I should not go to an Idaho jail for using the restroom | Opinion

Am I to be feared? Supposedly. Am I to be hated? That seems to be the idea.

But let’s look at that. I’m a former Marine Corps Judge Advocate and respected Texas trial lawyer, now a teacher, a writer, an artist, a parent and a grandparent. I’m also a trans woman, and evidently that scares some people, or stirs their hatred for those unlike themselves. Or maybe it’s simply that trans people offer them such an easy target for the kind of performative moral outrage that fuels the politics of today and has brought us to this particularly ugly time in our history.

Whatever the case, you might ask yourselves whether such attitudes are worthy of an informed, compassionate society.

Since transitioning twenty-three years ago I’ve lived and traveled all over this country and overseas with no problem at all, even though I’ve consistently used the women’s restroom wherever I’ve been. I came to Idaho thirteen years ago and immediately fell in love with the Wood River Valley. I’ve always felt welcome and valued here.

But now, thanks to Gov. Brad Little’s signature on Idaho House Bill 752, I shall soon be considered a criminal for simply using the restroom that conforms to my gender identity, the gender identity that I’ve been living twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week for more than two decades now, without offending a single person, or interfering with their life in any way. If I should encounter someone in the restroom, I smile, say hello, and go about my business, just like anyone else.

But now, were I to stay in Idaho, every time I use the restroom I’d have to consider the possibility that when I step out of that stall, or out the bathroom door, someone is waiting there for me, someone who, for whatever reason — my height, my voice, my physique — thinks that I might have been born a man, which now gives them the right to stop and interrogate me about my genitals and have me arrested.

I totally understand how difficult it must be for those who are not transgender to understand what it’s about, particularly for those who’ve known only the gender binary their entire lives. I get that, but we can all learn and grow.

Rather than supporting hateful laws that demonize people for simply trying to live their authentic lives with dignity and without fear, why not try to resist the lies and open your mind to the possibility that just because some people don’t see themselves the way you think they should, that doesn’t make them some kind of threat. Despite what you may believe, transgender people are just as human as you are. We love; we fear; we dream; we have families who love us; we want nothing more than to live a normal life with dignity, just like you.

I am more than well aware of the myriad problems and struggles that today’s world presents, for individuals, families, states, nations, and the planet itself. I, like you, have to find a way to face those same issues every day. But at least you don’t have to worry about being arrested simply for using a public restroom, or being harassed or physically attacked for doing so.

Human beings are an incredibly diverse lot, socially, ethnically, religiously, intellectually, and emotionally. I realize that it’s much simpler and more convenient to generalize about people, to stereotype them, than to try to understand their differences and recognize their commonalities, but unless we start doing that, we’re doomed to endless discord and suffering. This notion of us versus them is going to be the end of us.

I’m 78 years old. I have enough problems without worrying about being arrested for using the restroom.

Rachel Stevens is a seventy-eight-year-old trans woman, a former Marine Corps Judge Advocate and recovering Texas trial lawyer, a proud parent and grandparent, a screenwriter and artist, stubbornly weaving her way through the rich tapestry of life.