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Legal issues surrounding Bailey's book
11 May 2003 Dear Sirs The Australian WOMAN Network is a lobby and health support group for women
who have experienced the transsexual condition, their families, friends and
supporters. We are the largest such group in this country and we have established
a high degree of credibility with Government and the legal and medical professions
with whom we work closely. We are represented on the Attorney-General's Ministerial
Advisory Committee and the Equal Opportunity Commission Reference group and
we are well known for our advocacy efforts on behalf of our membership. Our reason for writing to you is to express our deep concern that an academic
from your learned institution has published a book which has already been described
as a concerted effort to defame all people with the transsexual condition and,
by extension, the great majority of the transgender and gay communities as well.
We refer, of course, to the book by Prof J M Bailey, "The Man Who Would
Be Queen..." which has, very unfortunately, passed through the review processes
of the National Academies of Sciences and been published by the NAP. You may
read this at http://www.nap.edu/catalog/10530.html
and thereby avoid contributing to Prof Bailey's royalties. From the title, right through the dissertation on transsexualism, the material
presented by Prof Bailey is distressing and offensive to people who have experienced
the trauma of a phenotype which is opposite their brain sex. His description
of us in terms of "effeminate homosexual men" and "autogynaephilic
response" are crass and plainly unsupported by the overwhelming medical
evidence which he chose to ignore completely. The vehemence of his attack on
our condition and our motivation for rehabilitative surgery can only be described
as deeply distressing and, with little doubt, intended to belittle and hurt
us to the core. His work constitutes harassment and vilification of a highly
marginalised minority will create an even more hostile public environment with
which we will all have to contend. There is a disturbing lack of science in Prof Bailey's approach to his topic.
He has taken anecdotal evidence, collected in sleazy night spots in San Francisco
from a very small sample of two small subsets of the so-called "transgender"
population, transvestite prostitutes and effeminate gay drag queens, and has
applied characteristics supposedly evident in these to a much larger and altogether
different population comprising women of transsexual background. He has compared
men with psychological conditions which are placed amongst the paraphelias with
women who were born with a biological variation of sexual differentiation; an
intersexual condition in which the phenotypical sex is opposite the neurological
sex. He has completely ignored the last decade of medical research into the
transsexual condition and the anecdotal evidence of the tens of thousands of
us who have been assessed and treated over the last fifty years or more. In
fact, he accuses us of lying about our reality when we reject his skewed conclusions.
The joint statement by 17 international experts at the International Symposium
on Transsexualism hosted by the Gender Identity Research & Education Society
(UK), which was accepted by the UK Parliamentary Inquiry into Transsexualism,
gives further evidence on the neurological basis of transsexualism and can be
accessed at: http://www.gires.org.uk/Web_Page_Assets/frontframeset.htm
On this basis alone, Prof Bailey must surely be viewed as an embarrassment to
an otherwise highly reputable institution? We note that your University prides itself on its inclusionary attitude and
that you have a very well-publicised policy against sexual harassment at: http://www.northwestern.edu/sexual-harassment/policy/index.html
This policy defines sexual harassment, inter alia, as:
We also note the undertaking that: "This administration is committed not
only to broad-based educational efforts to address the issue of sexual assault
on campus but also to aggressively pursuing disciplinary action against those
who choose to violate the rights of others..." We respectfully submit that the Bailey book very seriously contravenes this
policy as is evidenced by the extent and ferocity of the responses being made
to it by highly distressed individuals around the world. Even more seriously,
however, Prof Bailey has chosen to assist in the marketing of his book by engaging
in a round of promotional seminars at which his misplaced humour (vitriol) is
causing even more concern, and has attempted to justify his stance by way of
a website hosted by your university: http://www.psych.nwu.edu/psych/people/faculty/bailey/controversy.htm.
You can gauge the reactions these latest efforts are receiving by reading the
report published by Prof Joan Roughgarden at: http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/JOAN-ROUGHGARDEN-LETTER.html
We suggest that a Department of Psychology should be interested not only in
the science and art of psychology, but also the mental/emotional well-being
of the community, both inside and outside the campus. Ungrounded, unscientific,
sensationalistic smearing of an already marginalized community is inconsistent
with this responsibility. Bailey's book is actually an act of sexual harassment
against our entire community. A copy of this letter has therefore been sent
to Ms Marcia Mahoney, Director of the Sex Harrassment Prevention Office at North-Western
U. Finally, we offer the view that the Northwestern University is vicariously
liable for both Prof Bailey's actions in publishing his book and the pain, suffering
and hurt to countless individuals flowing from that publication. In view of
its pecuniary advantage, the university will undoubtedly be joined in the litigation
which seems inevitable. Since the material is published not only in hard copy,
but is also published on the internet, those legal actions may be instituted
in legal jurisdictions other than the United States of America, such as Australia,
in defamation where the onus is on the "publisher" to demonstrate
that his material does not impugn or otherwise damage the reputation of a person
or class of persons; in tort for damages in negligence and nervous shock; and
in sex discrimination for harassment and (incitement of) vilification. Your
counsel and public relations officers are therefore also provided with copies
of this letter. We trust you will commence an immediate investigation into Professor Bailey's
publication and public statements and take appropriate action to mitigate the
harm they have engendered. Your advice in the matter will be much appreciated. Yours sincerely Kate Clarke Karen Gurney Marcia Mahoney at Northwestern replied on 12 May 2003:
Australian WOMAN Network responded that day:
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