[su_astop]
GallusMag of GenderTrender has, on Sunday, October 19, 2014, been identified as Linda V. Shanko.
Linda Shanko
Shanko is perhaps best known for mixing false, malicious statements (often sexual in nature) in with her doxxing of trans women on her blog, GenderTrender, and The TransAdvocate won’t participate in helping GallusMag hide her identity. Shanko’s actions towards many — both trans and cis — may meet the legal criteria for harassment. In fact, Shanko’s actions have been so extreme that even other TERFs have taken legal action to make Shanko stop her abuse in the past. Until now, only other TERFs who’ve been privy to the name behind her pen name have had this sort of privilege.
How GallusMag’s Doxxing Occurred
On October 12th, 2014, someone with knowledge of Shanko’s identity as GallusMag/GenderTrender doxxed her on an anonymous cut-and-paste website. The anonymous poster provided a lot of dot-connecting information that outed Linda Shanko as GallusMag. We at The Transadvocate have made the decision not to link to that webpage because it discloses information about Shanko’s family. We’ve seen the damage done to trans women when TERFs/GCFs have forwarded private information and images to the family members of trans women, and we won’t participate in the same kind of abuse Shanko and other TERFs are known for.
Additionally, an email was sent from a TERF (trans-exclusionary radical feminist) who provided specific identifying information about Shanko. The email contained a private conversation between the TERF and Shanko which corroborates information from the anonymous doxxing.
On October 19th, 2014, before releasing Shanko’s name, The Transadvocate‘s Cristan Williams posted on her twitter account that GallusMag’s identity had been made known to some trans activists. Prior to identifying information about GallusMag’s uncovered identity was released by Williams, Shanko took to her blog to preemptively assert that the unreleased identity was incorrect. How Shanko expected people to believe that she knew the unreleased information was incorrect is not entirely clear; nevertheless, Shanko hasn’t backed down from claiming to know the information was incorrect prior to its release.
Since GallusMag was publicly and definitively linked to Linda Shanko, trans community members began using Shanko’s name to accomplish further dot connecting. One of the first and perhaps the most disturbing discovery was of Shanko’s old MySpace Page (backup copy).
Contextualizing “GallusMag”
First, it’s important to know who the historic Gallus Mag was and the folklore about her. This history and folklore give context to Shanko’s taking GallusMag as her pen name on her blog. The Old Salt Blog describes the historic Gallus Mag this way:
In New York City, there is a story told about Gallus Mag, the bouncer at the ‘Hole in the Wall‘, a bar and brothel on Water Street on the East River waterfront in the mid-1800s. Standing well over 6′ tall, she was said to be known for biting off obstreperous sailor’s ears, which she kept in a pickle jar behind the bar.
In an excerpt from Michael Batterberry’s On the Town in New York: The Landmark History of Eating, Drinking, and Entertainments from the American Revolution to the Food Revolution, Gallus Mag and the Hole-in-the-Wall (the saloon in which she was the bouncer) were described this way:
Walter Street’s most popular night spot was definitely the Hole-in-the-Wall, at the corner of Dover Street, run by One-Armed Charley Monell with the assistance of two ladies, Gallus Mag and Kate Flannery. Gallus Mag was a six-foot-tall English woman who kept her skirt up with “galluses,” or men’s suspenders. For use in her role as bouncer she kept a pistol in her wristband and a bludgeon strapped to her wrist. She knew how to use both. Like so many thugs of the period, she had her own entertaining “turn.” When she had clobbered an undesirable customer, she would drag him to the door by his ear, which she clutched between her teeth. If he gave any trouble, she summarily bit it off, and placed it in a jar of alcohol which she kept behind the bar for that very purpose. She was generally regarded by the police as the most savage living female.
The GallusMag of GenderTrender pays homage to the violence of the historic Gallus Mag by using an icon of an ear in a jar, an illustration by Susan Synarski for the book Booty: Girl Pirates on the High Seas, for her twitter account. 
