Last night the Arizona House Appropriations Committee passed a new version of the notorious “Bathroom Bill.”
SB1045 makes it against state law for local governments to pass laws or regulations which ensure access to public access to “privacy areas” based on “gender identity or expression,” reports Huffington Post.
“It nullifies existing laws that do, and states that business owners can’t be held accountable if they deny access to an individual if the individual’s gender expression doesn’t meet the business owner’s approval. Almost as appalling was the designation of this bill as an emergency measure. The last time I checked, Governor Brewer never had to call out the National Guard to put down mobs of rampaging transsexuals in bathrooms. Adding to the ludicrous nature of the bill is the fact that it creates a very soft definition of who can be discriminated against:
(a) An individual’s self identification as male, female or something in between and includes an individual’s appearance, mannerisms or other characteristics only insofar as they relate to gender with or without regard to the individual’s designated sex at birth.
“This means that the bill makes it perfectly legal to tell non-transgender women and men they can’t use the bathroom if they do not meet some arbitrary standard for femininity or masculinity. Butch lesbian? Take a hike. Have polycystic ovarian syndrome or acromegaly? No loo for you. Teen boy who wears his hair long? Go use the women’s and hope your friends don’t ever find out you were forced to. Wearing sweat pants and a hoodie instead of a house dress? Beat it before I call the cops. It isn’t hard to see how this bill has potential for extreme abuse. Of course, most sane people would ask how this could be constitutional. They would be right. It probably isn’t.
“Just as Phoenix recently passed a measure protecting transgender people recently, in the early 1990’s the cities of Aspen and Boulder enacted ordinances that banned discrimination (including public accommodations) on the basis of sexual orientation. Voters in the state of Colorado passed Amendment 2 to the state constitution in response. Amendment 2 repealed these ordinances to the extent they prohibit discrimination on the basis of “homosexual, lesbian or bisexual orientation, conduct, practices or relationships.” It also prohibited all legislative, executive or judicial action at any level of state or local government designed to protect the LGB people.”