Something That We Know…

…Is that we are in more danger than cisgender women in the bathrooms.

3 myths that shape the transgender bathroom debate
CNN
By Emanuella Grinberg and Dani Stewart
March 7, 2017

(CNN)The debate over transgender rights in America often gets reduced to bathroom talk.

Supporters of so-called bathroom bills say they will protect public safety by ensuring that all people, including transgender men and women, use public restrooms that correspond to their sex at birth.
Opponents say their impact is much wider. Critics call them thinly veiled attempts to discriminate against and stigmatize transgender people to score political points.

The first point,

Predators in bathroomsThe claim: Sexual predators will take advantage of public accommodations laws and policies covering transgender people to attack women and children in bathrooms.

The facts: Anti-discrimination protections covering gender identity have been around for years, and there is no evidence they lead to attacks in public facilities.

Explained: As of March 2017, 19 states, the District of Columbia and more than 200 municipalities have anti-discrimination laws and ordinances allowing transgender people to use public facilities that correspond to their gender identity.

CNN found one case of a Seattle man who allegedly undressed in a women's locker room in 2016, citing Washington's anti-discrimination law as motivation.

Otherwise, whenever the topic comes up in the news, prosecutors, law enforcement agencies and state human rights commissions have consistently denied that there is any correlation between such policies and a spike in assaults.

CNN reached out to 20 law enforcement agencies in states with anti-discrimination policies covering gender identity. None who answered reported any bathroom assaults after the policies took effect.

And the Washington case has been debunked by Cristan Williams in an article in the TransAdvocate.

Transgender people don't deserve protectionsThe claim: Being transgender is not a valid condition. Transgender people are mentally ill and should not be afforded the same legal protections or healthcare guarantees as gay and lesbian Americans.

The facts: The clear majority of mainstream medical, psychiatric and psychological communities agree that being transgender is not a concocted fantasy or mental illness. It's simply a valid state in which one's gender does not match what was assigned at birth.

Explained: The medical community defines gender identity as the way in which people perceive themselves, which could be different from their gender at birth. A transgender person's gender identity is different from cultural expectations based on the gender they were born with.
[…]
Letting children identify as transgender is harmfulClaim: Children are too young to know if they are transgender, and supporting a child who identifies as transgender is child abuse.

The facts: Research shows that not allowing transgender children to live their gender identity is harmful, and can be deadly.

Explained: Decades of research suggest that when it comes to psychological traits and abilities, boys and girls are more alike than they are different. A child's parents and environment are more likely to influence their gender expression than the body parts they were born with, and the concept of gender becomes more fixed as we grow.

Just as it advises for adults, the medical community endorses letting children live their gender identity to avoid gender dysphoria or other conditions that may hinder mental or social developmental.

I thought this was a very good article in discrediting the Republicans attack on us as lies.

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I can't understand why people hate us, hate us so strongly that they kill us.

Brazil police search for six men accused of brutally beating transgender woman to death
New York Daily News
By Jessa Schroeder
March 8, 2017

Police in Brazil are searching for a crew of six men who recorded themselves dragging a transgender woman from her home, demoralizing her and then viciously beating her to death.

The disturbing footage shows the men kicking and abusing Dandara dos Santos, 42, while hitting her with a wooden plank as she sits helplessly on the ground, covered in blood.

Why, why do they hate us? All we want to do is live our lives.