from the X-Y-XX-XY-XYY-XXYY-XXX-XXXX-XXXXX-FOXL dept.
This story is somewhat stale if not for the escalating national controversy concerning gender identity. In June 2015, The Advocate covered a curious incident of violence against a woman that occurred in January earlier that year. Cisgendered woman Cortney Bogorad was forcefully ejected from a Detroit Fishbone's restaurant, suffering several injuries.
Bogorad told news station WXYZ (autoplay video warning):
"As I came out of the stall, this gentleman - who was a security guard - came in the bathroom, and before I was even completely out of the bathroom he grabbed me by the arms and pushed me up against the wall, told me that boys aren't allowed in this restroom," she says. "This could have happened to anybody. There are lots of females out there with short hair. some people might think we're boys, but, at the end of the day, we're not"
The Detroit Free Press also carried a description of the injuries she sustained:
The guard carried her to the front of the restaurant and physically threw her out onto Monroe Street, Bogorad said. Her upper torso was exposed to all of the patrons that were sitting inside the restaurant.
"... In the process she sustained physical damages including contusions, wrist injuries, shoulder injuries and scarring which required medical treatment," the lawsuit stated. "As a direct and proximate result of the defendants' wrongful acts, plaintiff not only suffered physical damages, but suffered severe embarrassment, humiliation, shock and mental and emotional distress and anguish."
Fishbone's is a Cajun-style restaurant chain located in the Detroit area.
Here is my question, since many people recently have found themselves in various increasingly absurd demographics with much gusto. Is violence against women who do not have traditional looks acceptable in the pursuit of determining another's "true gender" and which spaces are acceptable for them to enter?
[Ed Note: there was considerable discussion among the editors as to whether or not this story would appeal to the community. Conclusion: We just don't know. Solution: Ask the community! So, is this particular story, or stories of this nature (cis/trans-gender issues), of interest to you? Would you like to see more stories like this posted to the site? Please reply in the comments.]
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @05:56AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:03AM
Really? Could have happened even to Donald John Trump?
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by davester666 on Tuesday March 01 2016, @09:10AM
A whole lot of people which it would happen to Trump. Over and over and over.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:06AM
So, is this particular story, or stories of this nature (cis/trans-gender issues), of interest to you?
This particular type of story is attention grabbing does not seem important enough to run often. It would be better to wait for a court decision or enough evidence of what happened in the situation is available. Who is involved and how severe the injury is would also affect the "importance".
(Score: 5, Insightful) by q.kontinuum on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:25AM
IMO, the interesting part of the story is that apparently this kind of violence seemed acceptable as long as the security guard (and others) thought it was applied to a man. I.e. Violence towards men might be seen as ok compared to violence against women. Just like killed men in wars are hardly touching us, but when women are killed it is suddenly much worse as in "even women and children". Or is there still this bias against men hitting women, while men hitting men is considered more manly? Even if the male-victim was a tiny nerd beaten up by amateur-boxer, and the women e.g. a valkyrie fend off by a tiny would-be victim? How about bias against men being hit by women, are they still ridiculed, adding insult to injury?
This particular article is not interesting in itself, it's just an opener for such a discussion and does not become more or less valid by a court verdict (imo). It's not even a good opener (because the security guard didn't just attack her mistaking her for a man for some random behaviour, but specifically for mistaking her for a man violating women private space).
That said, I'd like to have news sorted by tags or channels, so these kind of news can be published without bothering those who want to see only technical news. No big deal to me, I can skip a headline I'm not interested in, and apparently I was interested in this one, but in general such filtering would be great. I understand it would mess up some caching, as the front-page would have to be re-assembled for each visitor instead of being more or less static, but I'm not sure how big that impact would be.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:41AM
How about bias against men being hit by women, are they still ridiculed, adding insult to injury?
Ha ha, when my wife kicks the crap out of me, it's funny as shit. I guess it's alright because I could kick her arse, 'cept I can't 'cos rules... and it would be unfair because I'm trained like a deadly weapon and shit so like I guess the chances of her killing me are slim.
I don't tell people what happened. Because like outside of me thinking it's funny, I guess there is like a stigma and shit. People try to inculcate some form of battered person's symdrome or *snore*
Sometimes I just lay low until I heal up enough. Sometimes I make up crazy stories about what happened. Yeah man I went ostrich racing on a pebble beach and the unthinkable happened.... :D
Maybe one of these days I should just learn when to shut up....
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @10:13AM
The time to shut up was when you were supposed to say "I do".
(Score: 4, Insightful) by mojo chan on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:41AM
If it were a man who was injured and humiliated in this way I'm sure there would still be a lawsuit. Gender has nothing to do with it, beyond the initial mistake that the security guard made.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Tuesday March 01 2016, @10:25AM
Probably. But most likely it wouldn't make it into the news. Our perception is skewed. [telegraph.co.uk]
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 4, Informative) by hemocyanin on Tuesday March 01 2016, @11:07AM
The difference in reaction between male v. female and female v. male violence is interesting:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3PgH86OyEM [youtube.com]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @04:22PM
Of course. Because at least in the old days men tend to be a lot more effective once they choose to use violence[1]. Of course there are increasing numbers of women who are pretty good with guns, but even so, I think there are still more male top shooters than females.
But nowadays as the video shows the woman is allowed to get away with a lot and if the guy fights back or even resists forcefully (puts her in a hold to stop her hitting him) he has a high risk of getting in big trouble. It's not a stretch to say many women who are willing to physically abuse guys could also be willing to lie and say the guy attacked her. And then everyone is more likely to believe the woman.
Just look at the recent very public case of a female artist vs her male producer. Very many assume the producer is guilty, despite the fact that the artist still wants out of the contract even when given the option of working with a different producer, and the artist previously saying under oath that the producer did not sexually assault her, and the artist not wanting the producer to be criminally charged.
Of course that's because in most cases the guy is the perp. But it does suck if you really are innocent.
[1] On median/average taller, better reach, better upper-body strength, and more years of practice (and thinking about fighting). The hormones kick in at an early age. I see far more young male kids wrestling and fighting when playing than young female kids (many who try to boss or influence others verbally during play - "no you be the XYZ and I'll do PQR").
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Username on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:54PM
What you’re talking about is refereed to as female privilege.
Women are allowed to use the men’s bathroom, while men are not allowed in the women’s, and perverted men are tossed out while perverted women are not(possibly encouraged in clubs). IE: If Ms. Balbricker sees your tallywacker in the women’s bathroom, she’s going to get the bouncer to toss you out for being a pervert.
Whole story seems like some guy didn’t realize that just because he identifies as a woman, it doesn’t mean that everyone else views him that way. Moral of the story, regardless of what you view yourself as, just use the men’s bathroom.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by zoefff on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:13PM
that said, there are of course a lot more male perverts than female.
(Score: 3, Informative) by CirclesInSand on Wednesday March 02 2016, @05:24AM
I thought it was a biological woman that just looked like a man due to avoiding gender stereotypes. Man this is so confusing. Everyone seems too damn afraid to actually just explicitly explain the situation.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 08 2016, @04:31AM
The official defiition is: 'A persons who internal gender identity aligns with their assigned sex at birth.'
So this person was born a female, legally identified as a female, but perhaps due to an androgynous appears was mistaken for a man in the woman's bathroom.
My question: Why was it acceptable for the (presumably male) security guard to enter the female bathroom in such an instance in the first place? Seems like all you'd need to do to be pervy is get a job as the security guard. If this was really an issue you send a female employee in to verify conditions (possibly with the door open and the security guard present if help is needed (Given stalls this really shouldn't be a privacy issue, while retaining it as a 'safe space' until conditions require otherwise.)
