I guess you know by now that I simply love music. It is powerful, it can move you, change your mood in a lot of direction, make you wanna move your body to it, even unknowingly have this happen, and remind you of situations you want to keep in mind. The singer I present to you was introduce to me by a dear friend with the following words: So this hasn't happened to me in a looooong time: I hear a voice and can't stop crying. I can't decide which song I should send to you thus I send three of which the last one let me think of you.
And I have to agree, that voice is really great. Thanks a lot for sharing LP with me, dear! And given that I got sent three songs and I am not good at holding excitement back, I want to share it with you, so here are the songs:
Lost On You: Her voice is really great in this one.
Halo: Have to agree that this is really a great cover.
Someday: When I hear that song and think about that it reminds my friend of myself I'm close to tears, too ...
It's not often that an artist touches you deeply, but Thomas D managed to do so to the point of that I am (only half) jokingly saying that if there would be a church of Thomas D I would absolutely join it. His lyrics always did stand out for me in the context of the band I found about him, and the way he lives his life is definitely outstanding. And additionally there are these special songs that give so much and share a lot. I feel sorry for the people who don't understand German to be able to appreciate him.
Here are three songs that I suggest you to listen to closely:
Fluss: This song gave me a lot of strengh in a difficult time of my life. And it still works wonders when I feel down to get my ass up from the floor again.
Gebet an den Planeten: This songs gives me shivers. Let the lyrics touch you. And take the time to think about it.
An alle Hinterbliebenen: This song might be a bit difficult to deal with. It's about loss and how to deal with suffering.
I have a long overdue blog entry about what happened in recent times. People that follow my tweets did catch some things. Most noteworthy there was the Trans*Inter*Congress in Munich at the start of May. It was an absolute blast. I met so many nice and great people, talked and experienced so many great things there that I'm still having a great motivational push from it every time I think back. It was also the time when I realized that I in fact do have body dysphoria even though I thought I'm fine with my body in general: Being tall is a huge issue for me. Realizing that I have a huge issue (yes, pun intended) with my length was quite relieving, even though it doesn't make it go away. It's something that makes passing and transitioning for me harder. I'm well aware that there are tall women, and that there are dedicated shops for lengthy women, but that's not the only thing that I have trouble with. What bothers me most is what people read into tall people: that they are always someone they can lean on for comfort, that tall people are always considered to be self confident and standing up for themselves (another pun, I know ... my bad).
And while I'm fine with people coming to me for leaning on to, I rarely get the chance to do so myself. And people don't even consider it. When I was there in Munich, talking with another great (... pun?) trans woman who was as tall as me I finally had the possibility to just rest my head on her shoulder and finally feel the comfort I need just as much as everyone else out there, too. Probably that's also the reason why I'm so touchy and do go Free Hugging as often as possible. But being tall also means that you are usually only the big spoon when cuddling up. Having a small mental breakdown because of realizing that didn't change the feeling directly but definitely helped with looking for what I could change to fix that for myself.
Then, at the end of may, the movie FtWTF - female to what the fuck came to cinema. It's a documentary about six people who got assigned female at birth. And it's absolutely charming, and has great food for thoughts in it. If you ever get the chance to watch it you definitely should.
And then came debconf16 in Capetown. The flight to there was canceled and we had to get rebooked. The first offer was to go through Dubai, and gladly a colleague did point out to the person behind the desk that that wouldn't be safe for myself and thus out of scope. In the end we managed to get to Capetown quite nice, and even though it was winter when the sun was shining it was quite nice. Besides the cold nights that is. Or being stuck on the way up to table mountain because a colleague had cramps in his lags and we had to call mountain rescue. Gladly the night was clear, and when the mountain rescue finally got us to top and it was night already we had one of the nicest views from up there most people probably never will experience.
And then ... I got invited to a trans meetup in Capetown. I was both excited and nervous about it, what to expect there. But it was simply great. The group there was simply outstandingly great. The host gave update information on progress on clinical support within south Africa, from what I took with me is that there is only one clinic there for SRS which manages only two people a year which is simply ... yuck. Guess you can guess how many years (yes, decades) the waiting line is ... I was blown away though by the diversity of the group, on so many levels, most notably on the age spectrum. It was a charm to meet you all there! If you ever stop by in Capetown and you are part of the LGBTIQ community, make sure you get in contact with the Triangle Project.
But, about the real reason to write this entry: I was approached at Debconf by at least two people who asked me what I thought about creating an LGBTIQA+ group within Debian, and if I'd like to push for that. Actually I think it would be a good idea to have some sort of exchange between people on the queer spectrum (and I hope I don't offend anyone with just saying queer for LGBTIQA+ people). Given that I'm quite outspoken people approach me every now and then so I'm aware that there is a fair amount of people that would fall into that category. On the other hand some of them wouldn't want to have it publicly known because it shouldn't matter and isn't really the business of others.
