By Sandy……
April 26, a piece titled “Target’s Trans Bathroom Policy Really Isn’t about Bathrooms” appeared at csnnews.com, a site launched, according to them, in order to combat “…a liberal bias in many news outlets.” After an opening-paragraph bald-faced statement that Target is risking “the safety of their customers in the name of ‘political correctness’ ” by allowing trans-gendered folk to use the facilities corresponding with their gender identification, the op-ed gives the impression that all 840,000 people who are registered as sex offenders are queued up at women’s bathroom doors across America ready to pounce on unwary victims. I presume this includes the registered children, as young as nine, the females, and those physically disabled as well.
I suppose it is immaterial that the vast majority of those individuals have lived and functioned in their communities, some for 35 or 40 years since their offenses, without having committed another sexual crime. This new policy will surely bring them forth from their homes in hoards, the males donned in wigs, skirts, and heels, to converge on the bathrooms of their local Targets and any other public venues foolish enough to institute such a policy.
Then, in a segue that few will notice, the op-ed’s author moves from the 840,000 on the registry to all who have ever been or are currently inclined to commit a sex crime by saying that Target’s new bathroom policy is one that allows “…sexual offenders to pose as trans-gender individuals to obtain entry into the bathroom of the opposite sex.”
Just as this op-ed claims that Target’s policy is not really about bathrooms, I am of the opinion that the op-ed is not really about Target’s policy or even trans-gender individuals. It is rather about propagating the myths that registered citizens, as a group, are an imminent risk to women and children and that the greatest risk of sexual assault to women and children is from strangers skulking in public places.
This is contradictory to all evidence – and there is a lot of it — about the low rate of re-offense of registrants living in the community, the fact that virtually all new sexual crime – up to 96% — is committed by individuals not on the registry, and the fact that the vast majority of sexual crime is perpetrated by those known by the victims.
The op-ed says that, according to a cited source, 33% of women who are sexually assaulted are attacked “on school property or in a public area such as a commercial venue.”
The segue — from bathrooms to school property and public areas — is a little more noticeable this time. School properties and public areas do not automatically translate into bathrooms.
According to the op-ed, “There are numerous cases of sexual assault in commercial venues.” Three are given; all three are cases of “peeping toms” and attempts to take photos. None were rape or contact-assaults. One was in a college locker room. Why did the op-ed not use examples of more serious forms of sexual assaults in bathrooms if they are so numerous?
Speaking on behalf of Concerned Women of America, the author of the op-ed calls for a boycott of Target stores in order to protect women and girls from the dangers lurking in their bathrooms.
I call for an end to fear-mongering and the blatant disregard of facts.
I call for a massive dissemination of evidence and truth about the very complex issue of sexual crime. As a woman and mother, I want women and children protected from harm. I want policies in place that are fact-based and shown to further the interests of public safety. I want parents to know the truth about how best to talk with their children regarding sexual abuse issues, and I want women and girls — and men and boys — to know how best to protect themselves from being victims of sexual assault.
None of these goals will be accomplished by obsessing over who goes into what bathroom.
You know, I had that same assumption and I figured that the uneducated would bring to attack the weak.
And not for warning anyone, but just for views and likes on their articles.
The Trans-Bathroom issue has always been directly tied to the fear people have of sex-offenders. Always!! Don’t think for a minute that it’s about anything other than that. It’s why gay men were discriminated against for the longest time, when stupid people thought that being gay meant an inborn predilection to hurt children. In fact, there was a time when being gay and being a pedophile virtually meant the same thing. This myth produced the Anita Bryant’s and Jerry Falwell’s of the world. Anita was famous for her campaign to “save the children” from homosexuals. This is why gays could never work with boy scouts or become teachers; because there was suspicion that no straight man would want to work with children of the same sex. Although that myth somewhat persists to this day, it has been largely demystified except for those on the far right. Once the gay community successfully separated themselves from groups like NAMBLA and gave themselves a huge domestic makeover as far as their image, the myth dissipated. No longer was AIDS purely a gay disease. No longer did one picture a bunch of promiscuous men on Fire Island who lusted after the young. Suddenly, gays had dignity. AS THEY SHOULD!!!!!!