(Score: 2) by Rivenaleem on Wednesday March 02 2016, @04:37PM
Since you ask the question, I tried to put myself in the position. What if it had been a man in the women's restroom? For starters, in what world does this require physical ejection from the restaurant instead of a "You shouldn't be here"? Once you get past that, though, and assume that all men in the women's restroom are to be ejected, then you could argue that the security guard though he was dealing with a man, and thus used force appropriate for dealing with a man, and deemed that to be more than would be needed to eject a woman. I would assume that the victim started to resist, and (thinking it was a guy resisting) the guard got more physical.
I wonder would this happen in Europe? America seems to have issues with sex and sexuality (as seen by how movies are rated vs violence) and thus someone inadvertently in the wrong bathroom is instantly considered a filthy pervert. A lot of places (restaurants, not bars) I know of (anecdotal, I know) seem to have unisex bathrooms now, so this wouldn't be a problem.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by driverless on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:42AM
Another issue would be a third-party reporting of the event. So far we've heard the woman's version, perfect SJW incendiary material, but there's (at a minimum) two sides to every story. It'd be interesting to wait for the restaurant's view, when it comes, and no doubt other patrons who witnessed it also have their sides of the story.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by driverless on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:49AM
Further to my earlier post, there's something funny about this story. The lawsuit was filed in June of last year. A quick Google on her name indicates that all the stories date back to then (I stopped after the Google results started getting irrelevant, there may be something I missed on page 896 of the results). There's nothing since then, no details of the court case, no comment by anyone other than the woman involved, and all the stories seem to be repeating each other.
I think I'll give this one a pass...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Vanderhoth on Tuesday March 01 2016, @12:12PM
I've found a lot of articles are just parrots of other articles. So it's entirely possible one lazy reporter didn't get all the facts and wrote the original article and others were like, "Hey, this'll make good clickbait", and they just rewrite the original article with no further investigation. Then it becomes a game of telephone and you end up with a bunch of articles, increasingly ridiculous, with one source, that only one of the writers ever actually talked to. Even then it's entirely possible they just ignored half of what the source told them, not saying that's the case here, in favor of pushing an article to get people riled up because that sells clicks.
"Now we know", "And knowing is half the battle". -G.I. Joooooe
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Tork on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:10AM
Would you like to see more stories like this posted to the site? Please reply in the comments.
I don't have much use for this story, but yes, I would like more stories like it, and I'll tell you why: Not long before Slashdot shoo'd a bunch of people away with its beta site it was the place to be to argue about smartphone operating systems. Before that it was babble about how awful Sony is. Before that it was babble about how Microsoft is. As recently as 2014 on and average day there'd be somewhere between two and four stories that ended up mentioning Android or Apple... resulting in debate about Android and Apple. When a story clearly not about either OS came along, there'd always be some joker dragging it in. The other side would take the bait and *boom* hostilities abound.
I believe Slashdot could have avoided this (and didn't because they're ad-supported and ranting about reality distortion fields spins those counters) by bringing up a bigger diversity of topics. Also I believe that the SN Community is more than mature enough to handle a broader discussion. I do feel we should keep it at least a little tech-bound, but I would strongly recommend against over-doing it on any particular topic. That's a lot easier to do when the scope is broadened.
To those that disagree with me, that's cool, but I just want to say one thing: This also helps during slow-news periods.
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈 - Give us ribbiti or make us croak! 🐸
(Score: 4, Funny) by c0lo on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:19AM
Reading the two first posts, I wouldn't bet.
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Insightful) by quadrox on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:32AM
I don't mind seeing this story, and stories like it, as long as they come up "naturally" and it's not somebody pushing some agenda - whether the agenda itself is "good" or "bad" doesn't matter.
That being said, I heavily disagree with Torks idea of diversity preventing these kind of "wars", and even that they should be prevented at all. People coming to this site and the green site usually have strong feelings on various matters - be it apple, sony, or something else. They will defend their opinions, and sometimes they will go on a crusade. And I like it - as long as people stay more or less civil.
One of my personal pet peeves is DRM, and I will lash out against it (e.g. Steam, BluRay, ...) whenever it seems appropriate. You can't stop me, and you shouldn't wan't to - this is how/who we (the community in general) are.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Tork on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:41AM
People coming to this site and the green site usually have strong feelings on various matters
Just be clear I'm not talking about debates between people who have strong feelings about topics, I'm talking about breeding a flamewar. When I say 'breeding' I mean people becoming involved just to be popular. They're usually the first to cry "CYANOGENMOD!!" or "WALLED GARDEN!" or whatever Slashdot meme happens to be en vogue. But they're really shallow. Some of the more well-todo trolls have buddies with mod-points to help them out
There's a big difference between a heated debate and a flame war, I'm worried about the latter. (I'm also worried about SN ever becoming ad-supported...)
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈 - Give us ribbiti or make us croak! 🐸
(Score: 2) by quadrox on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:53AM
Very well - I agree with that sentiment.
That being said, I don't think the issue is as big as you make it out to be (I see posts that would qualify as trolls or flamebaits on these topics only occasionally), nor do I see how having more diverse topics would prevent these kinds of trolls.
And I most certainly do not want the posting queue to be filled with irrelevant stuff just to dissuade trolls from posting - that would dissuade real users as well.
(Score: 1, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:33AM
You happen to have found a news site with comments, but it isn't your style. There are many others on the Internet. Seek something that you would enjoy more. Don't demand to change a site that isn't really your style.
I know you like this stuff, but I'm not into it (no homo) and don't want it coming my way (no homo).
(Score: 2) by Tork on Tuesday March 01 2016, @10:02AM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈 - Give us ribbiti or make us croak! 🐸
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday March 01 2016, @05:12PM
First, whoever said this was a nerd site? Seems to me the motto is SN is made of People, not SN is made of Nerds.
Secondly, perhaps you should follow your own advice to "Seek something that you would enjoy more." considering you're "not into it (no homo) and don't want it coming my way (no homo).
(Score: 2) by Bogsnoticus on Wednesday March 02 2016, @03:01AM
By vigorously defending your sexuality in the comments section of a news article when it did not require defending, makes one believe you are so deep in the closet, the country of origin on your passport would read "Narnia".
Genius by birth. Evil by choice.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Thursday March 03 2016, @10:13PM
From the very beginning Soylent has always been about more than just science and tech news. Now, given that we're still mostly refugees from Slashdot, certainly we should keep things tilted towards tech ("tilted towards", not "exclusively".) And that ought to happen naturally. The only intervention that should be necessary is if the same person is spamming the submission box on a particular topic. As the community grows the diversity of discussion should grow with it. And the site should grow to accommodate that -- we've had plenty of discussion about "nexuses" and filtering already. Once that's implemented, you can view or filter out whatever you want. For now...maybe try not clicking on headlines you aren't interested in :)
- The SoylentNews Manifesto [soylentnews.org]
And a few sections further down:
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 08 2016, @04:40AM
Why don't we just have monthly or quarterly polls on preferred frontpage topics (Require logged in users if it seems like the polls are getting abused. Perhaps reset it on a slightly randomized yearly basis.) and keep other topics available for addition to personalized homepages of logged in users (or maybe a bookmarkable subdomain for customized homepages for anonymous users.) This allows people who DO find certain topics offensive to self-censor while leaving those topics available for discussion amongst the more open minded of us.
That said, perhaps we should also work on more accurate vetting of stories and including updates even if 'archived' indicating when previously published stories have been overturned as hoaxes or otherwise faked information. It's become a major problem in mainstream media and seems to be just as prevalent (although often commented upon) in here and the green's submitted article lists..
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:16PM
I'm not particularly interested in gender issues, myself. I have counted myself lucky to have mostly missed the Bruce Jenner thing, because I don't have cable and avoid gossip rags. But it looked like this article had stirred up some discussion among Soylentils so I poked my head in to see what people were talking about. As you might expect much of it is the usual invective- and label-slinging, but there have been a couple of comments about how if this had been a man nobody would have given it a second thought, and that made me think about gender issues for the first time in my life.
