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From our fabulous News Hawks!

Have you seen a TG-related news story online or in your local paper? Send it in to TGF and become a News Hawk! Don't assume we know everything that's out there, because you are our eyes and ears. To file a story, send it in to Cindy.

TG Fired Because
She Transitions

Contributed by Bobby G
via GenderPac
August 11, 1998

CAMBRIDGE, MA - Transgender woman Allie Lye was fired from her job at Sky Publishing Company in Cambridge because of her gender expression. She has filed suit against her employer for violating a city ordinance that protects transgender employees and a state law that forbids sexual discrimination.

She began transitioning on the job in May, with her supervisor's support and the good-will of her co-workers. A month into her transition, her supervisor left the company. Two days later, her new supervisor called her into the personnel office and told her to stop dressing in women's clothes or she would be fired.

She was told that her appearance was offensive to employees and customers,a claim she found disingenuous because her duties never put her in contact with customers and she got on well with co-workers. (Some even commended her courage, some her appearance). She filed a complaint with the Cambridge Human Rights Commission (HRC). The HRC contacted Sky Publishing who adamantly refused to negotiate, saying the ordinance is unconstitutional.

Ms. Lye was told to work as a man until she had Sexual Reassignment Surgery (SRS). She could then dress as a woman. She declined, saying that she had no intention of having SRS; and, if she did intend SRS, she would have to live as a woman for 1-2 years before she could have the operation.

On 24 July 98 she was fired, for insubordination. Her chances for judicial redress are not immediately promising. For defying the city ordinance, Sky is liable for only a $300 fine. And it could take nine months for her case to reach the Mass. Commission Against Discrimination.

Commented transactivist Nancy Nangeroni of Cambridge, "This is a clear-cut case of both transphobia and blatant disregard for local jurisdiction and basic human rights. The company is presenting a mean-spirited face in terminating a productive and well-liked employee simply for her gender expression... This kind of conduct is egregious behavior for any business and should not be tolerated."

Peru TS
Fails in Elex Bid

Contributed by Rachelle Austin and Elizabeth Parker
via Reuters
August 25, 1998

LIMA (Reuters) - A high-profile transsexual failed Tuesday to change Peru's traditionally macho image as an election body blocked her candidacy for local office, saying she counted on too little grass-roots support to stand.

But Fulvia Celica, a clairvoyant turned TV presenter turned woman, was in prestigious company -- Peru's National Election Board also halted President Alberto Fujimori's former wife from a candidacy for the mayor of Lima for the same reason.

Celica, claiming she was the victim of a dirty tricks campaign that blocked her bid for a minor mayorship in Lima's middle-class district of Jesus Maria, vowed to fulfill her political ambitions and run for Congress in 2000.

``Right from the beginning it was difficult for me because the election board invented obstacles, saying they were unsure if I were a man or a woman,'' she told Reuters.

Celica, who predicts Peruvians' futures on a local television show, presented almost 2,800 signatures of people supporting her candidacy -- 500 above the requirement to stand.

The election body said only 135 were valid.

``I'm staying calm for now. But if they say I committed fraud, then I -- an irreproachable woman -- will resort to presenting my case to the top human rights courts,'' said Celica, who suggested municipal workers destroyed her campaign propaganda.

Fujimori's former wife, Susana Higuchi, had also planned to run in Peru's Oct. 11 municipal polls as a candidate for mayor of Lima -- but the election body said she gathered barely a fifth of the required signatures.

The decision derailed the former first lady's political ambitions yet again. She was ruled out of the 1995 presidential elections, when she hoped to run against Fujimori, because the elections board said her links to her former husband made her ineligible. The couple divorced in 1996.

Mexican TS Seeks
Canadian Asylum

Contributed by Elizabeth Parker and Rachelle Austin
via GAIN Remailer
August 24, 1998

Canadian officials stopped deportation proceedings for immigration violations against Mexican transsexual Luis Ezequiel Manzo Chavez, also known as "Shadmith" or "Shameif," to allow her to argue that her life would be endangered if she returned to her homeland. Manzo has been held in a detention center in Malton since appearing at Pearson airport for deportation late August 17 dressed as a woman.

Officials ordered a psychiatric assessment, and a hearing scheduled for August 24 was delayed to August 27 to enable Manzo to obtain counsel.

Miqqi Alicia Gilbert, who has been supporting Manzo's bid for asylum, reports that Manzo has been living in Toronto for 3-1/2 years, where her work as a counselor and activist has won her popularity and admiration in the transgender community.

