Bill O'Reilly is an angry, aging conservative white guy. And while we don't know if Bill O'Reilly's audience is white, we do know that its median age is 72.1 and this would suggest that there just might be more than a few angry, white conservatives who are O'Reilly fans. Bill's Barcalounger Brigade, most likely, consists of folks who grew up in the halcyon days when women and minorities knew their place and gays led lives of quiet, closeted desperation. Transgender issues were certainly not spoken of and if they were, the terms perversion and demonic possession were probably utilized. And while some older folks might have gotten over the ignorant insularity of their upbringing, it's apparent that the Holy Ghost inspired Bill hasn't. As demonstrated by O'Reilly's (who doesn't "cast aspersions) latest attack on the transgender community, his fear and loathing render him incapable of even uttering the word "transgender."
O'Reilly's take on transgender issues is odious, uninformed, and bigoted - as is the coverage of transgender issues on Fox News. He actually criticized the show "Glee" for featuring a transgender character because this could convince "dopey kids to identify as gay or transgender" which he as described as a "lifestyle." He advanced the Christian right view that a California law to protect transgender students would encourage heterosexual men to claim that they are transgender in order to get into girls rooms where they could sneak a peek. According to O'Reilly, the bill was a recipe for "anarchy." He even mocked a "bogus" transgender student who was allowed to use a school's restroom for girls. He mocked a prison inmate who sued to obtain gender reassignment surgery.
So, last night, he used his "Mad as Hell" segment, a segment that features e-mails from his audience about stuff they are pissed off about, to attack another transgender prison inmate. Heather Nauert read a missive from a Nebraska wall of genius who is mad as hell that that prison inmates supposedly get better health care than veterans when, of course, the reality is that veterans, once they get into the system, are pleased with it. Lila Lewis is upset that the taxpayers foot the bill for knee replacement surgery (right, let's let those prisoners become non-ambulatory, that's a plan) and sex change operations which, unmentioned by neither O'Reilly nor Nauert, is only done with medical documentation attesting to the necessity of the procedure.
After Nauert cited costs for prison health care, Bill dropped his rhetorical turd:
"If you were a sex-change person, then you would just commit a crime, go in and have the operation, and then you get out. You see what I mean, Heather? You can work the system that way." Nauert agreed: "I suppose so." Bill said he "didn't want to give anybody ideas if you're a sex change person."
So there you have it. Bill O'Reilly thinks that "sex change people" are gaming the system by committing crimes which send them to prison where they will get their free surgery. How bout straight people committing crimes in order to get free room and board? Nah, it's those "sex change persons" who have evil, ulterior motives. Seriously folks, if there were ever any question as to whether Bill O'Reilly is batshit crazy, there won't be now!!!!!!
I’m pretty certain that the committing of a crime that would send someone to prison would be enough for a psychiatrist or therapist to recommend the person is probably not mentally stable enough to proceed with surgery.
(Now, committing a crime—say, bank robbery—to help your lover have a sex change might be the more likely route. Perhaps Bill needs to watch “Dog Day Afternoon.”)
