Whither the Transgender Community? Whither AEGIS? (1997)
The growth of the transgender community, the changes in the ways we view ourselves, demand that our organizations evolve to meet today’s needs. It’s no longer possible for a volunteer-based agency to serve the many persons coming out about their transgender issues, or of persons in transition, or of helping professionals. We need professional organizations with paid staff.
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How NOT to Get Rid of Unwanted Hair (1997)
One day, no doubt, some ingenious soul will figure out a safe, fast, painless, and inexpensive method of permanent hair removal. When that happens, those who have had electrolysis will of course be miffed because newcomers will not have to go through the same pain and expense they did. But until that day, it is only those who have had electrolysis who have thrown away their razors.
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Does Laser Electrolysis Work? (1997)
Is it possible for coherent (laser) light to kill hair? Certainly. Has anyone yet devised a laser treatment system which kills hair permanently and safely? Perhaps. Has anyone demonstrated permanent hair loss with laser electrolysis. Not yet, at least not to our knowledge.
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My Invited Comments on Proposed Revision of HBIGDA Standards of Care (1997)
In issue no. 9 of AEGIS News I took a look at helping professionals as part of the multi-issue Vision 2001: A Gender Odyssey. I expressed my concerns about the in-process revision of the Standards of Care of the Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association. I drew heavily upon statements made by Dr. Stephen Levine, chair of the revision committee. Dr. George R. Brown, a member of the committee, took exception to what I wrote. I published his comments as a letter to the editor in AEGIS News No. 10.
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Is There a Price for Political Activism? (1996)
The transgender and transsexual community tends to fractionate along lines of opinions about political activism: is it a good thing, or a bad thing? Not surprisingly some of those most opposed tend to characterize activists as ego-driven, sensationalizing dunderheads and even to claim that activists’ efforts have set us back rather than moving us forward. Equally unsurprising, some activists show little understanding of or concern for those who wish to keep their identities secret.
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Winning Transgender Support and Acceptance at PFLAG (1996)
I didn’t think the best place to ask PFLAG, “What constitutes homosexuality when gender is fluid?” was in the hot sun in a milling crowd on a Sunday afternoon, so a week or two later I sent the Atlanta chapter a letter, accompanied by Chrysalis, the AEGIS Transition Series booklets, and other materials, respectfully asking that we begin talking about our common issues.
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Office Care of Transgendered and Transsexual Clients (1997)
The very presence of transgendered and transsexual persons can have an impact on other clients and office staff. What should a clinician know about how to address the client, how to prepare billing records, what to tell receptionists and nurses, and which restroom to direct the client to? In other words, what is proper office protocol?
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Advisory: Polycystic Ovary Syndrome in FTMs (1997)
This is one of several medical advisories issued by AEGIS after being vetted by our 30-member advisory board. It was released in August, 1997 and re-released in 2002 by Gender Education & Advocacy, Inc., the renamed AEGIS. It also appeared in August, 1997 in the premiere issue of AEGIS’ Transgender Treatment Bulletin, accompanied by an article on PCOS by Jamison Green.
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What is the Role of the Helping Professional? (1997)
This was the lead article in the first issue of AEGIS’ Transgender Treatment Bulletin.
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Transgender Treatment Bulletin (1997-1998)
In 1997 and 1998 the nonprofit American Educational Gender Information Service published three issues of the Transgender Treatment Bulletin. The bulletin addressed a variety of health issues faced by transsexual and transgender people and was meant to be read by both helping professionals and transfolk. I was editor and I did the layout and some of the writing.
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Vision 2001: A Gender Odyssey (1996-1997)
In mid-1995 The International Foundation for Gender Education—the trans community’s largest organization—did an assessment of the transgender community. I thought it was the most ridiculous thing I had ever seen. Issue 6 of AEGIS News began my own assessment. It was fact-based, at least as much as possible considering the scant data that were available. The assessment ran four or five issues. Jessica Xavier was invaluable as a collaborator and author.
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AEGIS Public Service Advertisements (1990s)
AEGIS designed a series of public service ads, which ran on the inside front covers of Chrysalis Quarterly, the house journal. We also distributed them as flyers. The ads addressed assorted health issues of transsexual and transgendered people, including silicone injections, overuse of hormones, and HIV/AIDS. Margaux Schaffer designed the first two ads.