Manzo also recently held a two-bride wedding ceremony with her partner Crystal. Mexican diplomat Alfonso Nieto, stationed in Ottawa, publicly denied Manzo's claims of danger in Mexico, saying, "There are many transvestites in Mexico. It's illegal in Mexico to discriminate," adding that those who feel they have experienced discrimination can file a complaint with Mexico's human rights commission. Nieto continued, "What he's saying is false and just a story. Sounds like a good excuse for him to try and stay here.... I don't believe he'll face any problems at home.... People can behave as they want in Mexico. It's very easy to say these things to try and stay here."

However, earlier this month Mexico's Citizen Commission Against Homophobic Hate Crimes distributed a report to the Spanish and European Parliaments citing the assassinations of 125 gays "with viciousness and extreme violence" since April 1995.

In May, "Proceso" magazine reported increasing numbers of Mexican gays seeking asylum in the U.S., leading Deputy David Sanchez Comacho to tell the Mexico City council that, "Arbitrary discrimination, exclusion and segregation against homosexuals and lesbians affects all facets of their lives, from the family, in which they suffer the first rejection, to social repudiation ... including police extortion, raids on gay gathering spots, beatings, firings, being kicked out of rented housing due to the stigmatization of which they are the object, on up to unpunished murders."

Sanchez Comacho's PRD (Democratic Revolutionary Party) went on to hold a pioneering conference in Mexico City in May to look at legal reforms to protect the rights of lesbigay and transgendered people. There journalist Carlos Bonfil said, "In the history of Mexico, homosexuals have been burned alive, systematically morally lynched, disowned by their families, fired from their jobs, imprisoned, banished from their hometowns ... excommunicated and murdered -- solely for the crime of their sexual orientation."

TG Bat Mitzvah

Contributed by Elizabeth Parker
via NewsPlanet
August 15, 1998

In Woodstock, New York transsexual Rachel Pollack celebrated her bat mitzvah on August 15, 40 years after having a bar mitzvah at the traditional age of 13. She was joined in the coming-of-age ceremony by her family and friends (including transsexual performance artist and author Kate Bornstein), and by the Woodstock Jewish Congregation and its folk-singing Rabbi Jonathan Kligler, who said, "We are blessed when special people come to join us, bringing their unique gifts, because we gain and grow from those gifts."

After Rachel's gender reassignment surgery in the 1970's, she recited a traditional prayer of Orthodox Jewish men, "Blessed is God, who has not made me a woman," and added, "Double blessed is Dr. Lamaker, who has."

Brazilian TGs
Protest Abuse, Murders

Contributed by Elizabeth Parker
via GAIN Remailer
August 26, 1998

Brazil's Grupo Gay da Bahia and the local Salvador Transvestites Association have staged protests of assaults against two transvestite sex workers by four Salvador military police officers. The police reportedly humiliated and tortured the cross-dressers, forcing them to strip off their clothes and jump into the sea on August 4, resulting in the death of one. The other, known as Joyce, along with Salvador Transvestites Association president Lena Oxxa, believe their lives are in danger, and are said to be under the protection of human rights groups. The demonstrations resulted in the arrest and discharge of the four perpetrators, but not of their lieutenant. Grupo Gay da Bahia's continuing documentation of murders of gays and transgenders in Brazil has reached 1,600 for the period 1980 - 1997, with only 5% ever resulting in a trial.

Study Finds Women
Prefer Feminine Faces

Contributed by Bobby G
via Associated Press
August 26, 1998

Given a choice between a dewy-looking Leonardo DiCaprio type and a rugged Sean Connery sort of guy, women may be naturally attracted to the man with the more feminine face, researchers say.

Scottish psychologists studying sexual behavior report that women tend to prefer the faces of men with more feminine features because they are perceived as gentler and more trustworthy.

The researchers theorize that this preference is not just a 1990s concept of beauty but something that is hardwired into us by evolutton: Evolution has seen to it that women choose men who are likely to be more loyal mates and better fathers to their children.

"We speculate that the preference has been around for a long time," said lan Penton-Voak of the University of St. Andrews in Fife, Scotland. "If you look at the evolutionary record, we've moved from a more robust form to a more gracile form as a speces" in overall features.

The report is published in today's issue of the journal Nature. In separate experiments in Scotland and Japan, researchers created a composite "average" face for a man and a woman from about 30 digital photos. The faces then were altered at key points, including the eyes, lips, noses and eyebroves, to make them more feminine or more masculine.

Ninety-two volunteers -- college students and stafl members, ages 18 to 44,including 44 women -- were asked to rate the faces according to such factors as warmth, emtionalaty, honesty, intelligence and dominance. Both men and women preferred more feminine faces.

