Australian crime victims are demanding that convicted rapist Mike Tyson be barred from entering Australia and "totted out as a celebrity, like some kind of Mother Theresa." • Former Indian septic-tank cleaners and other female "untouchables" put on a fashion show at the U.N. honoring a for-profit organization to help untouchables. • A teen girl in Colorado is sentenced to 18 years in prison after killing her half-sister in a "Mortal Kombat" fight reenactment. • Bob Dylan's ex-girlfriend and muse (and the woman pictured with him on the iconic cover of The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan) breaks her silence in a new memoir about the '60s. • Victims of a peeping tom case in Seattle are blamed by the peeper's wife for "putting on a show" because of their broken blinds. • Two more teens videotaped themselves beating up a fellow classmate and putting it on the internet. One word for these girls: idiots. • Gender-based violence and harassment in the workplace continues to run rampant in Bangladesh. • Game makers attempt to woo young girls with a new game that is essentially a lamer version of Guitar Hero.• Could the HPV vaccine cause teen paralysis? • Deliriously cute Leftovers video: ducklings in a bathtub!

But this joyous occasion did not come without a price. In a personal essay in the Advocate, Thomas writes about all of the prejudice he faced when trying to find adequate medical care. One doctor, "after a $300 consultation, reluctantly performed my initial checkups. He then required us to see the clinic's psychologist to see if we were fit to bring a child into this world and consulted with the ethics board of his hospital. A few months and a couple thousand dollars later, he told us that he would no longer treat us, saying he and his staff felt uncomfortable working with 'someone like me.'" Even Thomas's own brother was unkind, telling Thomas after his first pregnancy turned out ectopic, "It's a good thing that happened. Who knows what kind of monster it would have been."

Thomas isn't the only transmale facing difficulties. In last Sunday's New York Times Magazine, there was a story about the opposition transmen are facing at women's colleges. The piece profiled Rey, a college freshman who started his university career at Barnard, only to transfer to Columbia because of the number of issues he faced. According to writer Alissa Quart, Rey is not alone in his alienation: "Many trans students feel themselves to be excluded or isolated at women's schools and at coed colleges. Some talk of being razzed or insulted by fellow students." But Quart also discusses the question of how colleges meant for women are supposed to serve people who no longer identify as women in the first place.

Will society ever be able to accommodate all the facets of the gender spectrum? Or will cases like Thomas's and Rey's always be a struggle for acceptance and personal freedom?

Labor Of Love [The Advocate]
When Girls Will Be Boys [New York Times]