Letters to the editor June 8

War tax

Much concern has been expressed by vehicle owners across Montana and throughout the country about the price of gas, which has increased $1.50 per gallon  since the outbreak of the war with Iran.  

Let’s look beyond just the price per gallon and take a look at the actual bite out of your budget over time. Let us use the following hypothetical example:  assume you drive to and from work five days a week. The round trip is 20 miles, and your vehicle averages 25 mpg. The work-week cost increase is 100 miles driven divided by 25 mpg, which equals four gallons.  Multiply that by $1.50 per gallon and you have $6. On the weekend you drive 50 miles, adding $3 more for a total-week cost increase of $9.

In the first 12 weeks of the war your cost increase has been $108. Should the war continue until the county’s 250 birthday, your cost is $234. You can call this your “war tax.”

However, if you are a two or three vehicle family, where the adults both travel to work and you have a child who drives to school, your “war tax” increases.  You can plug in your own numbers and find your personal amount. In economics this is called an opportunity cost. The money you choose to spend on your “war tax” is no longer available to spend on other things you want. The only way to reduce your war tax is to drive less. Tough choice for working folks.

­— Bob Hendricks, Missoula

Human rights

Transgender civil rights are human civil rights. This was affirmed 10 years ago in the American Medical Association’s Journal of Ethics. (November 2016. Tia Powell, M.D., et.al.) “Persons with either cisgender (in which assigned and experienced gender are the same) or transgender identities deserve to live and flourish in their communities — with freedom to learn, work, love and play — and build lives connected with others at home, in the workplace, and in public settings without fear for their safety and survival. These deeply personal decisions are and should be the prerogative of the individual and deserve the law’s protection. The United States protects religious freedom in the First Amendment, and religion is quintessentially a choice. We owe the same respect to all members of our communities.”

Transgender people represent 0.5 to 1% of the world’s population. It is a small minority in Montana but still would represent a town of 5,000 to 10,000 people who deserve respect and the same civil rights as everyone else.

For the last 70 years, or so, science has known that there are numerous human variations of internal genitalia, hormones, hormone receptors, enzyme deficiencies, chromosomes and gonads. The plant, insect and animal worlds abound with variations. The science of brain gender is still in the early stages of understanding and more is being discovered about brain gender every few years. Transgender children remind us anew of the creative power and diversity of nature and of love, a love of mutual respect for one another as human beings.

It will be up to future generations of people to change the unjust laws against transgender citizens. Previously, we have corrected unjust laws against citizens like women, pregnant women, children, persons of color, those with disabilities and others. We can do it again. Transgender civil rights are Human civil rights.

— John Lavin, Kalispell