The researchers said the results also reflect the natural tendency to favor youth when seeking a mate. The masculine faces tended to look older to the volunteers, even though the photo composites were identical in age.

The study expands on earlier work by Lori Roggman of Utah State Uni versity and Judith Langlois at the University of Texas, whose 1990 study sugested that a computer combination of "average" facial features produces the most attractive face. Roggman and Langlois said the new research doesn t necessarily conflict with theirs.

"In the real world, people would find both Leonardo DiCaprio and Sean Connery attractive. You have to use some common sense about this," Langlois said.

Roggrnan suggested that the latest findings may reflect "simple social pressure at a time in human history when we can afford the luxury of sweet men."

Estrogen Makes Men Sexy

Contributed by Dale Carlson
via Discovery Channel Online News
August 26, 1998

So you thought it was testosterone that makes a man of the '90s sexy? Maybe not. It may actually be estrogen that attracts women, according to a just-published study.

The male sex hormone testosterone increases muscle bulk and, in evolutionary theory, is associated with a male's reproductive success.

But, maybe not with modern women, reports David Perrett of the University of St. Andrews in Scotland and colleagues in the current issue of the journal Nature.

Perrett's assertion is the result of a study in which people were shown computer generated images of male and female faces, morphed to embellish male or female characteristics. Both sexes said feminine facial characteristics were the most physically attractive in the opposite sex.

Highly masculinized faces were associated with negative behaviors and were said to look "colder," "less kind" and "less cooperative" than the feminized images.

Men and women's faces are shaped by hormonal changes at puberty. Testosterone causes the development of facial hair, a larger jaw and heavy brow in men, while in women, estrogen makes the skin softer, the lips fuller and suppresses bone growth in the jaw and brow.

Over the course of millions of years, women's preference for feminine looking males may help explain the biological trend toward a more feminine look in the species as a whole, Perrett says.

But his results are controversial.

"Preferences are culturally determined not biologically driven," says Dane Archer, a specialist in non-verbal communication at the University of California, Santa Cruz. "Physical attraction plays a big role in the first stages of courtship, but after that other factors like values, beliefs and personal traits become important."

"Nothing is really feminine or masculine in a face, except for the facial hair," says Dahlia Zaidel, a professor of psychology at University of California, Los Angeles.

NY County Exec May Favor TG Protection

Contributed by Elizabeth Parker
via NewsPlanet
August 26, 1998

Onondaga County, New York Executive Nicholas Pirro surprised many with a letter to county legislators August 21 saying that he would not veto an amendment adding actual or perceived sexual preference as a protected category under the county's Fair Labor Practices Act, which legislators had approved by 13 - 11 early this month. The measure treats housing rights and public accommodations as well as job rights. While saying he had no problem with the concept, Pirro had previously indicated concerns for enforcement, particularly since it didn't match up with a 1990 Syracuse city ordinance, and for a legislative process which had offered limited opportunity for public input.

Pirro himself held a public hearing on the measure on August 17 attended by some 40 local residents. Although most spoke in support of the measure, a representative of the Manufacturers Association of Central New York expressed alarm at "more intrusive local or county government" on top of the state's high costs, high taxes and "complex regulatory environment." Notable among supporters of the measure were members of the gay and lesbian civil rights groups Stonewall Committee and Central New York Diversity, and of the Central New York chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union.

Pirro's August 21 letter said, "The underlying concept of this local law is to protect our citizens from discrimination, and thus, is a good one. As we prepare ourselves and our community for the challenges of the new millennium, ensuring the rights of our citizens to fully participate in community life is an appropriate action of government." Calling the law beneficial, Pirro indicated it should only be problematic for those who practice discrimination.

Syracuse's 20-year-old transgender group EON, Inc. had protested earlier that the bill spoke only to "sexual preference" and not to gender expression; EON estimates that at least 37% of the gay and lesbian community are also considered "gender diverse." The version of the bill which they had been urged to support in the course of the preceding eight years had featured more inclusive language. EON had been joined in expressing this concern to the legislature by members of P-FLAG (Parents, Friends and Families of Lesbians and Gays), Transsexual Menace, and the Fair Practices Task Force. The Stonewall Committee's Bonnie Strunk had suggested at that time that the gender expression clause might stall the bill, and said it was preferable to have the more limited version enacted than to have no protections at all. (A similar dialog once took place at the national level between transgender lobbyists and the Human Rights Campaign with respect to the federal Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which shows no sign of moving forward now despite having become two years ago the first gay and lesbian civil rights measure ever to be heard on the floor of the U.S. Senate.)

New York state law does not include civil rights protections from sexual orientation-based discrimination (despite some 25 years of lobbying) and does not apply to private employers, as the county measure will.

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