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- SIMON ARONOFF
Friday, April 27, 2007
BY: SIMON ARONOFF
I GREW UP in Fayetteville, Ga., and graduated high school just a few years before the dawn of gay-straight alliances — or at least before they dawned on Fayetteville.
Our community newspaper, The Citizen, was absolutely devoid of any liberal media bias, and when Ellen DeGeneres made the decision to come out on her sitcom, the Citizen opined with a column that read, in a nutshell, “Gross!” Why must Ellen bring her lily-licking ways into our living rooms? Why does she have to flaunt it?
Young and angry, I decided to submit a letter to the editor. It actually got published, and I still have the yellowed clip. Not all of the Citizen’s readership appreciated my 19-year-old explanation of the cultural importance of Ellen’s coming out. In fact, we got venomous prank calls at my parents’ house for months. But my soccer coach’s wife did call with a surprisingly appreciative review and I got a nice letter from a family friend.
Words have power. Words in the media have more. That’s why Michael Savage’s recent disgusting on-air tirade slandering Ruby Ordenana, a 24-year-old transgender woman who was found murdered on March 16, was so dangerous. I know you’ve read this before: Hate speech creates an environment where hate crimes are acceptable. But is anybody listening when those words slander transgender people?
SAVAGE’S COMMENTS MAKE the world an even more dangerous place for me and my trans brothers and sisters. Ruby’s body was found nude, lacerated and strangled, and the attention-seeking Savage called her a “freak” and a “psychopath.”
What is worse, Michael Savage (who no one expects to deliver actual news) is not the only trans-bashing voice in the media. Try reading through some transcripts from CNN’s Glenn Beck or MSNBC’s Tucker Carlson. Enabled by networks, producers and advertisers in this dangerous defamation, here’s Carlson in his own words:
“Just because you’re castrated and have a fake set of boobs does not make you a woman. It makes you a castrated man with a fake set of boobs. If a person voluntarily undergoes a castration … that is an act of a crazy person. … That’s like setting your hair on fire or blinding yourself … and I don’t want a person that unstable teaching my kids.”
And from CNN’s talking head Glenn Beck reporting on a trans teen who was turned away from her prom for wearing a dress:
“Don’t we as a society, don’t we have the right to say, what the hell is wrong with you? … Go home and change, freak boy.”
AT THE NATIONAL Center for Transgender Equality, we’ve been trying for a year to get CNN and MSNBC to take some responsibility for these trans-bashings. We monitor. We write. We speak with the network ombudsmen. We ask, at the very least, that producers book a trans-positive guest interview to offer some balance as their pundits call us “mentally ill.”
The silence is deafening.
As a community, we’ve made solid progress curbing anti-gay defamation. Ann Coulter and Isaiah Washington use the f-word a couple of times and they are rightfully raked over hot coals. Syndication is clipped. Rehab is called for. In 2000, Dr. Laura’s “biological error” comment spawned an amazing wave of grassroots media activism that ultimately cost the TV host her show. And Imus finally got his comeuppance.
But is anybody listening when Savage, Beck, Carlson and others routinely slam transgender people? Let’s set up www.StopSavage.com. Let’s join together and organize “CNNWatch.” Let’s make sure that Tucker Carlson’s boss calls him into the principal’s office the next time he mocks transgender lives because the network is nervous about a wave of public outrage and the loss of advertising dollars.
I’m not young anymore, but I’m still angry. That’s why I’ve started the web site Trans Media Watch (www.TransMediaWatch.blogspot.com). This time, I don’t think I’ll be the lone voice. Besides, my parents are moving out of Fayetteville in a couple of months. Let’s stop these demagogues of defamation. Together we can make the environment a little less toxic for transgender people. Let’s do it for Ruby.
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