Today's Seattle Times reports: "Democrats favor transgender discrimination ban"
The Democratic majority on the Metropolitan King County Council appears ready to adopt an ordinance that would prohibit discrimination against transgender people.Oh, brother. It's not like the government can grant every imaginable class of citizens privileged access to litigation if they don't get the job or the apartment they want. But you know that the Democrats will never stop increasing the number of privileged victim classes. Which minorities (sexual and otherwise) are they going to "protect" next? People who prefer sex with the lights on? People whose middle names begin the letter "M"?Supporters say they want to send a message that Washington's most populous county opposes an initiative and a referendum proposed by Tim Eyman to overturn a new state law protecting sexual minorities.
Fortunately, the Republicans on the Council are united against the Democrats' overreach:
Reagan Dunn, R-Bellevue, said Monday he opposes the measure because it would expand the role of government and put a strain on small businesses, opening the door for more lawsuits.Unfortunately, I think those are precisely the reasons why the Democrats favor this. Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at March 21, 2006 10:11 AM | Email This"I don't think we should be heavily involved in the minutiae of the way businesses are operating," he said.
1) Loser politicians who won't go away...Dino Rossi, David Irons, Chris Vance, Pam Roach, Mike McGavick and his sidekick Ted Stevens.
2) Part-time party loyalist computer geeks who make it their goal to disenfranchise legal voters by claiming to ridding the bad voters.
Even though thy are the scourge and dregs of society, we do need to protect them too, maybe put them on welfare til they all get real jobs.
Posted by: rossi too on March 21, 2006 10:28 AMJust look at unions. They are great for people who are willing to sell two pieces of their souls. The first piece is the acknowledgement that they should not be getting paid as much as they do in the union, and the second piece is the destruction of the competitive edge of the businesses they work for with respect to the future. In return, each union member who looks the other way, gets a nice wage, pension, and bosses who represent them in voting progressive / Democrat so they can keep the gravy train running. At least until the company goes bankrupt from foreign competition.
Posted by: Jeff B. on March 21, 2006 10:30 AMThis is a great example of how democrats look for a pile of crap, and then roll themselves in it like a street mongrel.
Why in the world do transgendered people (or, to put it in more correct terms, self-mutilationists) require protection from themselves? If I refuse to wear deodorant and brush my teeth or get a haircut and I am denied employment, it's my own fault, right? Well, what if I take hormones and whack off my genitals? When society shuns me because I am ruining my perfectly good body, should I get special treatment?
How many trans-gendered people are there? I am sure there are fewer than the homosexual population, which as near as I can tell is less than a percent of our population. Why bend over backwards for such a tiny minority? Do they honestly think you can keep winning elections (provided they don't cheat, of course.)
As the democrat population is decreasing due to a combination of drug abuse, confused gender roles, very low birth-rate, broken families, and abortion, do they have anyone but themselves to blame for embracing these destructive behaviors?
Posted by: Jonathan Gardner on March 21, 2006 11:33 AMAfter WWII, at the peak level of unionization in this country, wages and productivity grew together. In the late seventies productivity nearly ground to a halt and wages started declining (in real terms). When productivity began increasing again in the 80's wages didn't follow. The result of this has been declining real wages, with households keeping their incomes steady by increasing labor foce participation rates for women. As unions declined as a percentage of the workforce, the living standards of most Amercans declined with them. I wouldn't propose a simple cause and effect relationship, but the empirical evidence does seem to support it being one of a number of causes. GDP growth has been going largely to the top quintile of income earners. Maybe this is what you want to happen. Eighty percent of Americans would probably like to see this trend reversed. Are increasing levels of unionization the only way to do that? No, but it would probably help. The most pressing competitive problem for American business is the escalating cost of health care and the expectation that private business should pay for it. This is why Canada has a competitive advantage over both the US (where business is expected to pay) and the continental European countries (where health insurance is financed through payroll taxes). Individual companies should not bear the burden for providing health insurance, pensions,etc. Anyway, enough rambling. I don't understand your hostility to unions per se. Individualk unions can do harmful things, but then their membership would decline as their empployer suffered. Labor market strucure also has an important impact on how unions and employers make decisions. It seems like you're oversimplifying things.
Posted by: Eric h on March 21, 2006 12:13 PMThey'll need it.
A Republican Watchdog.