Shanko uses a different image for her comments in her blog’s comment threads: an image of the detached ear of Sadie the Goat. Quoting again from Michael Batterberry’s book:
When Sadie [The Goat] acknowledged Gallus Mag as supreme on the waterfront, Mag was so touched she returned to Sadie her ear, which she, in turn, as a gesture of sentiment, preserved in a locket hung around her neck.
Linda Shanko is a lowbrow artist. The lowbrow art movement, to quote Wikipedia, is “an underground visual art movement that arose in the Los Angeles, California, area in the late 1970s. It is a populist art movement with its cultural roots in underground commix, punk music, and hot-rod cultures of the street. It is also often known by the name pop surrealism.” She included images of her artwork in the MySpace photo pages — some signed, some not. One of those pieces of artwork she apparently created is an image entitled “Gallus Mag” (image 16 in Shanko’s MySpace photo gallery).
Image 16 of LMV Shanko’s MySpace Photos: Linda Shanko’s illustration of Gallus Mag
The Gallus Mag illustration appears to be Shanko’s intentional, or perhaps unintentional, self-portrait. When one superimposes Shako’s face from photo image 41 of her MySpace gallery over the face of her Gallus Mag illustration, pretty much every feature but the jawline matches in shape and proportion.
Animated image: Linda Shanko photo overlay of her illustration of Gallus Mag
“Evil” And Nudes
There is a certain fixation on evil she’s expressed as “LMV Shanko” (for Linda V. Shanko — LMV Shanko being the variant of her name she used for her MySpace and Facebook page), and one place you can find it is in a gushing comment to the author of The Lucifer Principle and Global Brain.
“My God, are you the real Howard Bloom? Of the Lucifer Principle and Global Brain?! WOW. Your books have changed my life and the way I look at the world on a daily basis. Your work is reflected in my work/art. I am grateful for your existence. Write a new book soon! Guess you don’t check your site often. Hope you get this message.” -LMV Shanko
The Lucifer Principle is described this way on Amazon.com:
The Lucifer Principle is a revolutionary work that explores the intricate relationships among genetics, human behavior, and culture to put forth the thesis that “evil” is a by-product of nature’s strategies for creation and that it is woven into our most basic biological fabric.
One can see how “evil” (often in the form of the demonic) are visible in her artwork posted to her MySpace Photo Gallery. In that photo gallery (in which the images are numbered), one can view paintings/illustrations entitled Pornicopia – 7 Levels of Hell (Image 6), Lucifera (Image 23), Breech (Image 25), Bebe (Image 3), and an untitled piece (Image 35).
“Pornocopia – 7 Levels of Hell”
Image 31 in Shanko’s MySpace photo gallery highlights a violent element to Shanko that’s in line with her taking on the pen name of GallusMag.
Image 31 of LMV Shanko’s MySpace Photos: Linda Shanko (GallusMag) pointing a rifle at the viewer
Shanko has a strong interest in artistically depicted nude women. One can see her public interest as posted in her GenderTrender post entitled Ways Of Seeing (episode two-female nude) (WayBack Machine archive here). In a very unexpected way for a self-identified radical feminist, Shanko uses highly sexualized — even objectifying — imagery in her paintings and illustrations of women. In her MySpace Photo Gallery, one can view her sexually fetishizing and objectifying renderings of women, to include works entitled Satan Worship (Image 22), what I’m working on (Image 10), Scratched Meat (Image 11), an untitled photo of Shanko beside one of her female nudes (Image 38), an untitled piece (Image 36).
“Satan Worship”
Images that include both “evil”/demonic elements combined with charged, sexualizing imagery include Bitchez Is Wack (Image 26). Spirits Bar (Image 13), Agoraphobia (Image 28), and a piece of simply entitled Women (Image 29).
