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[Harry Baldman]

Whether or not I'd notice is beside the point. Maybe I would, maybe I wouldn't. If a normal woman with short hair entered the bathroom, I may not notice either. But she ought not be there - it is a social (possibly even legal; not sure of the subtleties) law that a woman uses the room accorded to her sex.

"Trans men are men, trans women are women." Psychologically, I do not doubt that this is their internal definition. Alas, what the mind wants, the body does not always mirror - and it is the discomfort associated with different bodies meeting which is the issue. Not how they view themselves. It is another case of gender vs. sex, a distinction which seems to be increasingly bandied about - their self-gender is different, their sex is not. Segregated bathrooms segregate according to sex. Saying your gender is different is a moot point.

But I get the distinct feeling that I am only repeating myself now.

So would you say that your criterion of women versus men is what they pass for in public? Would a particularly effeminate man trigger your bathroom danger sense just as much as you imply trans men would? Is there some kind of Freudian element to people's hangups about sharing their bathroom space with people they deem to be not sufficiently like themselves, or is it merely a question of finding trans people inherently uncomfortable and choosing the public bathroom as their battleground of choice to humiliate them?

I'm not being facetious about the introspection part. It's vitally important that we examine our seemingly instinctual prejudices and think about whether they're valuable and worth keeping. Say, imagine if you thought white people shouldn't drink at your local water fountain because they're subhuman, disease-ridden trash creatures who'd find a way to fuck it up just like they fucked up basically every place in the world they've visited thus far. It'd certainly be nobody's place to claim you don't legitimately feel like white people are a blight on the universe and really should just generally stop, and you could cite some fairly reliable history to back up the claim. Still, the clear answer here is that you're really not helping anyone by perpetuating an ultimately arbitrary and meaningless dichotomy, and that while your feelings about white people are real they are nevertheless not actually valid or well-founded. It's important to take that step back and ponder on who exactly you're helping out and how by believing what you do.

To provide an example, by recognizing trans people's actual gender as opposed to pedantically adhering to their genetic sex or coming up with further qualifiers for what they ought to be, you're legitimately helping a vulnerable minority transcend a dysfunctional dichotomy imposed upon people for no good reason, and that to me seems like as good a reason to let people do what they want as any even before you get into the less obvious benefits of questioning the system that has produced the world we live in and all of its many miseries.

[scriver]

This is why the field of virology is the field of looking at phlegm

Wait a second, are you telling me electrons aren't made of amber?
More seriously, I've never been fond of using a word's etymology as an argument against the people who use it. Language has always been too fluid for a word to have any meaning other than the ones that were chosen for it.

I'm a very etymologically minded person, so it matters a lot for me. Languages are stronger when they're capable of more and better expression, and a lot of expression is grounded in etymology. After all, much like how with people it is the road we have travelled as much as where we currently is at that defines where and who we are, it is the change a word has gone through and not just how it is used today that determines what it means.

That said, the kind of argumentation ad etymology I made fun of above with the virology comment above is not something I like either (obviously). I just had to rush to etymology's defence because thoughtless, shallow things like -

Honestly, etymology be damned. Words are fluid and are capable meaning over time regardless of what their roots might say.

- just plain infuriates me!

(sorry, birdy, but they do )

[birdy51]

Tis ok! Words cannot hurt me anyways. I am above language!

[smjjames]

edit: nvm, misread.

[TD1]

Because people are people, and they do not view the world with such clinical eyes.

And this is why they need separate toilets too: in case one of those filthy pragmatists tries to go to the bathroom like they're people or something.

/s

Too true. It is a great shame when the sub-humans attempt to act like real people. Ecce homo!

So would you say that your criterion of women versus men is what they pass for in public? Would a particularly effeminate man trigger your bathroom danger sense just as much as you imply trans men would? Is there some kind of Freudian element to people's hangups about sharing their bathroom space with people they deem to be not sufficiently like themselves, or is it merely a question of finding trans people inherently uncomfortable and choosing the public bathroom as their battleground of choice to humiliate them?

