To view a PDF file, you need the free Adobe Acrobat Reader, version 3.01 or higher. Click here to go to the Adobe website August 2000 August 2000 Newsletter: To download the August Newsletter in Adobe Acrobat PDF format, please Right-Click on the following link, and then choose "Save Target" or "Save Link" (depending on your browser). Rightclick here to Download the August 2000 Newsletter While you're downloading the newsletter, perhaps you might consider joining CDI - if you do, you can receive the Newsletter in the mail, and save time! SPECIAL NOTE: Because of the photo spread on pages 6 and 7, the PDF for August is unusually large and takes a very long time to download, even with a 56K modem - also, because of that photo montage, the pages are being presented for this issue in "printer order" and on what would print on 11x17 - if you plan to print from this PDF, make sure your printer can accommodate the paper size. 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Rightclick here to Download the January 2000 Newsletter While you're downloading the newsletter, perhaps you might consider joining CDI - if you do, you can receive the Newsletter in the mail, and save time! Back Issues April 1999 Table of Contents - April 1999 An American Transvestite in London, by Cassandra Hilton | Adventure in Bluegrass Country: IFGE Takes Louisville By Storm, By Nancy Lamar | April Meeting To Feature Makeover | President’s Message: Observations on the Uniform Experience! By Nancy Lamar | Plan Now for Washington D.C. Lobby Days in May | Justice for all in the workplace? June Meeting a Party at Androgyny Featuring CDI Pool Tournament Guest Editorial: Truth! Thugs Targeting the Transgendered! By Riki Anne Wilchins < Recent Newsletter Highlights: Coming Events! Mark your calendars for CDI’s annual swimsuit event. The date is Thursday, August 17, 2000, and the place is the CDI Apartment, 404 West 40th Street, Apt. 2 (first floor rear). Mark your calendars for Dinner at Rubyfruit, NYC's premier upscale lesbian hangout. The date is Thursday, September 21, 2000, and the place is the Rubyfruit Bar and Grill, 531 Hudson Street (near West 10th Street) - Dinner at 8 pm. Mark your calendars for CDI’s annual costume party. The date is Tuesday , October 31, 2000, and the place is the Cabaret Room at Judy’s Chelsea, 169 Eighth Avenue, between 18th and 19th Streets. Wedding En Femme in New Jersey A great time for vow renewal By Linda Louise Everyone loves a wedding. Last month, I had the opportunity to attend a wedding. It was a wonderful affair but unlike most weddings this one had a decided twist to it. The happy couple had been married for several years and had decided to renew their vows crossdressed. The wedding was open to the entire crossdressing community and all were welcome. The church was beautifully decorated. The music was provided by the organist was beautiful as the couple came into the church. The groom (in real life, the wife) was immaculately dressed in a tuxedo and looked very handsome as “he” escorted the Bride who was beautifully dressed in a lovely wedding gown and impeccably made up. Following the ceremony we all retreated to the garden to feast on the traditional wedding fare of burgers, franks, potato chips and wedding cake. It was truly delightful. Reflections onPride March in June The President's Message, by Nancy Lamar So I made The Great Decision! To stick my (lovely) neck out a bit, and march in the transgender section of New York’s humongous Heritage of Pride Parade (on Sunday, June 26th). Along with Hillary Clinton, Rudy Giuliani (they in drab..me in drag) and hundreds of thousands of shouting, chanting, ebullient, out-of-the-closet gays and lesbians, some dressed, some pretty undressed, and if we separate out the 200 or so drag queens, maybe 50 or so transgendered people like you and me were out and proud. (Well, I still had that nagging fear of being spotted by someone I know.) But I made a second, less wise, decision to go along with the first, which was not to tell my wife! She knows about the crossdressing, but doesn’t want to see me as Nancy or discuss Nancy’s comings and goings. Thus, I tried a little verbal Houdini doubletalk about a very improbable CDI meeting Sunday morning with the Gender Identity Project (which really did sponsor the transgender section in the parade). This all seemed to have worked fine until CBS radio woke us up at 8 a.m. (as I’d asked her to do) with a blaring announcement about the noon gay and lesbian parade. Oh my! “Marching in the Gay Parade Dear ?” Caught in the act! So I admitted it, and got the gentle criticism I deserved, not about marching in the Parade (gay or not), but about telling a white lie. Maybe my Masculine Self learned a lesson! Maybe not! My Feminine Self has come to the conclusion that crossdressing is more than a closet fetish. It’s a second, real part of me, and Nancy has to partake of the real (transgender) world, including occasional, personally-risky, community-building behavior. For the Parade, that meant dressing Sunday morning, taking a subway en femme with two other CDI stalwarts to the Parade starting point. And there I was, sweating bullets in my tight corset, lovely (hot) taupe pantyhose, and my wig. (for our section, the noon Parade actually started to move sometime around l p.m.). Then we started slooooow-ly strolling down 5th Avenue from 56th Street toward the Village as the heat and humidity tried to melt my femininity. I was proud to be marching along with four dozen transgender sisters (all to the