By Martin Rawlings-Fein

How do we recognize G-d? The sages say that the Jewish people posses two methods by which to identify and recognize G-d. The first is the Anochi of Exodus. "I am Adoni your G-d. I performed public miracles when I brought you out of Egypt and gave you the Torah." There is a second way to recognize G-d. The ability of the Jewish people to recognize G-d's Anochi "I am" when Hashem is concealed, and invokes a singular talent, the ability to identify and understand the ongoing redemption of haster asteer, "I will surely hide and conceal." The presence of G-d's hand in human events, even when it is not evident, perceived, or obvious is similar to the special talent of the person who has trained his or her senses to recognize their friends at night by listening, feeling and waiting for their unique signature sound, sent, sight  or touch.

On Sunday night I saw and recognized G-d in the work of one Sean Dorsey in "Uncovered: The Diary Project." While one may laugh at this assertion, respectfully, one was not there to witness the beauty and stature of the four men who danced the most amazingly beautiful work that I have ever seen.  Captivated I witnessed the covenant of these four men with history and memory and the reconnecting with the life that so many people take for granted. Playful and innocent even in its bawdy essence the entire production conveyed the G-dly message that we must remember things as they were, not as we wished them to be. I was humbled and reminded that G-d is everywhere and that he hand picks his messengers. Dorsey along with Brian Fisher, Juan de la Rosa, and Nol Simonse were like angels in flight and lit with the fire of heaven.

The dance project was produced by Fresh Meat, a queer arts company that produces such events as Tranny Fest. For the uninitiated this may seem far fetched but to me it is the culmination of all of Dorsey's past achievements and a realization of where his work is heading. Dorsey's research into the journals of Lou Sullivan, a transsexual gay man who lived in San Francisco as a trailblazing activist, organizer and writer who passed of AIDS in 1991, created the backdrop. However, the dance itself embodied the spirit of Lou and inspired the wonder of all. G-d was in the details for Dorsey and his cohort of messengers.  I personally know Dorsey and Simonse but had never seen them dance so beautifully. While the beauty was expected it stilled the beating of my heart and caused me to weep.  

I created video piece for the production and spent three showings in the lobby listening to the audience react (My friend Zion Johnson spent two showings helping to setup the equipment). I wanted to wait until Sunday to see it, so that my first time would be with my wife.  All the while audiences filed out of the studio and into my installation silently and in awe of the production that they had just seen. Apparently my short silent film was a good companion piece, I was told this several times by random people that didn't know me. Those that did know me thought I was there watching the video like them, and wondered why I was watching the faces of the viewers and the wheels turning beneath the calm. Until they saw the credits and proceeded to tell me how surprised the were. I don't talk that much about my video work, I probably should. The most amazing comment was from Dorsey himself, saying that the video had choked him up upon seeing it for the first time.  

I feel a sense of humility and gratitude to Dorsey and his dancers, to Fresh Meat, and to Lou Sullivan the man who opened a crack in the door for people like me, a bisexual transsexual, who would not have been able to transition without Lou's groundbreaking work. I have indeed seen the face of G-d in both the details and depth of the dance and the life of Lou Sullivan.

Friday, November 28th.

A community-wide tribute to two remarkable men who changed the course of history

This special event commemorates the 30th Anniversary of the assassinations of George Moscone and Harvey Milk, featuring friends and family of George and Harvey, Holly Near, the Lesbian/Gay Chorus of San Francisco, and the GLAM Youth Choir.

This event also celebrates the 30th Anniversary of SF Gay Men's Chorus's first public appearance, making them the first and oldest gay-identified choral organization in the world. The Chorus is set to perform, along with other newly-commissioned pieces, songs they performed the night of the assassinations.

4 pm: Memorial Concert, steps of SF City Hall

5 pm: Twilight march from the City Hall to the Castro

 

This event is co-presented by the Harvey Milk LGBT Democratic Club, the San Francisco LGBT Pride Celebration Committee and the Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic Club.

Invite your friends, spouses, and family members and feel free to spread the word!

