Crossdressing and the LAW in the UK / USA | can I travel whilst crossdressed | what are my rights?

Hi my name is Sophie's Summers and welcometo the Crossdressing lifestyle channel now today we want to have a look atcross-dressing and the law.

Now I want to start off with a little bit of adisclaimer if I may.

I'm not a legally trained barrister or a lawyer justsomebody with a bit of an interest in the subject and I've been asked quite afew questions over the years about aspects of the law and cross-dressing inpublic so I thought I would just dive a little bit more deeper into the subjectmatter I've done quite a little bit of research recently and I'm absolutelyastounded by some of the law and its interactions with cross-dressing.

Now, I'm going to be looking at the UK and a little bit of the USA and aspects of thelaw in both of those countries so if you want to find out a little bit moreplease join me after the break So welcome back, so this video was reallyinspired by the fact that I get quite a few questions even today from peopleasking me about the law and cross-dressing particularly went out inpublic so I thought I'd do a little bit of research trying maybe bust a few ofthe old myths if they are myths if they're not miss please tell me down inthe comments below because I love to hear you know the actual roots of someof these laws and how they apply in the 21st century and the reason why I makethat particular claim is there are lots and lots of older statute laws that havebeen bent and buckled and missed use particularly against the gay communityand the cross-dressing community by the law over the years thankfully not somuch these days as we do have a lot of protection in thelaw so what I'm going to be doing is concentrating on basically three or fourkey areas the first one really is in the UK is the Equality Act of 2010 and thenI'm going to be sexual there's sexual offences Act of 2003 and how theyapply and also I want I take a little bit of a look at you know travelingbecause I get a lot of requests or say well, can I travel in the UK or can Itravel in America when I'm dressed? So I'm going to take each and every one ofthose points and work my way through them so let's try and get into a littlebit of nitty-gritty in a little bit more detail if we can now what I want to dois start off by reading a statement if I may so please bear with my very badreading skills but it basically says that cross-dressing is not an offence inthe UK even under the Sexual Offences Act of 2003 which contains a seeminglyinexhaustible list of a sexual misdemeanors it's quite interesting noris it illegal in most other West countries though you could run intoserious problems in many developing nations so I think that well establishedthat in the UK actually cross-dressing is not against the law so to speakhowever you could face some forms of discrimination and particularly you knowwhen out and about and crossdressed, so really that leads me quite nicelyinto the Equality Act of 2010 and forgive me again I've got to make alittle bit of reading note here 2010 is the relevant legislation that provideprotection for individuals who are subject to less favorable treatment i.

e discrimination now in this legislationthere are basically a twelve key categories or key areas no twelve arehopefully listed down here.

I would like to draw your attention to item three which is todo with the gender reassignment now I'm getting onto a little bit ofsort of gray area of knowledge here and also it could be a little bitcontentious with our fellow sisters that are transitioning and so I do apologizeif I make a few gaps here but this is my understanding of it and reading throughsome of the papers that have managed to get my hands on now if you were to sayis cross-dressing covered in discrimination by the laws of thisequality Act of 2010 no is not however to me is the very interesting point itsays quote, unquote but if you are thinking of transitioning in the futurenow I quite like that word if you are thinking about it then you would fallwithin the bracket of gender reassignment so although it doesn'tactually cover cross-dressing it does actually cover you if you arethinking about it so I find that quite interesting which goes to demonstratethat the law is a very flexible and can be used in your favor if you have theknowledge so to speak so that really that legislation here within the UKcovers any form of discrimination so that's a very good thing that allcovers in that particular aspect and I find that very refreshing so I think wecan clearly see there that in the UK it is not against the law to crossdress andif you feel as though you're discriminated against in any way thereis some legislation in place to offer you some protectionnow I'm not overly sure of the laws as they apply in the USA regarding crossdressing.

