Somehow, I don’t think we’ll be hearing any bellyaching from right wingers like Mike Huckabee and Tony Perkins about this judicial activist (from the Oklahoman):
An Oklahoma County judge is refusing to let men planning sex-change operations switch to feminine names.
District Judge Bill Graves has denied name changes in two such cases so far — last year and again in August. The judge ruled both times the requests were made for a fraudulent purpose. . .
Five other Oklahoma County judges who handle name change requests told The Oklahoman they routinely grant them in transgender cases.
Graves does not, for scientific reasons. He has concluded a person cannot really change his or her sex because the person’s DNA stays the same.
Predictably, Judge Graves also cites Genesis in support of his transphobia:
“To grant a name change in this case would be to assist that which is fraudulent,” Graves wrote. “It is notable that Genesis 1:27-28 states: ‘So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth …’ The DNA code shows God meant for them to stay male and female.”
Graves also makes it abundantly clear that in his courtroom, he intends to decide a person’s gender identity, rather than trusting their truth:
“You’ll give me publicity that maybe I don’t want,” Graves told The Oklahoman. “If you’re born male, you stay male, according to the study I’ve done on DNA. If you’re born female, you stay female.”
If this doesn’t meet the bar for “judicial activism,” I don’t know what would. Utterly reprehensible.
(h/t: LGBTQ Nation)
And if you have XXY chromosomes, you have no legal existence.
What if you want to change your name to Jamie or Pat?
Well, a judge who is legislating from the bench! Who could imagine it? AND one who quotes the Bible as a matter of law. No complaints from the Religious Right? AND HE did a study of DNA! What more could one ask from a right-wing, religiously influenced, judge (non-scientist though he be)? What matter is it to him that a trans-person, living as the opposite sex, wants a name change? It matters to him because he is biased and not ruling according to the law, but his own negative feelings toward trans people.
Also note how the person he went to for a medical opinion was apparently a buddy from his legislative career and a fellow Republican. Not an impartial stranger.
Good to see he knows better than the AMA and APA. I’m glad there’s such a qualified individual to obstruct these silly cases. Truly, this is the gatekeeper Oklahoman trans women need. I mean, really, there weren’t enough hoops to jump through yet without a 1/6 chance you’ll encounter an archaic zealot in your path who will waste your time, money and effort.
And while I’m at it, shame on The Oklahoman for going out of their way to publish the names of people he’s hurt. Hell, shame on them for all the language they’ve twisted here–’men planning sex changes’? Mmm, how quaint. Tastes decades old.
Can’t ostensible journalists put those sensationalist tricks down yet? It was completely unnecessary to call these individuals out by both their birth names and actual names.
And can they really justify saying that Graves denies them for ‘scientific reasons’? Really? How deluded does one have to be to say there’s anything ‘scientific’ about the way he has drawn his conclusions? I hope he gets more publicity for this than he knows to be afraid of, and I hope it ruins his career as it should.
“He wrote it also could let someone circumvent the state’s prohibitions against same-sex marriage.” Uh, if she does get a sex change, wouldn’t making her go by male identity mean she had to marry a woman? Didn’t we deal with that in Texas, with the district that allowed lesbian marriages because of that? They can’t even do the wrong thing right.
As for publishing the victims’ names – shame on the paper. The respectful thing to do would be to respect people’s identity (hint: she’s a woman, not a man) and privacy. Is it really more newsworthy now that she’s exposed to additional ridicule and harrassment? So much for the traditional journalist being more responsible than the amatuer blogger.
While our legal code has a basis in the Bible, it is secularized in many ways. I am no legal scholar, but this judge is giving a reasoning that will not hold up in a regular court of law. I have seen hard conservatives talk about the threat of Sharia law to America. Sharia law will not come to America under the star and crescent: It will come in a cross wrapped in the American flag with Freedom being crucified on it.
Oklahoma is the armpit of christianism. James Inhofe has been elected Senator from there more than once and this is Sally Kern’s stomping grounds as well (I meant that literally).
Christianist bigotry is alive and well there and its not OK.
Since we’re going by Biblical Law in America, I suppose rape victims will henceforth be forced to marry their attackers? (Deuteronomy 22:28-29)