good), by showing a CDI presence to our own NY transcommunity, and also adding to a microscopic addition to the TG presence for the benefit of the mostly gay/lesbian onlookers. It all comes back to two, very real personae living in one body: Masculine Me, a happily-married, normal-acting man, and Nancy Lamar, a happily-attired, normal-acting woman. Each has his/her agenda. And, as for Him explaining Her behavior and visa versa, I’m starting to learn that the more I tell the truth (within reason and discretion), the better! nancy lamar p.s.: next year: no corset, and no stockings (and no BS to my wife). But there was the one thing I did right: I will wear the same comfortable flat shoes. See you in the Parade! nancy. An open reply to Rod Dreher and the New York Post! Rod Dreher and your editor have something in common. Both his picture and mine served to illustrate his diatribe in the Tuesday, June 6, 2000 issue of the New York Post. There I am, right at the top of page 24 (copied above!). But beyond that, it appears we have nothing at all in common. In reading his words, I found myself sadly shaking my head in disbelief at exactly the sort of “fringe kook” (to use his own words) this man is. I am pleased to ally myself (personally) with the Empire State Pride Agenda, The Anti-Violence Project, and others, in opposition to the airing of a “Dr.” Laura television show. Let’s start with a principle. Human rights advocates believe that people ought to be protected against discrimination on the basis of “immutable characteristics.” These are things about a person over which the person has no control and to the extent these things are immaterial to a job, or to housing, public accommodations, education or credit, there should be no discrimination. Immutable characteristics include: race, color, ethnicity, national origin, ancestry, alienage status, sex assignment, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation and religion. I grant that alienage status and religion can be changed, but the former is in the realm of government consent, while the latter is a matter of personal choice. Dreher indicates that people who engage in homosexual activity or sexual activity of any kind are making a “moral choice.” Somehow he confuses sexual orientation, which is an immutable characteristic, with sexual activity, which does involve a “moral choice.” But don’t impose that choice on others! I personally question the morality of people who condemn gays for the “moral choice” of a “promiscuous lifestyle,” who, like Dreher and his pal Dr. Dobson, are the ones who holler the loudest against the idea of “gay marriage.” Yes, promiscuity is indeed a moral question, and moral and religious leaders ought to confine themselves to answering the contradiction between their stance against promiscuity, and their stance against gay people entering into stable family relationships through an institution like marriage. Dreher says he believes that only fringe kooks believe race hate can be justified by their twisted view of morality, and then goes right on to prove that his own view of morality is just as twisted. Dreher implies that hatred of gays is okay, ergo Dreher is himself a twisted kook. Quod erat demonstrandum! Dreher uses his overactive imagination to describe a situation involving “Massachusetts dad” Brian Camenker. Dreher doesn’t bother to identify Camenker as a dangerous homophobe and the leader of a pseudo-conservative organization called “The Parents Rights Coalition.” Dreher describes a workshop attended by Camenker with a tape recorder as involving “gay instructors explaining and encouraging kinky sex techniques to kids.” Here are the facts. The name of the workshop was “Teach Out 2000” and it was sponsored by the Boston chapter of GLSEN. The segment that was taped by Camenker and his accomplice involved answers to questions that were anonymously submitted by the teenagers. High school students should not be kept ignorant of the facts when they apparently already know enough about things to be able to ask the questions! According to a news report in the Boston Globe (May 19, 2000, page B 4), one parent who attended the conference with her daughter said the explicit nature of the discussions weren’t disturbing. “The gay youth had questions, and they were answered by trained individuals,” said Arlington parent Susan Ruggiero, whose 17-year-old daughter attended the question-and-answer workshop. “They went of their own free will. It wasn’t introduced into any curriculum. It was youth-led.” Of course, Dreher’s column doesn’t reflect the facts, because Dreher’s homophobic (and transphobic!) agenda is so clear from his column - and if the facts get in the way, Rod Dreher will simply ignore them or change them! Dreher’s blatantly obvious attempt to paint GLAAD as a “sick” organization refers to an Alexandria, Virginia, Transgender “conference and expo” in February 2000. He describes a sadomasochism workshop and implies that this is typical of gays and transgendered individuals. I can only imagine what Dreher’s warped little mind would have made of the IFGE convention in March! He could have chortled over the Sissy Maid class materials being held up at Customs, or perhaps made fun of the Kindred Spirits. The Dreher Diatribe, full of misstatements, illogical conclusions and outright lies, was a poor accompaniment for my picture. Then again, it was that rag, the Post, after all. CDI Home | Newsletter Index | Join CDI | Feedback | Links | Joann Percy Copyright 1999 Crossdressers International