The battleground of choice (shall we call it Water loo?) is chosen not in an attempt to humiliate trans people. Nor is there an issue with effeminate men or masculine women using the appropriate facilities. In the end, it comes down to the application of social mores and rules - namely, that a man in the men's room expects to find men, no matter their dress or their beliefs. Women in the women's room do not expect to find men. Nor want them. Water loo is chosen because it is where these social mores are challenged by trans-self-identification as opposed to societal identification. The individual says one thing, society another. This is fine in most venues, places, etc. But where the self-identifier ignores this rule in a place where it is important, namely "Water loo", they are taking into consideration only themselves and not the general public. It is true - perhaps even sad - that a trans-woman is not wanted in the woman's room, because societal perception indicates that this is a fox in the chicken coop, as it were.

I'm not being facetious about the introspection part. It's vitally important that we examine our seemingly instinctual prejudices and think about whether they're valuable and worth keeping.

Indeed. But that is a two edged blade if ever there was one. I do not argue that society shouldn't be scrutinised, held to account for its petty laws and mores. But while those laws are in effect and as firmly as sex-based toilet systems are, it is fruitless to change them. It creates tension, annoyance, discomfort and aye - even hatred. For both the trans and straight people. First, challenge the mores. Change the mores. Then implement the practical implications. Do not implement the practical implications and expect the mores to change to suit.

To provide an example, by recognizing trans people's actual gender as opposed to pedantically adhering to their genetic sex or coming up with further qualifiers for what they ought to be, you're legitimately helping a vulnerable minority transcend a dysfunctional dichotomy imposed upon people for no good reason, and that to me seems like as good a reason to let people do what they want as any even before you get into the less obvious benefits of questioning the system that has produced the world we live in and all of its many miseries.

See previous point. Questioning the system is essential before change is imposed - society wants to have the answer before it accepts its solution. I freely admit that I am part of the "problem" (which strikes me as not being so serious as many of the aforementioned miseries). It is not that I do not want transpeople to share bathroom space with me, it is that I do not want physically women to share bathroom space with me while, for instance, I use the urinal. It is a very uncomfortable idea for me and many others. A woman does not want to see, to use the Big Bang Theory as an example, this
 

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

while she is in the middle of her toilette. Perhaps - just perhaps - trans people should respect others' sensitivities rather than imposing the individual view as superior to the more universal law. If society changes or is changed in such a way as it becomes acceptable, then fine. Until then, is it not possible that imposing yourself in such a way as to make people uncomfortable is.... well, rude?

I'm not sure why I bother arguing this here, to be quite honest. I understand your point on introspection and laud it, but I've had negative experiences on Bay12 concerning topics similar to this in the past.

[smjjames]

Isn't your example an example of how some people might stereotypically see transgender? While it was likely played for laughs in Big Bang Theory, it's more complex than that. The example looks like an oversimplification. Though the picture does look like maybe a rather buff woman with short cropped hair.

I'm sure most transgender try to respect others sensitivities, it's just, you know, society being intolerant or something.

[McTraveller]

I think the philosophical issue is more deeply rooted in the meaning of "reality."  In general, society functions well when people are what they appear to be.  In fact, when people pose as things they aren't, we have terms for this like "counterfeit," "fraud," and the like.  Society actually cannot function if there is no relationship between appearance and actuality.  This is wholly a practical thing, not some kind of theoretical thing.

When it comes to gender versus physical sex, I think society missed a beat somewhere.  There is some kind of spectrum that probably has a few dimensions, ranging from "effeminate male" to "masculine female" which describes say, personality traits like demure versus assertive or "rough" vs "dainty"; there is the scale of sexual attraction which is independent of that personality, and that doesn't even get into the "I don't like the fact that I'm male/female/masculine/feminine."

I think part of missed beat includes the loss of distinction/confusion between the terms male versus masculine and female versus feminine.  I would class 'male/female' as reproductive function and capability independent of a person's preferences or self image, 'masculine/feminine' as social-norm-based attributes, and a person of either reproductive capability could be anywhere on that scale (and it doesn't help that masculine/feminine characterization depends on specific context either - you can be masculine when it comes to, say, sporting events but feminine when it comes to feeling toward puppies).

The part that bothers people though - at probably a fundamentally biological level - is when people act contrary to their appearance.  I don't think there is a practical concern about a person who looks and acts like a female using a female restroom.  It's only when someone who looks like a female that doesn't act like a female uses a female restroom, or if someone who doesn't look like a female but acts like one uses a female restroom.  It triggers those evolutionary survival mechanisms.

[redwallzyl]

part of the problem is a rather culturally narrow definition of what constitutes masculine and feminine. American culture has certain notions about what is supposed to be "normal" for these categories and does not deal well with deviation from that norm. The norm is also completely arbitrary and culture specific.

