Tag: Trans Rights Are Human Rights

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Episode 72: Understanding Our Transgender Friends and Family

Inspired, in part, by the new Amazon Prime series Clean Slate starring George Wallace, Laverne Cox, and Telma Hopkins, we take a different approach to this week’s show: We talk directly to those of you who may be confused about transgender people, who are both increasingly visible and increasingly under attack these days. We understand that many of you — many of us — grew up without learning or being taught accurate information about sex, gender, and sexual identity, and so many of us labor under misconceptions about our transgender friends, family members, and neighbors. But that can change if we approach these subjects in good faith, with an open mind, and an acceptance of our shared humanity.

So, with that in mind, we consider some common questions that we think many people are unclear about:

  • What does it mean to be transgender?
  • According to science, aren’t there only two genders and two sexes? For some background information that may be helpful, please read this Scientific American article. 
  • Isn’t this a “new” thing? How come I never heard of transgender people before?
  • Hasn’t the number of kids identifying as transgender exploded in recent years? Aren’t adults “indoctrinating” them?
  • What about kids getting gender affirming care? Isn’t that dangerous and won’t they regret permanent or life-altering treatment? This article in Mother Jones provides some useful statistical information. 
  • Isn’t it unfair to allow transgender athletes to compete in girls’/women’s sports?

Please listen to our answers to these questions. We think they may help people are confused and don’t know what to think. And, if you are interested, please watch this interview with George Wallace an Telma Hopkins on Clean Slate.

In addition to the audio podcast you can find here, you can watch a video version of this episode (and future episodes!) on our YouTube channel and on Instagram (@jenn_and_dave).

We hope you enjoy the show, please feel free to leave us a comment, and we’ll talk again soon. 

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Episode 70: Airing of Grievances

We got a lot of problems with you people. Well, maybe not you people, but … some people.

In this episode, we talk about the chaos that followed Monday’s inauguration and the never-ending stream of outrages coming from the new administration. In no particular order, we talk about Trump attacking transgender people, rescinding a 60-year-old executive order on race discrimination, raising tariffs, and gutting the federal government; Bishop Budde’s sermon and the rightwing reaction to it; Elon Musk’s unmistakable Nazi salute … and a whole lot more.

We also revisit the discussion of the Equal Rights Amendment that we began last week, and we’re less optimistic than we might have been.

Finally, with Holocaust Remembrance Day on Monday, we talk about the importance of speaking up, how ordinary people have answered the call in times of crisis, and how we should be those people today.

In addition to the audio podcast you can find here, you can watch a video version of this episode (and future episodes!) on our YouTube channel and on Instagram (@jenn_and_dave).

We hope you enjoy the show, please feel free to leave us a comment, and we’ll talk again soon. 

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Episode 64: Come for the Christmas Shopping, Stay for the Polio

On this week’s episode, we talk about Christmas coming up fast, Black Friday, and transitioning from shopping in malls to shopping online.

And then we turn to America’s recurring nightmare, because we can’t help ourselves.

First up: The incoming president nominating Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. to be Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. We used to point and laugh and crazy anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists. Now one is about to run the department that basically oversees healthcare in America.

We then have a very frank conversation about the threat RFK, Jr. poses to mental health treatment in America, which could, like his opposition to vaccines, have deadly consequences.

Finally, we talk at length about this week’s oral arguments before the US Supreme Court in United States v. Skrmetti, a case in which the federal government and a number of private plaintiffs are challenging Tennessee’s outright ban on gender-affirming care for transgender youth. While the outcome of the case is far from certain, the lawyers for the US and the private plaintiffs — US Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar and ACLU attorney Chase Strangio (the first transgender lawyer to argue before the Supreme Court) — were just fantastic. Please listen to this extended discussion of a very important topic, and check out this excellent piece by Chris Geidner on the Skrmetti arguments. 

You can also listen to a recording or download a transcript of the oral arguments on the Supreme Court’s website.

We hope you enjoy the show, please feel free to follow us on Instagram (@jenn_and_dave), and we’ll talk again soon.

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Episode 63: ’Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving

On this week’s episode, we begin with the story of how we met on November 23, 1993, the night before Thanksgiving. We did it the old fashioned way: In a bar, forced to have an awkward conversation by well-intentioned friends. And here we are, 31 years later!

We also talk about Rep. Nancy Mace’s Michael-Richards-style meltdown over Rep.-elect Sarah McBride, who will be the first transgender member of Congress, and the Republican Party’s obsession with other people’s genitals. As Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Will Bunch pointed out last week, this is perhaps the first major moral crisis of Trump II. Long story short: we need more people, including more Democratic politicians, to speak up for Rep. McBride and the broader LGBTQIA community.

To hear more, you’ll have to listen in … but do yourself a favor and read Will Bunch’s column. It’s very good.

We hope you enjoy the show, please feel free to follow us on Instagram (@jenn_and_dave), and we’ll talk again soon.

