Just in case the SupposiTory MP from Calgary West decides to scrub his site of this particularly harebrained piece of boneheadedness, I saved it so you can see just how dumb he is about transgender issues. Here’s the story, from CBC:
Anders wants to stop Bill C279, a private members bill that would amend the Canadian Human Rights Act and Criminal Code to include “gender identity” and “gender expression” as grounds for discrimination.
He says the bill’s goal is to give transgendered men access to women’s washrooms. He says it’s the duty of the House of Commons to protect children from any exposure or harm that will come from giving men this kind of access.
But transgender advocate Jan Buterman says she can’t believe what Calgary MP Rob Anders is implying with his petition.
“The suggestion that this is somehow some … conspiracy of trans people to sneak into bathrooms deliberately to harm people it’s ludicrous,” Buterman says. “Trans people have been using bathrooms all over Canada for decades with, as far as I know, zero evidence of any incidents whatsoever.”
And the best comment, from “ZenJos”:
“Anders says the goal of the bill is to give transgendered men access to women’s washrooms.”
Not that I’m acknowledging that this is The Purpose of the bill, but the goal would actually be to give transgender men access to men’s washrooms. And transgender women access to women’s washrooms.
If you’re going to oppose something with any political authority, you ought to at least get your terminology straight.
Bingo. Transgender men are men who were born with female bodies, so they’d be using the men’s room. I think Sleepyhead is thinking of trans-women, who are women born with male bodies.
There has never been an incident, to my knowledge, of any trans-person ever molesting a child in a public washroom. That is the furthest thing from their minds. When they go in, their only intent is to do their business, wash their hands, and get out again without anyone else making a stink about their gender. In other words: They want to be regarded no differently from anyone else using that loo. Which is why there’s a bill trying to eliminate that form of discrimination here in Canada.
If Sleepyhead is really concerned about sexual inappropriateness in public washrooms, perhaps he should start a petition against conservative men with wide stances.