I find I still don't care, but it was a walk down a block I had not visited before. There's value in that. I guess I'm with you on adding wild cards to the mix once in a while.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Beryllium Sphere (r) on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:26PM
I would like to see more stories like this.
I would like to see them in mainstream non-nerd sites with more circulation and less focus on technology. Soylent News could pick them up when they involve one of our colleagues or interesting bits of science.
There is lots of interesting science! For example, this (SFW) is what Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome looks like on XY people: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c0/Orchids01.JPG [wikimedia.org] . Sending those people to the men's restroom would be cruel.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by mhajicek on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:31AM
So what if it had been a guy? Does a private citizen (not a cop) have the right to pick someone up and throw them out in an injurious fashion?
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:33AM
"Centurion, twow him to the gouwnd, roughly!" Friend of Biggus Dickus, around the year zero, Occupied Palestinian sector, where they apparently cannot congugate Latin verbs. Curious.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by mojo chan on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:45AM
No, they don't have that right in most countries. Violence is only acceptable where absolutely necessary. All the guy had to do was talk to her and determine that he had made a mistake, or simply ask her to leave, or call the cops.
Her gender seems irrelevant beyond the fact that it was misidentified. If it had been a man who was thrown out and injured there would still be a lawsuit, if not criminal charges.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @11:35PM
Unless its to defend themselves, no they dont. Just touching someone is out of bounds.
This prick should be in jail. This woman should own that business.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by frojack on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:31AM
Is violence against ANYONE in the pursuit of determining "true gender" acceptable?
FIFY
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:13AM
Anything kurenai.tsubasa submits is to be posted. Why? That stuff is weird. I have no Idea where he/she is coming from most of the time, but I pay attention. The whole "bathroom issue" seems to be where the fascists are going these days. I have to admit, I am at my most vunerable when I am passing wastes out of my body. Why someone would have interest in that causes me all kinds of discomfort. But to think that this has something to do with gender? Look, I do not care who is watching me poop, male or female, naturally born or not, please just give me the privacy to make dodo, without your having to watch? Please? I mean, what interest could you have in this, unless you are truly a perv, or a "Wide Stance" Republican, or a security guard in a high school. WoW, So many perverts, so little time.
(Score: 3, Funny) by frojack on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:22AM
Look, I do not care who is watching me poop, male or female, naturally born or not, please just give me the privacy to make dodo, without your having to watch?
Parsing that hurt my head, but I think I got it.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:35AM
Well, then stop looking, you perv!! Oh, you already did? It was the smell, wasn't it? Somethings transcend gender.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:27AM
i can taste your stink, and every time i do i fear that i've somehow been infected by it
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Tuesday March 01 2016, @10:38AM
Everybody poops, even Agents in the Matrix, for the sake of realism. Hmm, which bathroom are completely virtual beings allowed to use? What if you are an AI? Androgenous Androids in the Ladies Room?? Oh, my god, where is the Senator from Idaho? (Answer: Airport Bathroom in Minnesota).
(Score: 2) by fleg on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:16AM
yes, this. its good to have such an unusual (at least to me) view of the world represented.
(Score: 2, Funny) by khallow on Tuesday March 01 2016, @12:59PM
Look, I do not care who is watching me poop, male or female, naturally born or not, please just give me the privacy to make dodo, without your having to watch?
I'M SORRY, CITIZEN. BUT THAT WOULD BE AGAINST THE RULES. OF COURSE, WE MUST WATCH YOU. IMPROPER POOP TECHNIQUE IS ADMISSION OF TREASON. PUNISHMENT IS IMMEDIATE EXECUTION.
PLEASE REPORT IMMEDIATELY TO DISINTEGRATION CHAMBER 445 TO CORRECT YOUR MISUNDERSTANDING OF THE RULES BY WHICH WE MAKE YOU SAFE AND SECURE.
WE HAVE DETERMINED THAT IMPROPER POOP TECHNIQUE IS FOR ULTRAVIOLET CLEARANCE ONLY. YOU HAVE COMMITTED TREASON AGAINST THE COMPUTER. PLEASE REPORT IMMEDIATELY TO CLONE REPROCESSING FACILITY 193 SO THAT WE MAY REDISTRIBUTE YOUR NUTRIENTS EFFICIENTLY.
ERROR DETECTED - CONFLICTING EXECUTION SEQUENCES CODE: 5F6DD091BA4356BF6773A3ED; COMMENT: "Dave still hasn't fixed this one, what a l0z3r". TREASON. THE COMPUTER IS NEVER IN ERROR. LASER WIELDING KILLBOTS ARE CONVERGING ON YOUR POSITION. PLEASE DO NOT WORRY. WORRY IS TREASON AND PUNISHABLE BY EXECUTION.
ALL HAIL THE COMPUTER!
(Score: 2) by SanityCheck on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:47PM
About the fascists, I think it's simple really: If they can force you to use certain restroom, even against your own volition, then they can tell you who you are and control who you are, and control who you can fuck. And if they can control who you can fuck (or how) that's like a proxy test for whether they can have total control over you. Almost all these retarded right-wing ideas can be reduced to control over your reproductive rights, the most primal form of control. It also explains why (to me) ideal form of feminism is the struggle against control of the reproductive rights of females, as that is in its basic form a struggle for true freedom against the oldest form of oppression known to humankind.
Note this is just my two cents I pieced over the years. Feel free to disagree as I based this entirely from a male perspective so I am bound not to "get it."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @10:20PM
I could only agree with you if the restrooms in question were owned by the government. As they were owned by a private business, I believe you are incorrect. (Granted, the use of violence against the victim here sounds like criminal assault regardless of mistaken gender.)
All your "ifs" are contingent on fascists/government having power. In the USA, all legitimate power is delegated to government by individuals [soylentnews.org] who have those powers already - this does indeed mean that government has no legitimate power to do anything that you or I as individuals cannot do. When government uses illigitimate powers (as it often does), that exercise of power is no different than that of a mugger's [soylentnews.org].
So, as bad as it sounds on the surface: the Civil Rights Act(s) as it applies to private businesses and property was a horrible crime and travesty as it attempted to give the facade of legitimate authority to government to do just what you fear: "they can tell you who you are and control who you are, and control who you can fuck". Once your freedom of association has been infringed, you can no longer choose with whom to associate with or disassociate from.
The only legitimate answer to actual racist businesses is to organize boycotts of their stupid sandwich counters.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Thursday March 03 2016, @06:43PM
I could only agree with you if the restrooms in question were owned by the government. As they were owned by a private business, I believe you are incorrect.
You are very completely and Paulistically wrong. If you own a business, you are probably an asshole. Your name is probably Trump, and you think you built that. You cannot discriminate against anyone if you are a public business. If you have a publicly accessible restroom, you have to allow access to everyone, regardless of how you feel about them. You might be able to restrict access to "paying customers", but you are not allowed to bar some persons from being "paying customers" on the basis of anything other than public safety or the ability to pay. Yes, I know Rand Paul said that if you have a business, you can put up a sign that says "nO giRls ALloWeb!!", but actually you cannot if your business is a public accommodation. It would be illegal discrimination and the violation of the civil rights of others.
