while i certainly appreciate the intention behind this story, i would like to point out that transgender people often do not believe that they are "tinkering with nature", rather, they are claiming what feels natural for them. trans women are not "becoming women", they are women, independent of the particular form their bodies take.

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The additional tragedy of the Susans in American society is that they often have to pay the penance of having to wait for sometimes more than half their lives to realize their desires/dreams.
They're prisoners of a societal concentration camp with little if any access to support.
Can life be any more complex than to realize that you're trapped in the body of the opposite sex and to be summarily sentenced to live out your life making others at ease with their decision?
None of us will be free until everyone has full rights and lliberties.

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Although I think that Stanton has a good lawsuit, the situation for transgender employees is that they are generally unprotected. You can learn more about the legalities of the Stanton case, and others, at Transgender Workplace Diversity Blog http://jweissdiary.blogspot.com

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The point is that if an employer hires a man to do a job then that employer has right to expect a man to show up. I couldn't care less about this person changing the sex it was born with. Just another perversion/freak of nature as far as I'm concerned. I've been involved in sex change operations as a medical technician and know what often happens in the follow up to these procedures. The emotional problems become even worse over time because the response to the constant use of hormones makes them that way. They usually never achieve the happiness and satisfaction they so desperately desire. Ain't no going back either.

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Look at Alternet's "Dating Page". All Trans folk are lumped together as TV/TS/TG. How rude !

Short lesson for illustration....

Transsexuals are women who fought their way out of a male body. They take hormones and function sexually as a female. Good to know when dating....

Transvestites suffer a Paraphelia, now more correctly called transvestophilia. Sound familiar ? Same psychological basis as Zoophilia, Kleptophilia, Scatophelia, Necrophilia -- and of course Pedophilia. Its the 'socially inappropriate' sexual attraction to an object. Transvestites have penises and they most definitely use them to masturbate when cross-dressing. Also good to know when dating....

Transgender folks are something else -- you would have to speak to each and every one of them to understand. It's complicated, even for them. They are generally good people, perhaps intense because of the pressure they suffer from society. Often they are transsexuals who cannot get health care / surgery from this awful Health Care System. They too have 'the equipment' as it were...

My heart goes out to all these people. What incredible suffering ! Far, far beyond the pain common to humanity.

But I have to ask WHY does alternet nevertheless lump these incredibly disparate people in the same group for Dating ? My gosh, some of these people have penises, some don't. Wouldn't you want to at least screen for THAT in a dating service ?

Maybe Alternet will reconsider their position. It's highly insulting and only serves to alienate even more.

If trans folk can't go to a Leftie, Liberal Progressive, Vegan Loving, Save the Earth group for support... then WHERE ?

Maybe Ann Coulter... personally I believe the rumors !

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...by including Transgendered people in their activism. There is nothing 'normal' about mutilating yourself. No amount of surgery will change a person's chromosomal makeup. Appearances can change but no mercenary doctor can change an X-Y to an X-X or vice versa.

And that is what we are talking about here. Mercenary doctors who do not care for the well-being of their patient. If they did, the counseling they would offer would be to find out the underlying reasons WHY someone wants to mutilate themselves.

As for the response to the post above wherein alaskagrrl states:

"There is overwhelming evidence the clinically demonstrable female brain structures found in MTF Transsexuals is caused by endocrine distrupting chemicals in the environment."

Without citing your references, you have no credibility. If this is true, cite the clinical studies to which you refer. But, for the sake of arguement, let's say that you are correct. Wouldn't it make more sense to try and find a way to correct this chemical imbalance instead of treating the symptoms?

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Appearances can change but no mercenary doctor can change an X-Y to an X-X or vice versa.

You seem to be under the misapprehension that humans only come in "XX" and "XY" chromosomal patterns, and that physical genitalia *always* matches those chromosomal sets.

Got news for ya - there are a lot of chromosomal options beyond XX or XY, most of them are indistinguishable without genetic testing... and parts don't always match chromosomes. (And sometimes 'parts' are not "standard", either.) Current research puts the incidence of intersex conditions at 1 in 500 births. (Documentation available at http://www.isna.org/ )

By your standards, neither myself nor my partner exist. Neither one of us is an XX or an XY. What gender do you think we should present?

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This is the second such outrage in recent weeks: Julie Nemecek of Michigan lost her job at Spring Arbor University, which said her sex change is "inconsistent with the Christian faith."

Dammit, people like that make me crazy. I'd love to hear exactly which ****ing Bible verse condemns sex changes. Hey, guess what, I'll bet there are NONE, since the dead beardy guys who wrote the Bible never saw a surgery more complicated than "remove arrowhead from buttocks". If god in his wisdom forsaw this possibility and disapproved... he'd have said something, right?

Even Iran allows sex changes, because if a man feels like a woman inside, it must be the will of Allah that he IS a woman, right? (granted it's the only place in the Islamic middle east where it IS legal - the rest apparently sharing Spring Arbor University's opinion)

In other words... nothing says "Jesus loves you" like some asshat using the word "Christianity" to justify whatever random bigotry they feel like expressing.

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