4 ms·

The law requires men to use the men's room, and women to use the women's room. I don't see the problem with that. If it's really an issue, why can't PayPal jus

The law requires men to use the men's room, and women to use the women's room. I don't see the problem with that. If it's really an issue, why can't PayPal just put a third bathroom in its facility for any gender?

gecko 11y ago
The law also bars cities from protecting LGBT rights, and bars individuals of any of the remaining protected classes for suing if they're discriminated against in the first place--effectively gutting the entire antidiscrimination law. Calling this "the bathroom bill" was a shrewd marketing move on the legislature's side, but there are some really strong reasons to condemn this bill even if you do agree with the bathroom part.
- joshuaheard 11y ago
  I read the law, and I don't see where it does that. I don't want my daughter going into a public restroom that is shared by a man, whether he is dressed as a man or not, or thinks he is a woman. The law provides an accommodation for single stall bathrooms for any gender. I think Paypal is being the troll here.
  - EdwardMSmith 11y ago
    > I don't want my daughter going into a public restroom that is shared by a man, whether he is dressed as a man or not. Why? What is the underlying reason for that? Is it different if your (hypothetical?) son of the same age might have a woman (regardless of dress) in with him? I'm genuinely curious.
    - joshuaheard 11y ago
      No, I don't want my 10 year old daughter seeing strange men urinating and defecating, or in various stages of undress in a public restroom. But, if the issue is whether we should have separate bathrooms for the genders, let's have that conversation instead of forcing it on society in the guise of discrimination.
      - kstrauser 11y ago
        Consider this law means your daughter has to share the bathroom with female-to-male people, including those who look like lumberjacks. Would she be more shocked by seeing a woman-appearing person in the bathroom (assuming they're not showing each other their private bits) than a man-appearing person?
      - vertex-four 11y ago
        > No, I don't want my 10 year old daughter seeing strange men urinating and defecating, or in various stages of undress in a public restroom. I'm confused... in bathrooms in the US, you don't have cubicles that shut+lock? You strip naked in public areas? In my country, we have cubicles that lock and people pull their clothes back on before unlocking them. Also, like... why's it ok for her to see strange cis women taking a shit, in case you actually do all shit in the open?
  - gecko 11y ago
    > I read the law, and I don't see where it does that. That's okay; a lot of people have reading deficits, and in fact my company works a lot to help people with them. One thing we've found helps with reading deficits is breaking things down, so let's do that. First, load up http://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2015E2/Bills/House/PDF/H2v1.pdf http://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2015E2/Bills/House/PDF/H2v1.pd... in another browser window. That's the actual bill text, presented as a diff. HB2 has three parts. The first part is about bathrooms, and the second part prohibits cities have a minimum wage other than the state's, so I'm going to completely ignore those two bits. That leaves part III. Part III has three main parts. Here's what they do: Part III, Section 3.1(c), says that only the state definitions of protected classes matter, and that local municipalities cannot define their own: "this Article and other applicable provisions of the General Statutes supersede and preempt any ordinance, regulation, resolution, or policy adopted or imposed by a unit of local government or other political subdivision of the State". So the only protected classes are those defined by the state. Part III, Section 3.2, adds the line, "This Article does not create, and shall not be construed to create or support, a statutory or common law private right of action, and no person may bring any civil action based upon the public policy expressed herein." This is technical language, but "private right of action", in this context, means "bring a suit." Thus, only the state can bring action; you can't. And due to Part III, Section 3.1(c), local cities cannot create their own laws that do permit this. Thus, the first part of my statement: you are now barred from suing for discrimination, and must rely on the state. Finally, Part III, Section 3.3(a), redefines the state's protected classes to include "race, religion, color, national origin, or biological sex". Since sexual orientation and gender identity are not included here, and Part III Section 3.1 forbade cities from having their own protected classes, we have now prohibited the entire LGBT community from being declared a protected class, and therefore the state is under no obligation (and, in fact, has no legal basis) to bring discrimination complaints about sexual orientation.
    - joshuaheard 11y ago
      All they changed was to add the word "biological" to "race, religion, color, national origin, or biological sex". Sexual orientation and gender identity were never in the state law. This is not the gutting of discrimination laws you describe.
natrius 11y ago
What is a man?
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
throwaway5752 11y ago
That is one of 3 major parts to the bill. You can read for yourself (with the handy diff-like format available here: http://www.ncleg.net/Applications/BillLookUp/LoadBillDocument.aspx?SessionCode=2015E2&DocNum=2&SeqNum=0e http://www.ncleg.net/Applications/BillLookUp/LoadBillDocumen...) or read any or the huge number of analyses of the bill. It is far beyond transsexual citizens of NC, though that aspect of the bill is ridiculous, too. Or will police have to inspect the genitalia of M2F/F2M transitioned people in the presence of a birth certificate? Please, by all means google pictures of transitioned people, both male and female, and look at their outward appearance versus their chromosomal sexual identity. Then imagine them being forced to use the bathroom with other people sharing the same genetic sexual identity. Everything was working just fine before this bill. There were laws about public indecency, sexual assualt, and invasion of privacy that covered any and all bathroom misbehavior. It solves zero problems, and lost NC $20M in annual salary. Again, and please look at the details of how it takes rights away from cities and states, and completely guts state level discrimination protection for all classes (veterans, race, religion, et al).
- vertex-four 11y ago
  > Or will police have to inspect the genitalia of M2F/F2M transitioned people in the presence of a birth certificate? Stonewall all over again - "Standard procedure was to line up the patrons, check their identification, and have female police officers take customers dressed as women to the bathroom to verify their sex, upon which any men dressed as women would be arrested."[0] You'd think the US would be doing a little better nearly 50 years on, eh? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_riots#Police_raid https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_riots#Police_raid
  - kombucha2 11y ago
    Wow...just WOW, I never had any idea that was a part of Stonewall.. jesus.
tzs 11y ago
If that was all it had done, and if it had defined men as "people who have a penis" and woman as "people who do not have a penis" or something along those lines, then unless one objected to the whole idea of separate men's and women's rooms it would be fairly hard to come up with a decent objection. (Why do we have separate men's and women's rooms? We didn't have them in student housing at my college, and it was never a problem.) Others have already pointed out that this is not all it does. It goes far beyond the bathroom. In addition to that, it also botches the bathroom portion because it sorts people into bathrooms by what is on their birth certificate. If your birth certificate says "male", for instance, but you've had male to female sex reassignment surgery you'd still be sorted into the men's room under this law. The proponents of the law say that it is easy in North Carolina to get your birth certificate changed to match your new sex when it changes, such as due to sex reassignment surgery. The problem with that is that there are actually people who are born outside of North Carolina, but for inexplicable reasons move there. North Carolina did not issue their birth certificates, and so North Carolina's ease of changing a birth certificate is irrelevant to them. Idaho, for example, does not allow amending the sex on a birth certificate. A person who is born female in Idaho, moves to North Carolina, and undergoes female to male sex reassignment surgery will be required to use the woman's room, despite sporting a penis, in North Carolina. Maybe we are splitting bathrooms wrong. Maybe instead of men/women, the split should be stand/sit. Have one kind of bathroom that just has urinals, and one that just has enclosed stalls. If you have a penis and just need to urinate, you use the former. If you do not have a penis or you need to defecate you use the latter. Since the latter would have enclosed stalls, you should have enough privacy that it doesn't matter who else is using the other stalls.

