Woman Posed as a 14-year old boy to have sex with 16 yr old girl

[Linus]

Stuff like this (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/07/patricia-dye-posed-as-14_n_638448.html) ends up being related to trans individuals (whether transgendered or transsexed) and it infuriates me. She lied to get involved with a girl that was under age (per law?). What people will focus on is how she changed her gender to get involved with the girl.

Patricia Dye, 31, posed as a 14-year-old boy under the alias Matt Abrams in order to allegedly have sex with a 16-year-old girl in Springboro, Ohio, according to the Dayton Daily News.

Dye was arrested after the underage girl she is accused of having sex with fled the hotel room that she shared with Dye, reports CBS News. Police say that the girl fled after finding out that Dye was an adult woman and not the boy that she had claimed to be.

Dye has admitted to posing as a young boy, but has not yet spoken on allegations of whether or not she had sex with the victim. Before her arrest, Dye stayed with the girl for in a hotel for three days.

"They were boyfriend-girlfriend," Sgt. Bob Marchiny said. "(Dye) looks just like a boy."
Dye, a 4-foot-11 woman from Franklin was six inches shorter than the victim and has no local criminal record to show.

Dye is charged with corruption of a minor and unlawful sex with a minor. She is being held on $100,000 bail.

[Waldo]

Stuff like this (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/07/patricia-dye-posed-as-14_n_638448.html) ends up being related to trans individuals (whether transgendered or transsexed) and it infuriates me. She lied to get involved with a girl that was under age (per law?). What people will focus on is how she changed her gender to get involved with the girl.

Linus where are you seeing this associated with Trans individuals? In thirteen pages of comments I see only one person using trans in anything approaching a remotely confused fashion. Someone else comments on trans but in a reference to Brandon Teena. And I'm not seeing any trans discussion of it on Twitter.

And not to fan the flames, but does anyone know if this individual identifies as trans or not or whether this person was simply preying on younger individuals?

If you are intent on having sex with an individual, of any age, would you not come out as trans assuming your genitalia does not conform to expectations? I would, but I'm neither trans nor male identified so it's easy for me to say.

But this begs the question - which is the bigger moral morass? Lying about your age or your gender (in this case I'm identifying this as a lie because clearly the "victim" in question was unawares that her paramour was not born a boy and did not have male genitalia) in order to get what you want?

[BullDog]

My first reaction is people are going to think this is a sick lesbian- which she may in fact be (don't know how she ids or what her sexual preference is if she is having sex with consenting adults) given she was trying to have sex with a minor. I don't see where transphobia is coming into play.

The first comment was about lesbians who look like Justin Bieber

[Linus]

A few of the comments on the other news sites that have this article suggest the commentors view this as "a sickness" or a "disease" and relate it to trans individuals. Whether explicit or not, it will be associated. It's partially where the "transwomen are rapists" come from.

[Andrew, Jr.]

Linus,

I agree with you. It pisses me off beyond words.

[BullDog]

A few of the comments on the other news sites that have this article suggest the commentors view this as "a sickness" or a "disease" and relate it to trans individuals. Whether explicit or not, it will be associated. It's partially where the "transwomen are rapists" come from.

There will probably be both trans and lesbian bashing come out of the story. Also a lot of people don't make real clear cut distinctions.

No matter how this person identifies in terms of gender as far as I am concerned she is definitely wrong trying to have sex with a minor- through any form of deception or not.

[Waldo]

A few of the comments on the other news sites that have this article suggest the commentors view this as "a sickness" or a "disease" and relate it to trans individuals. Whether explicit or not, it will be associated. It's partially where the "transwomen are rapists" come from.

"this" may well be a sickness. But, seriously I've now looked at seven other news outlets from the NY Daily News to MSNBC and AZCentral.com and again, one other Trans comment.

There is likely some transphobia around this but I don't think that's the overriding theme of the phobia, at least what I'm seeing.

favorite comment: "too fucking ugly to give someone oral" clearly this person is a big fan of Ron Jeremy.


Edited to add; "This" does not equal trans or queerness... but the actions of this individual.

[BullDog]

OK this might be an interesting story to follow for some of the points raised in the misogyny thread. I think pretty much everyone agrees that what the woman did was wrong. However, it does not excuse anyone from making pejorative and negative stereotypical statements about transgendered, transsexed or lesbian people. That can not only perpetuate stereotypes but can also lead sometimes to real world violence.

So if anyone is following the story more closely maybe they can let us know what is being discussed. I am sure it won't be pretty, but how things are framed and described could shed some light- personal experiences/something genuinely bad or wrong happening vs. the perpetuation of stereotypes.

[Leigh]

I really do hate seeing stories like this because alot of people can and probably will relate this story to trans issues. Of course because we don't know how Dye is id'ing or what exactly motivated her to do this in the first place, it was stupid and she should have known better!

[Waldo]

OK this might be an interesting story to follow for some of the points raised in the misogyny thread. I think pretty much everyone agrees that what the woman did was wrong. However, it does not excuse anyone from making pejorative and negative stereotypical statements about transgendered, transsexed or lesbian people. That can not only perpetuate stereotypes but can also lead sometimes to real world violence.

