Transgender Foundation of America seeks information about murdered transgender woman
"TG Woman Murdered in the Montrose
Does anyone know a a transgender woman named Myra Ical… around 50 years old? If so, please call the Transgender Center number at 713-520-8586. Any information you have about Myra can be very helpful!
Myra was murdered just off of Richmond on the 4300 block of Garrot in the Montrose area. She went down fighting; she had a lot of bruising and defensive wounds when her body was found around 2 PM on Monday the 18th. Her legal name was Ruben Dario Ical.
She was last seen in a black blouse, black jeans and a black sweater. Her body was found partially clothed.
As of right now, HPD has ZERO leads. Any information could be useful at this point! Please forward this information far and wide. It is important that we break the chain of unsolved transgender murders in Houston.
Five years ago, television network CBS rejected as too controversial an advertisement from the United Church of Christ (UCC) that suggested churches should be places free from discrimination, including discrimination based on age, gender, race, and sexual orientation. At the time, CBS told the UCC that the network had "a longstanding policy of not accepting advocacy advertising."
Fast forward five years, and now CBS is prepared to run an advertisement during the Super Bowl -- the largest watched television program in the entire country -- from vehemently anti-LGBT organization Focus on the Family. Focus on the Family has a long history of spouting anti-LGBT beliefs, from calling gay marriage perverted, to saying that homosexuals were a threat to civilization, to telling girls that sex education strips them of their modesty. On top of that, the advertisement that Focus on the Family plans to run during the Super Bowl will take an anti-choice viewpoint.
A history of anti-LGBT actions, coupled with tackling an issue like abortion -- and CBS doesn't think that counts as controversial?
Click here to tell CBS that they should reconsider their decision to run the Focus on the Family advertisement, or offer the UCC another chance to air their advertisement. Anything less sends the message that LGBT-friendly churches are controversial, while religious organizations that demonize LGBT people and women's rights are considered perfectly acceptable.
Former Nazi youth Pope Benedict XVI historic visit to a Synagogue in Italy was essentially a denial of the holocaust an effort to revise history and attempted assimilation of Jewish culture in a continuing effort to form a multi faith coalition to fight against transgender, gay and lesbian people's struggle for social, political and religious inclusion.
AP News regarding the objective of Benedict's visit "Under the leadership of John Paul and Benedict, the Vatican has been seeking common ground on such conservative agendas as traditional families while forging stronger relations with other religions, including Judaism and Islam."
Not lost on many is the likeness of the current Vatican's inaction regarding the proposed genocide of gay and lesbian people in Uganda and the Vatican's silence and collusion with the Nazi's when they attempted to annihilate the Jews during world war two.
UPDATE Jan 15 Facebook reevaluates decision to censor Dominic's profile picture!!Transgender people's VICTORY and EMPOWERMENT!!! *****Original post******** Pictured right is Dominic Scaia a transgender man from Canada who posted this profile picture of himself after top surgery on FaceBook. His account was then terminated and Dominic was unable to solicit a reply from FaceBook as to why.
Face Book reinstated Dominic's account only after xtra.ca contacted facebook. xtra.ca received this statement in a email.
"Photo content that you uploaded has been removed for violating Facebook's Statement of Rights and Responsibilities. Photos containing nudity or other graphic or sexually suggestive content are not allowed. Unfortunately, for technical reasons, we are unable to provide further information about the removed content.
However, after reviewing your situation, we have reactivated your account, and you should now be able to log in. In order to prevent this from happening in the future, please refrain from posting photos of this kind and remove any that still exist on the site. For more information on conduct prohibited by Facebook, please read our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities, which can be accessed by clicking on the "Terms" link at the bottom of any Facebook page."
Pictured left is a example of one of thousands of Facebook pictures that are of bare chested and sexually explicit cis men. Facebook's determination of acceptability is biased against trans men since these pictures and titles clearly are sexually suggestive. Hell, the word SEX is often used in the picture description! This is further illustrated since a cis woman who had the same type of surgery for the removal of a cyst was allowed to post like pictures.
Dominic talks his Facebook experience,
Dominic invites all to contact Face Book and express your opinion!
I contacted facebook using the press option and asked these questions on January 15, 2010 and stated I would like to have a answer by January 20th.
1.How does facebook determine acceptability of profile or other publicly view pictures? 2.Does facebook take into account the persons stated gender when determining if a naked chest picture is acceptable? 3.If facebook does not base it's decision to suspend a facebook account with a naked chest picture, on the stated gender of the account holder, who or what standards does facebook use to base this decision? 4.Why is contacting facebook difficult for suspended account holders?
It remains to be seen if facebook has the bravado to face these issues chest on or not.
Update January 15,2010 9:91pm CT
I received this email from Facebook in response to the above request for a interview with facebook;
Hi Kelli,
Thanks for your inquiry.
"We evaluate content on Facebook according to our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities, the governing document for our site (http://www.facebook.com/terms.php?ref=pf). Photos containing nudity violate our policies, and we will remove these photos – and may disable the account of the person posting them – when they’re reported to us by our users.
When determining if a photo meets our standards around nudity, we do take into account the gender of the person depicted.
Our policies are designed to ensure Facebook remains a safe, secure and trusted environment for all users, including the many children (over the age of 13) who use the site. Users can always write to our appeals queue (using the contact form in the “Warnings” section of our Help Center) if they feel they’ve been treated unjustly. Our team will then investigate and reinstate the account if appropriate.Regarding our customer service practices, we are committed to serving our 350 million users the best we can and continue to explore new options and additional resources to accomplish this goal."
Best, Jackson Colaco Facebook Public Policy
I replied with this email.
Dear Jackson Colaco,
The Facebook policy is fair and well advised. It would be supported by most gender diverse if it was adhered to. However Facebook did not follow it's own guidelines.
If facebook followed it's stated policy of taking into the consideration the stated gender of the account holder when deciding if a profile picture meets criteria that requires a account to be suspended, Facebook would not have suspended Mr. Dominic Scaia's account.
I am asking Facebook to follow it's policy and allow Mr. Dominic Scaia to post pictures of his bare chest without fear of retribution from Facebook.
Thank You, kelli anne Busey planetransgender http://planetransgender.blogspot.com Dallas Transgender Advocates and Allies http://dallastaa.ning.com
