Conservative teen says she'll fail high school if trans students receive equal treatment
By Unknown
http://www.gaystarnews.com/article/conservative-teen-says-shell-fail-high-school-trans-students-receive-equal-treatment/#gs.8BJvwXI
Gay Star News/By Ashlee Kelly 06/29/2017
A conservative Christian teenager in Pennsylvania has said she'll fail high school if trans students receive equal treatment.
Sigourney Coyle, from Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, spoke out against the prospect of trans students being able to use the changing room that matches with their gender identity in a meeting with East Penn state school officials.
In a video posted by her mother, Aryn Coyle, Sigourney said: 'You can't make a transgender change in front of someone they don't identify with. But if you put my name in there... you can't make me change in front of someone who I don't identify with who is physically male.
'Gym requires for us to participate to pass high school, and if I don't change I'm not allowed to participate. So my options are let myself be discriminated against, or fail gym for not participating and not pass through high school which would jeopardise my future.
. . .
In a post on Facebook in May saying 'The battle begins', Aryn said: 'I have always been an advocate of any special arrangement that prevents any group of people from being mistreated based on who they are. This includes non-Christians trapped in their own sin. But I will NOT stand by while the law dictates that male bodies are allowed to walk into my daughters locker room, undress next to her, and shower alongside of her.
'I will be proud of that failing grade in gym, and so would any Christian college.'
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Being a 21st century cast out leper gets depressing. I'm getting really sick of these people and their incessant hammering.
Stubborn people being unwilling to adapt and pursue available options when they have unreasonable requirements that exceed the protections available in law. She could:
Wear pull over dresses.
Take an alternate class that exempts for gym (marching band usually works, if you can't play an instrument, they'll give you a flag or baton or something) with no communal changing requirement.
pursue credit for gym via alternate methods.
participate in an extra curricular sport, you're "gym" will be outside class hours and unlikely to have the person you are avoiding participating in the same.
But no, she'd rather make a scene, and fail high school.
As far as jeopordizing her future? nah, if she's worthy of college, the SAT will show it; and academic grades will show it, and she'd be accepted HS diploma or not. I had friends that didn't even take their senior year, just applied and said, kthxbye. Some conservative christian colleges might even attempt to recruit, as its a good source to provoke conservative alumni donations.
It would surprise me if a transgender person would be allowed into a Christian college. Just sayin. Since Christians have such a firm handle on the Ten Commandments. They can't get that right how they expect people to understand all the other pages.
bah, I was too unclear.. again.
I'm talking about adaptations the conservative teen might make in order to easily get around her problem, instead of declaring to the world she was going to fail high school unless they do exactly as she wants them too.
The trans kid should have no reason to over react, law and policy are that the transgirl changes in the girl bathroom; if the transgirl is good with that, then she need but carry on.
Stating that someone else getting equal treatment has a negative impact on you? Wow. Life fail, never mind gym class.
The conservative mantra about not being able to discriminate is discrimination to them, is one of the oddest arguments you hear in modern logic.
To a degree, I agree with her: if I were cis*, (either sex), I wouldn't want someone with different private parts to be near me, let alone those parts to be visible to me.
I have bad memories of jr high and high school locker rooms and the showers, even though we were all "equipped" the same. Bad things happened outside the showers as well.
As far as not taking PE and not graduating...when I was in tenth grade, I told my counselor and the principal that I would not be taking gym any more, thankyouverymuch. They filled that time slot with other classes, but it started me realizing I wasn't getting much out of school anyway (10th grade I scored very high on the SAT, better than most seniors), so by 11th I dropped out.
Guess what? The only place that was a factor was with the USAF... I scored in the 98th percentile, and the recruiter said, "ah, if only you had a diploma...well, you're going to have to get your GED later" (which I did).
TL;DR
I agree, under-18 male bodies and female bodies should not undress or shower together.
imho
I hate to say it but there will never be a trans person walking around a change room letting it all out. Most of us are so ashamed or don't like our bodies that we try to cover them up as much as possible as it is. So this new "concern" that the conservatives have that they are gonna see trans women penis is complete bull ->-bleeped-<-. I say who cares let the dumb ass fail
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I only undressed in gym in front of the guys once and that was when was in junior high and trouble brewed when I developed breasts,in high school I was wavered from the locker room and was allowed to wear street clothes.
Ignorance to the fullest. Both her and her mother. She would fail her class because she wanted to and would be her own doing, not because of anyone else.
