Post Five: TED Talk by Ivan Coyote
In this TED Talk, Ivan starts off by saying there needs to be single stall gender neutral bathrooms. Ivan makes the case that it should not be about fitting into male or female bathrooms because some folks are not male or female. Even though they know they can often pass as male most of the time for bathroom purposes it still does not solve the issue of feeling uncomfortable in changing rooms. They follow that by saying, “And I shouldn't have to use the men's room because I'm not a man. I'm a trans person.” Providing the insight that even if you identify as trans that doesn’t mean you have to fit yourself into a binary especially not for social purposes like bathrooms or locker rooms.
Another important part of this video is the section about three minutes in when Ivan talks about the new legislation people are attempting to pass saying that people will have to use the bathrooms that match the gender assigned at birth. This creates a whole new list of problems. For example, Ivan is seen as too masculine presenting to be in a female bathroom so the men’s is usually the best option but if this legislation passes then that won’t be an option either.
An amazing point brought up is how we are going to attempt to police who goes into what bathroom. We usually assume if people are in the ‘right’ bathroom based on how many gender markers we can identify. Stereotypes such as hair length, clothing, or facial hair unfortunately are the first assumption that we know a person’s identity. How will we know what genitals people have walking in? We can’t have everybody stop and be searched or some ridiculous method similar to that. For that reason, Ivan makes the claim that this is all about putting fear in people. This will increase the transphobia people experience and create more dangerous spaces.
Much like other sources, Ivan appeals to the idea that these single stalled structures as bathrooms which can also double as changing rooms offer a safe space to not only trans folks, but people with disabilities, people with body image issues, or people that don’t fit neatly into the awful boxes that exist in public spaces. Creating single stalled restrooms that also have benches or things like a locker room would have would also be cost efficient in that both things would be in one place so there would be no need for an excuse about needing to pay more to create multiple rooms.
Source:
https://www.ted.com/talks/ivan_coyote_why_we_need_gender_neutral_bathrooms?language=en#t-7076