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A Quest for a Restroom That's Neither Men's Room Nor Women's Room
The New York Times ^ | March 4, 2005 | Patricia Leigh Brown

Posted on 03/04/2005 4:51:12 AM PST by MississippiMasterpiece

SAN FRANCISCO - Political epiphanies can occur in unexpected places. For Riki Dennis, a 35-year-old humanities student who is transsexual, it was the women's room at a rest stop on Highway 101 north of Santa Barbara.

"The boyfriend hit me, even in mellow California," said Ms. Dennis, who was in the early stages of becoming female when she was assaulted by a stranger after using the women's room. "I said, 'Sir, I have no designs on your girlfriend.' I just want to use the bathroom."

Ms. Dennis, whose lowish voice is now the lone betrayal of her birth sex, is a foot soldier on a new political frontier: the campaign to establish gender-neutral bathrooms in public places. The idea is to make sure that transgender people (an umbrella term that can include transsexuals, cross-dressers and those with a fluid, androgynous identity who do not consider themselves completely male or female) can use bathrooms without fear of harassment.

Ms. Dennis is one of 250 or so members of People in Search of Safe Restrooms, a group founded here three years ago. It reflects a small but active movement, mostly on college campuses but also in a few cities, in which the bathroom, that prosaic fixture of past battles against racial segregation and for the rights of the disabled, has become an emotional and at times deeply personal symbol of a cultural and political divide.

In fact, bathrooms have become a cultural "fault line," said Mary Anne Case, a law professor at the University of Chicago, where the Queer Action Campaign for Gender-Neutral Bathrooms recently got 10 single-use restrooms on campus designated gender neutral.

"Very few spaces in our society remain divided by sex," Professor Case said. "There's marriage and there's toilets, and very little else."

To young transgender people, especially college students, the issue has particular resonance.

"Students are looking hard at the right to express their gender, a painful right of passage for every young adult," said Riki Wilchins, executive director of the Gender Public Advocacy Coalition, a nonprofit group in Washington that fights discrimination and violence based on gender stereotypes. "These kids are demanding the right to be who they are and what they are 24/7. They're tired of being harassed or hassled when they simply need to use a public facility."

And so many students - including those at Beloit College in Wisconsin, Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, N.Y., and the University of California, Santa Barbara - have lobbied successfully for gender-neutral bathrooms.

At the New College of California, a liberal arts college in the Mission District of San Francisco, men's and women's rooms have recently given way to "de-gendered" restrooms, devoid of urinals as well as of white stick figures with pants or a skirt. Signs on the doors proclaim the new restroom politics: "Lots of people don't fit neatly into our culture's rigid two-gender system."

At the City College of San Francisco, a community college with more than 100,000 students, about 10 percent to 12 percent of the students are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender. After complaints of harassment by a transgender student, campus administrators recently transformed some men's bathrooms into gender-neutral ones.

Two new satellite campuses, to open in 2007, are being planned with men's, women's and gender-neutral bathrooms on every floor of the buildings. Major new construction on the University of California, Santa Barbara, campus is also going to include gender-neutral bathrooms.

One reason the issue has significance on these campuses is that in contrast to previous generations, in which many sought to transform their birth sex through hormones or surgery, today's young transgender people are content with a more fluid identity.

"I use the male bathroom, because I live my life as a male," said Rolan Gregg, a 29-year-old student at the California College of Arts and Crafts in San Francisco, who was born female and, though he is taking hormones, does not "pass yet," as he put it. "The problem with not passing is that my risk of violence is really high. So going to the bathroom becomes really scary."

Public restroom use is governed by a legal patchwork of city and town ordinances and state laws. San Francisco is one of five cities, including New York, with regulations protecting public restroom access based on "gender identity," which refers to a person's internal sense of gender rather than their birth sex.

But in other places, restroom access based on gender identity is "an evolving area of the law," said Chris Daley, executive director of the Transgender Law Center, a San Francisco-based civil rights organization.

Here in California, where the governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, speaks derogatorily of "girlie men," the battle over public municipal bathrooms began in San Francisco in 2001, when the city's Human Rights Commission surveyed use of the city's bathrooms after complaints by transgender people and others about harassment in public and private bathrooms. As a result of the survey, the city passed guidelines recommending gender-neutral bathrooms be an option in public places.

