That Moment When You Suddenly Realize

an invasive full body scan. These wackos pushing bathroom laws are such a pack of damn fools.

it to take place.

I wasn't keeping app with the matter really.

So you are saying that out of the clear blue sky NC passes a law saying that biological gender is what matters in bathrooms before the federal government even said anything about gender and bathrooms?

The Feds responded

This is really a continuation of the RW snit when same-sex marriage was made legal by the Court. Suddenly it went from weddings to bathrooms.

passed a city law permitting transgender people to use the bathroom of the gender they identified with.
The NC legislature then passed a law that prohibited localities from passing such laws.
The governor signed it into law.
It was an effort to throw a crumb to the religious right wing nuts.
Does anyone think they were not already doing this? Moreover, what problems has it caused?

It's a trojan horse. They took away the right to sue under state law for employment discrimination and also prohibits cities from setting their own minimum wage. What worries me is that they will repeal the bathroom portion but leave the rest intact.

https://www.propublica.org/article/why-north-carolinas-new-anti-lgbt-law-is-a-trojan-horse

https://www.balloon-juice.com/2016/03/24/nc-gop-bathroom-bill-is-a-steaming-load-of-crap/

You didn't ask "if" the feds started it, but "why" which assumes that they did start it.

Glad it got sorted out in the end.

whatever facilities they identified with re: gender.

McCrory and rest of NC Taliban disliked this so RUSHED into special session to pass a state law that effectively overturned Charlotte's (and added additional wording that prevented cities and municipalities from paying contract workers more than NC min wage and wording that prevented anyone from suing for discrimination in the workplace or elsewhere). It was gross administrative overreach by NC gov and leg. (though HE accuses Obama Admin of "overreach" it's McCrory & cronies who are actually guilty of it).

Passing of HB2 caused backlash from many schools, businesses, organizations and caused NC to lose millions of dollars in business and possibly millions in fed education funding.

Public schools all over the country thus asked DOJ to clarify rules for them so they can ensure they are following federal law and do not also lose funding.

So, DOJ clarified.

THAT'S why "fed govt" stepped in. They HAD to - were forced to by McCrory and his thugs.

and other GOP-controlled legislatures are who brought up the issue.

Should Obama have ignored their actions and done nothing?

And it sets a very ugly precedent for slippery-slope laws further down the road??

Jesus H. Christ... You can't win for losing... Had Obama said nothing and ignored the issue, the usual suspects would be going apeshit on this site...

You are 100 % right

Airport pornascans at every bathroom. It's a reason for some gross pig to get a free look at the genitals of every little kid out there.

our birth certificates with us wherever we go in case we need to use the bathroom?

view of the inner working of their perverted minds.

They have been engineering legislative attacks in a number of GOP dominated states as part of the Koch plan to disable the bill of rights and federal authority in general. They wrote the laws and coordinated the legislative passage. The FBI should be looking at them for RICO violations. This one outfit is responsible for many of the recent legislative attacks on LGBT people, the recent spate of excessive and inaccurate regulation of abortion service providers and women's health clinics, and the recent focus against access to sex ed. information and birth control for teens.

using the women's bathroom. What I'm outraged about is that all men will have to be allowed in - because it would sex discrimination if men were expected to use only the men's facilities.

I was assulted as a girl by a strange man and I don't want to provide the entertainment for voyeurs.

This stripping of women/girls of their right to privacy/dignity is a huge step backwards for women's rights.

Don't you dare fucking call me a whacko and a damn fool for not wanting it to be legal for a man to follow me into the bathroom to watch me on the toilet! THERE'S GREAT BIG GAPS AROUND THE DOORS!!!

I'm disgusted Obama for doing this. Will his daughter's college dorm allow the boys that to use the girls showers? Will they get male roommates? If they don't allow that then that will be sex discrimination.

no one will be the wiser. For all others there should be a separate unisex rest room. Some places call them family restrooms - it's like for men with small children, people who have to have an helper of the opposite sex go in with them. Great idea.

described it.

but imagine how this plays out in real time . . .. say you see someone going into the ladies room that looks like a mannish woman - what are you going to do? That person could be a cisgender woman who just looks mannish, or might be a transgender person who is transitioning but doesn't "pass". In both cases, I still think that person has a right to use the women's bathroom, don't you?


And what about lesbians who look into stalls and scope you and your daughter out? They certainly belong in the women's room, and there aren't special laws about that. The same is true for gay men in men's rooms.


It's just a solution without a problem - criminal activity can happen in restrooms, but we don't need new laws to deal with it.

Oh yes... separate...but equal!

prior to this without making life even more miserable for our transgender friends.

Trans woman (MTF transsexuals to use a slightly outdated term) do not identify as men. They are women. They aren't trying to get into the women's washroom as men, they're trying to get into the woman's washroom as women. They're not trying to get a peek at you, hell, a lot of them are straight women, and attracted to men.

It's the same with trans men. They do not identify as women, they identify as men. They are trying to use the men's room as men, not as women. They also are not trying to peek at guys, they're just using the washroom for who they are.

So, you are afraid that they will now have to allow all men into the women's washroom, but trans women are not men! They view themselves (and request that all others) as women. They're asking to be recognized as women, and thus it would not be changing any "rules" about men not entering the women's restroom.

Also, currently there is nothing stopping men from walking into a women's washroom, other than being recognized as men while they do it, and that's not going to change in any way.

Trans is not a drag act, y'know....

This seems to be what people don't get. It's not a guy in women's clothes.

It's akin to that "homosexuality is not a choice" debunked crap the religious like to tout.

