@zinhead It’s a good idea to read the entire article. If you still can’t see the difference in the two issues, I don’t know what to say. I am very familiar with U of T. I live close by, I have many friends who teach there, and three of my Ds are grads. As I said the U of T story has nothing to do with the transgender issue. You are looking for justification for your views in all the wrong places.
Greenwitch: “Homosexuality is a detestable sin. Leviticus 18:22” - that fits on a cake? A Bible shaped cake?
I doubt it".
Remember this cuts both ways. Should the Christian show up at the gay baker’s door and request this cake, that gay baker dare not resist.
Alternatively, we could let people hire people who want their business.
Yes, the person walked into the female locker room under claim of being female, but was anatomically male. This was quite jarring to the young girls because the person looked like male; nothing female looking about the person. It was jarring to their mothers as well.
As far as I understand this, these terms refer to the same person. A male who calls himself female is called transgendered and in some places can use the female locker rooms, even though the person’s body is still anatomically male. The difference is pre-op vs. post-op. And to be accurate, not all transgenders get surgery, so there are a good percentage who are called transgendered, but anatomically remain the opposite sex.
And you raise the biggest concern the Dads and Moms had - a grown naked penis around their little girls, fully nude, in the showers etc. Why people think that is OK for little girls to experience is quite interesting to say the least,
A trans male/man refers to someone labeled female at birth who identifies as male. The term you are thinking of is trans female/woman.
And it’s “transgender,” not “transgendered.” As Romanigypsyeyes so eloquently pointed out in an earlier post, you wouldn’t say “whited” would you?
I would have no problems with a rule that typically male genitalia should not be openly displayed in the women’s locker room or bathroom and typically female genitalia should not be openly displayed in the men’s. It seems a pretty common-sense compromise.
You’re right that some TG people don’t go through full gender reassignment surgery and that that could be a sticking point in these new laws, but it’s not as if people who don’t display the characteristics of just one gender didn’t exist before. We have always had intersex people (people with indistinct genitalia, genitalia of both genders, or genitalia that doesn’t match their gender) and we now have people who because of hormone treatment or surgery have a physical appearance when dressed that doesn’t match their genitalia. Where should such a person (think Catlin Jenner or Chaz Bono) go to the bathroom?
According to news reports, there seems to have been a man exposing himself to protest the law.
So, essentially, someone who’s not transgender exposed himself in a female locker and then tried the “I’m transgender” defense, but isn’t transgender. Again, this is not an issue with transgender people - and not even an issue of common sense, as I earlier thought, but a behavior that’s already punishable by law.
Well it looks like Tennessee wised up …http://www.hrc.org/blog/breaking-in-tennessee-anti-transgender-student-bill-will-not-pass-this-year
and FYI, major child advocacy groups such as the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Counseling Association, the American School Counselor Association, the Child Welfare League of America, the National Association of School Psychologists, the National Association of Social Workers, and the National Education Association are weighing in here on this issue on the side of transgender students…
http://www.hrc.org/press/major-child-advocacy-groups-urge-nations-governors-to-reject-attack
There are a lot of misconceptions about the law in this discussion. I’ll try to address some of them. There may not be a specific Constitutional right not to feel “icky,” but there is a recognized right to privacy. Just what that entails is what we’re talking about. @Sue22 said this:
I, too, think this is a reasonable compromise that respects the right of privacy of everybody involved–but does everybody agree? Or does anybody prefer to argue that, say, a ten-year-old’s right of privacy doesn’t extend to this situation?
Edited to add this (to make this post even longer): I think we all have to recognize that our culture has a pretty strong nudity taboo, partly from religion and partly from culture. We still have laws against public nudity in most places. I think the fact that we have separate bathroom and changing facilities for men and women in the first place is a manifestation of this nudity taboo–the taboo is primarily against seeing members of the opposite sex in the nude. My point is that this cultural taboo becomes part of the reasonable expectation of privacy. This is not going to be all that easy for high courts to figure out.
Also, somebody mentioned “hate speech.” There is a common misconception that “hate speech” is not protected speech under the Constitution’s free speech clause. This is not true. There is no “hate speech” exception to federal protection. So it makes no sense to say that a baker (or a sign-maker) could refuse to print hate speech while being required to print other speech with which he disagrees.
On the cakes, photographers, etc., I think eventually the Supreme Court will have to consider where to draw lines between “public accommodations” and “expressive behavior” that amounts to speech or the free exercise of religion. It won’t be easy. How they come out may depend on who is on the Court at the time. I feel confident that most, if not all, members of the Court would rule that (1) if there is a public accommodation law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, a baker will not be permitted to refuse to sell cakes that he has in stock to gay people–no different from a shoe store; (2) there is some level of expressive behavior, such as painting pictures, writing poems or songs, or ghostwriting books, that the Court will say that such a person cannot be required to transmit a message with which he disagrees, even if he offers his services to the public; (3) there would be some point at which a customer’s statement that he plans to “misuse” the product will allow vendors to refuse to sell it to him on religious or political grounds–such as if he says he wants to buy copies of the Koran in order to burn them.
