Gender Affirmation Is Care - Not Ideology

Over at “GenderReport.ca”, we find this steaming pile of verbal dung: “How Gender Ideology Imposes A Dangerous Political Agenda In Our Schools”.  

As is common with such articles, it is deliberately alarmist, designed to terrify people, not inform.  In particular, it treats the concept of “gender ideology” as a given, while never actually providing a meaningful definition of it.  In other words, like a lot of these articles, the term has become something of a “straw man” which the reader is then encouraged to direct their fears and worries into. 

What is “gender ideology”?  In today’s right-wing discourse (which is pretty much the only place you will see the term in active use), it pretty much boils down to anything that involves recognizing transgender identities as real and valid, any steps taken to acknowledge transgender people’s legitimate rights to move through society safely. They throw in a nice dash of “predator fear” for flavouring, and then dump it about in great quantities.  It’s the intellectual equivalent of cheez puffs - lots of volume and energy, no real substantive value. 

Where schools are concerned, we get the “protect the children” nonsense rolled out, with claims made that children are too young to understand this stuff, and therefore “Gender Ideology” is harming kids.  They go on to argue that social contagion (aka “Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria (ROGD)” - debunked over here) is going to cause their kids to be forcibly “transed” (sic - their term, not mine) by schools and doctors.  

Pay close attention to the wording of this last sentence here. It is loaded with misconceptions, misunderstandings, and generally false ideas about what transition means, the nature of medical treatments involved, and the ability of trans people of any age to understand and consent.  

First, let’s talk about the notion of “highly experimental surgeries”.  Male to Female gender reassignment surgeries have been around since the 1950s (and arguably sooner than that by some accounts), and in many ways are really little more than a variation on the seemingly less controversial surgeries performed on intersex children.  Female to Male genital surgeries are newer (60s or 70s, I think), but any surgery that’s been around that long is hardly “experimental” at this point.  Likewise, hormone therapy has been around since before the 1950s, and puberty blockers have been actively used to treat precocious puberty since at least the 1970s - hardly “experimental” in any meaningful sense of the term.  The risks and consequences are well documented and well understood. 

As for “taking pills for the rest of your life”, I challenge anyone over the age of 40 to look at their medicine cabinet and the prescriptions that they get refilled every few months.  Kids who have asthma often require inhalers for the rest of their life; Type 1 diabetics often need insulin for the duration of their lives, and so on.  I’m not seeing a major issue here.

Let’s talk briefly about the developmental issues that get raised - namely that “kids are too young to understand”.  First, this infantilizes students who go through some of the most significant stages of development while in school.  

By the time a child is in grade 1, we already expect them to understand “boy” and “girl” - and frankly the vast majority do.  Who is to say that a grade 1 child cannot also understand the idea of “I have a boy’s body, but I don’t feel like a boy”?  In fact, when you talk to a lot of transgender adults, stories of being aware of the incongruence of their body, the social cues they were getting, and how they felt internally is common, with awareness of being transgender happening somewhere between pre-school age and the end of elementary school.  Whether they had the language to express that or not is irrelevant.

If the boy that was Johnny is grade 1 comes back the next year and is going by Jane, with long hair now, that’s simply not a problem.  We know from experience that most of their classmates will shrug and carry on as normal.  Children are, at this age far more flexible than their parents often are.  

Middle School (or Junior High as it is called here), is the point in time when most kids go through puberty. Anyone who doesn’t think that transgender youth don’t understand what’s happening to their bodies has never talked to a transgender youth.  It is not uncommon for transgender youth to find themselves painfully isolated, both physically and socially at a time when social development is just as important as what’s going on in the body. 

By high school, the damage is done for many trans youth, and they’re hanging on until they can transition as adults, free from whatever strictures their parents may have imposed.  You cannot tell me that by their teenage years a person is incapable of understanding gender both in physiological and social terms.  If you’re going to argue that, then I’m going to ask how it is that person is deemed able to work, operate machinery, and ultimately vote?    

What about those for whom “it’s (trans identity) is just a phase?”.  Sure, there’s going to be some of that.  That is why in general irreversible treatments don’t happen until the individual is old enough to understand the consequences of their decision (mid-teens for cross-sex hormones, and 18 or so for surgeries).  Puberty blockers are reversible, and are used as an instrument to buy the person time to experiment and adapt socially without experiencing the often traumatic experience of “the wrong puberty” - and trust me, unwinding that experience as an adult is brutally painful work in therapy.  

