Comments on: Grandpa’s Agenda

By: Crissa

Crissa — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 22:49:10 +0000

We wanted to do a video/commercial with instead of the ‘wrong’ gender entering a restroom after a child but instead a creepy looking priest-dressed guy or scary knife-wielding soccer mom… But we couldn’t find anyone willing to be the creepy priest dude.

By: denelian

denelian — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 05:29:37 +0000

for the love of God -
a 5th grade trangendered girl is *not* any sort of “threat” to other girls (except inasfar as she might prompt questioning of social norms)

people are asking why it is always the victim who has to change something to be safe. and i wonder too – whenever i hear a story like this, i get very angry at it. it doesn’t matter why someone is being ullied or hurt – it is always the victims job to change.

it’s bullshit. that little girl has *every* right to use the bathroom with her peers (and probably many of them are her firends!). making her go to a different bathroom just highlights that adults (some of them) don’t think her presentation is valid – it’s like admin in the school are telling everyone “she isn’t really a girl” – and that is horrifying. and shaming. and WRONG.

By: Nicole

Nicole — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 05:09:59 +0000

That poor little girl – :( I’m not trans but I was bullied for years and years in school, and I remember being scared to walk out of sight of adults because of what the other kids would say or do. Its no way to grow up, and I hope that things have gotten better for her since this incident. I do know that the scars from being bullied and teased daily for years don’t go away – its so STUPID that the grandfather was encouraging the boy in the story to do that. I wonder how many other parents in the area are/would be doing the same thing. The comments on the BDN site make me ashamed to live in Maine. This sort of prejudice isn’t limited to a certain generation or location around the state, but seems to be common through out.

By: Sam

Sam — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 19:38:51 +0000

OMG I think I actually met Paul Melanson a long long time ago–I think he knows my family. This has sickened me, that poor little girl. People like Paul Melanson are just fostering and propagating hate onto an entire new generation.

By: voz

voz — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 15:06:45 +0000

That school is just a few miles down the road from my place. And yes, the neighbors are talking about it, and with far far more clue and sensitivity than I have seen on many feminist blogs

That said, Holly, if you want a local perspective, let me know. This is most definitely not the place for it.

By: Stop Bullying Transgender Children - The Pursuit of Harpyness

Stop Bullying Transgender Children - The Pursuit of Harpyness — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 15:03:07 +0000

[...] I read another story about a bigoted adult lashing out against a trans child. Angry that his grandson’s school [...]

By: Little Sara

Little Sara — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:59:44 +0000

I’m almost glad I was in my fog of confusion, not knowing, not caring, at school age. All that mattered was finishing the grade, getting it over with. Since I brushed the issue under the rug in my mind, I didn’t have to worry about the vast stupidity of adults while a child, well at least not to the extent I would have had I been openly trans. My parents knew I was depressed, but not why, and were too busy to investigate. The initial work and support to find out about trans was done solo, then friends, and finally my mom jumped in to help, when I convinced her it would be permanent, and irreversible (in a way she couldn’t ignore).

Pain makes us grow (we learn from it, become better, etc), but too much pain breaks us. I wish for that little girl to not have as much pain growing up as me and others have had, because of their difference.

By: amandaw

amandaw — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:44:55 +0000

The thing here is that for trans children, most of the time, the adults aren’t protectors, safety. The adults are yet more predators — and much bigger, more authoritative, powerful ones. The adults are yet more people out to hurt you.

By: little light

little light — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:34:05 +0000

prairielily@16:

(Note that this assumption only works if the staff is actually interested in protecting her.)

And honestly, call it cynical, but you’ve just brought up my primary fear about having this girl go through the faculty lounge or whatever to get to an isolated washroom away from the other kids. You combine that with the basic vulnerability of her being trans–and therefore, on some level, lacking credibility as a narrator to most people–and what you’ve got is an already-bullied little girl walking through an isolated area with only adults, all of whom know that a: she’s isolated and b: she has reason to keep her mouth shut, plus c: she won’t be believed about a lot of things. And if you’re the sort of adult who thinks this kid is a pervert and maybe even “asking for it”…

It’s a situation ripe for abuse. I hate to be the one pointing it out. It’s not that I don’t think well enough of teachers in general, it’s just that it’s a situation with no failsafes. And there were plenty of teachers who never wanted to protect me, even when I was a kid subjected to violence; it’s not a far extrapolation to account for the idea that there are teachers who don’t just look the other way when a gender-nonconforming kid is harmed, but maybe even agree with that grandpa that it should happen. It may be fine at this school in particular or a thousand others, but as a policy it’s a recipe for trouble eventually.

By: Little Sara

Little Sara — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:22:32 +0000

I’m glad the argument never actually even came up at my place of work. And it’s not like HR are not knowing of my history. With no document change they knew the day I was hired. I explained my situation as best I could, to clear things up (not let false assumptions do my piece instead of me), and have never had a problem using the women’s room.

No one’s been raped, or harassed or whatever else because of my presence (and I don’t mean to accuse the girl, I’m just saying, a trans girl using the girl’s room brings no issue unless someone makes it one – in this case the grandpa and son).

Frankly, given the way my case was treated when I attempted to go to college (which didn’t work out in the end, too little school loans to even survive), what with being forced to use my legal name and having to deal with bathroom and locker room (PE is mandatory in college here, just not all semesters) on my own, with no help at all… I thought a workplace would be worst.