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Episode 59: More on Will & Harper

After talking about our Saturday morning walk (or hike, as Jennifer called it) and Illinois’ 21-7 victory over Michigan, we continue our conversation about the Netflix documentary, Will & Harper, featuring Will Ferrell and Harper Steele. We talk about the challenges of coming out late in life, the importance of having support from family and longtime friends, and dealing with the inevitable haters.

But you’ll have to listen in to find out more!

So, we hope you enjoy the show, please feel free to follow us on Instagram (@jenn_and_dave), and we’ll talk to you soon.

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Episode 46: Music for All Occasions

We take the title for this week’s episode from a 1995 album by one of our favorite groups, the Mavericks. But more on that later.

We start out with an update on our local walking club, which we joined a few weeks back despite some initial … hesitation. Turns out, it’s been a lot of fun and we’re glad we joined. Then we discuss our upcoming schedule. We will be out of the box for most of May, going to our youngest child’s college graduation followed by yet another trip to Ireland. 

At least we have excuses this time. And we’re telling you up front!

After that, we circle back to last week’s topic — mental health. And, in particular, how to manage your mental health on social media. This week’s story begins with an infamous comment by an infamous billionaire author who’s made it her life’s work to trash trans and nonbinary people, and what happens to normal people when they push back. We talk about the positive side of social media (that it can give you a voice when you feel like you don’t have one) and the negative side (that angry mobs will try to silence you if you challenge their narrow-mindedness). And then we talk about the strategies that work for some of us: Don’t engage the haters. Instead, go ahead and block them, mute them, and leave conversations to protect your own mental health. These strategies may not work for everyone, but they give many of us peace of mind while still allowing us to have our say.

We then turn to much happier topics: Seeing the above-mentioned Mavericks in concert this past weekend for what is at least the sixth, if not seventh, time. From the first time we saw them at a small club in the Chicago suburb’s touring in support of their 1994 LP, What a Crying Shame, to this most recent show, they’ve never let us down. Their music spans country, rock, blues, and Latin, but it’s all universally fun. And they’re fantastic musicians, which doesn’t hurt. They also have a new album coming out called Moon and Stars which will be available on May 17. We’re really looking forward to that.

Finally, we talk about an interesting new album called Petty Country: A Musical Celebration of Tom Petty. As the name suggests, the album consists of twenty covers of Tom Petty songs by a diverse group of country artists, including Chris Stapleton, Luke Combs, the Brothers Osborne, Willie and Lukas Nelson, Margot Price, Wynonna Judd, Marty Stuart, Steve Earle, George Strait, and Rhiannon Giddens. We’re not entirely sure what to expect, but we’re looking forward to giving it a spin.

So, we hope you enjoy the show, and please feel free to follow us on Instagram (@jenn_and_dave). You can also follow us on the site formerly known as Twitter, where our joint account is @JennandDave1 and the podcast account is @itsotetPodcast. Until next time! 

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Episode 42: Channeling Difficult Emotions

Since we rebooted our podcast, we begin this week’s show discussing topics we plan to cover going forward, including familiar themes such as LGBTQIA+ rights, family, and music, and new(ish) themes like cooking and physical and mental health.

From there, we discuss the tragic death of indigenous nonbinary teenager Nex Benedict after a brutal attack at a high school in Oklahoma, and the range of emotions their death evokes: anger, rage, frustration, despair. But, more importantly, we talk about how to channel those emotions in a constructive and positive way, because losing hope is not an option.

To that end, we also talk about an important fundraising project we are involved in: the annual Lambda Legal Bon Foster Civil Rights Celebration in Chicago, which takes place on Friday, May 10, at 6:30 p.m. Central at the Art Institute. Please consider joining us if you can, and, if that’s not possible, please consider making a donation to Lambda Legal, one of the country’s oldest, largest, and most successful legal organizations fighting for LGBTQIA+ Americans and people living with HIV.

Above all, to paraphrase the late, great Joe Strummer of the Clash, we urge everyone who’s feeling justifiable anger today to turn that anger into power.

So, we hope you enjoy the show, and please feel free to follow us on Instagram (@jenn_and_dave). You can also follow us on the site formerly known as Twitter. Our joint account is @JennandDave1 and the podcast account is @itsotetPodcast. Until next time! 

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Episode 38: Happy Labor Day!

On this Week’s episode: a rambling conversation about everything from the holiday weekend to running races and training for marathons to … Martha Stewart? 

More importantly, we discuss the Texas Supreme Court’s ill-advised decision that lets the state’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors take effect despite the overwhelming weight of scientific and medical evidence to the contrary. And, on a related note, we talk about how the “parents’ rights” movement isn’t about parents’ rights at all, but interfering with your rights as a parent. We talk about the Canadian doofus who goes by the name “Billboard Chris,” the anti-queer cult’s complete misunderstanding of “consent” in the context of minors’ health care (hint: parents always have to consent to health care for their kids), and the limited (but obvious!) circumstances where parents lose the right to make decisions for their kids.

Finally, a couple of notes: First check out our friend Jesse Jackson’s appearance on the Bella Grayce Podcast where he talks about dealing with family members’ substance abuse and the uniqueness of losing a sibling. Second, we briefly revisit the firing of a local queer teacher over social media posts and the new GoFundMe to support him. Please consider making a donation!

