A gay bar opening next week in Winooski, Vermont has found itself at the center of considerable controversy due to its proposed name, which some people are finding offensive and transphobic.
Mister Sister will be the first exclusively gay bar to open in Burlington in eleven years.
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As Towleroad reports, owner Craig McGaughan insists he meant no offense and wanted to come up with a name that supported inclusivity.
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As he wrote on Facebook:
Like all names, Mister Sister will have different associations, interpretations and will be perceived differently by individuals.
My interpretation of Mister Sister is one of inclusiveness. It is a term that has been used among gays and Drag Queens for decades intended to be positively gender-bending.
Mister Sister is for the Misters and the Sisters, those that identify as both and everyone in between.
The official description of Mister Sister is “a gay bar for him, her and them”. I have been very intentional in using a pronoun that isn’t specifically male or female as a way to include anyone that identifies as part of the LGBTQ community.
Thank you to all of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, trans folks and our allies that have been supportive of Mister Sister. We look forward to welcoming everyone on March 10th when we reopen Oak45 as Vermont’s only LGBTQ bar.
He adds that “the LGBT community in Vermont has been missing a place to call our own and through luck, a lot of support and hard work, we have the space to offer that.”
But some people think the name is offensive to the transgender community.
Talking to the Burlington Free Press, resident Wiley Reading said he feels “‘mister sister’ is a transmisogynistic slur, and it is deeply uncomfortable.”
Josie Leavitt, interim executive director of the Pride Center of Vermont, agrees.
“Personally, I do find the name offensive,” she said. “I know Craig, and Craig is a good man. … His unwillingness to meet is what I’m finding to be the most troubling.”
The drama has led to the resignation of two board members, Timer Adams and Bailey Cummings, who, according to the Argus Press, said “they won’t be part of an organization that won’t take a stance on issues that affect the people it serves.”
Do any of you think the name Mister Sister is offensive to the transgender community, or is this whole controversy much ado about nothing? Sound off in the comments below.
CaliKyle
Its a great name for a gay bar. Leave the name alone and just enjoy the damn place.
miserylovedme24
Come on, there’s nothing wrong with this name. People need to stop getting offended at everything. Because then when there’s something that’s actually offensive, people don’t care! Save your outrage for things that deserve it.
Heywood Jablowme
Maybe someone should ask all the trans people in Vermont what they think… all three or four of them.
Anyway, how about Sister Cisgender?
Caine
No, I do not.
People have to stop being so politically correct all the time about everything.
(I also don’t think she-mail is and I’m still annoyed RuPaul caved in and stopped using it.)
Sluggo2007
Excuse me, but the term is she-MALE, not she-mail.
elizabeth_renaud
If you’ve ever watched RuPaul’s Drag Race, you’ll recall the She-Mail portion and it was, in fact, She-MAIL. It sparked a lot of controversy and after 7 years, it’s no longer a segment.
HighStrungLoner
No. No. No. It’s not.
edward_livingston
NOT at all, Norfolk VA used to have a Lesbian bar called the HERSHE . Mistersister sounds inclusive where men and women CIS TRANS OR GAY is welcome.
Amber LeMay
1) The bar is in Winooski, not Burlington
2) Looking forward to it
3) #immistersister
4) #dontcallmequeer
niles
Heaven help us from the trans wrath. We’ve already relinquished control over virtually all gay organizations (something we as a community will come to regret very shortly when the shit hits the fan). Now we can’t even enjoy the bars anymore.
IDoNotHaveToAgreeWithYou
Exactly. It’s past time to take gay rights back from these mental patients.
christine_hallquist
Hey, give the community a break. This community has been the most ostracized community and there are a lot of psychologically walking wounded. To write the entire community off because of some who are angry and bitter is unfair. This is exactly what was done to the gay community 50 years ago. Now you are doing it to another community. I disagree with the extreme viewpoints of the Vermont transgender community. I am looking forward to the opening of the bar. The answer is to integrate with the greater community. We have a lot of history of segregation, and our history shows us that it is a complete failure.
mike_sanders
This part of the trans community has absolutely no issue with the name. It sounds like a place for everyone
Heywood Jablowme
It’s not clear from the article that any actual trans people complained about it.
Probably it was only L & G bureaucrats, I mean activists, using their clairvoyant powers to predict that T’s would find this offensive.
elizabeth_renaud
As an L that went to the town hall, it was primarily T that spoke out against the name, with their allies in a close second. Don’t assume….you know what they say about that. ?
imaqt2
It’s not offensive these annoying pop ups while trying to post a comment however are.
Jack Meoff
Get an Ad blocker and you won’t see them any more.
Ruhlmann
“Personally, I do find the name offensive,” she said. “I know Craig, and Craig is a good man. … His unwillingness to meet is what I’m finding to be the most troubling.”
What you find the most troubling is he won’t bend over to what you find offensive.
Will L
Are you kidding us?!? That is definitely not transphobic for a gay bar. The sensitive transgenders need to focus their s**t on places that won’t serve them. Those are the truly transphobic places – regardless of the establishment’s name.
Josh in OR
No. Much like ‘tran ny’, this ‘controversy’ is a tempest in a teapot set off by overly-sensitive transgender activists assuming that anything that merges masculine and feminine is somehow about them.
Mister sister is a term of endearment used to describe a fierce, effeminate fella. Not a trans-man, nor a trans-woman.
