Let’s do some quick word association. When I say “gender identity,” say the first thing tha—OMG TOILETS!!!!

I’m not exactly sure where Ontario’s fringe Family Coalition Party gets its funding, considering they routinely get less than a quarter of a percent of the popular vote, but they seem to have enough resources to design and distribute some rather astonishing flyers equating the passage of a bill adding gender identity to the human rights code with bathroom predators.

NDP MPP Cheri DiNovo’s Bill 33, which passed in June, finally updated the Ontario human rights code to explicitly include trans Canadians in its existing protections. I guess the Family Coalition Party isn’t too happy about it, though, judging from the flyers distributed across Cheri’s riding. Referring to the bill as “The Bathroom Bill,” the party accuses DiNovo of enabling child predators by letting “a man who calls himself transgendered” to enter women’s washrooms, threatening “the lives of girls and women by putting them at greater risk from male sexual predators.”

Uh, they do realize that sexual predatory behaviour—especially toward minors—is already illegal, right? Do they seriously think this bill opened some kind of loophole here?

DiNovo, of course, sees the attack for what it is. “The transphobic message of the flyer is that trans folk are, in essence, pedophiles,” she told the media. “The whole structure of their argument is ludicrous unless you understand that basic message: there’s no such thing as a trans person; there’s just male pedophiles dressed as women.”

Bravo, Cheri. Now don’t waste any more time on these kooks and their crazy flyers.

• Family Coalition Party targets Cheri DiNovo [Xtra]

The province of Nova Scotia has refused to pay for a trans man’s hysterectomy, leaving him with a surprise $3,400 bill.

After experiencing some abdominal pain, Jessiah MacDonald was told that his uterus had several abnormal polyps and was recommended by a gynecologist that it be removed for preventative measures. He took his doctor’s advice (as most people should), but was told after the operation that he would have to pay for the procedure out-of-pocket because the province doesn’t pay for sex reassignment surgery.

“I felt it was wrong because despite my gender, I still have pieces of my body and if a piece of my body gets sick, I expect it to be treated as any other piece,” Jessiah told the media in an interview.

Canada has universal health care, which means that provinces typically pay for all medical bills, but sex reassignment is still considered cosmetic or unnecessary by some jurisdictions. Nova Scotia is obviously one of the provinces with this outdated view, but also apparently hasn’t considered the possibility that not all uterine surgery on trans people is related to sex reassignment.

Jessiah has now filed a human rights complaint against Nova Scotia’s Department of Health and Wellness.

• Transgender man fights $3,400 hysterectomy bill [CBC News]

Jenna Talackova, a contestant in this year’s Miss Universe Canada pageant, has been disqualified from the competition after organisers discovered that she’s trans.

Pageant judges selected Talackova from numerous other applicants to compete in the finals for the Donald Trump-owned competition, but after Denis Davilla, one of the directors, had suspicions that she didn’t meet the requirements of being a “naturally born female,” he asked her about her history. After confirming she was born a male, Jenna was pulled from the competition that same day.

Personally, I don’t get it. It’s a beauty contest. Judges thought she was beautiful enough to advance to the finals. What’s the problem, exactly?

Perhaps she may not have fared well during the portion of the competition where contestants demonstrate a live birth, but otherwise she clearly had the looks and determination to win.

Give ‘em hell, Jenna!

• Transgender beauty queen kicked out of Miss Universe [Daily Mail]