Talk:Leslie Cochran

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article must adhere to the policy on biographies of living persons. Controversial material of any kind that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous. If such material is repeatedly inserted or there are other concerns relative to this policy, report it on the living persons biographies noticeboard.

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page.	Biography Portal
Start	This article has been rated as start-Class on the Project's quality scale. [FAQ] (If you rated the article, please give a short summary at comments to explain the ratings and/or to identify the strengths and weaknesses.)

This article is part of WikiProject Texas, a WikiProject related to the U.S. state of Texas.

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject LGBT studies, which tries to ensure comprehensive and factual coverage of all LGBT related issues on Wikipedia. For more information, or to get involved, visit the project page.
Start	This article has been rated as Start-Class.

Contents 1 Pronouns 2 Election history 3 List of "weird" Austinites" 4 transvestite vs transgender

[edit] Pronouns

It should be noted that Leslie prefers to be referred to as "she." Should we change all the gender references in this article to represent his/her gender preference? EWS23 | (Leave me a message!) 04:09, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

Done. jareha 06:04, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

No, Leslie is a guy and should be referred to as so, in order to avoid confusion. Perhaps add in a part about calling him a "she", but do not refer to him in the article that way.

Just for reference, looking at articles about Leslie, the Austin Chronicle refers to Leslie as "he" while the Daily Texan refers to Leslie as "she," noting in the article that Leslie prefers to be known as a woman. I think the only major difference is whether you want to avoid confusion and be more technical, or if you want to meet the preference of the individual. Can anyone find an example in Wikipedia of other people with gender-preference issues, and how the article handled it? EWS23 | (Leave me a message!) 07:40, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Update: If you want to browse several pages with similar issues, you can check out the List of transgendered people. I have left a message on that article's talk page in the hopes that someone with more experience in this area could comment or help us out. EWS23 | (Leave me a message!) 07:52, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia naming conventions state that in these cases we should use the pronoun that the person self-identifies as. In this case, that appears to be "she", and it's not without precedent elsewhere, as with the Daily Texan article. Ambi 10:34, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Ambi is correct. The article should use the feminine pronoun. · Katefan0^(scribble)/mrp 20:14, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

I added the qualifier "male" after transvestite, because the female pronouns are misleading as to Leslie's actual gender. I apologize if this is incorrect. ~Neil K., unregistered user

This is too confusing and furstrating in my opinion. Leslie is clearly male, and the pronoun "he" is used to identifies those of the male sex, I see it referring more to sex rather than self-proclaimed gender. As he is actually a man, I feel it makes more sense to refer to him as "he." !BuffettJr

Even if it makes more sense to refer to leslie as a he, you should always refer to a person in their prefered pronoun, transvestite, transgendered it doesnt matter.67.9.164.145 04:34, 7 February 2007 (UTC)skipopidid@msn.com

Agreed, but there seem to be conflicting reports as to whether he has expressed pronoun preference. Rmj12345 06:00, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Election history

There has to be a better/clearer way to organize the "Election history" subsection, but I can't think of it. Any ideas? jareha 06:04, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

I think my latest edit should work. jareha 20:31, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] List of "weird" Austinites"

I've removed the following list of "weird" Austinites, from the Leslie Cochran article.

• Jennifer Gale - frequent gadfly candidate for virtually every office at one point or another. Claims to be a woman, but is in fact a cross-dressing homeless man that often sings to the Austin city council during its meetings.

• Crazy Carl Hickerson - a noted ecentric that spun flowers on his fingers at University of Texas baseball games and refused to use air conditioning or deodorant due to personal convictions. Ran numerous times for Austin city council and never got more than 2% of the vote.

• Shaun Stensol, a.ka. "Radiation Ranger" - unemployed Austin man that ran for city council wearing a gas mask and calling himself the Radiation Ranger to protest the destruction of mother earth. Dropped out of the campaign when he found a job at a Thundercloud Sub shop and still received less than 1% of the vote as his name remained on the ballot.

• Bob Makowski - 40 something year old closeted homosexual male that lived in the West Campus community near the University of Texas and attended classes for over 20 years as a means to milk money from his rich father. Makowski often supplemented his income by serving as a subject of medical tests and by working as a telemarketer. He never ran for office.

• Ray Blanchette - disgruntled Austin man that ran several times for Austin city council due to his anger over having his trash-dump of a home condemned and torn down. He rarely got more than a handful of votes.

• Steve Mason - bearded 40 something Austin male that often wears a scorpion belt and frequently rails against immigrants on Austin cable access tv. Has yet to run for local office despite repeated threats to do so.

If you disagree with my decision, bring it up at the Austin, Texas talk page. jareha 17:10, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Seems more appropriate for the Austin page, or maybe even Keep Austin Weird. · Katefan0^(scribble)/poll 17:52, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. Hadn't thought of the Keep Austin Weird article — that could work. jareha 18:05, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] transvestite vs transgender

The article refers to Cochran as a transvestite... but if she prefers to be addressed as "she", doesn't that make her transgendered, rather than transvestite? My understanding is that transvestites are people whose self-identified gender matches their sex, but who wear clothing typical of the opposite gender. Is Cochran an exception? Do we know for sure that she prefers to be known as "transvestite", rather than "transgender", despite her preferred pronoun? --Allen 01:14, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

theyre fags all the same buddy —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 88.113.137.249 (talk) 03:53, 14 January 2007 (UTC).

I don't know man. There doesn't seem to be a clear answer as to whether Cochran identifies as male or female. The name change referenced in this article seems to suggest that he's transgendered, but the articles linked refer to him with both female and male pronouns. Rmj12345 23:18, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

He's a transvestite, and I've never heard him talk about any operations that make it the contrary. Or even him mentioning what he prefers to be called. I'd say male references are the way to go for an encyclopia, at least without proof to the contrary. Sln3412 06:21, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

But there *is* proof to the contrary. The "Daily Texan" article says quite clearly "Leslie, who prefers to be known as a woman...". If that's the only reference we have to how Cochran wants to be referred to, then the pronouns should be changed. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 06:21, 10 March 2007 (UTC)