The month of September brought an extraordinary three-pronged assault on the rights of LGBTQ individuals to use bathrooms in New York City — a place widely considered to be a bastion of progress for queer rights dating back to the Stonewall Uprising and the sip-in at Julius’ Bar.
The most impactful attack on the city’s inclusive bathroom policies came from the Trump administration, which announced the cancellation of $36 million in federal education funding for the city after the US Department of Education sent letters laced with insensitive language warning the city that “male students who identify as female or transgender are given unqualified access to female intimate spaces.” In cancelling the funding, the Trump administration accused the city of pushing “ideological indoctrination masquerading as ‘inclusive’ policy.”
The city’s bathroom policies also came under fire from Mayor Eric Adams, who was a co-sponsor of the gender expression non-discrimination act (GENDA), which barred discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, when he was a state senator. In September, however, the mayor sounded a different tune, criticizing inclusive bathroom policies and stating his opposition to what he falsely described as “girls and boys using the same restroom.” He stated that he would look into his “authority” to change laws on that issue, but ultimately — and thankfully — conceded he does not have the power to do so.
But that’s not all. The government also appears to be targeting gay men in bathrooms. Multiple news outlets reported in September that the Amtrak police had arrested nearly 200 men since early June for lewdness in a Penn Station men’s bathroom, with up to 20 of those individuals being sent to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody. One man who was arrested told The City that he heard one officer say to others that “we got three more fag pervs.”
As reported by Gay City News’ Duncan Osborne, law enforcement has an extensive record of harassing and arresting gay and bisexual men and gender non-conforming individuals on bogus charges in men’s rooms and other spaces.
Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, who previously served as a city lawmaker from Brooklyn, put the issue into perspective during a rally for trans rights in Manhattan on Sept. 30.
“Almost a decade ago, I was actually the housing chair when the bathroom bill… came before the City Council,” Williams said. “I gotta say, in almost a decade, I haven’t had one parent, one teacher, one student, one staff person, one New Yorker ask me about bathrooms in our school system.”
Whether it comes from the mayor or the president, it is outright dangerous to distort the facts by hurling false accusations of men invading women’s rooms — all to score cheap political points. Using trans youth or gay men as props in a political culture war is as outrageous as it is ridiculous.
Moreover, the general targeting of LGBTQ individuals in bathrooms — from transgender individuals to gay men — is disgraceful. It is beneath any law enforcement officer or any other government official to stoop so low as to harass people simply for something most of us take for granted: the right to use the bathroom.
Let people pee in peace.
