When the Gender Confused Go to Prison

A murderer wants Californians to pay for his self-mutilation so he can be more effective in his make-believe role of being a woman and be transferred to a women's prison. He's not the only one. Jack Dolan has the story in the Los Angles Times, which insists on calling the man a woman.

Stevens, 42, and her expert witnesses say that surgery is medically necessary, and that removal of her penis and testicles and transfer to a women's prison are the best way to protect her from rape and abuse by male inmates.

Well, of course. If you're in a women's prison there is no chance of male inmates raping you – unless of course it is another male pretending to be a female. Expert witnesses are interesting in cases like this. I remember many "expert witnesses" that supported "recovered memories" of abuse that turned out to be bogus. Most abuse victim wish they could forget.

California law requires prison administrators to assign the state's nearly 162,000 inmates to men's or women's institutions based on "gender," which officials determine solely by a prisoner's genitals.

Maybe they should ask if they prefer watching "The Bachelor" or mixed martial arts?

While confronting complaints and lawsuits by transgender inmates challenging their housing assignments during the mid-2000s, the California prison system commissioned a study by UC Irvine sociologists to help them understand the small, uniquely vulnerable population. The study found that 59% of transgender inmates said they had been raped or otherwise sexually assaulted behind bars, compared with 4.4% of the general prison population, lead researcher Valerie Jenness told the state Senate Public Safety Committee.

Despite those numbers, 59% of transgender inmates said they did not want to move to a women's institution.

What if other inmates claim that some other physical trait makes them a target? Should the taxpayer have to pay for their plastic surgery?

The Los Angeles Times was the newspaper that enthusiastically supported a troubled sports writer they had on staff as he decided he wanted to pretend to be a woman. Despite the high-profile support, he ended up dropping that pretense (not uncommon), at least in part. Then, tragically, he killed himself. Maybe if his employer, which is involved in gender confusion advocacy, had insisted he get real psychological treatment, rather than reinforcing his self-destruction, he would still be alive. But did they even have that choice under California law?

As far as the prison system goes, it sounds like there are enough of these cases that perhaps they should have their own prison. And here's idea... how about, if you're taking hormones for this sort of things, you take extra special care to not commit crimes?