She Got Me Blogging

I’ve lured her to the dark side. My spouse Helen, whom some of you know from our “She Got Me Pregnant” vlogs, has started blogging.

It all began when she launched a side business, Affine Financial Services, to do tax preparation and financial planning. She started putting up regular tips on her Web site, decided it was fun, and began her descent down the slippery slope into full-scale bloggerdom.

Starting today, she’s also going to be a contributing writer for Queercents, a personal finance group blog for the LGBT community. It’s definitely a site you should check out, if you haven’t already.

Helen’s focus for Queercents will be on financial planning for queers, our families, and friends, as well as advice to people starting small businesses. Her own site is for a more general audience, with plenty that both LGBT and non-LGBT folks may find useful.

Her first post for Queercents is Marriage Penalty: same-sex couples still ahead at tax time.

Go show her some love, leave a few comments, and welcome her to the blogosphere. (It’s also our 16th anniversary this week, and I figure nothing says “I love you” like driving traffic to her posts.)

Transgender Day of Visibility

Today is the Transgender Day of Visibility. While I’m not trans myself, and can’t presume to speak for the trans experience, I’ve covered a few trans-related items as they relate to parenting and kids. Here’s a quick roundup in honor of the day:

• This American Life On Transgender Children: The NPR show did a great piece in February profiling two eight-year-old transgender children. The segment starts about 29 minutes into the show.
• Trans Parent, Gay Son: Pride Across the Generations is an interview I did with Marti Abernathey of Transadvocate.
• The Transgender Child: A Handbook for Families and Professionals, by Stephanie Brill and Rachel Pepper, is a great resource for parents and educators. The Kids of Trans Resource Guide, by Monica Canfield-Lenfest of the COLAGE Kids of Trans program, looks from the flip side. Here’s my review of both.
• 10,000 Dresses, by Marcus Ewert, is a delightful new picture book with a transgender protagonist. It’s just been nominated for a Lambda Literary Award. My review and author interview is here.
• Another great read, and a previous Lambda winner is Transparent, Cris Beam’s gripping book on homeless transgender teens. I did a small post on it about a year ago.

I’ll also make this a thread on gender roles and kids. As a parent, what do you find most noticeable about your children’s gender identity or expression? Is it what you would have expected before you had kids? What are your fears/concerns/inspirations as regards their gender identity and expression? Do you think L, G, B, and T parents each have different concerns? Do they also have different concerns than non-LGBT parents?

Tennessee Could Restrict Embryo Transfer to Married Couples

This week, committees in both the Tennessee House and Senate will hear bills that would ban anyone but opposite-sex married couples from using embryo donation to have a child. The House Family Justice Subcommittee is expected to hear it at 10:30 a.m. CDT, today.

The Tennessee Equality Project has set up a site for those in Tennessee to e-mail their legislators. You can also find your elected officials’ phone numbers and call them now.

(There’s one clarification I should make to the TEP announcement, though. TEP also says, “Passage of this legislation would mean that single women and gay and lesbian couples would be banned from using in vitro.” That’s not strictly true. In vitro fertilization (IVF) could also mean using a woman’s own egg, fertilizing it outside her body, and reinserting it into her uterus. The bills, as I read them, would not ban lesbian couples and single women from using all forms of IVF, only those that involve an embryo created from someone else’s egg. Any ban is bad idea, of course, but it at least looks like those using IVF and their own egg would be okay, should the bills pass.)

Family Voices International: VII

Here is the seventh interview in this phase of the Family Voices series. This time around, I am teaming up with Julieta of Ju, An y el Perro Activista to extend the series to include non-U.S. LGBT families. Julieta has also done Spanish translations of all the interviews, which you will find after the English below, and at her blog.

(Photo credit: Eric Wynne – staff photographer, Halifax Herald) Read the rest of this post »

Family Diversity Films Streaming to Your Computer

Now available for streaming to your computer: many of the the award-winning films about diversity from Groundspark and Academy Award-winning director Debra Chasnoff. (Here’s my interview with Chasnoff about It’s STILL Elementary, her documentary about teaching LGBT inclusion in schools.)

The films have been available for home use on DVD’s that run $30-50 each. A good investment in a worthy cause, IMHO—but if your financial situation makes you balk at that, you can now purchase a 90-day license to stream them over your computer for only $4.99.

The streamable films are:

• That’s a Family! A film for kids about family diversity. It was banned by a school board in New Jersey for including LGBT families, so you know it has to be good.
• Let’s Get Real. Kids speak up about bullying.
• It’s STILL Elementary – Talking About Gay Issues in School. Aimed at educators and parents, not children.

What you don’t get with the streamed versions, though, are the discussion and teaching guides that come with the DVD’s. (You can buy them separately, but it really pays just to get the DVD package at that point.) Still, if you have a personal interest in any of these, or want to screen them for possible institutional purchase by your school, religious group, etc., streaming may be the way to go.

(I haven’t tried the streaming myself, though, so I can’t answer any technical questions about it.)

Why We Need the Uniting American Families Act

I mentioned last week that the Washington Post had come out in support of the Uniting American Families Act, which would allow people to sponsor their same-sex partner for immigration.

Here, via Immigration Equality, is why we need this law—parents and children torn apart:

March 27, 2009 – Immigration Equality today spoke out about a California family that may soon be torn apart. Due to immigration laws that discriminate against lesbian and gay couples, Shirley Tan will likely be deported April 3, separating her from her life partner Jay Mercado, their twelve-year-old twin sons, and Jay’s mother, for whom Shirley is the primary caretaker. The deportation will send Shirley back to the Philippines, where she was a victim of extreme violence.

“From the moment my sons were born we have never been apart. It’s tearing me apart to have to leave without them,” said Shirley. Read the rest of this post »

Weekly Political Roundup

Mostly good news this week, huzzah!

First, one that didn’t make it into this week’s LGBT Parenting Roundup, but which is excellent news for LGBT families: Congressman Pete Stark (D-CA) reintroduced the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) into the U.S. House, adding important updates that would provide paid leave for all workers to care for their families, including lesbian- and gay-headed families.

[Update: 5:20 ET] Breaking news: Kentucky Senate Bill 68, which would prohibit adoption or foster parenting by any person “cohabiting with a sexual partner outside of a marriage that is valid in Kentucky,” died in the legislature. W00t! (And given that becoming a parent severely curtails one’s sex life, I’m not sure what the point was there in any case.)

• President Obama appointed Emily C. Hewitt, 64, a prominent lesbian attorney and ordained Episcopal priest, as Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims. From the Court’s very own Web site: “Chief Judge Hewitt is married to Eleanor Dean Acheson.” Awesome.
• Ever want to know the salaries of the heads of major LGBT organizations? The Washington Blade tells us. Pam has some useful comments about how to interpret the information. Read the rest of this post »

“She Got Me Pregnant”: Episode 63

What happens when the Massachusetts House Minority Leader visits our home to talk about his bill that could limit the discussion of LGBT families in schools and require parental permission before students participate in gay-straight alliances? Helen and I tell you in our vlog this week.

On a lighter note, we give new meaning to the phrase “parent trap,” and demonstrate what happens when our son decides he wants to play Indiana Jones.

Brought to you in partnership with After Ellen.