As the secular year draws to a close the film GER: Choosing to be Chosen is taking shape. It looks a little different than what I first imagined it to be, a film about many different personal experiences, like Clocked my first film. It will be short, around 30 minutes this time around — instead of the 45 plus that the first cut of Clocked was. I feel more confident about the style, after I have cut it down and inserted my own story, unlike Clocked where I didn't have any of my story at all.

Some things that need to be done before the first cut is tested out on audiences:

1. Insert personal dialogue — Just can’t get away from my story.
2. Cut down interspersed segments from interviews — just not enough flow as it stands.
3. Weave my own Gay/Bi/Trans coming out story in parallel with “Jewish Coming Out” story.
4. Talk to Sue about interviewing as an educational mentor — Need to have a few more mentors involved, maybe chat with Paul.
5. Try to get some sound bites from local rabbis: Rabbi Angel, Rabbi Kukla and others as needed.
6. Work on opening sequence, would like some sort of animation — Preferably trans Jewish artist (any takers).
7. Edit, edit, edit... 

Getting ready to go to NY for Thanksgiving, feel like I need to film some of our trip. Shelli (my wife) is a great camera person, she used to volunteer at access in college. I feel a little skittish about putting myself out there on film but it isn’t anything that I haven’t asked the participants in my films and television productions to do...

B'Shalom,
Martin Rawlings-Fein

JOIN US!

MEMBERS NEEDED FOR
CITY & COUNTY OF SAN FRANCISCO
HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION
ADVISORY COMMITTEES

The Human Rights Commission’s Advisory Committees are vitally important components of the Human Rights Commission where community members help the Commission study and address human rights issues facing San Franciscans.

  EMPLOYMENT ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Representatives from business, labor, community-based organizations and others working on issues of employment discrimination and diversity that impact San Franciscans

  ISSUES ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Community members coming together to address human rights issues in areas such as immigration, hate crimes, education and housing

  LESBIAN GAY BISEXUAL TRANSGENDER ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Addressing the wide range of human rights concerns of San Francisco’s LGBT and HIV communities

Application deadline: Thursday, January 22, 2009 – 5:00 p.m.

Learn more about HRC Committees and download a membership application at:  http://www.sfgov.org/site/sfhumanrights_page.asp?id=11572
or contact the Commission for an application.

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Just a little rant...

My wife and I sat up last night talking about Prop 8, the amendment to the California Constitution that would eliminate same-sex marriage.  We discussed the ramifications for our friends and family, and even our own marriage if Proposition 8 passed. It was a bitter sweet election night. While people danced in the streets for the news of President Elect Obama's victory, those of us with families, children affected by Proposition 8 were at home strategizing the next steps.  

It is amazing to me, in a very sad way, that a majority of Californian's hate same-sex couples.  Yes, I said it, they hate same-sex couples so much that they wrote discrimination into our State Constitution.  These people, that voted Yes to the tune of 52%, were also some of the very same people who voted for our first African American President Elect.  Single issue voters they are not, but what really strikes me as truly disheartening is the fact that these people are our neighbors and we have failed to move their hearts to the acceptance that is needed.  

Because it ceased being about tolerance a long while ago, I tolerate a hangnail, I accept that my mother loves my step father, just like my step father accepts that I am married to my wife and that we have a child together.  Tolerance is not a word that I use when speaking about same-sex couples, it demeans the very essence of the issue.  That we are all G-d's creation and we should all love one another.

As we continued to press on and watch the numbers slide closer and closer, I couldn't help thinking about all the weddings that we had been to over the past four months, all the happy smiling faces, even when our three-year-old daughter kept putting her finger, and sometimes her whole hand, in their wedding cakes. How much love and dedication it must take to have three weddings, not knowing if this one will stick.

I also think about my own political future, as a bi trans man in San Francisco, I have been part of the political process with the Human Rights Commission's LGBT Advisory Committee, working on Native American rights, bisexual invisibility, gay blood donation bans and so many other civil and human rights issues.  I feel like San Francisco is my home, and yet 25% of our San Francisco population thinks I have no choice when it comes to having a loving marriage -- one man one woman only.  It wont be long before these people decide to define what it means to be a man or a woman.  What this says about us as a society is that the majority of Californian's and a quarter of San Franciscan's think that our families are not as equal as their families, that our love is not as good as their love, and finally that we are not worthy of a basic human right.

