on the transgender marriage debate
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Transsexuals a new test of marriage
THE GAY-MARRIAGE DEBATE MAY CAST DOUBT ON VALIDITY OF UNIONS INVOLVING PEOPLE WHO CHANGE GENDER
By Yomi S. Wronge
Mercury News
Depending on how you see things, Fran Bennett and Erika Taylor are a heterosexual or lesbian couple.
Either way, under California law, they're married.
That's because the couple tied the knot before Bennett, once a popular Bay Area disc jockey known as ``Weird Old Uncle Frank,'' had what is commonly called a sex change.
Their marriage -- and possibly thousands like it involving transsexual women and men across the Bay Area and country -- is already testing the boundaries of marriage as the nation wrangles over the rights of same-sex couples to wed.
Many transsexual couples have until now fallen under the mainstream radar as they've continued to marry, or remain married despite having changed genders. And now they're worried the contentious debate over same-sex marriage will cast an unwelcome spotlight on their largely quiet existence.
``If the Orwellian religious right has their way, they could pull the plug on all of us,'' said Bennett, 50, a San Jose resident who made national headlines in 2002 when she announced her transition from male to female.
Threats from religious conservatives, as well as President Bush's push for a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriages, make couples like Bennett and Taylor uneasy.
``I am concerned that if there's a federal change defining marriage only between a man and woman, and I no longer qualify as a man, then could they try to dissolve my marriage?'' said Fairfax resident Dani-Marie Kleist, 54, a transsexual woman who married as a man 12 years ago.
Transsexuals -- people who have an innate sense they were born the wrong sex -- have a legal right in California to change their gender on various forms of identification. Those who elect to have sex-reassignment surgery can also apply for a new birth certificate that reflects their corrected sex. There are an estimated 35,000 to 60,000 transsexuals living in California.
Able to marry
Transsexuals have long been able to marry in California and many other states under a variety of circumstances, including marriages entered into before a person makes the transition to the opposite gender, and those that would be considered heterosexual after a person changes gender.
``It's a precious right that we already have,'' said Shannon Minter, a transsexual man and legal director at the National Center for Lesbian Rights, one of three organizations that filed a lawsuit in March for six same-sex couples arguing that denying them the right to marry violates California's constitution.
While Minter believes marriages like Bennett and Taylor's can't be undone, she said they underscore the arbitrariness of using gender as a basis to restrict marriage.
If these marriages are called into question, some wonder whether the larger gay and lesbian community will fight equally as hard for the rights of transsexuals to marry.
``I'm scared this will divide the LGBT community as opposed to bring it together,'' Taylor, 36, said of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.
The major groups advocating for same-sex marriages, meanwhile, say it's all one battle.
``When we look at transgenders, we see that denying same-sex couples the right to marry has all kinds of unintended consequences,'' said Jim De La Hunt, policy director for Marriage Equality California, a non-profit, grass-roots group advocating for the freedom of all people to marry.
Transgender is an umbrella term for people whose gender identity differs from their anatomical sex. The term includes cross-dressers, people whose sexual organs are ambiguous at birth and transsexuals.
Some political analysts believe it benefits gay and lesbian groups to avoid talking about this little-known community in the context of same-sex marriage.
``Middle America is having a hard enough time with just plain old vanilla gay marriage,'' said Larry J. Sabato, director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics.
Quiet strategies
Opponents striving to ban gay marriage are already quietly planning ways to head off transgender people before they reach the altar.
``Transgender marriage isn't marriage. It's an invention, a violation of a universal social principal law of a male and a female,'' said the Rev. Lou Sheldon, leader of the Traditional Values Coalition.
Sheldon calls transgender marriage ``the next wave'' in the battle to protect traditional marriage ideals.
That sentiment doesn't surprise Gwendolyn and Bonnie Smith of Antioch, a legally married lesbian couple who have lived in peaceful domesticity for more than a decade, but now fear backlash given the current political climate.
``I'm scared that, somehow, they'll come up with a way to reverse 12 years of my life,'' said Bonnie Smith, 35, who married Gwen Smith before Gwen made the transition from a man to a woman.
She cited recent family court decisions regarding transgender marriages, including one involving attorney Mathew Staver, whose Liberty Counsel is representing the conservative Campaign for California Families in suits filed to outlaw gay unions.
Staver is appealing a Florida court decision to grant child custody to a transsexual man in a divorce case.
Similar divorce issues have been argued in U.S. courts only six times. Those in New Jersey and Florida have upheld the validity of such marriages; Kansas, Texas, New York and Ohio courts have declared them invalid, Staver said.
``I think the whole gay marriage debate, although it may not always be phrased this way, is a debate about gender,'' he said.