So I'm uncertain. If we follow that path I guess something that is closed or at least offers the possibility to have a closed communication would be needed to not out someone by just joining in the discussion. It's was easier with Debian Women where it was (somewhat) clear that male participants are allies supporting the cause and not considered being women themselves, but often enough (mostly cis hetero male) people are afraid to join a dedicated LGBTIQA+ group because they have the fear of having their identity judged. These things should be considered before creating such a place so that people can feel comfortable when joining and know what to expect beforehand.
For the time being I created #debian-diversity on irc.debian.org to discuss how to move forward. Please bear in mind that even the channel name is up for discussion. Acronyms might not be the way to go in my opinion, just read back up the discussion that lead to the Diversity Statement of Debian where the original approach was to start listing groups for inclusiveness but it was quickly clear that it can get outdated too easily.
I am willing to be part of that effort, but right now I have some personal things to deal which eat up a fair amount of my time. My kid starts school in September (yes, it's that long already, time flies ...). And it looks like I'll have to move a second time in the near future: I'll have to leave my current flat by the end of the year and the Que[e]rbau I'm moving into won't be ready by that time to host me yet ... F*ck. :(
Last week we lost another great musician, song writer, artist. It's painful to realise that more and more of the people you grew up with aren't there anymore. We lost Prince, TAFKAP, Symbol, Prince. He wrote a lot of great music, even some you wouldn't attribute to him, like Sinead O'Connor's Nothing Compares To You, Bangles' Manic Monday or Chaka Khan's I Feel For You. But I actually would like to share some songs that are also performed by himself, so without further ado here are the songs:
As my readers probably are well aware, I wrote my transgender coming out poem Mermaids over 10 years ago, to make it clear to people how I define, what I am and how I would hope they could accept me. I did put it publicly into my blog so I could point people to it. And I still do so regularly. It still comes from the bottom of my heart. And I am very happy that I got the chance to present it in a Poetry Slam last year, it was even recorded and uploaded to YouTube.
There is just one thing that I was also told over the time every now and then by some people that I would have liked to understand what's going on: Why is it in English, my English isn't that good. My usual response was along the lines of that the events that triggered me writing it were in an international context and I wanted to make sure that they understood what I wrote. At that time I didn't realize that I am cutting out a different group of people from being able to understand what's going on inside me.
So this year there was a similar event: the Flawless Poetry Slam which touched the topics of Feminist? Queer? Gender? Rolemodels? - Let's talk about it. I took that as motivation to finally write another text on the topic, and this time in German. Unfortunately though I wasn't able to present it that evening, I wasn't drawn for the lineup. But, I was told that there was another slam going on just last wednesday, so I went there ... and made it onto the stage! And this is the text that I presented there. I am uncertain how well online translators work for you, but I hope you get the core points if you don't understand German:
Ich bin was ich bin
Fünf Worte mit wahrem Sinn:
Ich bin was ich bin
Du denkst: "Mann im Rock?
Das ist ja wohl lächerlich,
der ist sicher schwul."
"Fingernagellack?
Na da schau ich nicht mehr hin,
wer will das schon seh'n."
Jedoch liegst du falsch,
Mit all deinen Punkten, denn:
Ich bin was ich bin.
Ich bin Transgender
Und erlebe mich selber,
ich bin eine Frau.
"Haha, eine Frau?
Wem willst du das weismachen?
Heb mal den Rock hoch!"
Und wie ist's bei dir?
Was ist zwischen den Beinen?
Geht mich das nichts an?
Warum fragst du mich?
Da ist's dann in Ordnung?
Oder vielleicht nicht?
Ich bin was ich bin
Fünf Worte mit ernstem Sinn:
Ich bin was ich bin
Ich steh weiblich hier
Und das hier ist mein Körper
Mein Geschlecht ist's auch
Oberflächlichkeit
Das ist mein größtes Problem
Schlägt mir entgegen
Wenn ich mich öffne
Verständnis fast überall
Es wird akzeptiert
Doch gelegentlich
und das schmerzt mich am meisten
sagt doch mal wer "er"
Von Fremden? Egal
Doch hab ich mich geöffnet
Ist es eine Qual
"Ich seh dich als Mann"
Da ist, was es transportiert
Akzeptanz? Dahin
Meine Pronomen
Wenn ihr über mich redet
sind sie, ihr, ihres
Ich leb was ich leb
Fünf Worte mit tiefem Sinn:
Ich bin was ich bin
"Doch, wie der erst spricht!
Ich meinte, wie sie denn spricht!
Das ist nicht normal."
Ich schreib hier Haikus:
Japanische Gedichtsform
Mit fixem Versmars
Sind fünf, sieben, fünf
Silben in jeder Zeile
Haikus sind simpel
Probier es mal aus
Transportier eine Message
Es macht auch viel Spaß
Wortwahl ist wichtig
Ein guter Thesaurus hilft
Sei kurz und prägnant
Ich sag was ich sag
Fünf Worte mit klugem Sinn:
Ich bin was ich bin
Doch ich schweife ab
Verständnis fast überall?
