Transgender People and Restrooms: Neutrality is the Best Policy
College and university campuses have evolved over the years to provide safety and inclusion for its students of various backgrounds. However, a group of individuals attend school every day and are restricted from a basic human right: using the bathroom. Transgender students, or students whose gender identity does not conform to the gender that was assigned to them at birth, are susceptible to harassment and violence on campus because of sanctioned rules and social conditions that restrict them from using the bathroom of their choice. Discrimination against transgender individuals, or transphobia, is a force that some students face every day, and public bathrooms are often the scene of transphobic acts against transgender students. Debates on transgender rights concerning public bathrooms have risen in the recent years, and an ultimatum has yet to be reached between opposing sides of the …show more content…
“In a woman’s restroom I might get called a man and yelled at,” recounts Widmer, a transgender woman who is an advocate for transgender rights, “but while using a men’s restroom I might get called a faggot or a tranny and then beaten up. It doesn’t seem like a controversial issue to me, it’s pretty simple. People need to pee” (Steinmetz, 2015). Bryan Burgess, coordinator of the Safe Bathroom Access Campaign at the Transgender Law Center in San Francisco, elaborates that many transgender people feel unsafe in either of the gendered bathrooms, stating, "People stare and the message transgender people get is that they don 't belong there” (“Bathrooms,” 2006). In a 2002 survey by the San Francisco Human Rights Commission, it was found that almost 50% of transgender individuals that were surveyed expressed that they had been harassed or assaulted in public bathrooms (Lettelier,
College and university campuses have evolved over the years to provide safety and inclusion for its students of various backgrounds. However, a group of individuals attend school every day and are restricted from a basic human right: using the bathroom. Transgender students, or students whose gender identity does not conform to the gender that was assigned to them at birth, are susceptible to harassment and violence on campus because of sanctioned rules and social conditions that restrict them from using the bathroom of their choice. Discrimination against transgender individuals, or transphobia, is a force that some students face every day, and public bathrooms are often the scene of transphobic acts against transgender students. Debates on transgender rights concerning public bathrooms have risen in the recent years, and an ultimatum has yet to be reached between opposing sides of the …show more content…
“In a woman’s restroom I might get called a man and yelled at,” recounts Widmer, a transgender woman who is an advocate for transgender rights, “but while using a men’s restroom I might get called a faggot or a tranny and then beaten up. It doesn’t seem like a controversial issue to me, it’s pretty simple. People need to pee” (Steinmetz, 2015). Bryan Burgess, coordinator of the Safe Bathroom Access Campaign at the Transgender Law Center in San Francisco, elaborates that many transgender people feel unsafe in either of the gendered bathrooms, stating, "People stare and the message transgender people get is that they don 't belong there” (“Bathrooms,” 2006). In a 2002 survey by the San Francisco Human Rights Commission, it was found that almost 50% of transgender individuals that were surveyed expressed that they had been harassed or assaulted in public bathrooms (Lettelier,