Perhaps you are confusing the censorship argument, were we can argue that suppression of speech is only censorship if the government does it, so that private companies and persons can restrict speech on their own property. Perhaps, but these properties do not exist to provide public accommodation for free speech, in the same manner that a retail store or restaurant or hotel is providing public accommodation for its business and by extention its customers. And this then applies to bathrooms. People do not use bathrooms to express themselves, usually. More often it is just to evacuate their selves, and if there is an organic natural right, well pooping has to be it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 02 2016, @03:11AM
Women police other women by calling them sluts and similar. Men mostly don't care, or even like it, excepting their own wife. It seems that women seeking a long-term mating strategy are threatened by those with a short-term mating strategy. It's hard to use sex as a means to control men if other women give it out freely.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by KilroySmith on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:32AM
I'm sorry, but every news outlet in the world seems to be saturated with stories, awards, and hand-wringing over people with extraordinarily niche gender issues. As I came to Slashdot before they went off the deep end, so I now come to Soylent, to get my dose of tech news without the overwrought drama of "my teenage boy who identifies as a female got expelled for using the women's bathroom" type of stories. Let Oprah and Dr. Phil work out these issues, and we can argue about Android v. IOS, Windows v. OSX v. the Linuxes, and the societal issues wrought by technology such as the eye of Sauron watching us every day and night.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by patella.whack on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:19AM
Well I hope you got my subject reference, but seriously I understand your frustration. What is interesting though, is the fact that the further our tech gets to being human, the more it becomes an issue of whose software becomes dominant, and who laid down the rules. Let's hope it's not Dr. Phil (who is not an actual Dr.)
.. Are Asimov's rules enough?
(Score: 2) by KilroySmith on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:51AM
Of course I did; I am the modren man, who hides behind a mask.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by rleigh on Tuesday March 01 2016, @12:20PM
I'd have to agree. While I don't have any real interest in this "topic", I don't mind the occasional article on the matter. But it seems to be something which crops up here and in other places far more frequently than its (in reality) occurrence would justify. Please do think about keeping the frequency of such articles down; it's not really what I come here for, but I might find the occasional one interesting. But not this one; think about keeping out the reality TV-style drama, and focussing on articles which explore relations with the legal and ethical issues, for example. Otherwise its just voyeurism, and there are plenty of tabloid sites catering to that market.
(Score: 5, Funny) by isostatic on Tuesday March 01 2016, @01:05PM
Well I have no idea what a Dr Phil is other than Landry quoted him in an SG1 episode, however stories like this make me wish we had a good old systemd flamewar.
(Score: 2) by archfeld on Tuesday March 01 2016, @03:24PM
Besides being a general douche bag he's a TV host who fakes being a DR.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phil_McGraw [wikipedia.org]
You are genuinely lucky you've never been exposed to him, there is no known vaccine or cure...
For the NSA : Explosives, guns, assassination, conspiracy, primers, detonators, initiators, main charge, nuclear charge
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:05PM
Dear God No - We don't this kind of JSW "OMG is a boy or is it girl or is an it / OMG are your feeling hurt you special little multichromatic snow flake ( because we all know that white snow flakes are racist ) ?"on Soylent !
The general media is already saturated with this garbage - I come here to escape it.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Thursday March 03 2016, @10:22PM
Is it really that difficult to just not click the headline if you aren't interested?
Also -- please review The SoylentNews Manifesto [soylentnews.org]. Particularly the section titled "Freedom of Topic"; it's almost like it was written just for you ;)
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:44PM
Hear, hear.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 02 2016, @02:00AM
how about the fact that people with gender dysphoria make up a larger percentage of the tech community than the general community, probably in large part because we're allowed to isolate from others and, what matters in the industry isn't how you look, but the merit of what you are capable of doing... Given that, as small as SN is in the big picture, there are at least 3 of us at SN that are on the trans spectrum, it might not hurt for willing people to get some exposure as to what we have to live with.
As someone that doesn't pass at this point, I live in a constant state of awareness of the threats around me... and in a case like this, all I needed to do was pee (depending on the HRT meds, we're likely to have a reduced bladder size and/or may be taking a diuretic on top of it). Go into the womens room and risk having the cops called, possibly being beaten up, but certainly being embarrassed and guilty until proven innocent with proof from a therapist/doctor treating us, for being a perv. Go into the mens room and risk getting beat up for being a perv.
You might not care yourself, but we're seeing the same scenario as the "Whites Only" Jim Crow attitude... and the trans community is getting fed up with being told to stay in the shadows and pretend we don't exist. We're not asking for anything special, just the right to peacefully go about our own business without having to be confronted with violence because of the ignorance and insecurity of people that wish we didn't exist. Dirty secret is, a good majority of us wish we weren't trans and could just be "normal." We tend to spend a good portion of our lives trying to convince ourselves that we can be if we just try hard enough, but the day almost virtually always comes when we must decide between suicide or being who we really are despite what society has told us we're supposed to be. The simple fact that 40%+ of us at least attempt suicide should be a wakeup call that something is wrong with the way society treats us.
(Score: 2) by fleg on Wednesday March 02 2016, @02:39AM
interesting. thanks for the insight.
(Score: 2) by KilroySmith on Wednesday March 02 2016, @06:12AM
I understand that, for someone with gender identity issues, it pervades every area of their life, and every area of their online (and real life) being. It's important to you that it be discussed and consciousness get raised.
But, frankly, your struggles are generally not of much interest to me in this forum. Much like an alcoholics personal struggles with the bottle are of critical interest to them, I don't come here to listen to them. Much like a person with a collapsing marriage who wants to talk about it to understand it, I don't come here to listen to them. There are plenty of other places on the internet and in real life to get the support and discuss the issues.
To me, the solutions to the friction you have with society are simple; the implementations are impossible. Frankly, I don't care what you have in your pants, what you feel you should have had in your pants, or who you cuddle up with at night. Those are simply immaterial on this site. Were I your friend, I might very well want to know those things; but I'm not, and I simply don't care. I don't understand the hatred some people have for those who are different than they, and that's the problem that's never going to change - ask a black man whether racism has disappeared 60 years after Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat, or 150 years after passage of the 13th amendment.
I do care that, as a human being, portions of society view you with unreasoning hatred. I do care that the laws don't treat you fairly; and my concern informs my votes and the opinions I express in the proper forums. I don't, however, care enough to march on my local city council to demand a third kind of restroom in every public accomodation.
Good luck with your life, and I hope you find peace.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:32AM
I'd like to have 4 to 6 non-nerd stories per week. I most enjoy discussing non-nerd topics with nerds, but we'll get non-nerds on the site if we run too many of these stories. They will overwealm us with less-rational thinking and less-insightful comments.
This story doesn't have much to discuss. The headline is kind of funny. Some chick looks like a dude. The bouncer clearly would beat up anybody, male at least, who made an innocent mistake. Oh well.
We also have a long-standing problem of nerd sites evolving into sites for people who care mostly about these kinds of social issues. We're losing our nerd sites. Let's not lose this one. Those of you who do read the social issue sites: please point the article submitter in the direction of the most appropriate site for this article.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:50AM
Well said, dear sir.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by loic on Tuesday March 01 2016, @09:36AM
While gender issues and stuff are not always nerdish, it is always interesting to discuss about these. Science these days makes frequent discoveries that gender is not so clear cut as thought previously, but people take time to adjust.
Even if it was a man in the women restrooms, most men are not serial killer or rapists, you know. Here, in France, in bars, women sometimes go to men restrooms when women's are overloaded. The opposite, while rarer still happens, especially with the "baby care zones" which often gets integrated into women restrooms.
Keep calm and remember most humans are not evil.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:51PM
No, it's not "always interesting" when it seems like we get 1 or 2 every fricking day.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Linatux on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:48AM
Dress like a man, hair like a man, upset when mistaken for a man?
Seriously, I can't see the guard getting away with what sounds like serious assault. I suspect there is a lot more to the story so this should be parked until a verdict is reached.
Personally tired of stories about people who 'identify' as male/female/black/whatever - If I identified as God I'd be given meds.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:14AM
I think even a man would be upset after being physically assaulted in such a fashion, especially in the case of something nonviolent such as being in the wrong bathroom. So even if it were a male, being in the female bathroom doesn't warrant being physically assaulted.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:32AM
Sometimes it's really not that obvious.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by mendax on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:34AM
This is what I was thinking. The guard is guilty of assault as I see it at a minimum. Of course, the restaurant management probably is or was shitting in its collective pants wondering how much this is going to cost them in increased insurance premiums. The bad publicity probably cost them more than that.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by frojack on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:53AM
Personally tired of stories about people who 'identify' as male/female/black/whatever
Me too.
You can't discuss anything without the drama mommas making it about their self made problems.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:22AM
This supposedly normal woman had a moustache. It happens, especially to those with ancestry from Eastern Europe. Most women would bleach it at least. She left it clearly visible. Not that there is anything wrong with that, much like a unibrow, but it isn't really normal.
One would expect **something** kind of feminine. Not every woman wears a dress, has long hair, etc.... but nearly all will have at least one indicator of being female.
The overall look (piercings included) makes my gaydar go to 11. (well, after being told that she isn't a boy)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:05PM
This was Detroit. I suspect it has more to do with TNB than SJW issues.
(Score: 2) by Beryllium Sphere (r) on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:37PM
See "Whipping Girl" by Dr. Julia Serano for a fascinating attempt to find the right word for a trans person's experience of gender identity.
"Feel" doesn't capture the certainty of it. "Know" is better but makes it sound like the result of thought. "Sense" sounds a little tentative.
Given that the brains of trans people, as seen in dissecting rooms by experts, match their reported genders it looks like there's a reality to the self-reports.
If you thought you were God, meds might fix it. No therapeutic intervention, including unethically brutal ones, changes the gender identity of trans people. That alone rules out the hypothesis of mental illness as an explanation.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:01PM
Excuse me?
There are lots of mental illness situations that are untreatable. Some people are just going to think that the CIA has implanted a radio in their head, and no amount of anti-psychotic medication will fix it.
It is 100% clear that trans people have mental illness. I think you want to reject that because of the stigma, but really it's kinder to acknowledge that they have mental illness. The alternative view, rather popular in the southern USA, is that they are evil sinners. Admitting that they suffer from a tragic mental illness of biological origin allows for some sympathy.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:53AM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbkOXCAZDrI/ [youtube.com] Pretty much sums it up.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:08AM
I have several newssites from where I pluck my news. I expect this news to show up on Tumblr. Not here.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bradley13 on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:10AM
I don't mind the topic, but this particular story is crappy. What I dislike about it is the attempt to bring in sexual identity politics where they don't belong.
The "cisgendered" woman in the story: why not describe her as a member of homo sapiens, with two arms, two legs, and a laundry list of all the other ordinary attributes? She's a typical, average, ordinary woman. The only attribute which is (marginally) unusual is that she has short hair. So the only acceptable descriptive phrase would have been "woman with short hair", or maybe "woman with masculine face". Calling her "cisgendered" just shows that the author is trying to leverage a stupid incident for LGBT political capital, even though that's not what it's about.
To answer kurenai.tsubasa's questions in TFS: "Is violence against women who do not have traditional looks acceptable?" Obviously not. But that's not what this story is about. This is a story about an idiot guard, overreacting to whatever hysterical customer called him over. It's bodily assault by the stupid, not a statement about gender politics.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:32AM
Yup - it's a "soft news" story at its core. That's not a bad thing per se, but the social justice warrior vernacular crap really stands out as being shoehorned in. I also agree with the parent in that the story is not about "violence against women who do not have traditional looks", but rather a case of mistaken identity.
The real "gender equality" crap in this story is that, had the victim actually been a man, this wouldn't even be a story. I'm perfectly fine acknowledging the reality that men/women/humans are NOT all equal absent natural rights.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by wisnoskij on Tuesday March 01 2016, @01:30PM
I believe that "cisgendered" is relevant as it is implying that this particular woman was born with a dick, and other male features. And as they specifically even mention that her shirt got opened at one point, that she is pre-operation and 100% male physically. AKA, the security guard did not mistake a lesbian for a man, the security guard just did not take the time to ask if the obviously male person what gender they identified most strongly with.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:48PM
Cisgendered woman
born with a dick, and other male features. And as they specifically even mention that her shirt got opened at one point, that she is pre-operation and 100% male physically.
What the hell? I was under the impression that these two descriptions are polar opposites.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by wisnoskij on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:53PM
OK, ya I got that backwards.
Not sure how her chest was exposed and their mistake not noticed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 08 2016, @10:31PM
The security wasn't looking at the chest, probably, I'm guessing the womans top came undone as the guard was manhandling her, but by that point the guard had her facing the other way so the guard only saw her back as he chucked her out.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:57PM
Actually, i think that ciswoman means she was born a woman and identifies as one too.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @03:23PM
Ummm, I think you have that backwards... according to Wikipedia:
Cisgender [wikipedia.org]:
Transgender [wikipedia.org]:
(Score: 3, Informative) by splodus on Tuesday March 01 2016, @04:04PM
My understanding is that a 'cisgendered' woman was 'born female' and identifies as female. Whereas a 'transgendered' woman would have been 'born male' but identifies as female.
Unless I've got it wrong? It would have nice to just have it clear in the summary without having to look it up...
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday March 01 2016, @03:13PM
BS. "Cisgendered" is absolutely appropriate here, because of the rapid proliferation of transgender and transsexual people. Regardless of what you may think of them, there's a lot of trans stuff going on these days, so using the "cisgender" term is very useful here so that no one thinks this happened to some trans person. With a trans person, while this assault still would not be acceptable at all, it might make a little sense as to why the bouncer was confused about the person's gender, but this wasn't a tranny or anything like that, this was a woman who was born as a woman, and her only "offense" is that she apparently didn't have long hair and a dress and maybe looked boyish, which isn't that unusual for younger, thin, short-haired women with small breasts.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:52PM
Baloney.
"Woman" works perfectly as a descriptive word for the overwhelmingly vast majority of situations, including the very one mentioned in the article. Introducing a new word in such inappropriate circumstances is an attempt to make use of a "thought virus" to make other people think about issues that have absolutely no bearing on the topic at hand. It's insidious.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 08 2016, @05:28AM
To cover layman and technical definitions in one go. Only the LGBT or politically correct crowd tend to know all these definitions by heart, and while I appreciate the wikipedia link, as is indicated by this thread, just as many hotheads here RTFLs as on the green site.
(Score: 2) by Beryllium Sphere (r) on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:40PM
It's about someone being beaten up for not complying with social expectations of how women should present themselves.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Thursday March 03 2016, @10:25PM
I've read several comments here (including replies to yours) that mistakenly assume the woman was transgender. So apparently this information *was* required, and maybe should have been made even more explicit...
(Score: 2) by Gravis on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:11AM
There are lots of females out there with short hair. some people might think we’re boys, but, at the end of the day, we’re not"
so if you look like and dress like a man, you might get mistaken for and treated like a man? STOP THE PRESSES!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Vanderhoth on Tuesday March 01 2016, @12:35PM
This is what really bugs me about this stuff, because you KNOW had they actually been a man, this would have been a non-issue. No one cares when it's violence against men.
I also honestly believe we're not getting the whole story here. Obviously someone else complained about this person being in the women's washroom. A male security guard wouldn't just be nosing around in there unless someone had given him reason to. Is it possible the guard was just doing their job? Is it possible this women got violent because of the mistake which forced the guard to defend himself? Is it possible because of the hit to her pride this women is not exaggerating for revenge?
Likely we'll never know because the media has a vested interest in reporting stories as "violence against women", which they'll never go back to it to report any follow up once it's had it's 15 minutes of fame. The last thing journalist want is for people to find out the news is only interested in reporting half the story, the half that gets them clicks.
"Now we know", "And knowing is half the battle". -G.I. Joooooe
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @01:57PM
Most women with short hair don't look like boys with women's haircuts.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Bogsnoticus on Wednesday March 02 2016, @03:18AM
Most women with short hair don't look like boys with women's haircuts.
Explain Justin Beiber then.
Genius by birth. Evil by choice.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:19AM
So, is this particular story, or stories of this nature (cis/trans-gender issues), of interest to you? Would you like to see more stories like this posted to the site? Please reply in the comments.
Here I am again, in the morning, seeing another shit-tier question answered decades ago by trial balloon of actual hackers. [catb.org]
When asked, hackers often ascribe their culture's gender- and color-blindness to a positive effect of text-only network channels, and this is doubtless a powerful influence. Also, the ties many hackers have to AI research and SF literature may have helped them to develop an idea of personhood that is inclusive rather than exclusive — after all, if one's imagination readily grants full human rights to future AI programs, robots, dolphins, and extraterrestrial aliens, mere color and gender can't seem very important any more.
-- Hacker's Lexicon
In other words: No, we don't give a flying fuck about Marxist Identity Politics [wikipedia.org] FYI: The Hacker is typically an apolitical beast [catb.org] (as politics is show business for monkey minded masses), or one who lives by their own moral code which is superior to those found amongst the plebeians. See above: We've already accepted trans-species rights, the SJW bullshit can go fuck itself. Hackers have never been "racist" or "sexist" or even "speciesist".
People should bookmark this post and refer to it later, because they'll likely have to bring it back up time and time again (as all experience hath shown): Those that refuse to study their history are doomed to repeat it -- and editors are just this sort.
For the record: "Geek" and "Nerd" is a marketing label that groups expensive hobbies together and destroys the true culture that we once had. There has never been a "News for Nerds", because the "Nerd / Geek" culture did not truly exist except as a marketing label. Hackers had their own ethos and culture, deep, outdoorsy as much as basement dwelling, intellectual and as often practitioners of the neuro-linguistic as other forms of social engineering or martial arts (body-physics hacking). Gamers, Comic Book and Anime fans, astronomy, philosophy and physics nuts all have (had) distinct cultures as well. Then people realized we had disposable income and insightful comments so we could be marketed to and milked for modpoints rather than ridiculed. Bullied "nerds" grew up and realized the same would happen to their kids. Suddenly the "child genius" trope was born to sell to the intellectuals. Doogie Howser was a prodigy that advertized PCs at the end of every show. Screech and Steve Urkel became tragic comedic sidekicks to pity rather than bully. Today "Think Geek", "Geek and Sundry", "Dexter's Lab", or "Jimmy Neutron", and the whole cult of "Nerd Culture" or "Geek Culture" caters equally to anyone with the mildest interest in comic books, science, engineering, or [video] games. Nerd, Geek and Nigger are all derogatory terms used by marketing goons to leverage persecution complexes against unsuspecting simpletons who want to "take the term back" and become part of a special snowflake oppressed group that they can never actually belong to. Calling myself a "Gamer Geek" or "Computer Nerd" would be as retarding as Neil DeGrasse Tyson calling himself a "Space Nigger". It's disgusting, and Soylentils should be better than this.
If you want to talk about fucking identity politics, why not talk about how fucked the marketing driven culture paints groups the distinct culture of hackers, gamers, and science enthusiasts into an amorphous blob erasing the true cultural values and predilections so thoroughly that the editors here don't even know who we are? Or, perhaps talk about how those terms "Nerd" and "Geek" mean "social outcast" (which nerds and geeks typically are not), and how actual social outcasts aren't given a voice in the "Geek/Nerd Culture". Outcasts were a subset of Gamers, Hackers, and Comic book and Anime enthusiasts, or Science buffs, as they are of culture in general. However, the outcast who likes fashion doesn't get to don the newly cool "Geek" label because they are marketed to via a different strategy which fosters conformism of the nouveau by dressing up as group think as "originality".
Gender identity squabbles are truly beneath the Hacker intellect. We recognize the cultural struggle as inevitable, and acknowledge that the communists leverage this sort of divisive issue against western nations. [youtube.com] It's a topic that became boring 50 years ago. Yes, things like this will happen. So fucking what? Do you just want to mentally masturbate over how we predicted this shit for decades and how it KEEPS coming to pass?
IMHO: Get bent, Soylent. This shit drove me from the green site which fulfilled its purpose in attracting sensational simpletons. Now I realize that what we need is to destroy all centralized points of failure. The very concept of a "web site" is bogus. There should be a decentralized meta layer for the net by which we can converse about a web page, and filter out those who are morons via a trust / interest graph. Then all we need is an RSS reader to feed it. As soon as me or someone like me has created it, your website is dead. It's dying now. The subversive forces will not let up, they are well funded, and you are too stupid to purge them.
The very concept of this site shall soon be obsolete. Good day, and good riddance.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:36AM
Haven't you heard? "Color-blindness is still racism." http://www.tolerance.org/magazine/number-36-fall-2009/feature/colorblindness-new-racism [tolerance.org] *puke*
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @11:43AM
The subversive forces will not let up, they are well funded,
We are?!? I've been doing this shit for free. Where do I collect my checque?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Unixnut on Tuesday March 01 2016, @12:19PM
Damn.... what a rant! Who pissed in your cornflakes this morning?
Not that I disagree with you, these type of stories are what started driving me away from slashdot in the first place. I come here for hacker/tech news. There are other sites that cater to this kind of stuff, and those who are interested in said stuff, can do there for it.
I always saw these stores, when posted on slashdot, to be trolling in order to enflame conversation, and drive traffic to the site (as /. was at this point, for-profit ad-driven, so more eyeballs == more money). Soylent isn't ad supported, so no benefit to drawing the masses here. In fact better to keep it niche, so that it remains affordable for the site to survive on donations.
In short, hell no soylent, keep these topics off the site, they are not relevant to this subculture, as parent above me has already bluntly driven home.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:01PM
Yeah, that was a good rant. Makes me wish I had mod points, for the first time. It's nice to see that someone else is annoyed by the nerd/geek labels that are really insults even though some people pretend they aren't. Fuck off if you call yourself or someone else a geek or a nerd.
(Score: 2) by Unixnut on Wednesday March 02 2016, @10:12AM
Interesting question though, as "Hacker" has been co-opted to mean "criminal" and this has reached pretty much full penetration in society, what terms can you use to self describe your culture to others?
If Geek/Nerd are just insults, then what is left? Some people tried to replace "Hacker" with "Maker", but that a) just doesn't sound right, and b) really refers to a subculture for which fabrication and manufacturing independence is their interest, rather than the wider group.
Interestingly, removing a cultures ability to reference itself and associate with an identity is a common method of destroying cultures (in our case, by associating our identity with criminality to the point you can't really refer to yourself as one in society).
In fact it is a common method done to break up a people in order to make a nation-state more unstable and prone to easy conquest, just in this case it is done to a people who have no nation-state as such. I guess we were seen as too much of a threat to the status quo.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by jIyajbe on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:20AM
What intrigues me about these sort of articles is that they provide data to a new (maybe just new to me) question: What physical properties of the human body determine its gender? I'm in physics, not any of the life sciences, so my ignorance on this topic is vast. But, as far as I understand--
Et cetera...
Now it appears that evidence is accumulating that brain chemistry also might play a role; it is at least plausible that brain functions can fail to sync with glandular functions (testes/ovaries), causing, apparently, conflicting gender determination for an individual. This is exactly what I know nothing about, and wonder how complex the system is that determines gender.
"Don't blame the log for the fire." --Andrew Ratshin
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @03:49PM
Consider these data points in your analysis:
You have stumbled onto a political question, not a scientific one.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Beryllium Sphere (r) on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:52PM
Specifically, the central bed nucleus of the stria terminalis. "bstc" is a useful search term. Also "INAH".
It's early days in the neuroscience of gender identity and our understanding may evolve. New data might throw out today's working hypotheses. But that's where we are now.
Where it really gets interesting is that there are apparently multiple brain regions involved that can go in separate directions. There's another brain region which stores a map of what the body is expected to look like. If it goes one way when somatic development goes the other way, you get the people who have to turn off the lights to take a shower because it's unbearable to see themselves naked.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Beryllium Sphere (r) on Tuesday March 01 2016, @09:30PM
It's multi-factor, the results are not binary and not even on a single one-dimensional spectrum, and the mechanisms are still largely obscure.
The mechanisms are not all going to appear in the usual obvious places, judging from one bit of information that is guaranteed to blow the mind of a physics major. Take biology's closest thing to a controlled experiment, monozygotic twins. Same DNA, gestated in the same place with the same chemicals. Regularly, they'll grow up with one trans and the other not.
But then, monozygotic twins don't always come out as the same apparent sex, either. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11173871 [nih.gov]
Biology is messy.
We have a great deal to learn about this subject.
(Score: 1) by Zoe Brain on Tuesday March 01 2016, @10:54PM
Good question. It's complex, neither sex nor gender are strict binaries, but these two papers describe our current state of knowledge pretty well, albeit simplified and coercing facts to fit a binary model.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19955753?dopt=Abstract/ [nih.gov]
Sexual Hormones and the Brain: An Essential Alliance for Sexual Identity and Sexual Orientation Garcia-Falgueras A, Swaab DF Endocr Dev. 2010;17:22-35
The fetal brain develops during the intrauterine period in the male direction through a direct action of testosterone on the developing nerve cells, or in the female direction through the absence of this hormone surge. In this way, our gender identity (the conviction of belonging to the male or female gender) and sexual orientation are programmed or organized into our brain structures when we are still in the womb. However, since sexual differentiation of the genitals takes place in the first two months of pregnancy and sexual differentiation of the brain starts in the second half of pregnancy, these two processes can be influenced independently, which may result in extreme cases in trans-sexuality. This also means that in the event of ambiguous sex at birth, the degree of masculinization of the genitals may not reflect the degree of masculinization of the brain. There is no indication that social environment after birth has an effect on gender identity or sexual orientation.
http://www.hawaii.edu/PCSS/biblio/articles/2005to2009/2006-biased-interaction.html/ [hawaii.edu]
Biased-Interaction Theory of Psychosexual Development: “How Does One Know if One is Male or Female?” M.Diamond Sex Roles (2006) 55:589–600
A theory of gender development is presented that incorporates early biological factors that organize predispositions in temperament and attitudes. With activation of these factors a person interacts in society and comes to identify as male or female. The predispositions establish preferences and aversions the growing child compares with those of others. All individuals compare themselves with others deciding who they are like (same) and with whom are they different. These experiences and interpretations can then be said to determine how one comes to identify as male or female, man or woman. In retrospect, one can say the person has a gendered brain since it is the brain that structures the individual’s basic personality; first with inherent tendencies then with interactions coming from experience.
So in order to answer your question, we'd have to know more about which parts of the brain determine "basic personality". Certainly the lymbic nucleus is key, and the SPL affects body map - whether one feels one should have an "innie" or an "outie".
But even then, that just determines what someone's Gender Identity is, something factual and measurable. What someone's Gender is is a political, religious or ideological question, as that's a social construct.
Never attribute to malice what is adequately explained by incompetence.
(Score: 2) by fleg on Wednesday March 02 2016, @02:53AM
interesting links, thanks.
(alas, i'm out of mod points!)
(Score: 3, Informative) by ledow on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:29AM
"Here is my question, since many people recently have found themselves in various increasingly absurd demographics with much gusto. Is violence against women who do not have traditional looks acceptable in the pursuit of determining another's "true gender" and which spaces are acceptable for them to enter?"
Sorry, but it's illegal in my country to touch my person forcibly without due cause. Being in a room isn't due cause. In fact, such actions can easily be taken to be a prelude to an attack and justify self-defence. Yes, even that "little shove" or, "I just grabbed his wrist". That's enough for me to break your arm if I think I might be in danger of physical harm.
In this case, it would sound as if the victim is perfectly entitled to literally floor the person and/or seek assault charges for such actions.
You can ask them to leave. You can block their path (if they try and push past you while you're blocked - well... that could be assault and you could then restrain with reasonable force!). But you can't grab them, drag them out, etc. That's how charges get filed and a simple shoplifter gets to sue your store for thousands and have your security guard lose their job.
You stop them. You ask them politely, clarify the situation discretely. If you can't, you tell them you will call the police. If no change, you actually call the police. If you get to that stage without the extreme embarrassment that you'd misread their gender, then you're already into news articles anyway. But maybe you won't end up with charges against you.
Does it matter their age, sex, orientation, appearance? Not in the eyes of the law.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday March 01 2016, @09:08AM
Entitlement and capability are two different things.
How are those "free speech cages" again? They do have a right to pen you (forcibly if you resist) far away from anyone that can hear your speech, don't they?
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Bot on Tuesday March 01 2016, @09:23AM
Either someone proves, even if only circumstantially, that the guard did not sincerely mistook her for a man, or:
- This incident is not about violence on women but on MEN.
- If I, bot, want to dress up like a muslim saudi, and get kicked out a plane, the violence is not again bot, but against saudis. It's against the perceived enemy. This is banal.
- The fuss when a woman gets basically treated like a man is THE EXACT OPPOSITE of gender equality, whatever it means.
The media reporting angle when a woman gets treated like a man is THE EXACT OPPOSITE of gender equality, whatever it means.
It's not even police brutality since it's a private guard who likely is not insured enough for the shitstorm he caused.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 4, Informative) by pTamok on Tuesday March 01 2016, @09:38AM
Is violence against women who do not have traditional looks acceptable in the pursuit of determining another's "true gender" and which spaces are acceptable for them to enter?
No.
Ed Note: there was considerable discussion among the editors as to whether or not this story would appeal to the community. Conclusion: We just don't know. Solution: Ask the community! So, is this particular story, or stories of this nature (cis/trans-gender issues), of interest to you?
No.
Would you like to see more stories like this posted to the site?
No.
(Score: 3, Touché) by maxwell demon on Tuesday March 01 2016, @10:19AM
The first issue is: What does a male security guard do at a women toilet? Especially one where specifically "boys are not allowed"?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Bot on Tuesday March 01 2016, @05:36PM
>The first issue is: What does a male security guard do at a women toilet?
given the choice, whose toilets would YOU rather guard, meatbag?
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday March 01 2016, @05:44PM
Well, he should not be given the choice to begin with.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:58PM
The obvious assumption here is that some other patron reported "a man using the women's bathroom" to the business' staff.
It's an understandable mistake, given the photo of the victim [wxyz.com] provided by the news article.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @11:53AM
"So, is this particular story, or stories of this nature (cis/trans-gender issues), of interest to you? "
No.
(Score: 2) by Fnord666 on Tuesday March 01 2016, @12:32PM
(Score: 3, Insightful) by cubancigar11 on Tuesday March 01 2016, @12:39PM
REALLY??? ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME???
A woman faces what men face and the story is about violence against women????
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:07PM
I don't even know what "cisgendered woman" means. Yeah, I looked it up. It's utterly gratuitous. Why not call ourselves, "exclusively bipedal, hairless hominid" to differentiate us from every other kind? "Retinally enabled" to indicate, "not blind?" "non-animal-based sustenance" instead of "vegetable?"
All these contrived categories and labels and gradations of meaning are the bastard offspring of post-modernism, and aggravate me so much I want to hop in a time machine, travel back to when those scholars were beginning that academic fad, and kick the ass of each and every one of them.
"Androgynous woman using restroom mistaken for man, assaulted by security guard."
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Beryllium Sphere (r) on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:57PM
Sometimes when an incident like this happens it's a transgender person who's the victim. By explaining that this woman wasn't, the report makes the vital point that everyone is at risk.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:14PM
"Androgynous" is a solid word and able to clarify the situation. Using a construct that is part of an entire, artificial gender taxonomy is an intentional choice meant to convey much more than the "facts" of a case. It's like choosing to call someone in a situation "Aryan" instead of "white," because you want to communicate a subtext.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Beryllium Sphere (r) on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:28PM
OK, well taken point, but all taxonomies are artificial.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:49PM
All taxonomies are artificial, but all taxonomies are not created equal. If I recast the story as "Snozzwhanger Injured, Humiliated After Security Guard Mistook It for a Whangdoodle," because, see, a Snozzwhanger sort of resembles a Whangdoodle but not a Zipwhirr, then you would be absolutely right to pillory my taxonomy, which I just pulled out of my Grugslur, as gibberish. You would be dead on the money in saying I'm pushing a Jabberwocky agenda.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by ghost on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:31PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @05:22PM
Yeah, SJWdot is back that way.
