Why The Advocate Can’t Be Trusted

Unintentional inaccuracy?  Or deliberate subversion? 

You be the judge.

In the December 18th edition of the Shamvocate, its ringleaders make another attempt to con the public into believeing it gives a damn about trans issues and trans lives.  Part of this attempt is a running sidebar item, attributed to one Ryan Wentzel, entitled “A Transgender History.”

One item in that “history”:

1972: Sweden becomes the first country in the world to allow unmarried transsexual citizens to change their sex; the government will even pay for it.  Panama would become the second country to legalize transsexuality, in 1975.

Is the Shamvocate trying to pull a fast one by focusing on country, rather than states?  So it doesn’t have to mention the following problems for the Aravosisistic narrative of gay-supremacy history?

• 1955: Illinois enacts legislation recognizing transsexualism
• 1967: Arizona enacts legislation recognizing transsexualism
• 1968: Louisiana enacts legislation recognizing transsexualism

But, guess what?  Even if the Shamvocate wants to say it was only focusing on entire countries…

its still wrong!

There is that little matter of Switzerland recognizing change of sex at least as early as 1945 (and possibly as early as 1931.)

As for the Shamvocate’s “history,” it goes on to mention Minneapolis becoming the first city with a trans-inclusive ordinance - in 1975.  No problem there - though I think it would have been intellectually honest to point out that it happend only 18 months after the city had passed a gay-only ordinance, and it only happened because Twin Cities trannies bitched very loudly enough to scuttle an effort to enact the gay-only language at the state level.

Then this “history” hops to 1977 and Renee Richards’ victory - in a New York trial court - in her quest to play on the women’s tennis circuit.

Might there have been something between 1975 and 1977?  Something other than simply the year of 1976?  Like, perhaps, something that happened in 1976 that any legit, intended-to-be-informative-rather-than-deceptive trans “history” would have included?

Like, perhaps, a state appelate court recognizing - clearly and unequivocally - marital rights of post-op transsexuals?

Like, New Jersey?

Like, having done so - in M.T. v. J.T., 355 A.2d 204 (N.J Super. App. Div. 1976) - over thirty years before Lewis v. Harris?

Nice try, Shamvocate.

More High Quality Journalism (or the Lack Thereof) at the Advocate

This is only indirectly related to ENDA.  But, in light of the dubious items published by the Shamvocate on ENDA (hell, even Lame Crain snarks at it for its cozy relationship with HRC when it came to “that HRC poll”), I thought I’d pass it along.  It comes from Brynn Craffey at Bilerico and concerns what appears to be sloppy ‘journalism’ at the Shamvocate on the matter of civil unions in Ireland…

or lack thereof.

I don’t usually read the Advocate, online or otherwise, but an Irish friend alerted me to this article, saying. “It’s just pure laziness since, if they bothered to ask anyone in Ireland, they would know that the government has been promising civil partnership forever, and then conveniently forgetting about it.”

Honestly - I wonder how many college-level journalism classes use the Shamvocate for an endless examples of what not to do in the field of journalism?

Or the field of (wait for it) advocacy?

So Much For Bill Richardson

From the Bill Richardson for President website:

WASHINGTON, DC– New Mexico Governor and Democratic Presidential candidate Bill Richardson today released the following statement urging Congress to pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA):

“This should be a no-brainer for Congress: ENDA is an essential piece of civil rights legislation that has taken too long– thirteen years– to get to this point. It is hard to believe that we even have to debate prohibiting discrimination of any kind.

“I applaud Congressman Barney Frank for his tireless efforts in advancing the cause of equality and justice. However, let us be clear– the struggle for equality is not over. I am disappointed, as I know Congressman Frank is, that gender identity is not protected in today’s bill. That must be fixed.

“In my first year as Governor of New Mexico, I expanded anti-discrimination laws to include sexual orientation. I also signed into law New Mexico’s first hate crimes legislation, which included acts based on sexual orientation, and I issued an executive order extending state health insurance benefits to all domestic partnerships. As President of the United States, I will fight for those same protections and rights for every American.

“ENDA is a pivotal step toward equal treatment under the law for every American. Along with my friends in the LGBT community, I look forward to the day when this no longer is an issue, when discrimination of any kind is not tolerated, and when we can celebrate our diversity as a nation and the protection of every American’s civil rights.”

I wouldn’t be as offended by this if it did not include the line in which he presumes that Barney Frank is in any way disappointed that gender identity is not in ENDA.  Governor, have you been hanging around out in the New Mexico desert sampling the peyote?  Do you know anything whatsoever about who Barney Frank actually is and the generation of transphobic gays and lesbians that he actually represents?

