Help The Fully Functional Cabaret reach their funding goal!
A thunderous, campy, beautiful love letter to trans womanhood written and produced by and starring an all-trans-woman cast; a peepshow into our hearts and vices.
From Annie Danger:
Dear Fully Functional supporters (and other interested parties):
We are so close!! We are $1067 away with only 12 days left until the end of our campaign. Will you donate? Now? Before you click on anything else?
New Perk: $50 gets you a 24” X 36” Potentially Unflattering Portrait of the cast, drawn by yours truly! (Without looking at the paper, just the cast!)
Share now!
Fierce...Flawless...: amydentata: Some anti-trans folks love to pearl clutch and rationalize...
Some anti-trans folks love to pearl clutch and rationalize it by saying they don’t like penetration.
Last time I tried penetrative sex, purely as an experiment, I was in tears by the end of it. It was that upsetting for me. There’s a reason I need to get surgery. That shit down…
Same for me. The last time I tried penetrative sex was over eight years ago.
I have been living in my present apartment for nearly seven years.
I started transitioning over four years ago.
I mean, there’s the rare occasion when I find it enjoyable. But I have to be in a very specific mood, feeling very secure, and with just the right person whom I trust completely. And even then, it’s pretty freakin’ weird. Just an enjoyable kind of weird. And it usually works better as fantasy than as reality. (And strapons are a million times more enjoyable.)
Interpretive Screaming: Catharsis: Trans Women's Stories of Sexual Violence CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS
Call For Submissions 4/3/12 **Please Share & Repost!**
Catharsis: Trans Women’s Stories of Sexual Violence is seeking written submissions from trans women who are willing to share their experiences of sexual violence and assault. The goal is to create a book-length collection of personal essays and stories from trans women about their individual experiences. Through compiling these stories, we hope to counteract the tendency of broader feminist dialog to deal with the subject of violence against trans women as hypothetical, ethereal, and comparatively minimal. We also hope that such a compilation would reinforce the place of trans women among all women and help to bring support and healing to our often overlooked communities.
DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS IS JULY 31ST, 2012! For Submission Form Please go to: http://catharsisproject.wufoo.com/forms/catharsis-submission-form/
What We’re Looking For: Stories of personal experience from self-identified trans women who are survivors of rape, sexual assault, or other sexual violence. Submissions should be roughly 2-5 pages in length and focus primarily on individual experiences and feelings. Because every individual processes these experiences in different ways, the “tone” of the collection will be left to the contributors. Anger, humor, grief, healing, indifference, etc. are all welcome themes. Those wishing to remain anonymous will have that wish respected and not be named in the final publication. Anonymity will be granted to the degree at which it’s requested, so please make your needs clear with your submissions.
Why Trans Women Only? The perception that trans women are less often targets of sexual violence is incredibly pervasive, even among allies to the trans community. This erroneous assumption is deeply rooted in cissexism, transphobia, and transmisogyny. While sexual violence affects many communities and is often taboo or “invisible” in those communities, trans women’s experiences are uniquely derided and ignored. This results in the isolation of trans women survivors, a culture of silence within broader trans communities, and a false pretense for the exclusion of trans women from feminist conversations about rape and assault. The purpose of this collection is to give voice to and encourage dialog around the specific reality of sexual violence against trans women. We are interested in work by trans women of all backgrounds, regardless of transition status, race, class, education, ability, age, orientation, or occupation. Any survivor of sexual violence that self-identifies as a trans woman is encouraged to contribute. To send submit your story, go to: http://catharsisproject.wufoo.com/forms/catharsis-submission-form/
Anyone wishing to assist this project is encouraged to **forward this call for submissions widely.**
If you want to help further or have any questions please contact reddurkin@gmail.com
fyi trans women survivors of sexual violence, just passing this along—this resource needs to exist and having red behind this project assures that it will be stellar!
(Porn) I Have a Clip on The Woman’s POV
Upcoming Show: That’s What She Said!
See me perform true-life hilaribad stories as part of That’s What She Said, a variety show that celebrates the creative work of women!
When: Saturday April 21st at 8pm
Where: The Garage (975 Howard St, San Francisco, CA)
Seconded. And I know it’s not my place to even attempt to understand them, but I have actually struggled over reblogging their photos, with their watermark, to my NSFW blog. Even after doing research and making sure that’s their label.
Same here. I want to be all supportive and “every identity is valid”, but when an identity is based in demeaning stereotypes used to keep me down? It’s a bit harder. At the same time, I see similarities between my attitude toward them and that of “false-consciousness” sex-negative feminists. But yet, it’s undeniable there is extreme pressure put on trans people to adopt cissexist identities to survive, and undeniable those identities have a wide-reaching effect beyond those who self-identify. And while some sex-positive feminists reclaim slurs like “slut” and “whore”, those are descriptors used on the existing identity of “woman”, not labels used to erase and replace one’s identity entirely.
When I first started writing on the othering of trans women in porn, I incorrectly assumed all CAMAB trans people were on the same page with this. I don’t know how to fit those who self-identify as cissexist slurs into the discussion, and I’m not sure if I want to. Telling me this horrible slur isn’t a slur, that just doesn’t click. But then, I see similarities between that and how some people refuse the label of “queer” because of its history. However, people only started reclaiming “queer” on a broad scale after GL rights established a good deal of traction. The trans community hasn’t come that far yet. And I cringe at the idea of those slurs being reclaimed.
tldr; It’s complicated.
I Just Did the Math
My 1st puberty (aka The Wrong Puberty aka The Torture Chamber) started roughly when I was 12. I started taking hormones (aka The Right Puberty aka The Light at the End of the Tunnel) when I was 20. I’m now 30. Let’s take a look at the scoreboard:
Wrong Puberty: 8 years
Right Puberty: 10 years and counting
The Right Puberty has overtaken the Torture Chamber! This is officially the new normal. I’m racking up positive experiences in a more-correct body, to outweigh all the bad years. The pain is evening out with positivity.
Here is a recent interview I did discussing transmisogyny with the folks at Gendercast: Our Transmasculine Genderqueery. If you’ve got some time, I suggest giving it a listen.
Gendercast Episode 21: Transmisogyny: Interview with Tobi Hill-Meyer
Join Gendercast for our interview with Tobi Hill-Meyer as she so eloquently discusses transmisogyny, language about gender, analyses on the word *transmasculine and creates new meaning(s), pronouns, and her experiences at both Michfest and the Butch Voices national conference as a trans woman. She’ll tell us all about her unique narrative, being raised by second-wave feminist parents, and expands categories beyond the limits of a binary narrative of being socialiazed according to one’s sex assigned at birth. Also, there’s a nice smutty treat for you at the end of the episode, compliments of BB Rydell.
Episode Links
Tobi also talks about some of her projects, including:
Handbasket Productions and Tobi’s tumblr and her Girl Talk 2011 performance
her zine, Trans Sexuality: A Safe Sex Guide for Trans People and Their Partners
her film, Genderfellator
her article What Transmisogyny Looks Like in the Bilerco Project
the Brazen safe sex guide for Trans women Tobi mentions
the No More Apologies: Queer Trans and Cis Women Coming/Cumming Together! conference Tobi tell us about (this fb event for the conference in is the past, but has all the info)
and
The Gender Ternery: Understanding Transmisogyny blog post from A Radical TransFeminist (when I said fuck the patriarchy, I didn’t mean it literally) we reference
Julia Serano’s book The Whipping Girl
Check-in Links
If you liked his closing piece, also check out BB Rydell’s film Robin Hood is So Gay


