Dear Abby, Transvestites, and California

[BlueStarLizzard]

Being an internet bully doesn't change any hearts or minds, nor does it advance the discussion in any profitable manner.

It might even make folks think you are stupid or a tool 

Those of us who know you, know that isn't the case, but casual readers who don't agree with you...

 

Refusing to engage in the pointless fight and attepting to head it off before it begins is not being a bully. It's being tactical.

Maybe I should have added an emoticon. But we don't have a really good one to express "I will laugh my butt off at persons who decides to get a stick up the pekgo (sp?) over something that just is."

[Tuco]

This seems to be a good time to ask...
How would you feel if your employer allowed women to wear skirts in a professional setting, minimal customer interface, and disallowed kilts for men?
Is it the same thing?
  

Talk amongst yerselfs.
I've got to be to a soccer game in Cedar Springs in 90 minutes, and hope to pick up a sack of fresh apples on the way.

[BlueStarLizzard]

This seems to be a good time to ask...
How would you feel if your employer allowed women to wear skirts in a professional setting, minimal customer interface, and disallowed kilts for men?
Is it the same thing?
  

Talk amongst yerselfs.
I've got to be to a soccer game in Cedar Springs in 90 minutes, and hope to pick up a sack of fresh apples on the way.

That would be very wrong, and even dumber if they made a gender related reasoning like "men in skirts is bad" since kilts are masculine attire.

[Jamisjockey]

This seems to be a good time to ask...
How would you feel if your employer allowed women to wear skirts in a professional setting, minimal customer interface, and disallowed kilts for men?
Is it the same thing?
 

Talk amongst yerselfs.
I've got to be to a soccer game in Cedar Springs in 90 minutes, and hope to pick up a sack of fresh apples on the way.

Employer rights.  Don't like it? Go work elsewhere.

[seeker_two]

Employer rights.  Don't like it? Go work elsewhere.

Pretty much says it all. If the employer is OK with it, the customer gets to choose with his/her patronage, too. Gov't needs to keep out of the process.

....and I'll support BSL's right to dress up as a woman anytime BSL wants....

[lupinus]

Dress code meaning he's got all the pertinate parts covered. Beyond that a "dress code" is what the employer makes of it, and this law mearly prevents him from telling a person with male sex orgins that they HAVE to present themselves as male, or firing them for being who they are.

Because THAT is what this law is about. Gender idenity is an induvidual "choice" (choice is in quotations as much of gender ideinty is not based on what you choose to be but what you are. The law mearly allows a person to have the freedom to accept it)* and should not be dictated by society. And part of gender idenity is DRESSING AS THE GENDER TO WHICH YOU IDENTIFY.

* go ahead, everyone with an issue with that, and try to pick a fight with me on it. I am not defending what is fact, so you can argue over it till your blue in the face. All it will do is make you look stupid and me think you are a tool.

If an employer wants his employees with dangly bits to follow the male dress code he has every right to do so. If he wants his employees with a vagina to follow the female dress code, he has every right to. If he wants to have a cross dressing themed eatery and have his employees swap outfits he has every right to do so. If he wants a gender neutral attire, every right to do so. In short, on the clock, you dress and act like the boss says you dress or seek employment elsewhere.

How a person chooses to dress and identify themselves on their own time, is their right/issue/problem/choice/whatever the hell you want to call it. While on company time if the employer doesn't want his male employees walking around in wigs and female make up he has every right to tell them them not to. He just as much right to do this as he has every right to tell them to put on a tie or a suit or any other piece of clothing that will be the dress code. Just as much right to do this as he does to have them cover up an offensive tattoo, remove a piercing, or not show up with multi colored hair in an 8 inch spiked mohawk.

And if you want to consider me a "tool" for respecting the rights of a business owner to set their own dress codes and have their employees dress and act in a fashion that they feel wont offend their customers, then by all means consider me a *expletive deleted* tool. How a person chooses to identify themselves is their own damn problem.

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

Don't sit on your high horse an tell me that the business owners have no choice in who they hire and that the .gov can force them to hire anyone. Real life doesn't work like that.


do share your experience(s?) with hiring and governmental regulation thereof.    in particular in a place like the land of granola.