Transgender people are unfortunately experiencing the same projected bigotry that was once applied to the entire LGBT community. The same myths are being propagated and sold on the black market of propaganda. I wish this puritanical country of ours would just get over itself with its self-righteous, fear based, religion oriented hatred and start becoming the tolerant, Judeo-Christian country it says it is.
You beat me too it. I was going to say they are using the same logic they used when they said gay men are a danger to children. I hope we have involved enough to see past that by now.
What we have here are people who are afraid of change and it seems that when people are afraid of change they like to play the “threat to our children” card. The reality is they are scared. They are afraid of what they don’t understand so they do everything they can to demonize it, because they are too lazy to learn about it.
There sure is no shortage of ignorance in this world.
You got it Fred. Anytime a cause tries to play the “threat to our children” card, it is usually bound to work. In the recent gay marriage trial that began in Detroit and made its way up to the Supreme Court, the state tried to bring in experts who purported to show that gay marriage hurt children, though they had no data and we’re made to look like fools. Any opposition to gay marriage, like the transgender bathroom issue, has its roots in fear of how it will harm children. It’s not so much “because the bible says so” as it is “we don’t want our children to be harmed”. Each victory slowly (like the gay marriage ruling) slowly peels away each layer of the onion and shows the man behind the curtain isn’t really the great and powerful OZ.
So what’s my point? I am hoping that with time, the differentiation between “registered citizens” and “predatory pedophiles” who cannot help themselves will become clear in the public’s mind and then maybe, there won’t be the need for a registry.
Realizing the truths, no longer being ignorant may not help though. I’m a female SO and it seems that our older generations are who will have these “notions” instilled in them. And they will only pass it on to the younger generation. I feel you two, Paul and Fred, are correct. Their ignorance pisses me off. I do not minimize in the least. They ought to educate themselves in areas they are ignorant. The way registered citizens are treated in our country is absurd. I remember growing up, b4 I, myself, became an s.o where a guy I knew was registered. He became a recluse, never coming outside due to how we are treated. Targets bathroom is another step for us. I feel the thought that this could be more dangerous is crazy. If you wanted to fight it womens bathrooms and mens are just as possible. This world is becoming crazy! God, please help us!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTu6tj4slnc
— Quite unrelated, but still relevant, In this Youtube video, look at the trans looking woman using the “children” card to bring the cameraman down by saying that he could be a pedophile just because she couldn’t make the man do what she wanted him to do, and because she could not argue with him from legal perspective.
The issue with the society is that it is very easy to shut someone (in the registry) down by saying he/she is a pedophile whether a person’s offense involved minor or not. And often it is futile to argue with these people as it is like hitting your head on the wall. These people will not realize until they themselves or their family member gets entangled in these ridiculous laws, but God forbid.
REALLY??? Targets Open Door Policy??? NOT!! Granted they might be allowing MEN into our bathrooms but TARGET didnt start this, our President did. To even think its okay to pass a Transgender Law allowing Transgender Males into womens bathrooms is just setting us up for more criminal behavior. If they dont think for 1 minute that Criminals will use this law to gain access to women in a very vulnerable place, their own bathroom, is just plain stupid!! All they have to do is wear a dress and they’re in!!
Shay, Target initiated their policy far in advance of the President’s directive. There is no evidence to support your fears that this will facilitate criminal behavior. Transgender women have been using women’s bathrooms forever. There is no evidence whatsoever that trans people pose any sexual harm to children or that predators dress up as the opposite sex in order to commit crimes in public bathrooms. If they were going to do this, they wouldn’t have had to wait for Target’s policy to be put in place to do it. Children are far, far more likely to be molested by those close to them in their everyday lives and in their own homes or other places they regularly frequent than by anyone they don’t know, regardless of their gender identity, in a public place.