I will refer you to the following editorial which provides an intelligent, clear-headed overview of why gender affirming care - including recognizing transgender identities in schools - is so important.  I won’t bore you with a ton of academic papers which also support that position.  Suffice it to say that a few minutes with a decent academic search engine turns up plenty of evidence that supports the author’s claims. 

This is a particularly sly bit of sleight-of-hand.  Suddenly we go from “gender ideology” to “woke”, so the author can pivot to complaining how recognizing a student’s gender identity in class is somehow an infringement on their right to disagree.  We’ve heard this before, from Dr. Jordan B. Peterson (Dr in that he holds a PhD, not that he has any medical expertise).  The problem with positions like this is that it is basically telling the students that “as your teacher, I know you better than you know yourself”.  This is arguably backwards to begin with, but it’s particularly offensive when you are in fact condescending to the students in your classroom. 

As for scrutiny, it’s next to impossible to “scrutinize” a position like this when the concepts of “gender ideology” are not grounded in reality to begin with.  Instead it is a mashup of random fears and claims by people who clearly have little or no direct experience with transgender people, their needs and concerns, and the realities of treatment they face.  It is one thing to be concerned about something you don’t understand, it is quite another to use those “concerns” to try and erase an entire segment from society because they “scare you”.  

On a closing note, I encourage all of you to go read the article “Bathroom Battlegrounds and Penis Panics” for a clear-headed, social perspective on all of this.  

It Only Makes Sense If You're Insane

So, it seems that Ann Coulter wants to file a human rights complaint in Canada ...

Inflammatory right-wing pundit Ann Coulter took aim at a University of Ottawa administrator Monday night, saying an e-mail from the school warning her to use “restraint, respect and consideration” when addressing Ontario students during a speaking tour this week made her a victim of a “hate crime.”

Speaking to students and academics at the University of Western Ontario Monday, Coulter said the e-mail sent to her Friday by Francois Houle, vice-president academic and provost of the University of Ottawa, targeted her as a member of an identifiable group and as such, she will be filing a complaint with the Human Rights Commission alleging hate speech.

Kind of makes you wonder just what Ms. Coulter's speech was going to be, doesn't it? But then, like a lot of the extreme right wing in the US - and Canada for that matter - Ms. Coulter is well known shooting from the lips and not really paying attention to facts or reality.

... and right on cue, we find Ezra Levant on the stage:

Ezra Levant, lawyer and former publisher of the Western Standard magazine, spoke before Coulter on Monday and called Houle’s letter a “veiled threat.”

Why yes, Ezra, only you could possibly take a bit of advice given to someone who may not be fully cognizant of Canada's laws and interpret it as a 'threat'.

Of course, Ms. Coulter opens her yap during her speech and says the following:

“A word is either offensive or it’s not. In a world of political correctness, all words are banned unless they’re used against conservatives.

Ummm...no. It doesn't work that way, Ann - and you know it. The e-mail you received encapsulated the concept in three words: “restraint, respect and consideration”. It's not like your track record for saying amazingly ignorant things in public isn't well known in Canada.

If the notion of speaking in a manner that respects others, and being asked to do so, is 'discriminatory' against them and a form of hate crime, it does make one wonder just what they had in their minds to say in the first place.

US Hate Crimes Deliberations

The lies, intellectual dishonesty and political philandering around the so-called "Matthew Shepard Act" in the United States continues apace. I haven't paid much attention to the bill itself - a lack of time mostly - my own life has been filled with its own priorities that have consumed my energies.

However, it's Sunday, and I have a few minutes to spare and I was just reading the semi-funny, outright ridiculous tripe posted on Lifesite about this legislation.

The first complaint is the cry of "no fair" from the Rethuglicans because the Democrat majority has attached it as an amendment or rider to a defense spending bill:

"Those of us who oppose this legislation - and it is important legislation - will be faced with a dilemma of choosing between a bill which can harm, in my view, the United States of America and its judicial system and a bill defending the nation," protested Sen. John McCain, who denounced Reid's tactic as an "abuse of power."

