At the University of Pittsburgh, going to the bathroom is now a matter of such controversy that students need birth certificates to use the facilities.
Last month, the college decided that students and staff must use facilities that coincide with the gender on their birth certificates, rather than the gender with which they identify.
The new rule is problematic as well as insulting. The surgery that would allow birth certificate changes is expensive and not always desired by transgendered people. It’s equivalent to “forced castration,” one Pitt student told Think Progress, because “it results in sterility.”
Certainly Pitt could come up with a better solution. A Montco student proposes immediately converting at least two gender-specific bathrooms into gender-neutral and having all future construction include neutral facilities.
Whatever Pitt decides, its trans students and staff should have choice of facilities where they feel safe and comfortable, and Pitt should amend its anti-trans attitude.
