The new monster is in the locker room. No, it’s not Donald Trump’s locker room talk about unwanted sexual advances, and no, it’s not your own insecurity (or is it?). It’s the other people - trying to discreetly change without anyone noticing them or feeling shamed (so wait, is that you?). There has a been a wild new rash of anti-LGBTQ bills in states, in particular public discourse on sharing spaces with those that identify as transgendered. As the issue of trans-bodies is being contested in court rooms, the community is hitting legal pratfalls. There are no precedents of courts establishing them as a protected class, making them vulnerable to fundamentalist push-back.
Republican backlash aimed at critiquing social customs around LGBTQ acceptance could be possibly out of moral outrage, possibly in order to appear Republican-Bonafide to the socially conservative electorate. Whichever the case, scenarios are frighteningly scared up on podiums of deviant monsters lurking in locker rooms and bathrooms when crimes committed against transgender people happen at higher instances than the people propenents wish to shield. For instance, in 2015 it was reported that of TGQN (transgender, genderqueer, nonconforming) college students 21% had been sexually assaulted. That rate was 3% higher than gender conforming females. (1) The trans community experiences homicide rates far disproportionate to their population size. 2016 saw the highest homicide rates recorded at 24, just surpassing 2015, though likely more deaths go unrecorded. (2) Despite the majority of those targeted being transwomen of color, none of the cases in 2015 were able to be tried as hate crimes. (3) Trans-WOC are the most vulnerable in the subset due to their placement in the triad of racism, sexism, and transphobia. Key problems for the community as a whole are job discrimination and extreme poverty. Considering the difficulties it takes for a trans person to exist in our society, it begs the question of why this decade has seen a recent flurry of bills nationwide targeting LGBTQ rights and why the supreme court won’t make a precedent towards protecting them under the 14th amendment.
The court cases Romer V. Evans and Howe, et al. v. Haslam are good examples for teasing out where the courts stand on gender-identity and sexual identification. In Romer v. Evans, the Supreme Court ruled against Colorado’s anti-LGBTQ legislation on the basis that LGBT was not exactly a recognized class to be discriminated against (because who’s ever heard of homosexuals being singled out and discriminated?). Gender and sexual identification are scrutinized under the equal protection clause by “rational basis”, meaning there aren’t precedents guaranteeing them protection as a group. In contrast, race, religion, and sex have more protections in place and are highly scrutinized over in court. The ruling that LGBTQ identifiers aren’t a defined class has lead to many politicians taking advantage of the ambiguity to short-circuit statewide anti-LGBT laws. The first to successfully piggy-back off Colorado was 2011’s Howe, et al. v. Haslam in Tennessee, where the state was able to pass “anti-anti-discrimination" laws. It was particularly in regards to protecting private businesses right to refuse services to gay couples. Thanks to the case in Colorado, they realized that they didn’t have to explicitly state their motive; making it more of a “freedom of choice” or a “you can be gay, but not on my face” issue.
The successful win in Tennessee spread to other states most notably in North Carolina and now Texas where strict bathroom and locker room stipulations are butting up against transgendered people in school and the workplace. The laws could potentially out them and infringe upon their own security for the benefit of others. While it is contested that the bill violates Title IX protecting against sexual discrimination, advocates state that it is sexual discrimination to force anyone to share bathrooms or changing rooms with someone who was born biologically different than them. (4)
Along with changing social values, legal battles like the anti-LGBTQ win in Tennessee and the Supreme Court win for gay marriage equality have lead to nationwide bills and discourse on how this unclassified group of people should be contained for the comfort of others. What right do other people have to know about such personal matters in ones life? Well that depends on whether you have the legal right to a personal life. The largely Republican body of politicians pushing the who’s-in your-pants?-agenda are protecting the interests of the socially conservative that elect them. Who is protecting the underrepresented transexual community? Not their constitution.
In my colleague's article, Who's afraid of the locker room?, Molly asks the reader in the final paragraph, "Who is protecting the underrepresented transexual community?" I agree with her line of thinking and the data that backs it up. Out of concern, I searched and found that in 2017, more than 130 anti-LGBTQ bills were introduced across the country according to the website for Human Rights Campaign. I'm disturbed to see the amount of bills being proposed - but it's somewhat reassuring that we do have advocacy groups out there intervening. What I've learned so far, in my short little life, is that change happens. It seems as though at times, we take one step forward, two steps back, but I'm confident and hopeful that our constitution will represent us all. I think it's just important that we all stick together and use our voice!
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