Now, in general principle, I actually agree with the Republican complaint here - I don't like the way that unrelated topics get tacked on to significant bills in the US legislative system. It has always struck me as a fundamentally dishonest way to get things done.

That said, during the Bush II era, it's not like the Rethuglicans didn't engage in precisely that tactic themselves - repeatedly. There were many times where more noxious legislation was tacked onto legislation that the house would have to pass or risk stalling the business of government entirely.

I won't say that I am sympathetic to the Republican plight here - the tactic in question has been in place for years, and seems to be one the ways that the US legislative process works. I may not like the tactic, but it's a fact of life.

Critics have warned that the bill has a chilling effect on religious free speech against homosexuality, pointing out that similar laws in other nations have facilitated the prosecution of Christians who speak against homosexuality, particularly in Canada and the United Kingdom. More importantly, they charge, "hate crimes" laws violate the guarantees of equal protection under the law by creating preferential classes for justice.

The number of outright falsehoods and bogus comparisons in this is beyond ridiculous.

First of all, The statement about "chilling" religious free speech is provably false. In Canada, there has not been a single religious speaker charged under Sections 318, 319 of Canada's Criminal code.

It is also important to recognize that civil rights in general exist in a state of tension with one another. I have discussed this concept many times before on this blog. It remains ridiculous to me that the argument continues to be made that there is some religious "freedom" to be exercised in "speaking out against homosexuality". Since when did religious freedom override the right of an entire subgroup in our population to live their lives in relative peace? The religious are free to "disagree" with homosexuality all they like - just as I am free to disagree with some particular religion all I like. In neither case is there a right to demand that the members of either be treated as lesser citizens.

"'Hate crimes' laws contradict the 14th Amendment to the Constitution and create unequal justice by elevating some groups of victims at the expense of others," said Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America. Wright pointed out that under the proposed law, "Victims who engage in homosexual, transgender, or other sexual behavior get special treatment over victims who are military officers, police officers or veterans," such as the military recruiter who was slain in June by a Muslim convert at a shopping mall in Little Rock, Arkansas.

Hmmm...really? Let's consider a few factors here. First of all, Ms. Wright (ironically, probably the first time in ages that CWA has had a female spokesbot) is only partially correct. In many parts of the US, killing a police officer is an automatic ticket to Capital Murder charges. Period. Regardless of the circumstances. This has been the case for years. While I don't know if there are similar statutes regarding military personnel, that's irrelevant - there are already "tiers" of severity in the justice system.

Second, last I checked, there isn't an ongoing epidemic of people deciding to go "roll a cop" or "kill a queer" on a Saturday night. For GLBT folk, this is a common and well-placed fear. Killings like Matthew Shepard's, or for that matter Brandon Teena, are far too common; less dramatic crimes like beatings, vandalism and organized harassment are more frequent.

The use of hate crimes statutes is pretty rare. Only in the most egregious of cases is there enough evidence to suggest that there is a hate crime. Canada's Hate Crimes statutes have been on the books for several years, and have only been exercised a handful of times. In general, there are other, civil law remedies that are far more effective in dealing with the kinds of abusiveness that I will politely call "group slander".

There is also, in my mind, quite a difference between murder and murdering someone because of who they are. To return to CWA's bogus argument about a military recruiter's murder for a moment. The recruiter works for the military - that's what he does. It's his career. However, he can go do a different job if he wishes to. GLBT people are attacked for something that in general they are unlikely to be able to change. (and until someone shows me some actual credible long term follow up of "ex-gay" therapies, I will stick with that position)

However the Senate version of the "hate crimes" bill does not yet reconcile with the House version, the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Act, which alarmed conservative lawmakers as the bill fails to define or restrict the term "sexual orientation." One Democratic representative heaped praises on the bill for granting heightened federal protection for all 547 "paraphilias" or sexual aberrations documented by the American Psychological Association.

547 Paraphilias? Really? Wow - I'm going to have to go and review my copy of the DSM IV - because I only recall a handful of sexual paraphilias listed in there. In fact, the DSM IV TR specifically describes 8 specific categories of paraphilia, and one additional category to provide a diagnostic category for other, rarer paraphilic interests that may be encountered in the course of progress.

