About #IAmCait, Houston and HEROES

Image Caption: "I am just so done with this ignorance of intersectionality. As in, ya'll need to stop ignoring one set of rights for another. Image Credit: http://hairypitsandtits.tumblr.com/post/33112915839 

I've got nothing but respect for Jenny Boylan and the team of women working with Caitlyn Jenner but the news of their visit to Second Baptist Church in Houston has me concerned.

Everyone has the right to evolve, but when will a primarily white trans movement evolve past it's own white privilege?

It's a privilege to attend a Southern Baptist Church for many white folks and if you don't know your Baptist churches, that's just one more sign that you should be working with more Black trans folks like Monica Roberts!

Sure, I'm glad SBC got around to apologizing for its abject racist history and for banning Black folks from marrying in their churches as late as 2012, but the lack of intersectional approach in the transgender movement is part of what is killing Black trans women.

One on side I see a lack of outreach by trans leadership to Black communities about the lived experience and rich history of gender diversity in Black communities. On another side, I see tone deaf missteps by white transgender leaders who choose to dismiss voices that represent Black communities, or in some cases work to silence those voices in favor of working with Black trans folks without strong, productive working relationships with the Black community.

And I don't just see this in the trans community, this is an epidemic in the larger LGBTQIA community that's been taking the lives of Black people for some time.

It's time we start fighting back against the racism and white privilege in the LGBTQIA community, wherever and whenever we may see it.

This Black bi cis woman has your back Monica, for you are my sister and your struggle is indeed bound up with mine.

May we see freedom come faster than this.

Recommended reading:
My Being Patient With Caitlyn Is Over via TransGriot
Caitlyn Comes To H-town, Screws Up Again via TransGriot
Should Have Voted For HERO via TransGriot

Image of Monica Roberts courtesy of National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC), a leading advocacy non-profit for the Black LGBT community. Image Caption: "We have a history and proud leadership legacy as Black trans people to live up to and build upon." - Monica Roberts, Founder TransGriot

Jonathan Butler, Mizzou Hero

Black students are doing battle for their lives as reports of the KKK on campus and repeated threats of violence targeting Black students and all Black people. 

There are dozens of courageous Mizzou students fighting for the right to attend school safely, but I want to call out Jonathan Butler for additional love and light for making this powerful statement: 

"We will not continue to be called niggers on this campus, believe that!"

Butler's hunger strike ended with the resignation of the University of Missouri chancellor, but the fight for justice continues.

WE STAND WITH YOU JONATHAN BUTLER AND ALL BLACK STUDENTS AT MIZZOU!

Further reading:
http://www.refinery29.com/2015/11/97468/university-missouri-protests#.jt4o55a:gBYf
http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2015/11/11/the_federalist_and_sean_davis_say_the_feces_swastika_at_mizzou_was_a_hoax.html
http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/blackoncampus-continues-national-discussion-race-sparked-mizzou
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/tim-wolfe-homecoming-parade_56402cc8e4b0307f2cadea10

Waiting on GLAAD: Bisexual Representation In Media 2015

Photo: Wooden desk with glasses, writer and books and the words "From the desk of Faith Cheltenham". Credit: thefayth.blogspot.com / Faith Cheltenham

Every time the bisexual community asks for GLAAD​ to tackle current or upcoming biphobia, it's been a waiting game. Usually, we are asked to wait until GLAAD can utilize the relationships it has with networks and studios to foster a better representation for bi people on TV and Film.

I've been told I need to "wait and see" because we haven't read the script. If there was a gay "showrunner" like in the case of the rampant biphobia on GLEE, there was no response, which has been all too common.

So, I'm still waiting.

Meanwhile, bisexual actor Michelle Rodriguez​ is set to star in a potentially problematic "gender bending" thriller, and there's been an immediate response from GLAAD.

GLAAD's Nick Adams​ (WHO I RESPECT THE HELL OUT OF) says, it's a concept that's disappointing, and he's right, even if he's not read the script. Anything with the potential to dismantle progress for trans rights should be highly scrutinized.

READ: GLAAD Calls 'Tomboy' "Disappointing": Gender Reassignment Surgery Isn't a "Sensationalistic Plot Device"

One day, I hope that will ALSO be the case for the bisexual community too. We need LGBT orgs to get past making bisexual people "visible" just one week a year, and start tackling the prominent media issues of biphobia and bisexual erasure.

I salute Eliel Cruz, a bisexual person of faith advocate, for kickstarting a campaign to hold MTV accountable regarding recent biphobia on "Faking It". Cruz is directing petition signers to also petition GLAAD via social media and email to take action.

