Blog Posts

An Older Lesbian Considers the Anti-Gay Houston Vote

I was saddened and infuriated to read that Houston voters this month (November 2015) repealed a gay rights ordinance when the opposition made bathrooms the issue. They claimed that no one would be safe in restrooms if the ordinance protected transgendered people, whom they targeted, claiming they were potential molesters.

This vile strategy was successful despite the pleas for fairness from Houston’s lesbian mayor. Will I live to see discrimination rooted out? I’m not betting on it. When one of the largest cities in America chose a lesbian for mayor, it seemed that prejudice had been dealt a big blow. But I underestimated the force of anti-trans bigotry, widespread and vicious, at a time when lesbians and gay men are much more able than before to come out of the closet.

In Houston, trans people were peeled away from the now more respectable lesbians and gay men. It’s as if the L and G of the LGBT movement have been safely transported across a river while the T’s are purposely drowned. But as Hillary Clinton recently noted in an interview with Rachel Maddow, lesbians and gay men in many states can be married on Saturday and fired on Monday. Especially odious are the Catholic schools that fire longtime teachers when they marry same-sex partners.

LGBT activists in Houston now have a hard row to hoe. And if the vote this month encourages beatings of trans people, or firings, or hateful graffiti, it will have an even more shameful place in US history.

I should have known that anti-trans bias would be strong enough to swing a vote on a referendum.  In the university town of Orono, ME, several years ago, a grandfather objected to a small boy, who identified as a girl, using the girls’ bathroom. The ensuing battle took years to be resolved, in favor of the girl, who has just published a book about her experiences, Becoming Nicole (2015).

Of all the many foolish things Ben Carson has said during his campaign for president, the most astounding is that transgendered people should have their own bathroom. Can you imagine the sign on these bathroom doors: male-to-female and female-to-male, all welcome?

Much confusion has arisen lately, especially on campuses, about exactly what words to put on bathroom doors. The best solution is simple: the black and white image of a toilet created by Sam Killermann.