Fox News On the New California Law

[Carolyn Marie]

http://www.salon.com/2013/08/13/transgender_rights_make_fox_news_hosts_really_really_mad/

Carolyn Marie

[VickySGV]

Its nice to know that our site here is not on the internet, nor are the other better web sites, and oh yeah, even the APA² and AMA, and WPATH sites do not exist to Fox news staff!! My word, maybe I do not exist, in which case even the State Of California does not exist.

[Guest KimberlyF]

There are many here who were critical of the law but OMG! Fox News! Those people are really really bad! Salon & Fox are two sides of the same coin.

Is everything they said wrong? We can discuss them point by point.

"And they are also so confused about what being transgender even means!"

I would love to see the author or any member on this board come up with a definition of the word that everyone here likes and agrees with. Since there are so many different opinions on the definitions could one almost claim confusion, especially if they were not directly impacted by it?

Bad laws cause anger and backlash. This is a bad law. People on this board have that opinion other than myself.

[Guest Bellexia]

It's almost as if the people on Fox have not heard of this new thing called "google"

[Guest Mia J]

Ahhhhhhh. Fox News still being Fox News. What else did we expect from them.

Mia

[Guest Jenn348]

Check out the comments!

I've had luck educating a few people who wanted to listen, and there are plenty of the typical wise-crackers talking about how they're going to use this to invade a locker room, but there's one loon in particular called 'gbh' who makes up the wildest stories about a sibling who had SRS and then HRT, both without counseling or labwork. For this reason, all of us trans people (FTMs included) are doomed to die from a stroke if we take HRT for long enough.

Anybody else care to sign in on the comments and help dogpile this jerk? He even links to Laura's and claims that this is 'proof' that we're not real women (those of us that are MTF) because a real woman wouldn't like so much girly stuff.

[Guest KimberlyF]

It's clear from reading the comments that people think the law is more reasonable than it is. The law never mentions any kind of certification or therapist or doctor backing up a claim of gender identity and it also never mentions HRT.

If you are male bodied but ID as female, you can now compete on the girl's basketball team and never take estro in Cal.

[Drea]

There are many here who were critical of the law but OMG! Fox News! Those people are really really bad! Salon & Fox are two sides of the same coin.

Is everything they said wrong? We can discuss them point by point.

"And they are also so confused about what being transgender even means!"

I would love to see the author or any member on this board come up with a definition of the word that everyone here likes and agrees with. Since there are so many different opinions on the definitions could one almost claim confusion, especially if they were not directly impacted by it?

Bad laws cause anger and backlash. This is a bad law. People on this board have that opinion other than myself.

I guess it goes to show that people don't care much less about the facts than the messenger.

You are right that you couldn't get consensus on this site as to what transgender is much less when you throw in folks oriented substantially different than what is typical on this site. One can be sure that folks who crossdress once every blue moon may consider themselves transgender. Effeminate gay male that have some degree of female presentation may very well consider themselves transgender.

And as usual, there is total denial that anyone might exploit a law so broad when there are real world examples that show that some will.

[Carolyn Marie]

Bad laws cause anger and backlash. This is a bad law. People on this board have that opinion other than myself.

Yes, Kimberly. I am one of those who criticized the law. But only those parts of it that concerned locker rooms, showers and sports teams. I suggested that it should be amended to fix those problems.

Fox News focused exclusively on the restroom issue, the one part of the law that made perfect sense and is completely defensible. It isn't even about the facts, its the entire attitude expressed by all three supposed journalists. Their comments were snarky, borderline hysterical, and ridiculous. A student could claim he felt transgendered for one day and would be given access to the girls restroom? Really? Has that ever happened anywhere? Would such a student face discipline for pulling such a prank? The arguments were specious and the attitude expressed was that being TG/TS is completely bogus, such kids aren't worth worrying about, and this will cause thousands of parents to withdraw their children from school out of fear.

The fact that the LA Unified School District, the second largest in the nation, has had this policy in effect for 10 years without any known problems, wasn't even mentioned by the hysterical trio.

Fox feeds on paranoia, and does so shamelessly, repeatedly and over many different issues. Presenting both sides of any story is not in their best interests, and you rarely see them do it. The people they have on are the people who are paid to agree with the Fox News world view.

As for Michelle Malkin, she is an expert on being a conservative commentator and writer, and little else. She has written four books, one of which is a treatise on how the internment of Japanese Americans in WWII was completely justified. That tells you all you need to know about her world view and politics.

So that's why many of us are upset, Kimberly. Not because there are no valid points in their argument. It's hard to consider the validity of their points, when they make a mockery of my validity as a human being.

Carolyn Marie

[Guest Lupi]

God, what a bunch of (censored plural)!

[VickySGV]

Happily, I know of where to go online to get behind the scenes so to speak on how California bills progress into law. The discussions in the Legislative Analysis of the bill at 8 different stages of its progress show where the legislator had information on the concerns that many of us have had, and how they were resolved leading up to the affirmative vote. The underlying law to this bill, which is an amendment to law that has existed for several years does show careful thought and consideration for all parties. It cites law from other states as well that can be used in putting this one into action.

