This essay was written by Joe Blow, an FtM transfag, on his first experience lobbying for trans rights in Austin, Texas. This archive was found on the Wayback Machine.Texas Transgender Lobby Day:
A Guy's Perspective
by your average Joe Blow trannyboy
I slept through every class in High School and College that had even a hint of government, history or lawmaking in its curriculum. I was pretty successful at graduating with the smallest possible knowledge of the inner workings of our country's governing process.
The fourth week of January 1999, I was in the middle of working with some folks on establishing an FTM group, The Alamo Boyz in the San Antonio, Austin area when The Texas Gender Advocacy Network's, (TGAIN) notice about an upcoming Transgender Lobby Day was forwarded to me by the Alamo Boyz' first Austin member. We discussed it, me with complete ignorance of what it would entail and feeling my hard-won benightedness slipping away, him with unjaded enthusiasm and optimism. I didn't panic over the impending loss of my naivete but decided that attending it wouldn't totally wreck my perfect score of zero government participation. It'd just bend my score a little.
The evening before Lobby Day the Transgender coalition assembled in the meeting room of an Austin hotel for training. Walking into the training session wasn't intimidating. I'd been to enough transgender meetings in other parts of the country to know folks were going to be polite, open and gracious. I was right on all of that. I was also very pleased that the three members of alamoboyz were only half the male population in attendance. Guys tend to be a bit under represented in transgender community events.
Phyllis Fry and Sarah DePalma welcomed us guys with particular enthusiasm. Sarah talked with us about the need to get Transmen involved in the political action being undertaken to secure trans rights. It was a message I'd give a lot of thought to the next day.
The group of approximately thirty-five lobbyists—of which I was now amazed to realize I was one—was as diverse as any random cross section of Americans. There were degreed professionals, a couple of lawyers, homemakers, parents, writers, students nine to fivers and at least one engineer. And of course we had one thing in common which bonded us to this cause. Transgenderism. In that area we were also a pretty diverse group which was nice to learn.
We spent a few minutes greeting each other then took our seats. Phyllis Fry addressed the group and gave us a great talk on the importance of what we were there to accomplish. I followed her words carefully, relating what she was saying to my life and to the lives of the friends I've made during my move through transition. She talked about the history of transgender activism and how the numbers of folks involved had grown in the past fifteen years.
Phyllis introduced Sarah DePalma, the driving force behind the first ever Transgender lobby day in Texas. Sarah is such a motivating speaker. She had our undivided attention then explained to us that our presence, our gathering together in the state's capitol city already signified a huge success. Transgender people are now out and active. With that tremendous step accomplished we can become a voice that will be heard.
As Sarah began giving us the background information we'd need for our efforts the following day we had a surprise visitor. Well, his presence was a surprise to me, not to her. State representative from the Austin district, Glenn Maxey stopped by to give us a pep talk. It worked. He had us hanging on his every word, explaining the experiences of being the only out gay congressman in one of the most conservative states in America. He talked about what we should expect at the captiol building, giving us a sense of security and boulstering confidence. I could go on about him for hours (see the stars in my eyes?) but I'll save that for another day. When he left Sarah had a bit of work calming us down and focusing us on the task at hand.
We were there to work. She put us to work.
We'd be paired up into teams of two and would be walking from office to office in the capitol building seeing representatives and senators. TGAIN had prepared a booklet based on surveys filled out by Transfolk. We were to give these pamphlets to the legislators and after a short talk offer to answer their questions. The eight page booklet contained a cover letter from her as Executive Director of the Texas Gender Advocacy Information Network. The letter explained a bit of transgender history, our goals and what we were seeking this day.
The booklet also listed the six pieces of legislature Texas Transgender folks are particularly concerned with. The first four we as a group support and want to see passed into law. Those are:
- The Texas Employment Non-Discrimination Act.
- Hate Crimes Legislation
- Repeal of the State Sodomy Law
- A Prohibiton of Discrimination Relating to Education
The two pieces of legislation we oppose are:
- Refusal to Place Foster Children with Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual People
- Preventing Same Sex Marriage
Each team was given a starting list of eight legislators to go see. We'd ask first to see the Representative or Senator and if they were unavailable then we'd ask to see the executive assistant.
Here's kind of how a typical encounter went.
My partner and I arrived at a Senator's office without an appointment. The senator was either out or otherwise engaged. We were shown into the assistant's office, briefly explained who we were and gave them the booklet. We mentioned the six pieces of legislature we were concerned with, explaining how each would or did affect the lives of Transgendered people then offered to answer any questions. Then we asked the assistant how they thought their senator felt about each piece of legislature. Most of the time we got noncommital answers. I was aware we were after all, in a political office. Most were under the impression they had no transgender people in their district. I really got a kick out of informing them otherwise.
We made notes, recorded the name of the person we spoke with and left to go to the next senator's office. Occasionally we sparked interest, peaked curiosity and generally got people thinking on the subject. That was the success Sarah had told us we'd achieve, to get the people thinking about us as real citizens with real issues. We succeeded in every single office we walked into. We are no longer invisible to those folks we greeted, shook hands with, sipped coffee with and chatted with.
Despite my best efforts I learned about government, lawmaking and politics that day. It's all stuck in my brain now and I haven't taken the time to properly mourn my loss of ignorance. The most important thing to me was that now those elected officials can put a face to whoever will be directly affected by those laws they'll pass or reject or hopefully repeal. Sarah's talk of the need for transmen to participate really hit home then. If we're not there, we won't be considered by lawmakers when they're making decisions about things that affect us.
What a painless process it was! I don't know quite why I even hesitated to attend the event. It required a bit of rearranging my life. One and a half days out of my hectic schedule. I met some great folks, saw the capitol not as a tourist but as a citizen there to do business, saw the inside workings of many state senator's offices and got an indepth impression of day to day business as its carried out at my state capitol.
I recall the poll that was sent out asking Transgendered people which pieces of legislature were most important, what their stance was on each. I now see how Sarah and the TGAIN folks put that information to use for my ftm brothers and I. Of course there was a lot of work done by the TGAIN folks long before they showed up in Austin, long before I met any of them face to face. Next time one of those polls rolls into my email box I'll jump on it a little faster, follow up on it a little closer, and I'm also going to make every effort possible to be there the next time and every time Sarah, and any other TGAIN activists come back to Austin.
I had a blast, folks!
Joe Blow © 1999