[charby]

The great thing about living in the US is one can fly their freak flag anyway they want to. I may not agree with your choice of clothing or lifestyle but I'm not going to tell someone they can't do it.

[Monkeyleg]

I'm not going to bother arguing any longer, as I've said what I wanted to say.

The business owners have lost innumerable rights thanks to do-gooders, from smoking bans to EPA regs to minimum wage, OSHA, and more. Ultimately, though, the business owner has one right left, which is to close his business and eliminate the regulations by eliminating the jobs. That's something we've seen quite a bit in the last few years.

[charby]

I'm not sure if the restaurant has a uniform or not, uniforms are way for an employer to enforce a dress code.

[White Horseradish]

Something occurred to me - does this supposed law actually exist? Or are we just trusting the word of the noted legal expert Dear Abby, Esq. ?

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

in calif?
http://www.calaborlaw.com/2010/01/08/discrimination-laws-in-california/

[lupinus]

I'm not sure if the restaurant has a uniform or not, uniforms are way for an employer to enforce a dress code.

True, but even if there isn't an actual uniform there can still be a dress code.

[Monkeyleg]

Wear the uniform, but with a wig and makeup.

[Tallpine]

I'm not sure if the restaurant has a uniform or not, uniforms are way for an employer to enforce a dress code.

I wonder if I could get a job as a server at a Tilted Kilt in Califreakia if I wear the uniform

 

 

[MicroBalrog]

1. Businesses should have the right - indeed, they have the right, the state is just violating it - to discriminate.

2. Gender identity/transsexuality isn't a sexual issue per se. There's nothing sexually explicit about transsexuals or transvestites.

3. Teen pregnancy rates are at a 70-year low. Monkeyleg? This means teen pregnancy rates are lower than they were when you were young, unless you're far, far older than you let on.

[grampster]

Well I'm going to post this now, without reading the entire thread, just because I don't want to forget.

If California requires me to let my employee dress like that, then I suppose they wouldn't have any problem with me having the employee wear a large sign around his/her neck, front and back that says this: "Please Come Back And Enjoy Our Hallowe'en Specials".

I'll now go back and read the rest of the thread.

Oh, now that I have read the rest of your maunderings here is a PS:  There is more than one way for an oppressive government to "nationalize" commerce; regulate it up the wazoo until the business person is no longer able to run a productive business.  I think it would be reasonable for a restaurant owner who is required to let his employees dress in a disgusting fashion or in a way that does not foster an atmosphere that is conducive to a successful business, to be able to sue the government for a "taking" when government regulations causes the owner to close its doors because no one wants to come there anymore to be confronted with morons who display themselves in such a fashion as to chase off the paying clients.  Some of you younger people have been fairly well corrupted by how low we have reached as a culture in the interest of "tolerance" and "acceptance".

[Perd Hapley]

Gender idenity is an induvidual "choice" (choice is in quotations as much of gender ideinty is not based on what you choose to be but what you are. The law mearly allows a person to have the freedom to accept it)* and should not be dictated by society. And part of gender idenity is DRESSING AS THE GENDER TO WHICH YOU IDENTIFY.

* go ahead, everyone with an issue with that, and try to pick a fight with me on it. I am not defending what is fact, so you can argue over it till your blue in the face. All it will do is make you look stupid and me think you are a tool.

"Gender identity"? This is a fact, now?

[lupinus]

1. Businesses should have the right - indeed, they have the right, the state is just violating it - to discriminate.

Exactly.

2. Gender identity/transsexuality isn't a sexual issue per se. There's nothing sexually explicit about transsexuals or transvestites.

While this is true, the topics are at the very least related. Wearing a collar and being led around on a leash isn't necessarily sexual either, doesn't mean my 11 year old necessarily needs to know what a submissive is.

3. Teen pregnancy rates are at a 70-year low. Monkeyleg? This means teen pregnancy rates are lower than they were when you were young, unless you're far, far older than you let on.

