ENDA: The LGBT Community Has Ceded The "Bathroom Bill" Argument Without A Fight
by: Autumn Sandeen
Mon Feb 21, 2011 at 08:00:00 AM EST
http://www.pamshouseblend.com/diary/18696/enda-the-lgbt-community-has-ceded-the-bathroom-bill-argument-without-a-fightIt seems that whenever a civil rights movement has been fought in the United States, the battles have included public restrooms. From the segregated restrooms of the Jim Crow south, to the "unisex bathroom" arguments used in the fight against the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), to even the repeal legislation for Don't Ask, Don't Tell (DADT) -- where Elaine Donnelly and her Center For Military Readiness warned about the dangers of lesbian, gay, and bisexual people in bathrooms and showers -- the public restroom has been used as an essential feature for pushback against civil rights and ordinary equality.
When it comes to transgender people and the issues of antidiscrimination protections for employment and housing, as well as for the issue of antidiscrimination protections with regards to public accommodation, the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community has ceded the ground on social conservatives' and the religious right's arguments of "men in dresses" using women's public restrooms -- their argument that has been shortened to "bathroom bill."
