I Heart Verizon Strikers

While Verizon is taking in massive profits and paying its execs richly, it’s trying to force outrageous cuts on workers—which amount to $20,000 per family.  That’s why 45,000 employees in Verizon’s Northeast wire line division have been on strike since Aug. 7, and they need our support.  Don’t let Verizon destroy the bargaining rights and living standards of its union members!

Verizon’s demands include: freezing pensions for current workers and eliminating them for future workers, allowing contracting out and offshoring of more jobs, slashing sick leave, gutting health care plans for current and retired workers, and eliminating disability payments for injured workers.

Click here to demand that Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam value employees’ work and share his corporation’s success with those who make it possible. Click here for a list of picket sites in the New York and New Jersey area.  You also can click here to sign and tweet an act.ly petition demanding Verizon drop its outrageous concessionary demands.

An Open Letter to Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam from Sublimefemme:

Dear Mr. McAdam,

I am a Verizon Wireless customer and I stand in solidarity with the 45,000 workers who are on strike.  Although I have been a satisfied customer for many years, I will cancel my account with your company if you do not fairly treat your workers at the bargaining table.

Over the past four years alone, Verizon has made $19 billion in profits while paying its top five executives $250 million in compensation and bonuses. It’s outrageous that you are demanding huge givebacks from workers at the same time.

With middle-class families already struggling, it’s time for Verizon to share its success with the hardworking Americans who made it possible. This is not a time for corporate greed. It is time to do the right thing.

Verizon kicked off bargaining with dramatic concessionary demands and has not budged. And you continue to refuse to bargain seriously with the CWA and the IBEW.

That’s why 45,000 of your employees aren’t at work but will return once you agree to bargain fairly.

Please you drop your unfair demands and return to the bargaining table to negotiate a new contract in good faith.  If not, I will take my business elsewhere.

NYC Sex Worker Cabaret

NEW YORK CITY’S SECOND ANNUAL SEX WORKER CABARET

SUNDAY, JUNE 12, 2011
New York, NY – Sex workers take the stage on Sunday, June 12, 2011 at 7:30pm at Public Assembly (70 N. 6th St., Brooklyn, NY) to tell diverse stories through video, performance art, narrative, puppetry, burlesque, comedy and more. The event starts with a curated selection of short videos about sex work around the globe, and then features an all-star lineup of eleven performers. Tickets can be purchased for $12 in advance at www.sexworkercabaret.com or at the event for $15.

A sex worker, someone of any age, race or gender who trades erotic services for resources, is far more than fodder for tragic news blips. As artists, actors, writers, organizers, parents, siblings, neighbors and coworkers; listening to, rather than talking about, sex workers is critically humanizing. “Whether we work by choice, circumstance, or coercion, all of our voices are important — and dealing with the challenges and violence that sex workers face will not work until sex workers themselves can speak to solutions,” says activist Dylan Wolfe of SWOP-NYC.

Producers Sarah Jenny and Damien Luxe are proud to present this Sunday evening cabaret showcasing some of the most vibrant creative talent in the sex worker community. The cabaret is in homage to both Annie Oakley’s Sex Workers Art Show (1997-2009) and the San Francisco Sex Worker Film and Art Festival (2005-2011), and intentionally takes place during LGBTQ Pride month, a time to reflect on the importance of community and resistance.

A diverse array of performances will be presented by A, Aimee Herman, Audacia Ray, Ceyenne Doroshow, Essence Revealed, Inbred Hybrid Collective, The Incredible, Edible, Akynos, Lady Moustaché, Mariko Passion, Venus Flytrap, and Zachary Wager Scholl. The video artists featured in this event are Brown Meshugana, Gina Carducci & Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore, Laura Murray, Leanne Gillard, Ms Virilia Crush, & Mée Rose, and the Red Umbrella Project.

Come listen to tales of self-determination, and bear witness to survival and celebration as sex workers eloquently — and at times raunchily — speak their truths, and tell stories from their points of view.

For more information, please visit www.sexworkercabaret.com.

