I've made it to the initial round for favorite progressive blogger in the Air America Cruise Contest. I have to stay in the Top 5 before the second voting round begins, so your vote is appreciated! First voting round:
The Christian Civic League of Maine's Mike Hein calls Pam's House Blend: "a leading source of radical homosexual propaganda, anti-Christian bigotry, and radical transgender advocacy."
He is "praying that Pam Spaulding will "turn away from her wicked and sinful promotion of homosexual behavior."
(CCLM's web site, 10/15/07)
Ex-gay "Christian" activist James Hartline on Pam:
"I have been mocked over and over again by ungodly and unprincipled anti-christian lesbians."
(from "Six Years In Sodom: From The Journal Of James Hartline," 9/4/2006, written from the "homosexual stronghold" of Hillcrest in San Diego).
"Pam is a 'twisted lesbian sister' and an 'embittered lesbian' of the 'self-imposed gutteral experiences of the gay ghetto.'" -- 9/5/2008
Peter LaBarbera of Americans for Truth Against Homosexuality heartily endorses the Blend, calling Pam:
A "vicious anti-Christian lesbian activist." (Concerned Women for America's radio show [9:15], 1/25/07)
"A nutty lesbian blogger." (MassResistance radio show [16:25], 2/3/07)
Pam's House Blend always seems to find these sick f*cks. The area of the country she is in? The home state of her wife? I know, they are everywhere. Pam just does such a great job of bringing them out into the light.
--Impeach Bush
who monitors yours Bevis ?? Just thought I would drop you a line,so the rest of your life is not wasted.
Expect fireworks as the New Hampshire House debates a marriage equality bill along with a transgender rights bill. (Concord Monitor):
Last week, the House Judiciary Committee deadlocked, 10-10, on a bill that would permit same-sex couples to marry in New Hampshire. Two years ago, the same committee paved the way for the law creating civil unions for same-sex couples.
Backers of the bill call it a simple equal-rights measure; opponents say it's a dangerous change to an old social institution.
The Judiciary Committee also deadlocked last week 10-10 on a bill that would add an individuals' transgender status to the state's nondiscrimination laws, along with other factors such as age, sex, national origin and race.
Proponents say it would prevent landlords and employers from discriminating against those born as one sex but who identify as the other, some of whom seek sex-change procedures. Opponents dubbed it the "bathroom bill" and claimed it would allow men to prowl women's restrooms.
Look at the bullsh*t propaganda coming out of the professional "Christian" set...
Granite State Must Be Rock Solid on Marriage, Transgenders
Anyone who has predicted an end to the culture war needs only to look toward New Hampshire this week. There, state leaders are debating a radical menu of issues that could forever change the landscape of the family in New England. After a deadlock in the Judiciary Committee, two bills are heading to the house floor tomorrow for what is certain to be an impassioned debate. The first, H.B. 415, is a "bathroom bill," which in the name of tolerance would allow cross-dressers to use public facilities regardless of their biological sex. As FRC has argued, the most important issue at stake in this legislation isn't gender sensitivity but public safety. In the end, this policy could backfire, creating a hiding place for sexual predators who prey on men, women, and children.
Also up for consideration is H.B. 436, the proposal to legalize counterfeit marriage in New Hampshire. As homosexual activists have said, a victory in the Granite State could set the stage for a collapse of traditional marriages in the Northeast. To rally values voters against these bills, FRC Action launched a half-page ad in today's Manchester Union-Leader encouraging House leaders to block genderless marriage and genderless bathrooms. To view the ad or to support our campaign against these poisonous policies, log on to www.frcaction.org.
For those of you who live in New Hampshire, time is running out. Majority Floor Leader Dan Eaton (D-N.H.) said today that these are "conscience issues." Please call on your leaders to heed theirs and vote against H.B. 415 and 436. Additional Resources Contact your New Hampshire Legislators! Check out FRC Action's Union-Leader Ad
Jac Wilder VerSteeg, the Palm Beach Post Deputy Editor of the Editorial Page, draws an interesting point out in the conclusion of his opinion piece entitled No rest for (trans)gender politics. In the piece, he's discussing the ballot measure to change to Gainsville, Florida's fully inclusive anti-discrimination laws (emphasis added):
The ballot measure, if passed, would force the city's anti-discrimination ordinance to mirror the state's civil rights law. Gender identity isn't in the state's law. Neither is civil rights protection based on sexual orientation. So that also would be lost. The opponents, Citizens for Good Public Policy, deny that's their goal. But the group is allied with Florida Family Action, which is fronted by the people who brought us Florida's constitutional ban on gay marriages.
