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Culture War Roundup for the week of December 5, 2022

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Again, you're just quibbling about the enforcement mechanism, not the validity of the norm it enforces.

Do you think there are valid reasons for the social norm of penis-havers and people of menstruation being assigned separate lavatory facilities?

Why should the extant status quo be altered?

Just to be clear, you're asserting that the person in the photo I linked should indeed use the women's bathroom? And you expect that to be the popular (or at least red tribe) consensus?

Do you think there are valid reasons for the social norm of penis-havers and people of menstruation being assigned separate lavatory facilities?

Why should the extant status quo be altered?

I'm rejecting the claim that that was ever the actual status quo.

Just to be clear, you're asserting that the person in the photo I linked should indeed use the women's bathroom

I have one of those for you too. According to your rules, which bathroom should this person use:

https://twitter.com/pic/media%2FFi6TZG1XEBIcEvu.jpg%3Fname%3Dsmall

That link is broken for me, it just says "Hmm...this page doesn’t exist. Try searching for something else.". Maybe try linking to the tweet instead of the image from the tweet? Or doing a Google Image search on the image to see if you can find it hosted elsewhere.

Ah, the utterly demonic "feature" of this site, that replace nitter with twitter links, strikes again. Try this:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Fi6TZG1XEBIcEvu?format=jpg&name=small

nitter with twitter links

Ah, I should have thought to try nitter on your original link. That does work. As does the twimg link.


Anyway, as to your actual question... I'm not sure what your point is. I'm arguing for letting people use whichever bathroom they feel like is appropriate and not having other people police that choice. The point of the photo I linked was to point out that the issue is complicated enough that a simple rule is not going to result in a working binary division. I don't think pointing to another edge case is a counter-argument.

I thought you were arguing for people using bathrooms based on their appearance, and that this was the status quo before the conversation moved from gay rights to trans rights.

And if anyone can go to whichever bathroom they want for any reason, why are we bothering with separate bathrooms? Who are we separating from who anyway?

Sorry, I misunderstood your question, then. My personal view is that gender-segregated bathrooms are silly and I've never encountered anyone taking the gender segregation particularly seriously. I'm well aware I'm in a bubble.

My understanding of the pre-~2015 status quo before this was a Culture War issue was that people who didn't look like they belonged in the gendered bathroom they were in had a chance of someone expressing their displeasure at that which increased with how non-gender-conforming they were, with the corollary that some people would find they had a high chance of running into trouble in either bathroom.

The point of trans activists push on bathrooms is to eliminate the de facto "you must be this gender conforming to use a public bathroom (and therefore exist in any public situation where you may possibly need access to a bathroom)" rule. The effect (and uncharitably presented as the goal in trans-activist social media) of the right's push on bathrooms seems to be raise the bar of how gender conforming someone has to be to use a public bathroom.

Just to be clear, you're asserting that the person in the photo I linked should indeed use the women's bathroom?

I do not assert that. I dare you to show me where I asserted or implied that.

MY assertion is that the entity that owns the property in question can set up it's bathrooms however it likes and have whatever policy regarding gendered usage they care to, and it's up to them to enforce such policies. I think passing laws regarding bathroom usage on private property is actively stupid and detrimental in the vast majority of cases.

However I think there are simple and logical reasons to have gender-segregated lavatories, which are mostly related to the comfort of the females, especially females accompanied by children.

I think similar reasons apply even more starkly in, e.g. women's sports and in prisons (and I am not a fan of the whole concept of prisons, either). Bathrooms are just the ur-example that tends to impact everyone.

I'm rejecting the claim that that was ever the actual status quo.

I'm rejecting the claim that the right is the side that brought this matter to the forefront of the culture war. I'm claiming that the left deliberately pivoted to and advanced the transgender rights cause immediately after achieving victory on the same-sex marriage matter in mid-2015.

So what, then, do you believe the 'status quo' on this issue was prior to 2015? As I asked at the outset, what narrative of the last 20 years do you think shows the right pushing these issues and the left merely defending?

I'm rejecting the claim that the right is the side that brought this matter to the forefront of the culture war. I'm claiming that the left deliberately pivoted to and advanced the transgender rights cause immediately after achieving victory on the same-sex marriage matter in mid-2015.

Accepted. I conceded this point to you in a different reply to you in this thread where you provided evidence for it.

So what, then, do you believe the 'status quo' on this issue was prior to 2015?

I made some attempt at answering this in a reply to someone else in this thread.


I do not assert that. I dare you to show me where I asserted or implied that.

MY assertion is that the entity that owns the property in question can set up it's bathrooms however it likes and have whatever policy regarding gendered usage they care to, and it's up to them to enforce such policies. I think passing laws regarding bathroom usage on private property is actively stupid and detrimental in the vast majority of cases.

I apologize for the misunderstanding. I did not mean to put words into your mouth. The position you assert does not appear to be a popular one, so going further would be delving into your personal position, which is unlikely to shine much light on the greater culture war.