It does not describe 547 paraphilias per se. Additionally, the only paraphilia that would be covered under any hate crimes statute per se (and at that only indirectly) is formally labelled "Transvestic Fetishism", which may be coincident with some forms of GID. (As I understand it, many crossdressers engage in crossdressing for a combination of reasons, and few are absolutely fetishistic in nature)

In the context of hate crimes, it is important to recognize that the language of sexual paraphilias does not appear in them, nor does it seem to me that the language of the legislation I'm familiar with could be twisted to include most paraphilias - especially those that are known to be damaging or destructive to other, non-consenting parties.

Ironically, as this summary shows, getting the tar kicked out of you for your religious beliefs is already a protected category under existing US hate crimes legislation. (So much for CWA's "special category" lies - unless they are willing to admit that religion is very much a special category before the law already).

The ongoing squawking about including GLBT people in hate crimes legislation is nothing more than the religious right wingnuts demanding that the state protect the industry that they have spawned in their blind hatred of GLBT people. Whether one considers CWA, Americans for Truth Against Homosexuality, MassResistance or for that matter Focus on the Family, all of these organizations exist and depend on their ability to raise fear about GLBT people in the public in order to justify their existence.

Small Justice Moments

Once in a while, the world manages to see through the nastiness and intellectual dishonesty that so often appears in courtroom trials.

Today, the jury in the Angie Zapata murder trial delivered guilty verdicts on all charges.

"Hearing 'guilty on first-degree murder' and 'guilty of bias-motivated crime' was a hugely emotional experience for all the family, friends and the supporters of Angie," Barton added.

Considering that the defense was trying to recycle a "blame the victim" strategy, it is a major relief to see the jury toss that evil little strategy onto the midden heap.

Andrade admitted killing Zapata, but his defense argued that he acted in the heat of passion after discovering that Zapata was biologically male. The defense asked for a lesser verdict, such as second-degree murder or manslaughter.

Throughout the trial, prosecutors referred to Zapata as "she," while the defense referred to the transgender teen as "he."

"When [Andrade] met him, he met him as 'Angie,' " defense attorney Annette Kundelius argued on Wednesday. "When he found out it wasn't 'Angie,' that it was 'Justin,' he lost control."

But the jury rejected the argument, deciding in favor of prosecutors, who argued that Andrade knew Zapata was biologically male and that knowledge motivated the crime.

"This was an ambush attack," said Chief Deputy District Attorney Robb Miller. "This was an all-out blitz."

Zapata was "born in a boy's body but living as a female," added Miller. "Ultimately, she was murdered because of it."

To the jury: Thank you for seeing through the defense and convicting Andrade for the evil crimes he committed.

To the prosecution: Thank you for treating the victim with dignity, and respecting her memory. Above all, thank you for pursuing this case to its just end.

More on the Lawrence King Murder

Almost a year ago, Larry King was murdered by a classmate.

For most of the last year, we've seen a steady stream of 'blame the victim' coming out from those who think it's just fine to blow someone's brains out if they are GLBT.

Today, the Prosecution filed a brief in court that paints a bit more of the picture - and it's not pretty:

McInerney was the aggressor, teasing the effeminate King for weeks and vowing to "get a gun and shoot" him, according to a prosecution brief. Multiple students provided accounts of a growing hostility between the two boys, the document shows.

Lovely ... and it gets worse, as the prosecution's brief also paints a little more of the picture:

In her statement of facts, Fox contends that King and McInerney had an acrimonious relationship for months prior to the shooting. They sparred with "typical 8th grade, back-and-forth insults; some sexual, some not," she wrote.

Witnesses said King was usually not the aggressor. But after months of teasing by McInerney and other male students who called him "faggot," he had began to retort, according to prosecutors.
...
A few minutes later, prosecutors allege, McInerney told one of King's friends: "Say goodbye to your friend Larry because you're never going to see him again."

Ugh! What a nasty little piece of work. I remember kids like that when I was in Jr. High - they made my life decidedly unpleasant when I came into their sights. Fortunately, the chances of any of them being able to lay hands on a firearm were pretty much nil. Larry King wasn't so fortunate.

