War on Crossdressers more important than War on Terror?

Once again something hits the news where people are irrationally looking at things backwards.
http://www.pamshouseblend.com/diary/13725/#177468 where some people object to a human rights criticism of an anti-terror plan..

Oh no, being fair to crossdressers by not targeting them put us all at risk.... i find it hard to think down to the level of stupid involved in this faulty conclusion.

Only in a world with no female terrorists ever would that be a valid argument.

Instead we live in a world where female spies existed in world wars long before I was born. Where female suicide bombers have struck!

Which means that any policy that looks for men in dresses as higher potential threats than women is a threat to our security.

Passing is not easy fot many crossdressers. Sure some desperate people trying to escape a seige (and got caught!) have tried it. and sure some already skilled at crossdressing have a decent chance.. but then women suicide bombers exist. And a woman can hide on her person a weapon more easilly than a CD who has to spend so much time and effort disguising that they are a CD!

The terrorists are already using our sexism as an advantage by recruiting female suicide bombers.

Now we hand them the ready-made distraction of focusing on crossdressers while they slip the real terrorists by under our noses.

What is really important? Finding hidden penises in the skirts of crossdressers? Or finding hidden bombs?

Because those bombs can and will be hidden on anyone and anything.

A female-bodied Cisgender person can hide such a thing far better than the attention-attracting spectacle of a crossdresser failing to pass to everyone (and believe me even on a good day some can read you while others are fooled).

A policy that singles out crossdressers is a waste of time, no... worse... its a danger that may allow real threats to slip through while we waste our time searching every transgender person.

To be useful a priority searching system must prioritise the most common risks and the highest risks. How many crossdressed suicide bombers and crossdressed terrorists have passed successfully and got past checkpoints and airport security etc compared to how many female-bodied cisgender suicide bombers who do not need to disguise all male and masculine traits?

Surely any rational person who sits and thinks about this for 10 minutes can see its a dangerous and stupid policy and that being ready for cisgender female terrorists is a greater threat. That pretty much every person is a potential terrorist and ignoring the real existing threat of cisgender female terrorists by concentrating on screening for crossdressers make us all more vulnerable to female terrorists. And that reveals something terrifying about the people running our security.

Whats more important?
Finding the hidden penises or finding the hidden bombs?
Genuine security or sticking with sexist assumptions that cisgender females cannot be terrorists?

Looks like some people are more scared of some thing than bombs... and willing to risk all our lives because of it!

Transgender Brains, a vital resource for the community?

In many of the worlds cultures there have been traditions of sex and gender diversity where people who would be termed in modern labels as transsexuals, crossdressers et al were given special roles and positions in society. In some cultures they were sacred.
http://blog.ctnews.com/evans/2009/10/19/one-nation-two-spirits-our-native-american-brothers-sisters/

In modern society a wave of anti-transgender oppression has washed over the world, largely unremarked by historians and yet across the colonial world these practices were outlawed and often stamped out. Only through returning to early records have some of these traditions been rediscovered or saved from the brink of cultural extinction. Not just cultural genocide, the discovery of the 'transsexual gene' means many countries oppressive policies against transgender peoples identities being recognised until after they are steralised means such eugenics are actually genocide-genocide. A policy reducing the prevalance of a genetic trait within the population.

At what cost to society? And what advantage could make such a gene so prevalant worldwide?

Well this at Zoe's blog could well give us a crucial answer as well as validating many indiginous beliefs about transgender peoples wisdom and value http://aebrain.blogspot.com/2009/10/web-surfing-and-brain.html

Neurological variations often have great value to the community. Without Asbergers people we'd have far less technological and scientific advancement. Having a distinct advantage in combining both creative and logical thinking, as Zoe suggests may be the case (but in good scientific behaviour she mentions merely the possible as possible not as certain), is something of tremendous benefit.

Zoe mentions there have been studies suggesting a 30-IQ point advantage! That is collossal!

Considering that there is a tremendous advantage to companies, militaries, governments, administrations etc having transgender people in high-ranking positions!

Instead these people are far more often unemployed than average.. so much for the lie that our system is a genuine meritocracy!

Those companies and departments etc that however do rise above the anti-transgender bias have the pick of a very rich crop indeed! Corporate headhunters can pick and choose amongst people with substantial qualifications, often military experience and it seems a distinct neurological advantage! And with the high unemployment they could pick and choose, find people over-qualified for the job and still extremely grateful for what they can get! An employers market, a smorgasboard of talent!

