Over the last few days since it was learned that an 8 year old is transitioning at a school in Colorado, quite a few blogs have been pretty ugly about it. I wrote about some of these blogs on the post Targeted Families, Targeted Lives.
Last night I learned that a 10 year old, Cameron McWilliams, committed suicide. Cameron had asked for permission to wear make-up, and been teased after he was found wearing his half-sister’s undergarments. His mother said that:
It was apparent he was unhappy and said he wanted to be a girl. He did like girls’ things.
Gender identity disorder (GID) isn’t a game, it isn’t a lifestyle, and it isn’t an agenda. Of course there are people that want to make it such. Peter LaBarbera of Americans For Truth said of the transitioning Colorado 3rd grader:
Could it be that permissive parenting plays a major role in encouraging a gender-confused identity in a child?
What kind of loving Christian makes snap judgments about people they have little knowledge of? What kind of Christian blames the parents for a diagnosable and treatable mental health issue?
LaBarbera continues:
A wiser parent might have sought professional help from someone not beholden to “transgender” activist ideology — to guide the troubled girl into accepting the wonderful body and sex that God gave her.In the case of the eight-year-old boy, to what future are the politically correct adults — parents and school authorities included — consigning him with their “caring” embrace of deviance? Could a body-mutilating ”sex change” operation be down the road — funded by the taxpayers if the “GLBT” Lobby gets its way? In a saner era, it would be clear to all that the child — not society — has the problem. But what do we know? We’re just “trans-phobes.”
The “ideology” that LaBarbera talks about is actually a standard of care that is used to treat people with GID. They are treated by professionals that use a standard of care from the World Professional Association for Transgender Health’s Standards of Care for Gender Identity Disorders, which says:
Therapy should focus on ameliorating any comorbid problems in the child’s life, and on reducing distress the child experiences from his or her gender identity problem and other difficulties. The child and family should be supported in making difficult decisions regarding the extent to which to allow the child to assume a gender role consistent with his or her gender identity.
I will support people like Kim Pearson in her work for children with TransYouth Family Advocates because the work they are doing is important. They are dedicated to educating and raising public awareness about the medical and cultural challenges faced by children with gender variant and gender questioning identities.
This isn’t just a fight to wrestle the moral compass away from people like LaBarbera, it’s a fight for the lives and the well being of our children.
*sigh*
How many kids need to kill themselves over this, and how many people have to go through transition and come out the other end as happy and well adjusted as anyone else before these idiots will get the hint? I grew up Mormon and being around some of the most organized and mainstreamed anti-gay sentiment there is. Mormons at least have the excuse that they’re afraid for their ability to perform legal marriages if they are forced by law to accommodate same sex marriage, which is ridiculous but at least backed by more than a couple of vague passages in Leviticus. While I played along to prevent rocking the boat, I never ever ever really understood it. Hamfistedly forcing a “defense of marriage” style act in Utah under the banner of Mormonism was one of the straws that broke the camel’s back for me, since it seemed to fly in the face of the basic Mormon doctrine stating that the entire point of life was to execute Jesus’ plan to come down to earth and be allowed to make our own choices. Satan’s plan was to MAKE everyone conform. How could I possibly believe anymore when the top three head honchos sign a statement (carefully worded to avoid tax exempt problems, mind you) that advocates Satan’s plan?
I’m going on but my point is that I’m just disgusted and saddened by the idea that us transwomen are part of this evil and powerful cabal trying to make each and every one of them personally gay. Or something. I mean do these people even THINK about what SRS entails, for example? Do they think we WANT to undergo that? Does the fact that the very though of that likely makes them cringe REALLY HARD signify to them that maybe, just maybe, we’re pretty serious about this?
The utter lack of empathy is just disgusting, and for fundies shows an obvious lack of intimate time with their own New Testament. Or maybe they have a different one, the one I read involved this pretty laid back dude named Jesus going around telling people (mostly this “pharisees” group) to knock it off with the organized class discrimination and judging other people. Like that one time he stopped a bunch of people from stoning a prostitute to death, and was kind of specific about nobody else being any better than her and that they should really just leave her alone. Maybe his bible didn’t have that part.