Summary
So, here we are. Linda Shanko, the GallusMag of GenderTrender: a portrait of a woman who apparently believes “the thesis that ‘evil’ is a by-product of nature’s strategies for creation and that it is woven into our most basic biological fabric,” embraces “evil” and the demonic in her artwork, chose a pen name that’s connected to a violent woman in New York City’s history, and posted a photo of herself pointing a rifle at a camera. And add to that her hypocritical accusations that trans women (“transwomen are men” in her mind) fetishize cis women with their transitions, while at the same time she’s sexually fetishized and objectified women in her own artwork.
One certainly can’t deny that the human portrait of Linda Shanko is an interesting one in both a fictional and real-world sense. She certainly looks at us all down the barrel of a gun.
[hr]Shanko has in recent years lived in New Jersey and Vermont. If you believe you’ve been cyberharassed or cyberbullied by GallusMag, or believe you know somebody who has been, the cyberharassment law for New Jersey is here, and the cyberharassment law for Vermont is here.
[su_asbottom]
I tried posting comments on the GenderTrender blog and while a few of them were accepted, at a certain point, I think GallusMag blocked me. Yet, I was completely respectful to everyone there. I never cursed, I was never antagonistic. If I disagreed, I only did so respectfully. So, the only reason they could’ve had for blocking me would be that they didn’t want a dissenting opinion. The thing is, the GenderTrender blog consistently complains of transgender activists refusing to hear others’ views. But, if it’s so terrible not to be willing to hear others’ views, why are they behaving in the exact same way? GallusMag also complains of the antagonistic speech, writing, and images that transgender individuals and activists have posted online. Yet, they have a picture of themselves pointing a gun at the camera? And, then those other sexualized images? They’re disturbing and come across as very disrespectful towards women.
GallusMag lost my respect when they stopped allowing alternative viewpoints in their comments section. But, now I feel like I’ve been given a lot more perspective. This person obviously have some serious, unresolved issues, and they come across as fitting the same description as the transgender individuals that they complain about — issues with sex, power, violence, and a fundamental lack of self-awareness. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be posting such disturbing pictures, nor would they be so despotic in their approach to discussion of these issues.
I do get that this person is female and a woman, but they resemble none of what I know and love of femaleness or womanliness. Women can be tough without being antagonistic, women can be strong without being threatening, women can discuss issues without resorting to despotism, women can show concern about the state of things without belittling or judging others — but, this woman accomplishes none of that. Instead, she embodies the worst qualities of males and transgender individuals, which she herself complains about incessantly on her site. I wish that she would reflect on herself and make an effort to embody the qualities that she wishes to see in others rather than embodying qualities she rails against when others display them. It wouldn’t just help her, but all of those who encounter her.
A Troll by any other name ….
How sad that a member of a demonised minority group feels the need to abuse other minority members …
He looks trans to me.
She’s a cis woman who hates trans women. Did you even read the article? You basically just insulted someone who shares your worldview.
This is an alphabetical listing of individuals, groups and organizations that consistently disperse and/or distribute lies, misinformation or ideologically driven anti-transgender propaganda about transgender individuals, identity and public policies that support civil rights protections for those who are gender diverse.
Alliance Defending FreedomReligious Extremist/Legal Activism
“It is not enough to just win cases; we must change the culture, and the strategy of Alliance Defending Freedom ensures lasting victory.”
American College of PediatriciansReligious Extremist/Anti-Trans Hate Group/Pseudo-Medical Propaganda
“It is the position of the American College of Pediatricians that young children who present with a complaint of feeling as if they were born into the body of the opposite sex, or who exhibit behaviors predominantly identified with the opposite sex be evaluated extensively, along with their nuclear families. This should be done by a competent mental health professional who can sort out and address psychopathology and who does not have a bias to recruit the patient to an opposite gender identity… There is published evidence that psychotherapy can realign the patient to heterosexual orientation if that is what the patient and family wish to do.”
Americans For Truth About Homosexuality (AFTAH)Religious Extremist/Anti-Trans Hate
“Peter LaBarbera, 52, is president of Americans For Truth about Homosexuality (AFTAH), a non-partisan, non-profit group dedicated to exposing the homosexual-bisexual-transgender activist agendas.”