It's obvious that Citizens for Good Public Policy has a wider agenda. There's a fix that would keep bathrooms safe while still preventing housing and employment discrimination against gay and transgender people.
Like Gainesville, Palm Beach County and West Palm Beach have ordinances protecting civil rights based on gender identity. West Palm easily solves the bathroom problem by stipulating that the law doesn't apply to ''discrimination on the basis of sex in restrooms, shower rooms ... or similar facilities, which are by their nature distinctly private." The county's ordinance basically does the same.
Citizens for Good Public Policy could have asked voters to amend a similar easy fix into the Gainesville ordinance. Instead, they're trying to flush all protections for gay and transgender people down the toilet.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people need to be concerned about this ballot measure. This could be a blueprint for removing civil rights for the entire LGBT community in many states where localities have provided more civil rights protections than the individual states have.
And, yet another reason why we need a fully inclusive ENDA.
Women and children will face one of the greatest threats to privacy, safety and security that Maryland residents have ever known with the passage of a "Gender Identity" bill now before Maryland House and Senate legislators.
The proposed law adds a broadly defined category of "gender identity" to the state's existing anti-discrimination law. Because the bill's broad definition of "gender identity" includes "expression and behavior," men are not required to have undergone a sex change operation. The Maryland Retailers Association has purportedly agreed to allow men to enter women's bathrooms.
"The effect of this bill is to give special rights to men who want to dress like women, but completely disregards the safety of vulnerable women and children," notes Ruth Jacobs, M.D., president of Maryland Citizens for a Responsible Government. "Restrooms and showers will be opened up to cross-dressing or female affirming men thereby allowing undressing in front of women and children in a woman's locker room."
..."If it is not dropped, then exemptions similar to the Baltimore City law stating 'It is not discrimination for any person to provide separate toilet facilities for males and females' and other exemptions as signed by [then mayor and now] Governor Martin O'Malley should be included." ...
How appropriate is it for the name of the Opposing Views website to post an opinion piece like this one? I know I couldn't be more opposed to their conclusions.
But, to my point about what's wrong with the fears expressed in this opposition piece about bathroom predators -- Maryland Citizens for a Responsible Government needs to be able to tell us exactly how many predators across the nation have crossdressed and entered women's restrooms to do harm to women and children. Their argument needs statistics, and this organization doesn't have 'em.
If Maryland Citizens for a Responsible Government can cite some real world examples that back why their fears should guide public policy, I'd like to see these examples. So far, all I see from the organization is arrguments that seem to be based on irrational fears.
APPLETON - A mixed-race transgender person has filed a civil suit against a downtown nightclub, claiming it discriminated against her on the basis of race and sexual orientation.
The suit on behalf of Sierra D. Broussard, 28, of Appleton, was filed Tuesday in Outagamie County court by Appleton attorney Eric Pitsch.
...[Broussard] said she was twice denied entrance to Park Central, 318 W. College Ave., because of her race and her transgender status.
It appears from the whole article that what she's claiming is that she's being denied entrance because she is a member of multiple minority groups -- that it's because she's of mixed ethniticity and because she's transgener.
Oh, and it's always the bathroom that comes up when we're talking about discrimination against trans people, isn't it? ...
A club manager told The Post-Crescent newspaper this summer, however, that the bars do not discriminate against gays or lesbians, but cannot accommodate Broussard because allowing her to use either the men's or women's restroom is a safety issue.
I get angry reading about the same tactics over and over again against LGBT civil rights legislation - You just can't sell me that this isn't about hate when were seeing these same, hateful "Christian" mistruths and fear tactics used over and over again. When do we develop some good answers to his and his "Christian" peers' lies and fear tactics?
The ad below, by Citizens for Good Public Policy, is a for a Gainesville, Florida referendum to repeal a civil rights ordinance:
I don't look like that actor behaving like a predator shown in the ad when I go to use a public restroom; I don't act like a predator when I go use a public restroom -- I just go to the bathroom. So do other trans people. And hey, sexually predatory behavior in any public bathroom is unlawful everywhere in the U.S. -- despite what the ad says and the ad implies, the behavior shown in the ad isn't legal.
If there were documented cases of transpeople having acted like predators in public bathrooms, or documented cases of male predators dressing as women to molest women and children in public bathrooms, then you can bet that organizations like Citizens for Good Public Policy would be citing the cases. What does it tell you when they don't cite studies or cases?
As it is, my trans peers (and I personally) are portrayed as potential predators -- facts to support the claims and implications appear not to be needed. Frankly, it sucks raw eggs.
~~
(From today, there's a another story -- this time from Massachusetts -- that covers a similar "bathroom predator" argument. That story is highlighted in PHB's Quick Hits.)
In the piece Commission to investigate suspension of transgender student, I made a reasonable assumption that a transgender student was harassed for using a female restroom based on operative status. Apparently, she was discriminated against relating to whether or not she had genital reconstruction surgery (GRS), but it apparently was for being post-operative, and not pre-operative. From the New York Daily Record:
Jamie Nicole Anderson says she just wants to be treated like everyone else. The York woman is a 42-year-old ex-Marine who takes her 11-year-old son to school and never misses his football, baseball or hockey games.
...In May, she got a sex change operation, from male to female, and, she says, that's when the trouble started.
...Anderson said she was banned from using a women's rest room and was repeatedly referred to as "he" and "his" by her [Harrisburg Area Community College (HAAC)] clinical instructors.
Further:
Anderson said she was suspended for three days Oct. 2 by HACC for "insubordination," using the women's rest room after being told not to because some operating room employees said they were "uncomfortable" with her being there.
Anderson said she was dismissed from her program Oct. 30 for her violation of a dress code that forbids more than two earrings in an ear.
"I forgot to take (one) out that day," she said.
Anderson said she filed the complaint because she wants the situation corrected for her and other transgendered people like her.
If one is born with a penis, I tend to believe the arguments against fully inclusive anti-discrimination language will always revolve around the bathroom, whether or not a trans person/a person of trans history currently has a penis or not. Some transsexuals (and people of trans history) see a difference between pre-operative and post-operative folk where anti-discrimination rules should only be applied to the post-operative folk. In the real world where discrimination is often based on fear and/or hate, discrimination is often based on what the genitals looked like at birth, not what one's genitals look like now, or not what gender one is between the ears. It's based on societal gender norms associated with natal genitalia shape -- just as it is for effeminate gay and straight men, and masculine lesbian and straight women.
Anti-discrimination laws that give legal recourse for sexual orientation and gender identity and expression based discrimination are what keeps businesses and government from behaving badly against those perceived to be gender variant people.
Jamie is never going to be perceived as a woman by those who discriminated against her. I'm with Jamie -- to correct the situation for her and other transgender people like her, sometimes one has to fight against unacceptable behavior sanctioned by businesses and governments.
I thought about turning this video below into a Q of the Day, but I really don't want to put where pre-op and non-op transsexuals pee to a public vote. Frankly, turning this into a Q of the Day would just asking for public displays of bigotry.
Instead, let me put Riftgirl's Politics of P as a summation about how many of us trans folk feel about peeing in public restrooms. She's really captured those ambigous feelings about where to pee, and how to pee, that many of us trans folk experience.
Honestly, Riftgirl has expressed some common feelings on this subject better than I ever could have.
In the colloquial spirit of saying someone is a sandwich short of a picnic to mean someone isn't reasoning quite clearly, WingNutDaily's Janet Folger is a toilet stall short of a public restroom in her piece Go ahead: Arrest me.
Before we get to what she states she soon plans on doing, we need to get a take on how she reads a section of Colorado's recently signed-by-the-Colorado-governor public accommodation law (SB 200). From the actual text of the law:
SECTION 8. 24-34-701, Colorado Revised Statutes, is amended to read:
24-34-701. Publishing of discriminative matter forbidden. No person, being the owner, lessee, proprietor, manager, superintendent, agent, or employee of any place of public accommodation, resort, or amusement, directly or indirectly, by himself or herself or through another person shall publish, issue, circulate, send, distribute, give away, or display in any way, manner, or shape or by any means or method, except as provided in this section, any communication, paper, poster, folder, manuscript, book, pamphlet, writing, print, letter, notice, or advertisement of any kind, nature, or description which THAT is intended or calculated to discriminate or actually discriminates against any disability, race, creed, color, sex, SEXUAL ORIENTATION, marital status, national origin, or ancestry or against any of the members thereof in the matter of furnishing or neglecting or refusing to furnish to them or any one of them any lodging, housing, schooling, or tuition or any accommodation, right, privilege, advantage, or convenience offered to or enjoyed by the general public or which states that any of the accommodations, rights, privileges, advantages, or conveniences of any such place of public accommodation, resort, or amusement shall or will be refused, withheld from, or denied to any person or class of persons on account of disability, race, creed, color, sex, SEXUAL ORIENTATION, marital status, national origin, or ancestry or that the patronage, custom, presence, frequenting, dwelling, staying, or lodging at such place by any person or class of persons belonging to or purporting to be of any particular disability, race, creed, color, sex, SEXUAL ORIENTATION, marital status, national origin, or ancestry is unwelcome or objectionable or not acceptable, desired, or solicited.
How Folger quoted this same section of the new law in her recent article:
Section 8. 24-34-701. Publishing of discriminative matter forbidden. No person, being the owner, lessee, proprietor, manager, superintendent, agent, or employee of any place of public accommodation ... shall publish, issue, circulate, send, distribute, give away, or display in any way, manner, or shape or by any means or method, except as provided in this section, any communication, paper, poster, folder, manuscript, book, pamphlet, writing, print, letter, notice, or advertisement of any kind, nature, or description that is intended or calculated to discriminate or actually discriminates against ... SEXUAL ORIENTATION, marital status ... in the matter of furnishing or neglecting or refusing to furnish to them or any one of them any lodging, housing, schooling, or tuition or any accommodation, right [marriage], privilege [adoption] , advantage, or convenience ... on account of ... SEXUAL ORIENTATION, marital status ... [which] is unwelcome or objectionable or not acceptable, desired, or solicited.
I'm not an attorney, but it looks to me that the intent of the section of the law in question is to make it clear that the owner, lessee, proprietor, manager, superintendent, agent, or employee of any place of public accommodation, resort, or amusement shouldn't attempt to violate or circumvent the intent of Colorado Revised Statute 24-34-301 with some sort of written product. (Y'all attorneys out there in Blenderville correct me if I've got this totally wrong, okay?) Janet Folder seems to have edited the code section to imply SB 200 states that if any written product disagrees with the homosexual agenda and is found within the state boundaries of Colorado, that's unlawful -- and that any person who publishes or possesses such material is in violation of state law.
And, she pretty much states that this is her interpretation of the statute in this article excerpt:
* Sigh * -- From OneNewsNow's Moral debate now a public safety issue:
Citizens in Gainesville, Florida, are trying to repeal an ordinance that lets anyone reject their biological sex simply by stating that they "feel like" a member of the opposite sex. At least one citizen argues that introduces some serious safety concerns for the public.
...In fact, Davis' group has been collecting reports of such incidents, including one in which an elderly woman using a wheelchair complained when an adult male followed her into the women's restroom at a local grocery store.
"And the manager said, 'He can legally do it,'" Davis relates. "The manager didn't even ask this person if he had a sexual or gender identity issue. So just by having this law, men are walking in -- and managers, because of the liability associated with questioning people who are protected by the law, they don't even ask questions."
The difficulty with the public safety aspect of this argument is that there have been no news stories -- no documentation to support the premise -- that predators have ever tried to use a public accommodation law in an attempt to cover sexually predatory behavior in a women's restroom -- despite this undocumented, factually bare anecdote given in this article.