Sydney Femme Conference

Hello darlings!  I recently received a charming note from Bex of the Sydney Femme Guild asking me to help get the word out about their 4 day symposium–the inaugural Sydney Femme Conference (October 7-10, 2010).

Who knew I had readers in Australia?!  I’m personally delighted to learn about the Sydney Femme Guild (aren’t they fabulous?) and help them promote international femme community and solidarity.  Very cool.  Hurry and send your submissions to conference@femmeguild.com before the end of the month!

The Inaugural Sydney Femme Conference
Presented by the Sydney Femme Guild.
Femme in the Frame

The Red Rattler Theatre
6 Faversham Street Marrickville
7th- 10th October 2010
www.femmeguild.com

Callout for Presentations, Workshops, Panels, Visual art and Performance.

The Sydney Femme Guild is a moving feast of Femmes committed to fostering Femme friendships, building Femme community and raising Femme visibility in the queer and wider communities. Formed in early 2009, the Femme Guild has been creating community spaces, activism, parties, education, hospitality and networking for Femmes in the Sydney area and reaching out to Femme groups across Australia and the world.

Alongside the momentum of the international Femme community and conferences, the Sydney Femme Guild is excited to present a 4 day symposium covering a wide and inspiring spectrum of the Femme experience.

We are inviting Femmes, Activists, Artists, Academics and Organisers from Australia and around the world to contribute:

Workshops
Skill shares
Panel Presentations
Visual Art and Performance
Activist & organizational topics.

We welcome submissions from particularly from Femmes and Femme Elders, and also from Femme allies. We support submissions from Indigenous Australians, People of Colour, Fat Folks, Working Class folks, People with Disabilities, Queer Youth and hope to create a space that we can explore the intersection of Femme with other identities and experiences, privileges and access around the topic of “Femme in the Frame.”

Please send a summary of your submission to conference@femmeguild.com before August 30th, 2010.

Camp Trans Call for Workshops

CALL FOR WORKSHOPS CAMP TRANS 2010 – PLEASE DISTRIBUTE WIDELY

Hi, I’m gayge, and I’ll be helping to schedule and coordinate
workshops and caucuses for Camp Trans again this year. Every year, we
have workshops and caucuses on a variety of topics connected to trans
issues or of interest to trans people. Workshops are a great way to
share your expertise and knowledge with other attendees, and also are
a whole lot of fun. We welcome workshop proposals from people of every
identity and on a diversity of topics. In the past, we’ve had
workshops on such topics as being in solidarity to other oppressed
groups, identity, hormones and surgery, relationships, flirting,
organizing, and a wide range of other topics. Workshops and caucuses
are generally an hour and a half, and you can structure it as a formal
workshop, a group activity, a guided discussion, an informal caucus,
or some other format.

We particularly encourage workshops on topics such as working in
solidarity with other oppressed groups, experiences of how other
oppressions intersect with trans*ness, or that tie the struggle for
trans liberation in with other struggles.

Some caucuses that are already planned for camp trans this year are a
people of color caucus and several trans caucuses, including a
genderqueer caucus.

To propose a workshop, email me at solitonexcitation@gmail.com. Let
me know that you have a proposal for a workshop or caucus in the
subject of the email, and please include your proposal as an
attachment. Your proposal should include your name and pronoun
preference (and those of any copresenters), your contact info (email
and phone), the name of your workshop or caucus, a 200 word
description of your workshop/caucus including its goal and how it will
be structured, whether it will be open to the entire camp population
or limited to a specific population (generally, workshops are open and
caucuses are limited to a specific group or a fishbowl, however, both
closed workshops and open caucuses are great!), and a 100 word or less
bio of each presenter. Also, if you feel that your workshop or caucus
would benefit from having an advocate present, or want or need any
other accommodations, please let me know. If at all possible, please
send these proposals by July 23rd, so we can have plenty of time to
structure a schedule and publicize the workshops we’ll be offering at
Camp!

