When Westerly Windina refers to occasions from the past, she never uses the first person, "I."

She says, "Peter did this" or "Peter was."

The Peter she speaks of is Peter Drouyn, the man who brought surfing to great heights of popularity. Peter Drouyn is the name given to Windina at birth.

Directors Alan White and Jamie Brisick are looking to Kickstarter to help them fund their film about Westerly. With the working title of Westerly: A Man, a Woman, an Enigma, the film hopes to tell the story of a person who rose to the height of their game and then almost disappeared.

According to the Kickstarter website, in 2002 Windina, then still living as Peter, almost drowned:

"It was a supernova," said Westerly. "It just kicked in one night, and suddenly Peter went, Westerly was there."

Check out the trailer for an idea of who Drouyn was, and who Windina is. 

Stephen Beatty, the queer transgender son of Annette Bening and Warren Beatty, is an articulate and rapid-fire speaker.

The blogger from Super Mattachine and OP was recently asked to answer a few questions for the website WeHappyTrans. When asked who some of his heroes are, he mentions Truman Capote and Marsha P Johnson. 

The video has received some attention from The Advocate and even Entertainment Tonight. If anything, I hope the video provides people with an insight into the mind of an intelligent and articulate activist. 

Check out the video below.

On a recent episode of Cake Boss, Buddy Valastro teams up with RuPaul's Drag Race alum Carmen Carrera to play a joke on "Cousin Anthony."

According to Gawker, Carrera agreed to flirt with Anthony, to whom it was revealed that Carrera is transgender. It's kind of an unfunny joke, and it's interesting that Carrera chooses to be the butt of a joke, but she agreed to a contract with the producers. What she did not agree to is to be referred to as a man.

Apparently, Carrera had spoken with the producers about gender pronoun usage in her case, but at the reveal in the show, Buddy refers to Carmen as "a man."

Unfortunately, "Cousin Anthony" referred to Carmen as an "it" on Twitter, but the tweet was soon taken down, along with an apology to Carrera.

Buddy, Cousin Anthony and the producers of Cake Boss need to grow the fuck up.

I love this story.

A few weeks ago it was announced that the lead singer of Against Me! had come out as trans and had started transitioning. The singer, who had chosen the name Laura Jane Grace, came out in an article in Rolling Stone. Last Friday, Grace performed for the first time since delivering the news. According to Rolling Stone:

"The quartet played six new songs, including the rollicking anthem "Transgender Dysphoria Blues," the title track of an album they're working on. Decked out in a loose-fitting black tank top, tight black jeans and black eye shadow, Grace was in high spirits as she delivered her trademark, throat-shredding screams."

Bon courage, Laura Jane. Keep 'em coming, and keep 'em strong.

Antonio Santini and Dan Sickles want to make a movie, and they need your help.

Santini and Sickles are working on a documentary called Mala Mala, which tells the story of a group of young drag performers and transsexual and transgender individuals living in Puerto Rico. To help fund the making of this project, the duo have turned to Kickstarter, a crowd-sourcing webpage that allows people to donate funds to the making of their project. The film was recently featured on The Huffington Post and has less than a day to finish gathering the required funds to make this project a reality. Check it out.

What started as a performance/video installation/meditation on gender in 2004, soon became a tour of Europe and is now a documentary.

Turning is the love child of musician Antony Hegarty (Antony & The Johnsons) and filmmaker Charles Atlas. The documentary is more than just a concert film or a behind-the-scenes look into the creation of an artistic oeuvre.

The work in question was a series of performances by Hegarty wherein he would sing while Atlas filmed 13 "beauties" who stood on a revolving podium, the video feed beamed directly onto screens, leaving the audience with a live video portrait. The film also includes interviews with some of the beauties, such as Nomi, known from her work in Jessica 6 and Hercules & Love Affair.

My love of Antony knows no bounds, so to say that I am excited to see this film is putting it mildly.

At the beginning of the year, I wrote about a friend of mine who started a video blog about his experiences as a young trans man.

Last saturday, Salon contributor Tracy Clark-Flory posted an article about how more and more young transgender individuals are telling their own stories online, in blog posts, videos and more. It's an online grassroots movement, telling people all over the world: you are not alone. 

It doesn't matter if you are queer, straight, cisgender, transgender: it takes bravery to expose oneself, to tell your story for the world to hear, see and comment about.

 I'm glad someone out there is saying what they want to say, in a way that is true to them. Kudos.

S Bear Bergman is in need of a little bit of help.

Bergman recently launched a site on kickstarter.com to help fund a project called Flamingo Rampant! Gender Independent Kids Books. The project would help fund the publication of two books, entitled The Adventures of Tulip, Birthday Wish Fairy and Backwards Day.

Image from Bergman's Kickstarter page.

Bergman describes the reasoning behind the creation:

"As a writer and parent, my goal in writing these stories was to create books that would not only open up opportunities to talk about trans issues but also offer great stories - the kind I could imagine my own son asking to have read a second, third, or ::sigh:: fourth time before bed. The stories themselves fold issues of gender in seamlessly, making them great for any kind of kid."

In a video on the Kickstarter page, Bergman includes interviews with librarians, educators, trans families and more, all of whom highlight their desire to see these books - and books about gender variance - published. Children, and the families who read books to them, want to see themselves represented in books. It's that simple. 

Check it out.

Due to the rising controversy, the company that produces the tampons, Libra, issued this statement:

"Libra regrets any offence taken to our recent tampon advertisement. It was never intended to upset or offend anyone. Independent research was undertaken and the advertisement was viewed positively during that testing. Libra takes all feedback very seriously, and in response to this, we will immediately review our future position with this campaign based on the feedback received. There are no further advertisements scheduled in New Zealand. The advertisement has not aired in Australia. The advertisement was placed on Facebook however this has also been removed."

In light of the recent controversy around ABC's apparently abysmal new television show Work It, it's not surprising that more and more people who identify as transgender and genderqueer are taking umbrage at the fact that their image is being used lightly or for comedic effect. Although many people might defend the ad (or the television series) by saying, "It's a joke," it still highlights the idea of trans people as "other" and "outside" the norm.

And that's not funny.

At all.

I have featured the work of Jaime Carrera before on this blog, but I felt this video deserved a post all its own. Entitled Passing, the silent short tells the story of a "male-identified character's uncertainty about society's perception of him" and how eventually, he comes to recognize that the best way to be is to be true to himself.

It doesn't matter who you are -- I really believe that that is the best way to be and live: in the truth of the self.