An online campaign titled "Fight 4 Fallon" has been launched in support of Fallon Fox, a transgender Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) fighter, who has been scrutinized because she isn't a cisgender woman.
Following her coming out, wrestler Hulk Hogan sounded off on the controversy surrounding Fox. He told TMZ he was open to fighting Fox. "I'll whip her... I mean, I'll whip him," Hogan said. "I'll whip her... I'm confused."
In May Fox won her first fight since coming out as transgender. Her opponent, Allanna Jones, entered the ring with Aerosmith's "Dude Looks Like a Lady" blaring from the speakers, while Fox was greeted with boos, as the Advocate reported.
According to Out Sports, "Fight 4 Fallon" was launched to combat transphobic commentary and disrespectful treatment towards the MMA fighter.
Participants in the campaign, called #FallonFighters, are charged to respond to negative blog posts and commentary about Fox by informing and educating commenters about transgender lives and experiences in a respectful way.
In addition to written responses, their voices can be accentuated by making videos to spread positive stories about Fox. As Go Athletes notes, Hashtags such as #Fighting4Fallon, #F4F and #FallonFighters are used on social media platforms such as Twitter.
Fox's next upcoming fight will be against Ashlee Evans-Smith during the finals of the Championship Fighting Alliance women's 145 pound tournament, as NHBN News points out.
The transgender activist Laverne Cox came to our attention when she first appeared on VH1's "I Want to Work for Diddy," which made her the first African-American transgender woman to be on a mainstream reality TV series. The show went on to win GLAAD's media award for outstanding reality program in 2009 where Cox accepted the honor and spoke about transgender visibility (VIDEO). Since appearing on Diddy's show, Cox got her own VH1 reality series, "TRANSform Me," which got its own GLAAD media award nomination in 2011. She then exploded within the entertainment industry after becoming a breakout star in the Netflix original series "Orange Is The New Black." The pioneer continues her advocacy in public engagements and frequently writes about trans issues for The Huffington Post.
Louis Gradon Sullivan (1955 - 1991)
In 1976 Lou G. Sullivan began applying for gender confirmation surgery, but was rejected because he identified as gay. At the time, "female-to-gay male transsexuality was not recognized by the medical/psychotherapeutic establishment as a legitimate form of gender dysphoria at that time." After mounting a successful campaign to get homosexuality removed from a list of objections which served to keep interested candidates from undergoing surgery, Sullivan finally obtained gender confirmation surgery in 1986. That same year he organized FTM, "the first peer-support group devoted entirely to female-to-male [transsexual and transvestite] individuals."
Michael Dillon (1915 - 1962)
Dillon was the first person known to have transitioned both hormonally and surgically from female to male. A British writer, physician, philosopher, and Buddhist, Dillon penned several books including, Self: A Study in Ethics and Endocrinology (1946), Growing Up into Buddhism (1960), The Life of Milarepa (1962), Imji Getsul (1962), and numerous articles. He was in love with another famous transgender person, Roberta Cowell, but she did not share his feelings. He died in India -- where he had moved to study, meditate, and wrote under the name Lobzang Jivaka -- just days after sending his memoir, "Out Of The Ordinary," to his literary agent.
![In 1976 <a href="http://www.lousullivansociety.org/about-lou-sullivan.html" target="_hplink">Lou G. Sullivan began applying for</a> gender confirmation surgery, but was rejected because he identified as gay. At the time, "female-to-gay male transsexuality was not recognized by the medical/psychotherapeutic establishment as a legitimate form of gender dysphoria at that time." After mounting a successful campaign to get homosexuality removed from a list of objections which served to keep interested candidates from undergoing surgery, Sullivan finally obtained gender confirmation surgery in 1986. That same year <a href="http://www.lousullivansociety.org/about-lou-sullivan.html" target="_hplink">he organized FTM</a>, "the first peer-support group devoted entirely to female-to-male [transsexual and transvestite] individuals."](https://s.yimg.com/ny/api/res/1.2/6w.28bd2oaq__Y_OgGC8xQ--/YXBwaWQ9aGlnaGxhbmRlcjt3PTk2MA--/https://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/55a670041200002b00134ac9.jpg)