BTW - I’m curious about something else.  In your “first year as Governor of New Mexico,” you “expanded anti-discrimination laws to include sexual orientation” and gender identity!  Why couldn’t you point that out in your press release?  Did the author of the actual text of the press release come to your campaign directly from the Shamvocate?

Wow - Actual Journalism Sighting at Queer Channel Media

Credit where credit is due - even to someone willing to allow the creation of a federal right for gays and lesbians to discriminate against trans people.  However, Kevin Naff apparently has a functioning nose - and the HRC ‘poll’ doesn’t pass his smell test.

The Advocate circulated a story yesterday claiming that 70 percent of “LGBT Americans prefer passing an Employment Non-Discrimination Act that does not cover transgender people over not passing the bill at all.”

 

Although I agree with that position and have asserted that those opposing gay-only ENDA were in the minority, I have strong reservations about the credibility of this poll.

 

First, there is no mention in the Advocate story of methodology. Was this a scientific poll? What is the margin of error? What were the options for response? I’ve never heard of a poll where 100 percent of respondents answered a firm yes or no. So how many didn’t know or didn’t have an opinion?

 

Second, there is no mention of the poll on HRC’s web site and HRC itself circulated the poll under the Advocate’s logo. Did the Advocate pay for the poll? Was this an internal HRC poll that was intentionally leaked to support its stance on gay-only ENDA? Or did an Advocate reporter somehow obtain the information independently?

 

It is the responsibility of journalists to ask and answer those questions before running with a story. The unfortunate result is that the numbers have been widely circulated online and accepted without challenge and the rest of the Advocate story reads like an HRC press release.

Unfortunately, Naff’s piece then devolves into a talking point in its own right (”The idea that the majority of the community opposes gay-only ENDA was flawed from the start.”)  And, it would have been nice to see some deeper questioning of the Advocate’s credibility.  Still, I have to give Naff credit for speaking truth to poll excrement.

Who Miraculously Came Up With a Poll Showing 70% of Gays Being Willing to a Right For Themselves to Discriminate Against Trans People?

[UPDATED - 11/06/07, 06:06 CST, see below] 

The Human Right Scampaign, that’s who!

And guess who is pimping it…

The Shamvocate!

According to a new poll, 70% of LGBT Americans prefer passing an Employment Non-discrimination Act that does not include transgender people over not passing the bill at all. The poll, commissioned by the Human Rights Campaign and conducted on October 26, surveyed 500 members of the LGBT community across the country.

Well, if it comes from HRC and is being touted using the highly objective journalistic standards of the Advocate, it must be legit, eh?

It might be different if HRC had just been shown to have been consistently lying to trans (and all) people about its position on Barney’s ENDA, or if the Advocate had recently showed its hand regarding its own pro-’incremental progress’ position.

Oh wait…

But, lets look again at the poll.

The poll specifically asked: “This proposal would make it illegal to fire gay, lesbian, and bisexual workers because of their sexual orientation. This proposal does not include people who are transgender. Would you favor or oppose this proposal moving forward?” Seventy percent favored moving forward with the legislation.

The poll also asked people if they agreed that “national gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender organizations should oppose this proposal because it excludes transgender people.” Only about 20% of the people agreed with that statement.

However, about 70% of people polled still believe that protections for transgender folks should be included in the ENDA proposal, as they did in a poll conducted in 2004—but they also favor passing a non-inclusive ENDA as a path to gaining those protections for transgender workers. This shows a shift from 2004 when 70% of LGB respondents indicated trans-inclusion was important even if it caused delay. 

HRC has come out in support of the Frank’s non-inclusive ENDA.

“We’re on the brink of a historic step in the right direction toward what we’re all fighting for,” said Solmonese, “and with a bill on the floor, regardless of whether you think it ever should have gotten there or not, I would hope that most people think it’s important for our entire community that the bill pass rather than fail.”

He added that HRC’s policies on ENDA have been more focused on the best way to achieve legislative goals than on the opinion of the community. HRC did not immediately release the numbers because, at the time, members of the community were still working on getting votes for gender identity inclusion.

“To release those numbers or cite those numbers would have undermined those efforts,” said Solmonese.

Will he release the demographics on who was polled? 

Was the sampling of the ‘community’ as representative of the ‘community’ as his workforce at the Scampaign?

Was the sampling slanted toward people who have been targeted with gay-sponsored transphobic propaganda claiming that opposition to Barney’s ENDA amounted to ‘holding millions of gays and lesbians hostage’?

Did the sampling include any trans person from either New York, Massachusetts, Nevada, Maryland, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Wisconsin or Hawaii?

Minds that are actually inquiring actually want to know.

Of course, those who are capable of being honest with thenmselves really know already.

