Guest Post: Cody Kennedy on the Hop Against Homophobia and Transphobia

                                   A Beautiful Life

The Hop Against Homophobia and Transphobia is a blog hop created by a growing group of authors who write GLBTQIAP works and who wish to bring awareness about GLBTQIAP literary works and those who identify with non-binary genders to others. It begins on May 17th with the International Day Against Homophobia and lasts through May 27th.

We hope to bring attention to crucial issues surrounding homophobia, biphobia, and transphobia, and censorship of GLBTQIAP works, and to current socio-economic, political, and personal issues surrounding those who don’t identify with the strict binary categorization of sexual identity.

It’s important to note that The Hop Against Homophobia doesn’t only represent plights of discrimination. It represents a time of change; not only one of change in perspective but also one of behavior and the law. Now, more than ever before.

Yet, times of change can be polarizing and because it is human nature to define, categorize, label, and package, discrimination can sometimes be even more prevalent.

“Define, refine, constrict, package, and sell… No thank you. I would like to live in a world where your gender, nationality, sexual orientation, and, above all, financial status didn’t affect the opportunities you are given in life, the way you’re treated by others, and your overall freedom. In a world like that, I wouldn’t be given such a complex definition.”

                                                          ~Andrej Pejic

In today’s society, sexuality and gender are a part of a spectrum rather than a precise, black or white concept. There are many more labels for sexualities now than there were twenty years ago (straight, bisexual, homosexual, pansexual, asexual, intersex, etc) and we shouldn’t feel the need to label ourselves to satisfy society’s way of portraying us as part of a social status. Labels are not something that define who we are.

I am a person who does not identify with a strict binary gender categorization and, a week or so ago, someone wrote to me that “people felt betrayed” by my appearance at a recent authors’ conference because my appearance didn’t match the label many had formed for me in their minds. The comment bothered me in one aspect more than any other: entitlement.

 

You see, irrespective of gender and gender identity, everyone is not entitled to our life stories. That is something earned over time and by us deciding that someone is a person who we wish to get to know and vice verse. The fact that we might look different doesn’t change our privacy one iota. We decide who gets to know about us and who doesn’t. Our rights are not lessened or conditioned by the fact that we don’t identify with a strict binary gender. We not only have the same right to privacy that everyone else does, but also the same right to a beautiful life that everyone else does.

 

I write GLBTQIA literature because I believe that everybody has the right to create their own beautiful life based on the identity they have chosen for themselves, and not the labels society chooses for them. I am proud to be an author of GLBTQIA literature and hope to bring you works that inspire you, give you strength and, above all, give you hope.

Over the course of the next ten days, join me in bringing awareness to the world, in teaching the world that those of us who don’t identify in binary ways aren’t to be feared, reviled, or persecuted, but simply accepted for who we are.

In honor of this terrific blog hop, we’re giving away one SIGNED ecopy of my novella, SAFE.

All you need to do is comment below. At the end of the blog hop, we will randomly select a winner and post your name here! Be sure to check back on May 29th to see if you won!

Here’s to changing the world for the better! Be calm and rock on! It does get better!

~Cody

Check out Cody’s Blog here. Like Cody on Facebook, find Cody on Goodreads, on Twitter @CodyKAuthor, and read Cody’s free serial story, Fairy.

 

 

 

 

Available from: Harmony Ink Press

Caleb had one mission in life.

To keep his boyfriend safe.

They met at ten, kissed at twelve, and were madly in love by eighteen. Caleb Deering is the captain of the swim team and the hottest senior in school. He comes from a loving home with a kind father and a caring, but strict, mother who is battling breast cancer. Nico Caro is small and beautiful, and has a father who rules with an iron fist—literally. One morning Caleb forgets himself, and he pecks Nico on the lips at school. A teacher sees them and tattles to the Headmaster. The accidental outing at school might be the least of their problems, because the ball set in motion by the school’s calls to their parents could get Nico killed. In the face of that very real danger, Caleb knows he has only one mission in life: to keep Nico safe. Read an excerpt of Safe.

Also available from Harmony Ink Press:

 

 

 

 

Available from: Harmony Ink Press

Όμορφη. Ómorphi. Greek. Meaning pretty

Pretty. adj. /pritē/ Pleasing by delicacy or grace

~*~

High school senior Michael Sattler leads a charmed life. He’s a star athlete, has great friends, and parents who love him just the way he is. What’s missing from his life is a boyfriend. That’s a problem because he’s out only to his parents and best friend. When Michael accidentally bumps into Christy Castle at school, his life changes in ways he never imagined. Christy is Michael’s dream guy: smart, pretty, and sexy. But nothing could have prepared Michael for what being Christy’s boyfriend would entail.

Christy needs to heal after years of abuse and knows he needs help to do it. After the death of his notorious father, he leaves his native Greece and settles in upstate New York. Alone, afraid, and left without a voice, Christy hides the myriad scars of his abuse. He desperately wants to be loved and when he meets Michael, he dares to hope that day has arrived. When one of Michael’s team-mates becomes an enemy and an abuser from Christy’s past seeks to return him to a life of slavery, only Michael and Christy’s combined strength and unwavering determination can save them from the violence that threatens to destroy their future together. Read an excerpt of Omorphi

You can check out the other Blog Hop Stops here