 Photo: Eliel Cruz in a tie. Credit: Courtesy of elielcruzwrites.tumblr.com and BiAnyMeans.com

SIGN: MTV's Faking It Carelessly Reinforces Bisexual Stereotypes #NotFakingIt

I have hope that someday organizations just like GLAAD will see bisexual celebrities worthy of work that supports and fosters their identity as well as the larger bi, pan, fluid, queer (bi+) community. 

It's long past time that bi celebs stop being seen as "ALLIES" that support the LGBT community, without recognition of the incredible challenges they face as bisexual celebs. 

How will bisexual representation in media or in life every change otherwise?

#DemDebate Racial Air Quotes

Jim Webb's problematic explanation of affirmative action had me in tears...of laughter.

#DemDebate

Standing Bi Jennicet Gutiérrez

This year saw the fewest bisexual advocates in attendance at the White House LGBT Pride Reception since 2010. Only two invites were provided to bi community advocates who work on behalf of bisexual communities. In fact, more bisexuals have died by suicide in the last 3 months, than the number of bisexuals invited to represent us at the White House LGBT Pride Reception this year.

Photo Credit/Caption: Banner with name of bi+ teens who died recently of suicide (Blake, Taylor, Alyssa and Adam)

From what I can see from my personal Facebook feed, there WERE a huge amount of transgender advocates in attendance at the event, including members of SPARTA, a transgender military organization. So I don't think it's accurate to claim that the LGBT community was pushing back on trans people by booing Jennicet Gutiérrez when she stood up to demand President Obama address the subject of transgender women detained alongside cisgender men.


Photo Credit/Caption: Familia Trans Queer Liberation Movement members in front of the White House after an undocumented LGBT advocate was denied access to the White House just last month.

Yet, questions still remain. Would Ms. Gutiérrez have been booed if she were Black? If she were cisgender, instead of transgender? If she had a sign clearly listing her demand for #Not1More? Is it time to put down your protest sign if you've been invited to the White House for a social engagement?

Recently I was at a movie theater and I was asked to be wanded by security twice. I told security I had already been wanded but they did not believe me and my friend. Instead they let the white part of our group enter and took us folks of color aside for further security inspection. At a movie theater.

I'm not one to take such treatment in silence, so as I walked over to be wanded I called out, "It's fine! I'm gonna go over here and keep being Black OK?" Personally I thought I was being funny in light of the situation but a white woman came out of line and yelled at me in disagreement! She said "stop making it always about race" and "you need to stop bringing that up". Since I'd never met this white woman before I will assume she was referring to #blacklivesmatter and all demands for Black equality.

That's what it's often like for people of color when they speak up against basic injustices. I've been wanded, searched, and frisked while walking while Black. I have been pulled over countless times while driving while Black. I regularly experience racism and when I can, I SPEAK UP!

Photo Credit/Caption: Faith Cheltenham, BiNet USA President holding sign up for #NotToProudToFight 

Special thanks to Darnell Moore for starting the conversation.

If I will not stay silent in the face of my life being considered irrelevant, how can I possibly expect SILENCE from a transgender Latina woman currently subject to being detained with cisgender men who will assault her? If folks wanna enjoy the appetizers and drinks at White House receptions, they need to help end the dangerous circumstances for transgender women in immigration detention.


Photo Credit/Caption: Task Force Executive Director Urvashi Vaid interrupts President Bush's first and only AIDS policy speech in 1990. Her sign also reflects the history of bisexual erasure in the HIV/AIDS movement.

I've been witnessing the push back directed at trans people of color, many of them my friends, allies and fellow bi+ community members. They are fighting for their lives to be reflected in a transgender revolution that does not speak of their issues. Imagine what it must be like for LGBT people subject to detainment, to enter the White House alongside so many like myself who are not subject to that detainment.


The 6 white, cis, gay men above are the LGBT ambassadors for the US. Is that what your equality looks like?

As a member of the bisexual community, which has long been shit upon, I can well imagine the feelings of alienation, exclusion and loneliness that come with fighting from within your own community to be recognized. That feeling is far too familiar for LGBT people of color in their own movement. We are too often tokenized, utilized and USED UP by a white LGBT establishment that drowns out our grievances in favor of celebrating "wins".

So while you celebrate marriage equality today, keep in mind the fight still has a long way to go.

Fluid Pride Flag

In 2002, I co-founded UCLA's Fluid, a bi/pan/fluid/queer student group at UCLA. At the time I was unaware of the over 24 different labels that bisexual community members frequently use to describe themselves. I loved fluid for how it fit my particular sensibilities of not having any particular sensibilities when it came to my attractions. I loved fluid for how it described my capacity to be attracted to more than one gender. I love that our community has so many terms to describe itself and in discussion with trans and bi advocate Tara Avery during this year's LA Pride festival we mocked out what a fluid pride flag might look like.