gecko 11y ago

The law also bars cities from protecting LGBT rights, and bars individuals of any of the remaining protected classes for suing if they're discriminated against in the first place--effectively gutting the entire antidiscrimination law. Calling this "the bathroom bill" was a shrewd marketing move on the legislature's side, but there are some really strong reasons to condemn this bill even if you do agree with the bathroom part.

joshuaheard 11y ago
I read the law, and I don't see where it does that. I don't want my daughter going into a public restroom that is shared by a man, whether he is dressed as a man or not, or thinks he is a woman. The law provides an accommodation for single stall bathrooms for any gender. I think Paypal is being the troll here.
- EdwardMSmith 11y ago
  > I don't want my daughter going into a public restroom that is shared by a man, whether he is dressed as a man or not. Why? What is the underlying reason for that? Is it different if your (hypothetical?) son of the same age might have a woman (regardless of dress) in with him? I'm genuinely curious.
  - joshuaheard 11y ago
    No, I don't want my 10 year old daughter seeing strange men urinating and defecating, or in various stages of undress in a public restroom. But, if the issue is whether we should have separate bathrooms for the genders, let's have that conversation instead of forcing it on society in the guise of discrimination.
    - kstrauser 11y ago
      Consider this law means your daughter has to share the bathroom with female-to-male people, including those who look like lumberjacks. Would she be more shocked by seeing a woman-appearing person in the bathroom (assuming they're not showing each other their private bits) than a man-appearing person?
    - vertex-four 11y ago
      > No, I don't want my 10 year old daughter seeing strange men urinating and defecating, or in various stages of undress in a public restroom. I'm confused... in bathrooms in the US, you don't have cubicles that shut+lock? You strip naked in public areas? In my country, we have cubicles that lock and people pull their clothes back on before unlocking them. Also, like... why's it ok for her to see strange cis women taking a shit, in case you actually do all shit in the open?
- gecko 11y ago
  > I read the law, and I don't see where it does that. That's okay; a lot of people have reading deficits, and in fact my company works a lot to help people with them. One thing we've found helps with reading deficits is breaking things down, so let's do that. First, load up http://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2015E2/Bills/House/PDF/H2v1.pdf http://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2015E2/Bills/House/PDF/H2v1.pd... in another browser window. That's the actual bill text, presented as a diff. HB2 has three parts. The first part is about bathrooms, and the second part prohibits cities have a minimum wage other than the state's, so I'm going to completely ignore those two bits. That leaves part III. Part III has three main parts. Here's what they do: Part III, Section 3.1(c), says that only the state definitions of protected classes matter, and that local municipalities cannot define their own: "this Article and other applicable provisions of the General Statutes supersede and preempt any ordinance, regulation, resolution, or policy adopted or imposed by a unit of local government or other political subdivision of the State". So the only protected classes are those defined by the state. Part III, Section 3.2, adds the line, "This Article does not create, and shall not be construed to create or support, a statutory or common law private right of action, and no person may bring any civil action based upon the public policy expressed herein." This is technical language, but "private right of action", in this context, means "bring a suit." Thus, only the state can bring action; you can't. And due to Part III, Section 3.1(c), local cities cannot create their own laws that do permit this. Thus, the first part of my statement: you are now barred from suing for discrimination, and must rely on the state. Finally, Part III, Section 3.3(a), redefines the state's protected classes to include "race, religion, color, national origin, or biological sex". Since sexual orientation and gender identity are not included here, and Part III Section 3.1 forbade cities from having their own protected classes, we have now prohibited the entire LGBT community from being declared a protected class, and therefore the state is under no obligation (and, in fact, has no legal basis) to bring discrimination complaints about sexual orientation.
  - joshuaheard 11y ago
    All they changed was to add the word "biological" to "race, religion, color, national origin, or biological sex". Sexual orientation and gender identity were never in the state law. This is not the gutting of discrimination laws you describe.

