Fallon Fox: A Woman at War

I will be honest and lay it out there:
If Fallon Fox was not a transgender woman, I wouldn’t be a fan. I only know about her because she came out of the closet as a TS woman who is involved in mixed martial arts. She pretty much was forced out as there were members of the press ready to go public with her private information.  As I pay attention to all things trans* I paid attention to Fallon. It certainly isn’t the fights; I do not watch the fights.

When she first came out it was a little obvious she had no desire to be a poster girl. But it seems society had different plans for Ms. Fox and the role of advocate and TS role model was thrust on her.

In the time since she was forced out by unscrupulous members of the press, she has represented and really come up to task in the capacity of a role model for TS rights advocates.
She has written articles, made public appearances and been active on social media all for transgender rights. All while maintaining her training and participating in the fighting world, she has been a stalwart social warrior.

Well, as fighters are prone, she has a fight upcoming soon. She will be fighting Tamikka “Boom Boom” Brent’s on September 13^th in Illinois.

Well cool, so big deal, she is fighting…it is what fighters do.
Ah but see there is a bit of a rub to all this:
Tamikka said some shit. {I know, that is part of the game…fighters talk smack about each other, but this time it is different.}
This is a quote from Ms. Brents
“I am tired of Fox getting all this publicity just for being a transgender fighter rather than having great skills. I think it’s unfair anyway but as long as the opponent knows and accepts the fight then go ahead… I mean Allana took her to the third and she’s not even a 145er; she’s a more of a 135er who can probably go even lower to 125 pounds. She’s using all that attention as a good publicity tactic – go ahead and ride that free publicity train as long as you can. I’ll gladly derail that s#*t quickly so the world can go back to giving the publicity and notice to the female fighters who earn it. It just pisses me off that Women’s MMA has fought to get away from being seen as a side show. She’s using that to further her career while setting Women’s MMA back in the process.”

I know, pretty petty and downright disrespectful of Fallon and all transsexual women. But wait….
It gets even better:
Ms. Brents is known for walking into the ring with an LGBT rainbow PRIDE flag draped about her proud shoulders as a cape, and she is a lesbian.

So yet again we have a lesbian woman playing the trans-women are not real women card. This is a bugaboo that pokes its biased head up allot and it really needs to be retired.  

Had Tamikka not said the transphobic stuff and just kept her smack talk in the realm of normal fighter trash talk I might not find myself automatically rooting for Fallon. I would have been very invested into the fight on both sides. I have a lesbian mother and identify as lesbian myself. I might have leaned to Fallon. She is well known and well loved in the circle of TS advocates and activists I like to consider friends. Fallon has been a public face of TS women and a good advocate, whereas Tamikka has only walked into the ring with a flag on her shoulders a couple times.

With all that in mind, I hope Fallon Fox wins by a first round KO. Oh and Ms. Brents needs to leave the PRIDE flag in her locker for this fight. She is not the champion for LGBT rights. That distinction belongs to Fallon.  

 

 

RIP Robin Williams

The passing of this great legend has the world in mourning.

I have nothing to add.


RIP you were an inspiration to us all.

The backlash religion faces is just.

We seem to be at a turning point in our culture where we are starting to somewhat recover from the trauma that institutions of religious power over the millennia inflicted on the world. Many people have suffered historical and personal injuries greatly at the hands of the religious institutions.
It is only normal and human for people to lash out against that which has harmed them. It often goes into the realm of the vicious and the absurd; and those who once were the victims can very easily become the oppressor. Again this is a human nature thing to desire to give as good as you got.
Now I think we do a great disservice to the original victims to cast them as the villain. It perpetuates the cycle. We need to unpack the issues and reveal all the old ugly stuff that oppressed for so long. It is unfortunate for the current followers of these religions to admit the harm their elders perpetuated on the world. But we have to address these issues if we as a culture will grow beyond them.

The TERF and TRANS* War Continues

Recently the war between transgender exclusionary radical feminists and transgender women has ratcheted up.

There have been doxxings and verbal violence flying around from both sides.

