I love breaking news. And I was always trying to create the new, the next thing in television news. So I was the first to do overnight news.
I came out to be on television as a person, as a woman. And this can be a great thing for my community.
I’m so much more at ease now than when I was flying as Bob. Then, I was OCD about everything, always checking and looking for things. But flying as a female is effortless. I’m still checking traffic, instruments, and the radios, but it’s easier to multitask, and flying is fun.
That’s violence, terrible violence, to tell a woman to sit down and shut up.
Trying to erase 53 years of being a macho aggressive guy to trying to be a woman, and this is greatest challenge of my life.
I am not covering stories as a transgender reporter. I’m a reporter who is transgender. Otherwise, it would be like having a black reporter only cover stories about blacks or a Hispanic reporter covering stories about Hispanics.
I tell the truth. That’s my training as a reporter.
Transgender people really are misunderstood.
Television has played an important role in normalizing the experiences of gay men and lesbians in America.
2014 was a good year for transgender rights.
There’s diversity in nature, so why not the media?
I knew at a very early age, about 6 years old, that there was something different about me. But being young and not being exposed to people who had gender dysphoria, or role models that you see on TV today, I didn’t know what it was.
I know the way this city works. We have one of the most corrupt cities in the country. The reason it’s so corrupt is because everybody thinks it’s honest, and it’s not. You know the truth when you go to Chicago. The difference here in Los Angeles is you believe it’s honest – and that’s dangerous.
Everything about the Kardashian family’s public image centers around shock and dysfunction – the very image the trans people are trying to shed.
I always felt like a fraud.
I’m not going to lie to people.
I think women make better pilots.
When I was going through transition, I didn’t push it on everyone.
The Jewish Orthodox community is playing footsie with the alt-right.
I was raised in an environment where chaos was the norm, so I was at my best in chaos.
I was told I’d never work again, but once you come out, it’s like someone turns on the lights, and your life will be different.
I know so much about Los Angeles. I grew up here, I was born here, I loved it, and I reported on it.
I’m not loved by GLAAD or by HRC. I’m not going to be a spokesman for those groups, which are based on fundraising.
I was told I shouldn’t transition, and if I did, I’d never work again. That really bothered me.
Flying as Bob, there was always stress involved.
We filed suit against YouTube before the Google purchase. At the time I went after YouTube, I thought it was a small company ripping off our copyrights.
On May 6, 2013, I started hormone replacement therapy and began transitioning. I was very depressed, which is not uncommon for people with gender dysphoria. Two hours after my first estrogen injection, my depression went away for the first time in my life.
True transgenders do hypermasculine things.
In covering breaking news, there’s no better way than using a helicopter.
While television can help normalize the lives of marginalized people, it also can exploit their hardships and reinforce stereotypes, reducing their lives to mere entertainment.
Instead of doing what everybody else does and sue the city of Los Angeles, I decided I was going to run for mayor.
If what the transgender movement seeks is acceptance, association with the Kardashian circus is the last thing it needs.
When I saw that Google bought YouTube for $1.65 billion, I was dumbfounded! Why would Google get into bed with thieves? They’ve built a huge audience on the backs of copyright holders – and then they say I have to monitor them?
If someone asks about sexual reassignment surgery, you are supposed to say, ‘Why are we talking about that?’ But I am a post-op transsexual. And I am a reporter. If you can explain and talk about it, you demystify it. And if you demystify it, it’s not an issue.
When you’re living a lie, the scariest thing is to be alone with your thoughts.
