I am so upset. The reporter from the San Diego Reader, Ernie Grimm, contacted me a few weeks ago to ask if I would do a television interview with him when the story came out on the cover of the reader about my performance Becoming Dragon. I accepted and the reader’s publicist contacted me about TV interview dates. They scheduled an interview with me for this morning with an 8:50am arrival time for a 9:20am live air interview. I arrive on time, conservatively dressed with a long skirt, tights and a scarf up to my neck. We chat cordially in the break room first and then move to the green room. The publicist goes to talk to the anchor, and returns at 9:18AM to say “Micha I have some uncomfortable news. I’m so sorry, but because of how you’re dressed, they can’t have you on the show.” She goes on to tell me how they want to cover the Second Life aspect of the story and not talk about transgender issues at all.
This is absolutely an act of gender based discrimination. Imagine if they had said “I’m sorry, but because you’re a woman, we can’t have you on. We just wanted to talk about Second Life.” It is also very similar to them saying something like “I’m sorry, but because of the ay your face looks, we can’t have you on. We don’t want to talk about the fact that you’re black, just about Second Life,” if I was a person of color.
Then the anchorwoman comes into the green room to personally apologize to me and says its not her, it’s her “incredibly right wing republican boss” who is to blame. I do not say anything in response and look away. I refuse to say that this is acceptable. Admittedly, I laughed at the news at first, nervous and not sure of what to say. As I walk out the door, angry and upset, I realize that I should have told them right then and there that this is an act of discrimination.
I am disgusted. You can contact KUSI to tell them what you think of their transphobic, homophobic ways here, the show I was to be on is Good Morning San Diego:
Email information
News Story Ideas
NEWS@KUSI.COM
Good Morning San Diego
NEWS@KUSI.COM
MAILING ADDRESS 4575 Viewridge Avenue
San Diego, CA 92123
MAIN STATION NUMBER 858-571-5151
SALES 858-505-5120
NEWSROOM 858-571-NEWS (571-6397)
NEWS TIPLINE 858-292-TIPS (292-8477)
They proceeded to do the interview with Ernie, trying to avoid the issue, but even he couldn’t avoid saying that the project was about my, in his words “transgendering process”, and they both referred to me as “he” and with male pronouns for the entire interview, completely invisiblizing me. I should have never agreed to do the interview. I was actually up until almost 4am because I was so nervous and excited about doing the interview. I re-read Gloria Anzaldua for inspiration and read up on other cultures with traditions of cross-species transitions such as hinduism and buddhism. At least that was time well spent.
[...] Read on at my blog… [...]
March 29, 2009 @ 10:09 am