The prosecution brief also reveals for the first time that McInerney was familiar with firearms, and that he had used that particular weapon in the past during target shooting with his family.

Investigators found a training video in his possession titled "Shooting in Realistic Environments," as well as skinhead and neo-Nazi books and similar writings from the Internet, prosecutors wrote.

Delightful. Not only was the accused your basic garden variety middle school thug, but he's also shown us that he had fantasies about being a neo-nazi. This isn't exactly a poster child for upstanding citizen, is it?

Regardless of whatever may have happened in the school hallways, there is nothing that redeems the accused's decision to go get a gun, and pull the trigger twice. There is a degree of intent and premeditation being described here that is absolutely chilling - especially when it is coming from a thirteen or fourteen year old boy.

H/T: Trans Group Blog

Lines To Remember

"I've read the Bible cover to cover, Bottom line: love beats hate."
Lesley Brighton, Silverton OR resident

Apparently Fred Phelps sent his minions to Silverton, OR to condemn the town for having the temerity to elect a transgender mayor.

A woman pushing a baby jogger past City Hall did a doubletake on her run, backing up to question 16-year-old Victoria Phelps, whose family runs the small Kansas church.

"I'm a Christian," Lesley Brighton said, clearly perplexed by the girl's "God Hates Fags" sign. "This is some kind of joke, right?"

No, it's deadly serious, Phelps replied. Electing a transgender mayor, she said, was an abomination.

"I don't expect for it to sink in but it's our duty to come out here and preach to these people because they're so proud of having a transvestite mayor," Phelps said. "It's disgusting. And where was it? Was it Isaiah? Deuteronomy? About it being an abomination?"

Phelps and crew are a pretty nasty lot to begin with, unhinged being one of the nicer things said about them. I think Ms. Brighton did a lovely job of putting them in their place.

Kick A Ginger Day - And Other Outrages

[Update: 24/11/08]:
Not only was this widespread, but when one considers the misuse of electronic media for the purpose of bullying it shouldn't be much of a leap to understand how such media can be abused in the propagation of blind hatred.
[/Update]

So, some bunch of teenagers decided that it would be fun to kick the crap out of their red-headed classmates.

On one hand, we might look upon this as "just a bunch of kids funnin'", but I think it warrants a much more sober examination in the context of other aspects of the Canadian political discourse.

It wasn't so long ago that it was common "sport" for a group of young thugs to get together and go 'roll a queer'. Usually such events took place after a few too many drinks, and the collective intelligence of the group fell. The 'kick a ginger' thing is in the same category - it relies heavily on identifying someone by a distinguishing characteristic, and then attacking them. The difference here, is that instead of things being organized over a few beer in a bar, the "event" was plotted and planned using Facebook.

Meanwhile, we have a group of people in Canada - headed by the oh-so-enlightened Ezra Levant, Kathy Shaidle and Mark Steyn who are busy trying to remove Section 13 from the Canadian Human Rights code (or, in the case of the oh-so-rational Ezra, dismantling the entire mechanism because it offends his sensibilities).

Collectively, their thesis is that "words can't hurt":

And yeah, I guess if you're a wimp, words can hurt. So man up. But we all know that "manning up" isn't an option in our metrosexual p.c. society...

Right. Let's consider this for a moment or two - a group of people were just posting words on Facebook. Those words enabled some people to give themselves permission to kick the tar out of someone for what they looked like. Now, I recognize that the three individuals I just mentioned don't understand the concept of civility to begin with - they collectively specialize in making their point by being as noxious as possible.

I wonder if Ezra has clued in that people who would do him a lot more harm simply for his ancestry are fairly salivating over the prospect of S. 13 going away (look for a post entitled "Folks on Stormfront Giddy With Excitement; Conservative Party Might Want to Take Notice of Who Their Supporters Are" - Nov 17/08).

I have always argued that the problem with Boissoin's hate filled letter of 2002 was that in essence it could give some people the license to go beat the crap out of GLBT people.

But, here we have a more direct example where electronic means were used to organize attacks on a group of individuals for no better reason than their hair colour. Now, tell me again how "words can't hurt"? I'd argue that there's a bunch of red-headed teens around right now that stand as proof to the contrary.

Our country's lawmakers had better think long and hard before they try to enact the CPoC policy to repeal S.13 of our human rights law.

