Transgender Bathroom Ban Doesn't Discriminate, Court Holds

[Polybius]

Source: Bloomberg Law

Separating school bathrooms based on biological sex is constitutional and doesn’t violate Title IX, an en banc Eleventh Circuit said Friday in a divided ruling that may have widespread consequences in Alabama, Florida, and Georgia.

A Florida school board didn’t violate transgender high school student Drew Adams’ equal protection rights when it prohibited him from using the boys’ bathrooms at Allen D. Nease High School, the court said, reversing a trial court.

The US has a long tradition of separating sexes in certain situations, especially when it comes to the use of public bathrooms, Judge Barbara Lagoa said for the seven-judge US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit majority. Such sex-based classifications have never necessarily run afoul of the Equal Protection Clause, she said.

St. Johns County School Board showed its policy restricting bathroom use by “biological sex” was constitutional because it significantly furthered the student privacy interest the board claimed, Lagoa said. That interest included allowing students to use the bathroom away from the opposite sex and to shield their bodies from the opposite sex—an interest courts have long deemed valid “in a variety of legal contexts,” Lagoa said.

Read more: https://news.bloomberglaw.com/litigation/transgender-florida-students-bathroom-access-undone-on-appeal

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

2. Maybe all bathrooms everywhere should be unisex.

Okay, I'll admit that I'd be bothered if in a multi-stall bathroom both men and women were using the stalls. I happen to be female, born that way, happy to continue. One thing I like about living in Santa Fe is that about a decade ago some kind of ordinance was passed that all single stall bathrooms had to be unisex. How wonderful is that?

Meanwhile, I don't give a flying fuck about who is using a bathroom. I happen to know exactly two trans people, one a trans woman, the other a trans man. I'm actually honored that I know them. As a an older (age74) straight woman, I honestly feel grateful that I know these two people. Honestly, it doesn't get any better than this.

[NullTuples]

8. This isn't about men being in the women's room. It's about the GOP attacking trans kids.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

9. Thank you for clarifying that.

Sometimes I miss important stuff.

[cstanleytech]

11. "Maybe all bathrooms everywhere should be unisex." I have no problem with that but it probably won't

happen for a number of reasons the primary one being I do not see most schools being able to afford it as many of them are already running on shoestring budgets.

[NullTuples]

16. Unisex bathrooms are practical, once built. But the GOP would fight against them & has.

They've built trans people using bathrooms into a social-political issue behind which to rally their troops. This isn't going to be resolved by remodeling bathrooms.

[Dr. Strange]

20. That's probably the only logically consistent position.

[NullTuples]

21. Why? Why not just let trans people use the bathrooms we've always used?

I agree, there are arguments to be made for unisex bathrooms, including recognition that some people are non-binary.

But in this particular situation, unisex bathrooms are not a solution to the current underlying problem. Specifically, Republicans acting to prevent trans people from using bathrooms that match who they are simply as a way to harm and "other" us as political targets and scapegoats.

[Dr. Strange]

22. But why just trans people?

How do you tell if a person is really trans or not? Fundamentally, the only consistent position is to let EVERYONE use whatever restroom they want. And at that point, you might as well just make everything unisex anyway.

[NullTuples]

24. Thanks! I thought you meant *instead* of allowing trans people to use the room matching their gender

[Wolf Frankula]

3. Everybody needs to go to what a pub near my house does.

In each bathroom there is a toilet, a sink, a paper towel dispenser and an trash basket. On the door it says WC.

Wolf

[NullTuples]

7. Right? Single occupancy has been any-gender in California for a while now, and...nothing happened.

Same with allowing trans students to use the bathroom & locker room that matches their gender, which has been done for many years.

[cstanleytech]

12. Also a urinal for the boys as it does save on water usage.

[Igel]

17. My high school has 3000 students.

Sometimes the men's room has a line, and that's with 2 stalls and 4 urinals. Could have 4 stalls and no urinals, but urinals take up less space *and* use a lot less water.

We'd lose a lot of classroom space making every bathroom a private bathroom.

[truthisfreedom]

4. New buildings should be required to install family bathrooms.

That’s one solution.

[cstanleytech]

13. No problem with that but we probably wont see much of it in schools as most them are already

running on shoestring budgets so being able to afford would probably be difficult.

[Hekate]

5. Nearly everywhere I "go" over the past many years there has been a handicap-accessible...

…room with a wheelchair logo on the door. It is available to everyone, but is particularly useful for people in wheelchairs or maneuvering crutches, and extremely useful for mothers with strollers and active toddlers in tow. When I was out in public with the tots many decades ago I used to have to prop the stall door open with the stroller and hang on to the toddler’s shirt while I tried to do what we all hope will be private.

But these rooms of which I speak are in compliance with the ADA — and miracle of miracles they are unisex. And they’ve been around for decades, once business people stopped whining about the expense and inconvenience to themselves.

They exist on college campuses where I attend public lectures and plays. Don’t they exist in public schools? And if not, why not? They are, in my mind, the perfect solution for any kid needing more privacy than what’s available in a row of stalls or a row of urinals, and it is nobody’s damn business why they need that privacy.

What the hell is wrong with all the so-called adults in certain parts of this country?

[NullTuples]

6. 6 of the 7 judges in the majority were appointed by Trump; all were GOP.

The 4 who dissented were appointed by Democratic presidents. Also, this decision flies in the face of four other circuit court decisions on the matter and decades of precedent.

Needless to say, the McConnell-Trump / Federalist society majority's decision boiled down to, "We are going to ignore the statements of every major medical association, as well as the decades of solid science presented. We're also going to ignore legal precedent regarding discrimination based on sex. We say trans people are the sex/gender they were assigned at birth, and nothing can change that".

[Roisin Ni Fiachra]

10. So tired of ethically constipated religious perverts making life harder

for the rest of us.

[J_William_Ryan]

14. "6 of the 7 judges in the majority were appointed by Trump; all were GOP."

Likewise, any appeal would be pointless.

[appleannie1]

15. Most states have laws that require a child be educated up to a certain age.

If I had a trans child in school, I just might demand a tutor citing mental stress caused by singling my child out for bullying and get a doctor's letter stating that it was necessary for the well being of the child. When it starts costing them money, they just might reconsider.

[NullTuples]

18. I've known families who tried this. The school threatened to call CPS on them.

With one in particular, the family couldn't afford a protracted legal fight so they complied until they were able to move a few years later. It was only through massive amounts of emotional support and the kid's baseline personality that they made it through (in my opinion).

Some school administrators, especially in areas where rabid Christian Republicans have taken over school boards, very much intentionally want to make life as miserable for trans children as they can. They really don't care what it does to the kids.

[The Grand Illuminist]

19. Eradicate the humane spirit.

One of the right's primary goals.

[Joinfortmill]

23. Bathrooms in Paris are co-ed...

I took a trip to Paris a few years ago with a high school group (my daughter was a chaperone). I was washing my hands in a restaurant restroom in Montmartre when a man exited the stall next to the one I had been in. I nearly keeled over, being the uptight American I was. He smiled, nodded, washed his hands and left..me standing there with my mouth open.

The moral of the story is I survived and after a moment I mumbled, 'Oh, well', and went on to enjoy my day. This is not the problem it's being made out to be.