In Letter to the editor: MSHSL change, published Wednesday in the Morris Sun Tribune, Hancock school board chairman Barry Nelson writes:
Yes, that means a natural born male can, after hormone treatments, play on a girls basketball team as a girl with full access to the girls locker room and shower facilities. You can close your eyes now for a moment and imagine your teenage daughter, granddaughter, or niece in that situation.
We'll take a pass on following Nelson's advice.
Nelson is engaging in the sort of fear-mongering that The Advocate describes in Minn. Passes Much-Debated Trans Student Athlete Policy:
Essentially, a transgender student needs to provide written proof from parents, friends, teachers and health professionals of their "sincerely held, uniform and consistent gender identity" to play on a team that's not the gender listed on the birth certificate. If the student's school denies access, he/she can appeal through MSHSL. This draft also exempts nonpublic schools.
That's a lot of work just to be able to shower with 14-year-old girls. My experience, as a mother and high school coach, is that 14-year-old girls don't shower with other 14-year-old girls anyway. They go home and take a shower. So, heads up, predatory 14-year-old transgender athletes—all that gender changing could be for nothing.
Also, it challenges the imagination to envision large numbers of 14-year-old boys who identify as girls, who are simultaneously dealing with algebra, acne, Friday night and more than the usual body angst, wrestling scholarships (by the way, no 14-year-old has a scholarship in hand) away from girls, shattering dreams, and ending girls' sports.
The CPLAction's brand of holy cow-crazy fearmongering, though, relies on a vivid imagination. And not much else.
CPL spins Fayetteville Civil Right Ordinance into "Bathroom Bill"
Today, the Child Protection League tweeted
Voters overturn "BathroomBill" that allowed biological males who claim to be females to use women's bathrooms http://t.co/7LDeXaLusi
— CPL Action (@CPLAction) December 12, 2014
The link led to a CNS News article, Duggars Win -- Transgender Bathroom Bill Overturned, with the lede:
A city ordinance in Fayetteville, Ark, dubbed the transgender bathroom bill because it allows biological males who claim they are females to use restroom facilities for women, was overturned on Tuesday, Dec. 9, largely because of the intense lobbying efforts of Michelle Duggar, the matriarch of the reality-TV show 19 Kids & Counting, carried by The Learning Channel.
In Tuesday’s special election the rule, also called the Civil Rights Ordinance, was defeated: 7,523 votes to 7,040 votes, a 52% to 48% victory.
Compare that focus on transgendered people in the Media Research Center-operated CNS News to Tuesday's coverage in the Northwest Arkansas local paper via NWAOnline in Fayetteville's Civil Rights Administration Ordinance Repealed. Staff writer Joel Walsh writes:
Voters struck down the city's Civil Rights Administration ordinance in a special election Tuesday.
According to final but unofficial results from the Washington County Election Commission, 7,523 voters (52 percent) cast ballots to repeal the ordinance and 7,040 voters (48 percent) voted against repeal.
The ordinance, which the City Council approved Aug. 20 to prohibit local acts of discrimination based on someone's sexual orientation, gender identity and a number of other characteristics, will not take effect.
"The entire ordinance process was the problem," Travis Story, general counsel for the group Repeal 119, said from a watch party Tuesday night at the Hilton Garden Inn off Wedington Drive. "The City Council never ... brought all sides together to see if there was a problem and, if a problem exists, what we can do about that problem.
"Residents of Fayetteville said no to (the ordinance) because it was a bad law."
Repeal 119 submitted signatures from more than 4,200 residents to the City Clerk's office Sept. 20 to put the Civil Rights Administration ordinance to a public vote.
Alderman Matthew Petty, the ordinance's sponsor, said he was disappointed but not discouraged after results were announced at Fresco Cafe & Pub, where supporters of the group Keep Fayetteville Fair gathered. . . .
Tuesday's election results were similar to a 1998 referendum on a City Council-approved Human Dignity resolution. The resolution would have added "familial status" and "sexual orientation" to Fayetteville's nondiscrimination policy for city employees. When it went to a public referendum, the resolution was overturned by a vote of 7,822 (58 percent) to 5,736 (42 percent).
Unlike Minnesota, Arkansas does not have a statewide law banning discrimination on the basis of sexual identity.
The Nelson letter--which ends with a call for contacting legislators about the new MSHSL policies and the CPL decision to share an article framing a broad municipal civil rights ordinance as a "bathroom bill" leads us to wonder if Representative Joyce Peppin's call for legislative interference in the MSHSL's policy-making will be a Trojan Horse to wheel in an effort to repeal Minnesota's Equal Protection statute.
The equal protection law, rather than our 2013 law expanding the freedom to marry to all adult couples, is what prevents private businesses that offer goods and services from refusing to accommodate same-sex couples planning their weddings. Thus, fear-mongering against transgender teen athletes might be seen as a path to restoring discrimination.
However, Bluestem suspects that demonizing transgender teens is probably a much easier way to keep the socially conservative base enraged and mobilized than actually attempting a full-blown repeal of marriage equality and, well, equal treatment under the law.
Like churn against reproductive rights, this one could stoke the base for years.
Photo: Screenshot of an online ad run by the CPL, via Shower obsession: Conservative media lends voice to anti-transgender views by Andy Birkey at The Column.
If you appreciate Bluestem Prairie, you can mail contributions (payable to Sally Jo Sorensen P.O. Box 108, Maynard MN 56260) or use the paypal button below:
Email subscribers can contribute via this link to paypal; use email sally.jo.sorensen at gmail.com as recipient.
Comments