Grey Day in NYC

Grey day in New York City.

On the edge of a stranger’s bed I sit sipping a hot cup of Mate,

Reading and looking out over the East River at the rain shrouded Island of Manhattan.

The orange construction cranes at River’s edge and the vivid green of the trees interspersed among the muted red and grey brick buildings in the foreground, make that great skyscraper filled island appear as the painted backdrop from an old movie.

A film Noir that begins, “It was a rainy day in Brooklyn.”

The room is quiet but for the sound of afternoon rain filtering in from the open balcony door.  My head though, is filled with a babble of voices.  All the old Poets and Punks who shaped me.  Kerouac and Burroughs and The Velvet Underground.

Wild, crazy voices screaming about “living, really living!” and “Go, go, GO!!”

“Sunday Morning….” In an ethereal German accent.  Somewhere, Sid Vicious is singing “My Way” while Frank sidles up to the bar and orders another Jack and Coke from his Heavenly Host.

And the rain whispers about stories as yet untold.

 

Silence.

The silence always unnerves me.

I feel like I always have to have some… thing, going on.

Some music playing, some voices talking.

Some distraction from being alone with my own thoughts.

Because the silence is never silent.

The reason I rarely smoke marijuana anymore is because it just makes the noise in my head louder.  My thoughts run rampant from a million directions at once.

But that’s what it’s always like in my head more or less.

I think I’m afraid that if there’s no music on, maybe the thoughts’ll get so loud that the neighbors’ll hear ‘em.

Even when it’s quiet, it’s never silent.

The outside world leaks in.  The noise on the street.

A car honking, a machine whirring.  Indistinct voices speaking in a rapid fire patter.  A cadence you can tell as not English even though you can’t hear the words.

Those even can be distraction enough.

I’m afraid to be still.

My day is full of distractions.

From the moment I wake up, I’m trying to do anything but listen to my own thoughts.

I can’t nap during the day, and if I wake up for any reason, no matter how little sleep I’ve had, I’m up for good.  Once the fog clears, my brain starts to whirring.  All of the thoughts chased away by sleep’s sweet fog come crashing in on me.

The silence means I can hear them.

Even these words are distraction.  I start typing because a thought hits me and I can’t ignore it.  But then the words themselves fill my head.

I struggle to maintain honesty and not get caught up in the cadence and the details.

All I ever want to do is tell the truth.  It’s all I’ve ever wanted to do.

But not truth as in 1 plus 1 equals 2.  Or I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help me God.

The truth of a story.  Of poetry.

The truth that rings in your heart.  A little bell that sounds, “I know that…”

I want to get up onstage and open my mouth because that’s the only place the thoughts leak out.

The floodgates open up and all those thoughts come pouring out.

And my head quiets down.

When I’m in front of a crowd is the only time I am alone and it’s silent.

 

Why Vote?

I’ve been thinking about the Democratic Process this morning as I often do.  (Yeah, I know, I lead such an exciting life….)  It was spurred by a question my Mom posted to her Facebook page expressing frustration with the current political situation and asking in all earnestness if anyone could convince her of any good reason why she should continue to vote.

It should be no surprise that a lengthy debate ensued with many opinions and tangents expressed.  But it really got me to thinking and I thought I’d share my response with you here.

The basic question under discussion essentially boiled down to this:  Should you (or any of us) continue to vote?

The short answer is yes.  But that certainly bears some lengthier explanation.

I am not sure really how much individual votes actually count anymore it’s true.  I really believe that our original Electoral College system is far too easily gamed.  Individual votes can easily get lost, discounted or simply disregarded.

However, I would still urge you all to continue to vote.  As my old friend Ben Gulacsi put it, “if ya don’t vote, ya shouldn’t complain”.  That sounds harsh, I know, especially in light of the argument that individual votes don’t necessarily count.

The problem ultimately, with not voting, is that it encourages a form of political apathy.  It represents a refusal to participate at the most basic level of our “Democracy”.

Right now, many of us are pretty pissed off at our leaders, even the ones who are supposed to be “on our side”.  Frankly I think both parties are to blame for the current crisis.  The Republicans for being willing to play chicken with our national economy and ultimately putting average Americans into a situation where we are likely to face an even greater downturn in the current recession.  Democrats for being too cowardly to make a stand, too willing to just give in and give up on their principles.

And how have we gotten here?  How have we gotten to a point where the Super Rich are able to essentially purchase “Democracy”?  Apathy.  People who are willing to let their elected representatives do their jobs behind closed doors with little to no real constituent accountability.  An electorate who are more than willing to look no further for their news than what they get from the corporate mouthpieces of the big media outlets.

