North Carolina House Bill 2: Relax! No One Wants To Look At Your Junk.

As you're probably already aware, the North Carolina General Assembly recently passed House Bill 2. This is a state law which prohibits transgendered individuals from using the correct bathroom. Instead, such persons must use rest facilities which match the specific gender identified on their birth certificate. Obviously, this creates a dilemma for the transgendered community. More importantly, House Bill 2 is state-sponsored discrimination.

My take on this whole debacle isn't from the perspective of a transgendered person. I was born a male and I identify as male. I can't fully understand what it's like to be born with one set of physical sex organs, but feel like the opposite sex (or even somewhere in between) on the inside. Yet, I can certainly relate to the struggle that comes with being discriminated against. For that reason, I wholly support the right of a person to use the proper bathroom.

What bothers me most about House Bill 2 is that it attaches a stigma of perversity to a transgendered person. This is the same myth that was attached to homosexuality for years (and in many places, still is). You know, the old notion that the gays are perverts and want to molest little children. The gender you are has nothing to do with your sexual orientation, much less your propensity for sexual assault. A rapist will rape and a molester will molest -- heterosexual, homosexual or transgendered.

The law, at its core, is a statement made in total fear. Champions of the bill, including Governor Pat McCrory whom signed it into law, supposedly want to protect the safety of "normal" people from those whom might be different.

Protect them from what, though?

Without a shadow of a doubt, I know that I have shared a bathroom with a transgendered man. I won't relate personal details of a routine bathroom trip to you out of common decency, but you can imagine what using the toilet entails. And you know what? I survived just fine. This transgendered man didn't try to touch me, proposition me or even talk to me. They did their "business" and I did mine. Why? Because we were two human beings doing what human beings do. We were taking a crap -- a gross, disgusting and ultimately unarousing act that no one likes but everyone has to do.

There is absolutely nothing sexy about this.

That's the biggest point to take away from this nonsense. No one in the bathroom, transgendered or otherwise, is trying to look at your junk. People go to the bathroom to do their natural business. We're not in there to have raucous, unorthodox sex (gay or straight). You'll never catch me putting on a dress and a wig and trying to spy on women taking a dump in the ladies' room. I would wager a large some of money that you wouldn't either. So, why would you expect a transgendered person to do it? Is it because they're somehow different than you? Is it because they don't fit into your strict cultural expectations of gender? Is it because you fear what you don't understand?

Fear, my friends, is the problem here. Fear is the great divider. Fear makes some of us do silly things. Fear makes some of us hate. Fear makes some of us pass laws like House Bill 2.

I don't care if the person next to me taking a poo has a penis or not. I'm not so egotistical to think that a transgendered person has entered the bathroom solely to become turned on by taking a peak at my genitalia. I don't live in a bubble of fear, and neither should you. Odds are, you have already used the bathroom with a transgendered person and didn't even know it. Why? Because transgendered people are just like everybody else.

How Women Came Before Men... and Nipples Too!

After seeing some rather disturbing misinformation earlier in the day, I thought I'd quickly cover some scientific data in a very simplified manner. Specifically, I want to explain how women existed before men.

A classic television couple -- Ralph and Alice Kramden of 'The Honeymooners'.

To my friends, both scientific and brainy; I realize this explanation will be very basic. I don't want to delve too deep into the specifics of gender determination because it would go over most folks' heads. I'm 'dumbing it down' on purpose for the benefit of the layman. Bear with me.

When a fetus begins to develop in the womb, it starts out as a simple mass of cells. Over a number of weeks, these cells slowly start to form the basis of the human body. At some point around weeks six through eight, the sexual chromosomes of the fetus determine which sex it will become. Women, in terms of a chromosome pair, are identified by XX. Men are identified as XY. To be specific, the Y chromosome is the determining factor in the sex of the fetus. The presence of the Y chromosome is what makes a fetus grow into a male. The X chromosome has no power over this choice; only the Y chromosome will produce a male child. By default, all fetuses would become female if not for the presence of the Y chromosome. Both the X and the Y chromosome are allelic mutations from ancient autosomes in mammals. What's an autosome, you ask?

A diagram of all twenty-three human chromosome pairs.

An autosome is a chromosome pair that does not determine the sex of a creature. As humans, we have a total of twenty-three pairs of chromosomes. Twenty-two of those pairs are autosomes -- meaning they do not have any influence on the gender we develop into as a fetus. The final twenty-third chromosome pair that we possess DOES control our sexual development (it's known as an allosome).

