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Some folks have written to ask why I haven’t had any posts on my blog Intersex and Out for so long, so I thought I’d share the good news with everyone: it’s because I was busy perfecting my memoir proposal so my agent could shop it and sell it to a major publisher! I…
Read MoreI’m thrilled to join Joe Wenke, author of The Human Agenda: Conversations about Sexual Orientation & Gender Identity, and my fellow contributors Gisele Alicia (model, Barney’s Brothers & Sisters Campaign) and Captain Kevin Fisher-Paulson (author, SF Sheriff’s Dept.) to share our stories, perspectives and commitment to freedom and equality. Please join for what promises to be a thought…
Read MoreCan’t say how thrilled I am that my May, 2014 essay “What’s in a Name: Intersex and Identity” (originally published here for my blog, Intersex and Out), will be published by Oxford University Press this December in the college textbook, QUEER: A Reader for Writers, by Jason Schneiderman. My gratitude goes out to Schneiderman and…
Read MorePsyched that I asked the US gov’t to ban Intersex Genital Mutilation (IGM) here in the U.S. — as the Maltese government did there last week! 🙂 🙂 🙂 — and that I was able to discuss “interphobia”, in my interview in VICE: “I often say we’re on the front lines of homophobia and transphobia,…
Read MoreI gave a Keynote presentation, my first talk in Spanish, on March 23rd at the 10th International Workshop in Science, Technology & Gender (X Workshop Internacional Ciencia, Tecnologia Y Genero: Visiones Y Versiones de las Tecnologias Biomedicas, ) in Madrid, Spain. I’d like to give my DEEP thanks to allies Nuria Gregori Flor, Eulalia Pérez…
Read MoreI was interviewed for <em>Gender Talents</em>, a fantastic web-based project by artist Carlos Motta that engages movements and discourses for gender self-determination within trans and interest communities. Carlos did a FANTASTIC job capturing some of my best points about the numerous issues that impact intersex people — such as homophobia, gender-variant-phobia, sexism, fear of lesbian…
Read MoreI am interviewed in the fantastic new book The Human Agenda: Conversations about Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (February 5, 2015), by author and LGBTQI advocate Joe Wenke. I speak about the harmful “normalizing” non-consensual medical practices – a.k.a. Intersex Genital Mutiltion (IGM) – that intersex minors are often subjected to, the dangers of…
Read MoreSo I showed my Aljazeera interview to the lovely woman I’m dating this morning, and it left me with some thoughts to share. The interview was about the IOC & IAAF’s regulations for women athletes with naturally high testosterone levels, which ban them from competing as women unless they undergo medically unnecessary procedures to lower…
Read MoreI’m going to be on Aljazeera today — soon, in fact — talking about the sports policies against intersex woman with hyperandrogenism (high testosterone levels). Much more to come, but here’s the skinny: these women haven’t been doping and yet they’re being forced to take unnecessary hormones just to be able to compete — with no medical/scientific…
Read Morehttp://intersexandout.tumblr.com/post/95130298770/caught-in-the-gender-binary-blind-spot-intersex “Finally, everything I’ve been saying about cisgender — and how it reinforces the gender binary — in one LONG (yes, warning, it’s dense) essay. 🙂 “
Read MoreEarlier this month, two intersex blog posts about the term “cisgender” reminded me that it’s high time we talk about how current cisgender rhetoric facilitates intersex erasure. But wait, how does it do that? you might be asking. I thought cisgender was the new rage in progressive gender terminology? Well, let me explain. For those…
Read MoreI’m thrilled to present at this fantastic event, and honored to join with fellow pioneers in the fight for bodily intergrity and an end to infant genital cutting. I will be introducing the award winning inersex documentary Intersexion (http://www.intersexionfilm.com/) on July 23rd and 24th, with a Q&A to follow. On the 24th I will…
Read MoreOne of the icons of the queer community once said, “Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative.” I’m talking about the Western world’s first openly gay diva, the one and only, Oscar Wilde, whose wise words make me feel much better about missing last week’s blog post (as well as the “Wednesday” target this…