Key terminology there. BIRTHRATE is what the article states, not pregnancy. While birthrates may be on at a 70 year low, in the same time period, the rate of abortions (granted, this peeked about 1990 and has since floated around in a slight general decline) and contraception have greatly increased. While the rate of pre-18 marriages have also greatly reduced. Birthrate, and pregnancy in general, has very little to do with teenage sexualization and especially promiscuity.

[brimic]

1. Businesses should have the right - indeed, they have the right, the state is just violating it - to discriminate.

2. Gender identity/transsexuality isn't a sexual issue per se. There's nothing sexually explicit about transsexuals or transvestites.

Agree on both counts.

I think Dear Abby was right, but for the wrong reasons- her smarmy way of answering the question muddies up the issue.

An employer does and or/should regardless of state, be able to dictate dress/appearance codes to employees. If they allow crossdressing, so be it, if you don't like it, tell the manager why you don't like it and leave.

[Perd Hapley]

An employer does and or/should regardless of state, be able to dictate dress/appearance codes to employees. If they allow crossdressing, so be it, if you don't like it, tell the manager why you don't like it and leave.

This I could agree with.

[Hawkmoon]

in calif?
http://www.calaborlaw.com/2010/01/08/discrimination-laws-in-california/

Okay. And from the opening paragraph of that link:

Both Federal and California laws prohibit discrimination in the workplace based on an employee’s “protected characteristics”. Under California’s broad, pro-employee laws (perhaps the best in the US), “protected characteristics” mean: “race, religious creed, color, national origin, ancestry, physical disability, mental disability, medical condition, marital status, sex, age, or sexual orientation”.

My understanding is that a male transvestite still identifies sexually as a male, but wears female clothes. So sexual orientation is not at issue. I don't see "wears opposite sex clothing" as among the protected classes under California's "perhaps the best in the US" classes of personhood. Ergo, I would surmise that Dear Abby (Esq.) blew it.

What a surprise.

[Tallpine]

Okay. And from the opening paragraph of that link:

Both Federal and California laws prohibit discrimination in the workplace based on an employee’s “protected characteristics”. Under California’s broad, pro-employee laws (perhaps the best in the US), “protected characteristics” mean: “race, religious creed, color, national origin, ancestry, physical disability, mental disability, medical condition, marital status, sex, age, or sexual orientation”.

My understanding is that a male transvestite still identifies sexually as a male, but wears female clothes. So sexual orientation is not at issue. I don't see "wears opposite sex clothing" as among the protected classes under California's "perhaps the best in the US" classes of personhood. Ergo, I would surmise that Dear Abby (Esq.) blew it.

What a surprise.

Maybe it is included under "mental disability"   

[Monkeyleg]

MicroBalrog, I mentioned out of wedlock (what we used to call "illegitimate") birth rates, not teen pregnancy rates. The illegitimacy rate for whites in 1965 was 3.1% of all births, and 24% for blacks. By 1990 those numbers had reached 18% of all births for whites being "illegitimate" and 64% for blacks. By 2011, the number was 29% for whites and 73% for blacks.

I'm not saying that transvestites or transgender-whatever's cause out of wedlock births. I'm just saying that our culture has changed in many respects sexually, and not necessarily in a positive way, contrary to Dear Abby's Pollyana-ish views on kids "growing up faster".

[Nick1911]

I'm not going to bother arguing any longer, as I've said what I wanted to say.

The business owners have lost innumerable rights thanks to do-gooders, from smoking bans to EPA regs to minimum wage, OSHA, and more. Ultimately, though, the business owner has one right left, which is to close his business and eliminate the regulations by eliminating the jobs. That's something we've seen quite a bit in the last few years.

Dude.

Smoke causes cancer, full time at minumum wage is still below poverty, I've read the OSHA code book - It's not a draconian, impossible to follow law; it's simple specs to keep people safe in different occupational situations.

I'm the next generation; I'm oddly okay with living in a world where there are PELs on toxic airbone pollutants [including smoke], lung cancer rates are in decline, drop offs of more then 4 feet have to have guardrails and employers have to pay a whopping gross of $1160 a month.