Free Republic

The Jerusalem Rabbinate was forced this week to announce the nullification of a marriage it had performed, when it became clear that the groom was actually a transgender man, thus making the marriage invalid according to Jewish law. The saga began when the couple approached the Rabbinate to register for marriage. The Rabbinate saw that the woman was pregnant, and the man claimed the fetus was his child. […] However, two weeks later, the Rabbinate received information that the man married had not actually been born a man, and was previously a woman who had sex reassignment surgery in 2013....

Our pro-cross dressing President apparently doesn’t think people have DNA that makes them male or female. But he has just told an interviewer that white people and others have DNA that makes them racist and that American institutions are racist, too. These claims are described by our media as “bold” rather than bizarre racial slurs. CNN reported that Obama, during an appearance on a comedy show, said “the legacy of slavery, Jim Crow, discrimination” exists in institutions and casts “a long shadow and that’s still part of our DNA that’s passed on.” The host, comedian Marc Maron, has been a...

Here is how Father Mike Schmitz, a priest for the Diocese of Duluth, MN, explains society's acceptance of trans-gender. He breaks it down pretty well...

For the last few decades, our culture has warmly embraced moral relativism, where right and wrong are determined based on our feelings, and so there is nothing absolute. Morality is entirely relative, which means that you can have your morality and I can have mine. Today, we have moved from moral relativism to reality relativism, where not only morality but everything is determined by how I feel, so you can have your reality and I can have mine.This is not a matter of a dangerous descent down a slippery slope. This is a matter of falling off the cliff entirely....

CARSON CITY — State employees and covered family members will have health coverage for gender reassignment and other transgender procedures under a new insurance policy that takes effect July 1. The Public Employee Benefits Program board voted in November to remove language in the state’s self-funded and HMO plans that specifically excluded therapy for gender dysphoria. Brock Maylath, president of the advocacy group Transgender Allies Group, on Wednesday hailed the change as a “significant step” for the transgender community. Previous language in the state insurance design plan excluded treatment designed to alter physical characteristics and any other treatment related to...

For forty years as the University Distinguished Service Professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins Medical School—twenty-six of which were also spent as Psychiatrist in Chief of Johns Hopkins Hospital—I’ve been studying people who claim to be transgender. Over that time, I’ve watched the phenomenon change and expand in remarkable ways.A rare issue of a few men—both homosexual and heterosexual men, including some who sought sex-change surgery because they were erotically aroused by the thought or image of themselves as women—has spread to include women as well as men. Even young boys and girls have begun to present themselves as of...

The idea that one’s sex is a feeling, not a fact, has permeated our culture and is leaving casualties in its wake. Gender dysphoria should be treated with psychotherapy, not surgery. For forty years as the University Distinguished Service Professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins Medical School—twenty-six of which were also spent as Psychiatrist in Chief of Johns Hopkins Hospital—I’ve been studying people who claim to be transgender. Over that time, I’ve watched the phenomenon change and expand in remarkable ways. A rare issue of a few men—both homosexual and heterosexual men, including some who sought sex-change surgery because they...

... It is a transgender moment. President Obama was hailed just for saying the word “transgender” in his State of the Union speech this year, in a list of people who should not be discriminated against. They are characters in popular television shows. Bruce Jenner’s transition from male sex symbol to a comely female named Caitlyn has elevated her back to her public profile as a gold-medal decathlete at the 1976 Summer Olympics. With growing tolerance, the question is no longer whether gender reassignment is an option, but rather, how young should it begin. While no law prohibits minors from...

I do not for a moment want to minimize the very real struggles of those who identify as transgender nor do I want to ignore those individuals who have genuine biological or genetic abnormalities. I simply want to state once again – really, I want to shout it from the rooftops – that perception does not change reality, and so Bruce Jenner is no more a woman than Rachel Dolezal is black. In the last week, a steady stream of articles has drawn comparisons, both positive and negative, between Jenner and Dolezal, with not a few stating that Dolezal’s actions...

A few years ago, a colleague of mine asked me, “How do you know you’re a woman?” I had no idea how to answer her. I was enough of a feminist to know I couldn’t just list things like, “I’ve been called a girl since birth. I get a period. I like wearing lipstick.” But it also seemed disingenuous to say that I felt most like a woman when I was making tough decisions at work or lifting something heavy. Ultimately, I decided, I “just know” that I’m a woman. It’s no coincidence that the colleague who asked is transgender....

About 50 teachers and administrators of the Lebanon School District in Pennsylvania got paid time off to attend Islamic religious training. Teacher Lara Book called the day “amazing. Even though the rituals are different what came through loud and clear is that all religions want the same thing.” While the ACLU is normally “johnny-on-the-spot” to protest any show of religion in a public space, especially one where taxpayer resources may be unconstitutionally used to promulgate a faith, spokesman Betram Petty found no problem with this event. “The whole separation of church and state thing is a western way of thinking,”...

