LOS ANGELES — IAFD and Grooby have announced IAFD.com is in the process of re-categorizing transgender performers on its website
Trans women will be listed as “actresses” and trans men will be listed as “actors,” with the additional option of allowing performers to self-identify via the submission form.
“We are very appreciative for Steven reaching out and helping us see how important this issue is and that most importantly demonstrating it doesn't need to be a difficult fix,” said Jeff Vanzetti, IAFD webmaster. “In our internal discussions, our desire to ‘get it right the first time’ tied us in knots as we debated and tried to solve for every edge case and in doing so, paralyzed ourselves.
“We didn't want to ‘get it wrong’ so we didn't do anything; but we realize, paradoxically, that in not acting at all, our current position ‘gets it wrong,’” he continued. “With what turned out to be only minor tweaks to our underlying data tables — not the complete revamp as we feared — we are able to provide a solution that we hope treats everyone with the respect they deserve.”
IAFD and Grooby will be working together to identify those who were listed erroneously misgendered on the site and move them into the appropriate categories. Additionally, performers can also click on the “Submit Corrections” button on their IAFD profile to let the company know how they wish to be identified on the site. IAFD estimates the majority of changes will be implemented before the end of the year.
“We're really happy that we were able to take action and work with Jeff and the IAFD on this,” said Steven Grooby. “I reached out to them immediately after the open letter and happy to report that they recognize the problem and are allowing us to work with them. The first fix we will be doing is to ensure that IAFD has everyone in the correct gender category. Once that is done, we're going to look into giving them more details on specific performers and what content they may have appeared in.”
Vanzetti added, “We are ready to start migrating profiles as soon as the list is compiled or as the requests from the performers come in. We hope to have the lion's share of the work done before the New Year. Mistakes have been made, and since we're human we cannot claim that they won't be made again along the way, but rest assured our goal is not to belittle or marginalize performers who share so much of themselves — amidst great risk — for our pleasure.”
Grooby concluded, “I think this is a great example of how with just a little work, we can make fixes in the industry which become a win-win for the websites and the community. We look forward to getting this accomplished as quickly as possible. If any other companies or websites are looking for advice, as always, Kristel [Penn] is always available for you and one of the leading lights in the industry.”