A Memphis police officer is accused of beating up someone under arrest. The person seen being attacked on the tape is a transexual. She says the attack is a hate crime.

Now the FBI is investigating. One officer is off the job, and another is on desk duty.

Duanna Johnson says the officer beat her up after calling her all sorts of names and making fun of her sexuality.

On the videotape you see Johnson being attacked. One officer is holding Johnson back, while another throws punches.

A lot of people say, "Screw those people staring at you, do the right thing and give the kid a hug/pick him up and dust him off/help find her mommy."

On the balance, screw that. Maybe it'll be a nice interaction, maybe you'll get a glare, that part kind of washes out. Then you factor in stuff like the McMartin Preschool and Kern County, and you realize that, with nothing more than a pointing finger and an overly helpful interrogator saying, "Show me on the doll where he touched you," your life can be pretty much over, even if you are eventually cleared. The intangible of a five-second warm and fuzzy from an interaction with a child weighs nothing against it. One of the reasons I gave up tutoring children, despite the benefits to kids, was the increasing amount of this nonsense. No more babysitting, either, even if the kids ask.

It's just part and parcel of me walking to my car at night, only to notice that a woman fifteen feet ahead of me and a little to the right has quickly fumbled out her pepper mace. And not just once, either.

From a discussion on this article.

Over the last six years, hundreds of teenage boys have been expelled or felt compelled to leave the polygamous settlement that straddles Colorado City, Ariz., and Hildale, Utah.

Disobedience is usually the reason given for expulsion, but former sect members and state legal officials say the exodus of males — the expulsion of girls is rarer — also remedies a huge imbalance in the marriage market. Members of the sect believe that to reach eternal salvation, men are supposed to have at least three wives.

The problem with each men needing three wives is that you need a one to three male to female population ratio, but we all know that the chances of a newborn having a y chromosome are 50%. In other words, two thirds of the male population needs to be remove from the equation.

These days, if Rian Romoli accidentally bumps into a child, he quickly raises his hands above his shoulders. "I don't want to give even the slightest indication that any inadvertent touching occurred," says Mr. Romoli, an economist in La Cañada Flintridge, Calif.

Ted Wallis, a doctor in Austin, Texas, recently came upon a lost child in tears in a mall. His first instinct was to help, but he feared people might consider him a predator. He walked away. "Being male," he explains, "I am guilty until proven innocent."

In San Diego, retiree Ralph Castro says he won't allow himself to be alone with a child -- even in an elevator.

Last month, I wrote about how our culture teaches children to fear men. Hundreds of men responded, many lamenting that they've now become fearful of children. They said they avert their eyes when kids are around, or think twice before holding even their own children's hands in public.

...

The result of all this hyper-carefulness, however, is that men often feel like untouchables. In Cochranville, Pa., Ray Simpson, a bus driver, says that he used to have 30 kids stop at his house on Halloween. But after his divorce, with people knowing he was a man living alone, he had zero visitors. "I felt like crying at the end of the evening," he says.

When Robert Trigaux, the St. Petersburg Times business editor, tried an experiment and filled out an online application for a price quote for auto insurance from Geico, the results were shocking and troubling. In two separate tries he used exactly the same criteria except for the inquirer's occupation and level of education. The guy without a high school diploma and a janitor's job was given a quote that was $440 per year more than the Ph.D. computer executive.

...

Proxies for race and poverty should have no place on an actuarial table. If that means spreading risk to a wider customer base, it is a small price to pay for fundamental fairness.

What about charging males (who are technically a minority) the same as females? At least you have a degree of control over how much education you have, whereas your sex is determined at birth (for the most part).