After the fetus detects the presence of the Y chromosome , it grows into a male. It couldn't be any simpler. One reflection of this shared origin between males and females are our nipples. How many times have you heard someone ask in jest "Who do guys have nipples?"

The reason behind it is simple. Men and women both have nipples because all mammals develop this feature at an early stage as a fetus. All fetuses, whether eventually determined to be male or female, develop identically before the sex is selected. The presence of nipples is one of those non-sex based factors that develop. Due to how evolution has worked in mammals, the presence of nipples (or the lack thereof) has not been a trait which was turned "on or off" by natural selection (it simply wasn't "important" enough). By default (yet again), we all get nipples. 

So there you have it my friends. I can't make this explanation any simpler. When you first started to develop as a fetus (essentially a proto-female), you were by default going to be a girl. You grew nipples (at least I hope you did). Are you a man by chance? Then your allosome had a Y chromosome in it. Congratulations!

Any questions?

Misplaced Hysteria and Lena Dunham.

(The following blog contains mature language. Viewer discretion is advised.)

Let me get one point out of the way before I begin this article.

In my opinion, I find the twenty-eight year old writer and actress Lena Dunham to be wholly unpleasant. She oozes a persona wrought with selfishness. I liken her to an egotistical nitwit. Her immaturity is only surpassed by her narcissism. This is purely my own opinion and in no way a statement of actual fact. My opinion is based upon watching her in interviews, reading a handful of her essays and seeing a few episodes of her program "Girls". I'll never get back the time I wasted watching her show about utter nonsense, to which I regret. Being that I've never met her in person, I could be completely wrong in my assessment. Lena could actually be a heavenly joy.

Photo Credit - Parade

But I doubt it...

As you can plainly see, I have zero reasons to defend Dunham in spite of her recent turmoil. As the old saying goes, I have no dog in this fight.

The entirety of the internet is in an uproar over information contained in her recently published book  "Not That Kind of Girl". Within the book, Dunham recounts a humorous story where, at age seven, she became curious about her own female anatomy and asked her mother for more information. Soon after, while playing with her younger toddler sister, Lena looked at her sister's genitalia. Hilariously, Lena found that her sister had been putting rocks in her vagina while playing on the ground. The whole story is told with a humorous, over the top perspective that includes obvious comedic embellishment.

Leap forward to this week...

A right-wing conservative website, which I won't link to because they don't deserve even the paltry traffic I may provide them, has labeled Dunham a sexual predator. They published a scathing article, which claims Dunham molested her younger sister by looking at her anatomy. The hysteria prone peons of cyberspace ran wild with this story, in so much as totally damning Dunham to hell for her crimes against the flesh. Dunham has been forced to cancel book tour appearances and even wrote a tirade of anger and frustration in response. Yet, these vehement armchair activists seem to have completely forgotten the context of the situation.

Let's step back and think about this for a moment.

- Lena was a seven year old child curious about genitalia and her own body, just as all children are at that age.
- She did not force intercourse or any form of sexual activity on her sister.
- The entire situation (if you can call it that) was prefaced with a conversation between Lena and her mother.
- The now grown sister has made no allegations that Lena molested her.

When is the last time you heard of a child molester asking their mom or dad about genitalia before molesting someone? Go ahead, I'll let you search the internet for an answer. You won't find one... BECAUSE IT DOESN'T HAPPEN!

For you parents out there, surely you know how difficult it can be when your child finally becomes curious about their sexuality. How old was your child (or children) when they first asked about their private parts? Five? Six? SEVEN? All children wonder about their anatomy at a young age. Some are more shy than others, but all ponder the differences between the anatomies of males and females. While one child may be reserved and not explore the matter any further than their own mind, another child may seek out answers in the real world. Such behavior reflects the diversity present in humanity; we are all born with different personalities and levels of social exploration.

A young child being inquisitive about the human body and looking at it with curiosity is no more guilty of being a sexual predator than a mother nourishing her child by breast feeding. The original author of the scathing article against Lena failed to see the distinction between the curiosity of a child and sexual molestation. Did they have a personal motivation to slander Lena? Are they secretly fascinated by her? Do they just not like her television program? Who knows! The point is this...

Lena might be a pompous, self-absorbed narcissist... but she's not a child molester. This debacle is nothing more than misplaced internet hysteria. We've seen such nonsense time and time again. Had Lena repeatedly forced inappropriate touching and such upon her sister, then maybe these internet jabberjaws would have a point. At the very worst, I'd say she was a young child whom needed therapy (should that be the case, which it isn't). As it stands, though, Lena was just being a normal seven year old.

Internet... get over yourself.