It’s weird to see scare articles whining about “non gendered bathrooms” and “the PC future of genderless toilets”, as if they didn’t already exist pretty much everywhere. I’ve been using “gender free bathrooms” aka “the bathroom” at restaurants, gas stations, etc for decades, and nobody’s ever asked me if I have a dick or vagina before going in.
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Hmm, conservatives getting all fired up over some minority rights issue that a lot of people have no direct experience with? Something to get the crazies all fired up and motivated, and distract them from the very real hollowing out of the national economy and the fact that the right wing political elite has sold them out…
Must be an election year. The planet is overheating, ISIS is rampaging, the global financial system is on the brink of collapse. Municipalities are going bankrupt, pensions are failing, Wall Street continues to make billions.
But teh gays and weirdos! The children! Moral collapse or whatever! Eleventy!
This stops being an issue that anyone in politics gives a crap about (outside the ultra-crazies who will never let it go) on November 9th. It’s just another flag burning amendment dogwhistle to keep the proles distracted.
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Well, the whole thing probably matters to transgendered people, but maybe they might like to say if they care about this issue or not. I’d suspect that this is more than just right-wingers using this as a wedge issue, but also partially a backlash to gains made on LBGQT issues more generally, especially in the realm of hearts and minds.
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Insert shrill ‘think of the children’ bullshit here.
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It’s not about the bathrooms just like it was never about the water fountains.
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Fair point. I had actually gone back and edited in the ‘in politics’ part to try and avoid the notion that transgender people won’t give a crap. But it isn’t controversial for transgender people - they just want to go to the bathroom.
My point was that this topic, as a political football, will largely disappear in mid-November, at least for the current crop of politicians out making their hay on it right now. It bears all the tags of a right wing wedge issue, combined with all the stuff that seems blatantly obvious to the rest of us (that people of all stripes are people and we should be trying to make sure everyone is comfortable and safe).
‘Gay marriage’ was a hot button issue that was, of course, very important to those whose orientation excluded them from legal marriage. But it was also a hot button issue used to motivate a lot of social conservatives to vote against their interests. The same thing is happening now, because if it works once it will work twice.
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Sure but AFAIK, toilets in restaurants weren’t made unisex by presidential order.
Was it something along the lines of “If people are allowed to identify as something different than their birth gender, then I should be able to identify as a Native American and get me some of that Casino money?” Because that’s one I’ve heard tossed around lately and I find it a less-than-convincing argument.
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They weren’t this time, either.
The DoJ is suing the state of NC over House Bill 2 to protect existing civil rights. The suit states, very straightforwardly, two important things:
- transgender men are male, and transgender women are female.
- if your established gender identity is male, you should use a men’s room. If your gender identity is female, you should use a women’s room.
The talk about unisex bathrooms is something created by the conservative media (and articles like this one) as the possible end result of all the legal wrangling. The Obama administration isn’t requesting only unisex bathrooms, requiring it, or even mentioning it as a preference.
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The difference here is that there are established federal guidelines already in place as to who gets to identify as various races. In the case of Native Americans, it varies from tribe to tribe, but you aren’t allowed to simply declare yourself a Native. Every tribe has their own requirements, mostly involving proving your ancestry to be at least 1/8 or 1/16 Native, or census records showing your ancestry. For gender, so far, we’re in the early days of establishing it as a fluid concept, which wasn’t a big problem until some dickwads got their proverbial panties in a bunch about where people are allowed to pee.
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I spoke with my partner. Most of the ones they can come up with are more adult-centric and not really teenager appropriate. One that they did recommend is the TV Series I Am Jazz which they describe as being about a young teen girl and her family. The cool part is the family is comfortable with her transition. There’s also a made for TV movie with a similar title that’s far more of a documentary.
They do mention that they know of far more print materials, with a bit of a US bias. If you’re interested, please send me a message and I’ll get you a list. Good luck; it sounds like you’re doing parenting right!
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That post got 32 likes, even at #66 in the thread!
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I thought that was this:
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Here on Long Island, we have a group called LIGALY:
http://www.lgbtnetwork.org/ligaly
It is an excellent support for teens. My daughter is involved with the LGBT+ group at her school and this organization supports them. If you do not know of a similar organization near you, I would contact them to see if they know of a national organization that supports them that may have a branch in your area.
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If someone states that they identify as a gender different than that of their birth, is it appropriate to inquire as to their motivation??
Someones sex is not just decided by whether you have an X or Y chromosome. the foetus also needs to get the right hormones at the right time.
Nature gots it right about 99% of the time, but we are talking about the people where it doesn’t go right. There is evidence that Supernumary Phantom Limb syndrome exists, and I see no reason why penises and labias/vaginas are not affected in the same way (my personal experiences say that they are, but that is just anecdotal).
I have said before that I believe that Gender Dysphoria is an intersex condition, caused in a similar way to other intersex conditions. There does seem to be a far higher incidence of physical intersex conditions in trans people.
If you can show that there is a similar way for people to be born as a different ethnic group than what is thought at birth, then go right ahead and show us.
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Motivation makes it sound like you think they’re freely making a choice, which means you didn’t believe them when they stated that “they identify as a gender different than that of their birth”.
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Considering that there are almost no social, financial or legal advantages to claiming a different gender than your birth gender I’d say “almost certainly not.”
The only exception I’d make are the obvious trollies, like those assholes from the “American Family Association” who are now sending cisgendered men into women’s restrooms in some twisted attempt to make some kind of point.
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Exactly; transgendered people have been using the restroom they belong in for decades, but nobody’s ever raised an issue about it, because there’s nothing to be concerned about. Quite frankly, it’ll be far stranger when transgendered people (such as Shawn Stinson) are legally forced to use the restroom of their birth gender.
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