Not sure if you can make Camp? Worried that you’ll get there and
suddenly have a brilliant idea for a discussion group or a group
activity? Don’t worry! We’re also going to make sure to once again
include plenty of room for workshops and caucuses planned right at
Camp Trans. I’m looking forward to seeing everyone’s workshop
proposals and helping to make workshops and caucuses rewarding,
educational, and fun experiences for everyone interested in presenting
and attending.

Get Looped, Dahling

“Daddy warned me about men and alcohol.  But he never warned me about women and cocaine.”  –Tallulah Bankhead

Dahlings, send a video of yourself doing your best Tallulah Bankhead impersonation for a chance to win a trip for 2 to NY, tickets to see Looped on Broadway, a backstage visit with Valerie Harper, two nights stay at the fabulous and legendary Algonquin Hotel, and more!  I’ve stayed at the Algonquin and can attest to its fabulousity.

Here’s another of my favorite Tallulah quotes for inspiration:

“I’ll come and make love to you at five o’clock. If I’m late start without me.”

THE SCOOP ON GETTING LOOPED:

Videos should be 15 seconds or less.

Submissions will be accepted through April 30th, 2010.

Winner to be chosen and notified on May 4th, 2010.

Click here for information on how to enter your video.

Click here to watch Tallulah film and TV clips!

Body Heat: Femme Porn Tour

Queer Hard-Core Fierce & Potent Femme Porn writers, poets, dancers, performers, divas, coming to see YOU.  The tour kicks off in Boston tonight!

THE BODY HEAT TOUR ***March 2010***

March 13th – Boston, MA. @ Lily Pad 1353 Cambridge Street Cambridge, MA. $10.00 7pm (special guest Gigi Frost of The Femme Show)

March 14th – NYC @ Bluestockings Bluestockings Radical Books www.bluestockings.com 172 Allen Street New York, NY 10002 (212) 777-6028 $10.00 7pm (special guest Gigi Frost & Diana Cage)

March 15th – Pittsburgh, PA. Body Heat Tour ***Pittsburgh show added*** 6pm on March 15th @ the Shadow Lounge www.shadowlounge.net 5972 Baum Boulevard Pittsburgh, PA 15206-3815 (412) 363-8277

March 16th – Columbus, OH. – 1st night!!!!!! @ STONEWALL CENTER ON HIGH 1160 N. High 7:30PM $6 (special guests Viva Valezz & Missy Conley) More info 614-564-7517 Email: skyecolumbus@sbcglobal.net

March 17th – Columbus, OH. – 2nd night!!!!! @ BLAZER’S PUB sw corner 5th Ave. & High St. 10PM $4 More info 614-564-7517 Email: skyecolumbus@sbcglobal.net

March 18th – Milwaukee, WI. @ The Tool Shed: An Erotic Boutique 2427 N. Murray Ave. Milwaukee, WI 53211 (414) 906-5304 www.toolshedtoys.com 8pm $10.00

March 19th – Minneapolis, MN. @ Bedlam Theaterwww.bedlamtheatre.org 1501 S. 6th St (in the West Bank neighborhood of Minneapolis) 10pm $12.00

March 20th – Ann Arbor, MI. @ Aut Bar 315 Braun Court Ann Arbor, MI 48104 (734) 994-0558 – officewww.autbar.com 10pm $15.00 ($13.00 in advance) (special guest Cookie Tuff)

March 21st – Chicago, IL. @ Center on Halsted 3656 North Halsted, Chicago, IL 60613-5974 t (773) 472-6469 x 441 3pm – 5:30pm (matinee show!!!!!) $12.00 (also featuring local performer DeDe Dylynn)

March 22nd – Omaha, NE. @ Connections 1901 Leavenworth Street, Omaha, NE 68102-3126 (402) 933-3033 8pm $10.00 time & door $ subject to change ShadyBoi Productions 402-612-8837

BODY HEAT: FEMME PORN TOUR

Body Heat is a collective of fierce, sassy, irreverent Femme artists setting ablaze performance art communities and smashing open Femme stereotypes. Porn, Kink, Smut, Erotica -Body Heat is not reclaiming our sex so much as OWNING it. We will turn you on. We will challenge all of your Gender, Sex, Feminist, Social, & Political boundaries & assumptions. We will entertain the hell out of you. Mostly we will leave you panting, begging, dripping for more.

