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Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Mon Aug 30, 2021 10:56 pm
by Sinned
Dust, the mtf weight lifter spectacularly failed and I believe came last. So not a good example.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Tue Aug 31, 2021 12:44 am
by Dust
Wow, thanks for the civil responses, gentlemen. I truly appreciate that. Before I respond to any individual comments, a general point:

Trans people rely on stereotypes. In order to either pass, or simply signal to others how they wish to be addressed and treated. This is not tearing down stereotypes, it is at best utilizing them, at worse, building them up.

A man in a skirt stands in stark opposition to stereotypes. It's more like the woman with a buzz cut, or a girl who is a tomboy in behavior and appearance. We don't even have a decent word for boys doing the opposite.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Tue Aug 31, 2021 1:51 am
by crfriend
Dust wrote: Tue Aug 31, 2021 12:44 amA man in a skirt stands in stark opposition to stereotypes. It's more like the woman with a buzz cut, or a girl who is a tomboy in behavior and appearance. We don't even have a decent word for boys doing the opposite.
Precisely. A man in a skirt who is unabashedly a man is vastly more subversive than the butchest-of-butch women. Make no bones about it. "Tomboys" are celebrated; guys who do not conform are vilified. That makes it a tough road to follow, and requires strength, resolve, and just plain guts.

That said, I think there is genuine respect for guys who do not "conform" so long as they are genuine and approachable. This is not to say that they'll be welcomed into the parents' home of a girlfriend, or that girlfriends will even materialise, but one can hope.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Tue Aug 31, 2021 9:31 am
by Dust
Sinned wrote: Mon Aug 30, 2021 10:56 pm Dust, the mtf weight lifter spectacularly failed and I believe came last. So not a good example.
True, but simply qualifying for the Olympics is an accomplishment that many elite athletes never achieve.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 8:51 am
by Pdxfashionpioneer
Rode_kater said:
Hmm, can you explain to me then all the noise we hear about states in the US passing laws requiring teaching intelligent design/banning teaching evolution. Since from what you say that shouldn't be possible. Perhaps it isn't possible but they try anyway?


Great question Rode! As Moonshadow said, each state sets the guidelines for what should be taught. From there, each locality, either a county, a city or in really sparsely populated areas, a collection of counties figure out how to teach that curriculum. Unlike most European countries, there are no federal educational standards. As you might guess, that has lead to a lot of inconsistency as to what exactly a high school diploma means.

That situation has also lead to a number of Fundamentalist Christians to making a point of running for their school boards so they could put through such policies as teaching "intelligent design," "creationism," or whatever name they paste onto the creation story in Genesis.

During the Obama Administration the National Association of Governors realized what a crazy-quilt our education system had become and that thanks to globalization, there is, as your country figured out a long time ago, a certain body of knowledge and skills that a young adult needed to get started in life whether they grew up in the West Virginia hills or San Francisco; they just didn't know, for sure, what all that body of knowledge is. Consequently, they started a research effort that came to be known as Common Core Curriculum and they requested the US Department of Education coordinate the effort.

At some point right wing conspiracy theorists and their media enablers created the myth that this initiative was some diabolical plot by us evil liberals to trample on the states' prerogatives and indoctrinate the youth of America in our Socialist (code for Communist) ideology. No, it was still a state-led effort to figure out what young people needed to know in this day and age, but at some point perception becomes political reality and the process was snuffed out long before it could really take hold.

One thing I would like our foreign friends to try to appreciate is that it is hard to comprehend how large the United States really is. My brother, who hosted a lot of foreign visitors in his work as a regional sales manager, was always impressed by how amazed nearly all of those people were at how immense the US is. Just as a two examples, between my atlases and online research I learned that at about 26,000 square miles West Virginia ranks 40th of our 50 states in land area and it is still another 40% larger than the Netherlands. Alaska, our largest state, at 663,000 some square miles is larger than the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Spain combined!

Just as an aside, someone suggested that we adopt the European practice of proportional representation of our parties. Not only are adherents to each of splinter parties spread out across the whole North American continent and half-way across the Pacific Ocean, but the US includes both one of the deepest points on land -- a spot in Death Valley that's something like 229 feet below sea level -- and one of the highest -- Denali at something over 19,000 feet. While that doesn't qualify it as an "8,000er," as the highest peaks in the Himalayas are referred to, it's conditions are every bit as daunting and is therefore used as a training "hill" for climbers preparing for a Himalayan expedition.

In short, within one country we have every type of climate and terrain known to mankind: dessert, mountains, rainforests, tropics, plains comparable to steppes. You name it. Indeed, in my current home state of Oregon I live about an hour from a sea coast in one direction and a mountain that one can ski on year-round in the other. Another mile beyond that and I'm in a high dessert.

