The aggravating features
A transgender police community support officer was left feeling ‘upset and embarrassed’ after a teen yelled out:’ Is it a boy or is it a girl?’
Declan Armstrong, 19, saw PSCO Connor Freel when he was on duty in Mold, North Wales on October 16 last year.
When the officer looked over at him, he repeated the comment ‘very loudly’, Rhian Jackson, prosecuting, said.
Ms Jackson said: ‘Due to his transgender, when Connor heard Declan say what he said, it left him feeling upset and embarrassed.’
Armstrong was given a curfew requirement and ordered to pay £590 at Mold Magistrates’ Court today after he was found guilty of making the comments to PCSO Connor Freel following an earlier trial.
People shouldn’t yell taunts or insults at people in the street.
However.
£590???
I wonder how often men have to pay £590 for shouting insults and taunts at women in Mold, North Wales (or anywhere else).
Armstrong, of Victory Court, Mold, was convicted of a public order offence following a trial earlier this month but the court heard he still denied making the comments.
Gary Harvey, defending, said: ‘He doesn’t hold any prejudice against anyone in society.’
The court heard Armstrong, who acts as a carer for a man he considers his father, had been diagnosed with Asperger syndrome and suffered from anxiety and depression.
Sentencing, district judge Roger Lowe said the aggravating features of the case were that Mr Freel was performing a public service as a PCSO and the incident was in a busy town centre where other people could hear what was said.
He said the sentence had been uplifted from a low level to a medium level community order because of its transphobic nature.
Does that apply to misogynist taunts in the street? Racist taunts in the street? Xenophobic taunts in the street? Anti-Semitic taunts in the street? Anti-Muslim taunts in the street? Homophobic taunts in the street? Or is it just transphobia that results in a £590 fine?
Well isn’t that the point? The trans people *want* us to wonder about their gender, some of them just aren’t as convincing as others. The “upset and embarrassed” is on them, do a better job of being what you’re not.
That does seem a bit steep for a fine, but I suppose the intent to deter others from saying anything much and toe the line. I’m sure it’ll get weaponized soon enough by TRAs elsewhere too.
If this happened in the US, there would be a good 1st amendment law suit in the works by now.
For that price, the least they could do is answer his question.
A fine and… a curfew? So, a term of quasi-semi-confinement?
Yep.
And someone with Asperger’s yelling something at someone…if he really does have that condition, surely evidence was presented in court on that count. Targeting people with conditions that cause them to yell out things for yelling out things?
And when men yell things at women (or whistle, or grope, or upskirt photograph, or paw, or…ad infinitum), we are told to suck it up, it’s just boys being boys. Why isn’t this just boys being boys? Okay, I don’t like people yelling rude things at other people, but they have the right to be obnoxious, and if we take away that right, where does it stop?
I’m not sure people have the right to be obnoxious in the form of harassing people in public. I don’t think the yelling at a police community support officer was 100% ok, but I also don’t think it amounted to a crime (to put it mildly). I think the officer, or a different officer, could have had a word with the yeller. Possibly a ticket would be appropriate; possibly a warning. But this? It’s grotesque.
Very tangentially related:
Is there any truth to the story that surgeons are performing amputations on crazy people that think they ought not have particular limbs?
I’ve been fed this as justification for sexually mutilating people but it seems like the sort of thing no ethical surgeon would ever do
Notice also that Freel is referred to repeatedly in the article as “he”, “him”, and “Mr.”? I wonder how she feels about that, after making all that effort to be female (or didn’t really, if she’s being questioned in public)?
I think she should have shouted back “It’s a girl!!”, and been done with it. At least the people in earshot then would have been amused, I know I would have. She obviously wants someone else to pay the price for her own stupidity, such as PSCO is not an ideal career choice, or appearing androgynous in public. It’s apparently upsetting to her (but maybe not so), and yet somehow easily avoidable? Instead let’s punish the Asperger’s kid to “raise awareness.”
No Freel is a trans man, i.e. a woman who “identifies as” a man.
BK @ 9 – it is true, yes. I did a feature on it for The Philosophers’ Magazine years ago, back when I worked for them. There were then a very few surgeons who would do it, after a lot of vetting. It was controversial, to say the least. I don’t know if there still are, or if there are more (or fewer).
I’m so confused.
Now I think he should have shouted back “It’s a boy!”, that works, whatever.
It is indeed confusing. It’s almost as if that’s the plan!
Like playing Whac-A-Mole while reading Humpty Dumpty.
*Reading Humpty Dumpty’s dialogue in Through the Looking Glass is what I meant.
So, when I overhear someone wondering if I’m a man or a woman, I should sue instead of simply answering “Yes.” Righto.