Is this really transgender discrimination?

Lizzi Duff is claiming discrimination by Peoples Bank – a bank that promises “a higher level of service.” They have several branches in King, Skagit, Snohomish, and Whatcom counties.

Duff says she was discriminated against because she’s transgender. She claims, according to KIRO TV, that she was denied access to her own bank account.

She alleges she called her bank in November of last year for details on her account balance. But the customer service rep wouldn’t give her any details. Now, if you’ve ever called a bank and tried to do this on the phone, you’re usually asked a series of security questions that you need to answer (your high school mascot, your best friend in high school, etc.).

Duff apparently answered all the questions correctly. But she still wasn’t given access to the data. And this happened twice.

Why? Duff is transgender; she presents as a female, but apparently her voice still sounds like it belongs to a man when you hear it over the phone. So the customer service rep didn’t believe the voice belonged to Duff – a female. Is this discrimination?

Listen: Transgender issues explained

There is no doubt in the world that it is difficult for transgender people to live in a world where they’re misunderstood by the majority of people they interact with. I can’t begin to imagine what it’s like, which is why we held a roundtable discussion on it last month. But this doesn’t seem like discrimination worthy of punishment (at least not with what’s been reported at this point); this seems like good security by the bank. At the least, it’s a misunderstanding.

With ID theft on the rise and complaints about private information not being kept private, wouldn’t it sound like someone is scamming you in this situation? If Don O’Neill called you up on the phone, with his incredibly deep and masculine voice, but said his name was Suzanne, wouldn’t you suspect ID theft or a joke?

I think part of this complaint is being driven, not because of discrimination, but because the bank didn’t go through a training session Duff wants them to go through.

KIRO TV reports:

[Duff] said she alerted the bank manager about the issue and asked if employees could sign up for gender sensitivity training with the Gender Justice League, but said repeated requests were ignored.

“Cultural Competency Training, [which is the current language we use instead of sensitivity training], includes informing people about best practices and procedures when serving trans individuals, and cultural education to avoid unintentionally insulting or causing harm to the trans community,” said Tobi Hill-Meyer, of the Gender Justice League.

Sorry, they should pass on the microaggression course.

I’ll provide a simple solution: go to the branch, explain you’re transgender and you may use the customer service line. Ask the bank to make a note in your account that your voice may not match what is traditionally thought to be associated with a female.

Related: Microaggressions – An excuse to be offended, feel victimized

Now maybe she did ask the bank to do this and it didn’t. If that’s the case, that’s a problem and I think the People’s Bank needs to answer to that. But if she didn’t, and instead decided to try to turn this into a social justice crusade, then I’m a little less sympathetic. Let’s wait for the investigation by the Seattle Office for Civil Rights, whose director says, “We want everybody to know and businesses, anyone who provides a service, to know you cannot treat people differently based on their protected class.”

Fair enough: let’s see if the bank customer service representative knew (or should have known).