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Strollerderby
7-year-old Bobby Montoya dresses and acts like a girl.
Bobby Montoya is biologically a boy. But he is called she. She looks like a girl, dresses like a girl and acts like a girl. So it was no surprise when she wanted to become a Girl Scout.
But, as the Huffington Post reports, when her mother, Felisha Archuleta, tried to sign her up with a troop leader in Denver, they were denied because regardless of how the 7-year-old feels, the troop leader said Bobby has “boy parts.”
Archuleta tells 9 News she said, ‘Well, what’s the big deal?’ and the troop leader replied ‘It doesn’t matter how he looks, he has boy parts, he can’t be in Girl Scouts. Girl Scouts don’t allow that [and] I don’t want to be in trouble by parents or my supervisor.’
Bobby was devastated. Continue reading »
10-year-old Jackie, formerly Jack.
Jezebel posted amazing video today by ABC News about an Ohio boy named Jack who at age 10 began living as a girl. Jackie, as she’s now known, has the full support of her sister and her parents, but her Grandfather remains skeptical about the family’s choice to embrace Jackie’s new life. Jackie is totally happy as her female self and her parents say she “has more playdates now than ever before.” I dare you to watch this piece and not feel gleeful about the future of humanity! Continue reading »
Teonna Monae Brown, 18, was one of two teen girls arrested for the beating of a transgender woman in a Baltimore-area McDonalds
Last week I wrote with some amount of surprise about a teen girl in Michigan who was arrested for armed robbery. My surprise stemmed from the feeling that it’s way more unusual, I think, to hear of young girls involved with anything that includes violence or guns as opposed to anyone older or male. I’m sure it’s reverse sexism or some kind of ageism, but it’s just my feeling.
So paint me really astounded today to learn that two teen girls were arrested in that horrific beating of a transgender woman in a Maryland McDonald’s earlier this month.
Teonna Monae Brown, 18, was charged with one count of first-degree assault and two counts of misdemeanor second-degree assault. Her 14-year-old accomplice will be charged as a juvenile.
How do you argue with a person, no matter the age, who has always felt she or he is trapped in the wrong body?
A court in Australia is allowing a tween who was born a boy to become the youngest person Down Under to undergo a sex-change therapy.
“Jamie” has dressed in girls’ clothes, used the girls’ bathroom at school and worn her hair long and in a style more accustomed to those of the female persuasion for the past two years.
According to her parents, medical experts and psychiatrists, the fear is that without seeking the therapy, early-onset puberty could lead Jamie to self-harm or suicide, and therefore the court was petitioned to allow her to undergo the change.
Does this look like the face of liberal, transgendered identity politics?
To some people (like me), it seems innocent — and even cute — enough: a photo of a mom and her young son laughing adorably as she paints his toenails hot pink.
The image appeared as part of a J. Crew ad campaign that was emailed last week to customers. The featured mom is J. Crew’s president and creative director, Jenna Lyons, the boy is her son, Beckett, and the shade of pink is called Essie. The point of the ad was to highlight a few of Lyons’ favorite products.
The picture’s caption reads, “Lucky for me I ended up with a boy whose favorite color is pink. Toenail painting is way more fun in neon.”
Cute, right?
To me — yes. But not to everyone, apparently. Particularly if you’re connected to the Fox News family, apparently.
At what age should a person be allowed to change gender?
A 16-year-old Australian boy known as “O” was granted permission by family court judge Linda Dessau to begin drug treatment to enable a sex change. O has been diagnosed with a mild case of Asperger’s syndrome, but was determined to be “mature enough to know what he wanted,” the Daily Telegraph reports.
O’s decision is “backed by his parents, six specialists and the boy’s independent lawyer.” The one caveat to the ruling is that O must have his sperm collected and stored before he begins treatment “because of concerns the female hormones would affect his ability to have children.” The Telegraph notes that the judge’s decision is not unprecedented. In 2004, a 13-year-old girl was given the green light to begin taking male hormones and in 2009, at age 17, was allowed by the court to have a double mastectomy.
O was so desperate for this treatment “he had become suicidal and once ingested lead solder at school.” His entire family was supportive of his decision, including his father, who told the judge he, too, enjoyed wearing girl’s clothing when he was a teen. O has the encouragement of his sister, as well, whose clothes O had been secretly trying on.
The question here seems pretty obvious: at what age does a person have a right to make these types of decisions for themselves? I feel for O’s plight, but should he have been made to wait until he turned 18 before beginning a gender transformation? Continue reading »
Arryn Tyler: Gender Bending Warrior
71st High School in Fayetteville, North Carolina held its annual “Gender Bender Day” yesterday as a part of Spirit Week, an apparently popular school tradition wherein boys and girls dress like the opposite sex, based in football and cheerleading culture. The practice is meant to bolster school spirit, but by the end of the day yesterday, morale had plummeted after the arrest of a female student, who gave her principal the finger and was then tackled by a police officer.
The scuffle began when the school’s principal, Vanessa Alford, told some 600 students they were dressed “inappropriately” for Gender Bender Day, and that they’d have to go home and change. Arryn Tyler, a 17-year-old junior, “walked to the front of the auditorium and had words with the principal,” according to ABC affiliate WTVD in Raleigh-Durham. While at the front of the room, Tyler was grabbed from behind by a sheriff’s deputy, and she admits to kicking him. The 300-pound officer then “fell on her, causing her to scrape her head and knee.”
Tyler was charged with “resisting arrest, assaulting a law enforcement officer, and disorderly conduct.” I spoke with Tyler today, who calls the police response to her actions “excessive.” (Anna North at Jezebel feels the same way, as do I. Alford has not commented.) Tyler told me despite the fact that Gender Bender Day is a school-sponsored event – at a high school for the arts, no less – Alford “complained about girls wearing hats and guys in skirts.” Could this extreme incident be indicative of transgender bashing or homophobia at 71st High School? Continue reading »
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