This diversity and our history has made each of our state's quite jealous of their prerogatives in education and every other category of governance.

Despite all that, we've somehow made it work and even developed a reputation for doing the right thing ... though often not until we've tried everything else. As Winston Churchill pointed out in the early 1940's. :lol:

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 8:55 am
by Pdxfashionpioneer
Jim wrote: Sun Aug 29, 2021 11:20 am
Pdxfashionpioneer wrote: Sun Aug 29, 2021 7:57 am ...
"How do we define who is a male and who is a female in such contexts?" Amongst the people who have studied that question in a scientific manner, it is a settled question: People are who they say they are -- male, female or other -- no matter what other conclusions other people might come to if they were allowed to inspect their genitalia.
...
Help me understand this. How can this be studied in a scientific manner? It would seem to more be a matter of definitions.


To be precise, as scientifically as us quirky human beings can be studied. These are the conclusions of the people who study child development, human biology and biochemistry, etc. So much of this is only as scientific as social science can manage.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 9:21 am
by Pdxfashionpioneer
Apparently, the Olympic Committee and other sports authorities such as the NCAA have looked pretty carefully at the issue of what, if any advantage an MTF athlete might have over genetic females and have set a standard that MTF athletes are ineligible for a year after they start hormone treatments. They determined that after that length of time such athletes will have shed enough upper body muscle and bone and retained enough fat as to have a body comparable to any other women athletes. Some authorities say that within a few months those changes will have occurred so it is not true that starting hormones later in life will not cause those changes.

For those of you who prefer anecdotal evidence this phenomenon of losing upper body strength was reported by Renee Richards in her autobiography.

From the things I have read, as Pelmut suggested, the people who transition and later feel they need to transition back are few and far between. Their cases are tragic, but they in no way refute the challenges that trans-people, especially women, face. Nonetheless, because young children cannot be relied on to make such drastic decisions so early in life, current protocols call for prepubescent children to only transition socially. That is, wear clothes appropriate to their gender identification, be called by a name appropriate to that identity and in all other ways, including use of public restrooms, sports, etc. be treated and act in the way of any other child with that gender identity.

When puberty begins, such children are given hormone blockers so that their physical development is delayed while they mature to the point when they can make a reliable, informed decision at which point the prescriptions will change to hormones and generally after they reach at least 18, any desired reconstructive surgery.

As to the women in that documentary I cited, yes they undoubtedly put considerable expense and effort into their appearance, but it wasn't like some studio paid for it. Why would they, most of these actresses were bit players and there is a virtually endless supply of beautiful women available to Hollywood at the drop of a hat. There was nothing in not only their appearance, but also their voices, movements and other elements of affect that suggested anything other than they were women. No one can fake that.

As to Dust's other objections all I can say is, I stand by my statements. If there are any places where it is "cool," "hip," or whatever else to come out as trans, they're few and far between. And even in those places, it has to be challenging for anyone to come out as the gender opposite of what everyone else expects them to be. All of us should know that from our own experiences in wanting to wear so-called womenswear in public.

The good news for us, is that thanks to the bravery of LGBTQ folks in coming out, most people in developed countries have gotten a LOT more enlightened on these matters than they were even 16 years ago.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 12:06 pm
by rode_kater
Pdxfashionpioneer wrote: Wed Sep 15, 2021 8:51 am Rode_kater said:
Hmm, can you explain to me then all the noise we hear about states in the US passing laws requiring teaching intelligent design/banning teaching evolution. Since from what you say that shouldn't be possible. Perhaps it isn't possible but they try anyway?


Great question Rode! As Moonshadow said, each state sets the guidelines for what should be taught. From there, each locality, either a county, a city or in really sparsely populated areas, a collection of counties figure out how to teach that curriculum. Unlike most European countries, there are no federal educational standards. As you might guess, that has lead to a lot of inconsistency as to what exactly a high school diploma means.
(snip explanation)

Thanks for that, now I know what this whole Common Core is referring too that was doing to rounds a few years back. I've lived in Australia, I know what a federation looks like. It's almost as big as the US area-wise. They don't agree between states on what education should look like either.