I’m not talking about merely Fox News and the Murdock Media Empire here either.  I’m talking about CNN, The New York Times, AOL, Yahoo, Time Magazine, etc..  There is real information out there, but in this internet age, you have to not only dig for it, you have to be able to think for yourself.  You have to be able to sort the wheat from the chaff.  And have a willingness to go to the original sources.

And that requires an active and interested engagement with the political process.  Take the Tea Party for example.  They may be more corporately funded that they like to appear and I would probably disagree with 90% of the platforms they are pushing for.  But I admire their zeal.  Their political cohesion and their ability to mobilize the vote.  Heck, I envy them!  As much as I think they are being spoon-fed massive amounts of disinformation, at least they f—king care!!

An interview with a reporter talking about lobbying groups I was listening to recently, talked about the importance of politics at the state level and why so many of these conservative PACS were focusing on influencing legislation at that level.  Basically it boiled down to the idea that while the media tends to be overly focused on what’s going on at the national level, the real change comes from the local level.  This is a Republic, it’s important to remember.  A collection of affiliated States, each with a distinct social tone relatively unique to that geographic region.

If you can influence change in enough of those parts, it will inevitably effect the larger whole.

Finally, a specific example of what I’m talking about here in regards to the importance of voting, the effects of apathy and the reality of change coming from local levels, would be the still fairly recent election of Scott Brown (R) to The United States Senate from our great State Of Massachusetts.  Nobody here thought that a Tea Party supported Republican had a snowball’s chance in hell of being elected to the Senate seat that had been held by Democratic Lion, Ted Kennedy for so very many years.  Certainly not the State Democratic Party.  But Scott Brown, like him or not, went out there and WORKED for the vote.  He spoke to constituents.  He got people energized.  He ASKED for people’s vote.

Meanwhile, the leadership of the Mass Dems just sat back and figured the usual suspects would do as they had always done and elect the Democratic Candidate.  They underestimated the will of the people.  They took the electorate for granted.

And we all got f—ked because of it.  Of course Scott Brown got elected!  He wanted it.  He worked for it.  And people who agreed with his views or who simply were dissatisfied with the Status Quo, VOTED for him.

As Stan Lee would say, “’Nuff said.”

An open response to Gregory Kane of the Washington Examiner

The following blog entry began, as these “Open Letters” often do, as a reaction to a piece of venomous anti-trans bile I stumbled across in the wilds of the internets. I find that I start to write a “comment” and as the word-count climbs I realize I have much more to say than is appropriate for that kind of forum. Thankfully, I have a blog of my own.
I had been intentionally refraining from writing anything about the recent beating in a Baltimore McDonald’s of a woman named Chrissy Lee Polis, who as it happens is also transsexual. The reason for this is that I felt much had been said about the incident already. Her tragedy had been claimed and counter-claimed by various people and groups all purporting to know just what this woman was going through and using the publicity generated by this tragedy as fuel for their own fires.
I don’t judge necessarily, I’m a politician and an activist I know how it works. Some of these have been noble causes. Some not so much. But for myself, I decided to stay mostly silent.
It seemed to me that most everyone was forgetting that there is a woman who has been hurt and scared at the center of all this. A woman who has had all shreds of anonymity ripped away from her by sudden and unasked for internet celebrity. Who can no longer walk around her own neighborhood without being recognized and “outed” as transsexual.
And I suppose by writing this now; I am perhaps no different than anyone who has written about this horrifying incident before me. I offer only the small justification that I do not claim to have any more personal knowledge of Ms. Polis’ personal feelings than anyone else. Only that I recognize her ordeal as one which has sadly been shared by countless other transpeople who have suffered similarly, if less publicly. It is for all those of my sisters and brothers who suffered thus that I speak up now.
Also, as a blogger and a newspaper columnist myself, I felt compelled to respond to the column entitled: “’Hate crime’ justice is no justice at all” by Gregory Kane of the Washington Examiner. Perhaps I have not yet been nominated for a Pulitzer, as Mr. Kane has, but I try to be as well informed and balanced in my opinions and writing as I am able. And I found Mr. Kane’s bigoted and pointedly mean column to be quite lacking in these qualities.
This then is my response to him. I hope that he reads it.