The law does affirm school poiicies from San Francisco and Los Angeles Unified School districts that allow for cis gendered students who would be uncomfortable with transgender students to use enhanced privacy facilities at their desire, but while TG students are to be made aware of those facilities, they are not forced to use just those. An interesting point made was that the "discomfort" of the other users of the facilities was decided in a case involving racial and ethnic bathroom discrimination quite a few years ago. The undelying law also relys on another piece of law where the transgender student must have an "ongoing and consistent" presentation as the non birth gender, thus the worries of flip flop are mooted. Other citations in the analyses included the California Interscholastic Federation who can cover the hormone issues under existing law regarding performance enhancing drugs. AB1266 is directed at local school districts, and the existing law that this one amends has to do with class counseling toward careers and scholatic course work that must be open to all students.

The opponents of the bill were noted to have LOST a court suit against SB777 which was the predecessor to this bill because the oponents did not have sufficient facts of harm to constitute a cause of action in court. I did not read the full ruling of dismissal, but I can understand what really happened.

Its been a couple of years since I have done this type of research, and it was fun to get back to. I also have about 5 megabytes of stuff I downloaded

[Guest Jenn348]

Happily, I know of where to go online to get behind the scenes so to speak on how California bills progress into law. The discussions in the Legislative Analysis of the bill at 8 different stages of its progress show where the legislator had information on the concerns that many of us have had, and how they were resolved leading up to the affirmative vote. The underlying law to this bill, which is an amendment to law that has existed for several years does show careful thought and consideration for all parties. It cites law from other states as well that can be used in putting this one into action.

The law does affirm school poiicies from San Francisco and Los Angeles Unified School districts that allow for cis gendered students who would be uncomfortable with transgender students to use enhanced privacy facilities at their desire, but while TG students are to be made aware of those facilities, they are not forced to use just those. An interesting point made was that the "discomfort" of the other users of the facilities was decided in a case involving racial and ethnic bathroom discrimination quite a few years ago. The undelying law also relys on another piece of law where the transgender student must have an "ongoing and consistent" presentation as the non birth gender, thus the worries of flip flop are mooted. Other citations in the analyses included the California Interscholastic Federation who can cover the hormone issues under existing law regarding performance enhancing drugs. AB1266 is directed at local school districts, and the existing law that this one amends has to do with class counseling toward careers and scholatic course work that must be open to all students.

The opponents of the bill were noted to have LOST a court suit against SB777 which was the predecessor to this bill because the oponents did not have sufficient facts of harm to constitute a cause of action in court. I did not read the full ruling of dismissal, but I can understand what really happened.

Its been a couple of years since I have done this type of research, and it was fun to get back to. I also have about 5 megabytes of stuff I downloaded

That's the thing people don't understand about laws--you can't take them alone! You need to read the other laws and cases before claiming to know what it really means.

[Guest KimberlyF]

I just wrote a long post and deleted it by mistake. One of those mornings.

Anyway, here is the entire California Education code
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/.html/edc_table_of_contents.html

Here's SB 777 from 2007
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/07-08/bill/sen/sb_0751-0800/sb_777_bill_20071012_chaptered.html

And the latest changes SB 1266 which adds to that.
http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml

Big changes are that now legally TG is about internal ID without regard of legal information. It doesn't matter what all those forms in the office say, if you say you're a girl, you're a girl. And nobody can keep you from any sports teams.

Edited August 15, 2013 by KimberlyF
Corrected Legal Code title

[Carolyn Marie]

.And the latest changes SB 1266 which adds to that.

http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml

.

This link will take you directly to the bill page. Kim's link only takes you to the search page.

http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201320140AB1266&search_keywords=

In reading the bill analysis, the court cases noted by Vicky are mentioned. However, neither the analyses nor the bill language provides any guidance to school districts on how or under what circumstances a student's privacy rights should be protected. I maintain that it is not valid to compare an instance of a biological male sharing a locker or shower with a biological female, with court cases involving African American people sharing facilities with Caucasian people.

It is my hope that school districts, in applying this law, will allow for reasonable privacy accommodations for students in those rare instances that occur. I would have preferred that such guidance had been provided for in the law.

I also note that the Analyses mentions that the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) has guidelines regarding gender issues, and school districts may seek guidance from them. The Bill does not require that either, but hopefully, the CIF will require schools to seek such guidance.

Carolyn Marie

Edited August 15, 2013 by Carolyn Marie
Added new info from Bill Analyses

[VickySGV]

I believe it was in the first consideration by the Senate (but I am not going back to check) where a specific existing section of the law regarding student privacy was brought up as covering the "enhanced privacy" rights needed in this situation, and school districts are already required by that law to make students aware of those facilities for such things as special medical needs or even special religious needs. These are laws not originally aimed at transgender people, but are applicable and have a history of use and enforcement. No one section of any of our California Codes stands alone and thus having specific language in this bill, which added only a few words to an existing statute regarding school class availability and referral by counselors and administrators was going to really muddy things up.

I know about some of the laws there that go back to truly ANCIENT history since they applied to me as a pre-teen and teenager. I had severe Eczema that was not contageous at all, but did badly upset other students and their parents, and during normal PE in HS, I was to use a special set of Team showers, and if I needed to apply special creams to the eczema areas which were not in public view, there were un-marked, but open secret, rest rooms I could use, and very much wanted to. (I did have long terms of PE exclusion due to the rash however. I am almost glad I did not understand GD back then, the other body issues left me in physical and emotional pain that flash back on me even now.)