Dear Fundagelicals:

If you think you need to self-censor your messages to avoid running afoul of Canada's hate crime statutes, perhaps you might want to rethink what your messages really are?

Of course, Daddy Dobson censoring his "radio show" is no big surprise. He'd claim he was doing that just to perpetuate the meme that hate crime laws are unreasonable. (Of course, none of these clowns will speak out against the violence that GLBT people are subjected to as a result of the fundagelical hostility towards GLBT folk - such as this piece of irrational garbage)

Finally, the reason for “indifference and confusion” is that the Supreme Court has legislated sexual orientation to be a Charter right. This newly coined “right” was “read” into the Charter by Justice Peter Cory in 1995. This new right of equality now conflicts with existing (Charter) rights such as freedom of the press and of religion (http://catholicinsight.com/online/features/article_788.shtml).

The last point answers at once the question why it is important, indeed necessary, in Canada to resist: our rights as citizens are at stake. This is true not only for Catholics and Evangelicals, but also for the Greek Orthodox, orthodox Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus and anyone who holds to a traditional understanding of marriage in natural law, both as individuals and as supporters of such institutions as school, church, synagogue, mosque and temple. ...

Wait a second here - just what rights are we talking about here? Somebody show me where it says that "freedom of religion" gives anyone the right to spew some of the absolute crap that Dobson is so worried about.

There's one of two possibilities here - either they haven't actually read the statutes - especially Sections 318, 319 of the criminal code. In particular, I would draw your attention to S. 319(3), which reads:

(3) No person shall be convicted of an offence under subsection (2)

(a) if he establishes that the statements communicated were true;

(b) if, in good faith, the person expressed or attempted to establish by an argument an opinion on a religious subject or an opinion based on a belief in a religious text;

(c) if the statements were relevant to any subject of public interest, the discussion of which was for the public benefit, and if on reasonable grounds he believed them to be true; or

(d) if, in good faith, he intended to point out, for the purpose of removal, matters producing or tending to produce feelings of hatred toward an identifiable group in Canada.

So, if you are establishing an argument based on religious texts, there is a clear exemption. (Of course, when spewing the propaganda points that such luminaries as Paul Cameron have vomited up, there's little that could be framed in terms of any scripture - bad science is still bad science, even when wrapped in Leviticus).

Thus, one must suspect that the bible thumping crowd that follow Dobson's line either knows damn good and well that their supposed "religious opinions" are well beyond the line and really are hate propaganda, or that they are utterly ignorant of the wording of S319 3(b).

In the first case, it's time to reconsider the messages being published, isn't it?

In the second case, it really is time to start reading the laws before making false claims about it.

Hate Crimes ... Reprise

Little did I realize that when I wrote about hate crimes law yesterday that it was a day set aside by the transgender community as Transgender Day of Remembrance to acknowledge transgender people killed by others - mostly for being transgender in the first place.

Then I ran across Georgie Binks article on CBC today.

So much violence has been visited on the transgendered that Nov. 20 has been designated National Transgender Remembrance Day. Numerous transgendered people have been murdered over the years: the website Remembering Our Dead lists dozens of them who were shot, stabbed or otherwise killed.

And it continues. In January 2007, Keittirat Longnawa was beaten by nine youths who then slit her throat in Thailand. Michelle Carrasco was found in a pit with her face completely disfigured in Santiago, Chile, in March. ...

Violence happens, but it should never happen to someone simply for being different. Nobody deserves the kind of fate that blind malice and ignorance can impose. Being different - visibly or not - is not a crime.

Read Georgie's narrative about her encounters with Leslie, and it will remind you that above all else, no matter how different or unusual someone's story may be, they are still emphatically human, with families, feelings and lives.

[Update: Nov 22]
A friend brought the following comment on Georgie Binks' column to my attention:

...
Maybe once in while we could contemplate those who sacrifice self-fulfillment for the benefit of others and sacrifice their own dreams to protect those they claim to love. In my mind, they are the true heroes.

Apparently the writer of this has never faced himself in the deeply personal way that anyone who is transsexual ultimately must. Even more unfortunate is that he failed to read a couple of key aspects of Leslie's story correctly:

In fact, she'd lived a pretty normal suburban life. Married for 30 years to the love of her life, she had a couple of kids, a good job, and enjoyed a night out with the boys. But inside, Leslie had always felt she was a woman and I wanted to hear her story.

