OK Guys it's time to wise up

   I have thought about this blog for a few months.  Are all scandals caused by men??  It is hard to pick up the paper without reading some story of misconduct by a man.  The latest GSA and Secret Service incidents have me embarrassed that many guys never seem to leave their teenage years.  Male religious leaders, politicians, businessmen and athletes---when was the last time you heard of a woman in any of these categories being a jerk?  How many guys leave their children without ever paying child support or even thinking about their responsibilities as a father? Should we have only  women in positions of responsibility?  I know that there are many great men who bring honor to our gender but there still seems to be enough of us that discredit our gender. The old saying that "women were put on earth to civilize men" seems to be too true today. Maybe it is time to vote by gender rather than by political party!

P.S.
The Climate Change Initiative of Howard County has information on their latest discussion circles.

HUNGRY FOR CHANGE: Food, Ethics and Sustainability.

This discussion circle meets at Historic Oakland on Thursday evenings from 7:00 to 8:30 pm on April 5 through May 24. This is the newest guide from www.nwei.org

What impact are our food choices having on our health, the health of our community, and the health of our planet? Circle members will explore the interconnections between Nature and our food systems in weekly focuses: “The First Bite,” “Politics of the Plate,” “A Healthy Appetite,” “Just Food,” “Eating for Earth,” and “Hungry for Change.”

Weekly meetings are led by the 8 to 12 circle members who share roles to facilitate, open discussion, close the session, record action plans sparked in  the exchange, communicate each week, and follow up on actions at each session.

On April 5 facilitator Laura Mueller Florence Miller from CCIHC will lead the opening discussion and distribute booklets of the circle’s timely and topical readings, web-links, and video sources. The cost for the booklets is $21.

To sign up for this HUNGRY FOR CHANGE discussion circle, please provide your email and phone number to Pat Loeber or Dawn Linthicum at 410-730-4744, or tcvillage@columbiavillages.org.

A World of Health: Connecting People, Place and Planet– 7 sessions
Chicken Soup for the Planet!
What are the connections between human health and the environment, and how we can sustain both?
Topics: Redefining Health ~ Eating Well ~ Cleaning House ~ Building Healthy Communities ~ Curing Consumption ~                    Healthy Planet—Healthy People ~ Wrap‐Up

Starting April 30th - (Details To Be Announced)

To sign up, contact: Andy Monjan at amonjan@verizon.net

Resilience Circle/Common Security Club – 7 sessions
Mutual Support in Uncertain Times

How does the current economy create inequality and isolation? How can we provide mutual aid and build relationships while facing economic and ecological challenges? Topics: Our Resilience Circle ~ A New Vision ~ Breaking Isolation ~ Real Wealth & Security ~ Mutual Aid ~ Changing the Rules ~ What’s Next

Starting May/June (Details To Be Announced)

For more information, contact: Florence Miller at hococlimatechange@gmail.com
 
P.S. 1
The Human Rights Campaign (HRC), the nation’s largest lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) civil rights organization, is proud to launch a new speaker series titled Equality Talks.  The inaugural event will feature a reading and discussion with renowned developmental and clinical psychologist Diane Ehrensaft, an expert in the field of gender-nonconforming and transgender children.  Dr. Ehrensaft is the author of Gender Born, Gender Made: Raising Healthy Gender-nonconforming Children. Dr. Edgardo Menvielle, a psychiatrist at the Children’s National Medical Center will also be on hand to answer questions.  The event will be moderated by HRC Family Project Director and professional social worker Ellen Kahn.  The event will be webcast live at www.hrc.org/equalitytalks. Books will be available for sale onsite, through a partnership with Politics & Prose bookstore.

“We are proud to launch our new Equality Talks speaker series with a topic as important as gender-nonconforming and transgender children,” said HRC President Joe Solmonese.  “Equality Talks will take a critical thinking approach to issues important to the LGBT community”

The inaugural event will feature a reading and discussion with Diane Ehrensaft, Ph.D.  Dr. Ehrensaft is a developmental and clinical psychologist, and the Director of Mental Health of the newly formed Child and Adolescent Center in the San Francisco Bay Area.  For the past three decades, Dr. Ehrensaft has been working with and writing about gender-nonconforming children and their families.  In the midst of a sea change in attitudes toward gender and expanding options for gender identities and expression, but with ongoing harm still being done to children who transgress traditional gender norms, Dr. Ehrensaft will talk about the pressing need to re-learn gender and listen carefully to the children who live outside traditional binary gender boxes as they teach us about gender creativity and gender expansiveness and guide us toward the responsibilities we have to construct gender-affirmative environments for all our children--at home, at school, in the community, and in the halls of government.  Calling on both her clinical experiences and personal experiences as a mother of a gender-nonconforming child, Dr. Ehrensaft will present her model of the true gender self and the three-dimensional gender web, to be used as tools in building gender resilience in our children and buttressing gender supports in our communities.

WHAT:           Equality Talk Speaker Series Inaugural Event, featuring Dr. Diane Ehrensaft,  Author of Gender Born, Gender Made: Raising Healthy Gender-nonconforming Children.

WHEN:           Monday, April 23, 2012. Doors open at 6:00 p.m. Program begins at 6:30 p.m.

WHERE:         HRC, 1640 Rhode Island Ave. NW, Washington, DC and webcast live at www.hrc.org/equalitytalks

WHO:       Diane Ehrensaft, Developmental and Clinical Psychologist
              Edgardo Menvielle, Psychiatrist, Children’s National Medical Center
              HRC Family Project Director Ellen Kahn

The Human Rights Campaign is America’s largest civil rights organization working to achieve lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equality. By inspiring and engaging all Americans, HRC strives to end discrimination against LGBT citizens and realize a nation that achieves fundamental fairness and equality for all.