Editorial: Transgender misconceptions cloud policy

Federal education authorities have handed down their firmest stance on the rights of transgender students yet.

On Monday, the U.S. Department of Education determined that an Illinois school district had violated anti-discrimination laws by preventing a transgender student, who identifies as a girl and plays on a girls’ sports team, from changing and showering openly in the girls’ locker room. 

This overdue precedent will hopefully inspire students to fight discriminatory policies and influence courts to let them win when they do so.

In response to the Department of Education’s finding, district officials came up with a plan to balance the rights of the transgender student and of students who complained about invasions of privacy. Officials at a Palatine, Illinois high school decided to require the transgender student, who is undergoing hormone therapy, to change behind privacy curtains.

The Office for Civil Rights of the Department of Education said on Monday that the school’s policy violated the student’s rights under Title IX, a federal law that bans sex discrimination. If school officials fail to resolve the matter in 30 days, the school could lose some, or all, of its Title IX funding.

At the root of this locker room showdown is a prevailing — as well as false and backwards — idea that people “become” transgender for ulterior reasons. This baseless phobia of transgender attraction harms transgender rights. It mocks transgender issues, stunts acceptance and opens the door for people to write off the importance of using spaces that align with your gender identity.

Earlier this year, presidential candidate Mike Huckabee described the transgender rights movement’s attempts to gain access into bathrooms and locker rooms as an attempt to fulfill perverted desires.

“Now I wish that someone told me that when I was in high school that I could have felt like a woman when it came time to take showers in P.E.,” Huckabee said at the 2015 National Religious Broadcasters Convention in Nashville, Tennessee. “I’m pretty sure I would’ve found my feminine side and said, ‘Coach, I think I’d rather shower with the girls today.’”

This isn’t the secluded opinion of one jerk.

According to a 2014 poll conducted by CBS News, 59 percent of Americans believe transgender individuals should use the bathroom that corresponds with the gender they were assigned at birth. Only 29 percent of Americans are comfortable with individuals choosing the bathroom they use according to their determined gender identity. This biogtry dominates policy.

Disputes between schools and transgender rights activists are nothing new, and they’ve surfaced on Pitt’s campus. 

In 2012, former Pitt Johnstown student and transgender man, Seamus Johnston, filed a lawsuit against Pitt Johnstown after the university expelled him over a dispute concerning his use of the men’s bathrooms and locker rooms. Federal Judge Kim R. Gibson dismissed Johnston’s suit on the basis of Pitt Johnstown’s argument that Johnston could not claim protection based on transgender status without completing a gender transition and being recognized as a man by legal authorities.

Transgender individuals often have to jump through hoops before society even considers acknowledging their true gender.

Have they undergone a sex change? Do they have the right paperwork? Are they taking hormone therapy?

Where a transgender individual falls on the transitioning spectrum does not affect how strongly they identify with their gender.

So why does it affect how others perceive them?