*sigh*
How many kids need to kill themselves over this, and how many people have to go through transition and come out the other end as happy and well adjusted as anyone else before these idiots will get the hint? I grew up Mormon and being around some of the most organized and mainstreamed anti-gay sentiment there is. Mormons at least have the excuse that they’re afraid for their ability to perform legal marriages if they are forced by law to accommodate same sex marriage, which is ridiculous but at least backed by more than a couple of vague passages in Leviticus. While I played along to prevent rocking the boat, I never ever ever really understood it. Hamfistedly forcing a “defense of marriage” style act in Utah under the banner of Mormonism was one of the straws that broke the camel’s back for me, since it seemed to fly in the face of the basic Mormon doctrine stating that the entire point of life was to execute Jesus’ plan to come down to earth and be allowed to make our own choices. Satan’s plan was to MAKE everyone conform. How could I possibly believe anymore when the top three head honchos sign a statement (carefully worded to avoid tax exempt problems, mind you) that advocates Satan’s plan?
I’m going on but my point is that I’m just disgusted and saddened by the idea that us transwomen are part of this evil and powerful cabal trying to make each and every one of them personally gay. Or something. I mean do these people even THINK about what SRS entails, for example? Do they think we WANT to undergo that? Does the fact that the very though of that likely makes them cringe REALLY HARD signify to them that maybe, just maybe, we’re pretty serious about this?
The utter lack of empathy is just disgusting, and for fundies shows an obvious lack of intimate time with their own New Testament. Or maybe they have a different one, the one I read involved this pretty laid back dude named Jesus going around telling people (mostly this “pharisees” group) to knock it off with the organized class discrimination and judging other people. Like that one time he stopped a bunch of people from stoning a prostitute to death, and was kind of specific about nobody else being any better than her and that they should really just leave her alone. Maybe his bible didn’t have that part.
That is just grotesque. 🙁
And not another suicide. 🙁
That is just grotesque. 🙁
And not another suicide. 🙁
[…] (fundamentalism, fundamentalist feminism, radical feminism, transphobia) Marti Abernathey posted about an 8-year old child beginning transition and some guy named Peter LaBarbera’s response to […]
The problem with LaBarbera is that he knows the T community – he was allowed to attend a couple of Southern Comforts, and he attended seminars and took notes – and as a result, he knows how to attack the T community better than most. Bigoted, you bet, but a formidable enemy just the same.
The problem with LaBarbera is that he knows the T community – he was allowed to attend a couple of Southern Comforts, and he attended seminars and took notes – and as a result, he knows how to attack the T community better than most. Bigoted, you bet, but a formidable enemy just the same.
labarbera is an idiot. nothing would ever get through to him because he refuses to entertain any thought that is not already explained in his neat, well organized binary gendered world. even the possibility of being wrong would never occur to him. his religious beliefs forbid free thought. he would label those who care for a child as guilty of sexual deviance, rather than admit that the child was receiving the only medically and psychologically approved support available. sad, sad, sad. it explains perfectly why so many children with gender conflict commit suicide. they give up hope, in the face of unrelenting bigotry and ignorance. and that makes me unbelievably angry.
“The only two things that are infinite in size are the universe and human stupidity. And I’m not completely sure about the universe.” — Albert Einstein
labarbera is an idiot. nothing would ever get through to him because he refuses to entertain any thought that is not already explained in his neat, well organized binary gendered world. even the possibility of being wrong would never occur to him. his religious beliefs forbid free thought. he would label those who care for a child as guilty of sexual deviance, rather than admit that the child was receiving the only medically and psychologically approved support available. sad, sad, sad. it explains perfectly why so many children with gender conflict commit suicide. they give up hope, in the face of unrelenting bigotry and ignorance. and that makes me unbelievably angry.
“The only two things that are infinite in size are the universe and human stupidity. And I’m not completely sure about the universe.” — Albert Einstein
Peter LaBarbera needs to listen to Kim Pearson’s interview on Ethan St. Pierre’s program last fall (http://radicalguy.podomatic.com/entry/2007-11-26T16_13_11-08_00). Then he could hear Kim explain in her own words the pain and anguish she and her son went through with therapists and others to figure out why he was depressed and suicidal. Far from being a case of permissive parenting, Kim’s experience was a desperate struggle for the survival of her son. And the remarkable turnaround in his life after he and his therapist finally figured out that his problem was gender dysphoria will bring tears to the eyes of even the most hardened bigot.
Peter LaBarbera needs to listen to Kim Pearson’s interview on Ethan St. Pierre’s program last fall (http://radicalguy.podomatic.com/entry/2007-11-26T16_13_11-08_00). Then he could hear Kim explain in her own words the pain and anguish she and her son went through with therapists and others to figure out why he was depressed and suicidal. Far from being a case of permissive parenting, Kim’s experience was a desperate struggle for the survival of her son. And the remarkable turnaround in his life after he and his therapist finally figured out that his problem was gender dysphoria will bring tears to the eyes of even the most hardened bigot.