I really didn't want to comment on all this.
I do find it problematic that three names spell trouble in River City
(Columbus) when it comes to trans-issues are all in the forefront on
this list suddenly. Jeff Redfield, who is about as much a friend
to the
trans-community as Lizzy Birch or Barney the Purple Congresscritter.
M.
A. Horton, well known to many of us at this point and the main reason
I
didn't renew my NOW membership. Meral Crane.......what to say
about
Meral Crane? Well, the last time I commented on Meral Crane on
a
national list (TGS-Pflag)I was outted via an anonymous phone call to
my
work supervisor later losing that job, and I was forced out of the
chair
of It's Time Ohio all within two weeks! My sanity was openly
questioned
on local emails lists and my name generally slandered on a national
level. Granted, there were other factors at work with the ITOh
chair at
the time, but they all involved machinations of another member of the
Columbus gang of three and just coincidentally enough also involved
Meral Crane being invited as THE speaker at the EQUAL conference here
in
Columbus at the time and which had been hidden from me. Just
months
before all this, I had been asked to arrange the trans-education
part
of the UU Church gay and lesbian INTERWEAVE conference and had my own
therapist (very very capable and knowledgeable speaker) talk to the
group instead of Meral. Afterwards the church and various members
of
the church GLBT, This Way Out group received numerous phone calls and
letters that were characterized by them as harassment because Meral
wasn't the main speaker! I know this because they all complained about
it me, loudly. Little wonder she is the ball of wax here, her
shock
troops have made sure of that. For years her "people" have openly
insulted those of us who avoided her group for transitional needs and
told everyone they could reach that Meral was the ONLY route to hormones
and SRS in central Ohio, something totally false and they knew it and
were called on for repeatedly. Back then Meral herself told her
group
to shun me because I wasn't a "real" transsexual before she knew I
was a
major player in the local political scene. In the past several
years
Dr. Fox and myself have largely been cut out of all invitations to
speak
on the subject of transsexuality despite that fact that we have been
the
best known nationally figures in this area and have both been the only
ones at various hearings at a State level politically.
The Columbus NOW event was announced by Jeff Redfield, presumably
arranged by M.A. Horton, and features Meral Crane as main speaker and
Sarah and I hear about it only here onlist..........that is comment
enough.
I have tried to avoid contact with and commentary on these three for
several years since they literally destroyed my local reputation and
cut
me off from virtually all contact with other transsexuals in this area.
This was from having been someone called the "Godmother of the local
trans-community" not long before all this. I find it infuriating
that
at a time when I finally am able to reconnect with some locals, these
three once again are suddenly in the forefront of local trans politics.
A therapist who invites speakers to her group and then CHARGES them
and
about whom I've personally heard so many horror stories as to make
my
blood run cold. One who calls herself the "Central Ohio Gender Dysphoria
Association" and likes to leave an uncorrected assumption that she
has a
doctorate and who charged in excess of 500 bucks before you could
even
see her in the past. A gay man who has actively acted to cut
out and
negate local political involvement by politically active transfolks
for
years and dresses up in hag drag twice a year for local sporting events
knowing the level of insult that is to local transsexuals in order
to
say "F**k You" to the straights. A local crossdresser who worships
the
therapist who in return makes comment after comment of a negative nature
about crossdressers. One who practically single handedly destroyed
It's
Time America with his flip flop workplace gender presentation agenda
and
interfered in the Kentucky Fairness Campaign after his agenda nearly
derailed it and who routinely cut other individuals off local and
national email lists he controled in order to silence them and then
lied
about it. Gee, I'm overjoyed to see these names pop up
again and
again.
I don't get off work until 7am the morning of that event, but I shall
try to be there sans sleep anyway.
Oh, a final note, the president of Columbus NOW, Susan Bader, _IS_ a
friend of the community, had been an active and willing helpmate in
ITOh
for years and in no way should be slammed for any of this.
That I
personally know of her level of committment to betterment of
transgendered people is the single bright light in all this and the
reason I will go without as much fear in my heart of a debacle.
Cathy Platine
@)-'--.--'
"Feminism is the radical notion that women are people"