Why "Sex Change" Surgery is Medically Necessary, Revisited

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday March 07, 2012 · 10:42 AM PST

2012/03/07 · 10:42

Sandra Fluke -- the Georgetown University law student and women's rights activist who was excluded from the congressional hearing on access to contraception and then was labelled a "slut," "whore" and more by Rush Limbaugh following her talk to Democratic members of the House of Representatives -- is now being characterized as "a liberal activist pushing some rather radical ideas" for advocacy she has done for health care coverage of genital reassignment surgery for transsexual men and women... as if that would somehow make the epithets acceptable.

I wrote about this in 2009, but it's worth repeating. Because Fluke's position on that subject is not a "radical liberal idea," but rather the prevailing position of the medical establishment. Here's why.

DentedBlue

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Monday March 21, 2011 · 7:54 PM PDT

2011/03/21 · 19:54

As I write this, the LGBT community is struggling with a situation in Maryland where the provision for "public accommodations" has been removed from a bill that proposes to extend human rights to trans people, due to the ongoing "bathroom bill" panic-generation tactic. In Canada, Bill C-389 passed despite this same fearmongering, but faces an increasingly precarious situation in the Senate. In Montana, the state is proposing legislation that aims to erase the protections for all LGBT people that had passed the previous year in the City of Missoula, where the "not my bathroom" rhetoric failed... and where most pretexts of it have now been dropped in the battle against equality. Elsewhere in North America, potty panic has been used to stir up an emotional "ick" response to any legislation that protects trans people, and even some non-inclusive LGB protections. And once the emotions have been engaged, logic has to work five times harder to dispel the myths.

But in Maryland -- which in 2007 was the birthplace of this wave of "bathroom bill" spinmongering -- the tactic needs to be addressed head-on before it forever changes the face of how we accord and apply human rights. Because the recent removal of "public accommodations" affects far more than washrooms, all because of an irrational fear of the possibility of behaviour that isn't actually facilitated by trans protections and doesn't actually happen in real life.

DentedBlue

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Sunday June 27, 2010 · 4:02 PM PDT

2010/06/27 · 16:02

(This may be familiar territory to some, but is offered as a backgrounder to those who might not understand the full dimension of what is happening at the G8/G20 protests in Toronto)

Toronto has erupted in chaos in response to rioting that broke out during the G8/G20 Conference. What I'm posting here is from the perspective of someone who was not in attendance -- is not even in Toronto -- but has followed the goings-on and can add the perspective of someone who has been in in the middle of similar (but smaller) situations.

DentedBlue

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday April 13, 2010 · 3:24 PM PDT

2010/04/13 · 15:24

After 130+ trans-inclusive ordinances in North America, some dating back as far as 1975, there is no statistical evidence of trans protections being used to facilitate or justify predatory activity in washrooms. There is, however, plenty of evidence that prejudices against transgender people routinely cause them to be denied employment and/or housing.

And in Missoula, Montana, last night, people got it.

But the whispers are that the legislators preparing to discuss ENDA soon don't.

DentedBlue

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Thursday March 04, 2010 · 9:16 PM PST

2010/03/04 · 21:16

At Harlot's Parlour, Douglas Fox reminds us of the situation for sex workers in Louisiana, where women of colour and trans workers seem to be preferred targets of a backwards, draconian law that ruins lives:

"In many of the highlighted cases in New Orleans it is especially sex workers who are also the most vulnerable people in that society who appear to be the targets of this disgraceful policy. Placing people on sex offender’s registers that will affect their lives for years is not only disgraceful but wrong."

The end result of this policy is that women are put onto the sex offender registry. The law that enables this is a centuries-old statute that criminalizes "unnatural copulation." The sickening irony is that a legal tool meant to help protect children from predators is being used primarily to marginalize and impoverish women. And I probably don't need to say it, but the law has been and continues to be applied selectively. (more after the fold)

DentedBlue

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Monday February 08, 2010 · 6:21 PM PST

2010/02/08 · 18:21

The word was that Tim Tebow and mom Pam were intending to speak out against abortion in a Focus on the Family funded ad during one of the much-coveted Superbowl breaks. Well, for anyone who hasn't seen it, here's the nearly $3 million dollar spot.

Seems like much ado about nothing and a brilliant way for anti-abortionists to play victim to drum up sympathy, which is exactly what the pundits are saying this morning. Abortion was never mentioned in the ad, just a mom's statement that the football star almost never made it into the world -- and an invitation to go to the Focus website to learn more.

I smell a bait and switch. I suppose we all should have in the first place, since the decision to undermine womens' governance of their own bodies during a testosterone-pumped sporting event never made much sense to begin with -- but then again, a lot of what the far right does defies logic.

RSS

Why "Sex Change" Surgery is Medically Necessary, Revisited

Flushing the "Bathroom Bill" Fear Once and For All

Toronto G20 Protests: A View From a Distance

Montanans Tread Where Architects of ENDA Cannot?

1805 Law Used to Label Women of Colour and Trans Sex Workers as Sex Offenders in New Orleans

20/20 Hindsight: the Much Ado About Nothing FoF Superbowl Ad