Trangender Bathroom and Locker Room Useage at Public Schools - New Federal Guidelines.

originally posted by: DBCowboy

We need common sense.

We need peace love and understanding too, and unicorns and rainbows all day every day.

What we want and need doesn't always happen just because we want and need it.

The less than 1% of the population actually affected by the laws can't even agree on how it should be handled... The larger populace definitely can't agree about it.

All this does is get people disagreeing and arguing, most people aren't even affected in any way by the laws.

I agree, laws shouldn't be needed at all. But since they are I'd rather see them at a state level than federal level. They're easier to work with for the people that actually are affected by them that way.

a reply to: kaylaluv

We have common sense but fail to use it.

What people have underneath their clothes is no one's damned business.

a reply to: Noncents

Let's face facts: the Southern states are filled with evangelicals and other religious nuts who are still steaming about having to give gays marriage equality. This bathroom issue (which is actually larger than just who uses public bathrooms) is a way to get back some of the power the religious extremists have lost.

The exact same situation happened when slavery was outlawed. That pissed the Southern states off, which had them instate the Jim Crow laws, to get back some of the power they lost.

No state in the union should have the power to discriminate.

originally posted by: DBCowboy
a reply to: kaylaluv

We have common sense but fail to use it.

What people have underneath their clothes is no one's damned business.

I don't disagree with any of that. Tell that to the South.

What does "the south" or "the evagelicals" have to do with "guidelines"?

a reply to: kaylaluv
You're right. I'm no friend of the evangelical minds. I do not have a "it must be this way" type of hard-stance on the issue. But I do support a smaller federal government.

My only real life experience with the issue is a man with breast implants. I will not call him a her as he wants because he has refused to move past the implants for over a decade and has had several real chances to do so. He wants to keep his manhood and breasts and wants to be considered a woman. He is straight, as in, is attracted to women.

I don't think he has any place in women's changing rooms or showers. I can't speak beyond that about the issue with any certainty. He's the closest thing to a transgender person that I know.

a reply to: shooterbrody

It's not the liberal or "blue" states that have been fighting the existing guidelines on transgender students using the restrooms that align with their gender identity. The liberal states have already set up non-discrimination laws to protect these students.

Guess which states have been bucking the guidelines. Guess which states have been fighting the non-discrimination laws that have been proposed or passed there.

originally posted by: Noncents
I agree, laws shouldn't be needed at all. But since they are I'd rather see them at a state level than federal level. They're easier to work with for the people that actually are affected by them that way.

Why is it so hard to see the problem with this? In states like North Carolina and their HB2 and SB6 as proposed in Texas trans kids can't legally pee in the bathroom that goes with who they are. In 19 other states, the rights of trans people to use the public accommodations that are best for them is law. Do you expect parents with trans kids are supposed to just up and move if their state passes discriminatory legislation?

Equality needs to come from the top down to not be some confusing patchwork from state to state.

a reply to: Noncents

I know of several transgender people. Some have had the sex reassignment surgery; some have not. The ones who haven't had various reasons for not doing so - the money, not being able to take time off from work, fear of surgery, fear of the procedure getting "botched", etc.

Lesbians go into women's bathrooms and showers - they like women too.

a reply to: Freija
Now, now... I didn't say anyone should move. If a person is unhappy with their local and state laws then they should get involved and work to change those laws. It's easier to do so at a state level than at a federal level.

a reply to: Noncents

That could take years - so in the meantime, just suffer? In a state like Texas, I'm not sure it's even possible - the evangelicals have pretty much taken over.

originally posted by: Noncents
a reply to: Freija
Now, now... I didn't say anyone should move. If a person is unhappy with their local and state laws then they should get involved and work to change those laws. It's easier to do so at a state level than at a federal level.

Do you honestly think this isn't being addressed at local state levels?

Tell me, how is that going to work locally in the Bible Belt?

Human Equality belongs to all - - - and denying it because of a God belief is wrong.

In order... No, no and no.

I'm done here.

a reply to: DBCowboy

What a notion.

Common sense, it's what's good for you.

I wouldn't feel comfortable with boys coming into girls washrooms if I were a girl. Who's to say they won't gang rape a girl in a girls washroom?

originally posted by: happyperson
I wouldn't feel comfortable with boys coming into girls washrooms if I were a girl. Who's to say they won't gang rape a girl in a girls washroom?

What's stopping boys now from doing it?

It's illegal.

It has been and will be illegal to sexually assault anyone.

"Bathroom Laws" won't stop evil people from doing evil things.

