Found at: Bangkok Post

A Katoey has won a village head election after decades of service to the community.
Choochat Dulayapraphatsorn, 46, beat three other candidates during the village head election in his community late last month, and last Wednesday he was effectively appointed by a district chief as the village chief of Ban Moo 3, tambon Tai Ban Mai, Muang district.
Mr Choochat, called ''Je Kob'' or older sister Kob by villagers, said he decided to run for the post after serving as an assistant. The election was held after the previous village head resigned.
Mr Choochat said he believes the residents voted for him because they have witnessed what he has contributed to their community over many years.
''I'm confident that everybody here loves me and accepts me,'' Mr Choochat said.
Over years of community service, Mr Choochat has been involved in community crime prevention activities and has assisted neighbours with tasks such as catching pythons which have entered their houses and injecting their pet dogs with rabies vaccine. ''Even though I am a transvestite, I can do hard, physical jobs just as well as the men, if not better,'' he said.
Mr Choochat is now the only transvestite village chief in Samut Prakan. He said he wants to be a role model to children for his hard work in the community, irrespective of his gender identity.

Found at: Bangkok Post

Technorati: thailand katoey kathoey politics village head choochat

Found at Gay People`s Chronicle

A Cleveland city swimming pool has told a transgender woman that she must sign in as a man and use the men’s locker room to change into her swimsuit.
Karen Deamons of Cleveland has been swimming at the Cudell Recreation Center on the city’s west side since 2005. She swims there three times a week as part of her rehabilitation from a stroke that year.
Deamons says that there has been tension between her and Cudell management since she started swimming at the facility. But it has escalated in the last month, resulting in her being barred for a week, then being required to sign the men’s registry when she arrives.
She has filed a sex stereotyping complaint against the city of Cleveland. The complaint, filed June 24 with the Ohio Civil Rights Commission, will be investigated by Gina Curry of the commission.
Deamons says she complied last year when Cudell told her to use the men’s changing room, but “it’s getting harder and harder” mostly because of the children at the facility.
During the day, Cudell is used primarily by children. It was built in 1964 and the men’s locker room has no doors on the stalls and no privacy in the changing area.
But the women’s locker room does have doors on the stalls, Deamons said, and she prefers to change in one of them.
Deamons, 52, is a former electrician, Paradise Club member, and former president of the Alpha Omega Society.
She has been undergoing hormone treatment for ten years, has legally changed her name and lives completely as a woman according to the Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association standards, in preparation for eventual sex reassignment surgery. She has breasts and swims in a black one-piece women’s swimsuit. Because of the stroke, she uses a wheelchair.
She was in the men’s locker room on June 21 when a young boy came in and asked her why a woman was changing her clothes in the men’s room.
Deamons said all she could do was ask him to leave the room until she was done.
But for her, that was the last straw.
On her next visit, she used the women’s locker room and was promptly suspended for seven days.
“It’s embarrassing, coming out of the men’s room,” said Deamons, adding that the city’s policy of making women use the men’s room is what is confusing the children and causing complaints among adults.
Cleveland’s swimming pools are open to the public and free of charge, even for non-residents. Cudell requires that guests sign in on sheets marked “male” and “female” before using the pool or other facilities.
The city is not commenting on the matter. Cudell manager Ron Fields would not discuss it.
City Parks and Recreation director Michael Cox also refused comment, although he noted that, “I have been dealing with this situation for a long time.”
Law Director Robert Triozzi said, “The City of Cleveland approaches with regard to its recreational centers and all its business a sense of fairness. We try to accommodate all people regardless of the issue.”
Asked what accommodation the city has made for Deamons, Triozzi said, “I’m not going to go there.”
Triozzi said he could not comment because the matter is now before the Ohio Civil Rights Commission, but emphasized that the city “takes it seriously and has nothing to hide.”
Neither Triozzi nor Cox would say whether or not the city has a policy governing the use of its facilities by transgender people.
While Cleveland has ordinances barring discrimination by sex and by sexual orientation, it does not have any that cover transgender people, as do Cincinnati, Toledo, Dayton and Oxford.
Triozzi would also not say whether or not there had been any complaints filed against Deamons by other Cudell patrons.
Deamons says that Cudell manager Fields has used them to justify the restrictions she has been placed under, though she has never seen them either.
Deamons said that a previous manager she knew only as Mary called her into the office shortly after she started using the pool, and asked if she had the reassignment surgery.
Deamons said it was after then that the tension with the facility started.
Triozzi said the city is preparing its answer to Deamons’ complaint.

Found at Gay People`s Chronicle

Technorati: usa cleveland swimming pool discrimination

Found at typicallyspanish.com

Firemen in Sevilla have found the body of a transsexual in the city murdered in her home. F.P. was in the process of changing sex from a man to a woman and had been demonstrating almost every day outside the courts in Sevilla claiming a ‘police mafia’ in the city. The protest consisted of F.P. always wearing the same white skirt, and a t-shirt with messages against the police.
The protest had continued for such a time that local civil servants and court workers had got used to it and considered it inoffensive.
But news is now released that F.P. was found dead at home last Friday July 11 in the La Barzola area of the city after neighbours alerted the fire service because of the smell. The autopsy has revealed that death was caused by a stabbing in the throat and police investigations are continuing.

Found at typicallyspanish.com

Technorati: Spain crime transsexual Sevilla transgender