Posted by: A Watchdog on March 21, 2006 12:51 PMAren't the numerous protected classes created already Democrats? ;)
Posted by: Palouse on March 21, 2006 01:16 PMWhen I was in college there was a self-mutilator who had shaved his head from his left ear to the centerline and had long greasy hair to his shoulder in the off side. He then had the bald side of his head tattooed and festooned his face with a variety of hardware.
One day as I sat in the cafeteria eating my lunch I overheard him bemoaning that fact that he had someone else had been selected for a job he had applied for, imagine that. He thought that it was perhaps that ‘they didn’t like the way he looked’ and referred to the interviewers as prejudiced against him.
I have only this to say, if I showed up for a job interview wearing a rubber nose and a pair of big red shoes I would not find it at all surprising if someone else got the job.
My take on it is that every person that has ever been born wants to get attention, it’s just human nature. As I tell my nieces and nephews get attention for doing something worthwhile and doing it well as opposed to doing something weird. The attention you get for doing something well is acknowledgment of a job well done and it will last, any attention you get for doing something weird is not only transient it is more pity than anything else.
The Sea Times article included the following quote from a transgender person: "I know first-hand the prejudices and discrimination, and I've seen it happen time and time again with people I know."
Stefan, you're smart enough to know that you can't say that about people who prefer sex with the lights on, or whose middle names begin the letter "M".
Maybe that person's testimony was a lie. Maybe it's true, but not important enough to merit your concern. But your analogy is just plain dumb.
Posted by: Bruce on March 21, 2006 02:38 PMDems announce plan to increase slavery of some to let others throw off the shackles of such awful ideas as consequences of their own choices. For example I can kill the baby before it is born or suck it into the death culture after.
Soon training classes on how we are to treat each other!!
Wait those already have been implemented. The syllabus reads like this: white folk you are evil, everyone else (except Asians) are victims of white people. Those "unique" white people are also victims of the other white people as well. Unique Whites are those that understand they were either born the wrong gender, lust only after the same sex, want America destroyed or would change skin color if possible. Therefore they get the same benefits from the Dems.
Hitler's Nazi sought a white nation, Democrat’s Future America (FA) will be white free complete with the hate gringo state in the southwest. The latest tactic is to hope (small h) that the Muslims do in the white folk. In the end the stacks of white bodies will do nothing, nothing, to sooth the soul that chooses to have no consequences of its choices.
This country was founded on the premise that individuals have rights. When discrimination is identified it needs to be stomped out imediately. It is not about any special rights for anybody, it is about identifiying a problem and fixing it.
If everyone was treated equally there would not be any reason for any additional ordinances.
Posted by: BV on March 21, 2006 03:35 PMYou are mistaken. The notion of equality you're referrring to means "equality before the LAW." In other words, you and I can't be treated differently by *agencies of government.* Example: you and I both rob a 7-11 one night, but I get charged differently for the crime because I'm gay... let's say they add some specious charge to make it look like the crime I committed was somehow WORSE than what you did, even though we both did the same thing. By the principle of equality before the law, THAT'S discrimination.
The principle YOU don't understand is the principle of Freedom of Association. Frankly, if someone wants to open a radio station and only employ lesbian amputees from Albania, as far as I'm concerned that's perfectly within their rights. And yes, if my employer decided that they didn't want to keep me in my job because I'm a big ol' homo, I think they have that right. But they're not gonna do that, because I'm good at what I do and it doesn't make sense to get rid of me--they're getting their money's worth out of my skills. The free market will punish those who make bad business decisions (like hiring only blacks, or only whites, or only women, etc.) Would you shop somewhere if you knew they had a "whites only" hiring policy? Neither would I. The point is, in all those situations, you are tallking about PRIVATE decisions about how people choose to use their resources--whether it's in hiring decisions, renting to applicants, whatever. Either your property is yours or it's not.
Posted by: libertarianobserver on March 21, 2006 04:29 PMNot necessarily... but close.
Of course, that'd leave the evangelicals and other conservatives who prefer religion to guide their right-leaning politics who might want special protection. Might also be hard to call them Democrats.
Posted by: A Watchdog on March 21, 2006 04:38 PMWhat about protection for rich white males? They can't get a memorial at the UW (even if they're a poor Sioux Indian).
