What Gender Are You?

Marjorie Campbell, marjorie@marjoriecampbell.com

Deal, you write "The other protected groups -- including gender . . . -- are objective and do not require an invasion of privacy to determine."  But gender is not objective in California, don't you know?

On October 12 2007, Governor Schwartzenegger signed Senate Bill 777 - the California Student Civil Rights Act - over the fervent opposition and to the shock of pro-family groups like Catholics for the Common Good.  Among other purposes , SB 777 prohibits discrimination in all schools based on gender, a category commonly included among protected classes and traditionally referencing the sex - that is male or female - of a person.  But California has given a new, subjective definition to the word "gender," distinguishing one's selected gender from the mundane gender assigned by onlookers at a birth.  “Gender” means sex, and includes a person’s gender identity and gender related appearance and behavior whether or not stereotypically associated with the person’s assigned sex at birth. 

Under this definition of gender, the mostly-assigned-sex-male San Francisco Sisters of Perpetual Adoration - "a leading-edge order of queer nuns" - would be protected against discrimination as students using restroom facilities at a post-secondary school, for example, based upon the gender to which each associates, subject, presumably, to revision.  While each "Sister" may well have a stable, associated gender, many persons do not.  They suffer from conditions such as gender confusion, one of a growing list of transgender problems and challenges.  The emotional, biological and social causes driving this burgeoning field are little understood.  As one source states, "Usually, the only way to find out how exactly people identify themselves is to ask them, and sometimes, transgender people either cannot or will not define themselves any more specifically than transgender, queer or genderqueer." 

But lack of understanding has not stopped this tidal wave of confusion from sweeping into California's schools, regardless the location or age of student.  Here, the state's children will be exposed to disturbing, frightening and inappropriate displays of adult sexual uncertainty and confusion - an exposure no child requested and no child deserves.    Only harm to the environment requires "impact studies" - deleterious effects of adult social experimentation on our children don't factor to those pushing their political social agenda into school corridors. 

And you thought, Deal, that gender was objective.