"In San Francisco," said Marcus Arana, the a discrimination investigator for the commission, "the choice between being hassled or holding their water affects thousands of people."

Elsewhere in the Bay Area, advocates of gender-neutral bathrooms are beginning to make themselves heard. In January, they pressed the board of supervisors of Alameda County to adopt a resolution forbidding discrimination in public facilities, including restrooms, based on gender identity. Alameda County was the home of Gwen Araujo, a 17-year-old transgender high school student who was murdered in 2002.

But at the meeting, opponents to the provision focused on potential side effects of the law.

"You can be sure that stalkers and peeping Toms will take full advantage of this change," said Catherine Norman, 54, a substitute teacher from Fremont. She added, "Bathrooms are about biology, not perceived gender."

Whenever he is in an airport, Shana Agid, a 30-year-old transgender art student, finds himself praying he can hold out until he gets on the airplane.

"Day after day, it gets a little old," he said of a ritual he confronts at least a half-dozen times a day. "It feels ridiculous to tell people as a grown person that you have trouble going to the bathroom."


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: homosexualagenda; unisex; unisextoilets
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To: MississippiMasterpiece
Isn't there a story attributed to Abe Lincoln about asking a boy if you call a goat's tail "a leg" then how many legs does the goat have?

After the boy said five, Abe corrected him with a response of four.

The salient quote was something like this: "Just because you call it a leg doesn't make it a leg."

Otherwise I am nonplussed. Why is this even a story?

21 posted on 03/04/2005 5:19:24 AM PST by QwertyKPH (Non-profane tagline)
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To: nothingnew

If Riki looks female, how come she was harrassed at the rest stop? Did he pee in the sink because he couldn't find a urinal?


22 posted on 03/04/2005 5:20:04 AM PST by gridlock (ELIMINATE PERVERSE INCENTIVES)
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To: MississippiMasterpiece

She's got man hands!


23 posted on 03/04/2005 5:24:03 AM PST by Rummyfan
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To: MississippiMasterpiece

Either one stands to pee or one does not!


24 posted on 03/04/2005 5:24:47 AM PST by verity (The Liberal Media is America's Enemy)
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To: gridlock

Evidently s/he has a deep voice. One of my son's friends is definitely female. At first I thought she was a transexual whatever but then I met her mother. Same deep voice and big big woman.


25 posted on 03/04/2005 5:26:05 AM PST by Mercat (smeeeeee)
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To: MississippiMasterpiece

Good good ... how many "transgendered" people are there in America, and is it really enough to demand gender-neutral bathrooms in public facilities? I don't think we need to start re-ordering society to accomodate a tiny fraction of people.


26 posted on 03/04/2005 5:27:08 AM PST by Polonius (It's called logic, it'll help you.)
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To: MississippiMasterpiece
People in Search of Safe Restrooms

The PISSeRs?

27 posted on 03/04/2005 5:29:20 AM PST by KidGlock (W-1)
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To: MississippiMasterpiece
"Lots of people don't fit neatly into our culture's rigid two-gender system."

Name a culture in the world that has a gender system for more than two sexes.

28 posted on 03/04/2005 5:31:11 AM PST by KidGlock (W-1)
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To: Mercat
Evidently s/he has a deep voice.

When was the last time you talked to a stranger in a public restroom? If you're there to pee, pee. If there is any possible question over which restroom you should be using, shut up and pee.

29 posted on 03/04/2005 5:31:59 AM PST by gridlock (ELIMINATE PERVERSE INCENTIVES)
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To: bikepacker67
OK, so now we need three restrooms in every establishment: one for Males, one for Females, and one for Other. It is only a matter of time before this becomes an ADA requirement.
30 posted on 03/04/2005 5:33:02 AM PST by ARCADIA (Abuse of power comes as no surprise)
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To: gridlock

You must be male. LOL When women encounter each other, at least in the midwest, it's a smile and a "hi." elevator, bathroom, walking down the hall.


