When using a public restroom, it’s best to have a strategy.
In a men’s room, I find a three-pronged approach is best: 1) Get in and out as quickly as possible. 2) Breathe through your mouth in case it smells bad (it always smells bad). And 3) Never, ever make eye contact with someone leaving a stall.
And I was on a cleaning crew once upon a time, so I harbor no illusions that women’s restrooms are a whole lot better.
Yet it appears we’re living under constant threat of men posing as women to see and hear things we’d rather forget ever happened at all.
Sen. Doug Erickson of Ferndale rose up against this public hazard with his “men in the women’s locker room” bill. The bill, which the Senate shot down on Wednesday, would have repealed a Human Rights Commission rule that says transgender people can’t be required to use a “gender segregated” restroom that’s inconsistent with their gender identity. In other words, the bill said it doesn’t matter how you live your life; all that counts is your plumbing.
Our latest poll at HeraldNet.com shows our voters supported Erickson’s efforts. We asked whether you think transgender people should be able to choose restrooms based on their gender identity, and the vote was a firm 73 percent no.
This despite the fact that public school systems across the state have adopted transgender protections for students without any problems; the fact that there are other laws barring inappropriate restroom behavior; and the fact that you’ve almost certainly already been in restrooms with transgender people and come away unscathed.
Perhaps someday we’ll have enough gender-neutral restrooms that discussions like this won’t matter. Until then, we’ve got people like Erickson trying to protect us from the bogeyman — or bogeywoman. Mythical monsters, it seems, can be any gender.
— Doug Parry, @parryracer
Next up, we’d like to know how you’re feeling now about the privatization of liquor sales.
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