What makes this story quite honestly disgusting is her mother's remarks of being proud of her failing, as well as her backwards thinking.
Honestly, the locker rooms while I was in high school, were of course the communal showers and open space. But nobody ever used the showers unless it was the swim team, and they would keep their stuff on while they washed as it was. Most of anyone in the locker rooms ever normally in my school anyways had their physical education clothes up underneath their regular school clothes anyways.
Kate <3
Always remember to smile your face
Quote from: Katiepie on August 29, 2016, 06:14:09 PM
Ignorance to the fullest. Both her and her mother. She would fail her class because she wanted to and would be her own doing, not because of anyone else.
What makes this story quite honestly disgusting is her mother's remarks of being proud of her failing, as well as her backwards thinking.
Honestly, the locker rooms while I was in high school, were of course the communal showers and open space. But nobody ever used the showers unless it was the swim team, and they would keep their stuff on while they washed as it was. Most of anyone in the locker rooms ever normally in my school anyways had their physical education clothes up underneath their regular school clothes anyways.
Kate <3
Always remember to smile your face
Yeah i get the impression that people think locker rooms are straight out of the classic movie "Porky's" (if you haven't seen it don't, it's stupid). Naked people frolicking about and snapping towels at one another.
Communal showers seem to be getting rarer and rarer in most types of facilities. Many gyms and schools have shower stalls with curtains, because people asked for them.
Our private Gym has both and the communal ones are really only used for people rinsing off to and from the pool. I dress and undress in front of women 3-4 times a week and nobody has ever complained or raised the issue that my genitals are not like theirs. Indeed the amount of time they are exposed is like 10-15 seconds between towel and putting on my underwear
There should be no issues with letting a Trans person undress in front of others of their identified gender. The amount of time that you are actually exposed is minuscule. It's a straw argument based on indefensible culture war ridiculousness.
Quote from: RobynD on August 30, 2016, 12:35:44 PM
Yeah i get the impression that people think locker rooms are straight out of the classic movie "Porky's" (if you haven't seen it don't, it's stupid). Naked people frolicking about and snapping towels at one another.
That's exactly what the locker room was like for my high school football team.
My experience with women's changing rooms is that people's focus is on getting changed, not eyeballing anyone else's body or being inappropriate. I'm a little confused as to what this girl and her mother think is going to happen - seems to me they're sexualising a non-sexual situation just because nudity is involved. Any transgirl in question is just going to be concerned with getting changed as quickly as possible.
The girl could take an "adaptive P.E" course. There! The problem is solved. I was in one during my High School years. (I hated being in it. But, that is an entirely different story) There were two girls in the class. They were there due to "religious reasons". They weren't allowed to wear shorts, sweats, etc. So, they wore what they normally would: Very plain blouses and long denim skirts. They never went into the girl's locker rooms. If that can be done where I live. It can be done where this other girl lives.
Quote from: Deborah on August 29, 2016, 10:05:23 AM
Conservative teen says she'll fail high school if trans students receive equal treatment
Pathetic. Maybe she'll get results if she swears she'll hold her breath until she turns blue.
So let me get this straight...kiddo is going to cause herself grief with the hope that her silly sacrifice will allow her to reside in the intolerant cesspool of her political dogma? Oh honey...you are not really that big of a deal and you need every advantage you can get, like a solid education. That you are not able to share or play nicely in the sandbox is going to take a lot to overcome when you are in the real world.
Quote from: kaitylynn on August 30, 2016, 09:55:05 PMThat you are not able to share or play nicely in the sandbox is going to take a lot to overcome when you are in the real world.
That's so true; parents are missing a great teaching moment here, you don't have to like any particular person in order to be able to work and accomplish things with them around; but you do have to learn how to not waste your own energy over things that do not contribute to the task at hand.
Its sad, because you honestly don't get all that many of these real turning point moments to work with as a parent; the rest you just have to give a dumb lecture that gets forgotten by the next morning.
In general, this whole notion of "backing up your kids" (when they are acting like idiots) is just ridiculous. You need to back up the school's policy or the elected boards policy and make sure the kid can see why it is the way it is, and how to work around whatever problem they are having. If something needs changing, there are right ways of going about accomplishing that change for the cause of justice, and they need to learn what those are too. Argument in extremis, its just me against the US Marine Corp, and that just equals ... splat. lol
Her parents did not miss a teaching moment. They are using this to teach her their values. The facebook quote in the OP is from her mother.