31 posted on 03/04/2005 5:33:27 AM PST by Mercat (smeeeeee)
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To: MississippiMasterpiece

Another case of a militant minority forcing normal people in the majority to compy with thier point of view. Here, we have mentally unbalanced freaks requiring the rest of us to participate in their therapy.


32 posted on 03/04/2005 5:35:05 AM PST by Tacis ("John ("What SF-180?") Kerry - Still Shilling For Those Who Would Harm America!")
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To: MississippiMasterpiece
As a precaution, Riki Dennis carries identification that identifies her as female.

Calling it a female does not make it so. This individual is a mutilated male. End of discussion.

33 posted on 03/04/2005 5:40:39 AM PST by JimRed ("Hey, hey, Teddy K., how many girls did you drown today?")
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To: MississippiMasterpiece
What they are really looking for, is a gay-only rest room where the likes of George Michael can have a private glory-hole session, and sue establishments that don't provide such a service.

The depravity of these people knows no bounds.
34 posted on 03/04/2005 5:45:17 AM PST by esoxmagnum
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To: MississippiMasterpiece

I've said for a long time that any government that chooses to pretend that homosexuality is normal needs to do something about the restroom situation, i.e., either go to a single restroom for all, or have 4 restrooms: 1)Men, 2)Women, 3)Male homosexuals, 4) Female homosexuals.

Why do we have multiple restrooms in the first place? Answer: because women don't want men gawking at them when all they want is to relieve themselves and maybe make a few discreet adjustments to their undergarments. Well, I don't want "men" gawking at me either, and I'm a man! This has only happened to me once in my life that I noticed but I still didn't like it.

Either one or four; anything else is hypocritical. Hell, maybe we need six, adding another one for "male->female transitionals" and another for "female->male transitionals". Sigh. My preference though would be that people accept God's assignment and quit pretending to be something else.


35 posted on 03/04/2005 5:45:48 AM PST by libertylover (Being liberal means never being concerned about the truth.)
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To: MississippiMasterpiece
"The idea is to make sure that transgender people (an umbrella term that can include transsexuals, cross-dressers and those with a fluid, androgynous identity who do not consider themselves completely male or female) "

Jeez...How complicated can it be? Look in your pants, if you have a johnson, use the men's room,, if not, use the ladies room.
Bones
36 posted on 03/04/2005 5:45:48 AM PST by Bones75
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To: MississippiMasterpiece

"Students are looking hard at the right to express their gender, a painful right of passage for every young adult,"

Heck, as a young adult, I was ready and anxious to go express my gender...


37 posted on 03/04/2005 6:11:24 AM PST by tarawa
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To: MississippiMasterpiece

Great.

1. Some nutbag NGO at the UN is going to propose an "International Convention On Rights of the Transgendered" that will call for every nation to establish "third way" bathrooms, which will be ratified by exactly zero nations.

2. The Coalition of the Oppressed here in the US (i.e., the civil rights grievance industry) will sue for such rights on behalf of the 100 or so confused individuals out there.

3. The Supreme Court, lead by Justice Kennedy, will decide that the Constitution requires every government and every employer to provide unisex bathrooms in case they are visited by a transsexual, in large part because of "international norms" represented by some NGO's unratified treaty.

4. Taxpayers and businesses will be saddled with billions of dollars in costs to allow Justices Kennedy, Ginsberg, Breyer, Souter, and Stevens to try to impress their buddies in the UN/EU elite.


38 posted on 03/04/2005 6:14:11 AM PST by mondonico (Peace through Superior Firepower)
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To: MississippiMasterpiece
They oughtta change the name to People In Search of Safe Egalitarian Restrooms.
39 posted on 03/04/2005 6:17:53 AM PST by Savage Beast (My parents, grandparents, and great grandparents were Democrats. My children are Republicans.)
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To: MississippiMasterpiece

In a female rest room, there are only stalls. If this person simply entered the facility, without drawing attention, there should have been no fuss.

I think, if there is a push for unisex bathrooms, you'll see women (real ones) rise up in the kind of indignation not seen in this country since the Boston Tea Party.


40 posted on 03/04/2005 6:19:44 AM PST by Darnright (No matter how sick a person is, he is and will always be a man, never becoming a vegetable or animal)
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