Like the sign I saw in Raleigh said:

It wasn't about water fountains then and it isn't about bathrooms now.

This happened because Charlotte did something it wasn't supposed to do in our Conservative Nirvana of NC. An example must be made!

in a much better way. This is exactly the correct point.

Like, who gets to decide who "passes?"

Additionally, restricting people from using the washroom of the sex they identify with has its own pitfalls. A trans woman is going to present as a woman. If the assertion is that they were born as men, so they must use the men's room, you have an entirely new problem. Are women going to be okay with trans men entering the women's washroom because they were born as women? They present as men! They dress as men, look like men, and identify as men. Guaranteed women don't want them in the ladies' room.

"Limited intrusion small government" for ya.

is that in California, we have basically had this law, at least regarding our schools since 2013 and there have been no problems.

you don't say

This is a farce.

It's NO SHIT.

The CONGRESS hasn't been doing shit for all these years. And the obstructionist Republicans are the ones who are the PARTY OF "NO."

Totally earning that 9% approval rating. Republicans want the people to hate the government. Worst possible representatives, evah.

is placed squarely where it belongs:

- The oligarchs
- Wall Street
- The Military Industrial Complex
- Other big corporations

I say this because they are the ones who OWN our government. Sure, the worms we go through the sham of electing to national office are doing illegal shit. But it is illegal shit that benefits billionaires.

who own America, and, of course, both political parties?

Ask Jill Stein who runs America...

We have a secret war in Yemen, with a media blackout, to avoid talking about it.

...about robust debate over a few bullshit topics?

Hell, I'm from Brooklyn, so that is the fucking quote.

Ya gotta pee, ya gotta pee.

Just go pee.

did you hear that we now have ground troops in Yemen?

You'd think that would be a little more interesting from a "duty to inform the public" point of view than the bathroom thing.

Just bitched about it above and scrolled down to read this.

Jinx.

didn't use restrooms?

No one could tell. Nobody noticed. It's a made up thing to legislate, like women's bodies, because they can't govern.

than the local governments themselves.

I don't think this was even an issue until someone decided it should be illegal.
Would have thought that this would have come up 15 years ago when Family Bathrooms and Baby Changing stations started popping up. Those were unisex also.

Seriously, so we can get right on it. And when did Fox News become cover-up agents for Obama. The whole premise that the media exosts to lay down cover for a criminal government is laughable and a conspiracy theory at best.

from thing *THEY* don't want us to know.

In other contexts, the OP would be considered transphobic

Or, it is just a hit-and-run with no intent except to distract us by saying we are being distracted!

...a word like "shit" or "fucking"?

I can't post that shit to my fucking facebook wall. My auntie is on my facebook, for gawd sake!

They would rather have us focus on the absurd, the shame and disgrace of ludicrous national priorities than ANY of the life and death priorities that are important to all of humanity.

to be clear

One woman had a strange, eye-opening encounter in a Target bathroom.

http://www.upworthy.com/one-woman-had-a-strange-eye-opening-encounter-in-a-target-bathroom?c=upw1

She walked past the three open stalls and stood directly in front of my door. Then she leaned over and placed her eye firmly up against the gap between the door and the frame and stared in at me.

I am not making this up. And let me tell you, it was awkward. Bizarre even. This wasn't a case of someone hoping all those occupied stalls aren't really occupied. Mine was the only stall that was occupied. She deliberately stopped and stared in at me. My startled eyes met hers, and she moved away into one of the larger stalls.

I got out of my stall as quickly as I could, and as I stood washing my hands, her voice called out.

"Sorry about that," she said. "But, you know, Target lets men and homosexuals use just any bathroom. I was making sure you were a woman."

I walked out, utterly gobsmacked, and it wasn't until I caught up with my daughter and told her the whole ridiculous story that I realized the complete and utter irony of it. This woman deliberately made me feel horribly uncomfortable just because she was uncomfortable with the extremely vague possibility of someone being different from expected behind a closed and locked stall door.

My daughter raised a brow and asked, "Did you tell her that your teenage daughter has a girlfriend?"

"She probably would have blinded me with hand sanitizer or something," I joked.

stared at her while she was on the toilet. Imagine what she'll feel like when men are staring at her.

This is my point; when we are perched on the toilet we can be watched by any Tom, Dick and Harry. I never thought it would be a Democratic administration who would allow women and girls to be violated.

I plan to take my husband in to guard the door every time I use a public restroom. I won't be the only one either.

It is idiotic to suggest that they are going to put their eyeballs to toilet stall cracks. I sure the fuck don't want FTMs in womene's bathrooms. I don't want to be sharing the same bathroom with a man with a full beard, even if he still has a vagina.

that Bill Clinton signed to appease his right wing partners.
The fundies are using this to claim they have "right"s that are being infringed upon due to the nature of their personal religious hatred of other peoples.
A litmus test should be used to determine the veracity of their "religious" beliefs. Do they follow the "Golden Rule" or not?

Here is a link to 18 questions and answers about the impact of this law

http://www.ncjustice.org/?q=18-questions-18-answers-real-facts-behind-house-bill-2


It affects the rights of persons as far as any type of workplace discrimination lawsuits by taking away one's right to take grievances to state courts.

It affects the the possibility for local governments to make their own minimum wage laws in our state.

It affects the ability of any local government in the state to enact family leave policies that may differ from those set by the state

and so on... There's a lot more going on here than just who potties where, also the law was written so that each portion of it has to be removed individually so even if the bathroom portion of the bill get's overturned, the portions of the law that affect employment and workplace discrimination still stand so there is a lot more going on here than simple distraction