President Obama and other politicians are taking a wide stance over the nation’s public restrooms. Important bathroom policy will finally be determined at the highest levels.
Last week, public educators nationwide received a legalistically-worded letter from the Departments of Justice and Education explaining how to legally treat transgender students under Title IX of the Civil Rights Act. CNN boiled it down to “Fall in line or face loss of federal funding.”
Friendly federal “guidance” comes after dueling lawsuits between the Feds and North Carolina over that state’s House Bill 2, which establishes statewide restroom regulations. Those regs require that transgender folks use the bathroom appropriate to the sex listed on their birth certificate (whether Kenyan, Canadian or other).
Obama wants Americans to choose the restroom matching their self-chosen “gender identity.” Conservatives seem most worried that his policy is so loosely defined as to allow non-transgender male persons to simply claim to be transgender in order to shower with the girls volley-ball team or lurk in the powder room.
“Have we gone stark raving nuts?” questioned Sen. Ted Cruz, proclaiming: “Grown adult men, strangers, should not be alone in a bathroom with little girls.”
In California, there’s legislation to force businesses to make “all single-stall public restrooms” gender neutral. “Let’s make a clear statement that, if you want to go pee, by all means help yourself,” argued the proposal’s author.
Transgender people should be treated with care and respect, as should every person. But do we really need a national bathroom policy designed for maximum division in an election year?
Before politicians solve today’s glaring non-problem in public restrooms, they should solve a real problem first.
Just one.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
9 replies on “Toiletarianism”
It is my strong suspicion the transgender shave been relieving themselves in public facilities for a long time. That should be allowed to continue, not restricted by a law, but rather in the manner which causes the least ruckus.
What does it take to be considered “transgender”? All Johnny has to do is say, “I feel like a woman inside,” and he’s allowed to go into the girl’s locker room? If you’re going to give a group specific legal protections, you have to be able to clearly define who qualifies as a member of that group.- — Morning Jolt … with Jim Geraghty 13 May 2016
“Fall in line or face loss of federal funding.” How do they get away with this hollow sophistry? There is no law behind this. This is just Obama, desperately trying to embarrass the nation, he despises, one more time before he leaves the scene of the crime…
JFB — You said it more succinctly than I. Thanks.
If folks haven’t seen this video, it’s funny:
http://www.thv11.com/news/politics/meet-the-hb2-bathroom-police/178518744
Most new Chipolte, Pei Wei, various burger places and others of similar ilk have single stall bathrooms. I use whichever is available.
That graphic is amazing & very apropos. Congress is a toilet.
How many transgender students are there in high school that have been disenfranchised? I haven’t seen any sort of statistic any where. Prior to this, I never heard that this was a huge issue. Further, a gender neutral bathroom, like in many bars & airports, sufficiently stops this problem, without any government saber rattling.
As has happened so often in the past, they make a lot of noise over some stupid crap in order to keep us from learning what is going on “behind the curtain”.
Whipsaw of the Week. MY concern is the end result will be the removal of “perverts,” for want of a better term, from the legal system. As I told one defender of this, I can now walk in to a ladies room on a whim, and on my statement that I “identify” as female. Truthfully, I would opt for the shower room. The “fauxtographers” will still be prosecuted, IF caught. This gives me unfettered access.