Dear Mr. Kane,

You sir, are an ass.
However you have inadvertently provided an almost pitch perfect example of why hate crime protections for and education about transpeople are absolutely necessary. The sneering manner in which you refer to Chrissy Lee Polis as a “woman” and insist on the fairly pointed usage of male pronouns throughout, indicates to me that you neither know, nor care about the struggles of those who are not so fortunate as yourself. Who have not been lucky enough to be born in a body they were comfortable with. Who were “gendered” in a way they found discordant with their own self-knowledge. Who, in the attempt to align their own public identities with that self-knowledge, often find themselves marginalized, hated and abused with little available recourse.
Ill-informed hatred like that you spew forth from this column is the very engine that drives this abuse. Yours are the words that justify the beatings.
That said, I am going to assume by the fact you have been nominated for a Pulitzer, that you are an intelligent man. And I would like to point out to you, and to those of your readers who might be similarly misinformed, exactly why hate crime protections are called for and indeed vitally needed.
It is not, as you seem to assume, to achieve more excessive criminal punishments than are already called for. In point of fact if most crimes against transpeople were simply punished with the same severity as are similar crimes against most everyone else, it would be a step in the right direction. As it is, even the most heinous crimes, murder for example, when committed against transgender, transsexual and intersex folks, are often punished with little more than a slap on the wrist.
We are not looking for more stringent punishments than those against non-transpeople. We are simply hoping for some degree of equity with anyone else.
A sentiment which was, I believe, shared by the wise Founders of this country. In the interest of brevity I’ll refrain from direct quotes and assume you’re familiar with a rather important document called, “The Declaration of Independence”. At least I hope you are.
The real reason we need Hate Crime protections have little to do with the whinging “political correctness” you accuse us of. It has everything to do with being counted.
This evening I attended a meeting of local activists in which one member was presenting information on the recent beating of the woman you refer to in your column, Chrissy Lee Polis. Who I would like to remind you is more than just fodder for another week’s column, to be sneered at and denigrated. She is a real flesh and blood person. And a citizen of these United States who has been brutalized while others simply stood by and watched. (How Un-American is that!?!?!)
The person giving this presentation admitted that there was precious little in the way of hard information or statistics to be found regarding crime and discrimination against transpeople. Even the F.B.I. came up flat. This is because as a community we are often not counted. Ignored even in the national census. There are few crime statistics because the way the system in this country is set up, the only crimes against minority groups that are counted, tracked and dealt with are those which are registered as Hate Crimes. Everything from funding to prevent such violence to programs to help the victims, are determined by these numbers.
Without Hate Crime protections we may as well not even exist as far as some law enforcement and governmental bodies are concerned. Without Hate Crime protections, as well as other basic Civil Rights which we are also fighting for, we will continue to be beaten, killed, denied basic dignities and generally pushed to the margins of society.
And that sir is why we are standing up in ever increasing numbers to demand that we be treated with the same dignity as anyone else. Why we ask for Hate Crime Preventions and Anti-Discrimination Laws. Why I get so angry when I see men like you, men who have power, privilege and position; belittling and demeaning people like Chrissy Lee Polis and myself who have to watch our backs every minute of the day and fight for every step up we can get.
Think about that the next time you settle into your chair and begin another column with a full stomach and an unharmed body. And thank God for your great good luck.

Slainte!
Lorelei Erisis

A Collection Of Rooftops With Cops Passing By

A collection of rooftops with cops passing by and mountains in the background.  The cat tries again, and fails to get into the cupboard under the kitchen sink.  I hear the slam but barely glance.  Instead I start writing.  The radiators in my old building appear to have been turned off for the season.  Wind whistles through the empty pipes.  It is not warm enough yet to have no heat, but it’s not cold enough to complain to the authorities.  It’s unlikely they would even care here in my ramshackle Western Massachusetts city.

The place was once filled with millionaires.  More than any other in the area or the country or some such historical fact like that.  Not now.  Now it is a city whose purpose is long ago passed away.  Crumbling buildings and rotten infrastructure.

It’s not dead though.  Not by a long shot.  There are still people here.  People who live their whole lives here.  Or some of it.  Who call this home.

This collection of rooftops with cops passing by and mountains in the background.

I Do Care

This is my open response to the entry entitled “I Don’t Care” on the “Enough Non-Sense” blog.

Hmmmm.  Well, I’ve got a lot of disagreement with the things you state here, but clearly I’m reading and so are others.  This tells me there are many out there who feel as you do.  I’d love to respond more personally, but though you seem to do a lot of attacking, you don’t have an “About Me” page.  Too bad.  I’ve got one here, check it out.  I stand behind what I say.  Even when I am proven wrong, I find it important to own my words.  We appear to disagree, so I’ll have to respond more generally to you and your active readership.

