Yer disadvantaged, right?
But they just might possibly conceivably game the system.
Transgender applicants are being offered “ethically dubious” preferential access to a university, raising fears that fraudsters could game the system to get ahead of straight-A pupils.
Dundee University includes transgender status in its widening access policy, which lowers the admissions criteria for applicants who are deemed to be disadvantaged.
In the US it’s called affirmative action (and it’s highly contested and has been since it came into being decades ago).
Preferential access, widening access, affirmative action, whatever; why would trans people need it? What trans-specific barriers to higher education do they face?
Vikki Boliver, a sociology professor who sits on the Scottish government’s access delivery group, warned that fraudsters could “game the system” by pretending to be transgender.
Her team at Durham University found no link between gender identity and poor educational attainment.
Even if no fraudsters game the system, even if all trans applicants are sincere in their belief that they’re trans, on what basis do they need preferential access?
The idea of diversity does have solid points in its history, considering how legacies and just plain background racism and sexism meant that women, racial, and sexuality minorities have been excluded from opportunites and this needed to be corrected for society to function properly for all members. But much of it is now based on ideas that haven’t been studied to see if they have merit. D.E & I. evangelists have found a way to make money, and it doesn’t really matter if what they promote or teach is based on any true historical disparate impact, but now anyone who claims to feel excluded from access to opportunity is provided an avenue, even if it’s not really true. This goes beyond screening applicants, and I even saw a TedX Diversity talk from a woman who demanded that we allow her to feel “comfortable at work,” and wanted to be able to raise her sleeves so that she didn’t have to hide her tattoo while at the same time saying that this is not an invitation to comment on her tattoo.
Granting Transgender preferential access to applications for college is another example where squeaking loudly has gotten a population to be accepted as a “minority” and in a culture of fear of being called transphobic, there you go. “Sorry for the oppression, we’ll put you at the head of the line.”
I don’t think we need to split hairs about whether some fraudulent trans ID males will get an unfair advantage due to fraud, since the whole thing is fraudulent.
On what basis do they need preferential access? On the basis that they are the most oppressed, hated, beleaguered group ever, being murdered or committing suicide at alarming rates never before seen. It is known.
I suspect “my parents kicked me out because I’m trans”* is being taken as a standard situation requiring emergency measures of all kinds, including preferential admission to college in order to get them away from a toxic, unlivable family situation.
*(translation) “Yeah, Mom and Dad use my new name but don’t really truly believe I’m the gender I say I am so even though they keep telling me they love me I’m going no contact and couch-hopping from friend to friend.”
If someone genuinely hates their body and has the mental affliction to believe there’s a mind-body mismatch … I don’t know. I could see how the psychological distress of genuine dysphoria could impact someone’s grades.
But the problem is that society (the liberal side anyway) has decided that being “trans” is an actual thing. A gendered soul. That people with male bodies are actually female and people with female bodies are really male on the inside.
Which is all a bunch of hooey.
Yeah, this might be more a way for colleges to earn their merit badges rather than answering any real need. Or, the need being met is the college’s desire to improve their ranking with Stonewall.