Fair enough point. Sad though.
So let me get this straight. We're being accused of discrimination for being who we are, despite the fact the real discrimination is clearly those trying to force us to be who they think we should be based on their idiotic binary perceptions?
Got nothing against religion per se, but parents who raise children with such bigoted values should have their capabilities of parenthood evaluated. Anyone can read the bible but it takes a real nut to read the opposite of what it actually says: Love thy neighbor and all that.
Quote from: RobynD on August 30, 2016, 12:35:44 PM
Yeah i get the impression that people think locker rooms are straight out of the classic movie "Porky's" (if you haven't seen it don't, it's stupid). Naked people frolicking about and snapping towels at one another.
That happened when I went to a public pool when I was a child. Needless to say, I never went back.
Truly disgusting. Some of them are really really bad.
I never experienced such shenanigans/idiocy in locker rooms and i played sports (football, baseball mainly). We had some pretty tough PE teachers and coaches i suspect.
The reports i hear from our kids now is that locker rooms are pretty much a non-event in schools. 2/3 of the people don't even use them except to store their stuff and wait to get home to shower etc.
My gym locker room is pretty much like that too.
Lmao... she's from Leigh Valley! It's not like she was going to choose to finish HS anyway.
Not that it matters because they'll have plenty of coal mining and steel jobs now that Trump's president. I'm sure they will be glad to pay her below the minimum wage so her entitlement to compensation for work doesn't hurt the economy.
lol
Does anyone know how Sigourney Coyle's lawsuit turned out?
I'd guess that it was laughed out of court but I haven't found anything definite. The school board had seventeen people speak in the transgender girl's behalf. The board's meeting minutes just say that they obey the law (https://www.eastpennsd.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/SBM-9-12-16.pdf).
This case came to mind as there is a Pennsylvania boy how has filed a suit because he saw an FTM trans boy in the locker room. He believes that he suffered lifelong damage from the sight (LOL)
Bite thy tongue Jeanette and block another topic
:(
QuoteThis includes non-Christians trapped in their own sin.
This is an example of the bigotry religion all too often causes. If you're not one of them, you are a sinner. This even happens between different denominations in a religion, as I experienced as a kid.
QuoteNaked people frolicking about and snapping towels at one another.
Ummm... That actually happened back when I was in high school. We all used the change room and had to shower after gym class. There was often some joker who'd snap his towel at someone. One other thing I noticed was the girls didn't shower after their gym class and that was certainly noticeable in the following classes.
These days, I often go to a public pool. I am amazed to see so many guys feel they have to hide themselves, when getting changed. That certainly wasn't the way things were done when I was younger. I suspect this is a very unhealthy trend, where people are taught to be ashamed of their bodies.
QuoteThat's so true; parents are missing a great teaching moment here
Except both the parents and the school promote such bigotry in the name of religion. That girl, in that environment, is being encouraged to be a bigot.
Quote from: AnneK on March 23, 2017, 07:57:54 AM
Ummm... That actually happened back when I was in high school. We all used the change room and had to shower after gym class. There was often some joker who'd snap his towel at someone. One other thing I noticed was the girls didn't shower after their gym class and that was certainly noticeable in the following classes.
These days, I often go to a public pool. I am amazed to see so many guys feel they have to hide themselves, when getting changed. That certainly wasn't the way things were done when I was younger. I suspect this is a very unhealthy trend, where people are taught to be ashamed of their bodies.
I know that because of the fear of predators, many parents are, and have been, teaching that your privates (or even secondary parts of you) should be hidden at all times from others unless mom and dad say it is okay... eventually as the kid gets older you talk more about who you can share these parts with.... but it leaves you ingrained with the impression that your body is to be hidden....
Which is why I find it absurd that some parents I know tell these things to their daughter while wearing a VERY low-cut shirt and a mini skirt that barely covers them. They tell their daughters to hide their bodies while exposing everything... I have no problem with the outfit, wear what you want, but the hipocracy is frustrating.
In my gym class you changed and that was it. Showers were only used by the sports teams after practice. (while I was in JROTC I had many friends in regular gym and we shared experiences and talked about differences)
They said they all changed as fast as possible, one of my friends keeping her gym clothes under her reg until class and only fully changing after. My sister said the rule was look down and do it fast. lol
My mister said it was often similar in the boys locker room. No unders ever came off so genitals were never an issue. And a trans teen would easily be able to slip by by wearing a tank that they do not remove in the locker room.