Tran ny is/was a term originating not in transphobic cis-circles, but in the Drag community, and was used to describe someone whose drag was sloppy, like a transvestite. Not a transgendered person.
I love my trans-brothers and sisters, but sometimes, fam, you pick shitty battles that make y’all look petty and hyper-sensitive. Dial back the outrage and save it for ACTUALLY outrageous subjects.
pyewicket_tiger
Trans people don’t own everything, that refers to the feminine or masculine. People in the LGBT community need to stop attacking within itself. The more the world divides itself into groups, soon there will be no we or us only I. That will make a lonely world.
Chris
The first the name brought to my mind was that it’s a play on the name of the group, Twisted Sister. And they’re about as gay as can be.
So would someone please explain to me, as if I was five years old, how it’s transphobic? Sigh…..
IDoNotHaveToAgreeWithYou
Drop the T. These psychotic crossdressers do nothing but harras gays and stall the gay rights movement.
generalveers
Now this is transphobic.
Charlie in Charge
Oh hon can we drop you while we’re at it. I don’t think the bar’s name is transphobic at all but… come on now, try to remember what it’s like to have a soul.
salumbre
Yeah, I’m with Charlie here. “Mister Sister” is to me a funny moniker. I can see why some people could feel offended by it, though only if it were directed at them.
But your whole comment, and particularly the “psychotic crossdressers” bit, not only crosses the line, it tramples all over it. You should be ashamed.
P.S. It’s “harass.”
generalveers
No it’s not. What happened to the gay sense of humor. Everyone is turning into humorless assholes
inbama
Of course it is.
Several people have already committed suicide over the name of this bar,
throwslikeagirl
I object to “Mister”. That title clearly leaves out women who are unmarried, married, or prefer to not call attention to their marital status. I also object to “Sister”, as it clearly segregates those who have only brothers or are only children. I very much object to “Bar”, as it belittles the American Bar Association and those who’ve worked hard to earn their law degree.
I believe a more appropriate and polite-to-all name should be, “Mister Miss Missus Ms Sister Brother Only Child Alcohol Serving Establishment.
inbama
That isn’t funny.
“Mister Miss Missus” are often the last three words you hear before they smash your radio.
Jack Meoff
If I saw the name MisterSister the last thing I would think of is trans it sounds more like something drag queens would say. Political correctness gone crazy.
ddean
It was a gay bar in Orlando for a couple of years. Or less. Mister Sisters is a name not a lifestyle. How dumb. Sounds like somebody needs to pull their butt plug out. I think the toxity of this argue argument is making my eyes melt. It’s a name people. So the Parliment House must be killing people, I mean isn’t there a cigarette named Parliment. We shouldn’t smoke Parliment. Dumb
QJ201
No
When I worked in a gay bar we used the term all the time.
We also used to walk into work and say HELLO F*GGOTS!
But it was the 90’s and we all know THAT’s not PC anymore 🙂
mrzodiac2003
No! Can we quit being so over sensitive about every little thing.
Walker
I have always been a supporter of trans rights, have even dated three trans people, have trans friends….but it is becoming harder and harder to support them when they seem to have a problem supporting MY rights. I thought being pro-trans was being ok with the fluidity of gender expression in the first place? The activists seem to have a hard time even figuring out what their ideology is.
I guess my more flamboyant friends can no longer call each other “gurl,” “Mary,” or “queen” anymore for fear the trans police will come and yell at them.
Aiden
love the name! clever & funny ?
Ksb1978
Wow! Going through these comments I can see why there’s so much division in the LGBTQ community. So much fragility. I agree the name is fine and much ado about nothing, but some of these comments are downright transphobobic. Sounds like some cis het people getting mad to me. You know how they always getting mad on behalf of someone.
ait10101
It is quite a reach, I think, to find the name transphobic. Reaches like that will just me to ignore the cause as captured by nincompoops.That would be sad.
Neonegro
It’s a perfect name since many gays call each other “guuurl” and miss thing.
assiandude
I think that conflicts within the LGBT community is inevitable, especially when it comes to humor. Gay men, as a large group, are boys that want to have fun and make jokes about every aspect of sexual life. It’s not restricted to sexual preference, but also to gender identity. I think this is because the mainstream culture used questionable gender identity to make fun of Gay men and Lesbians even before there was the development of the Trans community.
What I find curious is that Drag is not considered greatly offensive to the Trans population. Male/female drag, makes so much more fun of gender identity that does the name of this bar. I think the only way for this to reach some compromise is to recognize that humor although offensive doesn’t necessarily come from a place of hate but from empathy.
The reaction from some Trans about this situation seems to speak more of a feeling of not being heard and not a true member of the LGBT community. Although politically the alliances have been strong and recently very supportive of Trans Rights, the front line culture has only been supportive in the last decade. After being out for 40 years I’ve observed discrimination based on race/age/trans status within the LG community that was comparable to that of Heterosexual/white establishments treatment toward minorities. I would assume it’s improved, but it’s not total acceptance. Until the Trans person feels that acceptance, the words above will be felt as dismissive and hurtful.
HairyHunkBerlin
Fantastic, we do not need bigot homophobic and transphobic Haters to disrespect us.
We disrespect and make ourselves ridiculous on our own….
I think we have other problems which are worth to fight for!