[smjjames]

If it's something that bothers people at a fundamentally biological level, that didn't stop the Ancient Greeks, or other cultures that don't see LBGT in a negative light.

Theres privacy concerns, yes, but the hate on LBGT is wholly a cultural construct as there are cultures with the opposite view. Hate on LBGT isn't universial.

Also, to echo Th4DwArfY1, discussions on similar subjects have gone down in flames in the past, so, let's just be careful here. And if we're going to continue the tangent, possibly find the gender and sexuality thread, if it's still around.

edit: Sorta ninja'd and redwall said it better.

part of the problem is a rather culturally narrow definition of what constitutes masculine and feminine. American culture has certain notions about what is supposed to be "normal" for these categories and does not deal well with deviation from that norm. The norm is also completely arbitrary and culture specific.

Exactly, it's a cultural construct, not biological.

[NJW2000]

Very unusual and upsetting experience on public transport this morning.

Underground trains are generally packed at that time. A woman was trying to get onto an already quite full train. This is standard procedure, and while uncomfortable is the only way my city avoids total civic collapse.

A man just inside the doors standing next to a young boy said to her, loudly and clearly, "If you push me or my child I'll smack you up."

The woman replied, "I'm not trying to push anyone" in an apologetic tone of voice. I also got onto the train, shocked. Nobody said anything further, though I expected people to. I wasn't sure what to do or say, and didn't know if I should say anything. The man and his child got off at the next station.

This sort of thing almost never happens on the underground. Unprovoked threats, I mean, there are occasional arguments.

I really wish now that I had told the man what how disgusting his actions were and what a low example he was setting for his child. I've been quite upset about it all day. I don't know how threatened the woman felt, but the people around them shouldn't have allowed the guy to behave in that way.

[Trekkin]

part of the problem is a rather culturally narrow definition of what constitutes masculine and feminine. American culture has certain notions about what is supposed to be "normal" for these categories and does not deal well with deviation from that norm. The norm is also completely arbitrary and culture specific.

Another part of the problem is, of course, the violence with which certain people take it upon themselves to enforce these social norms. We can debate airy ethical ideas of how society should change all we like, including how those other people should change to suit us, but ultimately there's too much blood on the ground to act like it's solely a philosophical problem.

[Harry Baldman]

The battleground of choice (shall we call it Water loo?) is chosen not in an attempt to humiliate trans people. Nor is there an issue with effeminate men or masculine women using the appropriate facilities. In the end, it comes down to the application of social mores and rules - namely, that a man in the men's room expects to find men, no matter their dress or their beliefs. Women in the women's room do not expect to find men. Nor want them. Water loo is chosen because it is where these social mores are challenged by trans-self-identification as opposed to societal identification. The individual says one thing, society another. This is fine in most venues, places, etc. But where the self-identifier ignores this rule in a place where it is important, namely "Water loo", they are taking into consideration only themselves and not the general public. It is true - perhaps even sad - that a trans-woman is not wanted in the woman's room, because societal perception indicates that this is a fox in the chicken coop, as it were.

I wasn't saying that your intent is to humiliate trans women, just to be clear, merely that bathroom laws generally are a confluence of the mostly accepted and occasionally encouraged practice of transphobia in public spaces actualized through the application of gay panic - in other words, those filthy gender-transgressing deviants want to defile our women, goes the conservative line of thought, often simultaneously with the thought that women call everyone rapists for no reason these days.

Indeed. But that is a two edged blade if ever there was one. I do not argue that society shouldn't be scrutinised, held to account for its petty laws and mores. But while those laws are in effect and as firmly as sex-based toilet systems are, it is fruitless to change them. It creates tension, annoyance, discomfort and aye - even hatred. For both the trans and straight people. First, challenge the mores. Change the mores. Then implement the practical implications. Do not implement the practical implications and expect the mores to change to suit.

It's ultimately fruitless to expect mores based on fear to change on their own because the fear and hatred feeds itself and multiplies in isolation: avoidance breeds anxiety. In social models such as actor-network theory (brought to you by the heady winds of postmodernist thought) there isn't actually such a thing as a broader social force, just the sum total of the interrelationships of every person, and it seems fairly consistent with what you observe in reality - whenever you hear about somebody rejecting white supremacy of their own free will, for example, it's almost always because they were exposed to the objects of their hatred and realized the absurdity of the notion of hating them when the expectations of their fear weren't met; there was also a whole article that made the rounds around here some while ago that mentioned how Democrats and Republicans, for example, can exist in complete and hateful separation from each other with no visibility or informational interchange simply through the circles they run in.

