An Oregon judge has allowed a 52-year-oled retired Army tank mechanic to change gender identity. Not from male to female, or vice versa. But to a new, third gender.
Jamie Shupe is now legally non-binary — widely believed to be a first for the United States.
Oregon joins several countries in recognizing a third gender. In 2014, India became the largest country in the world to have an official third option, following in the footsteps of Pakistan, Australia and Germany.
Shupe was born male, got married and had a child.
"I was in a deep, dark depression because I had boxed myself into this male identity that I couldn't stand anymore," Shupe says.
Three years ago, Shupe decided enough is enough.
"I told family members, we either let me out of this box or I'm shooting myself in the head. Things really got that bad," Shupe recalls.
Shupe is no longer legally male or female and prefers the pronoun "they."
So they left the military, moved into a cabin near Deep Creek Lake, Md., transitioned by taking hormones and grew breasts.
But Shupe still didn't feel fully female.
"Nobody can accept this thing ... 'you can't be female and have a penis,' " Shupe says. "That just makes people's heads explode. And that was another reason why I wanted out of this female classification because I have no intention of removing my genitals."
Three years ago, Shupe and their wife of 29 years, Sandy, moved to Portland, Ore.
The transition and the gender changes have been tough, Sandy says, but they still love each other.
"What if your spouse was in an accident and they were totally, they were, like disfigured? Would you still not love that person, just because of what they look like on the outside?" Sandy Shupe says. "That's my take on it. Jamie's still the same."
Sandy says her spouse is more pleasant to be around now, especially since they moved west.
Jamie Shupe tears up with gratitude when talking about the move.
"All you have to do is go on the Human Rights Campaign website and look up transgender and LGBT protection laws and the West Coast just lights up the map for protections," Shupe says.
But that didn't stop them from pushing for more.
A few months ago, Shupe applied to the Oregon Department of Motor Vehicles to be listed as non-binary. The agency refused, so they asked a Multnomah County judge for the new gender designation, and won.
As of now, the state isn't fighting the decision, says DMV spokesman David House. Instead, he says, the agency is looking into how to comply.
"We expect there would be a computer system change required, probably form changes. Also it's very likely that it would require some legislative and administrative rule changes," House says.
He expects that in a few months, Oregon driver's license applications will have new gender designations, in addition to male and female.
"Is it a third box? Or will it require multiple boxes?" House says. "We just don't know the answer to those questions; we're going to need to study that."
But just having this change is a move in the right direction, says Nancy Haque, co-executive director of Basic Rights Oregon, an LGBTQ advocacy group. She says while there are 50 ways to identify gender on Facebook, a third box is probably enough for now.
"I don't think anybody's asking the DMV or any other big institution to have 50 boxes," Haque says.
Jamie Shupe doesn't care whether there are 50 boxes or three; they say they're just thrilled to have broken such a long-standing, monolithic barrier.
"Most of the excitement is feeling the freedom of being set free of this classification system that I do not agree with," Shupe says.
Having a third gender on an Oregon driver's license is one thing. But people still have to choose male or female when booking a flight and when applying for a passport or health insurance.
>>6408650
Go for them or whatever I guess. More power to them, etc. My question is...\
why do all the nutjobs always seem to end up in Oregon?
It would be oregon.
>>6408794
Birds of a feather flock together. All the weird people live in Oregon, so Oregon has lots of weird people, so weird people who want to be comfortable and live around other weird people move to Oregon, further increasing the number of weird people in Oregon and thereby attracting even more weird people to move to Oregon. It's how communities work.
>>6408650
Cool, good for them. This reminds me, a survey thing I had to fill out for my job this week had male, female, and other as options for gender. Kinda nice to see stuff like this becoming more common.
>>6408650
It's amazing how rapidly this culture is getting crazier and crazier. This moron is not male because, get this, he SAYS he's something else.
>>6408895
The fuck's it matter to you?
>>6408902
I don't give a shit about what this delusional moron does, he could claim that his gender is attack helicopter for all I care. But it's kind of scary seeing that these days there are people braindead enough to go along with this nonsense.
>>6408895
What if the craziness is just us as a species sensing a massive shift incoming and we are collectively finding ways so that the ease into that shift won't be so hard on us.
If you brought a person from the Stone Age into 2016 he would likely consider himself in some dream walk.
But if you brought a farmer from the 1800s into 2016, he would most likely go crazy and mind break.
So maybe instead of thinking in terms of degeneracy something is calling to us from the future and the most persuadable are picking it up easier leading the way for a change in us so we won't mind break when it comes.
>>6408909
>there are people braindead enough to go along with this nonsense
The fuck's it matter to them?
It don't matter. None of this matters.
>>6408914
>None of this matters.
Maybe it doesn't matter to you, retard.
>>6408936
It shouldn't matter to anyone.
If it matters to you you're the retard, getting ruffled over pointless shit.
>Oregon
Either this is some crazy stunt after that muslim decided to rename Pulse to No Pulse, just so some crazy progressive can feel better about himself because he's oh so progressive and thus better than everyone else (which is the only reason they ever go along with it), or I left my tinfoil on again.
>>6408902
>crazy people metaphorically/literally hold people, businesses, and institutions hostage because they are too afraid of causing offense to tell them to fuck off
on second thought, you're right, I love watching faggots get theirs when gender of the month comes in accusing them of toxic masculinity, continue as normal
>>6408967
>when gender of the month comes in accusing them of toxic masculinity
I'm pretty sure that already happened when some british student association alled for less gay representatives since gays are less oppressed than [minority of choice].
Which was double irony since that decision was made by a straight cis woman (supposedly muslim), and essentially stripped cis straight men of their function.
Then again when a black actress who wishes to play a black actress in a movie is accused of things because said black actress isn't black enough to play a black actress, you know such movements never had any other option than failing miserably.
so "he" can finally be himself
good for them
>>6408948
I've followed this line of dialogue, and I agree with you anon.
>>6408883
Russia
>>6409057
Honest question: Would anyone you know understand why you come here?
>>6408650
hopefully oregon gets the most syrians
Why arn't these people in a mental asylum? That goes for all transgender people.
>>6410227
What purpose would locking trannies up do apart from keeping them out of your precious bubble of a world?
I will never understand how people can get to agitated by people like this who are at best a minor inconvenience, when in the same breath you'll put critics of Islam down when Muslims would literally kill you.
Fuckin priorities, right?
>>6409000
Zoe Saldana has a history of not talking about or liking being labelled as black. She only did so when people began criticizing her placement.
She also wore black face and prosthetics.
The issue is Nina Simone was a dark skin black American woman, not a light skin Afro-Latina. She was a outspoken civil rights speaker, pro-black and was not perceived as a beautiful woman in American media because she was dark skin and wide featured
Beyond the fact that the film couldn't hire a dark skin woman with wide features (which is colorist/the main issue and what Simone fought against her whole life) the love interest is fake as fuck because the man was gay irl.
