I went to Target twice in the last week. While there, I went to the bathroom. The most amazing thing was inside. STALLS. With doors. That locked.
I’ve actually yet to come across a stall-less Target bathroom (and I’d like to say I’m a professional on such things. Moms of toddlers know their – ahem – shit). So pardon me for being quite so simplistic, but… why are we so concerned that someone might be peeping at a pee-pee? Perhaps if the concern circled around the vintage trough-style urinals of the old Ohio Stadium, I could foresee some apprehension. But for my children, we’ve tried to instill in them the use of a door to conceal a view. (At least, in public.)
There’s a lot of fear in this whole trans-bathroom issue. Yet we seem to have difficulty distinguishing between the justified fear of pedophiles and the unjustified fear of transgendered people. Somehow the two groups became synonymous. They’re not.
I know people who have been molested. None of them by a transgendered person. The stats say you’re more likely to be sexually abused by someone you know (and perhaps even love) than by a stranger. And if we fear for our little ladies in public restrooms, we must continue protecting them when they become young women at college campuses. (MSU, I’m looking at you.)
For the sake of argument, let’s say a transgendered person would actually perform some sort of sexual misconduct in the bathroom of a Target. Please remember that this occurred because of the person’s wrong view of humanity – namely that people exist primarily for personal pleasure – not because of the offender’s gender identification.
The “correct” bathroom will not solve the problem of our young women becoming victims; learning, as a civilization, how to treat women, will.
Don’t make “them” the problem. We – all of us – are the problem when we allow inequality to continue in our midst.