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So you think people who are transgendered are the same as tomboys? How many transgendered people have you met? I had one in my class at a college last summer. You never would have known she was born male, and had been living as her gender, which is female since she was child. If she were to use a male bathroom, just because she was born with a penis, it was cause all sorts of issues, because she looks complete female. Why should you get to determine that because of her external genitalia, that she has to use a bathroom that she doesn't want to and which would just cause more issues than her going into the stall in e women's room?
I think the jury is out. It is not unusual for children to go through phases where they try out the opposite sex. The brain is not mature in high school and the emergence of sex hormones may straighten out any "confusion". I'm especially against hormone suppression therapy for kids. Let them grow up and then decide.
I worked with a transgendered woman for years. Sadly she didn't seem any happier after the surgery than she had as a man.
I've seen several "transgender" students as well but once the newness wears off they seem to revert back. I ran into one the other day who insisted on being called by a boys name when she was my student but got offended that that is the name I remember her by. She goes by her given name now which I can't for the life of me remember. I don't think this is something schools should be encouraging. This is a decision that must wait until well after puberty when the brain is fully developed. Most kids who have gender confusion will eventually come to accept the gender they were born with.
"Twin studies demonstrate that GD is not an innate trait. Moreover, barring pre-pubertal affirmation and hormone intervention for GD, 80 percent to 95 percent of children with GD will accept the reality of their biological sex by late adolescence."
This thread however is about bathroom use. I stand by what I said. Use the bathroom that fits your equipment. Parents should be seeking help for their kids if they experience angst over their gender but insisting on using the other bathroom just calls attention to the issue which may not be what the doctor ordered.
Last edited by Ivorytickler; 02-18-2017 at 09:26 PM..
I would have loved single user restroom and locker room facilities as a student, myself, for reasons of privacy that have nothing to do with gender/transgender issues. Private restrooms are great (every workplace I've been at happens to have had them, versus stalls/lines of urinals). And communal locker rooms/showers suck in general, and especially in middle and high schools, no matter who you are or your gender identity.
*shrug*
The definition of a locker room is a room in a school, sports stadium, etc., for changing clothes and for storing clothes and equipment in lockers. How do you have a single user locker room in a place such as a school where many people need to use the facility?
Quote:
Originally Posted by DDMP77
She is losing her right to privacy. An actual right defined in law.
Of course lesbians have the right to use the ladies room. They are ladies.
What law providing an actual right to privacy are you referring? The right to privacy refers to the concept that one's personal information is protected from public scrutiny. This include information such as health information. The right to privacy is most often cited in the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment, which states:
No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
I'm trying to figure out what laws define the limits of restroom privacy. I'm happy if I can find a public restroom that is relatively convenient and clean.
Last edited by toobusytoday; 02-19-2017 at 06:21 AM..
Reason: removed orphaned comment
Where from the above quotes do you possibly get the idea that I would think that type of behavior would acceptable? Where in "any other student would have been rightfully suspended, sent to an alternative school, or even expelled" do you come up with an accusation that the behavior this kid engaged in would be acceptable in anyone? It isn't. My point, in case you missed it, was that the transgendered student should have been disciplined just like any other kid would have been if they had done a third of what was described. This would have happened regardless of whether the victims and perp were of the same gender or a different genders. If a biological female had engaged in similar behavior with another biological female they would have been suspended, sent to alternative school, or even expelled. This student was treated differently than any other student in the school who had engaged in similar behavior would have been simply because they were transgendered and that is not right.
Great if the behavior is the problem how is this even an issue of which bathroom they used. A Cis girl could have behaved in the exact same way, and like this student should be disciplined. But unlike this student it wouldn't even be an option to tell that child they cannot use the bathroom anymore. So why is this instance of bad behavior being used as an a reason to keep transgendered kids out of the bathroom of their gender?
Our school board just passed one even though most people in our town opposed it.
Mod note - Since this is a hot topic, I'd like to remind everyone to keep their comments on-topic and speak only about school settings. Any personal attacks will result in posts deleted and infractions issued. It helps if you have a legitimate source to back up your point.
Our school board just passed one even though most people in our town opposed it.
I just wanted to mention that having a transgender bathroom policy does not necessarily mean that trans kids are allowed in any bathroom. Having a policy simply means outlining what is allowed and that could be saying that they are to use the bathroom for their physical gender or their self identified gender, etc. SB's pass policies on many issues and often just clarify what's currently happening.
I am also a teacher and I see an issue. The issue I see is once you declare your "right" to use the other bathroom you've gone public and kids/teenagers do stupid things to save face. You may find yourself feeling you have no way back if you change your mind and many kids do. From what I've read you really can't decide if you are transgender until well into your 20's. I'm not sure we should be encouraging switching bathrooms. Perhaps the answer is to just make them all unisex or to have three versions. Boys, girls and Haven't decided yet (but you still draw attention to yourself with that last one)
It's just a bathroom. Use the one that fits your anatomy and go on with your day. I have been known to use the men's teacher bathroom but it doesn't make me feel like a man. I had to pee and it wasn't occupied.
I agree that they are too young to decide for certain that they want to go through a transition process. I would disagree with things like hormone treatments and surgery. However, if a child wants to dress as a girl/boy and be treated like one and they have convincingly done so, then it only creates an incredibly uncomfortable situation to ask them to use the bathroom that corresponds to a gender that they don't look or act like.
