Sunday, June 6, 2010

They're EEEEEEVVVVIIIIILLLL


The Sun doing its, um... "best"?


According to media, the closer the trans community gets to dealing with issues of how they're defined by the psychiatric community and the DSM, the more eeevil we get. It's true. A lot of sinister trans sickies have been popping up in the last few years. The only thing media loves better than a sickie, or a celebrity sickie, is a transsexual sickie. The terms 'transsexual', 'tranny' or 'sex change' are the perfect marmalade for the media's insatiable appetite for finding creepy people who are preying on our society (apart, of course, from corporations, religious institutions or entire countries which do even more mayhem on a cosmically larger scale, but they don't count). A recent phenomena has been TV news shows like 48 Hours, Dateline and 20/20 which used to present "general interest" news features only to now purely focus on the meme of "the sick minds living among us." Scary. Lock your doors and windows.

The above headline was in reference to a article in London's The Sun tabloid (since retracted for being baseless) accusing a trans woman of child abuse. In what seems to be a horrible misunderstanding, the trans woman had her family situation investigated by child welfare due to some images they'd seen on the Internet. But the Sun saw fit to paint the story with the "evvvillll" brush." When trans people are involved, it doesn't take much to set off tabloid fireworks. [NOTE: I have removed some original references and graphics to the party in question due to The Sun removing the initial story and because it involves her children who in no way seem to have been actually abused).]


An Immaculate reason not to go on Facebook

Star quality
This is small potatoes compared to the most 'celebrated' transsexual-sickie running around, the person formerly known as John Mark Karr. That name might be familiar from 2006, when Karr was the person who admitted to killing Jon Benet Ramsey even though the police soon proved that was an impossibility and released Karr. At that time, there was a great deal of media attention given to how Karr, a former teacher and accused pedophile, was in Thailand possibly getting "a sex change." Two years later Karr turned up, as Fox News reported "being led away in handcuffs — after being arrested in a domestic dispute with his girlfriend at his parents' house in Atlanta." (and evidently still mostly presenting as male).

Immaculate Conception... sickie, sicko, sick
Fast forward two years and Karr legally changed names to Alexis Reich in Washington State (the acknowledged state where name changes can be done the quickest). Alexis started appearing on Facebook and on various online groups. A few months ago, there were allegations of Reich (who is now known as Alexis Valoran Reich or just Alexis Valoran) sexually abusing and threatening a former pupil (then a teenager) named Samantha Spiegel. An entire website made by Samantha's friends outlined the history of Spiegel and Valoran's connection and how Valoran threatened to kill Spiegel if she complained to the authorities. As of this time, Valoran is thought to be living in a homeless shelter or SRO either in the Bay Area or elsewhere on the west coast and is accused of trying to form a child sex cult of pretty little girls called "The Immaculates." Needless to say, disturbed as Reich/Valoran is, this story has been covered by hundreds of media outlets in a country which is currently engaged in two wars, has a major ecological disaster and a near economic depression on its hands.


In trans reportage passable = slightly less insane;
not passable = marketably insane


Don't mess with Texas
On a more local but still well-publicized level was the story of Renata Monet in Abilene, TX last year. Monet was a 60 year old recent transitioner. Ms. Monet slit the neck of her church pastor, Karen Lee Johnson at the Unity Church of Christianity. Monet, who grew up the son of a fundamentalist preacher, then hung herself and committed suicide. Like Karr, Monet is identified as being former teacher, a frequently published writer, obsessed with the Confederacy, former satanist, and extreme misogynist (it was said, resenting women because she had to live as a man) although was generally seen as being on close terms with her pastor before murdering her. Much media attention is paid to the various names and spellings of her name Monet used in the last few years. This quote from Monet was featured in a number of publications:
And at nights, I would find myself in bed before I went to sleep masturbating and my masturbation’s always carried with it the torture and murder of women.” However, Monet didn’t want anyone to think she’d acted on her obsessions: “[My] fantasies were just that–fantasies. For I was raised to ‘respect women’ and ‘boys don’t hit girls.’ So I put on my good guy mask and I gave them the respect they were ’supposed to have.’ But deep down, deep in my being, I began hating them because they were women and had a vagina and I was not and didn’t. I had to be a ‘man.


