As everyone knows by now, the Houston Equals Rights Ordinance was defeated on election day. The New York Times had an editorial (rightly) denouncing the results, and the usual comments ensued back and forth. I waited too long to post my comments (stupid job!) and I thought I'd share them here, for what they're worth.
The editorial stated that the way the opposition framed the arguments was, as we Kossacks know, focused on bathrooms. More particularly on pre-operative transgender women using women's restrooms. Apparently there were even t-shirts printed up and worn by the opposition to the Ordinance that said, "No men in women's bathrooms!" (conveniently ignoring the fact that transgender women are women, not men). My comments follow.
I'm curious as to why it's okay for a man to see a transgender man with female anatomy in a men's room, but it's some sort of crisis if a woman to sees a transgender woman who has male anatomy in the women's room? Because a male rapist could dress up as a woman and use the women's room? Setting aside the fact that in all the places where transgender women are allowed to use women's public facilities, this has never happened, what's to prevent a rapist from doing that now? Um, nothing. If you're going to break the law to commit rape, I seriously doubt adding any penalties associated with using the wrong restroom will be much of an additional deterrent.
I would also point out that denying access to a restroom to a transgender woman because of what a cisgender male might do is punishing one class of people for the actions of another group, which, the last time I checked, was against the Constitution, centuries of common law tradition and common sense. And didn't we already settle this discussion when we decided not to prevent gays and lesbians from marrying because two straights might pose as gay couple or a lesbian couple and get married to receive marital benefits?
Since it was the Times, I refrained from asking, "Are the people of Houston that stupid to fall for these same idiotic tropes after we just stopped believing this same crap about the 'dangers' of marriage equality?
Oh, and here's an idea -- unisex public locker rooms and bathrooms with individual shower stalls and toilet stalls. That would also eliminate the line outside the women's room, too. So, now that we have that weighty problem solved [eye roll], can we please move on to other issues like outlawing housing and employment discrimination against women, gays, lesbians, transgenders, the disabled, veterans and the elderly?