Daily Dose of Queer needs a dose of perspective.

Separatism is good, apparently.

I expect this sort of thing out of Chris Crain, but I didn't expect to hear his views uncritically endorsed by Maria of Daily Dose of Queer. Was I just being naive?

Here's the comment which I tried posting. Apparently the commenting system works with no browser known to human kind, however— or just not for people who disagree.

I find this editorial disingenuous.

"Trans-jacking"? As if protection from discrimination on the basis of gender identity and expression doesn't protect lesbians, gays, and others whose gender presentations are not necessarily as society expects, as well as trans people? As if the "gay rights organizations" trans groups were lobbying— HRC, NGLTF, among others— do not themselves say they are for the LGB*T* communities? Do we not have a right to speak our minds to organizations who claim to represent us as well? What about trans people who are also gay or lesbian?

Asking trans people to wait for protection until it has been achieved for gay people is also wrongheaded, and make no mistake, if we did not insist on inclusion, we would be excluded by people of an assimilationist bent who are as ashamed of certain portions of the gay and lesbian community as they are of trans people. It is demoralizing and dehumanizing to be told that our rights are less important, we should "take one for the team" and continue to suffer employment discrimination and hate crimes with no legal protections while supporting bills which protect our allies and exclude us.

Crain has no understanding of trans issues. How is qualified to comment on how trans people should organize on our own issues, as he does twice in this editorial? He is hopelessly confused about the spectrum and complexity of gender variant individuals, conflating the genderqueer movement with transgender rights advocacy, which are two separate issues. His case rests on a fundamentally flawed understanding of transgender issues and it saddens me that it should persuade others whom I consider allies.

I've read this blog with great pleasure for a few months now, but your uncritical endorsement of Crain's agenda here just makes me sad.

Clearly, in Crain's world, there are good gays and lesbians— just normal folks who deserve for their rights to be protected *right now*, and bad queers— trannies and leatherfolk whose agendas will spoil everything for the good gays and lesbians if they aren't carefully excluded. Do you endorse this kind of separationist strategizing? If so I'm afraid we have to disagree— I think it will be the destruction of us. It turns my stomach to see it glorified here.

DeYoung Press Opening

The press opening for the DeYoung Museum was a qualified success. There are still a few kinks to be worked out— lights to be put up, objects to be mounted, etc.— before the grand opening Saturday, and much of the landscape was still in final polish stages, but that's to be expected.

Here's what I found impressive, of the very little bit I got to see:

The building. Okay, yes, it's postpostmodern. It's made of metal. The metal is patinaed a very dark copper, with some iridescence. It's also perforated, with the inner structure of the walls showing through in places. However, the patina gives the building a much warmer feeling than any other metal building I've seen, and the perforations soften the hard edges. The building is also very well planned around its function— for instance, the entire basement level can be locked off from the upper galleries, allowing it to be rented out for events without endangering the objects upstairs. The parking garage is so designed that large objects and installations can be trucked right into the museum without having to spend time in secondary storage. Inside, the design of the building is fairly minimal, which allows the art to be displayed to the best advantage. The most important thing about the museum building is that it makes a good museum, and this does.

The Hatshepsu exhibit. The objects are impressive, and it's nicely mounted, if not innovative. The curator for that exhibit really knows what she's talking about.

The grounds are gorgeous. And in the sculpture garden, gingko trees (wisdom and longevity) are paired with sulptures of apples (immortality and learning), which I think is cool. Awesome lights in front, as well— they look like glowing pitcher plants.

The curators are great.

But:

The watchtower looks, as my classmate pointed out, almost exactly like the structure the Jawas went back to in Star Wars.

I'm still creeped out by the Oceanic Art collection. Something different needs to be done there; I'm not quite sure what.

What's up with the lights in the cafe? They look like candy. They're silly. You can see the compact fluourescent bulbs through some, but not all, of them. They're very 70's. They have to go.

If I never get another job...

...at least I can die happy knowing I impressed the hell out of the people at the ice cream parlor.

So I'm likely to be serving gelatto for almost no money for 30 hrs a week until I find something better. All right. Maybe I'll learn Italian while I'm there, and free gelatto is nothing to sneer at.

Another interview.

This one, eh. I'm not so keen. See, it's at a laser hair removal clinic. The ad just said "medical clinic", so I didn't know. I'm pretty sure they want someone more, um, chickish. Or at least someone who doesn't look like a woman with some barely-noticeable stubble.

I had a really great interview!

Too bad they didn't want to hire me anyway. Back at square one. The anxiety is really killing me.