I do know from the limited research I've done probably that New York is the most liberal and most protective for cross-dressing and transgender people inthe States if I am wrong please correct me bydropping me a note down below I'm fascinated by the history particularly of Stonewalland also some of the older laws that were in place in America to actuallypositively discriminate against crossdressers and a lot of this goesback to even the 1800s where they sort of bent the laws to be able to use anddiscriminate against cross-dressing so I'm not going that a great detail therethe only thing that I will go into any sort of detail with is of the actual TSAregulations when it comes to travelling in the u.

s.

so let's have a little lookat a situation of travel within the US and also the UK and Europe when crossdressed.

Ito say is that's it is not illegal in any way or to travel cross-dressedbut, it does have a few how would I say unique sets of challenges andconsiderations and they are primarily that your passport is probably in yourmale guys and when you turn up at the airport security your picture is notgoing to represent the picture that is in your passport however that is not amajor issue and now we're going to that in a minutebut the other consideration also is when you're going through securities ifyou're wearing a silicone breast forms they are more than likely going to tripthe security system on one way or another so how do we get over thesethings well all passports have a unique identifying code in them so with theexception I think is of India Canada and New Zealand that use an X for theparticular digit in the identification code the people on security and onpassport control would know whether you were male or female without even lookingat so that's one issue that the transgender community are trying andvigorously working on to get that unique identifying code in passports anddocumentation to be removed but I digress now the thing is that there area lot of people in security that are specifically trained to deal withcross-dressing and transgendered people the TSA in the US have a wholeload of regulations and guidelines for their staff with the dealing with thecross dressers and with transgendered people whereby you can should you wishto have a pat-down rather than go through security and set the alarms offthey will take you aside and they will do that discreetly and they will do thatalso in the UK but I must admit that the UK are a little bit behind I believe theu.

s.

in this particular practice I know it's a practice that's reasonablyfollowed throughout Europe but if I was traveling in theMiddle East or certain parts of Asia I certainly would not for my own safetytravel whilst cross-dressed so in summary of that little bit thereyou can travel quite freely and you're not breaking any laws if you aretraveling cross-dressed but there are certain considerations that you shouldtake into account I would say allow yourself more time when you're goingthrough security and just enjoy the experience try not to get too wound upabout it I also know in the u.

s.

they've got a lot of behavioral specialistsgoing around the airports are looking at people's behavioral patterns and I knowfrom personal experience you do get a little bit sort of how would I saynervous and I can pick that up as well but on the whole and never experienceany problems at all and finally, I really want to have aquick look at probably the most asked question would be whilst I'm out dressedwhich toilet should I use now I want to have a look at this from the legal standpointif there is one these days there are lots of gender-neutral toilets so itdoesn't really matter so much and failing that there are quite a fewdisabled toilets you could use but in mmm my personal experience what I'vebeen led to believe is if I'm presenting as a female then I am better off goingthere too many female toilet than a male toilet I did have this conversation withsomebody who was a police officer once and they said well technically and oldlaws that and statutes you may if there was a disturbance in the female toiletbecause of your presence could possibly and they said possibly be charged with asort of a civil disturbance offence which I thought was quite interestingand then if there was a disturbance in a male a toilet because I was presentingas a female I may even be able to be charged with a form of solicitationwhich I thought was very hilarious so out of those two sort of possibilities Idid ask which one carried the biggest fine or the biggest penalty and it wouldhave been the one for solicitation so I've always said that if I'm appearingas a female I will always use a female toilet but as a little bit of a caveatthat's a little discussion there and the policeman did say is highly highlyhighly unlikely that any of those charges would ever be bought so and thatwas just a little bit of a bit of hearsay board anything else so inconclusion I hope you found as a whole presentation of some sort of interest ifyou did please give us good old thumbs up because that helps us if you've notalready subscribed to our station I mean our station our channel please doconsider doing so we'd really appreciate that and as always always always alwaysplease stay safe in these very troubled times andalso as we always say stay gorgeous you.