So I'd vehemently disagree with the notion that we need to reach the point of society accepting trans people before providing them with legal protections and fairly basic rights, since the very point of those protections is to facilitate their acceptance and normalization as part of our daily lives. It's like claiming we can't desegregate schools until people stop being racist first. How can you expect change without working toward it?

See previous point. Questioning the system is essential before change is imposed - society wants to have the answer before it accepts its solution. I freely admit that I am part of the "problem" (which strikes me as not being so serious as many of the aforementioned miseries). It is not that I do not want transpeople to share bathroom space with me, it is that I do not want physically women to share bathroom space with me while, for instance, I use the urinal. It is a very uncomfortable idea for me and many others. A woman does not want to see, to use the Big Bang Theory as an example, this (classical example of a farcical, derogatory depiction of a trans woman, from Big Bang Theory of all places) while she is in the middle of her toilette. Perhaps - just perhaps - trans people should respect others' sensitivities rather than imposing the individual view as superior to the more universal law. If society changes or is changed in such a way as it becomes acceptable, then fine. Until then, is it not possible that imposing yourself in such a way as to make people uncomfortable is.... well, rude?

It's the "physically a woman" qualifier that's the hitch, and still a fairly obvious dodge of the core idea you're getting at - that trans people don't actually count as their expressed gender unless they pass - and coincidentally the reason why deconstructing and splintering the institution of gender is important. It's something that has had a lot of progress already made on it - when women began to do "men's work", when women began to own land, when men wore silk stockings to show off their nice gams, when you could begin legally putting down your gender as "other" in Nepal. Imagine the wage gap in a society where men can become pregnant and women can get testicular cancer (not that they can't already in what is actually a good example of the blurred lines we already accept between sex and gender just because we can't readily see the difference). Now that's thinking with postmodernism!

I'm not sure why I bother arguing this here, to be quite honest. I understand your point on introspection and laud it, but I've had negative experiences on Bay12 concerning topics similar to this in the past.

I hope I've not been overly confrontational, it's just that transgender and nonbinary acceptance is a topic I particularly sympathize with while being cis because it rubs right up against the broader sphere of transhuman initiatives, which I've always been a fan of even if I might hold the opinion that brain uploading and cryogenics are a crock of shit and computer scientists aren't nearly as clever as they think they are.

[wierd]

Ahh, but that comes back to the "Transwoman is actually just a man in a dress" thought process.

No, a transwoman is a woman who was born with the wrong parts, who underwent a painful and dangerous set of surgical procedures to correct that problem, who naturally wants to use the woman's bathroom.

Really, the "Dont want to see that there" line of argument is something society already abandoned when they got rid of "colored" bathrooms. Just like white people had to buck up and STFU about people with dark skin using their bathroom with them (Oh, the horror! /s), boys and girls are gonna have to buck up and STFU about transgendered people using the correct and proper bathroom with them.

[Trekkin]

No, a transwoman is a woman who was born with the wrong parts, who underwent a painful and dangerous set of surgical procedures to correct that problem, who naturally wants to use the woman's bathroom.

Neither of these is necessarily true. Trans people need not get surgery (or hormonal therapy, for that matter) to be "really" trans. Nor need they be dissatisfied with their anatomy. It is entirely possible and valid for someone to accept their anatomy and pick a label for themselves other people would dispute.

Sorry to be pedantic, but we probably shouldn't exclude people in arguing for greater inclusivity.

Incidentally, arguing that the dissenters should shut up has never worked. They don't go quietly away, they just get sneaky about it.

[heydude6]

Really, the "Dont want to see that there" line of argument is something society already abandoned when they got rid of "colored" bathrooms. Just like white people had to buck up and STFU about people with dark skin using their bathroom with them (Oh, the horror! /s), boys and girls are gonna have to buck up and STFU about transgendered people using the correct and proper bathroom with them.

So why not just unisex bathrooms then? If people should just get over their anxieties and let the “other” use their bathrooms, why don’t we just allow  all the “others” use the bathroom then. Why do we make an exception only for one specific group when we can change the rules and allow all the groups?

I’m serious btw. I do think unisex bathrooms would be a great idea.