DMV Fat-Friendly Community field trip to mini golf

My photo of the course’s seahorse statue at one of the holes, taken during one of my and Julia’s previous visits; I like seahorses, especially as they are dragon-like, and a trans*(-gender et al) symbol.

Today my partner Julia and I took the DMV* Fat-Friendly Community on a field trip to our city’s mini golf course.  I know, a city with its own mini golf course!  Gaithersburg MD, Julia’s hometown, is similar to my second hometown of Newton MA (first is Brookline MA), but for weather and other reasons I don’t think mini golf would be a good government investment there; (more) private mini golf is still pretty popular in MA though, especially at Summer vacation areas like Cape Cod.  We had a lot of interest in the event, but also a lot of scheduling conflicts – but we did have two other families join us, and all had a good time.  (*DC / MD / VA, as in District of Columbia / Maryland / Virginia; Julia founded the DMV FFC a few years ago.)

Here is the text of the Facebook event:

“DMV FFC Goes To G-Burg's Mini Golf

Come join Julia McCrossin and I at Gaithersburg's mini golf course (our town and her hometown)! We've been a few times, most recently on Labor Day weekend.

Start time is flexible (with notice), and we can host two rounds -- the last one must start by 6 (they close at 7, and the last players must start an hour before). Also, we have 6 free passes (residents $6, non $7, seniors $5/$6; groups of 10 $5).

And again, it is a pretty accessible place -- from Julia: "Just a note about accessibility, the course is not flat, but has paved walkways that are built for wheelchair/stroller access to each hole. Many, but not all, of the 18 holes have a sturdy metal bench for sitting. There is one pretty steep, but short, walk to a hole with a very steep incline."

Official site at http://www.gaithersburgmd.gov/about-gaithersburg/city-facilities/miniature-golf-course.

We will bring the remaining Birkenstocks Julia's mother is giving away, for those who want to try them on (see my post in DMV Fat-Friendly Community for details).”

Montgomery County MD Police LGBTQ Community Meeting #2

Tonight Julia and I attended the Montgomery County Police Department's second LGBTQ Community Meeting.  The first was in June, planned before and then galvanized by the mass shooting at Latin Night at Orlando's Pulse LGBTQ nightclub earlier that month.

There was only one member of the media present this time, apparently -- a reporter from WHAG, who did publish a story (video and transcript), and quoted my colleague Rev. Jill McCrory and I -- and not as many people; but hopefully that will change, especially as we continue to create the MoCo Pride Center (we have finally started an LGBTQ center for our county, and Rev. Jill is in leadership there as well).  And Julia's mother came with us for the first time (you can see both of them in WHAG's video).

The agenda included:
- The Department of Homeland Security's video “Run, Hide, Fight: Surviving an Active Shooter Event" (produced with Houston TX's public safety people)
- An overview of the Montgomery County Family Justice Center and its services available to the LGBTQ community
- A review of recent bias-related incidents in Montgomery County
- The Department of Justice's law enforcement training video “Effective Interactions with the Transgender Community”
 
The next meeting is scheduled for Wednesday December 7th, and the contact person is Lieutenant Nick Augustine at Nicholas.Augustine@MontgomeryCountyMD.gov -- a gay officer who speaks at and MCs these meetings.

#LGBTQcommunity #LGBTQ #MontgomeryCountyMD #MoCoMD #MoCo #MontgomeryCounty #Gaithersburg #MD #Maryland #police‬ #countypolice

Fat Studies Journal call for proposals -- Fatness & Temporality

(I couldn't find a web page for this CFP, so I gave it one here. My "Good News : A Sermon On Fat Justice" appears in the Journal's Religion & Fat special issue of April 2015 (volume 4 issue 2).  : > ))

Special issue of Fat Studies: Fatness and Temporality

Guest edited by Jen Rinaldi, Emma Lind, May Friedman, Crystal Kotow, Tracy Tidgwell

The “Fatness and Temporality” special issue of Fat Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Body Weight and Society considers the relationship between fat identity and the social construction of time. The editors invite papers on a variety of topics that explore, for example, how fat bodies interrupt, disrupt, engage, or resist ideas about normative timelines and expectations of the human lifespan. Building upon queer theory’s temporal turn, our interrogation of fat temporalities considers the impacts of affect, sensation, and memory through the lens of fat citizenship. We seek to answer questions such as: what is the fat body’s imagined past and future? How might we theorize fat futurity? How do fat subjects “fall out of time” in their disavowal of normative life scripts?

This special issue invites papers across disciplines that may consider themes such as:

● Fat bodies as sites of metamorphosis and, thus, atemporality;
● Age-specific weight guidelines and the normative construction of the growing adolescent body;
● The exclusion of fat bodies from “youthful” standards of idealized bodies;
● The pressures to lose weight in anticipation of rites of passage like marriage;
● The “perils” of fat as violations of the necessity of long life and prosperity at any cost;
● Fat bodies as retreating to childlike states in terms of both external controls and the imperative to shrink;
● The recursiveness of fat bodies which may yoyo through different states;
● Fat as outside of normative timelines of romance and reproduction and the limitations and opportunities offered by existing outside of these frames;
● Implications for fat reproduction and/or fat parenting as impossible or highly fraught states;
● Fat history and the association of obesity with industrial modernity.

To submit a proposal for inclusion in this special issue of the journal, please send a 250-500 word summary of your article as well as a current CV to Jen Rinaldi, at Jen.Rinaldi@uoit.ca by October 1, 2016. Any questions about the special issue can be directed to this email address as well.

First drafts of full manuscripts will be submitted for editorial review by December 1, 2016. Full final manuscripts will be required in March 31, 2017. Final submissions should be between 3,000 and 6,000 words, including all notes and references. If you wish to include reproductions of visual images with your essay, you will need to receive permission to do so from the artists/ copyright holders of the image(s). All authors will need to sign a form that transfers copyright of their article to the publisher, Taylor & Francis / Routledge.

Fat Studies is the first academic journal in the field of scholarship that critically examines theory, research, practices, and programs related to body weight and appearance. Content includes original research and overviews exploring the intersection of gender, race/ethnicity, sexuality, age, ability, and socioeconomic status. Articles critically examine representations of fat in health and medical sciences, the Health at Every Size model, the pharmaceutical industry, psychology, sociology, cultural studies, legal issues, literature, pedagogy, art, theater, popular culture, media studies, and activism.

Fat Studies is an interdisciplinary, international field of scholarship that critically examines societal attitudes and practices about body weight and appearance. Fat Studies advocates equality for all people regardless of body size. It explores the way fat people are oppressed, the reasons why, who benefits from that oppression and how to liberate fat people from oppression. Fat Studies seeks to challenge and remove the negative associations that society has about fat and the fat body. It regards weight, like height, as a human characteristic that varies widely across any population. Fat Studies is similar to academic disciplines that focus on race, ethnicity, gender, or age.