Another Reason To Love The Amish

One says, "It's up to me to accept people as they are."  Another declares, "Transgender is not part of God's plan." Still others say they want her to be happy.  And then there were some who, verbally, shrugged their shoulders.

As you might have guessed, they were reacting to Caitlyn Jenner.  But they didn't hear about her the way most of us did.  They don't watch television, let alone look at the Internet.  They don't even have most of the basic technology most of us (in the industrialized world, anyway) take for granted.

So how did the good folks in the Pennsylvania Amish country learn about Caitlyn?  Well, the fact that they (most of them, anyway) don't have TV didn't shield them from the news media--or, at least, one member of it.  Too bad he had to be one of the worst.

Although it wasn't their intent, the gentleness of the Amish people--whether they approved or disapproved of what Caitlyn has done--made Jesse Watters seem like even more of an ass than he normally does.

 

Even Bill O'Reilly seemed civilized by comparison!

Are You Surprised?

I promise not to say "I told you so!"

But, really, are you surprised that Faux News would plumb new depths of insensitivity and just plain ignorance when it came to AB 1266?

Faux Humor About Trans People

Almost everyone I know whose politics are anywhere to the left of David Duke's complains about, or scoffs at, Faux News.

If you've been reading this blog, you know that Faux News is known to most of the world as Fox News.  Most of my work colleagues, friends and acquaintances abhor its sensationalism as well as its to-the-right-of-Genghis-Khan political views.  

But us trans-folk have all the more reason to dislike Faux:  It doesn't like us.  Or, more precisely, it foments hate against us. 

In the last thirty years or so, no other news outlet anywhere in the US could have gotten away with making such mean-spirited and bullying comments as Faux commentators make about trans people.  Perhaps the worst part is that their crass, mean-spirited jokes about us are spontaneous and unscripted, which reveals the level of hate folks like Brian Kilmeade, Steve Doocy and Gretchen Carlson actually harbor:


   

There's plenty more hate where that came from.  You can find a few samples here.

Fox News Celebrates Transgender Day Of Remembrance

Perhaps I should pay more attention to Faux, I mean Fox, News than I do.  After all, in its own way, it's brilliant:  It whips up resentment against everyone in the world except the ones who are making the lives of their viewers more difficult.  Of course, the reason for that is that Fox is owned by the sorts of people who make their viewers' lives less tenuous.

A friend of mine alerted me to an egregious (even for Fox) example.  When the first Transgender Days of Remembrance were held, Fox executives and producers could honestly claim they were unaware:  Hey, I was, too!  However, I don't think that they could make such a defense of themselves now.

Certainly there's no defense for what they did on Tuesday, the 20th:  They started their day's "news" broadcasts with an alert that mocked transgender Massachusetts inmate Michelle Kosilek's request for electrolysis treatment.

Whether or not you believe that she had a "right" to such treatment, I don't think you can defend the network's timing.  I, for one, cannot see it as anything but a cynical ploy that shows Fox executives and producers have as much contempt for their audience as they do for those against whom they try to fan the flames of resentment.