**UPDATE**

Alex Blaze over at Bilerico is asking some questions also:

The Advocate article doesn’t say anything about methodology, only that the 500 people came from across the country. But were they representative? And how did they find these people? Donors to the HRC, Advocate subscribers, people with registered same-sex relationships and “across the country” means California, Connecticut, Vermont, and Massachusetts? What methodology did they use to control outside variables that would come with any list of queers?

Honest questions.

But, we’re dealing with an organization that has been proven to be as incapable of honesty as the Bush Administration.

[I]f true (which is entirely possible to me), this really just highlights the main reason that the ENDA should only move forward inclusively: no one’s going to come back for the T-folk. They’re a much smaller group, numerically, than the GLB and have even less money to be spending on lobbying. And if 70% of queers don’t see how much harder it’ll be to come back for the transgender people later, or the ramifications of, on the second major piece of specifically queer legislation at the federal level, splitting up the LGBTQ activist community, I don’t think that they’re going to put pressure on their advocacy groups over the next several years to lobby for an ENDA specifically about gender identity.

Ya think?

Aravosis Seemingly Thinks its Shocking That the Advocate Would Take a Transphobic Stance

[UPDATE - 10/24/2007, 6:54 am CDT: As if to amplify the ridiculousness of Aravosis's feigned shock that anyone at the Advocate - male or female - would adopt a wide transphobic stance, the entertainment magazine (it ceased being a news publication years ago) is uncritically repeating the imaginative claim by Alice Dreger that she has cleared the name and reputation of pseudo-science huckster J. Michael Bailey.

Alice Dreger wrote in the report that critics conducted a smear campaign intended to ruin Bailey, also a professor at Northwestern, because they disagreed with the basic findings of his book.

If anyone at the Shamvocate had a dictionary with which to look up the definition of 'journalism', it could just as easily have been discovered that even Dreger herself, in the paper being touted, acknowledged the truth of the central popular complaint against the huckster Bailey: that his 2003 The Man Who Would be Queen is not science.

But, just as The Man Who Would be Queen is not science, the Advocate remains as a magazine to trans people what HRC is to us as an organization.]

———-

Aravosis speaketh - apparently trying to make some sort of point that justifies his position:

The Advocate’s editor is a sexist, misogynistic, two-spirit hating, racist, transphobic, homocentric, rich white man

You see, John ‘it sucks to me me since I was stupid enough to rely on the prognosticatory abilities of Peter LaBarbera’ Aravosis is trying to make a funny; the editor of the Shamvocate is shilling for Barney’s ENDA and the editor of the Shamvocate is a woman - and that somehow upstages all supporters of the real ENDA because the oppenents of the real ENDA are often referred to with some variant of the term string that Aravosis pecked out above.

So…the fact that some of us occasionally fail to call out the lesbians among the rich, white, transphobic homocentric elitists along with the males bolsters your position how??????? (BTW - I like to think that I suffer from no such shortcoming.)

From the Shamvocate editorial that Aravosis is pimping:

The P.C. way is to squelch all dissent. And that keeps us from the real debate we urgently need.

Sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo…we didn’t urgently need such debate for the 32 years that those-who-know-what’s-best-for-all-GLBTs-because-they-say-they-know-what’s-best kept a trans-inclusive bill from ever being introduced?

Yah - keep in mind that this is the magazine that barely seven years ago ran an op-ed from the obnoxious transphobic bigot Norah Vincent which called for the extermination of transsexuality.

[M]any transsexuals, the most draconian arm of the PC language police, are fond of mis-using the word gender–mostly because, unlike the word sex, there’s no biological imperative attached to it. This is where the postmodernists are right. Gender in humans is socially constructed and therefore fungible. Coiffed wigs and makeup are feminine now, but our oh-so-butch founding fathers wore them once.

The PC thang? Where have I seen that before?

So why, as adults, do transsexuals mutilate their bodies in order to make them conform to the fashionable version of the opposite sex and gender? That only reinforces oppressive stereotypes every bit as much as liposuction or a bimbo’s boob job. If you’re a man in a woman’s body, then live androgynously if you’re such a revolutionary. Don’t conform. I do it every day, and it isn’t particularly easy. Half the time I’m sir, and half the time I’m ma’am, and that’s how it should be when sex and gender don’t matter.

If you truly want to thwart gender norms, don’t pull a fast one on the dictionary or your poor blameless privates. Live with all the polymorphy God gave you, body and soul. It’s a lot more radical.

Yes, in 2000, the Shamvocate ran an op-ed which did double-glorification: Janice Raymond and Paul McHugh, all on one page.

HRC likes to con people into believing its changed since then. The Shamvocate kinda tries, too.

But neither one has.

And, as for John Aravosis?

First you get suckered by The Peter. Now you (apparently) get suckered by the belief that anyone really believes that the Shamvocate gives a damn about trans people.

I hate to kick a prick when he’s limp - but if there’s one who has it coming, its The John.