National religious right legal firm gets involved in MSHSL’s trans-inclusive proposal

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The Alliance Defending Freedom, a well-funded religious right legal outfit, has inserted itself into the debate over a transgender-inclusive athletics policy being considered by the Minnesota State High School League.ADF, formerly known as the Alliance Defense Fund, was founded in 1994 by half a dozen prominent religious right groups including Focus on the Family, Campus Crusade for Christ, and the American Family Association. The group opposes reproductive rights, LGBT rights, and a secular society, and often uses its lawyers to insert itself into local debates.On Tuesday, the group announced that it has sent a letter to the Minnesota State High School League which is in the process of drafting a framework for how schools can create an inclusive environment for transgender athletes.The letter represents a fundamental misunderstandings about transgender students, misgendering them in the process: “Forcing students into vulnerable interactions with members of the opposite sex in secluded locker and hotel rooms disregards basic notions of personal dignity, which federal courts have recognized in a variety of contexts…. MSHSL and its member schools also have a common law duty to maintain school “property free of unreasonable risks of harm.”ADF also warned that religious schools might sue if the policy is implemented: “It is unlikely that a court would uphold the proposed transgender policy’s interference with religious freedom. Most, if not all, religious schools regard facilitating the denial and rejection of one’s God-given sex to be a grave sin. And religious students are precluded by basic modesty principles from sharing locker or hotel rooms with members of the opposite sex.”The group is also targeting transgender-inclusive policies in Wisconsin’s Sparta Area School District and Rhode Island’s Westerly Public Schools.Here’s the full letter:Download (PDF, 374KB)Related stories:Minnesota League tables trans-inclusive policy under mounting opposition (Sheila Regan, TC Daily Planet, 2014)State athletics league mulls transgender inclusion in sports (Andy Birkey, The Colu.mn, 2014) Continue Reading

Performance artist Peterson Toscano on LGBTQ and climate justice intersectionality October 29th

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While at the People’s Climate March in New York City on September 21st I had the pleasure of personally meeting performance artist Peterson Toscano, and hearing about his “The Queer Response to Climate Change” creation. He will be using storytelling, humor and skilled facilitation to perform “Climate Change: What’s faith got to do with it?” October 29th at 7 PM at All God’s Children MC Church 3100 Park Ave S as well as “Transfigurations–Transgressing Gender in the Bible” 30 October 2014 7:00 pm at Richfield United Methodist Church This is a Community Voices submission and is moderated but not edited. The opinions expressed by Community Voices contributors are their own and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the TC Daily Planet.As someone who has done spoken word comedy performances about global warming myself, I can attest that it is exciting and uplifting to bring together the diverse interests of faith community building, LGBTQ liberation and climate justice. Peterson recently wrote that he addressed these three important issues “always with the goal to hold out hope and to encourage us to dream and scheme about how we can envision and achieve a future world that is more just, clean, and stable for all.“ Peterson’s optimistic vision can only be held up by taking robust, coordinated action to address the climate crisis which I “voted” for by putting my body in the street for the People’s Climate March. While each climate march up to this point has been sponsored by a much small handful of organizations, this climate march was unprecedented as a diversity of over a hundred groups and organizations took part. A whole new meaning opened up for me when I saw a website about one of the groups in the march called “Queers for the Climate”. Continue Reading

Girls explore creative coding at Katie DoJo

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Since my return from the Code for America 2014 Summit I have replayed – virtually and literally – the images of the presenters. One image keeps recurring – the image of creative young women working with users to craft techie tools that solve real-life human needs. For so many of these young women the story was not so much about the tool but about the ways in which the app improved someone’s life. That implicit purpose seemed uniquely explicit in the presentations of dozens of young female coders. Continue Reading

BEHIND THE STORY | What’s so problematic about equal rights?

