Rachel9 wrote:
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You're so caught up in applying tran needs to the existing situation, that you're failing to see that I'm saying that once you do that in any sort of "official" way, you change the existing situation. If people of either sex can use either restroom, then there's no distinction between them. There ceases to be a "mens restroom" and a "womens restroom". They just become "restrooms". Get it?
You're not understanding what I'm saying.
Yes, I do understand. You're arguing that the determinate of who can/should use any given restroom is based on gender and not sex. I'm arguing that it's based on sex and not gender. My argument is based on two things:
1. It's based on sex because there are differences between the restrooms that are clearly based on the physical traits of those intended to use them. Since sex is based on physiology and not psychology, this strongly suggests that sex is the determinate being used.
2. If it's based on gender and not sex, and gender is purely subjective (determined by the individual and not via any external objective means), then the distinction is irrelevant and we have no usable determination of who should use which restroom, and thus having different restrooms becomes meaningless..
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Why do you think i am arguing for anyone to be able to use any bathroom they want? That is clearly the opposite of what i am saying. There IS a distinction, it's just not penises and vaginas.
I don't think you're arguing *for* that per se. But your argument is the equivalent of arguing for that. As I've stated repeatedly, since gender cannot be determined by any external objective means, allowing use of restrooms by gender effectively requires that we allow anyone to use any bathroom they want. It's like you're arguing for people who like strawberry ice cream to have strawberry ice cream specifically, but failing to grasp that what you're really arguing for is anyone to have any flavor they like. Unless you want *only* people who like strawberry ice cream to have what they want, but everyone else has to eat whatever flavor they're served. In which case your argument is discrimination in the guise of fighting against discrimination (as I've also pointed out several times in this thread).
This is why your argument is about allowing anyone to use any restroom they want. You may not think that's what you're arguing for, but it is the only way to fulfill the thing you *are* arguing for.
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From this, we can work backwards and conclude that because we do have two different restrooms, and one of them has urinals and the other doesn't, that the distinction we use is based on sex and not gender.
No, you most certainly cannot conclude that. Women (gender) virtually never use urinals. Men (gender) virtually always use urinals. Just because <1% of them do/don't doesn't change anything.
And? Women (sex) never use urinals, and men (sex) almost always use urinals. I'm not sure what your point is. Urinals can only be used by people with penises. Thus, they exist so that people with penises may use them. The fact that not everyone with a ***** will use them every time doesn't change that fact.
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Gbaji, i think you might be worse than Alma. You are just saying the same exact thing, thinking i'm arguing something i'm not, despite me repeatedly explaining that i'm not.
Which is funny, give that this is precisely what you are doing.
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If you want to continue, you could at least explain who you think would be using urinals in women's bathrooms so much that they would be needed if bathrooms were separated by gender.
I'm not arguing that. See how you are doing what you accuse me of doing? It's called projection. I'm arguing that if bathrooms were separated by gender
urinals would not exist. Because if they were separated by gender, we could not assume that people with penises would use one restroom, but not the other. Thus, there would be no reason to put urinals in one, but not the other. Additionally, since there would be concern about people with penises peeing in urinals in front of people without penises, we'd have significant pressure to just put stalls in all the restrooms and no urinals.
That was my primary argument. I thought it was quite clear.
A secondary argument is that if we didn't have pressure (hangups) in our society about people with penises using urinals in front of people that don't, then the rationale for having them in either restroom becomes equal. You get that the reason trans people today don't use urinals is because of social conventions and no other reasons. If we didn't exist in a society where men aren't expected to wave their penises in front of women, we'd have communal restrooms with both stalls and urinals. But we don't.
The problem is that you are arguing for changes to how society deals with certain things, but not really thinking through the ramifications of the changes you're arguing for. You're assuming that one thing can change without anything else changing. But that's not how things tend to work.
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Yeah, you really just have no idea what you're talking about. Liking pink isn't even a factor here. It has absolutely nothing to do with gender identity. This goes way beyond some basic personality traits.
So neither is wearing a dress? Or looking as society currently expects a woman to look, right? I just find it funny that you're arguing for a social change/acceptance of one thing, but then steadfastly insisting that it can't change in some other way. So a biological male who is gender female in your world should use the women's restroom both because it's more comfortable for him/her *and* causes less problems for the other occupants (since they'll assume she's female). But there's no reason why a trans person can't identify with the gender of the opposite sex, without feeling the need to dress according to social stereotypes regarding that gender, right? Not unless you're discounting the possibility of a butch trans female, or effeminate trans male. You're being just as discriminatory for other forms of deviation from the norm (and deviation is not meant negatively here btw) as you accuse others of being regarding yourself if you do that.
Which brings us back to "anyone can use any restroom". Once you separate the issue from biology, there's no rational reason to argue that this person with a ***** can use the women's restroom, but that other one over there cannot. But you seem to want to pretend that we can make an exception for your group, but not anyone else. I think that's problematic.
Edited, Apr 2nd 2013 3:43pm by gbaji