Even as the reporter makes clear that Latiesha lived as a woman, she says right at the top of the story, “…police say he [DeLee] killed a man because he’s gay.” Though she occasionally refers to Latiesha using female pronouns, she also continues to refer to her as male, as does the Syracuse police chief. In one particularly lurid moment the reporter says, “Latiesha was no stranger to the torment that surrounded her lifestyle”.

Jim is not a reporter, he’s merely sharing information from other sources and most of those available sources are perpetuating the misunderstanding about Cannon’s gender identity. It’s one thing to offer sources that clarify the situation, it’s another to attack Jim for sharing the information in as accurate a way as he is able.

I think the important thing here is that someone has been killed simply for being who she was. This is a truly awful and unacceptable thing. My heart goes out to the grieving family and to all who knew and loved Latiesha. I’m glad to know that whatever confusion and discomfort police may have with Latiesha’s identity, they have acted swiftly to apprehend and charge the alleged killer and have been clear that this was a bias-motivated crime.

—

Again, for the reasons I’ve outlined above, I am not going to “read in” an identity when published reports remain ambiguous. I should note that the LGBT press has made the same call I did.

Of course, on the other hand, as we learn more I will revise this post as necessary. But I’ve gotten into too much trouble before in making assumptions on how people chose to identify and express their gender. Where it’s cut and dried, it’s an easy call to make. But I have encountered too many situations personally to know that one can’t always assume that it’s cut and dried. And as I have learned, assuming wrongly can be just as insulting.

I don’t find it surprising that her family would refer to her as “him” and use her male name. I know of a lot of trans people who’s parents treat them like that; I wouldn’t expect that behavior to change just because the person died.

Also, the joke is, they probably think of themselves as “accepting” even though they are far from it.

Teish’s mother said, “That’s the life he chose. That’s who he wanted to be,” yet she also kept photos of Teish as a woman prominently displayed in the home, and gave the photo you see in the post to the local news media. It was precisely this ambiguity from Teish’s mother which gave me pause.

From the material available to me, it is very unclear to me precisely what identity Teish followed. I struggled for a very long time to try to figure out how to best represent Teish. My intent was to try to portray Teish as accurately as I possibly could with what’s available to me.

While I know that many people identify solely as one gender or another, some people experience some fluidity in gender. In fact, I once got a serious yelling by someone who rejected all gender labels, and I also have come to know an acquaintance who is very clear that he is a he sometimes, and a she at other times. Based in these experiences, I will not presume to attach labels to anyone beyond what is presented to me, and so I did not want to preclude the possibility that Teish experienced a similar degree of fluidity.

With the ambiguity of these news reports, it appeared to me that Teish’s identity may have been somewhat fluid as well, since people around her also identified Teish as “gay” with a male lover. Was “gay” also a term Teish used? I can’t tell.

And of course, news reports themselves may be inaccurate. They often are when reporting on transgender people. But right now, they are all I have to go on.

I meant no disrespect whatsoever. In fact, I was motivated to try to provide as much respect as possible. With the material before me, my intent was to represent Teish in the most accurate way possible without imposing labels which weren’t presented to me. I was trying to leave Teish’s identity as open as the material appeared to be.

When I wrote about Angie Zapata, her identity was much more precise, and so my writing reflected that. I will certainly welcome more clarity in Teish’s case. And as that information becomes available, I’ll respond accordingly.

This is very sad. At least the Police chief seems to get it. Well, maybe.

As a transwoman myself i find your posting highly offensive.

You are a disgrace to bloggers everywhere and lost all respect i had for you.