Straight Parent, Gay Kid
Who Is Kristin Beck? Why We Should Care
Just last week, I watched a documentary entitled “Lady Valor: The Kristin Beck Story,” released in 2014, at our local theatre. The movie was preceded by Beck’s memoire Warrior Princess: A US. Navy Seal’s Journey to Coming Out Transgender, co-written with psychologist Anne Spechard, Ph.D. in 2013.Apparently, the movie was filmed a few months…
The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly (In LGBT issues, that is.)
First the Good News: · Captain Franchino married Captain Hall on January 13, 2018 at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, New York. The two Apache helicopter pilots stationed at Fort Bliss, El Paso, Texas are the first active-duty, same-sex couple to exchange vows at West Point. · Gallup poll reports that 64% of…
Suicide: It’s All Too Common
Did you know that suicide is the second leading cause of death among young people, ages ten to twenty-four? Compared to heterosexuals, LGB youth seriously contemplate suicide at almost three times the rate. And the numbers climb when a teen is transgender. Thirty percent of transgender youth report a history of at least one suicide…
All Straight Parents Should Be So Understanding
I recently saw the excellent stays-with-you movie “Call Me By Your Name.” In this film, Elio, a seventeen year-old Italian Jew, falls hard for his father’s research assistant, twenty-four year-old confident doctoral student, Oliver, from the United States. Elio lives with his family during the languid summer at a villa in Crema ( Northern Italy)….
What’s Cooking in those Red Kettles?
Do well-meaning people know that by heeding the call of the uniformed bell ringers and dropping money into those red kettles, that they may be supporting homophobia and transphobia? Although the Salvation Army is the largest provider of drug and alcohol recovery services in the United States, and is no “fly-by-night” organization (it was founded…
Who Owns The Cake?
Tomorrow, the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) will hear oral arguments about whether a Colorado baker has the right to refuse making a wedding cake for a same-sex couple. The couple, David Mullins and Charlie Craig, who were married in Massachusetts, complained for being turned down by the baker. It has resulted in a case, The…
Coming Out: Is It A Good Idea During The Holidays?
Chances are you may see your relatives on few occasions. Thanksgiving may be one of them. Christmas may be the other. You don’t want to upset the tone of the holidays by injecting a life-altering announcement that will either elicit a million questions or silence your guests who are unprepared for such news. The news…
It’s National Transgender Awareness Week, Nov. 13-17
Did you know that: · The F.B.I. released hate crime statistics for 2016 and highlighted the ongoing epidemic of anti-transgender violence in the U.S. · In 2016, advocates tracked 23 deaths of transgender people in the United States. · One in every 137 teenagers in the United States identifies as transgender. In our schools, transgender…
November is National Adoption Month
I have two adopted children: a son, born in 1983, and a daughter, born in 1988. Both were closed adoptions of infants through a well-known adoption agency in Manhattan. I have little medical information about the birthparents from my son’s adoption and precious little from my daughter’s adoption. I’m not sure it would have been…