Pride... In Leather

Last night was the Oregon Leather Sir/boy contest in which my boy, Dominic, was runnning. To say that he won would be an understatement.. He did me, the whole family (and indeed, boyhood itself) proud. His interview was great, his speech was heartfelt and awesome and the fantasy (Co-starring yours truly) got a standing ovation.

As many of you know, he also made me proud by vocally objecting to the anti-transmen rule and was successful in getting the rule thrown out at our local level contest. In his speech, he diplomatically touched on his desire to use a title to further the cause of inclusivity in the leather community. He never used the word "Trans-inclusivity", but the message was clear to those that needed to hear it. Specifically, some higher-ups in the Leather Sir/boy hiearchy.

Following the intermission, our current American Leather Man, Rusty, who was a judge, gave a speech specifically about trans-inclusivity and the mean-spiritedness and wrongness of exclusion. It was an awesome speech. At the time, he was unaware that the rule in our contest had just been thrown out. After dom-boy won, I made sure Rusty knew about how Dom-boy had made them change it.

I am ever hopeful, perhaps too optimistically so, that pressure will come to bear on those that refuse to budge. I know that there are those who will never change their ways. But as more and more people hear from men of all ilks, trans and non-trans alike, that we will not be told by others what defines our manhood, perhaps their obstinance will at least cost them standing in the community.

The Oregon contingent is going on to the Northwest Regional contest, where it seems to me, they will be proud and vocal to their objection to injustice and thier desire to change it from within. They will be going, with uniformscout, our new Columbia Boot Black and out Transman (Whose permission I specifically asked for, and was given, to describe him here as such), who won the competition by receiving 68 points above the "Maximum" possible points. They will be going as a family of men who never even thought to question the validity of the manhood of their bootblack. Their easy, automatic and silent acceptance of Scout as one of our own will speak volumes loudly. And if that is not loud enough, I can count on my boy to SHOUT it from the stage.

I stick by my decision to take the path of protest, refusing to enter the contest (Even though I was specifically asked to). But I have also learned, by Dominic's actions, that change from within is possible. I love that sometimes, it takes a boy to teach a lesson.

I am so damn proud, I can barely stand it.