At heart of the battle is that TERF activists refuse to accept that TS women are indeed women and TS women asserting that they are indeed women.
Now one would think that such a disagreement would remain academic and reserved for the halls of philosophers but at the insistence of certain feminist voices {Trans* and TERF} this issue is worth going to war over.

TERF activists want spaces for women born women to remain transgender free. Now that seems a sticky subject. Ok, fine I wasn’t socialized as a female during my male days, but I sure as hell wasn’t treated like one of the boys. Sure go ahead and have your bonding experiences with other like minded women. Go to the Michigan Women’s Music Fest and your private group, get together activities. Not exactly very welcoming to all women…
But it isn’t that simple. TERF voices are calling trans* women men. That trans* women should not be allowed into any woman only space, like public restrooms and locker-rooms. They maintain that transgender females are somehow intrinsically dangerous to natal women and children. Some go as far as to say we rape women virtually; using our transformed bodies as a ticket into women’s spaces. The entire premise of their argument is very fear of rape mongering.

See now I have a problem. Trans* women are women. Period. Transgender females are much more likely to be attacked in a restroom. When we ask TERF Henie Penny’s to cite the evidence for the alleged dangers TS women pose, we are treated to a new round of circular logic and argument. No real evidence is presented.

I ask:
Would you really send me and my trans* sisters to the men’s facilities?!
Not only is it dangerous for trans* women to go to the men’s facilities, it also would be disruptive to society at large.

Let me say this loud and clear to any TERF reading this: Your ‘discomfort’ at seeing a TS woman does not trump a TS woman’s right to pee in peace. Your misplaced fears are not justification to send her into the men’s spaces. Transsexuals have the medical and psychological community’s on our side in these matters. The science is on the side of the trans* community. We are the gender we say we are.

 

The End of Prohibition in the Marijuana Era

First off I want to dedicate this article to the memory of my father A. Kent Bussell. For better or worse, for right or for wrong my father gave me my taste for marijuana and a sense of being a weed aficionado.
Now my father did not smoke me out my first time. The name of that person shall sit with me in secret as that person really should have not been smoking out a 7 year old. But it is what it is.
At about 10 or 11 years of age my dad gave up on fighting with me over the weed I was swiping from him and he gave me some rules of use and we slowly over the years became stoner buddies. See dad was a weed dealer and the stuff was always around. Weed put me through school, put clothes on my back and food on the table pretty much the entire time I lived with my father as a kid. For years I was his protégé, his mini me partner in crime; we would scale up more pot in a month than most people will see in a life time. Early on I developed a delicate palate for marijuana and I would grade the weed for dad. I probably shouldn’t go into to many details of these felonies my father committed, but he has long passed on and I am pretty sure the D.E.A. already has a much larger file on my father than I do, it is no big deal. Everyone who knew Kent, knew he was a drug dealer. This is no big revelation.

Dad was of two minds on the entire idea of marijuana prohibition repeal. On the one hand he wanted to be able to go into a store and be able to buy it without any worries about getting busted. Before being a weed dealer Kent was a weed smoker. He might sell you all the pot in the world, but he would never sell his last bag. On the other hand he knew that weed prohibition repeal would put guys like him out of work and it would take away the single best tool in his tool box for selling coke. (Yeah, dad sold coke, and some other heavy drugs.)
See the best way to build a coke or meth empire is to already have access to the local black market. You can show up 'Johnny Come Lately' in just about any town or city and start selling weed in one day and very few eyebrows are raised. But if you are new to a town and you try to start selling coke or meth you raise eyebrows, you step on toes and it gets a person busted fast or in a grave.
But with a weed empire in place it is much easier to ferret out whom is into the harder stuff.
I won’t go into the details of how to do it as I don’t want to give ideas to people, just trust me on this. You NEED marijuana to safely set up a hard drug empire. Weed is the key.

Daddy also used to say many times “the day someone figures out how to get the government to accept tax money on a weed sale, is the day weed becomes legal and I am out of a job.”

Personally I never thought I would see the day. I am not the only one who knows the dirty ins and outs of the drug trade. I am not the only one who knows the prominence and importance of marijuana to the black market. Big players, scary people who would kill for profit, who have pull and power know this stuff and make money from weed and from the black market that was created on the back of weed.
So I was rather surprised that Washington and Colorado have turned a new leaf in this department and they are now allowing the sale of marijuana in proper stores.