Transsexuals a new test of marriage
THE GAY-MARRIAGE DEBATE MAY CAST DOUBT ON VALIDITY OF UNIONS INVOLVING PEOPLE WHO CHANGE GENDER
By Yomi S. Wronge
Mercury News
Depending on how you see things, Fran Bennett and Erika Taylor are a heterosexual or lesbian couple.
Either way, under California law, they're married.
That's because the couple tied the knot before Bennett, once a popular Bay Area disc jockey known as ``Weird Old Uncle Frank,'' had what is commonly called a sex change.
Their marriage -- and possibly thousands like it involving transsexual women and men across the Bay Area and country -- is already testing the boundaries of marriage as the nation wrangles over the rights of same-sex couples to wed.
Many transsexual couples have until now fallen under the mainstream radar as they've continued to marry, or remain married despite having changed genders. And now they're worried the contentious debate over same-sex marriage will cast an unwelcome spotlight on their largely quiet existence.
``If the Orwellian religious right has their way, they could pull the plug on all of us,'' said Bennett, 50, a San Jose resident who made national headlines in 2002 when she announced her transition from male to female.
Threats from religious conservatives, as well as President Bush's push for a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriages, make couples like Bennett and Taylor uneasy.
``I am concerned that if there's a federal change defining marriage only between a man and woman, and I no longer qualify as a man, then could they try to dissolve my marriage?'' said Fairfax resident Dani-Marie Kleist, 54, a transsexual woman who married as a man 12 years ago.
Transsexuals -- people who have an innate sense they were born the wrong sex -- have a legal right in California to change their gender on various forms of identification. Those who elect to have sex-reassignment surgery can also apply for a new birth certificate that reflects their corrected sex. There are an estimated 35,000 to 60,000 transsexuals living in California.
Able to marry
Transsexuals have long been able to marry in California and many other states under a variety of circumstances, including marriages entered into before a person makes the transition to the opposite gender, and those that would be considered heterosexual after a person changes gender.
``It's a precious right that we already have,'' said Shannon Minter, a transsexual man and legal director at the National Center for Lesbian Rights, one of three organizations that filed a lawsuit in March for six same-sex couples arguing that denying them the right to marry violates California's constitution.
While Minter believes marriages like Bennett and Taylor's can't be undone, she said they underscore the arbitrariness of using gender as a basis to restrict marriage.
If these marriages are called into question, some wonder whether the larger gay and lesbian community will fight equally as hard for the rights of transsexuals to marry.
``I'm scared this will divide the LGBT community as opposed to bring it together,'' Taylor, 36, said of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.
The major groups advocating for same-sex marriages, meanwhile, say it's all one battle.
``When we look at transgenders, we see that denying same-sex couples the right to marry has all kinds of unintended consequences,'' said Jim De La Hunt, policy director for Marriage Equality California, a non-profit, grass-roots group advocating for the freedom of all people to marry.
Transgender is an umbrella term for people whose gender identity differs from their anatomical sex. The term includes cross-dressers, people whose sexual organs are ambiguous at birth and transsexuals.
Some political analysts believe it benefits gay and lesbian groups to avoid talking about this little-known community in the context of same-sex marriage.
``Middle America is having a hard enough time with just plain old vanilla gay marriage,'' said Larry J. Sabato, director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics.
Quiet strategies
Opponents striving to ban gay marriage are already quietly planning ways to head off transgender people before they reach the altar.
``Transgender marriage isn't marriage. It's an invention, a violation of a universal social principal law of a male and a female,'' said the Rev. Lou Sheldon, leader of the Traditional Values Coalition.
Sheldon calls transgender marriage ``the next wave'' in the battle to protect traditional marriage ideals.
That sentiment doesn't surprise Gwendolyn and Bonnie Smith of Antioch, a legally married lesbian couple who have lived in peaceful domesticity for more than a decade, but now fear backlash given the current political climate.
``I'm scared that, somehow, they'll come up with a way to reverse 12 years of my life,'' said Bonnie Smith, 35, who married Gwen Smith before Gwen made the transition from a man to a woman.
She cited recent family court decisions regarding transgender marriages, including one involving attorney Mathew Staver, whose Liberty Counsel is representing the conservative Campaign for California Families in suits filed to outlaw gay unions.
Staver is appealing a Florida court decision to grant child custody to a transsexual man in a divorce case.
Similar divorce issues have been argued in U.S. courts only six times. Those in New Jersey and Florida have upheld the validity of such marriages; Kansas, Texas, New York and Ohio courts have declared them invalid, Staver said.
``I think the whole gay marriage debate, although it may not always be phrased this way, is a debate about gender,'' he said.