Anyway, please enjoy this week’s episode, feel free to share your thoughts in the comments, and, as always, support the rights of LGBTQIA people everywhere! And follow us on Twitter at @itsotetPodcast and @JennandDave1.

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Episode 31: Transitioning While Famous, and the Supreme Court Strikes Out

On this week’s episode, after reminiscing about being in New York City last year for the 4th of July and giving a shoutout to Garland and Claire Jeffreys for commenting and sharing last week’s podcast, we get down to business.

First, we talk about Elliot Page’s book Page Boy: A Memoir, which Jennifer highly recommends. Navigating becoming famous while coming to terms with being transgender is not an easy thing to do, but Elliot has managed to do it with grace.

And that brings us to a discussion of other people who’ve transitioned while in the limelight, including Grammy-winning artist Wendy Carlos, who brought the Moog synthesizer to Bach and other classical composers in the 1960s and ’70s, and Chaz Bono, who began to transition around 2008 and sat down with David Letterman for a memorable interview in 2011.  

In this same conversation, we talk about Gina Chua, former executive editor at Reuters with a decades-long, high profile career in journalism, who transitioned during the COVID-19 pandemic. In a 2021 New York Times story, she said the pandemic gave her the privacy and time to be able to “grow into her skin.” Chua is the most senior transgender journalist in the country. In the Times article she says, “There are a lot of people who are 14 years old who would like to know that this is not a death sentence.” She continues, “It’s not a millstone. It’s something you can be proud of, it’s something you can celebrate and something you can live with.”

Finally, we turn to the recent Supreme Court decision in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, where the Court considered a web designer’s challenge to a Colorado civil rights law that might, theoretically, possibly, maybe, someday … require her to create a wedding-related website for a same sex couple. The only problem is, no same sex couple has ever actually asked her to do that, so her entire case is based on mere speculation. That’s the kind of case that courts ordinarily throw out because, without an actual injury, a plaintiff has no standing to bring a lawsuit in the first place. Not so much under the current Bizarro-World Supreme Court, apparently.

But it’s actually worse than that. At some point during the case, anticipating a challenge to her standing, the plaintiff filed a declaration under penalty of perjury stating that a same sex couple named Stewart and Mike contacted her company to inquire about a wedding website. Though the documents the plaintiff filed provided Stewart’s telephone number, no one bothered to verify the story. Except for a journalist named Melissa Gira Grant, who published a piece in The New Republic on June 29, 2023, one day before the Supreme Court delivered its opinion. In her New Republic article, Grant reveals — and other media outlets have since confirmed — that the story is simply untrue. Stewart never reached out to 303 Creative, never knew that they used his name in their case, and absolutely never requested that 303 Creative design a website for him. In fact, Stewart himself is a web designer and was already married at the time of the alleged contact … to a woman, not to a man named Mike. 

Apparently, some folks are so consumed with their own hate that nothing else matters, least of all the truth.

So, anyway, please enjoy this week’s episode, feel free to share your thoughts in the comments, and, as always, support the rights of LGBTQIA people everywhere! And if you’re new here, you can also follow our Twitter account, @itsotetPodcast.

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Episode 27: “You’re Not From Chicago”

So, we’re done talking about our Ireland trip and the Bruce Springsteen concert (for now), but we have to mention that our episode of Jesse Jackson’s Set Lusting Bruce podcast is now live, so check it out. We had a great time recording with Jesse.

Turning to this week’s episode, we talk about living in the Chicago suburbs and folks from out of town getting dunked on for mouthing off about our city … even though it’s not really our city. (For context, see this write up of Fox & Friends’ misadventures in suburban Naperville on the morning of Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson’s inauguration.)

But it’s not all fun and games. Picking up on a part of our conversation with Jesse on his show, we also talk about the current status of LGBTQIA rights in America and the increasing threats to the community. Is it just the last angry gasp of a dying ideology, or is there a real danger that our community will lose its hard-fought rights? We take a look at a violent incident in Glendale, California, where far-right thugs attacked supporters of LGBTQIA rights and what it says about the growing desperation of anti-LGBTQIA bigots. But we also share some good news — a US District Court judge in Florida entered a preliminary injunction that temporarily prohibits the state from enforcing portions of its recently-enacted law banning gender-affirming care for minors. The ruling only protects the named plaintiffs at this point, but the court’s decision (which you can read here) is very encouraging.

However, even that good news comes with a word of caution. While this judge got it right, we know there will be further litigation and likely appeals in the Florida case, along with other challenges to these types of statutes around the country, and at some point one or more of those cases could reach the Supreme Court. In the past, we might have been somewhat optimistic about the Supreme Court’s ultimate decision in these cases — after all, this is the Court that gave us Obergefell and Bostock — but in the post-Dobbs world, all bets are off.

So, please enjoy this week’s episode, feel free to share your thoughts in the comments, and, as always, support the rights of LGBTQIA people everywhere! And if you’re new here, you can also follow our Twitter account, @itsotetPodcast.

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