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It’s disappointing that our Governor thinks supporting transgender student athletes is “problematic.” As reported by the Huffington Post, Governor Mark Dayton, when asked at a recent debate whether he supported “allowing transgender high school students to participate in sports based on their gender identity,” Dayton, like the other gubernatorial candidates deferred the decision to the Minnesota State High School League, saying it was a complicated issue. “Giving transgender students the choice of which team they want to play on is, I think, problematic,” he is quoted as saying.It’s the wrong answer. The right answer is to follow the bill that Dayton supported and signed into law, the Safe and Supportive Schools Act, which requires districts and schools to “establish strategies for creating a positive school climate and use evidence-based emotional learning to prevent and reduce discrimination and other improper conduct.”How, may I ask, is denying young people the opportunity to participate in sports because they happen to be transgender reducing discrimination? It seems to me that it actually encourages discrimination, not by other kids but by the school itself (which has the ripple effect of encouraging discrimination from students). Naysayers might argue- oh, well they can still play sports as long as they play on the team whose gender aligns with that on their birth certificate, but that doesn’t work, because in that case you would be requiring a student to deny their very identity just to participate in an athletic activity. Continue Reading

VIDEO | Bridging the transgender community and the city of Minneapolis

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The first ever Minneapolis Transgender Equity Summit was held on Sept. 25 at the Humphrey Center for Public Policy. The Summit was organized by the Minneapolis Transgender Issues Workgroup, an initiative begun by Andrea Jenkins. At the summit, members of the transgender community and friends met with city of Minneapolis officials, staff, and others to raise issues of concern and need.Entertainer and entrepreneur Angelica Ross spoke about her experiences and lessons learned in the event’s keynote speech. She was joined at the podium by Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges, City Council Members Barbara Johnson and Andrew Johnson, and others. Continue Reading

Privilege on the bus: Who’s comfortable in public spaces?

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I recently rode a bus with my girlfriend from my house to the Science Museum of Minnesota. When we boarded, she went first using a transit pass, while I opted to go last since I paid in cash and would not hold up the bus since it could start moving while I paid. When I had finished paying, my girlfriend had already picked a spot and I sat next to her; she was on the outside of the bus, next to the windows and I was next to the aisle. I looked up and down the bus and noticed that only one woman was sitting in a forward facing seat, next to the aisle. A small sample size for sure, less than ten women on the bus the whole ride, but through the entire ride I noticed some striking ways in how people seemed to choose their seats. Continue Reading

Leading by example: New youth directors to lead Trans Youth Support Network

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Local trans youth can now officially turn to their peers for help in navigating a system they say doesn’t accommodate their needs.On July 1, Trans Youth Support Network transitioned into a completely youth-led organization. Jahleel Princeton Arcani, TayvonCaples, La’Niya Dixon and Jakob Rumble took over the organization, replacing TYSN’s previous adult leaders Katie Burgess and Roxanne Anderson. Officials say the transition will allow TYSN to better support trans youth in the Twin Cities.“We don’t just want to be serving youth,”Jakob Rumble said. “We want to be leading by example.”Rumble took over as financial director, and said it’s important for young trans people to support other young trans people when it comes to navigating societal and governmental systems.Trans youth face higher rates of poverty, higher drop-out rates, and more homelessness, he said, and they’re often forced into it.Some of TYSN’s support services include learning how to acquire jobs properly, and offering advice on how to pass as cis-gender in order to apply for a name change.Jahleel Princeton Arcani took over as the development and sustainability director, and said the group is excited about the change. The organization has always been youth-led since their board members must be under 30, he said, but this transition is the final push to a fully youth-led nonprofit.“It’s been a dream of the people who started TYSN for it to be youth led,”Arcani said, noting the two top leaders weren’t youth. Continue Reading

Constitutional Personhood: A tale of women, fetuses, corporations, animals, robots, and Martians

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“We the people” are the first three words of the Constitution. Legally it should be simple to decide who is part of that we. But as the Hobby Lobby decision showed when the Supreme Court ruled that a corporation had religious rights, it is not always clear who or what the Constitution considers a person or a thing. One would think that it is simple–persons have rights, property does not. The reality is that throughout American history the constitutional line between property and personhood has been thin and contentious. Continue Reading