So if anyone is following the story more closely maybe they can let us know what is being discussed. I am sure it won't be pretty, but how things are framed and described could shed some light- personal experiences/something genuinely bad or wrong happening vs. the perpetuation of stereotypes.

Following the discussions on topics like this across mainstream publications is a form of torture I would not wish on anyone.

Seriously when you're dealing with people who's first response is "No wonder she lied, she's a fuckin' ugly chick" what hope do you have for a meaningful conversation?

[BullDog]

Following the discussions on topics like this across mainstream publications is a form of torture I would not wish on anyone.

Seriously when you're dealing with people who's first response is "No wonder she lied, she's a fuckin' ugly chick" what hope do you have for a meaningful conversation?

Yeah, you could be right. I tried to read some of the commentary over Cynthia Nixon's comment and couldn't get too far. It was too ugly.

Maybe how the news is covering, rather than the blog comments? Just a thought.

[Stearns]

Following the discussions on topics like this across mainstream publications is a form of torture I would not wish on anyone.

Seriously when you're dealing with people who's first response is "No wonder she lied, she's a fuckin' ugly chick" what hope do you have for a meaningful conversation?

"Her last name is missing a 'K'; "better-looking version of Rachel Maddow"

[Linus]

I really do hate seeing stories like this because alot of people can and probably will relate this story to trans issues. Of course because we don't know how Dye is id'ing or what exactly motivated her to do this in the first place, it was stupid and she should have known better!


She used multiple different names and posted pictures that showed her both in her boy form and female form. This sounds like a con artist pure and simple. This does not sound like an ID issue but I wonder if she will use that as a defense at some point.

[Stearns]

She used multiple different names and posted pictures that showed her both in her boy form and female form. This sounds like a con artist pure and simple. This does not sound like an ID issue but I wonder if she will use that as a defense at some point.

Good thought on the defense issue. I'd guess it's likely. I just consider her a pedo.

[Waldo]

"Her last name is missing a 'K'; "better-looking version of Rachel Maddow"

I know we could get wound up on the lesbian bashing here, but I think it goes further, right to root of the issue - a woman did something. Anything, which garnered attention. And that's bad.

It doesn't matter if it's Lindsay Lohan, Michelle Obama, The Queen Mother, Penelope Cruz, or Meghan Fox. Some neanderthal, some where is going to make disparaging comments about her based on her looks. And everything else flows from that.

[BullDog]

Yeah, good points by Waldo. I think a lot of the commentary will flow from her being a woman.

Also, I think when any queer- whether it's a gay man, lesbian or whomever is publicly discussed doing something wrong, illegal, stupid, etc we all feel a clench in our stomach for what is to follow- whether they id exactly like we do or not. We know the misogyny, homophobia, transphobia is to follow.

[Heart]

Through my lens: My guess is that the primary reaction to this story will be that women are "just as much" pedophiles, "just as much" sexual predators, "just as much" child abusers, as men. And from that will flow the comments about how particularly sick and predatory lesbian women are.

It will be interesting to see if there is any specific scrutiny of transgenderism in this case, or if that was just opportunisitc on her part.

Whenever a woman commits a sexual crime involving a child it is intensely focused upon and sensationalized, in spite of the fact that men commit 85% of sexual crimes involving children.*

*That's reported crimes and yes, if reporting went up, crimes by women would go up, but so would crimes by men.

[betenoire]

I read an interesting book a few years back, about women who commit violent crimes. (I get we're not talking about murder right now, but I promise what I am saying is relevant) The book did a bunch of case studies of females who had committed murder, and the outcomes of their trials.

Basically, a woman who is "acceptably" female (ie - attractive, thin, straight, white, domestic, blah blah blah) almost -always- get a lighter sentence than women who are "unacceptably" female. In the case where the woman is unacceptably female she will often get a harsher sentence than a male who commits a similar offense.

I'll be watching this case with interest.

[BullDog]

I read about 7 pages of the comments at Huffington. I think I should reward myself with a cookie for getting that far. A lot of it is just ridiculous nonsense, but I do see lots of misogyny, anti-lesbian and transphobic comments made- and it's all mixed and mashed together, which is of course how life is. Nobody makes little boxes around what is misogyny, homophobia, lesbophobia, transphobia etc and most people don't know the differences between all of them.

I do agree with Heart- something like this happens and all of sudden it's- women can be just as bad as men. Yes an individual woman can be, but if you are looking at from a broader perspective the overwhelming majority of violent and sexual crimes are perpetuated by straight males. However, when a straight male commits a crime no one is scrutinizing his gender or sexuality.

I also think that all these ugly types of comments do come from the stereotypes people already have in their heads about women, lesbians and transpeople. Otherwise they wouldn't have these ugly things to say in the first place. That's why I think we have to be vigilant about not perpetuating stereotypes (even in more benign forms) in our queer communities.