California Restroom Bill

[Guest -guest-]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2355571/California-approves-mandating-K-12-transgender-students-allowed-use-restroom-choosing.html

[Cyndee]

Jerry Moonbeam will sign the the law. What happens in CA historically leads the country socially, and reflects the wave of "gender indentity vs birth sex" thinking.

It's really good for CA T students, however the reactions are mixed, as a parent of 2 daughters I can truly understand the counter arguments.

Comments such as some 14 year old straight boys will claim transgender to enter girls space however is not going to pass the mustard, there will be some type of qualifications such as doctor or therapist recommendations required.

C -

[VickySGV]

What is needed next here in the great "Golden State" is a better science curriculum that teaches children about human biology and hygiene uniformly and at an age BEFORE accidents can have tragic consequences. As a long long time youth group leader what I saw was that it was the kids teaching their peers bad information about their sex and sexuality that led to the most bizzare behavior and also to inappropriate expressions of curiosity and experimentation. The parents of the worst offenders were always piously spouting that it was "the parents job" to teach those things to "THEIR" (in a personal property ownership sense) children, but who had not gotten around to it before the first pregnancy scare from a son's girlfriend.

[Guest Jenn348]

It's interesting to see the differing priorities from state to state. In places like California, government defers to the individual on social freedoms but the individual has to defer to the state on economic and most technological freedoms. Places like Texas are the opposite, where social freedoms (especially for social minorities) are routinely violated while economic and technological freedoms are mostly respected.

[Cyndee]

It's interesting to see the differing priorities from state to state. In places like California, government defers to the individual on social freedoms but the individual has to defer to the state on economic and most technological freedoms. Places like Texas are the opposite, where social freedoms (especially for social minorities) are routinely violated while economic and technological freedoms are mostly respected.

Very well put Jenn and so true !

[Carolyn Marie]

I have mixed emotions about this bill. On its face, it seems like a good bill, with no down sides. An earlier version had specific references to students being allowed to use showers and locker rooms of their preferred gender. I was appalled by that, and wrote a letter to my legislator. The final version only references "facilities," so its open to interpretation, which is almost as bad.

@Cynthia, the bill contains no requirements whatsoever regarding therapist or medical documentation or recommendations. It really does hinge on what the child says they prefer.

I like the idea of kids being allowed to be their true selves in school. But I fear a backlash that will be hurtful in the long run. All it takes is one person gaming the system, or one district allowing an MTF child to use the shower, with no regard for the natal girls sharing it. This bill needed more discussion, more safeguards, and more thought. My letter to my representative was not answered. It would have been nice to have had a dialogue.

Carolyn Marie

[Guest Debbie_L]

I was born intersexed, no testes until I was 11. The boys room had no doors on the sit down stalls. I could go standing up, but if I sat, the boys would crowd around the open missing door to see what I didn't have when I stood up. Later, on the playground, they would target me because I was a sissy, because I was different.

Of course, this was back in 1962. We dealt with the Cuban Missle Crisis, and the treatment for transsexuals was daily electro-shock for daily for a few months. If that didn't work there was always lobotomy.

That kind of brutality drove me deeper into secrecy, seclusion, and isolation. Even though I spent years in therapy, my therapists REFUSED to even let me discuss my desire to be a girl. In 1964, I lived with the house mother for the girls, and spend evenings and week-ends with the girls and completely thrived. I danced, my asthma almost completely disappeared, in less than 6 weeks! When they tried to put me with the boy's house-mother and have me play with the boys, I almost had to be hospitalized several times.

From 1961 to 1968, I had to be hospitalized dozens of times, much of it asthma, made dangerously severe as a result of beatings and attacks.

The notion of some boy claiming to be a girl just so he can sneak a peek at the girls is absurd. He might get to see something, but if he was obviously a boy, he would probably be beaten severely by the other boys for being a "Sissy". The problem is when a child who presents successfully as a girl is forced to use the boy's room, they became a target for horrible abuse and violence by both girls and boys.

Imagine it's your child. Though born male, she completely presents and is perceived as a girl. She plays with girls all the time, and has done so since she was 2-3 years old, all the way to kindergarten. Then, she is forced to use the boy's room, and as a result is then beaten 4 times a day by dozens of boys, once before school, once during lunch, once during recess, and once on the way home. Each beating involves rocks the size of baseballs, sticks the size of baseball bats, being tripped and kicked by a dozen or so boys. The lunch and recess beatings are conducted under the supervision of school staff. Each night, you come home to see your daughter covered with bruises, cuts, torn clothing, and either crying a lot, or very quiet. Every night, she wakes up screaming, having nightmares of the more severe of the beatings.

Her grades begin to suffer. The teacher tells you she has stopped participating in class, refuses to read, and doesn't even try to answer questions, but answers correctly when asked directly. At home, you see that she is not only reading, but she's reading above her grade level, even by two or three grade levels.

What if she tried to kill herself? What if she tried several times? What if she tried to mutilate herself so bad she had to be hospitalized?

If you knew that all that pain and suffering could end by simply allowing her to live out her school years as a girl, and NEVER being treated as a boy, even if she has to start at a new school, wouldn't you do everything you could to give your daughter the chance at a normal and happy life?

If you are transsexual, you probably know exactly what I'm talking about. If not, it's nearly impossible to imagine, especially if you don't have children or your children are normal and happy.

Detractors often only look at the world through their narrow and severely limited point of view. They see the world from a position of wealth, power, conformity, and carefully guarded "normal". Even if they hate it, they figure it's just the cost of peace and security. Many struggle with their conformity as much as any of us, and need to justify their choices to conform by trying to force others to conform to their vision of the world. It's not their fault, they are just ignorant. They choose to ignore the experiences of others that don't match with their own experience.

[Cyndee]

@Cynthia, the bill contains no requirements whatsoever regarding therapist or medical documentation or recommendations. It really does hinge on what the child says they prefer.

Ok Carolyn I stand corrected, thanks. I can't believe they would leave that out, but you are closer to this. Perhaps there maybe discretion at the local school level or district level. Should'nt common sense play a role, is that too much to ask ? Don't write a law that is so easily exploited, it's gonna hurt us in the long run.

C -