Body Heat: Femme Porn Tour  will feature Body Heat founder and spoken-word performer Kathleen Delaney (Atlanta, GA.), former On Our Backs editor, radio personality, and acclaimed author Diana Cage (NYC), Sister Spit vet, former slam champion, filmmaker, and writer Meliza Bañales (San Francisco, CA), published author and sex-workshop facilitator Jen Cross (San Francisco, CA), Nationally renowned singer / performer Nicky Click (Durham, NH), The Femme Show founder & performer Gigi Frost (Boston, MA), Erotic writer and versatile performer Alex Cafarelli (San Francisco, CA.), and Burlesque performer The Lady Ms. Vagina Jenkins (Atlanta, GA). Along with an arsenal of erotic song, dance, camp, poetry, smut, and prose they will also be joined by special guests along their various stops. Celebrated sexologists and authors Carol Queen and Shar Rednour are just two of the special guests that will join the tour in cities across the Nation.

If you are a queer femme who specializes in smutty poetry, burlesque, queer porn, and/or performance and would like to perform with the femmes on one of their stops, you can contact us at femmeswriteporn@yahoo.com or www.myspace.com/femmeporntour.

Never Been a Bad Girl

Whether you’re nice or naughty, you’re going to like Sabrina Chap’s new video!

From The Queerist:

In a world of flash-in-the-pan acts and pop music saturation, it’s a joy to discover Sabrina Chap, a deeply talented musician who’s well grounded in songwriting and grand performanceship . When her songwriting career collided with a discovery of ragtime years ago, it launched her in a new direction, creating jazzy-heavy tunes with vintage, hearty vocals. Clever lyrics and a penchant for cabaret only amped up the appeal.   Read the rest here.

Femme Means Attack (Call for Submissions)

“Femme Means Attack” call for submissions. “Femme Means Attack” is a collaborative zine of submissions by people who identify as femme and as radical, anarchist, and/or anti-authoritarian. Femmes are often seen as non-radical or counterrevolutionary in many radical communities, despite the fact that we can take to the streets just as well as anyone else, in heels or steel-toed boots, and are FIERCE while doing it. As radical femmes, we often find ourselves alienated from mainstream femme discourse that focuses on standards of femme/femininity which are white, homonormative, aspire to be bourgeoisie, and rely on conspicious consumption. Thus, we radical femmes often find ourselves alienated from both our radical communities and femme communities.

“Femme Means Attack” aims to change that by giving us, radical femmes, a voice. We welcome submissions from femmes of all genders, trans and cis, binary gendered and genderqueer, of all races, socioeconomic backgrounds, both urban and rural, of all dis/ability statuses, etc. While submissions should touch on both femme identity and radical politics/communities, we leave it up to each contributor to determine what that looks like. We welcome all types of submissions – essays, personal accounts, poetry, artwork, etc.

Along with your submissions, we ask that you submit a one hundred word bio. This is merely to let us know who you are and where you are coming from on the femme spectrum. That said, there will be a bio section in the zine, so if you do wish to have your bio included, let us know.

Likewise, if you wish to tell us (the editors) your name, but would not like it published in the finished zine, just let us know. However, we do request that you use a pen name or nom de queer so that half of the zine is not attributed to “anonymous.”

Criteria for submissions are:

Absolutely nothing oppressive.

You may submit as many pieces as you would like.

Submissions must be in an easily accessable computer format.

Additionally, written works must be submitted in a format that will allow for editing.

That is- editing of format, not content.

PDF files will not be accepted.

Artwork must be submitted in jpeg format.

If any other issues arise with submissions, they will be handled on an individual basis. You will receive notice as to whether or not your submission has been accepted. If you wish to challenge our rejection of your submission, we welcome your feedback. We only ask that you are as respectful to us as we will be to you. We both identify as anarchists and do not wish to hold any sort of power over anyone else. This zine’s purpose, and our purpose in publishing it, is to bring unity and strength to femmes around the world.

