Teen with Aspergers convicted of transgender hate crime, he asked is that a boy or a girl.

One comment under the article: "But criminals get off scot free"

And I'm inclined to agree. We live in an age where burglaries and muggings aren't even investigated, the cps can't be arsed to even prosecute a high proportion of rape cases - rapes are happening in our school, at the rate of one per school day - but the CPS throw the full strength of the legal system into prosecuting an Apsergers lad for "hurt and embarrassment" to a PCSO.

"Are you a boy or a girl" - a common question that will be asked by children to gender non-conforming people - at what age are the CPS going to criminalise then in their new super-secret guidelines for schools?

Ugh

While I completely understand it must be awful to be misgendered, it can’t come as a complete surprise that some transpeople don’t ‘pass’

I said exactly the same.beforw and my comment got removed. Apparently, you're not allowed to say you basically might make a mistake.

@AnyOldSpartabix How long before Woman: Adult Human Female T-shirts and Women don’t have penises stickers are criminalised?

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/10/14/police-response-transphobic-stickers-branded-extraordinary/

Oxford police beat you to it.

Sorry - mistyped - including potentially a difficulty understanding and predicting the impact of one's words on another person.

One of the diagnostically essential features of autism is that a person must have difficulties in social interaction and communication. This would include social understanding, including, potentially, an understanding of the impact of one's words on another person and a need for clarity / dislike of ambiguity.
That this wasn't used in mitigation in this particular situation is amazing to me.

Goingoverground have you met anyone with ASD or Aspergers? Certainly the people I know with it either don’t care or don’t know much about social niceties like volume control.

So it is now a crime for a person with a learning disability to question someone's appearance if it is outside the norm.

I mean that really is totalitarianism in action isn't it?

I was called worse, just this morning, by a man who got off a bus as I had the temerity to be walking past him and not smiling.

I’m appalled by this and the CPS thread. Just. Fucking. Awful.

They are so making an example of him.

I think anyone who shouts at a police officer is very unwise tbh, but police officers in general are trained in resilience and de-escalation techniques.

And why was his Aspergers not mitigating?

And why do I feel like I'm living in an Authoritarian police state?

Don I understand those concerns, but in the style of local news it's not too hard to imagine the story another way. Sad face photo to start, a quote from the teen saying he just wasn't sure and meant no harm, stress the fact that he acts as a caret..,

I'm not sure about this one. The article doesn't say that perpetrator asked whether the PCSO was a girl or a boy, it says he twice shouted loudly, "Is it a boy or is it a girl?" after walking past the PCSO. As I read it, he isn't saying that he has Aspergers and didn't intend to be offensive, he is denying that he said anything all.

It’s bizarre to not be able to brush that off as a police auxiliary. I too have been called many worse things by pupils, most of whom don’t have Aspergers as a reason. If I worried about every snide comment I got I’d never get anything done. For goodness’ sake.

Just that. I don't have the words right now.

FRom Wales Online article:
concludes:
"Edward Marsh of the CPS said: “Comments deliberately targeting a person in this way have no place in modern society.

“The CPS takes any hate crime allegation extremely seriously and we will robustly prosecute cases that meet the code for crown prosecutors.”
www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/teen-prosecuted-after-asking-whether-17651755

current thread: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3804613-New-Year-New-Judicial-Review-CPS-Hate-Crime-Guidance-for-schools

and i often fantasise about an abusive man curfew

I love walking at night on a crisp cold winter night with the moon, or those long sift summer evenings. Wouldn't it be wonderful to be able to walk at night safely? Oh the freedom.

The point about the law donquixotedelamancha is that it's broad enough to cover just about any spoken or written word(s) or signs that someone says they're upset by. But that doesn't mean action will be taken by the Police and the CPS. Action is only taken if the Police and the CPS want to send a message. This means from the point of view of the public, this part of the law is arbitrary.

It doesn't even need to go to court and lead to a prosecution. The breadth of the law alone is enough of a threat and the Police can go knocking on doors or calling on the phone to tell people they've taken against that they need to be compliant or else.

I agree completely- it's bad law. I also think that the way the police and CPS are approaching these (unavoidable) areas of discresion has changed in recent years (though perhaps it was always so inconsistent, and just not reported).

I do think it's exacerpated by the hate crime guidance. I don't think a similarly rude comment would have got past a judge towards (as is often suggested) a female police officer.

But street harassment of women is, apparently, not a hate crime.

Street harassment of women would be within the breadth of this law. The point is that the Police and the CPS wouldn't be interested in acting.

What incredibly biased reporting- where's the outrage?

As has been pointed out on other threads:

Court reporters can get in a lot of shit for not making stuff like this very factual. National papers may have the resources to say what they think but the Birmingham mail will have little budget for arguing with IPSO and a reporter who drops them in it might easily lose thier job.

I don't think that's OK, but I do think the reporter gave all the relevant info, in clear terms, so the public can make up their minds- they best they could do really.

Things that have been shouted at me by random men while I've been walking down the street:

• Oi, I'd do you
• Hey, fatty bum bum
• Hey girl, you got a black arse. You want some black in your arse?
• Nice tits!
• Nice face, shame about the arse (and vice versa)

I'm sure there's more but they were largely variations on a theme. I wonder if plastic policeman Freel (plastic on the basis that PCSOs aren't real police offices) has spoken to some female colleagues and asked if they've had that kind of abuse and if so, if they felt upset and embarrassed?

Because I certainly did. I obviously didn't go to the police because I have been called a stupid slag (and worse) by police officers in the past so I'm pretty sure they don't give a shiny shit about misogynist abuse.

But being outed as trans by a kid with a learning disability is obviously terribly traumatic

Off topic, but putting 'woman adult human female t-shirt' into Google (cos I want one) landed me with this.
I think if I roll my eyes any harder they'll fall out. Think whoever designed this t-shirt needs a biology lesson.

Interesting point on the harassment women and girls receive. Most of which is far, far worse.

Also in Daily Mail

(extract)
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."

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7943147/Teenage-yob-ordered-pay-compensation-transgender-police-officer-abuse.html

I've got a teen with Aspergers, I've often worried that he'll say the wrong and get thumped, I never thought he'd be at risk of arrest!

The point about the law donquixotedelamancha is that it's broad enough to cover just about any spoken or written word(s) or signs that someone says they're upset by. But that doesn't mean action will be taken by the Police and the CPS. Action is only taken if the Police and the CPS want to send a message. This means from the point of view of the public, this part of the law is arbitrary.

It doesn't even need to go to court and lead to a prosecution. The breadth of the law alone is enough of a threat and the Police can go knocking on doors or calling on the phone to tell people they've taken against that they need to be compliant or else.

What incredibly biased reporting- where's the outrage?

cross post dolora

and i often fantasise about an abusive man curfew.