Royal Blue and Lavender stripes acknowledge that fluid community members are proudly part of the bisexual community, the flag of which shares these same stripes. Turquoise is an acknowledgement of the pansexual pride flag as well as the many bisexual, pansexual, fluid and queer people who celebrate the power bisexuality has to set us free from binaries of gender and sexuality.

NEW FOR 2019 - larger size

BiNet USA President Faith Cheltenham Is Bruin Pride

Had some fun recently at UCLA's LGBT Resource Center, shooting a segment for "I am Bruin Pride", a documentary and archival project honoring the words, stories, and contributions of LGBT students, faculty, staff and alumni of UCLA.

  

 Image Copyright Jack Kaden, I Am Bruin Pride Project 2015

About The "I Am Bruin Pride" project:
UCLA's LGBT Campus Resource Center proudly presents the I Am Bruin Pride Project, a documentary and archival project honoring the words, stories, and contributions of LGBT students, faculty, staff and alumni of UCLA.

“I Am Bruin Pride” presents the stories, experiences, and contributions of LGBT students, staff, faculty, and alumni of UCLA in an inclusive and diverse manner. Each interviewee has been picked based on a variety of factors contributing towards a diversity in race, experience, orientation, and identity. Featuring a poster series and an interview, “I Am Bruin Pride” documents the important histories of those within the UCLA LGBT community.

Here's the link to the "I Am Bruin pride" nomination form. Anyone is welcome to nominate themselves or someone else.

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1hRgkUh3kViavmDuz19w7bdiqKx-qO_Au7YoL5kWl8HQ/viewform

In prep for my interview I put together some bullet points of what I got up to while at UCLA...and what I've been up to recently!

UCLA Accomplishments

1998

Sexual Violence Prevention Program Director, Student Welfare Commission

1999

HRC Campaign College Internship on Gore 2000 campaign

(My reference letter was provided by UCLA LGBT Center Director Ronni Sanlo)

2000

Board member, La Familia

2001-2004

• Co-chair/Co-Founder, UCLA’s BlaQue
• Co-chair/Co-Founder, UCLA’s Fluid
• Co-Founder, UCLA’s Queer x Girl
• Co-chair/Co-Founder of UCLA’s Queer Alliance 
• Managed organization’s budgets (over $67,000) 
• Created annual Queer Student Leadership Retreat in Lake Arrowhead
• Co-created “The Other Side of The Rainbow (TOSTR)” to celebrate LGBT POC
• Established computer lab for Queer Student Center
• Presented at UC-LGBTIA conference, Feb.  2004.  UC San Diego.

2005
Chair – UCLA’s EnigmaCon 2005: A Tsunami Relief Benefit

UCLA AWARDS 

UCLA Women for Change Student Leader Award, 2003 

“Zeke” Weber Award for Excellence in Activism and Education, 2005

Accomplishments at large

• Appearances on 2006 Emmy award-winning FX Networks docu-series show on race in America, “Black. White”.
• Successful corporate launches of web/digital projects for clients like Macmillan’s tor.com, Oprah Winfrey Network’s “Finding Sarah” show, and Warner Bros.’ “Harry Potter Book 7 Part 2” film.
• Writing for Huffington Post, Advocate, South Florida Gay News, and the BiNet USA blog or my personal testimonies on Truth Wins Out, #StillBisexual, I’m From Driftwood and the Center for American Progress.
• Speaking engagements at locations as varied as the California Democrats State Convention, The GLBT History Museum, The United States Senate Hart Building, San Diego Comic Con, UCLA, The White House, HRC’s Time to THRIVE Conference and Yale University.  
• Appointee, University of California LGBT Task Force (2012-2014)
• Co-organizer, 2013 Bisexual Community Issues Roundtable at the White House
• 2014 invitee and stage participant, White House Executive Order signing 
• First president of a bisexual non-profit to meet with a sitting U.S. President alongside other LGBT leaders.
• Parent to a child, “Storm”

Bisexual Is Not Always An Umbrella

I'm leaning away from using bisexual as an umbrella term; umbrellas are supposed to keep the rain off of you, instead of bring it. Bisexual is a political term that the bisexual community fought 40 years to see used with pride.  Just like gay doesn't always mean happy and lesbian doesn't refer just to an island, bisexual does not refer to two; it refers to “more than one”. We are the people with the capacity to be attracted to more than one type, and we have many ways to describe that. Please don't "identity police" and ask us to erase the generations of activism that led us to this point. Words like bisexual can change over time, but what doesn't is the need to respect complex sexualities. If you identity yourself as pansexual, polysexual, multisexual, fluid, queer, and/or non-monosexual, do so with the full knowledge of what the term bisexual has meant politically and how it was also used as a tool to serve transgender communities and re-frame the dialogue about sexual minorities away from gay and lesbian alone. I am proud to stand by bisexual, are you proud enough to stand by me, no matter what the wind and rain may bring?