I think all this divisiveness is sad really.  As a life-long student of politics, I can tell you it’s the primary tool that those who would oppress us use to keep us under their heel.

Still, anger is just too easy.  I could spend all day responding piece by piece to your statements just in this entry alone.  But your primary thesis is that you “…Don’t Care.”  So detailed refutations would be pointless.

A particular quote that struck me personally however was this one:

“I don’t care…if those who have recently transitioned feel that special legislation will smooth the edges of their life for they don’t realize that any success they may have with it lies in their ability to be perceived as what they think they are; just saying they are doesn’t make them so.”

I recently transitioned myself.  Four/five years on HRT and the effects have been dramatic and wonderful.  I even “pass” sometimes, though it always catches me off-guard when I do.  I try to be the best woman I can be.  The woman I am.  It’s really not difficult to do, I just let myself be myself.

I also have something like 20 years or so of Improv and Theatre training, so I can convincingly portray the Prime Minister of England if I really wanted to.  Just being a socially-acceptable woman is cake.  Again, I’m really just being myself and making minute adjustments.

I even won a friggin’ Pageant!  I’m the very first Miss Trans New England.  Even as an alternative Pageant, it’s pretty much the most mainstream, heteronormative definition of “Beauty” we have in our society.  And to be clear, because I mentioned I’m in theatre, I am not and never have been a “drag queen”.  I do sketch comedy and improv mainly, but have also done Shakespeare and more serious things.  I’m basically a good Yankee New England woman.

But.  I’m also 6’4″.  If you haven’t got that, it’s exactly the same height as Abe Lincoln.  (Who I played in a long running series of shows at Second City LA)  The practical upshot of which is that no matter how well I may “pass”, how “good” a woman I may be, my height will always invite close scrutiny, which is the enemy of complete “passability”.

Also, as an actor/writer/artist I’m not in a traditionally lucrative field.  Surgeries and such will come as I can afford them.  Which very well may be never.  I was not prepared to wait for that, so I started as I could and have never for a second regretted the choice.

I will likely always be read as Trans.  But I still need to pay the rent and maybe scrape together the lucre it takes to get to my next goals.

That requires employment.  Also, protections for basic things such as housing and services would be helpful.  I don’t think asking for the same access as anyone else is extravagant.

For these reasons, I fight for legal protections for all trans people.  Transsexual and Transgender identified alike.

Yes, we have a lot of differences among us.  What large group of people doesn’t?  But we have enough in common to stand together.

I wish you would stand with us instead of tearing us down.  I wish you would stand with me.

Slainte!

Lorelei Erisis

Time To Stand Together

I‘m going to say something here that is bound to get me in trouble.  I believe that not only do trans people of all types need to band together in a unified “transgender” movement, despite our individual differences.  I also believe we have an important place in the larger LGBT movement.  Not only that, but I believe we must find ways to support and band with larger movements for social justice and freedom all around the world.

The time is NOW!

If we want trans rights now, we need to speak out with the strikers in Wisconsin.  If we demand our basic freedom, we need to support the free peoples of Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia, Yemen and Bahrain.  If we want to end oppression of trans people, we must work to end oppression wherever it may be found.  We should concern ourselves with the plight of the poor and the powerless on the streets of New York; in the mountains of Appalachia; and in the fields of Afghanistan.

If you are saying to yourself right now, “But why should I concern myself with all of these other problems?  I have my own problems.”  Then you have answered your own question.  This is the very attitude we, as transpeople are up against.  Most folks don’t hate us, they just don’t see why they should be bothered to help.  They have their own problems.  And everything they hear and read and watch encourages this individual focus.

If we have learned anything from the recent actions in the Middle East and Africa, it is that change will only ever happen when the people band together.  When we set aside individual concerns and turn out in numbers to demand freedom for all our Brothers and Sisters.  We saw it in Egypt when bands of Christians stood and protected their Muslim allies as they prayed.  We are seeing it in Wisconsin in the crowds that flood the Capital to say no to an unjust policy that will do nothing but hurt their neighbors.  We see it anywhere people help each other out, simply because there is need.

We must remember that the fight for trans rights is the fight for human rights.  We can either stand together and march towards victory or stand apart and suffer under the fists of oppression.

The time is now.  Together we may succeed.

Just Lorelei

Looking back at the latest posts on this here blog, I was noticing that things were getting kind of heavily political.  Which is all well and good, but is not the primary focus of this here Transproviser.  This was always meant to be a blog about a little bit of everything.