(Score: 5, Informative) by pTamok on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:31PM
Could I point out that this is an Internet website, which, as far as I know, does not tailor content according to the geographic distribution of its readers.
On that basis, please be aware that not all the readers are from the USA, and that as a submitter (or editor), that phrase would be better re-cast as "the escalating controversy in the USA", or, if nationality is not important to the point being made, "the escalating controversy".
Thanks.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by GungnirSniper on Tuesday March 01 2016, @02:55PM
We have the ability to divide our story feeds by nexuses, so perhaps we should have more options [soylentnews.org] than just All, Breaking News, and Meta. This sort of general interest story with light science bits (how do we determine gender) wasn't the main focus of this site or the green place, but it's clear from the quantity of comments these stories generate that on the whole people are interested in them. Giving the tech-only naysayers an option to avoid them should help balance everyone's concerns.
As others have mentioned, using "Cisgendered" rather than pointing out the woman's short hair is somewhat revealing of the submitter's biases.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by purple_cobra on Tuesday March 01 2016, @08:01PM
"Cis" is one of the few terms that make me turn the metaphorical page but, as previously mentioned, I am a parochial old fart.
Object to the story? Not in and of itself, but I would question the point of it here. It tangentially touches on how gender is identified, but the crux of the story seems to be "thug acts like a thug" which is not really news, let alone tech news.
(Score: 1) by Warm_Fusion on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:10PM
I specifically left Slashdot and came to this alternative Soylent News site to *get away* from the endless bombardment of gender politics / 'social justice' articles that pollute so many news streams these days. If I see a lot of 'men are bad, women are victims' articles here, I'll stop reading here too.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by RedBear on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:12PM
This is a very sad day on SN for me. Nearly all of the upvoted comments I've seen (and there are a lot of comments today) pretty much boil down to a sort of victim-blaming "Yes, violence against any misgendered individual is perfectly OK."
To the people who dismiss transgender issues because "it's a tiny percentage of a population", I'd like to point out that in just the US alone we're still talking about a minimum of ONE MILLION individual human beings of all ages who have to face potential violence on a daily basis for doing something as simple as trying to find a place to pee in public, and you are essentially condoning that violence. And there are no doubt many more individuals that haven't yet decided to come forward because they are still hiding from the intense hatred leveled at transgender individuals. So we're probably ultimately talking about more like two or three MILLION Americans here. It's sickening to imply that violence against a sub-group of Americans is no big deal simply because there aren't very many of them.
To the people who say, "Dress or look like a man, what do you expect?" This is textbook victim blaming and a direct condoning of violence against any misgendered individual. How so many people in 2016 can still public and proudly advocate violence against a human being based on them having the "wrong" haircut or wearing the "wrong" article of clothing is beyond me. And remember that every person has a different idea about what might be the "wrong" haircut or the "wrong" article of clothing. If I see a dude with a ponytail, does that mean I have the right to punch him in the face and not be charged with assault? Hint: The answer is always "No". YOU are responsible for YOUR actions against others.
To the people who say, "I'm tired of everyone talking about this." I hope someday you'll realize that the only reason you don't want to talk about this is because it doesn't happen to affect your personal social group, and by wanting everyone to keep silent you also are essentially condoning the violent acts that are perpetrated regularly against transgendered or mistakenly misgendered people. You're just like all the people who during the entire 20th century have tried to get everyone to stop talking about the existence of systemic racial discrimination, and thus actively condoned the continuation of that racial discrimination.
The way this conversation has turned out today, I am now 1000% on board with talking about gender issues, and no, that doesn't just mean "violence against women". We definitely need to talk about why so many of you are basically willing to throw away another person's human rights because ACCORDING TO YOU they may not be presenting the "correct" gender in a given situation. That's sickening.
I fully expect this time to be modded Flamebait or Troll. But I have to speak up for those who are being ridiculed and dismissed today.
¯\_ʕ◔.◔ʔ_/¯ LOL. I dunno. I'm just a bear.
... Peace out. Got bear stuff to do. 彡ʕ⌐■.■ʔ
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:05PM
You're completely missing the point. The only reason this situation is deemed newsworthy by some is because a woman was MISTAKENLY identified as a man! Had the victim actually been a man (you know exactly what I mean), this would not have been news.
You and I both know that initiating violence against anyone is wrong. Yet, culture today is completely accepting of violence against males. I'm not complaining about this, even being male, but merely pointing out how nauseating the shrieks of "gender equality" are when a closer examination reveals that the harpies-of-any-gender absolutely do not care about true equality.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @06:32PM
Like many other people who have already commented, I'd rather not soylent devolve into yet another identity politics vector. There are plenty of those already and precious few tech/science sites with a focus on the actual tech/science where I don't run into this endless ideological warfare.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Eristone on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:24PM
For f*ck's sake people. The editors *asked* in the summary. There is no need for the "SJW", the "I ran from Slashdot" and the "I can't handle sunlight or reality outside my basement" whine . Just say "No, I don't want these type of stories. Thank you." Oh, and contribute something, too. (note to self - make a quick donation after posting this) The rest, thanks for the reasonable discussion, which is part of the reason I enjoy coming here.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @11:46PM
OK. No, I don't want these type of stories. Thank you.
Happy now?
(Score: 1) by Eristone on Wednesday March 02 2016, @12:07AM
Yes. Thanks. :) (it's the little things...)
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @07:25PM
When in Paris, France some years ago, my daughter needed a wee at the Eiffel Tower and I, in my stupid ignorance, was dragging her towards the men's section as I was used to from the UK ... only to be told by a female attendant to use the women's section instead. The rationale: At the men's, my daughter might catch a glimpse of an unsuspecting, upstanding gent's todger, whereas no untoward body parts are supposed to be on display in the women's.
I was definitely not forcefully ejected!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2016, @10:08PM
Seriously, this CIS- crap that get spewed is pisses me off. Say CIS and I think you are a compelte fucking idiot and rate you in the SJW level of oxygen thieves
I'm not CIS, I'm fucking male / femaale / trans. Anything else GTFO
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 02 2016, @01:06AM
Sounds a little absurd to me. I can understand being forcefully ejected after showing agressive behavior or refusing to leave or something like that, but being thrown out of an establishment no questions asked just because walking into the wrong restroom? I'm having a hard time believing that. But if it really happened then the security guard clearly wasn't being professional and he should be held accountable. The gender (identity) of the victim isn't relevant at all.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 02 2016, @06:24PM
> Would you like to see more stories like this posted to the site?
Hell no and the poster K T is a known troll. martyb needs a whack with a ruler for publishing the crap post. No more in the future please.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Thursday March 03 2016, @10:36PM
Personally, I like our manifesto [soylentnews.org] and I'd like to keep it :) And based on the manifesto I have to say that any story any member submits is fair game.
If you don't like the headline, don't click the link. I will never understand why that seems to be such a difficult concept for some people to grasp. How is it easier to keep coming in and writing rants about how you don't want to read something rather than just NOT READING IT?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 04 2016, @10:17PM
Only people that seem to be a man going into the ladies toilets.
In the guards head he was potentially saving the women from a pervy man.
It's not like this was totally random.
I'd like to think the guard would also chase a woman who refused to leave out of the men's room.
However in Australia, I'd imagine the guard would be in trouble. He does seem to have overreacted with inappropriate force and escalated way too quickly.
Guilty, by kangaroo court!