Jesus wept.
Quote from: Patty_M on March 22, 2017, 11:21:42 PM
Does anyone know how Sigourney Coyle's lawsuit turned out?
I'd guess that it was laughed out of court but I haven't found anything definite. The school board had seventeen people speak in the transgender girl's behalf. The board's meeting minutes just say that they obey the law (https://www.eastpennsd.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/SBM-9-12-16.pdf).
This case came to mind as there is a Pennsylvania boy how has filed a suit because he saw an FTM trans boy in the locker room. He believes that he suffered lifelong damage from the sight (LOL)
"Lol" all you want(I bet you'd screech if someone laughed off the idea of "lifelong damage" for a transkid changing in the nurses office) but telling a kid to "get over" being told to change in front of someone of the opposite sex would be about as clear-cut Title IX violation as there is if we weren't currently stuck in Clown World. I mean even the rabid right wing(lol) New Yorker has been warning how this interpretation was going to cause problems with Title IX: http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/public-bathroom-regulations-could-create-a-title-ix-crisis
Thanks for posting the New Yorker piece; it cut to the chase. As much as I want a world where people (especially me!) can use the bathroom corresponding to their true gender, objections will have to be addressed in a way that wins support, rather than simply throws gasoline on the fire. I'm not always clear on how to accomplish that.
The only way to begin to address that is to have some accepted legal definition of what is transsexual. I understand that many in the community would resist such a thing though.
Conform and be dull. —James Frank Dobie, The Voice of the Coyote
Quote from: Deborah on March 26, 2017, 01:23:38 PM
The only way to begin to address that is to have some accepted legal definition of what is transsexual.
My state of residence, Maryland, has provided for access to "public accommodations" based on "core gender identity". That has been enough so far. Maybe the experience of states like Maryland that have accommodated the needs of transgendered citizens will over time erode resistance in states that haven't. Hope so.
Quote from: becky.rw on August 29, 2016, 10:24:58 AM
But no, she'd rather make a scene, and fail high school.
As far as jeopordizing her future? nah, if she's worthy of college, the SAT will show it; and academic grades will show it, and she'd be accepted HS diploma or not. I had friends that didn't even take their senior year, just applied and said, kthxbye. Some conservative christian colleges might even attempt to recruit, as its a good source to provoke conservative alumni donations.
The only place she could have a problem going, as far as college is concerned, is the ivy league. Their requirements and standards are so extreme that your average student isn't worthy in the eyes of the ivy's. So when she applies to say, Yale, and they deny her she will press a suit against them for discrimination of some form. Maybe her hair is too blonde, or her shoes are not heels, or her favorite movie is Pee-Wee's Big Adventure. This girl is the type that honestly (however pathetic that may be) believes, it's ok for her to discriminate against anyone she chooses for any reason she chooses, but when someone is within say a billion trillion light years of doing it to her, then it's the greatest injustice in the history of the universe. These people make me sick. We need to bring back the stocks for them, if only for a short (a few months should do) while.
Hell, bring the hole out of prison. That would be fine too.
Seem's this student has problems with prejudice. It seems to be a personal problem. How about the party of responsibility start taking some.
Quote from: AnneK on March 23, 2017, 07:57:54 AM
Ummm... That actually happened back when I was in high school. We all used the change room and had to shower after gym class. There was often some joker who'd snap his towel at someone. One other thing I noticed was the girls didn't shower after their gym class and that was certainly noticeable in the following classes.
These days, I often go to a public pool. I am amazed to see so many guys feel they have to hide themselves, when getting changed. That certainly wasn't the way things were done when I was younger. I suspect this is a very unhealthy trend, where people are taught to be ashamed of their bodies.
They gave you time to shower? My school barely gave us time to change. I was often late to my next class.
It's funny, I went in the girl's locker room at my high school all the time. It, as well as the boy's locker room, had a Coke machine and usually one was broken. We would ask if the PE teacher standing at the door if there were any changing before entering. The girls would not always do the same.
Failing gym isn't going to jeopardize her future, but using the men's locker room may jeopardize the other girls life.
It's because of stupid crap like this that I waited until I graduated high school before going full female. The locker rooms at my school were just for changing. And nobody like ran around naked. And no one ever even used the showers. They used the showers to store gym mats.