This is not "that" Newton-John
although this one did get "Physical"

Why-O, why-o, why-o... why did I ever leave Ohio
Last year there was a conviction is another highly publicized "transsexual as sicko" case involving trans woman Christine Newton-John in Ohio. The 41-year old Ms. Newton-John (yes, it IS hard to write that name with a straight face) forced her 73-year old husband who had a heart condition, to keep swimming in their apartment complex pool and wouldn't let him get out of the water. It was all caught on a surveillance video.
Police viewed the tape and saw Newton-John abusing her frail husband, who friends said was deathly afraid of water. Detective Stehlik counted 43 separate occasions in which Newton-John prevented her husband from leaving the water. She dragged him around by his arms and legs. On several occasions, he laid his head on the side of the pool gasping for breath.
He died of a heart attack, and Newton-John pleaded guilty to reckless homicide and is currently incarcerated.


Trans people: leave the driving to us!

At least cis dictators made the trains run on time
On a lesser scale of sicko but no less publicly excoriated was 24-year old Aiden Quinn, the Boston MBTA trolley driver who, while texting his girlfriend on the job, collided into another train. 49 passengers were injured.
As Quinn was texting, he ran through yellow and red warning lights at about 25 mph within the subway tunnel. Quinn's train then struck the two-car train ahead of him, which was stopped at another red light and had its brake lights on.
Not only did the press mention his obvious job carelessness and prior moving violations, but they were also adamant in mentioning how Quinn was "an FTM transgender"
Quinn had referred to himself as one of the first transsexual employees to be hired by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, which oversees the subway system. The article contained a quote from an unnamed source who said that the driver 'was initially hired as a minority and used 'her' transgender status to get the job.' (my bolding and quotes)
See what trying to be nice will get you!

Lock your doors at night
Yes, those transgenders live among us all right. They're accused of abusing children, creating creepy pedophilia cults, doing spousal abuse, murdering spiritual leaders and being criminally negligent on the job, just like normal people. This is NOT to apologize for real world child abuse, pedophilia, spousal abuse, homicide or mind-boggling criminal job negligence. There are some sick puppies in the trans community who have hurt other people and being trans doesn't give them any kind of a pass.



Even our prisoners aren't safe from "them"


But what makes makes the stories unique is, they're trans. When a train conductor in my city recently drove negligantly, slammed into another streetcar and injured 43 passengers, no one really mentioned his gender. When the thousands of spousal abuse cases are summarily reported on, other than providing names and pronouns, no one specifies they are cisgender. It's safe to say Renata Monet's crime got bigger coverage in Texas than those of numerous murders of trans women in that state. Gen Y 'alternative' news outlets like The Young Turks negatively discuss how a trans woman who was a rapist is being transferred to a women's prison while never mentioning how there are cis women inmates incarcerated for rape and sexual assault... and yes, they're in the women's prison population as well.

Even among 'serious' news outlets, transsexual = crazy; crazy = entertainment; therefore, transsexual = entertainment. Do the math, it all adds up $$$.


* I just want to mention that my use of the highly judgmental terms 'crazy', 'sicko' and 'evil' are being referenced as discussions of media, not of mental illness nor injurious behavior.


3 comments:

  1. There's a lot of trans identified folk out there that make me really wince. The feeling of being a freak is something we all struggle to overcome, and then comes along the ones who don't help that perception.

    Seems like I'm still repeating to myself that it's OK to be trans, like a mantra. (sigh)

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  2. Teri, don't forget to click your heels three times when you say that. :-)

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  3. :o) And me with out any ruby slippers. Think pink flip flops get you any where? If only it really was some weird dream one could wake up from.

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