seasons.

So taking it into account Drag Race has a large viewership who could use a little Trans 101 education, it's time for the trans community and our allies to take this opportunity Monica's coming out presents us to put a major dent into the long held myth that drag queens and trans women are exactly the same and far too often conflate the two..

So lets start with the major difference between an trans woman and a drag queen.

A trans woman is someone born in a masculine body at birth with a feminine gender identity and expression that lives full time in the feminine gender role. They may seek gender realignment surgery, counseling, hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and other medical procedures to facilitate the process.

That is light years difference from a drag artist who generally loves everything about being in the masculine gender role, blanches at the thought of genital realignment surgery and have no desire to present as female except on stage.

There are and have long been trans women like Monica who perform in the drag world for various reasons. Some do so because they simply enjoy the experience of being on stage and the confidence boost it provides. Some do so because it's a job that helps them earn the money to pay for their hormones, other medical procedures to perfect their feminine presentation and eventually get to the point where they can have genital surgery.

Trans women who are on that drag stage when the performance is over wipe the excess stage makeup off their faces, hang up the beaded gowns and gaudy costumes and head outside the club in their regular clothes and stripped down makeup to live their everyday feminine lives in a world that is indifferent and in many cases hostile to them. And far too often some of that hostility directed at trans women comes from people in the same gender loving (SGL) and cis communities. It also manifests itself in terms of discrimination and off the charts levels of violence and death aimed at us. 

image not included in original article

It has long been an irritant to African-American trans women that cis people will easily let the 'she' pronoun slide off their lips for a RuPaul, Madea or any assorted drag queen but can't bring themselves to do the same for a transwoman in their midst who is living her everyday life in the female gender role.

Trans woman does not equal drag queen. It's past time for people to get that fundamental point and give trans women the love, respect and codified human rights as members of the community they deserve.

University of Technology launches Tolerance project post gay student abuse

UTECH launches tolerance and respect project for students and staff (TVJ video above)

Go HERE for the original post on Gay Jamaica Watch on that matter and the related video

A sensitization project  on respect and tolerance was this morning launched  at the University of Technology (UTECH).  The project "Promotion of Respect, Tolerance and Diversity" was developed in response to the November 2012 assault of one of the university's students who was accused of being a homosexual. Partly funded by the European Union, the sensitization efforts which will be undertaken throughout 2013 will address issues related to respect and tolerance particularly as it affects the rights of 
minority groups such Lesbians, Gays, Bi-Sexual and Transgender (LGBT).  

The respect and tolerance project though mainly focused on students and staff at the University is also intended to reach the wider society. It will feature sensitization sessions at each of the University's six locations, public forums, a qualitative research and national survey, essay competition among all tertiary students across the island, debates organized by the Students' Union and the purchase of CDs and print materials to be used throughout the project. The University has also committed to modifying its curriculum for the academic year 2013-2014 to address issues of respect, tolerance and diversity. 

Addressing the launch, President of UTECH Professor Errol Morrison pointed out that following the well publicized incident several measures have already been put in place and that the project comes as a well needed support to ensuring that change. "Despite some of the negative publicity which occurred some three months back we are only so happy that we are now moving on to a new threshold…We are not only attempting to reach out to the University community to create that better understanding and appreciation of difference but to reach out to the  wider society trying to engender that softer accommodating society." 

Ambassador Paola Amadei, Head of the Delegation of the European Union to Jamaica commended the efforts of the leadership and administration of the University to undertake such a programme adding that only when all Jamaicans are guaranteed equal rights and freedom will it unlock its true potential.  

"Discrimination based on sexual orientation will be a specific focus in this project, as individuals still face significant obstacles to full participation in public life, hindering their ability to work, study and integrate in society without discrimination and exclusion. The great diversity of the Jamaican population is aptly represented in its motto "out of many one people". To live up to this motto members of society who are considered "different", should not be  discriminated against and to the contrary should be able to exercise the full gamut of their rights in society. "


Contact- Jodi Brown-Lindo 
Delegation of the European Union to Jamaica,  
Belize, Turks and Caicos Islands, Bahamas and the Cayman Islands 
Tel: 1 876 924 6333 

As part of its Respect and Tolerance Initiative, the University of Technology (UTech) has developed a special course targeting security companies.

Michael Steele, head of the Joan Duncan School of Entrepreneurship, Ethics and Leadership, said the course would focus on conflict resolution, values and ethics, customer service and human rights.

The course and wider initiative are a response to an incident at the campus last November where a student, accused of being gay, was allegedly beaten by two security guards after he took refuge in the guard post after being chased by students.

Two of the security guards involved are currently before the courts on various charges.

"Coming out of the incident, there were various calls for action against the security company. Some people thought we should fire the company right away," said Steele.

"We felt, as an institution, that we should take the higher road, and we should try and inculcate a certain level of tolerance by training," he added.

open to all security companies

A separate set of courses addressing issues of tolerance, respect and diversity will be inserted in the curriculum for the 2013-2014 academic year.

"We put everything in a series of short courses and have it open to all security companies," said Steele. He noted the university had started marketing the course and had sent its proposal to over 30 security companies across the island.

"We have got one or two responses but we are more or less waiting on the full response before we start the course," he said.

Steele said of the few to respond, their attitude was favourable but they were worried about the cost.

"It's a short course, so the cost is not that high but any additional cost is going to be, for some companies, a cause of concern."

He suggested companies look at the returns of investing in the training rather than just at the cost. He said the course would be available at all UTech campuses.

The Respect and Tolerance Initiative is funded by the European Union at a total cost of €9,950 or J$1.21 million.

Professor Rosalea Hamilton, UTech's vice-president of Development and Community Services, led the discussion among staff and students to form the initiative.

Hamilton noted various viewpoints were gathered from the informal sessions on the November incident, and about similar events across Jamaica. She felt participants had a better understanding of their differences and learned how to respond to some of the complex issues arising from the incidents.

Hamilton warned that not everyone will change their point of view and we would have a renewed look at what 'one love' and 'nuff respect' really mean.

"As we expand the limits of these phrases, we believe that enough of us will conclude (like Marcus Garvey) that we are all children of one God, one aim, one destiny. One love."meanwhile feedback came from some students via a report on Radio Jamaica, RJR's newscast recently: