bbauska wrote:Show the link to the person damaged by a cross in La Jolla and what that damaging offense was. They are offended. Just like people who have to share a bathroom with someone of the opposite gender. If there are damages against the people who put up a cross in La Jolla there should be a judgment against them giving damages to a specific person who can cite a damaging act.

Speaking of rhetorical points:
Isn't that what you did with the three solicitors of sex in a bathroom who have NOTHING to do w/ transgender?

Doctor Fate wrote:Ad hominem attacks on homosexuals! I'm shocked, just shocked.

Sassenach wrote:

Why is it PC consensus, and not just consensus?

Because it's objectively false. Like I said, as a matter of simple politeness I'm ok with it, but it does open up ethical issues which need to be taken more seriously.

But now there’s mounting evidence that gender identity is rooted in the brain. In January this year, neuroscience researchers at the University of Vienna in Austria discovered “strong differences” in the microstructure of brain connections of cisgender control subjects (men and women who identity with their biological sex) and transgender people. Using a specialized MRI technique that allows them to study brain wiring, they found “these differences in really almost all networks in the brain. It was quite a huge finding,” one of the researchers, Georg Kranz, says in a phone interview. On a spectrum of neurological characteristics, whose two polarities are defined by the cisgender female brain and the cisgender male brain, the characteristics of the brains of transgender people, on average, fell somewhere in the middle.

“We show that trans sexuality is a human biological variation, and I think that is a kind of relief for transgender people,” Kranz says.

One of the leading experts on the subject is Dick Swaab, professor of neurobiology at the University of Amsterdam and author of the book We Are Our Brains. According to his theory, which the researchers at University of Vienna share, the male hormone, testosterone, plays a key role in shaping the parts of our brain that influence gender identities. This happens in the womb during the second of two phases. In the first half of gestation, surges of testosterone – or the absence of it – influence the development of the genitals as male or female. In the second half of fetal development, testosterone surges – or their absence – shape the brain in terms of gender identity in the female or male direction.

“It’s just a matter of interest in brain development,” Swaab explains on the phone. “And let’s not forget, it was once said about homosexuality that it was a choice, and some called it a political choice. And when I said the choice was made for you in the womb, people became very angry. But nowadays, it’s very well accepted that it’s programmed into the brain and cannot be changed.”

To emphasize that gender identity is set before birth, Swaab, as well as others familiar with the medical history and work in gender identity, point to the case of David Reimer, a boy born in 1966. A botched circumcision at birth left him without a penis, and John William Money, a psychologist and leader in gender identity issues at the time, convinced the parents that sex reassignment surgery would be in the child’s best interest. His testes were surgically removed at 22 months. He was named Brenda, raised as a girl and given female hormones at puberty. Money, insisting that gender identity was learned and not innate, published the case as a success. It was not. Witnessing their child’s distress and trauma, the parents refused to let the doctor create an artificial vagina at a later age. Since the age of 9, Reimer failed to identify as female. At 15, he transitioned to living as male. After a series of hardships in adult life, he committed suicide in 2004.

“This case shows that you can do whatever you want after birth. But you don’t change gender identity,” Swaab says.

danivon wrote:

Doctor Fate wrote:Ad hominem attacks on homosexuals! I'm shocked, just shocked.

Not at all. Not because they are "homosexuals" - an identity. Because they were caught engaging in illegal acts in toilets - actions. Criticising a person for their actions is not "ad hominem". And I do not mean to imply in any way that homosexuality is all about oral sex in toilets. It is not, whatever you infer.

My basic point is that I can find quite easily cases where Republicans have abused toilets for sexual purposes. I am waiting for anyone to provide me examples where transgender people (or those "pretending to be" have

I read these reports, and my heart starts to race. They can’t be serious. Let me be clear: I am not saying that transgender people are predators. Not by a long shot. What I am saying is that there are countless deviant men in this world who will pretend to be transgender as a means of gaining access to the people they want to exploit, namely women and children. It already happens. Just Google Jason Pomares, Norwood Smith Burnes, or Taylor Buehler, for starters.

While I feel a deep sense of empathy for what must be a very difficult situation for transgender people, at the beginning and end of the day, it is nothing short of negligent to instate policies that elevate the emotional comfort of a relative few over the physical safety of a large group of vulnerable people.

Don’t they know anything about predators? Don’t they know the numbers? That out of every 100 rapes, only two rapists will spend so much as single day in jail while the other 98 walk free and hang out in our midst? Don’t they know that predators are known to intentionally seek out places where many of their preferred targets gather in groups? That perpetrators are addicts so committed to their fantasies they’ll stop at nothing to achieve them?

Do they know that more than 99 percent of single-victim incidents are committed by males? That they are experts in rationalization who minimize their number of victims? Don’t they know that insurance companies highlight locker rooms as a high-risk area for abuse that should be carefully monitored and protected?

Don’t they know that one out of every four little girls will be sexually abused during childhood, and that’s without giving predators free access to them while they shower? Don’t they know that, for women who have experienced sexual trauma, finding the courage to use a locker room at all is a freaking badge of honor? That many of these women view life through a kaleidoscope of shame and suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, dissociation, poor body image, eating disorders, drug and alcohol abuse, difficulty with intimacy, and worse?

Why would people knowingly invite further exploitation by creating policies with no safeguards in place to protect them from injury? With zero screening options to ensure that biological males who enter locker rooms actually identify as female, how could a woman be sure the person staring at her wasn’t exploiting her? Why is it okay to make her wonder?

. . .

There’s no way to make everyone happy in the situation of transgender locker room use. So the priority ought to be finding a way to keep everyone safe. I’d much rather risk hurting a smaller number of people’s feelings by asking transgender people to use a single-occupancy restroom that still offers safety than risk jeopardizing the safety of thousands of women and kids with a policy that gives would-be predators a free pass.

Is it ironic to no one that being “progressive” actually sets women’s lib back about a century? What of my right to do my darndest to insist that the first time my daughter sees the adult male form it will be because she’s chosen it, not because it’s forced upon her? What of our emotional and physical rights? Unless and until you’ve lined a bathroom door with a towel for protection, you can’t tell me the risk isn’t there.

For me, healing looks like staring at the little girl in a Polaroid photo and validating her need to be seen, heard, and protected instead of hating it. It looks like telling my story, even the parts I can never make pretty, in hopes it will help break the anonymity of survivors and create a sense of responsibility in others to act.

The issue of how society treats trans people is a relatively recent social phenomenon, and it's become something of a social crusade among the right-on fraternity. To a very significant extent they have a perfectly valid point. I was subjected to a number of people who I like and respect but who are much more PC than I am explain to me at great length that continually referring to people who have a different gender identity by their biologically correct pronouns is insulting and belittling and something they find deeply hurtful, and therefore something that no decent person should be doing. I found it a bit weird at first but on reflection I came to the conclusion that they were right. It doesn't hurt me to be polite about it, and so now I follow the convention. Why not ?

Charges were filed Tuesday against a man who wore a wig and women's clothing to disguise himself as he allegedly used a concealed camera to record "hours" of video of women in a Los Angeles-area department store restroom.

Jason Pomare, 33, of Palmdale, was arrested Saturday after customers contacted security officers at a Macy's store to report a man in the women's restroom. The security officers contacted a deputy, who was on patrol at the Antelope Valley Mall (map) when he saw a man matching the subject's description leave the store.

When the deputy found the man hiding in a mall storage area, the subject was wearing a wig, women's clothing and bra, according to a statement from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.

A man wearing a bra and wig was arrested Friday after he was spotted in a women's bathroom at Everett Community College, police said.

Officers responded to the scene at about 1:30 p.m. after a college staff member said she saw the man go into the women's rest room and alerted security personnel.

An investigation found that the suspect had gone into the rest room while two women were inside, according to a police report. The women were later interviewed and said they had no idea that the man was there.

When police interviewed the man, he claimed that he had gone into the bathroom to use the facilities.

But the investigating officer noted that the man was wearing a wig and bra. A search also turned up a pair of woman's panties in his front pocket, according to the police report.

The man, later identified as Taylor J. Buehler, 18, of Lake Stevens, was placed under arrest.

He admitted to officers that he was the suspect in an earlier voyeurism incident at Everett Community College on Monday, police said.

In the earlier incident, he said he took a shower in the girls' locker room for sexual gratification, acccording to the police report.

rickyp wrote:And the question you ask really is at the heart of the matter. Why not treat them as they wish to be treated? It harms no one to dignify their wishes.

Furthermore, why wouldn't a predator or just a garden-variety pervert do this?

geojanes wrote:It saddens me that this topic is sucking up so much attention. You could be thinking about anything else and it would likely be more productive.

rickyp wrote:fate

Furthermore, why wouldn't a predator or just a garden-variety pervert do this?

There are already laws against voyeurs, and sexual predators. No matter what your sexual orientation you have to obey these laws or face arrest ad criminal prosecution.
These "bathroom laws" are specific laws that assumes that transgender people are either voyeurs or sexual predators.
Based upon zero instances of Transgender persons being charged with offences of voyeurism or sexual assault...

Its very specific discrimination.