In 1970, the Kinks released a song titled “Lola” If you would
like to hear it again, just click on the link below:
The
Kinks - Lola (Official Audio) (youtube.com)
If you would like to read the words as you listen to the song,
click on the link below:
https://genius.com/The-kinks-lola-lyrics
The song came to mind on Monday of this week, when I reported
for a job at Tucson High School. On the first floor of one of the buildings in
the campus complex, there is a room that USED to be designated “male teacher
bathroom”.
It is now known as the “all-gender” bathroom, much to the
chagrin of the male teachers on the first floor, who no longer have private
bathroom facilities available to them. According to one of the teachers that I
talked with, it is an attempt to be more accommodating to transgender students.
He said that he has already been in the bathroom when a person of the opposite
gender came in, so it’s obvious that a better monitoring system needs to be put
in place to avoid further embarrassing situations.
Trans gender bathrooms have been a hot topic since 2016, when
North Carolina passed HB2.
A
transgender “bathroom ban” in North Carolina caused a national uproar in 2016.
Bruce Springsteen, Cyndi Lauper, Nick Jonas and a long list of other A-list
performers canceled shows in the state. Global corporations Deutsche Bank and
PayPal torpedoed plans to expand in Cary and Charlotte. The NCAA moved its scheduled championship games elsewhere.
Now,
eight years later, after Utah passed a similar bill on Monday, the reaction
beyond the state’s borders appears to be more of a shrug.
Neither
of Utah’s largest businesses released statements in response to the
legislation. Tens of thousands of out-of-towners, and an ensuing economic
boost, were just heading home from the Sundance Film Festival, held annually in
Park City. Global sensation — and queer icon — Bad Bunny is slated to headline a concert
in Salt Lake City in upcoming weeks. Next month, Salt Lake City will be hosting
first- and second-round games in the NCAA men’s basketball tournament.
Representatives
for the NCAA, Bad Bunny and Sundance did not immediately return requests for
comment.
In
fact, nine other states passed so-called transgender bathroom bills in
the years between those passed by North Carolina and Utah, with little fanfare
as well.
HB 2 —
which was later partially repealed in 2017 — also prevented
local governments from passing LGBTQ nondiscrimination measures and rendered
then-existing protections, including one in Charlotte, moot. For this reason,
the law affected a much broader segment of the population compared to today’s
bills and therefore drew national ire, said Shannon Gilreath, a professor at
Wake Forest University’s School of Law and a faculty member of the university’s
gender and sexuality program.
“When
one’s own interests are not directly compromised by some form of
discrimination, one is less likely to respond or to care,” Gilreath said. “I
might not believe that’s necessarily the right attitude to have — to do what’s
expedient versus to do what’s right in a situation — but that’s human nature.”
Some
studies back Gilreath’s line of reasoning.
A survey from the nonpartisan research group Public
Religion Research Institute conducted last year found an estimated 79% of
Americans support anti-discrimination protections for LGBTQ people. Policies
that largely favor trans Americans solely received significantly less support;
the poll found. However, Americans who say they know at least one trans person
are much more likely to support pro-trans policies, a 2022 survey from the Pew Research Center found.
Reed
said that what’s changed from 2016 to now is that people — and even
billion-dollar corporations — have become afraid of provoking the far-right.
She
pointed to a group of conservative provocateurs who collectively have amassed
tens of millions of social media followers in part by stoking outrage over
LGBTQ issues. In several instances, threats of violence have followed the
subjects of posts made or amplified by the group of right-wing influencers.
“These
people are scary,” Reed said. “If the NBA All-Star Game threatened to pull a
game right now? In this atmosphere? Today? They’d get bomb threats from
conservatives.”
Last year, bomb threats were made to Budweiser factories
across the country after trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney’s brand partnership
with Bud Light created an online firestorm in pockets of right-wing social
media. Target also pulled some of its LGBTQ-themed merchandise for Pride
Month from its shelves last year after it said it received “threats impacting
our team members’ sense of safety and wellbeing while at work.”
Reed also suggested that it might not be politically
advantageous for Republicans to go against the grain when it comes to issues
that affect trans people.
Republican Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine faced political blowback
after vetoing a bill that would ban gender-affirming care
for minors in the state in December. Former President Donald Trump urged Ohio
state lawmakers to override the veto, writing on his social media platform, Truth Social,
that he was “finished” with the Republican governor. Ohio senators overrode the governor’s veto last week.
In recent weeks, local activists had been unsure whether Utah
Gov. Spencer Cox would sign HB 257. Cox in 2022 vetoed legislation that aimed to limit transgender
students’ ability to compete on girls sports teams in school, citing the
disproportionate rate of suicidal ideation among trans kids.
But since then, anti-LGBTQ political rhetoric and legislation have
surged.
Conservative lawmakers introduced more than 500 anti-LGBTQ
bills in state legislatures across the country, according to a tally by the
ACLU, with the majority of them targeting trans people. Seventy-five of those
bills became law, including a ban on gender-affirming care for
minors in Utah, which Cox signed into law.
Cox signed Utah’s “bathroom bill” on Monday evening with
little fanfare and issued a short statement after weeks of speculation on his
position.
“We want public facilities that are safe and accommodating for
everyone and this bill increases privacy protections for all,” the statement
read.
The law is effective immediately.
In addition to Utah, legislators in five states — South
Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Kansas and Iowa — have introduced their own
“bathroom bills” or legislation that further expands “bathroom bills” already
on the books, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.
What is ironic about all these bills is that the greatest
danger to ladies in the bathroom is not trans people, but Republican
legislators.
https://www.complex.com/life/a/amanda-wicks/republican-legislators-arrested-for-bathroom-misconduct
Research shows the only thing Republican lawmakers have to fear
when it comes to inappropriate behavior in bathrooms is—wait for it—themselves.
At
least three Republican legislators have been arrested for soliciting or
performing sexual acts in a bathroom, according to NewNowNext.
But
lawmakers in North Carolina, Arizona, Florida, and Texas have been pointing the
finger at trans people. Those states continue relying on the claim that
sexual predators will be able access to women's bathrooms if trans people are
allowed to use facilities that match their gender identities instead of the sex
assigned on their birth certificates.
Media
Matters, a non-profit organization dedicated to monitoring media for
conservative misinformation, found that no actual incidents involving predatory
transgender people have occurred. What stories have circulated in the press
have all turned out to be false and perpetuated by hate groups.
There
has never been a single reported case of sexual abuse perpetrated by a transgender person in a
bathroom.
My wife and I know a few gay people, and we also know at
least one person is trans. It is also noteworthy that a few of those trans
people are well known celebrities
Neither one of us is bothered by that, so we are definitely in favor or legislation that prevents discrimination against LBGT folks. The realty today, though, is that are still a lot of crazy people in this country who will resort to violence if their beliefs are threatened.
In 2022. Boston children’s hospital received bomb threats because
they provided gender-affirming care to trans youths.
If I could tolerate Bud Light, I would have bought a few
bottles during the controversy about when Dylan Mulvaney was a hot topic, but
the controversy has now died down.
The best response that I have recently about controversial
topics was uttered recently by the new vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz:
“Mind your own damn business”.
.
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