And finally: being forced to do something you don’t want to do is “harm,” even if other people disagree with your reasons for not wanting to do it.
“Also, somebody mentioned “hate speech.” There is a common misconception that “hate speech” is not protected speech under the Constitution’s free speech clause. This is not true. There is no “hate speech” exception to federal protection. So it makes no sense to say that a baker (or a sign-maker) could refuse to print hate speech while being required to print other speech with which he disagrees.”
The cake maker is not discriminating against one class of people if he refuses to inscribe hate speech on a cake. Most likely - the baker doesn’t inscribe any hate speech on any of its products - but if the baker inscribed Happy Wedding John and Jane - the baker has to inscribe Happy Wedding Sue and Mary - otherwise the baker is discriminating against a particular class of people. Also, “God Hates Gays” is not religious speech so not protected. It has no other meaning other than as an expression of hatred for a particular group.
Just like a cake maker isn’t required to make a cake shaped like a penis or a vagina either, if that is not a product the baker sells.
I’m worried for kids who may be encountering adults of the opposite sex in public restrooms.
Why? Seriously when I was a kid, I went into the bathroom with my dad all the time because generally I’d be with him and not my mom. Especially at busy venues, he didn’t want me going into another bathroom alone.
It was NO BIG DEAL. No one cared and no one is traumatized.
Besides, kids aren’t going to know (nor is it relevant) what sex an individual was assigned at birth in a bathroom.
This is NOT A PROBLEM. Stop using “BUT THINK OF THE CHILDREN!” as an excuse for your discomfort and/or bigotry.
When he was little I’d take my son into the women’s restroom because there are stalls and he’d have privacy and I could look out for him. But typically men’s restrooms have urinals where men expose themselves. However a trans male would be using the women’s restroom with it’s stalls and wouldn’t be exposing his ‘parts’ to girls.
@romanigypsyeyes, as I pointed out earlier, the fact that something doesn’t bother you is not really a strong argument about whether it does, or should, bother other people.
Also:
There are a number of problems with this. First of all, this conflates discriminating against a class of people with a desire not to “speak” a message one disagrees with. (Note: I can imagine a court drawing a line between designing a custom cake for a same-sex couple–requiring it–on the grounds that it isn’t speech–isn’t “expressive” enough, and not requiring a specific message to be written on the cake if the baker disagrees with it–on the basis that it’s “speech.”)
Second, “God Hates Gays” is entirely protected speech. In addition to being religious in nature, speech expressing hatred for a particular group is protected. So if you’re going to say that a baker must print any message that is protected speech under the constitution, he’ll have to print “God Hates Gays.” He won’t have to print, “I Will Kill You,” because that’s a threat, and he might not have to print something obscene. But if you’re going to exempt him from printing things he strongly disagrees with, “God Hates Gays” or a swastika aren’t really different from “God Loves Gays” or “Happy Wedding Bill and Joe.” As I said before, this idea that “hate speech” isn’t protected leads to a lot of confusion.
I think that probably the majority of urinals have dividers between them so that to “expose” yourself you’d have to be dangerously far back or the person subjected to the exposure would have had to be looking very intently.
Why is the trans male in the women’s restroom? Do you mean in NC? Fwiw, most men’s rooms have stalls also.
Just because it is protected speech ( he can’t be jailed for saying it) doesn’t mean a baker or anyone else has to inscribe it or print it.
See the reasons why the Colorado baker did not discriminate against the person who wanted “God Hates Gays” on a cake shaped like a bible.
"The agency’s decision found that the baker did not discriminate against Jack based on his creed. Instead, officials state the evidence shows Silva refused to make the cakes because the customer’s requests included “derogatory language and imagery.”
I agree with the result in the Colorado case, but not with the reasoning. “Derogatory” is a pretty vague term. Rather, the better argument is that it would violate the baker’s free speech rights to require her to transmit a message with which she disagrees. What if the guy goes in next week and asks for a cake that says, “Marriage should be between one man and one woman.” Is that “derogatory?”
Why? Bathrooms have stalls. When you use a public restroom, do you normally see other peoples’ private parts? I can’t remember that ever happening to me.
It happens in men’s rooms all the time. To bring a college reference here, the men’s rooms at the Yale Bowl feature long troughs that serve as the urinals.
But I think the issue is really more relevant in locker rooms, especially if they have communal showers, which is apparently still the case in some secondary schools.