What we're really discussing here is a fear of predatory behavior by cross-dressed males in public restrooms vice actual, documented examples of predatory males actually engaging in any otherwise unlawful behavior in public restrooms -- while at the same time being cross-dressed when they attempt to use public accommodation laws as cover for their predatory behavior.
Let's be frank, here. If there had ever been any documented examples of cross-dressed individuals attempting to use public accommodation laws in an attempt to cover unlawful predatory behavior, I'm absolutely sure we'd have heard about it -- it would be a very, very newsworthy story.
The burden of proof that this happens at all -- that crossdressing males going into women's restrooms constitute a real, documentable public safety issue in municipalities, counties, or states that have passed public accommodation laws, and that these allegedly existing predators used public accommodation laws as legal cover for their allegedly predatory behavior -- should be on the conservative Christians who claim it as fact, vice falling on us transgender people and allies to prove the negative; vice falling on transgender people to prove that this scenario hasn't been documented by somebody, somewhere.
Names, dates and times, incident reports and police reports -- If conservative Christians want to claim gender identity and expression specific public accommodation laws facilitate predatory behavior and constitute a real, public safety issue, they need to show us palpable evidence that indicates this really is a public safety issue. Otherwise, it's just transgender bashing based completely on hearsay and/or fear.
~~~~~
Related:
* White Male Privilege & Women's Fear Of Crime Intersecting With Gender Expression & Public Restrooms
* When It Comes To Transgender People & Civil Rights, It Really Is Always About The Bathroom
* The Predator Argument Doesn't Work With Transgender Fifth Graders
* Kevin Moore's Take On Colorado's "Bathroom Police"
* I'm Going To Colorado In August With PHB; I'm Going To Make Use Of Public Accommodations
* If Dr. Dobson Were King, We'd All Be Wearing Depends
* The Non-Trans Woman Thrown Out Of A NY Women's Restroom Sues
* Outing #2: When You Endanger A Child For The Sensationalism Of It
* Latest Attacks Of Teh HomoSEXual Agenda's Transgenderededs's Bullet Points
Media Matters has an article up on their website entitled On Hannity's radio program, DeLay falsely claimed Obama supports "a bill to fingerprint every American in this country". The gist of the article:
On The Sean Hannity Show, Tom DeLay falsely claimed that Sen. Barack Obama is "in favor of a bill to fingerprint every American in this country and have a national fingerprint database." In fact, the bill to which DeLay was apparently referring would require employees of banks that apply for "licensing and registration as a State-licensed loan originator," as well as individuals who apply for licenses, to submit fingerprints to "to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and any governmental agency or entity authorized to receive such information for a State and national criminal history background check."
So, former Representative Tom DeLay (R-TX) was describing how Presidential Candidate Barak Obama as someone who govern as a "dictatorial proletariat," when he spun off into how Colorado's legislature and governor had functioned as a dictatorial proletariat in creating Colorado's new public accommodation law (emphasis added):
HANNITY: Well, now, you see, you're going to be a "dictatorial proletariat." Are you saying that he'd be a dictator? You know people are going to be taking those comments out of context.
DeLAY: No, but I'm talking about the definition of dictatorial proletariat is using the government to penalize and punish people for behavior that you don't agree with. I mean, look at the criminalization of politics now. There's -- I mean, there was a bill passed in Colorado not too long ago, signed by the governor, that would allow men to go into women's bathrooms. And if you were the owner of the bathroom and don't allow that to happen, you can go to jail for a year and get a fine. I mean, that is a dictatorial proletariat. That's not a criminal action, but they make it a criminal action. That's going on all across our country, and people better realize it.
Great. He implied the predator argument without using the word predator, and called folk like me men in the process. Oh yeah, the allegedly corrupt congressman just gave me one more reason to dislike his f*cking a**.
~~~~~
Related:
* If Dr. Dobson Were King, We'd All Be Wearing Depends
* I'm Going To Colorado In August With PHB; I'm Going To Make Use Of Public Accommodations
* When It Comes To Transgender People & Civil Rights, It Really Is Always About The Bathroom * Hypocrite... thy name is "Republican"
* Rut roh! Tom DeLay unloads on Gingrich
* It's over, pesticide man
I feel like I've been talking about public restrooms way too much of late. Blame the news cycles; blame conservative Christians -- LGBT civil rights and public accommodation issues seem to be boiling down to which public restrooms transpeople are going to be using. It's of special concern, it seems, which public restrooms transwomen are going to use.