What about a law to protect short people? They can't get a job in the NBA as a player. Is that fair? NO! It's not fair because I said so, and it hurts the short people's feelings.
http://www.thisislondon.com/news/articles/16449119?source=PA
http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-ouch17.html
They live in a delusional fantasy of their own creation, expression their opinion and world view and treating it as fact.
There's a new word for that. "Truthiness" is the quality of stating concepts one wishes or believes to be true, rather than the facts.
Posted by: Obi-Wan on March 21, 2006 07:25 PMI hate to break it to you, Jonathan, but that book is fiction.
When society shuns me because I am ruining my perfectly good body, should I get special treatment?
I'm so glad to hear that your body is perfectly good. The premise of transgender people is that their bodies, prior to surgery, are not perfectly good. I am far from an expert (I've never even known a transgendered person), but the little I've read leads me to think there are some people legitimately in this category. If you've looked at the data and don't buy it, then you are welcome to conclude that they don't have a point. If you want to just assume they're weird because you feel uncomfortable with the topic, that's irrational and mean.
Why bend over backwards for such a tiny minority?
What does size have to do with it?
Posted by: Bruce on March 21, 2006 07:44 PMOf course, this is all part of the liberal agenda..
Posted by: KS on March 21, 2006 08:38 PMYou need to do your homework. It's a well known fact that the big three auto are struggling, and in large part due to the stranglehold of epensive union labor. And comparison with scandanavian countries is incorrect because they do not have nearly as free a market as we do. In other words, they prove my point even more. As for NAFTA, you might think it's a "free trade" agreement because of the name, just like you might think that a progressive stands for progress. You'd be wrong on both counts. NAFTA is 29,000 pages of regulations on supposedly "free trade."
This country is a very different place than it was after WWII. Today most our work force is knowledge based. Unions are on the decline because private sector employees prefer the benefits of stock options, better health plans, ownwership in the company, and the knowledge that their job will remain in place with the successful competition of their employer. Trotting out the same old tired lie about how companies would mistreat their employees without unions ignores that most of the businesses in this country are non-union and the employees are doing just fine.
Wake up buddy, there is no free lunch.
Monday, I watched the hearing on cable, and it was a most impressive learning curve. About ten transexual folks talked about the need for these protections.
They were articulate, educated amd sincere. I was impressed.
That journey must be one of the most difficult any person could possible take in any given lifetime.
It is a medical condition, long recognized, and far more prevelant than the idiots posting here supppose.
And it is obvious that it is better for society to say that we want you to be employed and self supporting in a climate of neutratality about your private life than to see folks out of work, depending on welfare.
I support this change and will call my county council person tomorrow. And will copy these posts to present to the next hearing as proof of the need for the new law.
How very cruel and uneducated the posts here sound. Medieveal.
Posted by: Bob on March 22, 2006 12:58 AMReading some of the comments above, you'd think that some of guys posting here are 'anxious' that their (ahem) limbs might come off -- in sympathetic reaction.
I know two of these 'self-mutilators' (someone else's term) who went male to female. They are actually pretty conservative (political philosophy) and aren't asking for anything from King County, or Washington State, or any other government agency. They didn't want anyone else's money -- certainly not public funds -- for their SRS. But they appear, here, to be getting snarky and insulting remarks as part of a broad brush swipe at they and others like them. One had a considerable amount of support from people whose conservative/religious (LDS, primarily) bona fides were beyond question, and I saw them treated like shit by proud self-described liberals.
I've also know one who had some real issues, aside from this one.
So, I guess that they have the same range of outlooks on life as the rest of us... and they are individuals who should be looked at as individuals -- rather than as a lump to be pigeon-holed by ankle-biters.
Boy. That's a conservative/libertarian approach to dealing with people.
/sarc
From the diagrams I found on-line, after talking to these people, it appears that -- in reality -- most of the parts are reused. Very little goes into the biohazard bags, apparently.
Maybe that's why the King County Council is trying to help them... and others are being snarky. They're (voluntarily) recycling!
Posted by: FT on March 22, 2006 04:13 AMWill you?
If not, then shut the Hell up. The politicians know they can take you for granted and can vote against you whenever they want without you abandoning them.