Although, according to wikipedia Australia has actually got a sort of common curriculum now, who knew?
Pdxfashionpioneer wrote: Wed Sep 15, 2021 8:51 am Just as an aside, someone suggested that we adopt the European practice of proportional representation of our parties. Not only are adherents to each of splinter parties spread out across the whole North American continent and half-way across the Pacific Ocean, but the US includes both one of the deepest points on land -- a spot in Death Valley that's something like 229 feet below sea level -- and one of the highest -- Denali at something over 19,000 feet. While that doesn't qualify it as an "8,000er," as the highest peaks in the Himalayas are referred to, it's conditions are every bit as daunting and is therefore used as a training "hill" for climbers preparing for a Himalayan expedition.
PR is a broad church, basically defined as "anything not FPTP". I wouldn't have one region for the whole US. I think even the UK is too big for a single region. Some form of MMR I think is a good compromise between local representation and proportionality. While I think it would help reduce the divisiveness of your politics, it's obviously the choice of the people living there.

Australia is also quite varied, though not as much. I always laugh at people saying they want to see Australia in a few weeks. I tell them they need to pick an area because there is no way they're going to see much of the country in such a short time.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 2:29 am
by Dust
rode_kater wrote: Wed Sep 15, 2021 12:06 pm
Pdxfashionpioneer wrote: Wed Sep 15, 2021 8:51 am Rode_kater said:
Hmm, can you explain to me then all the noise we hear about states in the US passing laws requiring teaching intelligent design/banning teaching evolution. Since from what you say that shouldn't be possible. Perhaps it isn't possible but they try anyway?


Great question Rode! As Moonshadow said, each state sets the guidelines for what should be taught. From there, each locality, either a county, a city or in really sparsely populated areas, a collection of counties figure out how to teach that curriculum. Unlike most European countries, there are no federal educational standards. As you might guess, that has lead to a lot of inconsistency as to what exactly a high school diploma means.
(snip explanation)

Thanks for that, now I know what this whole Common Core is referring too that was doing to rounds a few years back. I've lived in Australia, I know what a federation looks like. It's almost as big as the US area-wise. They don't agree between states on what education should look like either.

Although, according to wikipedia Australia has actually got a sort of common curriculum now, who knew?
Common Core was only the latest in federal education initiatives. Before that it was No Child Left Behind under Bush Jr. The Department of Education had been around for a while, so to say federal education standards started under Obama if just plain false.

But as PDX points out, the US is huge! The states were originally close to being separate countries with a common military (and that only on an as needed basis, Congress still has to re-authorize having a military every two years), held together by something more akin to the EU than the UK. At the time of the Civil War, many thought of themselves as Virginians or Pennsylvanians (or whatever state) rather than Americans. We still retain a lot of that history, and that is important for foreigners to understand. I've run into Southerners who still call it the War Between the States. There is still animosity between different parts of the country, and state laws vary a lot. Usually it comes out half jokingly with complaints about Californians or New Yorkers, or even Yankees or Southerners, but it's still there.

There is an argument to be made that most of what the Federal government is doing today is unconstitutional, including all federal education laws. I don't see any going back, but there it is. Our Constitution was written to make the federal government big and powerful where and when it is needed but at the same time to leave as much decentralized and left to the separate states to do themselves as possible. We still shouldn't quite be viewed as a singular country like Germany or France. We are bigger, more populous, and more diverse than any one EU country. We have individual states that dwarf many European countries on any and all metrics. But at the same time, we are not a collection of separate countries like the EU, either. We are far more united today than we were at our own founding. Hopefully we can continue to work together where it's needed.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 10:03 am
by rivegauche
You have to wonder about Tennessee, but then it includes part of the Appalachians, not thinking of Deliverance at all. In 1925 they put a teacher on trial for daring to teach evolution in a science class. In 1957 the USSR scared the life out of western science education by putting the first satellite in space - I wonder if the US would have got there first if they had taught more science in their science classes. And the Bible Belters still seem to be a force to be reckoned with. Scary stuff.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 8:38 pm
by Sinned
It sort of puts into perspective the recent passing of anti-abortion laws by Texas and the quick reaction of the Supreme Court to threaten the state for doing so [0]. It also explains why there aren't common voting laws across the country and hence Trump's ability to falsely claim voting fraud. Maybe there is a case for "normalising" such across all states to reduce friction.

[0] I thought that abortion was settled long ago as legal in all states and confirmed by the Supreme Court and hence was surprised when Texas passed the laws it did. I'm not arguing for or against abortion, I consider that the personal decision for any woman to make, just the passing of laws for or against.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Fri Sep 17, 2021 10:59 am
by Pdxfashionpioneer
the recent passing of anti-abortion laws by Texas and the quick reaction of the Supreme Court to threaten the state for doing so


Unfortunately, the US Supreme Court ruled, without hearing any arguments on either side, to let the new Texas law stand until the challenges wend their weary way to the Supreme Court.