It's the perpetrator thing. Frankly, many women look at men who are strangers to them as potential predators, and these same women (along with their male protectors) perceive visibly transgender women who use women's public restrooms as potential male rapists. And if these same women (and their male protectors) have female children, they perceive visibly transgender women who use women's public restrooms as potential pedophiles. There's hasn't been any studies that have substantiated or unsubstantiated this fear of crossdressed males abusing women and children in women's public restrooms, but this fear of crossdressed, male, public restroom perpetrators is being used in an attempt to shape public policy on LGBT civil rights and public accommodation legislation -- most recently in Montgomery County, Maryland and Colorado.
But, the predator argument doesn't work very when we're talking about male-to-female transgender fifth graders. A ten or eleven year old who knows her gender identity doesn't match her* natal sex isn't going through the process of a social transition for sexual reasons. And, whether or not adults accept the idea that a fifth grader is self aware enough to understand when her gender identity and natal sex may not match, most are aware that fifth graders aren't public restroom predators. Shannon Garcia and Kim Pearson of TransYouth Family Allies have frequently reminded me that transyouth really are the future key to public understanding of how gender identity in transsexuals isn't directly correlated to sexuality.
So, since the scream of predator won't work for a fifth grander, Mike Heath (of the Christian Civic League (CCL) Of Maine) and his conservative Christian surrogates are now trying to employ a privacy related strategy. Paul Melanson, a grandfather to a student in the same class as the transyouth, has announced he's filing a complaint with the Maine Human Rights Commission (MHRC) -- which is seen as a first step prior to filing a civil suit in U.S. District Court at Bangor. From the Bangor Daily News article on the lawsuit announcement press conference:
Jasmine Smith, 13, is concerned that next year the fifth-grader at Asa Adams Elementary School who identifies as a girl will be changing in the girls locker room.
At a press conference Monday night in front of the municipal building, the seventh-grader said that because she has seen the fifth-grader in the girls bathroom after school she assumes the student will be allowed to use the girls facilities at Orono Middle School.
"That would be an invasion of the girls' privacy and of my privacy," she said.
Smith acknowledged that no teachers or administrators have told students the fifth-grader would be changing in the girls locker room or using the girls bathrooms at the middle school.
Smith appeared at the press conference called by Paul Melanson of Orono, who formally has objected to the practice of allowing a boy to use the girls bathroom at the school. Melanson said he asked Smith to speak at the press conference to show that although school officials had told him the fifth-grader was using a teachers bathroom, he was using the girls bathroom.
The constitutional right to privacy is the basis right that found abortion legal in Roe v. Wade, so it's an interesting choice of argument for conservative Christians to employ. But even past that it's an interesting argument, the CCL's choise to employ a privacy argument against the transyouth just doesn't appear to resonate with the public in the same way as a predator argument does against older transgender people.
(Below the fold: Excerpts of comments left for the Bangor Daily News article Grandfather plans rights suit over boy using girls bathroom)
I'll be the first to admit I'm very uncomfortable connecting dots on sensitive subjects -- such as on gender related privilege and race -- especially when I haven't seen anyone else connecting dots in the same way I'm connecting dots. And yet, I've noticed two articles on natal women being ejected from women's restrooms, and then further ejected from the business establishments in which the women's restrooms were located -- and I noticed when reading the articles that the women were both African-American.
So let me back up a little bit on what I'm getting at. In broad society, there is the concept of privilege, which is defined as...
A special advantage, immunity, permission, right, or benefit granted to or enjoyed by an individual, class, or caste.
And with that, most folk who've studied feminism at even a cursory level are familiar with the concept of male privilege, and it's related concept of white male privilege. Per Peggy McIntosh, having privilege -- and being the victim of privilege's oppression -- are often entwined.