Read MoreSo I went to a baseball game for the first time in about 35 years yesterday, because the person who invited me is so cool she inspired some formerly nonexistent interest, and I actually had a great time! (Such a great time that this blog is being posted on Thursday, rather than the typical Wednesday,…
Read MoreGiven my newfound commitment to weekly Wednesday blogging , not every blog will be a well thought out exploration of topics deeply intergral to being intersex. Some weeks’ posts are bound to be just the random, shallow but hopefully funny musings of your typical intersex chick next door. I think this is one of them.…
Read MoreI’ll never forget seeing the cover of a 1950’s lesbian novel called The Third Sex. It’d been made into a postcard, and was on sale at one of those touristy gay stores in Manhattan’s West Village. The cover was alarmist, calling homosexuality “society’s greatest curse”, and featuring a picture of two women about to make…
Read MoreI was recently interviewed by the awesome Vash Boddie of IMRU radio in L.A., the county’s longest running LGBTI radio station (airdate T.B.A.). At one point, he said, “everyone’s a little intersex”, and it got me thinking: who can call themselves intersex? It’s a relevant question because, believe it or not, there’s a fair amount…
Read MoreNowadays, the preferred-gender-pronoun question comes up quickly when I speak about being intersex. I see it as a positive indication that we’re moving beyond Intersex 101, and folks are starting to wonder what we’re actually like, as people. I tell them that, just like non-intersex people, we have a wide range of gender identities and…
Read MoreHi everyone! I thought I’d apologize for and share that the reason it’s taken me SO long to write something new is that my mom passed away this year. Being a sensitive, emotional type, and her death being unexpected, it knocked me for a loop. And then another. And another. Now however, I feel her…
Read MoreIn 1987, I was outed to my parents by my older brother in a scene straight out of the hysterical queer comedy But I’m a Cheerleader: dad yells, “Why can’t you be more like your sister!” gay son replies, “Guess what? She’s a lesbian!” I hadn’t told my dad because I was afraid he’d stop…
Read MoreVery excited to about this — Vassar students & staff are cutting edge, so this should be a good one! Wednesday, March 26, 5:30-7pm, Rocky 200. Link to PDF of poster >>>
Read MoreSo happy to see the groundbreaking panel Sports Comes Out Against Homophobia, that I’m honored to have participated in at the United Nations for Human Rights Day, getting some more coverage. This article, “Free & Equal Releases Video of Landmark Event Featuring United Nations Leaders, Sports Stars and LGBT and Intersex Activists” covers…
Read MoreI am deeply honored to be presenting at the United Nations in New York in recognition of Human Rights Day, Dec. 10th, along with the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, tennis legend Martina Navratilova, basketball star Jason Collins (the 1st NBA player to come out as gay), and fabulous human…
Read Morehttp://bayareabirthjusticefair.wordpress.com/2013/11/02/fall-2013-forum-key-note-speaker-hida-viloria/ Very happy to be presenting at this event for parents which deals specifically with the issue of children’s right to physical integrity. And I have a whole stack of brochures of the educational resource for parents of intersex newborns that I authored — Your Beautiful Child: Information for Parents — to bring…
Read MoreGermany’s new third gender law becomes effective today, and has been hailed as a groundbreaking advancement for intersex people, but every intersex advocacy organization in Germany is opposed to it. Why? The answer is simple: the new law places intersex babies at risk for increased discrimination. According to the law: PStG § 22 Abs. 3:…
Read MorePlease help spread awareness by sharing the info in this link with at least one person in your life. 🙂 https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=644596792238810&set=a.355696581128834.86699.189133101118517&type=1&theater
Read MoreI’ll be presenting, “Intersexphobia: What It Is and What We Can Do To End It,” today at NYU, with my colleague Claudia Astorino. Please join us to learn how to support equality for intersex people! 🙂
Read MoreSo happy to be invited to the University of California at Davis (UC Davis) once again to educate about intersex people and our need for human rights! October 23rd, 5-7pm An KBTQIARC event.
