LGBT News Twitter Explodes After Trans Subject of Golf Article Kills Herself

This is unbelievable

 

Adrian Chen was correct on Twitter that it was pretty fucked up. It was unprofessional and sexist to focus on the gender of Dr. V. The point was to write a god damned article about a putter.

What a shithead. I hope Caleb gets ruined professionally. Serious breach of ethics, my god!

 

How could anyone praise such a piece of work is beyond me. The point of the piece was supposed to be the product, and Hannan instead dived into Dr. V's personal life where he had no business going. Not only do his actions lack any sense of morality, he has the audacity to describe his story as "the tale of a troubled man", showing he understands absolutely nothing about trans* individuals at all. He obviously cared nothing for the feelings of Dr. V, the purpose of what the piece was supposed to be, and the ethics of invading another person's life.

It's utterly disgusting and I hope that his career is ruined because of it.

 

I'm still trying to get my head round why he thought readers of a sports blog would be more interested in this lady being transgender than the putter and it's development. Go right ahead if you want to query her credentials and qualifications, but unless he's trying to imply that transgender = lying I'm not seeing how that aspect is relevant, nor do I see why he considered it ethical to out her.

Unless he woke up one morning and thought he was working for TMZ.

 

pretty sad to read.i wish journalists were as ethical as they think every one else should be.

 

I think I am gonna be sick.

 

I hope the journalist is at least fired...dear god.

 

This article really pulls on my heart strings
Poor Dr V.

I hope the journalist is haunted by her death, and that righteous karma will be bestowed upon him.

 

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This story is so confusing and this kind of clarifies things a little.

1. She committed suicide BEFORE the article was even published. The article was just published this year while she committed suicide in October.
2. She previously attempted to commit suicide in 2008.

Knowing this can you really blame the journalist for her death? She committed before he published anything and tried to in the past. How is it his fault?

 

"Knowing this can you really blame the journalist for her death? She committed before he published anything and tried to in the past. How is it his fault?"

Because last time I checked he started writing it long before she killed herself, and while he was 'researching' it decided to start accusing her of this that and the other. You can't say he was the ONLY factor, but he damn well didn't help matters. Not to mention that it really doesn't matter if her suicide was his fault, the article should never have been made in the first place.

 

Letter from the editor of Grantland (where the article was originally published) regarding all this.

 

How can you say "assusing" her? Last time I checked she did LIE about her creditentials. The article should've been made because it was about a putter that is supposively better and the point of the article was to point out how easy it is to fake cedentials. Should the article have been published after her death?Maybe not. Who knows. Should the article have mentioned her gender idendity? Absolutely not! It's irrelivent. But to say that an emotional suicidal girl commiting suicide is his fault is super misleading.

 

" she did LIE about her creditentials"

Oh yeah, completely, and if he'd have focussed ONLY on on her fake credentials then we wouldn't be having this discussion.

So assuming you weren't out to anyone, and I decided to make an article calling you out on a genuine lie, but decided that actually a more interesting thing to do would be to out you to the world and say that it was a public service because it was just further proof that you don't have an honest bone in your body, how exactly would you go about telling me that any negative feelings you had afterwards weren't my fault?

Doesn't matter if she was miserable before, hell she could have tried to kill herself as many times as you like before, if this dude pushed her over the edge, it remains his fault...

 

She was STEALTH.
No one who worked with her or knew her knew that she was a trans woman.
This asshole THREATENED TO OUT HER TO THE WORLD and you're quibbling over whether or not he had anything to do with her suicide?

I can state categorically that if I was outed to the whole world, I would hang myself.

 

Uh not it doesn't "remain his fault". Lets say there's someone who is suicidal and hates their birthday and tries to commit suicide everytime someone wishes her a happy Birthday. Well this is Bob's first day on the job. He doesn't know that she's someone who needs physiological help. If he wishes her a happy birthday and that "pushes her over the edge" does that mean Bob should be blamed for her death? No?? I didn't think so...

This is one thing that annoys me about some people in the LGBT community. I'm tired of people like you who feel that because someone is LGBT they are automatically the victim and can do no wrong. That's a double standard and i'm tired of it.

 

STOP ARGUING WHETHER IT'S HIS FAULT. The point is he outed her to the world. So his fault or not, he's a fucking asshole. Period.

 

First of all... legit isn't a word Caleb, the hell, he should have been fired a LOOOONG time ago if he used that.
Second, does it matter whether or not she is trans? Outting someone who is living in stealth is a big no. With people accusing you, you don't have a great chance at explaining someone, maybe it was that she worked with an astro-physicist who the hell knows. This was handled very unprofessionally.
Whether or not she killed herself because of the article or not, there isn't exactly huge proof about the suicide, or the previous suicide.
However this is dealt with, I hope Caleb's reputation is permanently ruined in reporting as this should not have happened at all. He really had no reason to mention the LGBT aspect at all... sigh, the world is filled with idiots.

 

I don't see why we are arguing about who's fault this is. I'm sure that there were other things that contributed to her decision. That we will never know. We cannot pretend that we know that this is the reason that she did what she did.

As for the article, it was wrong on so many levels. He shouldn't have used that information that he found in the article. It's common when writing a personality profile to look at the history of the subject of the profile. As soon as he found out she was trans though, he should not have printed any of that info. If it were me in this case, I would've focused on her achievements in the golf industry, not on her gender. (Although, I would mention that she was a female working in the mostly male dominated profession of gold engineering. That would be all the more that I would mention about gender in that story.)

 

Actually, she was intersex, not trans, and she never considered herself trans.
http://www.azcentral.com/community/...or-suicide-website-essay-anne-vanderbilt.html

The situation is whole hell of a lot more complicated than anyone is giving it credit for.

I got to talk to Caleb for a while, and from what I can tell, he's genuinely sorry and is regretful that this story might be peoples' first experience with a trans (though she's not trans) person. He talked with me and was interested in learning more about the community. He listened and asked respectful questions, and was very understanding about my experiences that he read on my blog. I didn't talk to him to attack him, and I had complete trust in his intentions while talking to me. We had a conversation: human to human.

We forget after years of being involved in our respective communities what it is like to be uneducated about things. Personally, before I learned more about my own community, I didn't know transpeople by anything other than "trannies" because of the lack of education around me growing up. I know that Caleb didn't see what was coming. He made a mistake, we all make mistakes, and it's easy to not even know you're making a mistake until it's too late. If we want people to accept us, we can't let anger be the medium through which education is done because it will get us absolutely nowhere. We have to believe in people's intentions and educate in a way that they will be receptive. Putting out anger, no matter how rationalized that anger is, puts up a front and stops communication.

I'm telling you, he is a genuinely good person who made a mistake, and he is listening to us to understand and learn. I have rarely talked with someone, even people that consider themselves allies, who was so willing to listen and was so respectful and easy to talk to. We've all made mistakes, and you wouldn't want someone haunting you about your mistakes because when that happens, it doesn't allow people to grow, and doesn't allow change. Hoping for ill will, or wanting to punish those that inadvertently (or not) hurt us is not good for them, and not good for us. Forgive. Educate. Connect, and move forward towards more change.