Transgender Bathroom Access Rights

Important: First off this purposely is for specifically this issue for news & discussion and maybe for some people to learn something, not for transgender issues as a whole, so if you wish to discuss something else, I'll ask you take it to a different thread, or make a new one to talk about the subject.

And I'll remind everyone to remain respectful & civil even with different opinions, thank you.

If you find yourself unfamiliar with the terms, I'd suggest this link for a bit of understanding on trans & gender identity related terms.

First off the USA's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) recently published a set of "best practices" for the matter.

OSHA Publishes Guide to Restroom Access for Transgender Workers

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Washington, DC (WorkersCompensation.com) - The Occupational Safety and Health Administration today published a Guide to Restroom Access for Transgender Workers (PDF*). The publication provides guidance to employers on best practices regarding restroom access for transgender workers. The guide was developed at the request of the National Center for Transgender Equality, an OSHA Alliance partner that works collaboratively with the agency to develop products and materials to protect the safety and health of transgender workers. OSHA's Sanitation standard requires that all employers under its jurisdiction provide employees with sanitary and available toilet facilities, so that employees will not suffer the adverse health effects that can result if toilets are not available when employees need them. "The core principle is that all employees, including transgender employees, should have access to restrooms that correspond to their gender identity," said Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health Dr. David Michaels. "OSHA's goal is to assure that employers provide a safe and healthful working environment for all employees."

Link to the actual OSHA publications here. Which to me is a solid step in the right direction for this matter.

Even Japan recently has been making some moves on the issue recently:

LGBT Students In Japan: Education Ministry Asks Schools To Let Transgender Children Use Preferred Bathrooms

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Japan's education ministry reportedly sent out a statement Thursday encouraging schools to increase their of support transgender students. The Japan Times reported that government officials instructed area education boards to allow children to use whichever bathrooms and locker rooms they feel most comfortable with. "It’s a very important step," 28-year-old transgender male Mameta Endo told the Japan Times, adding that he experienced discrimination when he was in school. "I have seen many friends who were pushed into quitting school . . . hopefully, this move will help decrease the number of such students." As of last summer, Japan's school system had more than 600 students with gender dysphoria. About two-thirds of them received "special consideration," according to a translation of a June 2014 Excite News article. These policies mostly included letting children wear whatever clothes suited them best and enabled them to use nurses' offices to change before physical education classes.

The biggest argument against are claims the myths about it somehow being a "threat" to other people using the bathroom where are completely unfounded or worse using a fake story in one case and often ignore that their crazy ideas for laws on "biological sex" would force transmen into female bathrooms because they more about transwomen who happen to be more visible and slightly more common, thus are double ignorant on what their own laws would even accomplish.

Data shows from the article below that their claims are fearmonger and trying to make people panic based off personal bias and nothing more rather than looking at the truth of the subject and failing to understanding denying people rights puts them in danger.

15 Experts Debunk Right-Wing Transgender Bathroom Myth

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DC Trans Coalition: Conservatives Use "Bathroom Panic" To Defeat Transgender Non-Discrimination Laws. According to the DC Trans Coalition: All over the world, anti-trans bigots try to convince the public that trans people are somehow a "threat" in public bathrooms. We've seen it in New Hampshire, in Gainesville, Fl and close to home in Montgomery County, Md: Our opponents stereotype trans people as sexual predators and try to use "bathroom panic" to defeat legislation that would protect our ability to gain employment and live safe lives. Fox News Has Promoted Harassment Fears About Transgender Access To Restrooms. Fox News has repeatedly invoked fears of sexual assault and misbehavior in restrooms to attack equal access to public accommodations for transgender people, including a fake story about a transgender student harassing females in her school's restroom. Conservative Media Outlets Have Promoted Bogus Bathroom Stories. Numerous conservative media outlets, including The Daily Caller, WND, and the Media Research Center, have similarly promoted the myth that sexual predators will exploit trans-inclusive restrooms to prey upon women.

Thankful groups aren't ignoring laws that would try deny a simple right to people with absurd over react.

LGBT Coalition Launched to Fight Anti-Trans Ballot Initiative

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It’s on. The anti-trans group “Privacy for All,” founded by the anti-LGBT Capitol Resources Institute with Prop 8 mastermind Frank Schubert as its leading strategist, received a title and summary Tuesday for their latest attempt to prohibit transgender people from using government facilities that match their gender identity. California Attorney General Kamala Harris named the bathroom policing initiative “Limits on Use of Facilities in Government Buildings and Businesses.” The initiative would mandate that the government monitor bathroom use and, if the initiative becomes law, anyone offended by the presence of a person perceived to be trans in a government restroom could sue that person for a $4,000 in damages, as well as attorney’s fees. Equality California and other LGBT and allied organizations have been waiting for this announcement and today made one of their own. The groups have officially formed a coalition to fight the proposed initiative that includes American Civil Liberties Union of California, Equality California, the Human Rights Campaign, Los Angeles LGBT Center, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), and Transgender Law Center. The groups informally created a diverse steering committee in anticipation of the initiative. “All Californians should have the same freedom to go about their lives and access government buildings without having their privacy invaded or being forced to undergo invasive examination simply to use a public restroom,” Kris Hayashi, Executive Director of Transgender Law Center, said in a press release. “The bathroom policing initiative would unfairly single out transgender people and people who don’t meet stereotypes of what it looks like to be male or female for interrogation and exclusion.” “Our opponents clearly have a taste for irony,” said Rick Zbur, Executive Director of Equality California. “Why else would they include ‘privacy’ in the name of their organization that seeks to invade the most basic dignity of the transgender community – or really, of anyone who doesn’t match subjective standards of masculinity or femininity? This initiative has no safeguards about who does the interrogating or how an individual would prove their identity. It’s a recipe for harassment.”

Again though please be respectful & civil in discussion :).

Transgender Bathroom Access Rights