Read More(FINALLY, a new blog post! 🙂 ) A few weeks ago, I testified as an expert witness on the television show Caso Cerrado (translation: Case Closed). It’s kind of like People’s Court but in Spanish, and is the first television show on a Spanish language station to have been nominated for an Emmy. I was…
Read MoreLike everyone who’s logged onto Facebook this week and has a diverse group of friends, I’ve read mixed reactions to the Zimmerman verdict, and seen the subsequent arguments. After several days of witnessing this aftermath, I want to reach out to those who’ve been unfriended, or something similar, because you said you didn’t see why…
Read MoreI’ve been meaning to write a review of Abigail Tarttelin’s novel Golden Boy, about an intersex teen, since it was released late last month, but a few things got in the way: 1. I find writing reviews kind of weird. 2. It’s even weirder when my review is meant to provide an insider opinion —…
Read MoreThe LGBTQI Pride Parade was today in Los Angeles, and instead of riding with the Dykes on Bikes, or watching with friends and then going to Booby Trap, the queer women’s pool party, I found myself blissfully biking down to the beach, then along the beach… then texting cancellations. Basically, I’m more into chill activities…
Read More[Note: In honor of LGBTQI Pride month, this post’s title is a riff on the old Queer Nation slogan, “We’re Here! We’re Queer! Get used to it!” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queer_Nation.] There’s a line in Golden Boy, the excellent, recently released novel featuring a 16 year-old intersex protagonist, where he says that you have to choose one or the other,…
Read MoreJust read the novel Golden Boy, by Abigail Tarttelin, about a 16 year-old intersex boy. The full review’s coming up separately, but I want to quickly say that I found it hard to put down, and that it didn’t– unlike lots of stuff written by non-intersex people about intersex people – offend me or, imho,…
Read MoreRecently, I’ve been thinking about what motivated me to be an intersex spokesperson and activist. For starters, there’s inspirational role models like the incredibly brilliant, badass Angela Davis. She took the racist establishment on head first, eloquently and bravely, jeopardizing her career as a university professor and spending 18 months in prison as a result. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qh49nbTq268…
Read MoreLast week, before my okcupid-induced outing, I realized I was going to have to come out again, but not in the usual way. I’d found my date in a “girls who like girls” online search, so I obviously didn’t need to come to her as queer. But if I wanted to be able to…
Read MoreAttorney & intersex ally Toby Adams’s excellent blog about how intersex people are left out of the law. http://tobyshome.wordpress.com/2013/04/17/intersex-rights-id-please/
Read MoreToday, I want to talk about my favorite new idiom: well-hung woman. As most English speakers know, “well-hung” is slang for a man with a large penis, so you might be wondering how a woman could be well-hung? Well, if you know something about intersex people, you may have already figured it out; but in…
Read MoreAuthor Gayle Pittman’s blog “Girls, boys, and the rest of us” examines intersex, diversity, and acceptance. 🙂 Boys, girls, and the rest of us
Read MoreA few days ago, I received an excerpt from an article-in-progress by a law professor that stated that intersex is increasingly included as a subcategory of transgender. I’m grateful that she contacted me for feedback, and confident that she’ll edit this out, but I’m shocked at how much people continue to obfuscate intersex. Why oh…
Read MoreNote: This article is based on my blog post Zero Tolerance to Female Genital Mutilation — Unless They’re Intersex I’m happy to report that it was re-published in The Global Herald, but note that they changed the title, unfortunately, to: “US Ban on Female Genital Mutilation Mired in Racism and Fear.” /http://theglobalherald.com/u-s-ban-on-female-genital-mutilation-mired-in-racism-and-fear/29098/
Read MoreLast week, Steven Colbert made fun of Republicans who complained that hurricane Sandy was “good luck” for Obama, imitating their annoyance with, “’…Sandy? What kind of a name is that? Are you a dude storm or a lady storm?’” Yes folks, Steven Colbert is hip to intersex humor (intersex people, fyi, are born with sex…
Read MoreA friend of mine recently relayed that she told some friends about my intersex activism, and me, and they said, “She’s just doing that for attention, that doesn’t exist.” Yes, intersex is to today’s two-sex system what the idea of the world being round was to the dominant earth-is-flat view: something most people couldn’t imagine–…
Read MoreI’ll be speaking at two events in New York City in October for Intersex Awareness Day, which is observed on October 26th to commemorate the first known U.S. intersex protest, at a medical center in Boston. Intersex Awareness Day Workshop Friday, October 26 New York University NYU Global Center for Academic and Spiritual…
Read MoreLecture on Intersexuality Friday, October 12, 2012 12pm – 1:30pm Storrs Campus Rainbow Center @ UConn, Student Union 403 Admission Fee: Free and open to all The Rainbow Center is pleased to host Hida Viloria, an expert educator on the topic of intersex, which is rarely talked about in society, let alone campus communities.…
Read MoreI’ve received a scholarship from ILGA — the world’s largest LGBTI organization, which is “Intersex”/”I” inclusive — to attend both their Intersex Forum & their Annual World Conference in Stockholm, Sweden this December. Yay for raising more Intersex awareness and connecting with LGBTI allies! http://ilga.org/ilga/en/index.html
Read MoreIs sex testing in the Olympics a fool’s errand? I’m quoted in the Los Angeles Times in an article by Jon Bardin about the Olympics’ unsound policies for intersex women. “According to Hida Viloria, director of the Organisation Intersex International, such therapies amount to ‘an athlete doing an experiment on themselves,’ and she likens…
Read MoreI’m quoted today from my recent letter in The NY Times in this KICK-ASS article by Katrina Karkazis (author of Fixing Sex) and Rebecca Jordan-Young, about the Olympics discriminatory policy toward intersex women. yay! 🙂 “In a letter to The New York Times, Viloria pointed out that meeting participants discussed other physical and medical…
Read MoreIntersex Awareness Week is held annually in late February as a time of education and awareness around intersex issues and experiences. It is organized under the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Resource Center. Events vary greatly, from speakers, to activist projects, Intersex 101 and academic discussions of community intersections (to name just a few). WEDNESDAY…
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