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Farther Toward a Sex-free Society
A few months ago I wrote about local YMCAs changing their locker room policies to be more inclusive to transgendered individuals (to the exclusion of normal gendered individuals — double digression — shouldn’t the term “non-crazy” suffice here?), and the aftermath was great both locally and in the comments on Ricochet. One of the strongest arguments made in favor of the change (or at least in favor of not getting worked up over it) was that the Y is a private organization which individuals are free to patronize or simply ignore as their consciences dictate. It wasn’t as if this was being mandated by the government. That is, naturally, no longer the case in the People’s Republic State of Washington.
The day after Christmas, Washington state’s Human Rights Commission gave us all a gift of bathroom and locker room desegregation. It is now illegal for business owners like the YMCA or their competition at another gyms to “limit sex-specific facilities such as bathrooms, showers, and locker rooms to persons with the anatomical parts of one sex.” So, the argument that the Y (and everyone else) can do what they think right is no longer valid.
The new rules apply not only to businesses but also to schools. That’s right, if a boy thinks he is a girl (or at least says he thinks he is) he now has a right to change and even shower with anatomical girls whether the girls like it or not. In fact, according to the Family Policy Institute of Washington:
once a man begins to undress in the women’s locker room a person who “expresses concern or discomfort … should be directed to a separate or gender-neutral facility.”
But wait, there’s more! Not only do the new rules exclude women from the women’s locker room should they feel discomfort about disrobing around men, but the rules also criminalize speech.
It is illegal to ask “unwelcome personal questions about an individual’s sexual orientation, gender expression or gender identity, or transgender status.”
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It is also illegal for a business to deliberately “misuse” someone’s preferred pronoun. If a man believes he is a woman, but you refer to him as a “he” anyway, he can sue you.
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It is also now illegal to use “offensive names, slurs, jokes, or terminology regarding an individual’s sexual orientation or gender expression or gender identity.”
What does the Y think of this change, you may wonder? I’m sure they are ecstatic, especially since “[i]n mid-December, prior to the public becoming aware of the state’s new policies, the YMCA once again reversed its own rules to allow transgender individuals unlimited access to the facility of their gender identity.”
Whatever isn’t forbidden shall be required.
Published in General
This transgender thing makes me think about the Muppets. I was always a little amazed when I would see, for example, Miss Piggy on the Tonight Show. Everyone just acted like she was a guest like any other. No one said, “You’re a puppet made of felt, manipulated by operators, voiced by man named Frank Oz. You’re not a real anthropomorphic female pig.”
One of the rules of improv theater is that you can’t contradict the imaginary things the other actors make up. For example, if someone pretends to hold a phone to their ear, you can’t say, “There’s no phone in your hand, dummy!” I like improv theater, but participation should be voluntary. The transgender movement wants to make all of life an improv play where participation is mandatory.
No idea. I can’t even begin to understand it. I have no doubt that most women in that situation would not be able to stick it.
Yes. It’s not surprising to me that Bruce Jenner, a 65 year old man, wants to be a cover model and not a 65 year old grandmother.
If Donald Trump stole this line, his approval rating would soar another 10 points, if not more.
One of the points I tried to make when the Y made this policy a few months ago is that people are reasonably accommodating, but the problem in this situation is the unreasonable accommodations desired. There really are rational, non-bigoted reasons to keep people separated by physical (not mental) sex in situations where they are likely to be naked. And, that’s even before considering the problem of sexual deviants gaming this law for their pleasure.
Remember that “slippery slope” some of us warned about when Gay Marriage was instituted by Judicial Diktat?
That’s how.
Do they start with their oldest recruiting slogan?
Well, then there’s this for illness….
I think you guys are being too hard on millennials. We hired a 26 year old to estimate, and I’ve been impressed by just about everything about him. He pays attention, works hard, and sometimes beats me to work even though I usually get to work 45 min early. Plus, his voice is way deeper than mine.