It also makes ENDA and it's ilk around the world as good for the economy. Any short-term costs likely paying for themselves quite quickly. And those countries that more successfully incorporate such neurological varient people as Aspergers and Transgender will likely have advantages over their competitors in international trade, strategic planning, international politics etc. So it's even important for National Security!

Now thats something that demands serious thought.

I find it amusing my disability may come from a 'retro' virus (and transgender)

Amusing because I always have loved old styles of sci-fi, art and fashion.

http://sacfs.asn.au/news/2009/10/10_11_xmrv_retrovirus.htm

Now of course its still early days. There's been other biological factors found for this illness still considered by many even in the medical profession as purely psychological.. yeah they can tell that to the blood tests where i was eating for three and my body still thought it was so starved that canabilising my muscles and bones seemed a good idea to it.

It's a big puzzle and with many complicated aspects, what is thought in one discovery to be causal may instead be consequential and vice versa. And it may well be the umbrella term covers more than one illness related causally or unrelated but for similarity of symptoms.

Seem familiar?

There are quite a few similarities between that and much in the Transgender world.

Of course even with the name conflicts between Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Fibromyalgia and Myalgic Encephalomyelitus and whether or not fibromyalgia is a seperate similar maybe related illness or merely just the side of CFS that gets more muscle and joint pain compared to the exhaustion and cognitiove imapirment on the other with a false-divide with lots of people having a chunk from each camp and being difficult to shove into either box there has still not been in my experience any of the vicious vitriol and ad hominems amongst sufferers in these debates.

Unlike the TS anti-TG extremists who in the comments at Bilerico recently went on and on in attacks, but again fell silent when those with an ounce of scientific literacy challenged them and called their pseudo-science and cherry-picked science bluffs. (when oh when will they respond to the discoveries of cross-sexed brain neurology of gays and lesbians and the inclusion of non-ops in some of those studies they tout as proving their claims?)

There's lots of pseudo-science around CFS too.. people get desperate so some of those without conscience will try and fleece sufferers. Other sufferers try all sorts of things and if they are lucky enough to go into remission will celebrate whatever they were taking or doing at the time.. alas all too often theres no evidence it actually will help anyone else. Heck years ago one teenage girl was so desperate she trepaned herself.. drilled a hole into her own skull with a powerdrill to expose her brain!

For those used mostly to my posts being directly related to transgender issues its worth looking at the experience of people with CFS. I'm lucky that I can string written sentences together with a reasonable enough degree of coherancy that the cognitive impairment problems don't so often show.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMh_JpPmL-s

And with CFS ignorance and bias amongst the medical fraternity ignoring the evidence, ignoring the science also kills

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Y_T5ylWUv4

And of course there are lots of ways that society punishes the disabled.. centrelink is a minefield of ablist beaureucratic traps seemingly designed for no other purpose than to make disabled peoples lives more difficult or to find excuses to cut their pensions.

So there is good news.. but only another piece of the puzzle at the moment, no new treatments are available and there is only a chance this discovery will lead to some.

And its a good opportunity to think about the issue, and for those without disability to think about those around them whose quality of life and their very continued existence depends on society fulfilling the social contract and looking after them.. which all to often it's failing to do.

When religion is used to demand Special Rights

"Special Rights"

Its one of the common ways to denigrate a valid claim to equality.

It's usually used when someone would use the same right in a different way.

The right to marriage being used to marry someone of the same sex is called a 'special right'. But its really just marrying the person you love.

Whereas to say that only straight people may marry is in fact to demand a real 'special right'. It becomes a special right only available to straight people.

Now in Victoria there are attempts to get 'special rights' for religious businesses and organisations to deny services and employment to people for a large swathe of reasons. http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/balancing-religion-and-rights-the-case-against-discrimination-20091003-gh9y.html

A religious persons right to worship whichever god/s they choose are not harmed by having to sell a product to every customer equally. A religious persons right to worship are not harmed by having to fulfill their duty of care and obligation of duty to serve every person in need equally. Its even theologically bankrupt for those christians supporting it, Jesus was more than fine hanging with gentiles and tax collectors etc, he outright targeted them.

Yet caving to these people is somehow considered a valid course of action by the government. And when 85% of Australians want anti-discrimination protection on sexuality and gender identity!

So its a minority demanding the special right to discriminate against other minorities!

Religious rights do not supercede others equal rights. thats how that word Equal works. But yet some people irrationally and unethically and unjustifiably are demanding a special right to treat others as not equals. A codified double-standard. They want injustice to be ptotected and legal.

Thats the real special right demanded here.
It's unethical, unequal, unjust, unpopular, undemocratic and unaustralian.

An abuse of universal human rights and basic equality.