Maybe you don't know any transgender people. I do - you would never know. Imagine a child who looks and acts like a girl, the children in the school treat her like a girl and assume she is a girl and have no problem with that, and then the school announces that this little girl with the blond curls and cute pink dress is really a boy and needs to use the boy's bathroom. That is doing much more harm to that child than what you imagine might be construed as support and might set up some vague expectations that clearly the child already has set up for him/herself.
If the parents have gone along with the gender identity and the child has adopted it, then whether you agree or disagree that it's a good idea is just irrelevant. It's really not the school's place to step in and try to not encourage it by humiliating the child. Whether you agree or not, there is nothing sound about that approach. It's just not the school's place to interfere.
I think the jury is out. It is not unusual for children to go through phases where they try out the opposite sex. The brain is not mature in high school and the emergence of sex hormones may straighten out any "confusion". I'm especially against hormone suppression therapy for kids. Let them grow up and then decide.
I worked with a transgendered woman for years. Sadly she didn't seem any happier after the surgery than she had as a man.
I've seen several "transgender" students as well but once the newness wears off they seem to revert back. I ran into one the other day who insisted on being called by a boys name when she was my student but got offended that that is the name I remember her by. She goes by her given name now which I can't for the life of me remember. I don't think this is something schools should be encouraging. This is a decision that must wait until well after puberty when the brain is fully developed. Most kids who have gender confusion will eventually come to accept the gender they were born with.
"Twin studies demonstrate that GD is not an innate trait. Moreover, barring pre-pubertal affirmation and hormone intervention for GD, 80 percent to 95 percent of children with GD will accept the reality of their biological sex by late adolescence."
This thread however is about bathroom use. I stand by what I said. Use the bathroom that fits your equipment. Parents should be seeking help for their kids if they experience angst over their gender but insisting on using the other bathroom just calls attention to the issue which may not be what the doctor ordered.
But it's not your place to decide that. It's the parents' and the pediatricians' and the psychologists'. Just because you can google an article does not make you an expert. Plus, you are not doing anything to change what is happening - you only embarrass the student and set them up for bullying and humiliation with these "bathroom" policies.
I know a lot of transgender people. I have several close friends and even a relative who have gone through a transition. I'm sure there are many unhappy ones out there, but not among those who I know. I can't say that I understand it or would have advised them to do it, but I can certainly see that it is beyond my level of expertise to have an opinion and take any action that would cause them grief. Just not our place as teachers, not the place of schools.
I'm glad I don't make urinals for a living. I think they will be disappearing soon.
I can see school showers going the way of the urinal.
Restroom shouldn't be a problem. Use a stall, pee, and leave. But people won't leave it at that. People will be offended and then sue.
Is anyone here involved in a new school construction and know how they are addressing this?
Still installing urinals and stalls. The urinals will usually start with dividers but they'll get ripped down fairly quickly. It will take longer for the stalls to be destroyed. Replacing them wasn't a high priority at my former school.
Great if the behavior is the problem how is this even an issue of which bathroom they used. A Cis girl could have behaved in the exact same way, and like this student should be disciplined. But unlike this student it wouldn't even be an option to tell that child they cannot use the bathroom anymore. So why is this instance of bad behavior being used as an a reason to keep transgendered kids out of the bathroom of their gender?
Guess you have not had experience with dealing with students of the same gender who have engaged in sexual harassment, which I am glad to hear and I suspect this is more of an issue at middle school. Among the first lines of intervention I have seen different administrators at schools with more than one bathroom take was to "assign" each kid their bathroom and put the one assigned to the other off limits. They could also use the faculty bathroom in the front office area. In another case we had a kid on an IEP who bothered multiple kids and that kid was only allowed to use the bathroom by the office. In any of these cases had the student gone in the wrong bathroom they would have been suspended.
I know you seem to think that other kids shouldn't be bothered by having a transgendered student in the bathroom or locker room but that flies against developmental norms. Adolescents, even in the most "normal" of circumstances, struggle with their emerging sexuality. What they are being asked to do is ignore the developmentally normal discomfort of having someone they feel is of a different gender in the same room where they are engaged in activities that require they remove clothing from areas of their bodies they associate with sexuality. In this current environment if they express this they basically are told they are a bad person for feeling that way and/or that their feeling don't matter. Once one kid gets this "you horrible person" treatment from administrators, teachers, and/or students any other student who feels that way is going to keep their mouth shut and suffer in silence. As with other issues that students encounter in school, while they may put on a public face of "I don't care" many will express their true feelings at home, which in some cases will trigger their parent to take on that battle for them. Simply because students are not saying they are bothered at school, especially in front of a teacher who strongly feels they shouldn't be, does not mean they aren't. Nor does claiming they wouldn't be bothered when discussing it in theory mean they wouldn't be bothered by it in reality, you know the good old NIMBY effect.
As I have asked you before, do the feelings and/or rights of only the transgendered child matter? That is what you seem to advocate. Please don't start up on the biology of the issue. I acknowledge that for an extremely small percentage of students there are biological reasons why simple male and female designations are not appropriate. However, that does not change the fact that for the overwhelming number of students those very simple designation work just fine and there is more science supporting that notion than not. Additionally, the latest research indicates that at least 85% of those children identifying as the opposite gender will identify as their their natal sex by the time they finish puberty.
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