Public Bathroom Persuasive Essay

What would it be like to walk into a public restroom or locker room, and see someone of the opposite sex? Probably a little alarmed or confused. How would it feel like to be denied the bathroom of the sex you unwillingly identify with? Unfair and singled out one would assume. Both of these questions must be asked when the debate over transgender people and public bathrooms takes place. One side believes a person must use the bathroom which corresponds to their gender given at birth. The other side thinks a person should be able to use whichever restroom they wish, as long as they identify with that gender. Like many other debates in our world today, there is no correct answer to this question, and there is no clear solution. The subject of

This is true for Galvin who was denied use of the men’s restroom after two incident-free months. Galvin, a transgender male student, claimed “he is not making a ‘choice’ any more than a gay or straight student chooses his or her sexual orientation” (Sanchez). If laws can be made to support and benefit the gay community, then there should be no problem doing the same for transgenders in this case. In fact, Mary Sanchez, a writer for the Kansas City Star newspaper, explains that many schools around the country are making attempts to open up to their transgender students and help other members of the school understand their situations. The more educated people are the better off this situation will be. Another factor in restricting the use of gender identity when choosing a bathroom is the singling out of these individuals. Looking back on Galvin’s case shows that he was required to use the bathroom in the nurse’s office (Sanchez). This may have caused inconveniences or even been embarrassing for Galvin, and it all could have been prevented if he was allowed to use the men's restroom. The article “Transgender People and Bathroom Access”, a post on the “National Center for Transgender Equality”, confirms that it would be quite troublesome to require separate bathroom in public facilities. It also “reinforces the idea

There is no better example of this than what happened in a Seattle swimming pool in February of 2016. After the conclusion of a girls swim team practice, many of the girls became very startled when they saw a young man casually sitting in their locker room. This man, who dress and presented himself as male, was asked to leave the pool. He told the pool staff “the law has changed and I have a right to be here” (qtd in Rhoads). He was not wrong though, because the state of Washington gives people the right to use the bathroom of which they identify with (Rhoads). This is obviously a situation that needs to be avoided, but without clear laws people are able to bend the rules. Later on the pool admitted that they had no rules on how a person would distinguish their gender, and that they “relied on people's physical appearance or verbal claims” (Rhoads). Theoretically this form of assessment would be quite simple, but at the same time it could seriously offend many transgender people. Rhoads points out that many women reject the modern stereotypes set by society, and he cautions that “it can be impossible to guess the gender identity of someone who is biologically female but mannish in appearance”. So perhaps physical appearance may not be the best way to sort out the bathroom room issue. But even if