Wird es akzeptiert?
Erstaunlicherweise
Doch ich bin auch was and'res
Und hier geht's bergab
Eine Sache gibt's
Die erwäh'n ich besser nicht
für die steck ich ein
"Deshalb bin ich hier"
So der Titel eines Lieds
verfasst von Thomas D
"Wenn ich erkläre
warum ich mich wie ernähr"
So weit komm ich nicht
Man erwähnt Vegan
Die Intoleranz ist da
Man ist unten durch
Hab 'ne Theorie:
Vegan sein: 'ne Entscheidung
Transgender sein nicht
Mensch fühlt sich dann schlecht
dass bei sich selbst die Kraft fehlt
und greift damit an
"Ich könnte das nicht"
Ich verurteile dich nicht
Iss doch was du willst
Ich zwing es nicht auf
Aber Rücksicht wär schon fein
Statt nur Hohn und Schmäh
Ich ess was ich ess
Fünf Worte zum nachdenken:
Ich bin was ich bin
Hope you get the idea. The audience definitely liked it, the jury wasn't so much on board but that's fine, it's five random people and it's mostly for fun anyway. Later that night though some things happened that didn't make me feel so comfortable anymore. I went to the loo, waiting in line with the other ladies, a bit later the waitress came along telling me "the men's room is over there". I told her that I'm aware of that and thanked her, which got her confused and said something along the lines of "so you are both, or what?" but went away after that. Her tone and response wasn't really giving me much comfort, though none of the other ladies in the line did look strangely.
But the most disturbing event after that was to find out about North Carolina signed the bathroom bill making it illegal for trans people to use the bathroom for their gender and insisting on using the one for the gender they were assigned at birth. So men like James Sheffield are now forced to go to the lady's restroom, or face getting arrested. Brave new world. :/
So, enjoy the text and don't get too wound up by stupid laws and hope for time to fix people's discriminatory minds for fixing issues that already are regulated: Assaults are assaults and are already banned. Arguing with people might get assaulted and thus discriminating trans people is totally missing the point, by miles.
Today is one of these moods. And sometimes one needs certain artists/music to foster it. Music is powerful. There are certain bands I know that I have to stay away from when feeling down to not get too deep into it. Knowing that already helps a lot. The following is an artist that is not completely in that area, but he got powerful songs and powerful messages nevertheless; and there was this situation today that one of his songs came to my mind. That's the reason why I present you today Moby. These are the songs:
Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad?: The song for certain moods. And lovely at that, not dragging me too much down. Hope you like the song too. :)
Extreme Ways: The ending tune from the movie The Bourne Ultimatum, and I fell immediately in love with the song. I used it for a while as morning alarm, a good start into the day.
Disco Lies: If you consider the video disturbing you might be shutting your eyes from what animals are facing on a daily basis.
Hope you like the selection; and like always: enjoy!
People these days often do think about what worked well in the last year that they are proud of, what didn't work so well and what they plan to change the coming year. For me a fair amount of the resolutions were about my name. One of them was getting rid of my old name from the Debian—Project Participants page. Actually, I started with it on new year's eve already:
So far I've done a fair amount of my job. There are eight source package left to get tweaked. Those might be a bit more difficult and require more attention though. What I also did during those efforts: Convert all packages to source format 3.0 (quilt), and use a dh style debian/rules file. The latter enabled the packages to build reproducible too, which is also an added benefit. So this is a win situation on many levels.
One of the most prominent reasons why I didn't convert to a dh style debian/rules file yet was that I considered it making easy things easy and difficult things difficult. Finding out what to override and how to do that was something I was unable to figure out, and speaking with people didn't help me there neither. Only recently someone told me that there is dh binary --no-act to figure out what would be called, and then you just prefix it with override_ in debian/rules to get to where you want to go. This worked extremely well for me.
I'm personally still not a big fan of source format 3.0 (quilt) with respect to that it insists on patches to be applied and leaves them that way after building the source package, which makes it difficult to deal with when having upstream source in the VCS too, but I managed to find my way around so many things in the past that I can live with that. The benefit of not having to repack upstream source if it isn't in .gz form is a far bigger benefit.
So, I hope to stay productive and be able to get the remaining package also adjusted and fixed. Guess that's doable until the end of the month, and getting rid of all reproducible build bugreports against my packages along that lines. I will check those packages that carry my name already too after my old name is gone from the overview page.
Happy new year everyone! Let's start with another round of nice music, this time it is coming from Chipzel who is a great chiptune composer. Given that I'm coming from a c64 background I love chip tunes, and she does a really great job in that area. Check it out!
Focus: The first tune I heard and I still like it. I had it as ringtone for a while. :)
To The Sky: Nice one too, always set your high goals.
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