Welcome! All about this community...
Welcome to the No Dumb Questions online community!
I am thrilled to have you here and am excited to build this community with you.
This online community is a chance to take the dialog begun with the Sundance award-winning documentary film, No Dumb Questions, to the next level. I hope this community will provide a safe space to explore what it means to be male or female, and to cross the boundaries of societies definitions of gender. A place to express fears and concerns - that doesn’t preach or expect us to take a stand, but meets us where we are in the process of understanding and acceptance.
A place where anyone can ask their own "not dumb questions" and tell their own stories about gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation.
And I am so proud and excited that we have Monica Canfield-Lenfest on board to help moderate our online community. Monica is a community leader and pioneer in the fight for understanding and acceptance for our transgender family members, friends, and colleagues. Watch Monica's video and read her blog.
Also, stay tuned for more new footage from the No Dumb Questions family! We have recently gone back to re-interview the family and find out what impact Aunt Barbara’s transition has had everyone. That new 5 years later follow-up film will be released soon, with sneak preview clips appearing on this site.
I have been overwhelmed by the love, honesty, and healing No Dumb Questions engenders. The film happens focus on issues of gender and sexual orientation, but the lessons could easily be about culture, race, class, or difference of any sort. I look forward to working together with you to deepen our understanding of what it means to confront, embrace, and transcend difference.
Again, welcome to the community, and I look forward to changing the world with you.
Best wishes,
Melissa Regan
Producer/Director, No Dumb Questions
BACKGROUND: WHAT’S THIS ALL ABOUT, AND WHY ARE WE DOING IT?
Seven years ago a friend took me aside and said, “Oh my gosh. My brother just told us he’s becoming a woman. He’s coming to visit in a month as a woman. I have to tell my 6, 9, and 11 year-old daughters. What do I do?”
My response was, basically, “Dude, I don’t know. I’m just a lesbian.”
I didn’t know any transgender people. And I didn’t know how my friend’s family’s conversation should go. But I knew that they were all so warm and open and funny, and that no matter what they did, it would be amazing.
Together we agreed to document their experience to share with other families. At the very least I wanted to share with my own family an example of what can happen when people walk bravely forward into difficult conversations, tricky feelings, and scary new situations.
The result was a 24-minute documentary film we called No Dumb Questions.
WHAT NOW?
A lot has happened since we finished the film in 2001.
I’ve learned a lot about the transgender experience. And I’ve been deeply touched by the heartfelt response the film has received from television, film festival and educational audiences around the world. It has proven to be a powerful tool for sparking dialog and changing hearts and minds in families, schools, colleges, faith communities, and workplaces.
We’ve pushed hard over the years to expand the film’s reach and encourage this dialog. But, ultimately, these in-person film viewings are one-way conversations or interactive discussions limited to the group at each screening.
We wanted to expand the conversation.
Social networking and Internet video technologies now offer the opportunity to take the conversation begun by No Dumb Questions to the next level. To move beyond the largely one-way conversation of film, to a powerful collaborative peer-education and ally/activist network.
WHY IS THIS SO IMPORTANT NOW?
Are you a boy or a girl? Does your answer clearly and absolutely fit society’s expectations?
In February, 2008 8th-grader Larry King, an openly gay teen who sometimes wore makeup and heels, was murdered by a classmate. Larry’s case is not an isolated tragedy. Two thirds of all teenagers are verbally or physically harassed, the top three reasons being physical appearance, perceived sexual orientation, and perceived gender identity [GLSEN, 2005]. Transgender Americans face the most severe penalties, including a 1-in-12 chance of being murdered [Harvey Milk Institute, 1999]. Those who survive often suffer extreme rates of self-hatred, family rejection, workplace discrimination, health care neglect, child custody denial, and police harassment and brutality.
The fight for acceptance, equality, and freedom from bullying and violence for those that differ in their gender identity, gender expression, or sexual orientation is far from over. Continued violence and discrimination, increased visibility of the transgender experience with no supporting cultural dialog, and a narrow window of legislative opportunity are creating a delicate tinderbox, out of which could come either widespread acceptance or a fierce backlash of intolerance and institutionalized discrimination. The entrenched antipathy to LGBT rights has even fractured the LGBT community, leaving transgender and all gender variant Americans at even greater risk of being left behind.
I am thrilled to have you here and am excited to build this community with you.