What a joke! How many adult women do you know that wear bobby sox and Mary Janes? He wants to be a little girl not a woman.
Well yeah. He claims he’s a 6 year old little girl. And the sicko’s with him in the video adopted him.
Not all of them are part of the problem. My daughter’s boyfriend has a manly voice, even if it’s housed in an incomprehensively skinny body. Perhaps when he departs for the Air Force this month they’ll put some meat on him. He’s a good kid who will develop into a good man. My daughter chose well, even if earlier than I would have desired.
Good for him! Give that man a raise. He must not have been to college.
Seriously, there’s a feminized affect among young men that is spreading like wildfire. It’s scary shtuff. If your employee hasn’t adopted it, buy him a beer.
Well, he did major in concrete technology.
Proponents are very organized, very committed, and savvy about how to use natural allies in the media. Opponents not nearly so much. And then there’s the great middle who care more about Honey Boo Boo than which chromosomes are in which rest/locker rooms.
I think it’s more than that. They used our inherent decency and desire to be generous against us. If only we really were the grumpy malcontents the left believes us to be this could never have gotten off the ground. We want to be kind and accommodating, the left knows this, and they wield it as a bludgeon in every fight.
Yes, I think that makes sense. What I find amazing is the speed with which a particular cause mobilizes on the left. This issue should be controversial, especially as implemented in locker rooms etc. But, in the blink of an eye, a really small “minority group” such as the transgendered became darlings of liberals everywhere, including those holding office all over the country who, a couple of years ago, could have cared less. While the cause is going from 0 to 60 faster than a Boss Mustang, those in potential opposition are wondering how to organize and what type of opposition will “play.” And it’s already over
Well said, TKP!
I don’t know any actual little girls who dress like that.
I’m against a sex-free society.
This issue should not even BE an issue in any rational society.
Pandering to mental illness is itself a disease.
That certainly was the case here at Ricochet in the same sex marriage discussions.
BTW, has anyone heard from Cato Rand since Obergefell?
I think it’s just the “Y” now. They dropped the “MCA” a few years ago, if I remember correctly.
I have a photo of 2 little girls, ages 2 and 6 in 1960s both in white soxs and Mary Janes. LOL
By 1970 they were in blue jeans and boots, haven’t looked back.
You are either an innie or an outie. What you do with it is your business, but it’s chromosomes, man.
As the aggressors in the culture wars, they choose the battlefield, and can target resources on one matter at a time.
Why not get men to stand naked in every YMCA women’s locker room? Every day, all day. Claim what ever gender-variable needed. Force your average YMCA worker to field the complaints, to deal with the pr challenges. Make them direct hoards of voting, elderly swimmers out of their own locker room into a likely-to-be-too-small-for-many, gender-neutral locker room.
Make it not worth the time for the lowest paid employee to enforce the mandates sent from on high. Raise the cost of working for the YMCA and doing business.
Apologies to those innocence who will be scarred with the sight of their bodies, David Beckham will not be appearing in this film.
The picture gave me an idea. How about a bathroom that becomes whatever you need it on demand. It has three buttons and three corresponding lights, M, F and T. The prospective user pushes the appropriate button and the appropriate light outside the door of the bathroom goes on. No transexuals need be offended because the bathroom, so long as it contains at least a toilet, can become identified on demand to any of three options. The button lighting would be relatively inexpensive to retrofit on existing individual bathrooms, say in your average Starbucks. But it has the disadvantage that all shared bathrooms would have to be converted for single person use. Some of the added cost could be mitigated by the elimination of urinals.
It’s hard for me to believe that the Human Rights Commission does not or did not at one time hold an opinion on the presence of opposite sex people in locker rooms as constituting a sexually harassing environment. I think it’s inevitable that the new policies would result in a sexual harassment lawsuit, which should put an end to the change in policy.
I am pleased to report that the Starbucks on my recent road trip to Bellingham has completely compliant (though single person) bathrooms. Except they were out of toilet paper.