Transgender inmates in California will now be housed according to their gender identity thanks to a new law signed Saturday by Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA). The law states that prison officers must privately ask inmates going through the intake process if they identify as transgender, nonbinary, or intersex. If the inmate indicates one of those identities, they will be allowed to request a move to the facility that houses their preferred gender.
There is a caveat to the new law, however. If the state has “management or security concerns,” it will provide a written explanation of why it denied an inmate the chance to be housed according to his or her gender identity. The inmate will be given a “meaningful opportunity” to object, The Associated Press reported.
“The law says the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation cannot deny those requests solely because of inmates’ anatomy, sexual orientation or ‘a factor present’ among other inmates at the facility,” the outlet reported.
In addition to being housed with their gender identity, prison officers are also required to address the inmates according to their preferred pronouns and must search inmates “based on the search policy of their gender identity,” the AP reported.
This exception is not included because the state believes men will claim to be women in order to harm female inmates, but because it believes male inmates will attack biological women who identify as men.
State Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), who authored the bill signed by Newsom, said transgender people are the ones who are routinely victimized in prison.
“It’s just a false narrative about transgender people and about transgender women in particular that they’re somehow not really women and are just trying to scam their way into women’s bathrooms or facilities in order to do bad things,” Wiener told the AP. “Overwhelmingly the people who are being victimized are trans people.”
One inmate who identifies as a woman, Michelle Calvin, said during a news conference (Calvin called in) to claim they had been abused and disrespected for being a transgender woman.
“I’ve been in for 15 years. I’ve been through the abuse, I’ve been through the disrespect of staff not addressing me for who I am because I am a woman,” Calvin said.
California prison systems will have to be very careful when it comes to housing transgender inmates. In 2018, The Daily Wire’s Amanda Prestigiacomo reported, a “biologically male criminal who identifies as female and has yet to have reassignment surgery was allowed to stay in a women’s prison to serve his sentence.” The transgender inmate was then “accused of sexually assaulting or harassing four female prisoners.”
The Blaze reported at the time:
The first assault allegedly occurred soon after White arrived at the high-security prison. The first victim claimed to have become friends with White before the attack.
Another prisoner alleged that White made inappropriate comments about oral sex to another inmate.
The third victim claimed White attacked her, and the fourth victim accused the transgender prisoner of kissing her on the neck.
HD Editors Note: Why Is This News Biblically Relevant?
The issue surrounding “transgender prisoners” has become a prominent debate in recent years as the transgender movement has become more widespread, and so has its forced acceptance. Among the chief concerns to those that stand in opposition to the gender identity-based prisons is the obvious, and frankly unavoidable safety concerns.
The safety problem has been virtually ignored in the signing of this new California law, and as usual, Newsom’s focus is more honed in on “woke points” than the potential harm to those involved.
The other major issue with this newly signed in law is that those that work in the prisons are forced to lie by calling the prisoners by their chosen gender, rather then the true gender they were born.
In an article from Christian Concern titled, “Transgender prisoner debate ‘still relevant,’” they go through many of these issues surrounding transgender prison policy. Among the problems discussed is the “culture of organized lying” and the threats it poses to religious freedom:
This culture of organized lying poses a serious threat to Christian work among prisoners. For at the heart of such work is offering the hope of redemption through accepting Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour. At the heart of that is the command to put on the mind of Christ concerning all things. Fundamental to this, but unfortunately often sidelined by those who should know better, is the need to accept the mind of Christ on the truth that God created all human beings, male and female, and to put away all falsehood. There are examples of people who de-transition after committing a crime and then coming to Christ. However, the freedom of Christians doing prison work to call people living a lie as putative members of the opposite gender will not be helped by the deepening of the pro-transgender mentality in the prison service and the Ministry of Justice. Instead, it is perfectly possible that any such Christian talk could get slammed as ‘conversion therapy.’
Scripture explains that the last days would be characterized by liars, “deceivers,” those who hate the truth and despise all who live godly in Christ (2 Timothy 3:1-13). In other words, our culture would become increasingly deceptive and hostile to Christians who follow Biblical standards of righteousness.
In our society, even something as simple as being male or female gender is no longer said to be determined by God, but instead by feelings and sins contrary to the Biblical and natural ways God himself set in place.
The Bible also tells us that the world in the last days would be like it was in “the days of Lot” (Luke 17:28). In Lot’s day, God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, chiefly for the sexual immorality and homosexuality that the cities were given over to (Genesis 19, Jude 1:7).
In Romans chapter one, Paul warns against the sin of homosexuality and, more specifically, the celebration of it as a rebellion against God.
It is this reprobate mind that our society has fallen into, not in the celebration of sins alone (such as homosexuality, transgenderism, abortion, etc.) but also the forced celebration which disregards and violates religious freedom and freedom of conscience.
