The Associated Press has updated its media style guidelines related to LGBT or people who identity as neither male nor female.
The new 2017 guidelines asks the news media to stop referring to female impersonators as transgender unless it is relevant.
The new LGBT guidelines also includes using the phrase “gender confirmation” for “medical procedures often but not always used for a transition.”
But the most troubling new guideline is the AP’s insistence that journalists avoid references to transgenders being born a boy or girl.
In other words, reporters should avoid informing their readers or viewers that a biological man was born a boy.
Reporters are also urged to stop informing their readers of a transgender’s real name — even if the transgender has not legal changed his name on any official IDs.
An example of media outlets abiding by the new LGBT guidelines is this Nola.com article that does not inform readers that Christiana Godds, pictured above, was born a boy or state his real name.
Godds, 19, was arrested in August for performing oral sex on a juvenile. The writer refers to Godds as a “woman” and uses feminine pronouns throughout the article.
The AP’s new guidelines takes the transgender debate in a problematic direction. Critics say crime statistics will be skewed to show an upward trend of women committing violent crimes and rapes.
Men currently lead all categories of violent crimes including sex crimes against women and children. But that will soon change.
Critics such as writer Sohrab Ahmari say the AP’s new LGBT guidelines “trample free speech.”