I couldn't sleep after watching the celebrating with the Yes on 8 crowd, my mouth agape and eyes wide as a reporter described the Yes on 8 people as being anti-gay marriage, and then after being corrected by the Yes on 8 person and told that they were pro-traditional marriage not anti-gay, then reasserting himself the reporter said, "But you are anti-gay marriage that is what the amendment is for,  to stop gay marriage, right?" thrusting his microphone into the Yes supporters face. All the while people were in the background celebrating the destruction of stable loving family structures. My first sense was to get deeper into the game,  it is the only way, while I have been dipping my toes in the water, I have been doing a disservice to the thousands of people that I could protect from this Yes on 8 creep.

Now this is where it gets corny, sometimes I watch Smallville, I know, what does that have to do with the price of eggs, but go with me here. There is always a slacker mentality to Clark Kent, he is a good student, a good football player, a good kid, but he has no ambition, he doesn't want to stand out, he is driven to help but is always in the background saving people without really accessing how much he could do as Superman.  I guess what I am saying is that we are all Clark Kent. More importantly, I see myself as Clark Kent, the do gooder boy scout, and I need to see the Superman inside, in fact all of us do.  

We all need to access the power inside our hearts and get involved as more than just foot dippers. All people of good conscience should be outraged enough to become the political insiders, the  City Supervisors, the Commission Chairs, State Senators and Assembly(wo)men.  I vow to, I will attend the meetings,  I will go to the candidate brown bags, I will make the effort to come out of the shadows and make the difference that one man can make. It is simple, I make the commitment to live my life fully and as openly as I can, and that is the way that I will fight this amendment, this bigotry, and this hateful spirit that has taken my state and city down the dark path of limiting the civil and human rights that have been fought over for so long.

Transgender Remembrance Shabbat

Friday, November 21, 2008, 7:30 pm
290 Dolores Street (corner of 16th Street)
San Francisco, CA 94103
www.shaarzahav.org

Since 1999, November 20th has been set aside in cities across the country as Transgender Day of Remembrance.  This day memorializes those who have been killed due to anti-transgender hatred.  High rates of murder and other violence continues to be one of the most critical issues facing our transgender communities; and more and more people, trans and non-trans, are raising their voices in commemoration and protest. 
 
At Congregation Sha'ar Zahav, we have designated November 21st as Transgender Remembrance Shabbat.  At Friday night services we will remember all who have suffered from anti-transgender violence, with special liturgy, music, sermon, and the reading of names.  As the Congregation Sha'ar Zahav community participates in the holy act of remembering, we continue to educate ourselves and to commit to further action on this critical community issue. 

More information about the Day of Remembrance can be found at  http://www.transgenderdor.org/

Our Mission: At Congregation Sha'ar Zahav, we are committed to sustaining a safe environment to nurture and express our diverse spiritual, sexual, educational and ethical values. Our rabbi, lay-leaders and members join together to bring meaning to Torah and Jewish observance. We are committed to creative prayer, study, mitzvot and tikkun olam (repairing the world).

I'm in the home stretch now with the production of GER. There was quite a bit of controversy at the beginning of filming, while looking for participants. Some Orthodox community members thought that filming converts from different movements would be like filming apples and oranges, because they didn't recognize converts from other movements.

Since that confrontation I have changed my focus to a small segment of Reform, or Reform leaning, converts -- Queer Jews. I really have to thank the people who were so against the making of this film about conversion. I feel like I would never have narrowed the focus if I hadn't been pushed to the fringes. Of course there is the fact that most of my friends are Queer Jews, and I run in circles with a lot of Jews by Choice who are also LGBT or Queer.

On another note as the closing of AGENCY is a month away, another chapter in my television production career is opening. Etz Chaim will be taking the place of AGENCY, and running twice a month on the 1st and 3rd Sunday at 6 PM. Etz Chaim will be a chat show about Queer interpretations of Torah, and Rabbinical Texts.