Normally, that would be what one would except that this law was written so cleverly (diabolically) that mounting a legal challenge is nearly impossible. Typically the way one challenges a law in the US system is to file an injunction against whoever is responsible for enforcing the law to not enforce it. The new Texas law does not assign any government official with the responsibility of enforcing it nor any criminal penalty for breaking the law. However, anyone can sue any other person or entity who performs, assists in or abets an abortion after the 6th week of pregnancy in civil court and if they prevail they need to awarded at least $10,000.

The language on aiding, abetting and performing an abortion is so vague it could include the person who drove the pregnant woman to and from the clinic where the woman got her abortion. Who knows? Maybe even the person who suggested she get an abortion. As far as I know, there's no limitation on the number of people who may sue a given individual who participated in a given abortion.

Why 6 weeks? Because that's the point where a so-called fetal heartbeat can be detected (It's not really a heartbeat because the heart isn't a functioning organ at that point, but "alternative facts" are the stock in trade of the extreme right). Unfortunately for women, few of them even know they are pregnant at 6 weeks. Reprehensively, there is no exception allowed for rape or incest.

Unfortunately, just as there is no provision for states to separate themselves from our Union, there is no provision for kicking them out either. I am beseeching our English Cousins to review the Treaty of 1789 to see if there is any provision for revocation. If so, would you please exercise and demand we swear allegiance to the Queen. If there is no such provision, could you please see if the United Kingdom would, as you did between 1789 and 1814, simply ignore the treaty and this time make a serious attempt to bring us back into the fold?

You'll probably have to enlist the cooperation of the other members of NATO, but after the last 4 years that might be easier than you think.

Not up for it? Very well, we did ask for it in 1776, so we have yet another example of why one should be careful about what one asks for. But please don't hate me for asking. :) :)

Hopefully what Winston said about us still holds and we only have a few more "everything elses" to try before we get back to the right thing.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Fri Sep 17, 2021 1:14 pm
by rode_kater
Sinned wrote: Thu Sep 16, 2021 8:38 pm I thought that abortion was settled long ago as legal in all states and confirmed by the Supreme Court and hence was surprised when Texas passed the laws it did.
As an outsider the way abortion has been "legalised" in the USA looks odd. The USA is a federation and so states have a lot of rights. In particular, the federal legislature (AIUI) cannot legislate to legalise abortion everywhere. However, as a workaround there is the Supreme Court which can legalise it by appealing to the constitution? Coming from a civil law jurisdiction this seems like the courts sitting in the chair of the legislature and so bypassing the rights of the states.

The argument itself (IIRC) runs along the lines of the Due Process clause somehow implies a right of privacy and therefore bodily integrity and therefore legalises abortion. This feels extremely tenuous. Don't get me wrong, I believe women should have the choice, but I can also understand that people disagree with the way it was achieved.

Here it's also complicated, since it is an EHCR thing and that has explicit right to privacy and bodily integrity, but is not even a federation and has no enforcement arm at all. So it has ruled that abortion should be available but the states can determine the conditions, which in practice means a huge variation across the continent. Freedom of movement however means that in practice it's available almost everywhere.

For the USA this does feel a bit like a "states rights" issue, I hope you can figure it out in a better way than the last time the issue blew up.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Fri Sep 17, 2021 9:57 pm
by Sinned
But surely this just means that a woman would just go to another state which does allow abortion. And the out of state agency can't be sued because the law banning is just for one state. Sorry I don't mean to start a discussion on the rights and wrongs of abortion so please don't continue in that vein. I was interested in the legalities of this example between federal and state, more complex than I thought and thank you all for your insight.

Re: Teenager wearing a dress harassed by inbred Tennessee hillbilly

Posted: Fri Sep 17, 2021 11:20 pm
by crfriend
Sinned wrote: Fri Sep 17, 2021 9:57 pmBut surely this just means that a woman would just go to another state which does allow abortion. And the out of state agency can't be sued because the law banning is just for one state.
We don't quite know what this means yet, and we don't know if the mere act of driving a woman across state lines still satisfies the Texas statute which stipulates civil liability rather than criminal liability -- and civil liability is a much lower bar to clear than criminal liability. This is a nasty one to be sure, and we're going to have to wait to see how it's dealt with by the courts. Honestly, I'm not confident that this one will turn out well given the national stance at the moment.

To PDX's earlier comment, I'd posit that the USA missed a powerful opportunity to ensure a brighter future for itself by not letting the south go in the late 1850s and early 1860s. Imagine a country without the obscene blemish of the Civil Rights era of the 1960s (which still hasn't been settled, hence the Black Lives Matter movement of today), the Southern Baptist Conference, and the mere presence of Texas. A shining opportunity lost forever.

I detest lost opportunities.