natrius 11y ago

What is a man?

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

throwaway5752 11y ago

That is one of 3 major parts to the bill. You can read for yourself (with the handy diff-like format available here: http://www.ncleg.net/Applications/BillLookUp/LoadBillDocument.aspx?SessionCode=2015E2&DocNum=2&SeqNum=0e http://www.ncleg.net/Applications/BillLookUp/LoadBillDocumen...) or read any or the huge number of analyses of the bill. It is far beyond transsexual citizens of NC, though that aspect of the bill is ridiculous, too. Or will police have to inspect the genitalia of M2F/F2M transitioned people in the presence of a birth certificate? Please, by all means google pictures of transitioned people, both male and female, and look at their outward appearance versus their chromosomal sexual identity. Then imagine them being forced to use the bathroom with other people sharing the same genetic sexual identity. Everything was working just fine before this bill. There were laws about public indecency, sexual assualt, and invasion of privacy that covered any and all bathroom misbehavior. It solves zero problems, and lost NC $20M in annual salary. Again, and please look at the details of how it takes rights away from cities and states, and completely guts state level discrimination protection for all classes (veterans, race, religion, et al).

vertex-four 11y ago
> Or will police have to inspect the genitalia of M2F/F2M transitioned people in the presence of a birth certificate? Stonewall all over again - "Standard procedure was to line up the patrons, check their identification, and have female police officers take customers dressed as women to the bathroom to verify their sex, upon which any men dressed as women would be arrested."[0] You'd think the US would be doing a little better nearly 50 years on, eh? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_riots#Police_raid https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_riots#Police_raid
- kombucha2 11y ago
  Wow...just WOW, I never had any idea that was a part of Stonewall.. jesus.

tzs 11y ago

If that was all it had done, and if it had defined men as "people who have a penis" and woman as "people who do not have a penis" or something along those lines, then unless one objected to the whole idea of separate men's and women's rooms it would be fairly hard to come up with a decent objection. (Why do we have separate men's and women's rooms? We didn't have them in student housing at my college, and it was never a problem.) Others have already pointed out that this is not all it does. It goes far beyond the bathroom. In addition to that, it also botches the bathroom portion because it sorts people into bathrooms by what is on their birth certificate. If your birth certificate says "male", for instance, but you've had male to female sex reassignment surgery you'd still be sorted into the men's room under this law. The proponents of the law say that it is easy in North Carolina to get your birth certificate changed to match your new sex when it changes, such as due to sex reassignment surgery. The problem with that is that there are actually people who are born outside of North Carolina, but for inexplicable reasons move there. North Carolina did not issue their birth certificates, and so North Carolina's ease of changing a birth certificate is irrelevant to them. Idaho, for example, does not allow amending the sex on a birth certificate. A person who is born female in Idaho, moves to North Carolina, and undergoes female to male sex reassignment surgery will be required to use the woman's room, despite sporting a penis, in North Carolina. Maybe we are splitting bathrooms wrong. Maybe instead of men/women, the split should be stand/sit. Have one kind of bathroom that just has urinals, and one that just has enclosed stalls. If you have a penis and just need to urinate, you use the former. If you do not have a penis or you need to defecate you use the latter. Since the latter would have enclosed stalls, you should have enough privacy that it doesn't matter who else is using the other stalls.