Okay, as long as you understand that this is a very radical idea and that there’s literally nobody out there who actually wants to do that.
So let me ask you why you want to - do you think wanting a woman who doesn’t want to share a bathroom or locker room with men hates men? Is she a bigot?
Yes, it is.
That’s what we’re discussing.
Not sure how you think it’s anything else than that.
So if we just left the “whites only” signs up but said it was only a convention, not a rule or law, that would be okay with you too?
Possibly, it depends on her motivations. Might be that she’s just a prude, might be that she thinks all men are rapists (and yes, that’s sexist).
That’d clearly not be ok with me because I don’t think it’d work; I think gendered signs just being a convention would work, but I could be wrong. That’s why I said you might be convincing me that full unisex is a must.
And here’s the point - in reality, as you said earlier, there is no way whatsoever for you to know whether anyone is being deceptive or not. Just as you explained to your daughter.
So there is no way to enforce gender separation in bathrooms. You can’t ask someone if they are transgender, or whether they really are transgender.
So really there’s no such thing as gendered rooms any more. Even if you are in a locker room with a naked person with genitals you can clearly see are opposite the gender identity of those in the room, they could be transgender. So there’s no gender privacy any more, and no possibility of it. The only way to accomplish that would be a law that allows someone to call the police and the police come and demand proof that someone really is transgender.
So then what’s the point of being so concerned about transgender people using the “right” room if the right room effectively doesn’t exist, or at least only exists as long as most people care to go along with it? Why pretend?
So if a white person doesn’t want to associate with blacks, he or she might not be a bigot - it depends on the motivation?
LOL. What a fantastic dodge when I trapped you. So if keeping whites only signs up WOULD work, you’d be okay with them? It probably would have worked just fine in the South in 1965, so would it be okay with you then?
As you have been told over and over and over and over and over again, it’s not a matter of transgender people using the “right” room-it’s more a matter of them using the room they feel safer in, because of the real dangers(as opposed to the imaginary feewings of your six year old girl) they face.
Here’s why this is bullshit, IMO – the vast majority of people will still use the bathrooms that correspond to their gender. Sure, you can pretend that the possibility of deception means “there’s no such things as gendered rooms any more”, but in reality, the vast majority of people will continue as they have been, with people who identify as men using the men’s room, and people who identify as women using the ladies room. So in practice, gendered restrooms will continue. There will exist the possibility of deception, and the possibility that someone could ‘invade’ the ‘gender privacy’, but in practice, there will be very little deception, and nearly everyone will have ‘gender privacy’ almost all of the time in bathrooms.
So there’s no pretending – the vast majority of people will still use the “correct” (gender-corresponding) bathroom, and the vast majority of people will have ‘gender privacy’ the vast majority of the time.
The only really “new” thing, if new cultural (non-bigoted) and societal mores are accepted, will be that transgender people no longer have cause to fear being brutalized for using the bathroom.
Sure, maybe for now. But given the many people here on this board saying gendered rooms are pointless, or even that they should be abolished, do you think that will last forever?
I never would have though we’d have legal pot, gay marriage and a black president in my lifetime either. But things change, sometimes fast.
And here’s the thing - why fight it? That’s my greater point. Why pretend that we somehow value gendered bathrooms and locker rooms if you don’t want to do anything whatsoever to preserve them other than just hope most people keep using them the same way? What’s the point?
Next time you use a men’s room where women aren’t allowed, you’re a bigot, just like if you joined a mens’ only club or whites only. Be sure to feel guilty.
Because that’s how it’s always been, even though it’s not that hard to be deceitful. Because the vast majority of people have no interest in going into the other bathroom.
Why would it end, at least before society comes to a general agreement to end gendered bathrooms altogether? The vast majority of people have no interest in going into the bathroom that corresponds to the other gender. Why would there be any reason to think this would change?
But there have been people crying out for these things for a long time, and successfully demonstrating the harm with their lack. The same is not true for gendered bathrooms – the vast majority of people want to go to the bathroom that corresponds to their gender, and don’t want to go to the other one. Why would this change?
There’s no push for change, so there’s no ‘need’ to fight against the change. We just all go “meh” and continue as we always have, and people will continue to go to the bathroom that corresponds to their gender the vast majority of the time. What’s the point of doing something different to this?
Trying to change the societal practice of gendered bathrooms sounds like it would take tons and tons of effort for the barest gain. As long as transgender people aren’t discriminated against, then gendered bathrooms seem to do very little harm, and therefore there seems to be very little need to change them.
The status quo is sucky and unsafe for transgender people, while simultaneously (I’m being told in this thread) threatens the feelings of some cisgender people.
The proposed anti-transgender “gender of birth” laws are sucky and unsafe for transgender people and for cisgender people, for all the reasons already mentioned in this thread. They’re a step in the wrong direction. They put more, not fewer, people at risk, both of bodily harm and bruised feelings.
Unisex bathrooms - which I’m not so much a proponent of as accepting of - make things safer for both transgender people and for cisgender people, simply by virtue of having more people in and out of one room, reducing opportunity for assaults, and making it unremarkable for anyone of any gender to walk through the door.
So that’s where I’m at. Unisex bathrooms are better than what we have now, and much better than the anti-transgender solution.
But I’m not married to it. And so, again, if you’re against unisex bathrooms, what do you propose to make things safer for transgender people?
What we cannot do is sit quietly by while legislators make things even worse for all of us.
I was talking about a hypothetical future in which social mores have changed, transgender people are not discriminated against, but gendered bathrooms remain.
Well, gender discrimination will always exist, because once we went back to recognizing genders as different we accepted that people will want to associate with their gender in certain situations and exclude those of other genders. So we have two choices: go back to the radical feminist assertion that the sexes are the same other than the obvious difference, or support freedom of association even when it’s discriminatory as far as gender goes. Which will mean that a lot of cisgendered folks will only want to have Ladies night with other cisgender ladies.
Those two choices aren’t in conflict – no one opposes freedom of association, and people will always be able to choose who they want to hang out with. No one will force ladies to hang out with anyone they don’t want to on ladies night or any other night.
We do respect freedom of association, but we socially ostracize those who discriminate on the basis of race. As long as we recognize that freedom of association for gender is a different thing, then we’ll be all right.