Oh god. If you thought Jerry Springer was bad...

[TheLongChodeAhead]

it may be comparing apples to oranges, but remember, they're both fruits

[alyssats]

i just couldnt believe some people would be in that kind of things, so much fetishes out there. well at least he have the gutts to wear swim suits beside a road i dont even have much confidence to do that

[SarahG]

Oh come on I can't believe people are defending this pervert. He was going around harrassing women for fucks sake. Imagine being a young women walking on your own and coming across this sick hairy arsed weirdo trying to make you uncomfortable.

Good thing the cops got him, because sometimes these things can escalate it something far more serious.

I'm certainly not defending him.

I don't care who or what someone is, if you're going around CHASING people- that's fucked up. End of story.

My problem is strictly with the way the police handled it. I don't think indecent exposure was the correct charge, however that doesn't mean he should have been released & allowed to go around chasing people. There are certainly other things they could have charged him with, that I wouldn't have cared about.

[SarahG]

Regardless of their sources, I'm saying our misuse of terms and labels is part of what social conservatives in turn misuse to justify the continued marginalizing of this community as part of whatever bigger agenda they have.

I don't doubt the conservatives smile with glee upon seeing the lgbt community turn on itself (i.e. dropping trans inclusion in ENDA).

But, I still don't see any evidence that would show that the community's factions are responsible for the way the social conservatives misuse terms & labels.

The social conservatives have, from the very start, held control of the dialogs. For as long as there has been a LGBT community, it's been a constant game of "Hear and react." The social conservatives will make some absurd argument, the community will take notice of it, and react by pointing out the argument is absurd, and repeat.

There is a reason why anyone who holds control of the debate direction, in a debate, wins the debate even if they don't have accuracy & the truth on their side. Just look at how effective absurd disinformation has been in the global warming debate (and that's not an atypical example).

Call it define and conquer. By generalizing the community as whole to its worst examples, they try to reduce its credibility as a whole. But by pitting one part of the community against another, they try reduce the power of a unified group.

I really have a hard time buying that the Republican Party in NH this year decided that they should imply all trans people are "sexually deviant perverts" thinking that it would serve to divide the relatively powerless TG community & cause TG community infighting.

The reason why they made the "sexually deviant perverts" argument when facing a trans-inclusive discrimination bill was because its a scare tactic that WORKS with people outside the community. All they have to do is talk about the people who would do stunts like this guy from this news story, and say "would you want this happening in a female restroom when your wife or young daughter walks in?"

In state after state, town after town, city after city- that argument has been EXTREMELY effective in convincing non-trans voters that trans discrimination bills are a risky idea, and the social conservatives know this.

Just because something is a consequence of an argument, doesn't mean it was the intended effect of an argument. An added unforeseen bonus, sure. But not the main objective. The main objective was getting the non-trans voters to react the way they did in NH. It was predictable, it has happened before, and it worked without a hitch.