This online community is a chance to take the dialog begun with the Sundance award-winning documentary film, No Dumb Questions, to the next level. I hope this community will provide a safe space to explore what it means to be male or female, and to cross the boundaries of societies definitions of gender. A place to express fears and concerns - that doesn’t preach or expect us to take a stand, but meets us where we are in the process of understanding and acceptance.
A place where anyone can ask their own "not dumb questions" and tell their own stories about gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation.
And I am so proud and excited that we have Monica Canfield-Lenfest on board to help moderate our online community. Monica is a community leader and pioneer in the fight for understanding and acceptance for our transgender family members, friends, and colleagues. Watch Monica's video and read her blog.
Also, stay tuned for more new footage from the No Dumb Questions family! We have recently gone back to re-interview the family and find out what impact Aunt Barbara’s transition has had everyone. That new 5 years later follow-up film will be released soon, with sneak preview clips appearing on this site.
I have been overwhelmed by the love, honesty, and healing No Dumb Questions engenders. The film happens focus on issues of gender and sexual orientation, but the lessons could easily be about culture, race, class, or difference of any sort. I look forward to working together with you to deepen our understanding of what it means to confront, embrace, and transcend difference.
Again, welcome to the community, and I look forward to changing the world with you.
Best wishes,
Melissa Regan
Producer/Director, No Dumb Questions
BACKGROUND: WHAT’S THIS ALL ABOUT, AND WHY ARE WE DOING IT?
Seven years ago a friend took me aside and said, “Oh my gosh. My brother just told us he’s becoming a woman. He’s coming to visit in a month as a woman. I have to tell my 6, 9, and 11 year-old daughters. What do I do?”
My response was, basically, “Dude, I don’t know. I’m just a lesbian.”
I didn’t know any transgender people. And I didn’t know how my friend’s family’s conversation should go. But I knew that they were all so warm and open and funny, and that no matter what they did, it would be amazing.
Together we agreed to document their experience to share with other families. At the very least I wanted to share with my own family an example of what can happen when people walk bravely forward into difficult conversations, tricky feelings, and scary new situations.
The result was a 24-minute documentary film we called No Dumb Questions.
WHAT NOW?
A lot has happened since we finished the film in 2001.
I’ve learned a lot about the transgender experience. And I’ve been deeply touched by the heartfelt response the film has received from television, film festival and educational audiences around the world. It has proven to be a powerful tool for sparking dialog and changing hearts and minds in families, schools, colleges, faith communities, and workplaces.
We’ve pushed hard over the years to expand the film’s reach and encourage this dialog. But, ultimately, these in-person film viewings are one-way conversations or interactive discussions limited to the group at each screening.
We wanted to expand the conversation.
Social networking and Internet video technologies now offer the opportunity to take the conversation begun by No Dumb Questions to the next level. To move beyond the largely one-way conversation of film, to a powerful collaborative peer-education and ally/activist network.
WHY IS THIS SO IMPORTANT NOW?
Are you a boy or a girl? Does your answer clearly and absolutely fit society’s expectations?
In February, 2008 8th-grader Larry King, an openly gay teen who sometimes wore makeup and heels, was murdered by a classmate. Larry’s case is not an isolated tragedy. Two thirds of all teenagers are verbally or physically harassed, the top three reasons being physical appearance, perceived sexual orientation, and perceived gender identity [GLSEN, 2005]. Transgender Americans face the most severe penalties, including a 1-in-12 chance of being murdered [Harvey Milk Institute, 1999]. Those who survive often suffer extreme rates of self-hatred, family rejection, workplace discrimination, health care neglect, child custody denial, and police harassment and brutality.
The fight for acceptance, equality, and freedom from bullying and violence for those that differ in their gender identity, gender expression, or sexual orientation is far from over. Continued violence and discrimination, increased visibility of the transgender experience with no supporting cultural dialog, and a narrow window of legislative opportunity are creating a delicate tinderbox, out of which could come either widespread acceptance or a fierce backlash of intolerance and institutionalized discrimination. The entrenched antipathy to LGBT rights has even fractured the LGBT community, leaving transgender and all gender variant Americans at even greater risk of being left behind.
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| Host a screening. Raise awareness, raise funds, and get people talking in your community. | |||
| Watch the opening scene | |||
| Sneak Preview: 5 Years Later | |||
| see more clips! | |||
| Wonderful. It is such a lesson in how parenting should be and how families should be. -- Betty DeGeneres, mother of actress Ellen DeGeneres | |||
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© 2009 Created by Melissa Regan
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