Readers would know that I am certainly somewhere on the "cynical" end of the scale on acceptance of the current understanding of what transgender identity is all about. Especially when it comes to the matter of children and the way some parents respond to it.
On the other hand, what is this American conservative panic about transgenders using the toilets they want to use? I would have thought that a man who wants to be a woman wants to identify with them - not use their existing equipment to present a danger to them. I mean, I could be wrong, but I would have thought a transgender man (pre-op or not) is about the safest person a woman could find in their toilet - more wanting to exchange make up tips than have raise any issue about sex.
Is the concern that men could pretend to be transgender so as to get their way into a toilet that might give them access to a woman alone? I suppose...but really, any heterosexual potential rapist could already sneak into a women's toilet if he wants to.
If a woman is concerned by any man who does not appear to be non transgender in the toilet alone, does the law change prevent her raising a concern?
Err Steve,
ReplyDeleteWhen you go to the toilet why do men use urinals?" It doesn't matter how much I try to think I am a woman I will still need to use an urinal and vica versa.
Homer, how do you manage to live at home if your toilet doesn't have a urinal? (I'm also pretty sure that an "intact" wannabe transgender man will sit down rather than risk making a mess by standing up.)
ReplyDeleteIt's not unknown in Japan, by the way, for women to sneak into the men's if the women's toilets have a line up for them. Men standing at the urinal don't freak out about it. Women in America have even less chance of spotting a penis if it's a transgender wannabe going into one of their stalls.
I believe we are talking about public toilets. no-one shares toilets at my place.
ReplyDeleteTo put in crude but accurate terms if you have dick you use male toilets no matter what you 'think' you are!
Even if convincingly presenting as a woman in dress and general appearance, hey?
ReplyDeleteIt aint what they are dressed in but what they use at the toilet!
ReplyDeleteThat is why they are called male and female toilets
I can see why it would be a sensitive issue for some people. One example that comes to mind is women who have been raped; the last thing they'd want to find in the toilet is a man-transitioning-to-woman.
ReplyDeleteGee, Tim, it's pretty much that attitude that prompted me to write the entire post. A woman who fears men, I would have thought, has little to fear from a man who is so determined to be a woman he would like his penis removed...
ReplyDeleteAnd the other "sensitive issue" you don't mention is the man dressed half convincingly as a woman who goes in to use the men's. I may consider quite a few of them to be a tad nuts, but I don't begrudge them their interest in avoiding bashings, which (I would presume) is tens of times a more likely outcome from toilet use than a woman being raped via a transgender using their toilets...
ReplyDeleteHere, this Time magazine article looks at the issue.
http://time.com/3974186/transgender-bathroom-debate/