Bathroom Discrimination

Trans activists and critical gender scholars have documented the way bigender toilets function to exclude those who are gender variant or seen to [Page 72]be at odds with the dimorphic gender signs on toilet doors. Transphobia in gendered toilets is well documented. The bigendering of toilets functions to regulate, to police, and to excommunicate those who do not conform to gendered signage. Although the gendering of elimination is a historically recent phenomenon, it is now so commonplace in North America that people presume such gendering to be normal and natural. As many commentators have noted, however, there are no legitimate health and safety rationales for gendering toilets, much less for excluding people on the basis of gender identity. This entry discusses the sociohistorical and legal ...