...After I realized, through faculty development work in Women's Studies, the extent to which men work from a base of unacknowledged privilege, I understood that much of their oppressiveness was unconscious. Then I remembered the frequent charges from women of color that white women whom they encounter are oppressive. I began to understand why we are justly seen as oppressive, even when we don't see ourselves that way. At the very least, obliviousness of one's privileged state can make a person or group irritating to be with. I began to count the ways in which I enjoy unearned skin privilege and have been conditioned into oblivion about its existence, unable to see that it put me "ahead" in any way, or put my people ahead, overrewarding us an yet also paradoxically damaging us, or that it could or should be changed.
Well, one of the few areas where I, as a male-to-female (M2F) transsexual, and my friend Travis, who is a female-to-male (F2M) transsexual, have noticed real female privilege is in not being perceived as a predator...a perpetrator. I addressed the concept briefly in the piece When It Comes To Transgender People & Civil Rights, It Really Is Always About The Bathroom, and concluded...
In our society, it seems to me that we tend to perceive most men as potential perpetrators. Transgender women, far more often than not, aren't perpetrators...they aren't predators of other women or of children. But, because transgender women are perceived as men by conservative Christians and others, transgender women are perceived as perpetrators...predators. This is especially true in the public restroom.
...Which public restroom transgender people who don't have "passing privilege" should be legally allowed to use usually comes down to this: Is a visibly transgender woman automatically assumed to be a man, and therefore a potential perpetrator in the women's public restroom? If one considers the transgender woman to be a woman, then public restroom usage by transgender people is considered in terms of a transgender woman's safety, or in terms of discrimination. If one considers a transgender woman really to be a man -- a potential perpetrator -- then restroom usage becomes an safety issue for the natal women who use the women's restroom.
As we've seen in the cases of Tanya White and Khadijah Farmer, this isn't just a transgender bathroom issue -- if a female dresses outside of societal gender norms, then they are also are suspected of being predators of women and girls.
And, when I look at Khadijah Farmer and Tanya White, I can't help but notice both of them are African-American women with "less than feminine" appearance. I think what happened to these two tells us something about our societal expectations regarding those who are perceived to be both black and male -- or even black and lesbian if one's "lesbian presentation" is perceived by others to be too dyke-y or too butch. What my gut level instinct tells me is that people who are assumed to be African-American men, or African-American crossdressed men, are more likely to be seen as "more suspect" bathroom predators of women and girls in the women's restroom than people who are assumed to be white men, or white crossdressed men.
Basically, it appears Khadijah Farmer and Tanya White lost their female privilege by dressing too masculinely, and because they also appeared to be African-American, they also appeared to be the kind of black men (or black, crossdressing men) that are out-of-control evil strangers -- strangers who randomly attack their white, female victims.
[After the fold: Are we also unknowingly talking about perceived sexual orientation/heterosexual privilege, race/white male privilege -- black male predators and rape/white women's fear of crime when we talk about public accommodation laws and the public restroom?]
Anyone who has predicted an end to the culture war needs only to look toward New Hampshire this week. There, state leaders are debating a radical menu of issues that could forever change the landscape of the family in New England. After a deadlock in the Judiciary Committee, two bills are heading to the house floor tomorrow for what is certain to be an impassioned debate. The first, H.B. 415, is a "bathroom bill," which in the name of tolerance would allow cross-dressers to use public facilities regardless of their biological sex. As FRC has argued, the most important issue at stake in this legislation isn't gender sensitivity but public safety. In the end, this policy could backfire, creating a hiding place for sexual predators who prey on men, women, and children. 
* Sigh * -- From OneNewsNow's 
Jasmine Smith, 13, is concerned that next year the fifth-grader at Asa Adams Elementary School who identifies as a girl will be changing in the girls locker room.
I think what happened to these two tells us something about our societal expectations regarding those who are perceived to be both black and male -- or even black and lesbian if one's "lesbian presentation" is perceived by others to be too dyke-y or too butch. What my gut level instinct tells me is that people who are assumed to be African-American men, or African-American crossdressed men, are more likely to be seen as "more suspect" bathroom predators of women and girls in the women's restroom than people who are assumed to be white men, or white crossdressed men.