Some politics sure, and some music and if I ever get around to it, some of my thoughts on improvisation, especially as it applies to being transgender.

At it’s heart though, this is a personal blog.  A way for me to share a little bit of who I am and what I think with the world.

Today is a snow day for me.  The second in a row in fact.  So I am presented with the rare opportunity to take some of the thoughts that roll around in my head in the wee morning hours and get them down in black and white.  Turn those nagging electrical/chemical impulses into words on the page.

So if you don’t mind, I’ll just jump right into it.

You probably have figured out by now that I’m a transgender woman.  I know you’re surprised, but it’s true.  And when it comes right down to it, I’m really more specifically a transsexual woman.  It’s a little embarrassing to my radical sensibilities, but I really don’t consider myself to be genderqueer or any of those other nifty and boundary pushing identities.  I think of myself as a woman.  Simply and entirely.

I am also trans and proud of it.  It’s a valuable part of who I am and my journey in the world.  I ID as transgender to show solidarity with my brothers, sisters and others who fall all along the gender variant spectrum.  Also because I am not overly fond of the phrase “Pre-op” transsexual.

I consider myself transsexual because I am in the process of medically transitioning to my “true” gender.  I have been on HRT for several years and my body and mind have changed dramatically and wonderfully!  However, I have not yet had any surgeries and frankly don’t know if I ever will.

Certainly there are surgeries I would like to have.  I am aiming at a number of them.  I may eventually even choose to get the full “gender confirmation surgery”.

The main reason I have not gotten any of these surgeries is less radical and more pedestrian than I would like to admit.  I am an artist.  An actor and a writer and explorer of places and ideas.  Consequently I am not terribly wealthy.  These are only profitable professions for a small minority.  The rest of us do it because we have to, we are compelled.  And maybe, hopefully, someday, I will make money doing what I do.  Just not now.

So I work day jobs.  I do what I have to do to pay the rent and keep food on my table and live life as fully as I am able.

I made a choice when I decided to transition that I was going to simply let myself be the woman I had always been.  I would live as myself and take what steps I could to conform my body to that reality.

More though, I refused to wait any longer.  I would not wait for some long off day where I could afford to have all the surgeries and such that we are told are the requirement to be a “real transsexual”, “a true woman”.

I AM a woman.  I AM a transsexual.  Surgical status be damned.

So here I am.  This is why I identify as both transgender and transsexual.  I am NOT pre-op thank you very much.  I am not pre-anything.  I try as best I can to live my life in the moment.  To do and be what I can in the now.

Life for me is a journey in which the present is just as important as the destination.

So I take baby steps and make attainable goals.

And I try to pay attention to the details along the way so I can better share them with you.  Because I feel if I can share my own experience, the broad strokes as well as the little details, I can enrich the body of what is known about us.  De-mystify our trans identity a little so that other folks may realize we are not so very different.  We are people, same as anyone else, with similar loves, hates and everyday troubles and triumphs.

The same dichotomy of identities even.

I am both Lorelei Erisis, the larger than life celebrity who loves to stand on the stage and work the energy of the crowd and Lorelei who has to keep kicking her elderly orange cat off the table and trudge out in the snow to go pay the rent.

Often what you see here is Lorelei the celebrity or Lorelei the politician.

It’s Lorelei the woman that I want to talk about today.

And of course the idea of identities.

HRT has brought for me a tremendous number of changes.  It’s essentially a second puberty so that ought to be unsurprising.  But it still manages to be so.

One of the really radical changes for me has been in my sexuality.

When I was a teenager I assumed I was going to be the “gay one” in my circle of friends.  It was a lot of years before I would accept my repressed gender identity, so I took the dressing up and other side-effects of that repression as well as the fact that I was a pretty snappy dresser and a little overly fond of showtunes to mean I must be gay!

Imagine my surprise when it turned out I was really attracted to women and not so much to men!  As it turned out in fact, the only one in my little geeky-nerdy group of friends who always had a girlfriend and went through almost the entire, fairly small circle of available girls in our clique, was the “gay one”.  If only he could have come out earlier, some of the rest of us might have been able to get a date!

Eventually though I settled into an identity as bi-sexual.  But really it was more that I was particularly open-minded than that I was actually attracted to men.

