Posted on 10/02/2015 7:08:25 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Courts, businesses, schools and legislatures grapple with transitioning reality.
Caitlyn Jenner is now a woman in the eyes of the law. The transgendered woman, who has become an international symbol of the right to choose one’s own sexual identity, legally switched genders Sept. 25.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Gerald Rosenberg signed the paperwork. Now the woman who was born William Bruce Jenner on Oct. 28, 1949, can get a new driver’s license and Social Security card, along with all of the other government documents that everyone needs.
But will that be enough to allow the former Olympic athlete to enter the women’s locker room at Planet Fitness? Maybe. And if she does, will Caitlyn’s new legal status be enough for the women who would be changing their clothes and showering alongside her?
The answer has to be “no” for Michigan woman Yvette Cormier. She has sued her local Planet Fitness franchise and the national gym chain’s parent company because her membership was cancelled after Yvette refused to stop warning other women about a transgendered woman — male appendage still intact — that she saw in the showers.
Her suit claims emotional distress, numerous violations of the Michigan Consumer Protection Act, and an invasion of privacy were all caused by Planet Fitness’ policy of allowing transgenders to change and shower with women.
However, the judge hearing the case is having trouble dealing with the allegation at the heart of Yvette’s legal action: that simply the presence of a man claiming to be a woman in the locker room and showers of Planet Fitness constitutes sexual harassment under the Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act.
Midland County, Mich., Circuit Court Judge Michael Beale pointed out in a 90-minute hearing that Yvette was never touched by the transgendered woman in question. But her attorney, David Kallman, argued a transgender-friendly policy is “sexual in nature by allowing men in the women’s locker room,” not to mention the fact that women and men are naked together in the same locker room and taking showers together.
Arthur Pressman, an attorney for Planet Fitness, spoke for his client when he told reporters, “We don’t judge our members and we don’t allow them to judge each other.”
Try telling that to the parents of children in the Troy City Schools in Troy, Ohio.
Kids in that school system are allowed to choose which restroom and locker room they use, depending on their “sense of gender,” regardless of which sex they were assigned at birth.
“I think there’s a lot of unnecessary fears around this. For our son, who started his transition in high school, he used the boy’s bathroom and it was honestly a non-event,” Laticia Miller, parent of a transgender student, told WKEF-TV after the school district held a public meeting led by the head of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital’s transgendered clinic to help parents of the rest of the kids deal with their fears.
“We need to understand showering or dressing next to a member of the transgendered is nothing to get excited about,” a social worker explained to parents during a similar meeting in an upstate New York school district.
“Gender originates in the brain. It has nothing to do with external genitalia at all and it is not a choice for transgender people,” Patricia Jordan told WICZ-TV.
It is still all about external genitalia in Massachusetts, where the state’s governor and a dozen of its largest cities are at odds over what the Massachusetts Family Institute calls “the Bathroom Bills.”
Ironically, the debate is taking place in the fictional home state of Cage, Fish & Associates, the law firm where Ally McBeal and her associates shared a unisex restroom [1] on the Fox TV show.
Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh and eleven of his mayoral peers announced their support for Senate Bill 735 and its companion, House Bill 1577, in early September.
The legislation would extend Massachusetts’ non-discrimination laws by adding gender identity to the list of protected classes, granting explicit protection for transgender people in public spaces.
“Everyone has the right to enjoy retail stores, hotels, restaurants, hospitals, theaters, public parks, and public transportation,” said Mayor Walsh. Left unspoken by Walsh is the real intent of the bills: to make sure everyone can choose which bathroom to use.
If the Legislature passes what Walsh has endorsed, Gov. Charlie Baker (R) has promised to veto it. Although he has not issued an official statement, Baker has said through his top aides that he would prefer the state’s non-discrimination laws be left alone.
Kris Mineau, the board chairman and president emeritus of the Massachusetts Family Institute, has been much more outspoken in opposition to the legislation.
“If House Bill 1577 becomes law, men will be allowed to shower with women and young girls in gyms, and schoolchildren as young as kindergarten will be allowed to co-mingle in bathrooms,” Mineau told the Daily Item. “No law should make whole segments of the population feel unsafe and exploit their privacy and security.”
And then there is what actress Courtney Thorne-Smith, who played the role of Georgia Thomas on the Ally McBeal show, said about using a unisex bathroom: “There is just so much room to play in there.”
Yes...you idiots....
Ask the black robes.
They know everything.
Yes.
Next question...
If repeating a Seinfeld joke in the workplace constitutes sexual harassment, then surely forcing a woman to view a penis in a women’s locker room does. But what do I know? That’s common sense thinking, so it doesn’t apply anymore.
But colleges have to provide “safe spaces” for students who feel threatened by simply hearing the word “rape” to retreat to.
How does things so simple get so complicated...
If women shouldn’t be bothered by showering with a tranny then the tranny shouldn’t be bothered by showering with men.
Locker room sex reassignment surgery might be needed in certain cases.
These idiots need to relearn the meaning of words most of us learned as toddlers: “man”, “woman”.
No, you nutball. You are the one who needs to understand that normal people do not care to be vulnerable and stark naked when there is a sexual freak in the immediate vicinity.
I'm willing to bet that's not true. I guess little girls are forced to shower in school gym classes. Obviously, it would be inappropriate to allow men to use the school showers when little girls are forced to use them.
I just can't imagine any school permitting that and I think there is such a thing as overselling opposition to a proposed law. There is enough really wrong with this kind of proposal. There is no need to exaggerate.
At a minimum, any laws in this area should begin with a recognition that no one should ever be forced to shower in public places if they are for any reason uncomfortable. I know that some kids may stink a bit by the end of the day, but you can't go down the crazy road that this proposed law will take us without making the whole thing voluntary.
How many off color jokes can the lawyers tell in the court room before the judge throws them out? And on what grounds? retorical
“We don’t judge our members and we don’t allow them to judge each other.”
Umm...you judged the woman who complained.
State mandated makes it unquestioned of government.
However, her DNA still says she is a man.
And, DNA don't lie.
So let me get this straight....these sex-freaks supposedly can’t control “who they are” sexually, but can absolutely control themselves in a mixed-sex locker room with no clothes on?
These idiots are the same people who decry religious people because they lack absolute proof of a deity, yet we are supposed to suspend actual proved reality and accept that a person with male DNA and a male penis is somehow a woman because he FEELS that way.
If a person dresses as Napoleon and demands that we turn over the government of France to him, are we required to go along with his insanity as well? Or is it simply people who suffer from sexual insanities that we are to humor.
.......with a penis.
Yes.
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