While many people don’t stress over something as seemingly simple as going to the restroom, many transgender people are faced with the question, ‘Which restroom do I use?’
“Any transgender person is hyper-vigilant about what others are doing, how they’re looking and how they’re responding,” Pima County public defender Abigail Jensen said.
A person’s negative body language is enough to send Jensen across the street to use a more welcoming restroom.
As of now, restrooms can be a space of questioning and harassment. For many members of the LGBT community, their gender identity and gender expression differ from what is listed on their birth certificate.
“I’m a woman and I belong in the women’s restroom,” Jensen, a transgender woman, said.
Most cities do not have laws explicitly stating that a man cannot use a women’s restroom or vice versa, Jensen said. The idea that transgender people aren’t allowed in the gendered restroom they prefer is incorrect, she said.
“The social convention of restricting bathrooms in the United States is only enforced by people complaining,” Jensen said. “The problem is, people think they have the right to police how other people look and whether or not they look feminine or masculine enough to be in a certain place.”
One solution that some businesses and schools are adopting is gender-neutral restrooms.
These are restrooms marked for use by people of any gender, unlike restrooms marked specifically male or female. Gender-neutral restrooms are also different from restrooms marked for use by both men and women.
Gender-neutral restrooms benefit anybody who might not fit within stereotypical gender norms, like men who are more feminine, women who look more masculine, or women with medical conditions who can grow more facial hair than men, Equality Arizona Board President Rebecca Wininger said.
“It’s a matter of personal freedom and autonomy. We all should be able to decide who we are and live accordingly as long as we’re not harming anybody else,” Jensen said. “Ideally, people should trust that we know where we belong.”
One n Ten, a support group for LGBT youth in Phoenix, is one establishment that uses gender-neutral restrooms.
“We have a casual approach to bathrooms,” said Donald Smith, co-coordinator of One n Ten’s housing program for homeless LGBT youth. “In our One n Ten bubble, the restroom is no big deal.”
Q High is a blended learning center through One n Ten. It helps youth earn a high school diploma through a partnership with Arizona Virtual Academy, a public online charter school. Q High has two gender-neutral restrooms that serve transgender students in particular.
Radioo, a 17-year-old senior at Q High whose name has been changed at his request, said Q High’s restrooms make him feel safe. Q High’s support helped Radioo come out as a transgender man in August.
“Here at One N Ten, it’s acceptable,” Radioo said. “Out there it’s not. People don’t understand it, and what people don’t understand they fear, and fear always leads to violence.”
Q High promotes the idea that gender is a fluid spectrum.
“For the most part, your perception of someone’s gender of what you appear on the outside may not be what someone appears on the inside,” Smith said.
Outside of Q High, gender-neutral restrooms can be hard to find. Radioo said if one Circle K every 50 miles had a gender-neutral restroom, it would make a major difference.
“It’s scary every time I go into a male restroom. I feel like I belong in there, but I feel judged and wonder if someday, I might not make it back out,” Radioo said.
There are times that people who are transitioning look enough like a woman and enough like a male to feel uncomfortable and be questioned in either restroom. Other times, their transition is complete and not distinguishable.
Jensen said that most people have probably been in a restroom with a transgender person and had no idea.
“What’s the greater good of our society, policing bathrooms or making sure everybody, regardless of how they express themselves, feel safe?” Wininger asked.
The private act of using the restroom has become a public issue for transgender people.
“Going to the bathroom is a natural act — everybody does it. To now make it an act that when you’re in public you have to think twice about going or holding it in becomes a health issue in addition to a civil rights issue,” Wininger said.
Arizona is the sixth largest city in the country and is home to the fifth largest LGBT community. But there are no statewide laws that protect the LGBT population. Other states like California have passed marriage equality and statewide protection for LGBT employment.
Proposed laws in Arizona like Senate Bill 1045 threatened to make it punishable by law for people to use a restroom that didn’t match the gender marker on their birth certificate.
“Gender identification is a subjective thing. Allowing people to apply laws based on a subjective opinion is really dangerous,” said Claudine Wessel, board member and area representative of the Human Rights Campaign.
The supporters of SB 1045 say it was proposed to keep predators from entering into restrooms and assaulting people, Wessel said. However, criminal laws are already in place to protect against public safety issues like this.
“Laws are created to deal with issues, and choosing a bathroom is not an issue in 2013. Yet we have close-minded, bigoted people who want to make it their problem to discriminate,” Wininger said.
Although there is no statewide protection for the LGBT population, the city of Phoenix has instated some protections.
Most recently, an anti-discrimination ordinance was passed in February. The fully inclusive ordinance prohibited discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression or disability. Race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, genetic information and marital status were already protected.
The anti-discrimination ordinance is part of the reason why Phoenix received a perfect score on the Municipal Equality Index, Wessel said. The MEI measures a city’s LGBT-friendly policies and level of inclusion.
Phoenix was one of eight cities to receive a 100 percent without the accompaniment of state legislative protection.
Wessel said the next step is to spread the inclusive protection that all LGBT community members should have throughout the state.
While gender-neutral restrooms are becoming increasingly more popular, not all are in favor of installing the restrooms.
Some businesses don’t want to invest the money in changing their existing restrooms into gender-neutral restrooms for the benefit of a seemingly small group of people, Smith said.
But individuals in the LGBT community generate and contribute well over a billion dollars per year in regard to spending, Smith said.
“If a business chose to support its overall community by involving and including something as simple as a gender-neutral bathroom, being cognizant of diversity and providing a welcoming environment, the benefit of LGBTQ business would far outweigh the initial cost of redoing a bathroom,” Smith said.
LGBT people tend to frequent places that are welcoming and open to diversity, Smith said.
“If the community as a whole would show that this is the norm, this is who we are, then incoming businesses wouldn’t have a choice but to support LGBT (people) if it wants to be successful,” Smith said.
But Jensen has a different opinion of gender-neutral restrooms as the solution to harassment. She said it shames transgender people to be sent to separate restrooms because they do not fit the societal norm.
“It’s fine to make those facilities available to people who want a separate accommodation like families or handicaps,” Jensen said. “But when you tell a transgender person that because they’re making other people uncomfortable, they now must use a separate restroom, that’s segregation.”
Regardless of what they think of gender-neutral restrooms, most advocates can agree that it is a priority to ensure the comfort and safety of transgender people. Whether this involves blocking discriminatory legislation, promoting legislative protection or advocating for accessible public spaces, organizations like Human Rights Campaign and Equality Arizona are fighting for transgender rights.
“We want equality yesterday, but at the same time, slow and steady wins the race. I can say that because I’m standing on the shoulders of giants that started this fight decades ago,” Wessel said. “I truly believe before we know it we’ll be in a place where we can see equal rights and opportunities for every person.”
Contact the reporter at Katherine.Sitter@asu.edu