This morning Sevan and I were driving in Spokane to see a friend and on the way we spotted a marijuana store. I noticed there was an open sign and people were going in and out.
Well we did a u-turn after talking about it for a few seconds and we scrounged together our dollars. As I walked into the store and saw the meager over priced offerings I remembered my father and how we would talk about this day and if it would ever come or not.
I remembered the stress of so many back alleys and in the park weed deals over the years. Memories of going to the bad part of town and entering a building I knew for a fact was a front for a well known gang with international name recognition just to get some weed ran through my mind. The worry if I may get robbed, sold bunk weed, or laced weed was ever present when making a new connection. But there were none of those elements of danger. As it dawned on me just how momentous this moment really was I started to feel wonder and awe. The emotions started to whelm up in me. Until the last election when we legalized I never thought I would see this day. Even though we had passed the referendum part of me still doubted I would ever see this day.
Eventually it came up to my turn. The young man asked me what I wanted in the friendly manner one is accustomed to in other stores. It took a monumental effort to not burst into tears as I stood ready to make my request. I made my selection and paid my money then made my way out of the store quickly because I could feel the tears coming.
By the time I got to my car I was a blubbery, snotty, tear stained mess. Years and years of waiting for this day culminated in a small purchase of only a gram of mid grade marijuana that I paid more for than it was worth. Honestly I really didn’t even need the marijuana as I have a little bit of my medical grade crispy treats left over from last year’s harvest. But that gram of weed wasn’t about need; it was solely so I could do it. I bought that marijuana wishing my father was standing next to me, imagining how he would be joyful to be in that store. I bought it because this day has been so long overdue. I bought it because I want desperately to see the end of black market marijuana. No one knows better than me the price the drug wars have exacted on this society. I grew up at the knee of a drug lord seeing first hand how brutal it got over the years. I want the illegal trade to end.

As we drove off and I was composing myself I found myself wondering if back when alcohol prohibition was repealed if some woman had a tearful moment as she bought her first legal bottle of gin or whiskey. The feeling that a long hard righteous battle had been won is a feeling of anti-climax in a way. Since the day I bought my first bag of pot I have been part of the drug wars. Many times in the past I got involved in the marijuana trade simply out of a sense of duty and honor. The idea that the government was trying to eradicate this plant set wrong with me. That people were going to prison for a substance with so much potential while holding so few side effects was an injustice. I knew prohibition was wrong and I did my part to make sure that when prohibition was repealed we would have marijuana available.

What didn’t happen as I bought my marijuana is the most important part and the message society really needs to hear:
As I walked into the store I didn’t need to worry the marijuana dealer might have a gun, it didn’t even cross my mind. As I said hello to the store tenders I was greeted with a smile and in a professional manner and I was not intimidated. No body guard of questionable repute was guarding the dealer and weed. As I handed over my money for my package I was not offered a line of coke, a puff of meth or a dose of acid. There was no chance of that as no reasonable business would risk such idiocy. I was not pressured into buying more marijuana than I could afford. I was not invited to participate in any form of felonious activities. And that is the most important thing! No crime was involved, and no one conspired to commit a crime. It was a simple government sanctioned and TAXED transaction. It was just like going to any other store selling a specialty product.