These laws segregate and punish innocent people who have done nothing wrong.

I agree with the people who said toilets and locker rooms are not the same.
Firstly, I'm no longer in school, and the conscription or even varsity residences in my day would have had scant respect for trans people.
Men were socialized to have very little shyness amongst each other.
It simply wasn't viable to give every soldier or rugby player his own private stall (for showers or number two's - often not even for number one's. You'd be going in the bush with your buddy watching over you with an R4 rifle).
Even in the US, male swimming was in the nude, since before the advent of nylon, wooly swim-short fibers broke the pool's filtration system.
Yeah it's on YouTube with many testimonies.
In some places this carried on until the early 1980s.
Here, we saw young conscripted men lining up in their underwear on the news.
Are you ready to poop with your bros on the back of a truck with no privacy?
No? Well perhaps you should re-consider living as a male.

I was in gym today, and there were 20 guys in the locker room.
It was pretty crowded.
I don't know if any of those guys were trans or not.
OK the locker rooms are 18-years-of-age and above, and any impropriety can be reported to staff.
But from a masculanist perspective, male "shyness" was bred out of us from a young age.
There is a "bro-code" about it.
Focus on what you're doing, and unless a brother speaks to you (look him in the face), or look at the floor, or nowadays, the screen with the sport's update.
We were expected to be more physical than women.
Even the way we burp and fart - it reflects the jobs we were expected to do.
Dangerous jobs. You can't fall off the ladder because somebody farts.
Even today, where there's no conscription, men must sign up for a potential conscription (and I hope that applies to female-to-male transsexuals).
We're all facing masculine problems as brothers, and if you want to be us, you shouldn't only get the privilege, but also the responsibility.
Not just a room of your own, but also a potential body-bag of your own.

But toilets - in well policed areas like trendy clubs, or some liberal campuses - for sure.
But unisex toilets everywhere, no and I fear for the women.
You want men following you into the public toilets in the middle of the night, and I can't even report it?
Good luck with that in the rape capitals of the world, whether you're a trans or biological woman.

Toilets in bars and clubs that are relatively small and for an older dining club - never had a problem.
There's cubicles you can close only, and love doing my hair at the mirror with some female input.

But sometimes men also want the male spaces they were introduced to as youngsters.
People of the same gender also like to bond, discuss things after the game, or that you want advice from your brothers about that girl by the bar.
Is she for me? Or he? I've asked hetero buddies for advice in the crapper too.
As Fonzie said: "Step into my office".
They already took all our clubs and homosocial spaces in civil society, and men also need affirmation and advice from other men.

In gym locker-rooms - if you look like a male, behave like one, and nobody feels uncomfortable - why not?
Most younger guys wear shower-shorts anyway.
But know the "bro code".

However, in SA, I don't want it to be a free for all.
Similar to defining tribal, aboriginal or ethnic identities, there should be tribunals (which could include trans and cisgender representatives).
One could then get a card, and bona fide identity.
One also wants to prevent a pervert or voyeur "rapist" from abusing the situation.
There should be some boundaries around gender identities.

originally posted by: kaylaluv
a reply to: shooterbrody

It's not the liberal or "blue" states that have been fighting the existing guidelines on transgender students using the restrooms that align with their gender identity. The liberal states have already set up non-discrimination laws to protect these students.

Guess which states have been bucking the guidelines. Guess which states have been fighting the non-discrimination laws that have been proposed or passed there.

What you call "existing guidelines" were in no way in the law passed in 1972. When the DOE and the DOJ pushed their interpretation onto a law that was 44 years old of course states sued. Especially when the DOJ threatened to withhold federal funding for non compliance.

No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance

That is what title 9 is. It was intended to give girls in schools the same opportunity with the same funding as boys. What the former administration with help from the doe and doj attempted to do was change the law without congress.
Removing the guidelines does not change the law. Discrimination on the basis of sex will cost the education program or activity the federal funding they get.
You want a law to change what the meaning of "sex" is in title 9 go right ahead.
It appears to me that you have no problem with the govt changing laws when they agree with your agenda; and then when changes are made the same way but against your agenda it is "wrong". Appears hypocritical.

originally posted by: shooterbrody

What you call "existing guidelines" were in no way in the law passed in 1972. When the DOE and the DOJ pushed their interpretation onto a law that was 44 years old of course states sued.

But only the religious red states sued. Funny, that. Those same states were the ones who got so upset at marriage equality for gays, too. There's a consistent theme here - do you get it?