Thirty years of self-doubt, of trying fit into a life that feels "wrong" at some fundamental level isn't a sacrifice? Trying to hold yourself together to make a marriage work for three decades is not a sacrifice? Sorry, but this is one of those moments where I must borrow a line from a now old, but favourite movie of mine:

"Sometimes the needs of the one outweigh the needs of the many" (Star Trek III: The Search For Spock)

I do not know how good the relationship between Leslie and her now ex-spouse is, but if they have managed to remain on speaking terms, I'll bet that it will be a lot healthier now that Leslie is living as she felt she was intended to.
[/Update]

Why Hate Crime Laws Matter

According to some right wing bloggers, an apparently low rate of conviction means that hate crimes don't really matter.

Sure - unless you are the victim of a hate crime. In which case it is all too real.

Getting the tar kicked out of you because someone thinks you are gay, belong to the wrong religion or whatever is all too real, and if the motive can be demonstrated as being 'hate related' there is a legitimacy to adding that to the list of convictions.

Hate crime statistics are troublesome because hate crimes themselves are notoriously under reported, and it is extremely hard to get a conviction because in order to demonstrate that the crime was in fact a hate crime, the prosecution must demonstrate motive - something that most prosecutors find extremely difficult to accomplish.

Hate crimes are the tool of the bully. The bully in this case seeks to intimidate not just the victim, but other members of the same "group" as the victim. While word of a hate crime is likely to spread within the community of the victim, few among minority communities are willing to draw attention to themselves - which makes it less likely that the crime will actually be reported.

This does not mean that the crimes do not occur, nor does it mean that they are any less serious than other crimes against the person (or their property). The legal concept of "hate crime" is simply a way for the legal system to recognize a serious aggravating factor in the offense. A low frequency of reporting, and similarly lower still numbers of convictions does not invalidate the legal constructs involved.

Lies and Distortion - Lifesite Style

Right-wing religious "news site" Lifesite has taken it upon themselves to completely misconstrue the Boissoin case as being a "hate crimes" case.

Two things popped up on this:

1) Lifesite whining about "media bias" in the coverage of the hearings. Mildly amusing, if it wasn't so pathetic. (Especially when two days before, the following editorial - which claims:

What may be most objection-able about Prof. Lund's complaint, however, is the way he is trying to use a single, unverified gay-bashing assault that happened in Red Deer two weeks after the letter's publication as evidence that Mr. Boissoin's declaration of "war" against the gay rights movement had the effect of inciting hatred. No charges have been laid in the assault, so this tactic creates the steepest kind of slippery slope imaginable.

The absence of charges being laid is utterly irrelevant here. One doesn't have to reach too far to figure out that the furor over Boissoin's letter was still rippling about Red Deer media at the time. (But coming from the National Post, this doesn't surprise me - and it mysteriously echoes the refrain from people like Brian Rushfeldt - making me wonder just who actually wrote that unattributed column)

However, the bit that triggered me to write this was this article about Bush pledging to veto hate crimes legislation in the US. This law is a direct result of Matthew Shepard's murder several years ago. In the article, Lifesite reports:

The Canadian version homosexual "hate-crime" legislation, Bill C-250, that was given royal support on April 29, 2004, has proved true many of the fears and predictions of concerned Canadians. While attempting to prevent crimes against homosexuals, the bill has in effect opened the door to countless forms of legal action against other groups. Canadians have seen it being used to actively discriminate against religious leaders such as Pastor Stephen Boissoin who publicly denounced homosexuality based on his moral convictions, or companies that have refused to offer their services to homosexuals and has limited the freedom of the press.

The bullshit call here is obvious. Boissoin is not facing any criminal charges (that I am aware of), nor could he. Bill C-250 came into law well after 2002, and it's fairly rare for laws to be retroactive. More correctly, Boissoin is the subject of a civil complaint being handled through our human rights tribunal processes - this isn't even before the civil courts yet. Lifesite is not only lying through its teeth, they are deliberately distorting reality to suit their agenda. (not like I haven't seen them do that before...)