Now at the exorbitant price of $25 a gram there is no way you can put a dent in the black market. The price is too high. If the local businesses can get the price down to $12.50 then the black market will start to slowly diminish. The reason why I say $12.50 is the magic number is because the average street price of a gram of high quality marijuana is $10.00. At $12.50 that is only two and a half bucks higher than the street price. This is two and a half bucks spent to not get busted buying black market weed. I am pretty sure the majority of pot smokers would gladly pay a $2.50 fee to not get busted. As it stands at $25.00 a gram for moderate grade weed it is a no brainer for the pot head already accustomed to breaking the law. It is a no brainer, the stoner is going to go to the black market dealer who will sell the pot head 2 grams for $20.00 and the criminal marijuana buyer has 5 bucks left over for Cheetos, Pepsi and Funyuns. The legal sellers are not going to be able to compete with the criminal sellers at these prices. Now sure you will see legal store sales to plenty of novelty buyers, marijuana tourists and people who do not smoke regularly as they do not have a dealer, but the heavy marijuana user is not going to be your customer. The person who is used to paying $10.00 is not going to be willing to pay $25.00; it is just simple economics here.
My advice to the powers that be in Washington State and the providers is if you are serious about putting an end to black market marijuana is to lower the price and open a bunch more stores. For the first 5 years completely undercut the black market. Drop the local price and you will squeeze out the black market dealer. As it stands, with folks having legal right to smoke, the black market will only get larger. I can tell you that a grower can make a enough money to make it worthwhile by selling as low as $5 a gram, at $10 a gram they are comfortable. Now that the prices are so high in the legal stores the black market dealer can safely push his product price up to $15.00 a gram and cut out the legal store from the loop and live very well.

But let us not bury the lead with negativity.

Today I walked into a professional marijuana store and bought marijuana. It has finally happened daddy. I wish you were here to see this day.
So as I spark this next doobie I dedicate it to the memory of my father who would have been just tickled pink to smoke a joint that has been taxed.

What Now?

What Now?
{a post Pride rumination}

Pride month has come to an end. Now that we are properly into July we can take all of the last couple months in and consider what to do now…

Tranny Bingo is still a thing, the name hasn’t changed.
The entire LGBT internal war over slurs has died down until the next major offender says something stupid.
The negative things that happened to trans* women at a few PRIDE events across the nation have slid away to be forgotten.
Radfems are still rabidly anti TS women.We have not reached a place of agreement between gay men and TS women over the use of transphobic slurs. The word war seems to have simmered to a dull mutual disdain. There are no major flame ups between the groups at this moment, but there could be a spark set it off at any time.

From the vantage point of this writers view of the world, stagnancy seems to best describe the state of the queer world.
Yes we are making gains in the courts with marriage rights being affirmed for all people, but there is not the normal atmosphere of exuberance one used to see when these judgments were handed down. Sure the various LGBTQQAI…etc/Queer organizations make a public post on FaceBook or an article on their respective webpage’s but there is no fire in the ranks.
It is a done deal; it is just a matter of time for the last of the hold outs to equality fall before the onslaught of judicial righteousness we have seen over the last few months.

Now what?

Where do we as a class turn our energies?

To what shall we turn to next?

There are many things left undone, but there seems to be little motivation left in the queer universe.
Now I am not talking about the organizers and ‘usual suspects’ in the various groups. Those people have their own needs to do the work that are always individual to the advocate and do not apply to the mass populace. I do appreciate the work of our leaders, but without people to lead we are left with skeleton crews keeping the lights on so to speak.

Perhaps the people need a break from the cause. I understand that, I really do. But as we rest on our laurels there are still some major issues in our society that directly impact people of color and trans* people that must be addressed.
We can not just sit back and enjoy the break we feel entitled to when there is still so much left to do.

Americas Got Transphobia!

So if you have not seen this little slice of transphobia from Americas Got Talent {AGT} then take a look. However be warned that it is transphobic.
Now am I really upset with Ray Jessel?

No. Not really. I understand that he is an elderly man who probably has no true understanding of what he has done. If we lived in a world where transphobia was non existent I am sure I would have laughed right along with the world at this joke song. Ray wasn't vicious and he wasn't mean, he was just singing a funny song. He is a nice enough elderly man and I feel I can give him a pass over this faux pas.
However....{there is always a however it seems}
The song was transphobic and uncalled for in polite society. The judges, Howard Stern, Heidi Klume, Mel B and Howie Mandel, should have recognized that the song would be problematic for AGT and disqualified him. The producers and directors of AGT should have known that the trans* community would be upset and not aired this segment. There are hundreds of auditions that are not shown during the show which could have served as a better time filler.
Yet here we are again telling a major network to police themselves on the transphobia. Come on AGT people, I know that someone in the company should have known better. Listen to that voice next time!