Who’s In Your Bathroom? [Opinion]

Like many people, I’ve avoided this topic for a long time simply because pretending it doesn’t directly affect me is easier than addressing it.

Unfortunately our city commission has forced the issue on the citizens of Bozeman by siding with the ACLU against Initiative 183.

Initiative 183

To paraphrase — Initiative 183 basically says — use the bathroom that matches the plumbing you were born with. I’m not sure it’s that simple.

Identify As … ?

The current question seems to be that people identify as a sex different from their birth sex. Identify being the optimum word.

Many state laws have been passed to protect members of the LGBTQI community against discrimination.

There are two conflicting definitions that muddy the water:

What is sexual orientation?

Sexual orientation is about whom you’re attracted to and want to have relationships with. Sexual orientations include gay, lesbian, straight, bisexual, and asexual.

Sexual orientation is different from gender and gender identity.

Sexual orientation is about whom you’re attracted to and whom you feel drawn to romantically, emotionally, and sexually. It’s different than gender identity. Gender identity isn’t about whom you’re attracted to, but about who you ARE — male, female, genderqueer, etc. (Source)

We often tend to lump both together in one sexual basket.

Gender Identity

If I were to tell you that I identify as an 18-year-old female supermodel I think you might suggest I seek some kind of professional counseling. I really don't look the part. Yet, if I just said I identify as a woman, it would be accepted at face value and everyone would be supportive of my gender decision.

What’s the difference? I’m neither of those. So why accept it at face value just because I claim it to be true?

New York City has 31 different gender identities you can choose from, and apparently people change them on a day-to-day basis as needed. If you’re a business owner and discriminate against any of the approved definitions the city’s Commission on Human Rights could hit you with a six-figure fine.

This is why it’s hard for the LGBT community to get support from the rank and file citizen when definitions of who they are, and what they want, get more confusing by the day.

The Bathroom Argument

I can’t buy the bathroom assault of a child by a transgender person. Anyone who really wants to assault a child in a bathroom will find a way to do it without changing their identity. But I will buy the locker room argument in high schools. Everyone in that locker room would lose.

Budding high school adults have a hard enough time adjusting to hormones, high school clicks, relationships, grades, zits, and social media bullying without adding the opposite sex to showers.

I think we have to draw the line somewhere.

Some Final Thoughts

While I can only speak for myself, I know for a fact that I was not born with a predisposed sexual attraction or gender identity. For me, those things were learned through societal influence and life experiences.

If we believe that people are born with a predetermined sexual attraction then you’d have to accept that pedophiles are born and can’t help what they are.

That’s a very hard argument to make and is rejected in today’s psychiatric world.

I'm not sure if we'll be better off or worse when the dust finally settles after election day. Currently the initiative is being re-written to be more definitive. I guess we'll know on November 8th.

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