It was a perfect diversion during this, another pre-election campaign season. While ISIS continues to dominate the Middle East, Christians continue to be beheaded, Iran develops its nuclear bomb and secret trade Javelin 1976agreements are being pushed through Congress, all media attention is directed elsewhere. At the 1976 Summer Olympics, Bruce Jenner won a gold medal and broke an Olympic world record, scoring 8,634 points in the decathlon. He was more famous than Mohammed Ali! A good looking guy, he did it all! Twice married, once with the mother of the famous Kardashian sisters although they were sired prior to...

Here’s a real surprise…A man… bit cut up… beat the stuffing out of a woman.From Libertarian Republic (the video is brutal): Transgender MMA [c’mon… MALE] Fighter Destroys Female OpponentCritics are scrutinizing mixed martial arts (MMA) competitor Fallon Fox, after the transgender fighter gave her opponent a concussion and broke her eye socket.Fox defeated her opponent, Tamikka Brents, by TKO at 2:17 of the first round of their match. Brent’s eye injury resulted in a damaged orbital bone that required seven staples.In a post-fight interview this week, Brents told Whoa TV, “I’ve never felt so overpowered ever in my life.”  [That’s...

A black transgender assistant professor at Cornell just got $30,000 from the government to write a book about the history of “black transness” in America. [Snip] Snorton said he plans to put his fellowship money to good use answering important questions about “the relation between how we think about blackness and something we would call transness … a kind of open-ended, non-normative gender articulation,” he told the Chronicle. “What do these stories of gender revelation and gender transformation (in the Schomburg archives) tell us about the politics of integration and our understanding of the period, referred to as the long...

The federal government is strongly urging employers to give transgender employees access to bathrooms that correspond to their gender identity, marking a new policy front in the fast-moving campaign for transgender equality. In a four-page Guide to Restroom Access for Transgender Workers, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration advises employers on “Best Practices” concerning restroom access for these employees: “… It is essential for employees to be able to work in a manner consistent with how they live the rest of their daily lives, based on their gender identity,” the guide says. “Restricting employees to using only restrooms that are...

It’s official — Caitlyn Jenner can now use the ladies’ room. The US Department of Labor has issued guidelines to private businesses that say transgender employees should be allowed to decide for themselves whether to use the men’s or ladies’ room. “The core belief underlying these policies is that all employees should be permitted to use the facilities that correspond with their gender identity,” according to OSHA guidelines released by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration of the Labor Department. The National Center for Transgender Equality had requested the guidance.

When Caitlyn Jenner, formerly known as Bruce Jenner, unveiled her new name, appearance and TV show last week, it shined a light on transgender Americans. But much about the community, such as its size, remains opaque.The main reason is that the United States Census Bureau and other keepers of official records do not ask about gender identity. Also, gender identity can be fluid and hard to define in a multiple-choice list. There are now more than 50 gender options on Facebook, for instance.Some researchers are also concerned that the number is undercounted because of a reluctance among some transgender people...

Always forward! Not resting on its gay-marriage laurels, and while still celebrating the bravery of a man in drag, the house organ of crazy modern “liberalism” now stamps its high-heeled combat boots...[snip]...Let’s face it: we’ve wandered into the realm of barking insanity at this point, as the Left tries to linguistically (and thus politically) redefine the most elemental aspect of our physical nature. All part of Critical Theory: attack everything and anything. And with America’s defenders now running away even faster than the Iraqi Army, who is left to stop them?

A transgender woman said Tempe Tavern in Tempe, Ariz., refused to serve her Saturday. The woman said she walked into the bar to get a soda and instead was kicked out. “All I wanted to do was see a horse race and have a drink,” Briana Sandy said. But Sandy said she didn’t expect what happened. “‘I can’t serve you any drinks,’ and I go, ‘What? What’s the problem?’ And she goes, ‘We don’t serve your kind,’ and I’m like, I didn’t just hear that. And then all of a sudden, this guy, who was I guess the bouncer, walked...

Lindsey Graham says he'd welcome Caitlyn Jenner as a political ally. He'd work with Democrats on entitlement reforms. And he'd lower climate-harming emissions to address global warming. As long as you agree there's "too much debt, too many terrorists," the South Carolina senator and 2016 presidential contender says there's room in his Republican Party for you. "Here's what I would say to the talk show hosts: In the eyes of radical Islam, they hate you as much as they hate Caitlyn Jenner," Graham said. "They hate us all because we won't agree to their view of religion. So America, we...