Friends of Jennifer Gable were astonished when they attended her open casket funeral to discover her dressed as a man, complete with short haircut and suit.
Her identity as a trans woman was completely erased and replaced with her former self, the version of her that her father was more comfortable with, reports Miami Herald.
Programs featured her birth name “Geoffrey Gable,” and gave a briefing of her life that completely left out her transition. It read:
Geoffrey Charles Gable, 32, Boise, passed away suddenly on October 9, 2014 while at his job at Wells Fargo Bank.
He was born in Twin Falls on January 27, 1982 to Anthony Clark Gable and Lori Ann Walton.
Geoff and his brother, Steven, were raised from toddlers by their maternal grandparents, George and Joan Walton.
He attended Morningside Elementary School, O’Leary Junior High and graduated from Twin Falls High School in the year 2000.
He was married to Ann Arthurs in 2005 in Hawaii. They were later divorced.
Geoff grew up as a member of the Twin Falls First Christian Church, where he was baptized in 1996.
Meghan Stabler, a board member of Human Rights Campaign and member of HRC’s National Business Council, had contact with Jennifer a few years back. She had this to say of the ordeal:
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“No mention of the woman she knew she was and had lived as for several years. Just erosion of her identity and an old photograph of how the father perceived her to be.
She had done what she needed to do legally to be seen as her authentic self. Her father erased her identity either though ignorance or arrogance.”
She added that this injustice shows the importance of keeping an updated will.
Here’s what attendees saw on the program:
Our thoughts go out to Jennifer and those who truly knew her.
tardis
This story is incredibly heartbreaking and shocking, too. What were these people thinking?
Ladbrook
If I died tomorrow and my parents “erased” my identity as a openly gay man, and instead, listed the name of my old high school prom date or something… well, I’d haunt them for a very long time. I would also hope that my friends would do what Jennifer’s friends did: report it to the local press for some good old-fashioned bigot shaming. RIP, Jennifer.
MarionPaige
the first thing that comes to mind is the funeral scene of the two guys in the movie Heathers who’s deaths had been made to look like gay suicides. One of the grieving fathers stood up and yelled: “I loved my dead gay son”.
Funerals are for the living to grieve and Gable’s family had every right to present the body the way the family wanted it presented. Imagine the chaos if random clowns from the internet had some legal authority to sue a family over how a deceased loved one’s body is presented at funeral?
Ladbrook
@MarionPaige: You are, without a doubt, the biggest idiot on this site. Clearly, you are writing under more than one handle, but your tone and language choices give you away every time (smeds, mcfrisky, whatever).
So based on your logic, this father could have dressed his child as a Satan worshipper or a Ringling Brothers trapeze artist if that’s how they wanted him to look as they lowered him into the ground? No thought or respect for the dead and her wishes??? What a jerk, you are.
MarionPaige
this story is clearly not about Geoffrey Charles Gable. Imagine going to some random newspaper and trying to interest it in reporting on a story about your trans friend who identified as woman but was buried as a man by “her” family (and you aren’t that friend’s spouse or life partner). Anyone with any experience with the press knows that you wouldn’t have gotten very far (UNLESS YOU HAD SOME FRIEND WHO WAS A REPORTER or some other PR connection to help you pimp the story).
If I had to guess, I would offer that some trans rights activist with a media connection is the fire behind this non-story. Geoffrey Charles Gable did in fact have life experiences and friends / associations prior to transitioning. No matter how Gable’s body had been presented someone could have claimed that it was an attempt to erase one part of the person’s life. Gable’s family are the people with the right to make the determination one way or the other.
In this case, there isn’t even some lover or “life partner” claiming to have been injured; only trans rights advocators.
aliengod
@MarionPaige: I agree with you. This is a non-story about a family doing something they had every right to do.
Stache99
Interesting when you compare it to your own life. One day at work you just drop dead. It can happen. Then of coarse the funeral and family or friends cleaning out your belongings. Your life done and now summed up. I think that’s why I keep my place so clean. Weird but I think of these things.
MarionPaige
I’m not saying one way or another but …
what do you say about someone who has no problem using a dead gay person (and her family) to pimp trans rights?
inbama
Mehan Stabler, the offended HRC trans spokeswoman quoted in the article, married her wife in 2011 in Texas by declaring herself a male based on her birth certificate.
Still, the father is a fool, and no one in their right mind should appoint MarionPaige his executor as she doesn’t seem to believe the deceased’s wishes should be respected.
Saint Law
@MarionPaige: Have you no one in the real world to whom you can express your ‘thoughts’? Perhaps a cat? Because if so you should really spend more time with them.
Or kill yourself. Whichever.
Saint Law
@aliengod: At least the twat behind the MarionPaige account makes some effort with its trolling. A whole lot of effort in fact.
What do you do but stand there with your finger in your nose drooling?
TransParency
Cis-trash family.
jayj150
“Friends of Jennifer Gable were astonished when they attended her open casket funeral to discover her dressed as a man, complete with short haircut and suit.”. Oh the horror!!. Why are transsexuals so obsessed with how people should present themselves based on their sex?. Women with short hair are still women; men with long hair are still men. Diane Keaton is every bit as much of a woman as any other, despite her love for pants and ties.
GreatGatsby2011
@MarionPaige: “what do you say about someone who has no problem using a dead gay person (and her family) to pimp trans rights?”
I don’t know, probably the same thing I would say about the person who used a dead gay person to “pimp” gay rights (Matthew Shepard).
“Thanks for finding the one good thing that could have possibly come out of this tragic event. I’m sure the deceased would support their death being used to bring light to the injustices their community faces on a regular basis. Don’t let sociopaths on the internet discourage you; they are sad, lonely people who should be pitied.”
onthemark
“this injustice shows the importance of keeping an updated will.”