Submissions are due by April 15, 2010 Please send submissions to: femmemeansattack@gmail.com

Your co-editors,

naydeehn pearl messier and gayge sparkly purple unicorn freyjasbarn

Friends of Dorothy Zine (Call for Submissions)

Friends of Dorothy (FOD) calls for submissions for a new radical queer zine focusing on gentrification tentatively titled “Hey Girl Get Out, or Why Housing is a Queer Issue”.  FOD is an autonomous group of radical queers in Columbus, Ohio dedicated to fighting the consequences of global capitalism and imperialism by working in solidarity with low/no income multi-racial communities struggling for collective liberation. Currently we are joining up with Columbus Housing Justice to challenge the ongoing gentrification happening in our city – creating this zine is our first step in providing our community (locally and more broadly) a tangible resource for building our collective Resilience, Resistance, and ability to Re-imagine.

It’s no surprise to us that the assimilationist, consumer-driven mainstream gay community has played and continues to play a large role in the displacement of low-income and working class communities and communities of color – including members of the LGBT community. This is certainly the case here in Columbus as highlighted in the 2003 documentary “Flag Wars”.

We’re currently looking for essays, articles, news, poems, art, stories, and interviews that highlight our major themes for this zine which include: The history of gay-driven gentrification in the U.S., queer struggles for economic / housing justice, community centered alternatives to gentrification, and success stories highlighting queer & multi-racial working class organizing efforts. That said, If you have other ideas for topics, please don’t let this hold you back!!! Ultimately we want to create a zine that uses the issue of gentrification as a means to support the queer community in developing a deeper anti-racist, anti-capitalist, and queer liberationist praxis for economic and housing justice. Our submission deadline is February 28th – the zine is scheduled to be out in by April. Submissions my be sent to organizeCBUS@gmail.com

Helping Haiti

I have a friend in Haiti now. I’ve heard from her family that she’s OK, which is a tremendous relief, but I keep thinking about all the other people who were not as lucky as she.  As the Western Hemisphere’s poorest country, Haiti needs our help now more than ever.

If you haven’t yet donated to the relief effort in Haiti (or even if you have), I want to encourage you to consider contributing $10–or whatever you can afford–to one of these 3 organizations.  All have been awarded the highest rating (4 stars) from Charity Navigator, America’s largest independent evaluator of charities:

• The International Rescue Committee goes to crisis zones to rescue and rebuild.  It’s now deploying its Emergency Response Team to Haiti to deliver help to the devastated city of Port-au-Prince. They will be working with local aid groups to provide vital medical care, clean water and sanitation to the quake’s survivors.  The IRC’s specialists are veteran first-responders who have quickly set up effective emergency programs around the world during violent conflicts and natural disasters, including last year’s cyclone in Myanmar and the South Asian tsunami in 2005.  Click here to support the IRC’s emergency work in Haiti.
• Partners In Health, which has been fighting poverty and disease in Haiti for close to 25 years, is already on the ground with facilities strategically placed just outside Port-au-Prince.  They are now mobilizing resources and making plans to bring medical assistance and supplies to communities that have been hardest hit. Your contribution will be quickly routed to these relief efforts. Go here to help Partners in Health deliver much-needed care to Haiti’s earthquake survivors.
• The international women’s group MADRE has also worked in Haiti for many years, supporting community-based organizations in times of disaster.  MADRE has already activated an emergency response through its partner organization, Zanmi Lasante Clinic. Right now, 100% of your donation to their Emergency & Disaster Relief Fund will be used to help doctors, nurses, and community health workers meet the urgent needs facing Haitian women and families.  Click here to contribute to MADRE’s important work.

Of course, there are lots of other great organizations and ways to help.  One of the fastest ways to send relief is to text “Haiti” to 90999, which sends a $10 donation to the Red Cross.

If you aren’t in a position to make a financial contribution, you can help raise awareness of the earthquake tragedy. Talk to your family and friends and direct them to these websites for updates and ways to help.