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The View from the Other Side of the Treatment Fence (1991)
This article is best read in situ, as it is a counterbalance to my article The Politics of Diagnosis and a Diagnosis of Politics: How the University-Affiliated Gender Clinics Failed to Meet the Needs of Transsexual People.
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How to Shop for Service Providers (1991)
In 1991 professional help for transsexuals was so hard to find we tended to be grateful for anything offered—whether good or bad.
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Review of Shocking Asia (1991)
This film is the first I came across that had anything whatsoever to do with transsexualism.
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CQ’s Quotations From the Literature (1991-1993)
The first six issues of Chrysalis Quarterly contained a short feature called Quotations from the Literature. In each, I highlighted one or two offensive, stupid, or absurd (and in some cases insightful) passages from articles in textbooks or professional journals.
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Transgender Cross-Cultural and Historical Models (1997)
This book chapter looks at historical, cross-cultural, and contemporary models of gender variance and provides suggestions for researchers, authors, and mental health professionals.
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No Regets: The Standards of Care (1991)
The Standards are a road map for service providers, telling them what they must do, at minimum, to provide competent care to transsexual people. To the majority of service providers, who are ignorant about transsexualism, the Standards can serve as a cookbook, giving them the necessary confidence to treat men and women they might not otherwise agree to serve.
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Weight and Transition (1991)
Extreme weight is a counterindication for any form of surgery; medical risk is increased dramatically. Here I interview a transsexual woman who committed to lose an extreme amount of weight so she could meet the weight requirements for sex reassignment surgery.
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Sex Reassignment, Hormones, and Health (1991)
The theme of the first issue of AEGIS’ Chrysalis Quarterly Journal was transsexualism and disability. This was the lead article.
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Beware Philip Salem (1991)
AEGIS’ first advisory was about a pill-peddler named Philip Salem.
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Selected Readings on Transvestism, Transsexualism and Related Subjects (2000)
JoAnn Roberts took lead on the publication of this bibliography. Most of the references and annoations were drawn from my 1994 book Gender Dysphoria: A Guide to Research.
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AEGIS Recommends Breast Self-Examination (1995)
AEGIS recommends that all MTF transsexual and transgendered persons who have experienced significant breast development from hormonal therapy and all FTM transsexual and transgendered persons who have not had mastectomy/chest reconstruction do a breast self-examination on a monthly basis.
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AEGIS Advisory on Vaginoplasty (1996)
This is one of several medical advisories issued by AEGIS after being vetted by our 30-member advisory board.
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My Transsexual Autobiography (2006)
For me, gender reassignment was a good thing, a fulfilling thing. It removed the pebble from my shoe. Life is good.
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My Big Award (1995)
In 1995 the International Foundation for Gender Education gave me their Trinity Award. It was a distinction I didn’t particularly want, because IFGE was fond of giving the award to its inner circle. I certainly wasn’t a part of that circle (nor did I want to be), so when I was notified I would receive the award I had mixed feelings about getting. That’s where this song came from.
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Perfectly Modular Male (1995) (NSFW)
This song, is of course, about packing—using a prosthetic device as a phallus. It’s something every FTM knows about. The song is influenced by a book by science fiction author Robert A. Heinlein—The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. In it, the protagonist uses a variety of prosthetic arms, depending upon need. He has a social arm with fingers and simulated a skin, an arm for manipulation of small objects, and an arm designed for brute power. So—why limit oneself to a single packie?
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Once a Year (Gender Conference) (2000)
I wrote this song about the trans conference Southern Comfort, which takes place every fall in Atlanta. It was a transformative event for me and continues to be for others. I’m happy to have been a part in its formation in 1990.
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AEGIS Online News (Some Single Posts, 1995-1996)
In May, 1995, when I was Executive Director of the nonprofit American Educational Gender Information Service, I compiled and transmitted what I believe was the first transgender-specific online news feed. It was called AEGIS Online News. The News initially went out to several hundred AEGIS members and other subscribers as a plain text file over the fledgling internet.
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Gender Dysphoria Update (1995)
AEGIS distributed thousands of copies this excellent article by Blaine Beemer. I was responsible for layout and editing.
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Transsexualism: Religious Aspects (1978)
In the 1970s the Erickson Educational Foundation produced a series of booklets about transsexualism. Rights eventually came to my nonprofit American Educational Gender Information Service, and, in the early 1990s, we reprinted and distributed this and some of the other booklets.