I never had a lot of trouble meeting women and had a bad habit of falling passionately in love pretty easily and regularly.  Even when I began experimenting with gender pretty openly, I never had a lot of trouble.  Despite my childhood fears that my gender variance would mean I was going to end up alone and unwanted, I found quite the opposite to be true.  Quite a number of the women I dated very much liked the fact that I would do “drag” occasionally.  I even met several of them while out “en-femme” as they say.

Flash forward and I have accepted my gender variance and allowed myself to finally be myself.  Realized that the “drag” I was wearing was not the dresses and makeup, but the suits and ties!

And flooded with hormones a funny thing has happened to me.  I have fairly suddenly and a bit unexpectedly gone from theoretically attracted to men in a “yes I find that to be an attractive man” way, to “holy crap that guy is hot!” teenage-girl boy-crazy!!

Additionally, I have had the wonderful occasion in the work I do to meet a great many beautiful people with all sorts of gender identities.  Some extremely hot ones in fact!!  So I adjusted my sexual identity accordingly to consider myself to be pan-sexual.  I am attracted to people simply because I find them attractive, regardless of gender or any other factors.  And I try not to worry about it.

This has meant that socially and personally I identify as Queer.  It is an identity I am comfortable with and proud to proclaim.

But, this is a journey and so I have come to something of a crisis of identity lately.  Though I continue to identify as Queer and find myself attracted somewhat to women and others.  I find that what I want, what truly gets my heart racing, what gets me all hot and bothered, is men!  And yet, despite  my revolutionary pose, or perhaps because of it, this makes me oddly uncomfortable.  I find myself having to adjust to the idea that despite my Queer & Kinky identities, I am much more of a straight-girl than I am completely comfortable with admitting.

And I haven’t the faintest idea what to do about it.

As an Out, kink friendly transwoman, I have I can assure you, any number of men who would like to do all kinds of unmentionable things with me.  But gods forbid I should be able to find a guy who will take me out to dinner or a movie and maybe if we hit it off, go back to his place and fool around a little on the couch over a nightcap.

I haven’t even the faintest idea where to find a nice, cute guy who might be into me too.  Gay bars aren’t really any good.  Mostly they’re filled with gay boys who just want other really hot gay boys!  There simply aren’t any “tranny bars” close enough to justify a night out.  And straight bars are a tease.  I find most guys I might meet there are simply too afraid to approach a 6’4” Out transwoman in public.  Even a damned pageant queen!!  And the ones who are into me are too afraid to admit to it publically.  They’ll fuck me, but they won’t be seen with me.  Fun as that is, I just can’t get into that.

Just Lorelei

Don’t get me wrong, I love hot, dirty sex as much as the next girl.  Heck, given that I spent 5 years in a long-term relationship with a famous and notoriously dirty dominatrix, I’ve had experiences and done things that most people will only ever read or fantasize about.

But I’d really like a little vanilla-ish romance now!  I want it so badly it hurts.  I’d like to let go of being Lorelei Erisis, trans-activist for a few minutes and just fall into the arms of a beautiful, strong man.  Ideally one who is tall enough to not be dwarfed by me.  Who can see me as simply the beautiful woman I am.  Whose self-identity is strong enough to be seen with me.

I have no idea where to find him.  He’s not popped up on any of the dating sites I’ve put profiles on and if I’ve met him in real life, he hasn’t had the cojones to speak up yet.

I hope I meet him soon though because I’m ready and anxious to explore what it means to be a straight girl.  Even if it is an Out, Queer, Trans one.

A Trans-Analysis of SNL (and some really blatant self-promotion)

Lorelei Erisis doing what I do best!!!

There are those moments when I think to myself, “Lorelei, keep you’re your trap shut”.  Sometimes I listen, sometimes I don’t.  This is clearly one of those moments where I don’t.

There was a sketch on SNL last weekend that’s got all kinds of folks up in arms this week.  It was one of SNL’s standard fare commercial parodies starring guest host Jesse Eisenberg and several other cast regulars.  The sketch was a commercial for a fictional product called, “Estro-Maxx”, an estrogen supplement for male to female transsexuals hoping to speed up and simplify their gender transition.

I haven’t watched SNL regularly in years, so I had no idea about this sketch until this morning when I opened up Facebook and saw several of my friends and acquaintances from the trans world expressing their horror and dismay over this particular sketch.  Some were even calling for a public apology from NBC as well as a removal of the offending sketch from all media and future broadcasts.  In short, it was a shit-storm.

So, trans-activist that I am, I clicked the link, ready to formulate my own facebooked expressions of dismay but also trying my best as a comedy person to keep an open mind.  One minute and 55 seconds later, my impressions were similarly divided.

