Free Republic

Netflix’s Orange Is the New Black star Laverne Cox, a biological male who identifies as female, says a new music video the actor produced was inspired by straight men who secretly desire males who identify as female. In the music video for “Gretchen: A TripHopera Pt. 2,” Cox channels the mythical 18th-century story by writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, which involves Mephistopheles helping Faust seduce a young and innocent woman, Gretchen, whose life is ultimately destroyed when she gives birth to Faust’s illegitimate son. “In my version, Faust is actually Fausto, and instead of Gretchen being tormented by her desire...

Transgender Hollywood star Laverne Cox and Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) pushed for the defunding of the police in a joint appearance Thursday on Watch What Happens Live, during which Sen. Harris said that putting more cops on the streets is “just wrong.” Laverne Cox expressed her enthusiasm about the Defund the Police movement in the virtual conversation. “The fact that there’s a national conversation about defunding the police, I think is remarkable. And that people of all races are having that conversation is really exciting to me.”

President Donald Trump's administration is considering a policy that would eliminate transgender recognition by requiring individuals to be defined as male or female based on their genitalia at birth, according to a government memo obtained by the New York Times. The report has caused an uproar on social media Sunday (Oct. 21). The Department of Health and Human Services is aiming to establish a uniform definition of gender, determined “on a biological basis that is clear, grounded in science, objective and administrable," the report says. “Sex means a person’s status as male or female based on immutable biological traits identifiable...

A restaurant chain is facing a lawsuit regarding a Harlem restaurant staff's refusal to serve a group of transgender woman and a gender nonconforming person. Deja Smith, Daniele Marino, Jonovia Chase, Jahmila Adderley and Valerie Spencer claim they were told the Texas Burgers & Chicken on Frederick Douglass Boulevard and West 116th Street was out of chicken when they attempted to order there on May 28, but a customer directly behind them had his order taken, according to multiple reports. A video of the discriminatory behavior went viral in May after it was posted to Instagram by "Orange is the...

As a transgender woman, Trace Lysette had watched from the sidelines as actors like Eddie Redmayne (“The Danish Girl”) and Matt Bomer (“Anything”) played members of her community on the big and small screen. When news hit last month that Scarlett Johansson would portray a transgender man in the biopic “Rub and Tug,” she could no longer stay quiet. Since the “Transparent” actress wasn’t getting opportunities to audition for cisgender (non-transgender) roles, she argued on Twitter that the industry should at least allow transgender actors to play what they know.

(snip)Watch it all in real-time on Glamour's Facebook Live channel.(snip) 9:15 AM: Chelsea Clinton and Laverne Cox on How to Persist and Repeat. With Alex Wagner, CBS new anchor and contributing editor at The Atlantic, moderating, Women of the Year 2014 honorees Chelsea Clinton and Laverne Cox discuss how to keep pushing when the world is pushing back. The two start the talk by sharing how much love they have for each other. For example, when Chelsea was "about to pop" with her second child, Laverne asked her if she was having "a boy, girl, or trans?" As the talk...

Some of you will have noticed that my observations on the subject of transgenderism/transsexualism have not been met with universal approval, especially among transsexuals. No surprise there. The responses came in predictable forms, mostly juvenile profanity. But there was a bit more. The Telegraph’s Tom Chivers (a guy called Tom?) offered a response under the question-begging headline: “Whether or not Laverne Cox is a woman is not a question of biology; it’s a question of language.” (I assume that Mr. Chivers, like most columnists, does not compose his own headlines, but it is an accurate summation of his argument.) That...