Posted on 05/27/2004 1:58:55 PM PDT by adam_az
FREMONT, Calif. - The name on the birth certificate was Edward Araujo Jr., but the teenager preferred the first name Gwen. At age 17, before getting a chance to make the name change official, Araujo was beaten and strangled after the people she thought were her friends found out she was biologically male.
This week, Araujo's family asked a court for a posthumous name change to Gwen Amber Rose Araujo.
"She's Gwen to me, and I'm her mother," Sylvia Guerrero said outside the courthouse. "This is who she was. She's transgender and she's Gwen."
Superior Court Commissioner Thomas Surh called the request "a novel situation" and said he would let Guerrero know his decision in about a month.
Araujo's family said she had used the name Gwen for years, convinced from an early age that her sexual and biological identities conflicted.
In October 2002, police found her body in a shallow grave 150 miles east of her home in the San Francisco suburb of Newark.
The man who took police to the site, 21-year-old Jaron Nabors, later said Araujo was viciously beaten and strangled following the revelation of her gender.
Nabors pleaded guilty to manslaughter. Three other men, including two who were sexually active with Araujo, are on trial in a case expected to go to a jury next week.
Officially recognizing Araujo as Gwen has symbolic importance, said Christopher Daley of the San Francisco-based Transgender Law Center, which helped the family request the name change.
"The courts serve as a voice for the people of California," Daley said. "By filing this petition, we gave the people an opportunity to explicitly recognize Gwen as Gwen."
Araujo picked the name Gwen after the singer Gwen Stefani, Guerrero said. Guerrero added Amber Rose because those were names she picked in pregnancy, believing she was carrying a girl.
"I lost Eddie a long time ago, and I had to say goodbye to Eddie," Guerrero said. "Unfortunately, to Gwen, too."
"After reading Talblack's post I found myself wondering if this (requiring legal name on tombstone) would be the same if the remains were cremated,then taken to another resting place and the name given --"
Yep! It's the same. People try it and when the cemetary finds out the fees are cahrged the name recorded. In fact they now keep an eye out for the urns. Calvary Cemetary in Queens NY recently had to deal with this.
The bottom line is that burial is an "historical act" in that it is the disposition of a once living person. All other considerations aside (and there are many)people in the future won't have access to the truth if the records don't exsist or are muddled.
I prefer to refer to that type of surgery as genital mutilation. There is no way he ever could have been a female no matter how much surgery he would have gotten.
I don't see why people go along with these people's false perceptions of reality.
I have no idea how those men could have had sex with him and not known he was a man. It boggles the mind!
"the girl yelled to the young men now on trial for murder..."
Ok, I can't say what I had planned... About them not receiving a medal, about how "he/it" won't be a loss, etc. etc. I'm so sick of this crap I guess I'm finally at a loss for words. Buh-bye, gwennie with the weenie!
Regarding the photo you posted, do you know who the poor innocent little baby belonged to? A relative, adopted child, sacrifice to satan???
Pschaw. As I said, it's only rape if "gee, I wish I hadn't done that" date rape is rape. By law it is only rape if a sex act is committed against a person's consent by threatening force towards them or someone else or taking advantage of their unconsciousness or inebriation. Impersonating someone of the opposite sex to do a sex act does not constitute rape (unless, in some states, the minor successfully impersonated the men's wives). There is no evidence that any of these men were not able to give consent at the time of the sex act. True, if they had possession of all of the facts, they would not have given consent, but legally that doesn't constitute rape.
As I said, it was wrong, dangerous, and stupid to lie. But on the flip side it was very wrong for these men to collaborate in killing him. Definitely something like that would cause extreme anger and humiliation, but a *real man* would accept his share of responsibility and realize maybe his sexual practices need reconsidering if he can accept sexual favors from someone and not even be sure of their sex. Instead, these scum committed a brutal murder. I would be more inclined to be sympathetic if it were a sudden thing. But they initially were laughing about it, and then got slowly more angry, and ended up beating the boy for two hours. This isn't something where the disclosure caused a sudden rage and one of them stabbed or shot the transvestite immediately after finding out, causing sudden death. Any person capable of a drawn-out deliberate murder like that is capable of equally horrible things that perhaps would garner more of your sympathy, like beating to death a cheating girlfriend or a granny too slow handing over her purse, for instance.
I never called it a hate crime. I know this was a personal thing. I think hate crime legislation is an attempt at mind control, and makes some crimes more severe depending on who they are directed at. While motive can be a consideration, most of the time it shouldn't affect the charges. This was a cold-blooded premeditated murder, and the killers should be executed.
If you'll notice, I did.
If the men knew that they were having sex with a man why bother to send a woman in to find out for sure?
Pretty pathetic that they actual had to go send someone to check, isn't it? You'd think they might have covered that little detail before getting intimate.
I suppose you do not believe that any crime has been committed when someone videos (without permission) himself having sex with a woman (maybe even a one night stand).
Yes, it's invasion of privacy or improper photography or visual recording or whatever local laws call it. It's a crime, but it's not rape, and it doesn't deserve a slow, violent death.
Hateful. Just hateful.
Something in the way she moves
Attracts me like no other lover
Something in the way she woos me
I don't want to leave her now
You know I believe her now
Somewhere in her smile she knows
That I don't need no other lover
Something in her style that shows me
Don't want to leave her now
You know I believe her now
You're asking me will my love grow
I don't know, I don't know
You stick around now it may show
I don't know, I don't know
Something in the way she knows
And all I have to do is think of her
Something in the things she shows me
Don't want to leave her now
You know I believe her now
[Something, Beatle George]
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