Should schools alter changing rooms, toilets + uniforms to accommodate trans pupils?

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From what I have seen the tg community want to use the toilets of the gender they present as not forced into a 3rd type

Altho some people have mentioned not feeling comfortable doing that, even if they may want to. Even a simple thing like all the toilets (not the urinals) in the male toilet being out of order

Reply 141

Implication

Original post by paul514

Err nah.

They should be made to use the facilities of their sex.

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Why sex rather than gender?

Reply 142

tazarooni89

I feel like we've fallen into a habit of going very far out of our way to be "accommodating" to people with various first world problems, and it's bordering on being unhealthy. An important part of life is you learning to adapt to your environment rather than vice-versa, and when something isn't quite to your specific standards, to be resilient enough to just "deal with it" yourself instead of putting everyone else out.

I'm not saying that it's a bad thing for a school to cater for its pupils, but it should be proportionate in terms of cost and effort for the school, the number of pupils who will benefit from it, and the extent to which it is truly a necessity.

For example, it's great to have disabled access for people who would otherwise be literally unable to enter the school building. It's not that difficult for a school to have a vegetarian lunch option for the 1 in 20 people who don't eat meat, so they don't go hungry. But insisting that a school goes through the cost and inconvenience of physically constructing new changing facilities or toilets just because one or two pupils out of thousands feel uncomfortable about their gender seems unreasonable to me.

Schools need to raise pupils, not to be overly sensitive and pampered, but to have a balanced give-and-take relationship with the world and remember they're not that special. But recently, it appears that the our culture is shifting towards one of entitlement, where the whims and feelings of the individual are prioritised above all else. The more we continue indulge this, the more people will start to milk it and the more high-maintenance they'll become.

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 143

username1148663

Original post by Implication

Why sex rather than gender?

Because it's made up in their head

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Reply 144

AlteredBoy

Original post by joecphillips

From what I have seen the tg community want to use the toilets of the gender they present as not forced into a 3rd type

Nobody is being forced into any bathroom? I'd love a gender neutral loo in college. I don't know how much everyone knows about trans men and the bathroom, but we can get prosthetics that allow us to pee out of them. Ok, yeah, home is the best place to practise with them but we are inevitably gonna need to pee in school at some point. At least if there's a gender neutral bathroom we can use a urinal without being under pressure to get it right with other cis boys in there.

Reply 145

AlteredBoy

Original post by paul514

Because it's made up in their head

That's completely wrong. Gender dysphoria may well be a mental condition diagnosable through the DSM, but in no way does that make it 'made up'. Whenever I hear someone say something like that it makes me laugh. Trans people are at a higher risk of self harm or suicide than any other social group. That's not made up. The NHS has provided us with SEVEN gender identity clinics, all of which are under strain from a lack of resources whilst the patient population rises to what is thought to be between 500,000-650,000 people seeking or having competed a gender reassignment in the UK as of 2015. That fails to account for anybody that falls outside of the gender binary.
Do us a favour and google things before you say them. Trans people have been around for centuries. People profit from trans people. There are surgeries specially developed for trans people. Do you really think that would happen if it was all just a made up chapter of our lives?

Reply 146

Implication

Original post by paul514

Because it's made up in their head

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Gender is made up?

Reply 147

Dalek1099

Original post by MarleyZ

The Association of Teachers and Lecturers has voted to lobby for better training for staff to support transgender pupils.

Teachers with experience of supporting these pupils have said that changes to toilets, changing rooms and uniforms are more straightforward ways to help - what do you think?

Should these changes be made? ie. all gender toilets and changing rooms

I think that schools should have to build cubicles for changing I think all children have the right to privacy and that toilets should be all gender.The uniform should either be the same for both genders or scrapped, I think that uniform is sexist as it often allows more freedom for girls(they can wear skirts boys can't wear shorts) and it also makes us conform to the belief that boys should dress this way and girls should dress another way, this is similar to gender roles when you think about it and instills sexism.

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 148

Dalek1099

Original post by Implication

Gender is made up?

Yes the idea of gender is completely made up, you can't define gender without making sexist stereotypes to basis genders on.The concept of gender causes a lot of sexism today.I don't agree with transsexuals changing sex its due to the discrimination in gender roles, these people should be free to be whoever they are regardless of whether you are a man or a woman.If you are a certain way and you change sex because of it you are discriminating against the sex you change from and saying that if you are that sex you can't be that.

Reply 149

beccatiger123

Original post by MarleyZ

what going on with toliets and changing rooms

Reply 150

Implication

Original post by Dalek1099

I do kind of agree, though I wouldn't use the term 'made up'. Gender as distinct from biological sex is at some level just a label, and in a world free from sex-based prejudice and discrimination I do think it would be an unnecessary one.

Reply 151

glowanti

It is easy & done to tell a trans person to go to the changing room according to their gender (e.g if they transition to a female, go to a female bathroom) but there are people who are agender (don't class themselves as any one gender) and people who consider themselves to be both gender - having sex separate bathrooms could make this a really difficult/awkward experience for them, so I'd say a unisex bathroom to make their experience a lot more comfortable

Reply 152

rockrunride

Perhaps unisex able-bodied stand-alone toilets as well as accessible stand-alone toilets and the usual male and female communal toilets?

Would cater well to those that like a bit more privacy when doing their business - me included.

Reply 153

Implication

Original post by rockrunride

What about a communal sink area and then a bunch of proper cubicles? There could also be a separate section with urinals for anyone to use if necessary.

I really don't see why anyone's gender is remotely relevant to toilet usage except for the fact that it always has been that way.

Reply 154

rockrunride

Original post by Implication

Well, for example at football stadiums if I were a woman I probably wouldn't want to have to compete with alcohol fuelled testosterone, so there is an argument for it - and it reduces the safe space detractors' argument to rubble - but I can definitely see it working in some instances.

Reply 155

Implication

Original post by rockrunride

But again I think you're inserting gender into a situation in which it shouldn't matter and treating it as if it should matter. Why does whether or not someone is male or female affect whether or not they should have to deal with what you call 'alcohol fuelled testosterone'?

Reply 156

llys

I don't like communal changing rooms anyway. I think there should be cubicles for people (of all persuasions) who like their privacy.

I've never seen the need for uniforms. I'd have school clothes and pupils can pick what they want to wear and/or combine it with normal clothes.

Reply 157

rockrunride

Original post by Implication

Would you want to be a woman walking into a facility dominated by drunk men?

'Here, darling, get in this cubicle with me..."

Reply 158

Implication

Original post by rockrunride

Would you want to be a woman walking into a facility dominated by drunk men?

Well, no. But I wouldn't want to be anyone walking into a facility dominated by drunk people. Gender doesn't come into it.

'Here, darling, get in this cubicle with me..."

Harassment is clearly unacceptable, and if it became a problem something would definitely have to be done about it. Segregating the toilets based on gender really is a very old-fashioned and divisive 'fix' though. It doesn't really tackle the problem; it just disguises it and creates other problems.

Do you think this would really be that common in the situation I described though? Precisely the same can happen when the doors to the men's and women's are near to each other. Most of the the 'testosterone fuelled drunks' would probably be waiting for the urinals anyway.