Gender bender

Nothing in the AP style about this one. Gwen Araujo, a 17-year-old murder victim is identified as a girl in today's Chronicle story, and most coverage of the case, I believe. Is that Bay Area political correctness, or an appropriate reference. I guess if you're willing to pony up for the surgery, you're afforded being identified by the gender you switched to. I suspect this would be handed differently in the deep south.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/05/13/BAJK17JSU3.DTL&tsp=1

 

And there's this, from the FAQs at APstylebook.com:

 

If the person had a sex change, why would she/he be referred to as their former sex? Like Buck said, it would be wrong.

 

Thanks Buck. Seems reasonable. Not sure I agree with it, but maybe that's my own backwards thinking. Tragic story any way you look at it.

 

I suspect if you talked to any transgendered person, they would agree with it.

Think of it like the writers who referred to Muhammad Ali as "Cassius Clay" for years after he changed his name. It's just disrespectful, and there's no reason for that.

 

Good point. I don't think names and gender are equivalent, but I can see why a transgendered person would consider it disrepectful in the sense that it shows that you're not recognizing how they identify themselves, so in that sense I do agree.

 

Exactly.

 

That's a thread for another day, but thanks for mentioning that. I'm glad I wasn't the only one noticing Cassius Clay references in the 1972 sports pages.

 

That's a good 20 years before bucky was even born.

 

So not this guy?

 

I seem to remember an AP Stylebook entry on this very subject that referenced Renee Richards in the example. Don't have one handy. Can anyone confirm?