3.28.2008

Define Gender...and then Define Sexual Harrassment

The news is just too compelling today...

First I got so pissed off reading about yet another Texas Airport Security related scandal, I was ready to drive there and picket...even though the drive would take twenty hours...I would not under any circumstances fly into or out of Texas...

But more on that rant in a second...

Because I was so awed by this story:

Thomas and Nancy Beatty are having a baby, although Nancy isn't pregnant, Thomas is. His announcement was released in Advocate magazine in the form of an essay written by him. He explained (no quotes folks...just me relaying the story) that he was once a she and although she had breast surgery and hormone therapy, opted to not have her reproductive organs removed, and has been living as a male. His impending maternity/paternity leave challenges our notions of gender roles and societal norms, since Thomas is legally both male and married to Nancy.


I'm certain that making the decision to have a baby was a hard decision once it was realized that both Thomas and Nancy wanted a child and faced with the fact that Nancy cannot have children. But then perhaps it was the easiest, most natural decision in the world...at least for the couple...the ones shaking their heads will be the ones who didn't understand his decision to become a man in the first place and I applaud his bravery for being who he is and doing what he needs to do to live his life authentically.


Now, back to my rant about Airport Security...
When is too far really too far...and are women targeted more than men?

For me, I've opted to drive the last few years because of my own brush with security a few years ago when I felt unduly harassed and singled out after being patted down more than once at more than one airport (two layovers), including having a security officer run his hands ankle to my thighs...my big mistake...or so I though at the time, wearing a long skirt and I decided then and there it was jeans for me from then on...but as I already mentioned...have since just rented cars. It's so much easier...

My concern is that women always seem the target for unfair treatment...
It wasn't a man who recently died in Phoenix...
And now nipple rings are dangerous?

Yes, it appears so...because Mandi Hamlin was forced to remove her nipple piercings with a pair of pliers while male airport security snickered and laughed at her embarrassment and pain.

Unbelievable.

Even more unbelievable, she was allowed to board while still wearing her belly-button piercing. Is that a contradiction? And at what point are we able to say enough is enough?

Increased security was supposed to keep out terrorists...right? Are we really keeping out terrorists? Or maybe it's just Texas has the real issue of identifying who the real trouble makers are, seemingly especially if they are men. On June 26th a man was allowed to board even though a man with a Middle Eastern name and a ticket for a Delta Airlines flight to Atlanta shook his head when screeners asked if he had a laptop computer in his baggage after an X-ray machine operator detected a laptop. A search ensued revealing a clock with a 9-volt battery taped to it and a copy of the Quran. A screener examined the man's shoes and determined that the "entire soles of both shoes were gutted out." He was cleared to travel even though all of the making s for a bomb was present except the explosive material.

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