WRONG – Funeral instructions should be separate from the will, and kept NOT with the lawyer but with whoever would be arranging the funeral, since the will may not be read until weeks after death.
(The classic case is none other than Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a wealthy man who wanted a very simple funeral and said so in his will – which wasn’t read until several weeks after his extremely elaborate state funeral.)
In her (?) usual obnoxious way, “MarionPaige” makes a few correct legal points here, sad to say. Jennifer Gable was a single person, who let no written instructions, and who was not paying for the funeral. In such case the family pays for the funeral, and if the family makes a travesty of it there’s not much anyone can do it about it.
If you’re someone without much money, and you want something specific, look at it this way. Can you save up a funeral account? Can you count on a friend to arrange a simple funeral? If not, and your homophobic or transphobic relatives disrespect your memory at a funeral they’re paying for, unfortunately there’s not much you can do about it from The Great Beyond.
This case IS an injustice, but not one that could have been prevented by legislation. These things require advance planning which few of us ever want to think about, especially at a reasonably young age.
Tackle
What@MarionPaige: is saying,
is correct. Yes it’s unfortuninate situation, but several things/ questions stand out. Did her family know about her transition? Was she in contact with her family in anyway?? @onthemark: Great post: thank god for calm, rational people. Instead of being angry at @MarionPaige: , take what she said as a learning experience.
Inform your trans friends/ family/ acquaintance/: well anyone for that matter. The importance of funeral instructions. A co- worker just passed away, and she left detailed instructions on how she wanted to be buried. And it was granted.
And her family could have done a lot worse: such as not having or holding or doing any funeral. And lets not lose site of the most important thing, and what really counted. In life, she got to be and lived ,as who she wanted…
Alan down in Florida
This is reminiscent of the Golden Girls in which Dorothy’s cross-dressing brother wanted to be buried in a teddy much to Sophia’s consternation.
The sad thing is Jennifer dying at such a young age without having planned for this contingency.
I pray that she can RIP after this familial betrayal.
I'm Black, and HIV-Positive.
A tragedy, and a travesty. No pun intended.
I'm Black, and HIV-Positive.
@Ladbrook: You’d haunt them? Oh, so then now all of a sudden you believe in the afterlife? You’re embarrassing. You and I both know that’s not a real response. There needs to be something that can be done to avoid this kind of bullshit ending to a person’s life. Alan Down in Florida said it best when he implied that this is a family betrayal.
I'm Black, and HIV-Positive.
@MarionPaige: Imagine the chaos you wrote? Oh, just so long as a few tail feathers don’t get ruffled then? You are truly warped in your perception of the world, and how it should operate. This is chaos dimwit, and we all know that you’re a two faced hypocrite here spouting off this bullshit, but that when you go to sleep tonight that it’s you who just hopes and prays that your parents die before you do when the time comes.
I'm Black, and HIV-Positive.
@Ladbrook: You are so weak accusing of someone of being represented by multiple usernames here. You dumb-asses even tried to say that I was someone else at one time. Maybe you should develop the strength, and face up the real truth here, and just cry your lonely, dumb bitch-ass to sleep at night instead of just boring us all with your lame, pathetic accusations Mr. McCarthy!
I'm Black, and HIV-Positive.
@aliengod: And your username implies that you worship deities from the planet Jupiter. Shut the fuck up!
I'm Black, and HIV-Positive.
@jayj150: So then she was presented in her coffin in double drag then you blithering idiot? You make no sense with your commentary. Thank you very much!
I'm Black, and HIV-Positive.
@Tackle: I think you’re wrong. There is nothing worse here that they could have done. And clearly the body was found with long hair, and in possession of women’s things. Not a shaven boy’s haircut.
Will L
@onthemark: I agree with what you have said. Who would expect to die at 32? I certainly didn’t have my documents put together at that age.
This is very unfortunate but the man had lost his child. We all have to cope in our own way.
Tackle
@I’m Black, and HIV-Positive.: Ok: She was found with long hair, and in possessions of women’s things. But,,,, Did her parents know about her transition? I’ve read several articles about this story, and it seems to me, that she was not in touch with, or had a relationship with her family later in life.
If that’s the case, I could imagine the shock, of a new identity being sprung up on someone. Again, I take this story as a lesson. We all need to prepare…
aliengod
@I’m Black, and HIV-Positive.: And your name implies that you live a careless, irresponsible lifestyle. So how about you stfu!
GayEGO
This is an unexpected sad thing to happen at such a young age. I am 73 and just last year I set everything up for my lifetime partner and I, over 2 years, for when we pass away. A will, a burial plot, cremation, a grave headstone with our names, birthdates, a remembrance phrase, and spaces for the dates of our deaths.
At 32, one is not thinking of wills and burial instructions, otherwise I expect Jennifer Gable would have all of this set up the way she wanted. Her parents/grandparents think of the person they gave birth to and raised and, in my opinion, did what most would do, bury their child as Geoffrey Gable. If Jennifer had instructions in her will to be buried as Jennifer and they did not honor her wishes, then I would say they did the wrong thing by refusing to bury her as Jennifer.
GayEGO
Whoops I meant to say my lifetime partner and I, over 52 years.
TransParency
@I’m Black, and HIV-Positive.: My point, uncle Tom, is things like hair or clothes don’t define someone’s sex. Funny you’d call me an idiot when I’ve managed to stay HIV negative. Please, consider adjusting your meds. 😀
Tackle
@GayEGO: Well said. This is a lession for EVERYONE!!