“Perhaps the depression and suicidal ideation that gender-confused teens, post-op “transsexuals,” and homosexuals experience results in part from societal disapproval, but perhaps their anguish results at least in part from apprehension of the truth that God has written on their hearts regarding homoerotic activity, cross-dressing, and bodily mutilation.”
AFTAH published and supported the following commentary by Laurie Higgins of the Illinois Family Institute. It was in response to the suicide of an Ohio transgender teen who had been rejected by their extremist Christian family:
“There is no evidence that [the teen’s] parents abused him [intentionally misgendering her] or even rejected him [emphasis theirs]. They rejected his belief that his desire to be a girl signified something true and good. They rejected [the teen’s] belief that his desire to be a girl should be affirmed as central to his identity. And they rejected his request to pursue bodily mutilation.”
American VisionReligious Extremist/Anti Trans Hate
The following letter to California Governor Jerry Brown is posted on the American Vision website. It is related to California Assembly Bill 1266 which protected transgender student rights:
“In attempting to protect “transgender” students, you have not only helped consign them to living their life as a lie, but you have also risked the safety of a host of other children out there. So when will you resign? Will it be when the first messed up “transgender” kid commits suicide because they were led to believe a lie about themselves as a result of your legislation? Will it be when the first sexual harassment or abuse case emerges as a result of the law you have signed? Or will you repent and repeal the law before such situations arise?”
Breitbart NewsFar Right Conservative “News”/Far Right Conservative Opinion
Excerpt from an anti-transgender 2015 article written by Thomas D. Williams, PhD:
“When nature is removed from the equation the only thing left is personal self-expression, which can take on as many forms as there are human beings. Society’s pathological fear of offending others by calling a spade a spade and a sickness a sickness has left us in the impossible situation of supporting every whim imaginable, even to the point of amputating limbs, calling boys girls and helping people kill themselves.”
Center for Family and Human Rights (C-FAM)Religious Extremist/International Anti-Trans Hate Group
General Assembly Fights Back Against Sexual Left:“The [United Nations] General Assembly this year was one of the most socially conservative in recent memory. The sexual left has been wrangling with delegates at the General Assembly for years, because countries inevitably find their suggestions distasteful and inappropriate. But, with the help of influential friends in Europe and the USA the sexual revolutionaries always manage to make some normative gains, however minor. This year they were denied any progress at all… Sexual orientation and gender identity was kept out of all resolutions, a sound defeat for homosexual pressure groups.”
Chalcedon FoundationReligious Extremist/Christian Absolutist
“We believe that the whole Word of God must be applied to all of life. It is not only our duty as individuals, families and churches to be Christian, but it is also the duty of the state, the school, the arts and sciences, law, economics, and every other sphere to be under Christ the King. Nothing is exempt from His dominion. We must live by His Word, not our own.”
Christ The King Convenant Presbyterian Church (Larkspur, Colorado)Religious Extremist/Anti-Trans Hate Group
“The word of God is quite clear. He’s destroyed every culture that has embraced homosexuality. The sin is similar to that of cannibalism and child molestation in the sense that it’s a sin against society.”
Family Policy Institute of WashingtonReligious Extremist/Far Right Cultural Conservative
“The Family Policy Institute of Washington works to unite a coalition of allied national and local organizations to create public policy that recognizes and respects the significance and sanctity of the family.”
Family Research CouncilReligous Extremist/Far Right Cultural Conservative/Anti-Trans Hate Group
Mission of Organization:“Family Research Council’s mission is to advance faith, family and freedom in public policy and the culture from a Christian worldview.”
From “Understanding and Responding to the Transgender Movement“:
“In recent decades, there has been an assault on the sexes… The first wave of this attack came from the modern feminist movement and the second from the homosexual movement. The third wave of this assault on the sexes has been an attack on a basic reality–that all people have a biological sex, identifiable at birth and immutable through life, which makes them either male or female.”