As a transwoman, I was deeply unsettled by the depictions of a transwoman with a beard and one with a mustache.  I was also jarred as an activist by the sloppy pronoun usage in referring to these transwomen.

But as someone who has spent most of their life studying, performing and working in the comedy field, I couldn’t help but think maybe there was something there.  I’ll admit, I did laugh a couple of times.  Not a hearty laugh, but enough of a chuckle to count.  I still felt somehow offended, but there were details that kept nagging at me.

As it happened, I had to get to work and get on with the day to day of paying the rent and living life.  But I kept an eye on the opinion threads through the day, wanting to feel out how other people were reacting.

The more I thought about the sketch though, the less offended I was.  There were little details that made me have to think.  Inferences I made based upon what I know about comedy and from a lifetime of eagerly staying up late to hear Don Pardo say, “Live from New York!”

When I got home just a little while ago I watched it again and discussed it with my friend Widow Centauri, who I met while she was doing standup and I was running the show at The Hollywood Improv.  Here are the conclusions that I’ve come to.

(click the link  below to watch the actual sketch on NBC.com)

http://widget.nbc.com/videos/nbcshort_at.swf?CXNID=1000004.10045NXC&widID=4727a250e66f9723&clipID=1279560&showID=61

First, yes it is offensive.  It’s comedy though and sometimes comedy ain’t pretty and almost all comedy is offensive to someone.  Even “self-deprecating” comedy is simply making the comic themselves the butt of the joke.  They are offending themselves.  And before you shout, “What about Bill Cosby?!?” at me.  Just consider how his kids must feel about his jokes.  Or Noah?

The line between when people feel offended and when they laugh, tends to lie in direct proportion to how actually funny the joke was.  I’ve seen comedians get away with the most incredibly, outrageously, the-ACLU-should-be-alerted, offensive material, because the audience just couldn’t help but laugh!  Because it was super-friggin’ funny!!  Because it was delivered well and the timing was just so.

Now the folks at Saturday Night Live have to turn out a fresh show every seven days.  An hour and a half of material that people are going to reasonably expect to be funny.  But that isn’t always going to be gut-busting.  With that much pressure, some of it will be “merely” clever.  Kinda funny.  Hopefully at least smart.

So, back to the sketch.  It was kinda funny and the more I examined it, kinda smart too.  It works on a number of levels.  Transsexual folks are only one of them.  It’s a very effective skewering of all those commercials offering health products to women.  Menopausal women especially.  On that level, it’s a pretty note for note replication of one of those commercials.  For it to work as satire though, you need an unexpected element.  For that, in this context, transsexual women are perfect.

On deeper reflection, I am forced to believe that this was in no way meant to be a skewering of transwomen.  Though there are women-with-beards presented, it in no way resembles the standard “gender-panic” type joke that you usually see pointed at transpeople in the popular media.  It is nothing like Letterman’s tasteless joke when Amanda Simpson was appointed by President Obama last year.

In fact, given the very specific reference levels of the sketch, I would say that it was written and performed by folks who, while they may not be perfectly sensitive, are at least familiar with and surprisingly informed about transpeople in real life.  There were elements of the sketch that, while easy to miss in the first flush of reaction, were pretty trans-specific.  Like the idea that the initial stages of gender transition are never as quick or as dramatic as some of us would like it to be.  Or showing transwomen as respectable people living our daily lives, in positions of power even!

I also read a number of comments from transpeople around the internets who noted that for once, we were not portrayed as over-sexualized freaks.  Heck, most of the women portrayed in the sketch weren’t even in dresses.  They were mostly in casual pantsuits!  They were probably dressed the closest to how actual (or at least, white, middle-class) transwomen dress that I’ve yet seen on television.

The sketch really could have been quite a positive piece overall.  But then came the facial hair.  And you could almost hear a thousand transsexual and transgender people go “Booooo!!!  Hissssssss!!!!”  And honestly, if it had been me, an actual, honest to Gods, transgender woman, writing the sketch, I would not have gone there.  But it wasn’t me, it was a bunch of (as far as I know) young-ish, cisgender guys.

Folks whose job it is to come up with, write, perform and often produce themselves, fresh funny material in less than six days every week for several months a year.  And hopefully not offend anyone too badly.  A job I would kill for, but by no means an easy one.

I actually thought, upon examination, that the “Estro-Maxx” sketch had a lot in it that was specifically applicable to transpeople, potentially funny to us and not necessarily a lot of other people.  But SNL has a lot of other people watching who also need to be made to laugh.

