Two P.C. Protests We Could Do Without

I've been known to hyperventilate now and then about the New York Post's insensitivity to gays. But I think GLAAD -- that would be the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation -- is wasting its energy railing about today's Page Six item on There's Something About Miriam, the Fox reality show about a pre-op transsexual and "her" unsuspecting male suitors.

Yes, the show itself is beyond tacky. It makes Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire? look like I, Claudius. And GLAAD has a good point when it says the show encourages a pernicious myth about transsexuals, one that could inspire violence.

But if the mere use of the word "she-male" -- which inspired GLAAD's broadside -- is a beyond-the-pale outrage, someone ought to tell the transsexuals who use it to describe themselves in places like here. You can sort of understand why Page Six editor Richard Johnson would brush off a complaint (and, I admit, his choice of retort made me laugh out loud. Yes, I am 10 years old.)

On a tangentially-related note: Are people actually offended about the Filipino med-school joke on Desperate Housewives? This isn't a put-on?

I realize the easiest thing for ABC to do is apologize and move on, but come on: Nobody's "devaluing Filipinos in healthcare." The joke -- Teri Hatcher's character asks her doctor if his diploma is from "some med school in the Philippines" -- clearly referred to Americans who go overseas for training because they can't get into school in the U.S., not to Filipinos who study there, then move here.

I haven't attended med school anywhere, but to ABC I prescribe a backbone; to outraged Filipinos, a sense of humor.