Family Research InstituteReligious Extremis/Anti-Trans Hate Group
“Family Research Institute is a non-profit scientific and educational corporation that believes the strength of our society depends on preserving America’s historic moral framework and the traditional family. FRI is working to produce sound, scientific data on pressing social issues — especially homosexuality — in an effort to promote traditional policies. We welcome all who would join in the fight to restore a world where marriage is upheld and honored, where children are nurtured and protected, and where homosexuality is not taught and accepted, but instead is discouraged and rejected at every level.”
Family Watch InternationalReligious Extremist
“Preserve and promote the family, based on marriage between a man and a woman as the societal unit that provides the best outcome for men, women and children.”
Gender Identity WatchAnti-Trans Hate Blog/Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist (TERF)
“Gender Identity Watch is a blog devoted to tracking legislation and case law that attempts to codify “gender identity” into law and to override protections based on sex. Contributors to Gender Identity Watch are lawyers who apply a radical feminist analysis to gender, but who also are aware of the compromise that comes from interaction with legislatures and the courts.”
The following post by frequent contributor Linda V. Shanko (under the pseudonym GallusMag – TRIGGER WARNING) is but one of many examples of posts containing misrepresentations of fact and conflation of crimes committed by cisgender male predators with everyday, non-invasive use of gender segregated facilities by transgender girls and women.
“One of the tropes Transjacktivists use to promote and legalize their desire to eliminate female spaces is to assert that males with GID are speshul snowflakes or claim that males wouldn’t adopt transgenderism in order to prey on women. Or that males who are arrested repeatedly for getting off on watching women perform intimate activities (in places they assume they are free from males) wouldn’t go through the trouble of putting on a wig that makes those same activities legal.”
Generations with VisionReligious Extremist/Anti-Trans Hate Radio
“There are no professionals on this program. There are no psychiatrists, professional counsellors, bureaucrats, and seminary professors. But you will find fathers, mothers, grandparents, pastors, and friends. We are introducing modern life to a different social context. We also assume the existence of God and the foolishness of human thought without the benefit of transcendent truth.”
Heterosexuals Organized for a Moral Environment (H.O.M.E.)Anti-Trans Hate/Anti-LGB Hate
A H.O.M.E. suggested letter from parents to their LGBT child:
“Now, if you feel that you have to engage in homosexual activity, as long as you are living in our house we must insist you don’t. If you go ahead and do so, you will create problems… And if you are living outside of our home, and you choose to flaunt the fact that you engage in homosexual activity, that will also create embarrassing problems. No moral family is going to be very welcoming to members of that family who loudly and proudly engage in immoral activity… It will be much easier to include and welcome you in family functions (though it could still be awkward) if you are discreet about your homosexual activity. Needless to say, any homosexual lovers/partners you have will not be welcome at family functions… Actions have consequences. Choices have consequences.”
Illinois Family InstituteReligious Extremist/Anti-Trans Hate/Far-Right Cultural Conservative
“We oppose efforts to include “sexual orientation” as a category for preferential status under civil rights statutes at the federal, state and local levels. We support a full repeal of SB 3186, a law which adds “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” to Illinois’ Human Rights Act. We believe such laws invariably erode the freedom of people of faith and others who oppose homosexuality and normalizing gender confusion (“transgenderism”) as a matter of conscience.”
Liberty CounselReligious Extremist/Anti-Trans Hate Group/Legal Activism
“Today Liberty Counsel filed a lawsuit against the School Board of Fairfax County, Virginia, for illegally changing its nondiscrimination policy so that it conflicts with the state’s policy… The board added “sexual orientation” on November 6, 2014, and again added “gender identity” on May 7, 2015, of which the school failed to even define its intended meaning.”
Pacific Justice InstituteReligious Extremist/Legal Activism
“Pacific Justice Institute is a non-profit 501(c)(3) legal defense organization specializing in the defense of religious freedom, parental rights, and other civil liberties. Pacific Justice Institute works diligently, without charge, to provide its clients with all the legal support they need.”