So, beards on transwomen.  In comedy terms it’s an unexpected juxtaposition of elements.  One of the basic building blocks of comedy, put a couple of disparate things together and build the yucks.  It ain’t always pretty, but it’ll make the Coors Lite buying segment of the viewing public laugh and keep them tuned to an otherwise oddly specific sketch.

But wait!  It goes a little deeper than just that even.  When we first see the bearded transwoman, she’s going through an airport security scanner.  The bored looking guard overseeing this doesn’t even blip at the women with obvious facial hair going through the scanner until he sees the scan and the scene implies he’s seen her genitals, at which point he finally reacts.

I kept thinking about this and it seemed to me, the more I thought about it, that this was actually a pretty astute observation of how genitally obsessed people in our society can be.  I can tell you from personal experience that I encounter this sort of thing all the friggin’ time!!  People will be completely unfazed by the fact of a six foot four woman with a gameshow announcers voice towering over them, but they cannot let go of the idea that my genitals might not be the standard issue for most women!!

But then, the guard does not react with the boring old, standard issue comedy, shock and horror, total disgust face.  The guard actually seems interested and happy!  He even shows up in the final tableau!!

The mustache on the other hand, I can’t defend except to say that for some reason it was a hilarious mustache in and of itself.  Seriously, you could show me 30 seconds of just that ‘stache and I’d be laughing my fool head off.  But probably it wasn’t appropriate for the sketch.

All told, I did not think the “Estro-Maxx” commercial parody was the funniest thing I’ve seen in ages or even close to the funniest thing I’ve seen on SNL.  (“Wake Up And Smile” was.  Trust me, Google it.  It’s friggin’ twisted)  And I can well understand why many of my transsexual/transgender sisters and brothers are so offended.  But I have to say that I found it surprisingly smart and somewhat funny.

It’s never fun to be the butt of the joke, but I can tell you one thing.  When they’re making fun of you on Saturday Night Live, it means people are paying attention.  You are important enough to make reference to.

And transpeople are that!  We are finally beginning to be heard.  The media juggernaught has taken notice and the advertisers will not be far behind.  That is something SNL got dead right.

Now, the question is, what do we do with that spotlight?!?!

As far as SNL is concerned, I know what I’d like to see.  I’d like to see a transsexual/transgender host or even cast member!!  If Lorne Michaels and NBC want to make a gesture to the trans community I have a suggestion.

Let me host!!!

I’m a Second City trained improviser, actor, writer and sketch comic who has been doing comedy one way or another since I could first make words come out of my mouth!!  And I’m also a genuine Bona-Fide transsexual woman!  Heck, I’m even a transgender celebrity.  A columnist, an activist AND a pageant queen.  I was the very first Miss Trans New England!!!

How do you like them apples!??!?!

And if one transgender woman’s not enough for ya, I’ve even got funny friends!!  I’m sure my friend, stand-up comedy veteran and also genuine bona-fide, etc., etc., transwoman, Tammy Twotone could be convinced to join me!  You could get a Comedy Transwoman Two-fer!!

So whaddya say Mr. Michaels???  Will you let me host?

How about you internet friends?  My trans sisters and brothers and everyone else reading this???  Do you want to see a flesh and blood transsexual woman making the funny for you on national TV??  Do you want your voices represented?

Then make it so.  Time for us to grab control of that spotlight ourselves.

Get out there and tell SNL and NBC that you want Lorelei Erisis to deliver that famous line, “Live from New York!  It’s Saturday Night!!!”

Lorelei Erisis, Tammy Twotone & LezleeAnne Rios

Tell Lorne Michaels you want Lorelei Erisis to host SNL

Slainte!

The People Of The Book (DJ Erisis Sacred Sounds Mashup)

This is a mashup I made some time ago.  When I first heard the Muslim Call To Prayer (or at least really listened to it) I was inspired by how beautiful it was.  It kept rolling around in my head for some time and I realized that it reminded me a great deal of other sacred sounds I was familiar with from the Christian and Jewish traditions.

Realizing this, I wanted to find a way to express those echoes.  To show how these separate faiths which all derive from shared roots, retain however a great deal of harmonic synthesis.  The three are one.

I have been hesitant to share this however out of a desire not show disrespect to any of the faiths represented here.  The recent uprisings in Egypt however, and their cross-faith solidarity, inspired me to share this.  I do hope you find it as beautiful as I do.

Click the link to my Podomatic blog to hear it: The People Of The Book

Peace.