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Two Poems, Two Women (2013)
I spoke these into my iTouch while on the road from New York to Georgia. The feeling just came over me, and before I knew it they had rolled off my tongue. They’re unchanged, except for one misspoken word.
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If For Transsexual People (1991)
Any number of people have taken liberties with Rudyard Kipling’s poem If, which was meant as an inspiration for young boys. Is it any wonder I couldn’t resist? My most profound apologies to Mr. Kipling.
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Where We’ve Been and Where We’re Going (2011)
When a keynote presenter bailed at Fantasia Fair, Dainna Cicotello and I were asked to do this presentation on short notice—24 hours. This is my portion of the presentation. I was asked to give it again at the TransEvent Conference in Albany—and did.
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Your Virtual Life is Waiting (2007)
What would you do if you could build a world—and a perfect body—from scratch? What would it mean if you could fly? If you were fabulously wealthy? What happens to our consciousness when we can simultaneously control multiple or inhuman bodies, each with its own personality? Computers make possible the creation of complex virtual worlds which can enrich, extend, and redefine the human experience. Linden Lab’s Second Life is such a world, a three-dimensional space created entirely by its inhabitants.
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One Hundred Years in the Spotlight (2011)
I take a look at how transpeople have been portrayed in the movies and talk about new opportunities for self-expression provided by emerging categories of media.
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Out of the Closet, With Style (1999)
Felix Carroll, the author of this article, didn’t understand how varied the attendance of Fantasia Fair was. To him, everyone was a crossdresser. Aside from that, though, it’s not a bad article. I do wish it didn’t consist almost entirely of one-sentence paragraphs.
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Butcher John Ronald Brown (2002)
Three thousand miles away Dallas Denny read of the case and immediately recognized Brown’s handiwork. Denny called Stacy Running, the San Diego Assistant District Attorney, and told her assistant about apotemnophilia, a fetish identified by psychologist John Money, in which an individual is sexually turned on by missing limbs and sometimes wishes to become an amputee.
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Why Did He Cut Off That Man’s Leg? (1999)
Dallas Denny, an Atlanta-based transgender author and activist who periodically posts warnings about Brown on the Internet, says that among transsexuals he was known as “Table Top Brown” for his willingness to operate in kitchens, garages and motel rooms.
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JoAnn Roberts: On My Mind (2006)
“On my Mind” was JoAnn Roberts’ column as publisher of LadyLike. Here she remembers and eulogizes a number of transgender community publications, including Transgender Tapestry. I was editor of Tapestry from 2000-2008.
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Of Men, Women, and Those Living Somewhere in Between (1997)
“When you get political, you get a great sense of pride in yourself,” says Denny, herself a transsexual. “People struggle with this, often for decades. It can’t be cured. It is not a disease. It is just a way to be human, People are just trying to live their lives with dignity and respect for themselves.”
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AEGIS Advisory Board (1992)
The nonprofit AEGIS maintained an interdisciplinary advisory board from 1991 through 1998. Members were distinguished in fields that were important to transsexualism and transsexuals and were consulted on policy issues and the advisories we periodically released.
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AEGIS Fact Sheet (1993)
The American Educational Gender Information Service, Inc. (AEGIS) is a 501(c) (3) nonprofit clearinghouse for transsexual and transgender issues. AEGIS actively supports the professionalization and standardization of services for transgendered persons; promotes non-judgmental, non-discriminatory treatment of persons with gender issues; advocate respect for their dignity, their right to treatment, and their right to choose their gender role; helps transgendered persons make reasoned and informed decisions about the ways in which they will live their lives; and provides educational materials, information, and referrals.
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A Guide to the HBIGDA Standards of Care (1993)
In 1993 we developed this brief guide to the HBIGDA Standards of Care and sent it, along with the Standards, to people seeking information and support.
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Pride Special (1994)
Member of the Atlanta Gender Explorations Support Group, including myself, passed out thousands of these flyers at Atlanta Pride events during the 1990s—and we distributed them to activists and organizations around the world for use at their local events.
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Zum Thema Hormone, mal wieder (1994)
A half-dozen or so of my essays have been translated into a variety of languages, including German, Dutch, and Norwegian. The translations were web-published, and all seem to be gone now. I happened to make a copy of this German translation.
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Trans Activist Runs for Pine Lake City Council (2001)
The tiny town of Pine Lake, a former resort community located just outside 1-285 near Stone Mountain, will soon learn whether it will be home to another political first for Georgia and possibly the U.S. on Nov. 6.
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