Check out how your politician voted
http://apps.leg.wa.gov/billinfo/summary.aspx?year=2005&bill=2661
O. I remember. You're bigots.
Posted by: Epiphany on March 22, 2006 12:21 PMSo, if there were evidence that short people were discriminated against, it would be perfectly sensible to prohibit that discrimination. Same with people with middle names beginning with M, or people with hispanic names.
People should not be fired or denied opportunities for anything other than economic or job performance reasons. Surely this isn't too hard to understand.
I think it's ridiculous to claim that transgendered people haven't been denied jobs, etc. because they are transgendered.
Posted by: Epiphany on March 22, 2006 03:41 PMIt isn't a hard onus to bear. I'm sure any interested group could prove it to anyone's satisfaction.
Posted by: Epiphany on March 22, 2006 04:07 PMI think this whole thing is just a red herring.
Posted by: joer on March 22, 2006 04:54 PM"You need to do your homework. It's a well known fact that the big three auto are struggling, and in large part due to the stranglehold of epensive union labor."
I did not deny that the big three auto makers were in financial trouble, due, at least in part to the contracts they had negotiated with their unions.
"And comparison with scandanavian countries is incorrect because they do not have nearly as free a market as we do. "
Sweden in particular has had a much more open, export oriented economy than the US. What do you mean by a "free" market?
"As for NAFTA, you might think it's a "free trade" agreement because of the name, just like you might think that a progressive stands for progress. You'd be wrong on both counts. NAFTA is 29,000 pages of regulations on supposedly "free trade."
Are you putting words in my mouth? You seem to be attributing opinions to me about the nature of the NAFTA agreement that I haven't stated. At the time of it's passage both the left and the right in America were split. The right was split along the america first/nativist line and the pro-big business line. The left was splt along the american jobs first/new economy-pro-intrnational line. Is it really "free trade"? No. Is there such a thing as actually existing free trade? No. Markets are strucured by law, history, and tradition. Attempts at seeing what unfettered markets in the absence of such a tradition would do have been disastrous. An overly ideological attachment to markets or planning or managed competition or anything else seems to be a policy proposal waiting for disaster. What's your point?
You addressed none of my comments on labor market structure and the effects on competitiveness. So, you didn't have anything to say about the questions I was raising so you misrepresented what I said and then disagreed with that? Good job. Straw man up. Straw man down. Real conversation/communication: 0 partisan points:1 Go team.
"Trotting out the same old tired lie about how companies would mistreat their employees without unions ignores that most of the businesses in this country are non-union and the employees are doing just fine."
Where did I say that? Really, where? Are you talking to me or some other person with whom you've disagreed in the past?
"This country is a very different place than it was after WWII."
Yes,it is. And one of those differences is the lower percentage of union membership. Why that should be barred from our analysis I don't know, and you didn't address. All you say is that it's different. Good of you to notice.
"Unions are on the decline because private sector employees prefer the benefits of stock options, better health plans, ownwership in the company, and the knowledge that their job will remain in place with the successful competition of their employer."
Interesting. What study are you citing? Or are you suggesting that your personal feelings tell you all you need to know about the transformation of the American labor market over the last sixty years? Your grasp of labor law is indeed both intimidating and enlightening. How does any of your response pertain to what I said?
"Wake up buddy, there is no free lunch."
In my discussion of market structure and US economic history I must have forgotten the important place in life of imaginary free lunches. Yet you picked up on the true essence of my comments. Bravo!
Posted by: eric h on March 22, 2006 05:11 PMIf they voted for the bill - VOTE AGAINST THEM.
Otherwise just shut up because obviously you really care about the issue.
http://apps.leg.wa.gov/billinfo/summary.aspx?year=2005&bill=2661
Posted by: Conservative, Not Republican on March 22, 2006 05:12 PMIf it's just a matter of proof that people are denied jobs because they are transsexuals, I'm sure a minute of research will do wonders.
I'm glad you'll support the law as long as discrimination is proved. Very reasonable of you.
Posted by: Epiphany on March 22, 2006 05:54 PMOne way would be to ask them...
...it also could depend upon what it says on their drivers' license...
...or their reissued/amended birth certificate...
...or court-approved name change...
...or what might be suggested by their Social Security card.
I can vouch, based upon what I have seen/heard, for the harassment that some have been subjected to at work, including one receiving a threat of physical harm (with -- ahem -- extreme prejudice) when they returned to work from their reassignment surgery. That enough for you, E?