Pray In Jesus Name Project aka Gordon James KlingenschmittReligious Extremist/Anti-Trans Hate Propaganda
Gordon James Klingenschmitt (aka “Dr. Chaps”) is the national TV show host of PIJN NEWS on the NRB network, affiliate faculty at Colorado Christian University, and the former Navy Chaplain who dared to pray “in Jesus’ name.”
“Dr. Chaps” authored the following petition to Congress in opposition to the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA):
“Nancy Pelosi admitted ENDA is a “bathroom bill” that forces women and little girls nationwide to share public bathrooms and locker rooms with cross-dressing men. ENDA would punish any Christian employer with fines, penalties, and lawsuits for “segregation” and “discrimination” if they disagree. Gender confusion is a spiritual and psychological disorder that needs proper counseling…”
The Ruth InstituteReligious Extremist/Far Right Cultural Conservative
“For the past fifty years, the Sexual Revolution has torn families apart through divorce, cohabitation, out of wedlock childbearing, abortion and pornography. The “gay marriage” issue is but one strand of a larger cultural problem of the Sexual Revolution and the destruction of marriage. A whole generation suffers from childhood wounds, and from participation in the toxic sexual culture. Loneliness and cynicism are among the widespread results of the Sexual Revolution.”
Save CaliforniaReligious Extremist/Far Right Cultural Conservative
“SaveCalifornia.com is a leading West Coast nonprofit, nonpartisan organization standing strong for moral virtues for the common good. We represent children and families in the areas of marriage and family, parental rights, the sanctity of human life, religious freedom, financial freedom, and back-to-basics education.”
Sons of Thundr (Faith Baptist Church)Religious Extremist/Anti-Trans Hate Group
“WE WILL continue to scorn, mock, rebuke and dispute with the sodomites [homosexuals] and we will never accept the wicked act of so-called “Gay Marriage”! You may continue to turn the Truth of God into a lie and you may never return to the closet, BUT YOU WILL NOT ESCAPE THE MESSAGE !
Romans 1:26-32″
Traditional Values CoalitionReligious Extremist/Anti-Trans Hate Group/Far Right Conservative
“For over 30 years, TVC has warned that the homosexual agenda has nothing to do with toleration. These people are demanding acceptance of their lewd and sick lifestyle, and they are willing to wage a ruthless war of extermination against Christianity in the public square to get what they want.”
Truth In Action Ministries/D. James Kennedy MinistriesReligious Extremist/Anti-Trans Hate Group
Truth in Action Ministries is a ministry that educates, motivates and activates believers to understand God’s truth, apply it to their daily lives, and transform their culture for Christ.
United Families InternationalFar Right Conservative/Anti-Trans Extremist
“United Families International is devoted to maintaining and strengthening the family. By strengthening the family, communities, states and nations are strengthened.”Family: Respect for existing law, political structure, religion and cultural norms that preserve the family.
Marriage: Respect for marriage between a man and a women founded on chastity before marriage and fidelity in marriage
This blog is maintained by TransActive Gender Center, a leading national non-profit organization providing education, advocacy and other resources and services to gender diverse children, youth, their families and the communites in which they live.
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Author: jennburleton
Jenn Burleton is the founder and executive director of TransActive Gender Center. An internationally recognized educator and authority on diverse gender identity in children, youth and adults, she is a passionate advocate for the civil and human rights of gender diverse and transgender children, adolescents, teens and their families. She lives in the Pacific Northwest United States with her partner of more than 30 years.
View all posts by jennburleton
[…] now. Meet Linda Shanko who is according to Transphobia.org and the TransAdvocate Gullus Mag and Gender […]
uh….uh…..uh…..employing demonic art…….brandishing and pointing a rifle barrel into a camera……hyper-masculine behavior and traits…..while claiming that others (trans) are violent toward other females (lesbian)?