March is the home to both Women’s History Month and International Women’s Day. To celebrate, I headed to a college campus to investigate how the terminology surrounding women has changed and ask students what they thought about trans women being platformed during this month.
“I think trans-women are women,” a queer-identifying student shared, “however you choose to present yourself, you are a woman, you don’t even need to have any gender affirmation surgery” she concluded. Another student shared that we need to be platforming trans-women because “they are women.”
“Trans women are oppressed and stuff,” another student shared. Her “non-binary” friend then piped in, stating that “trans-women of color should be uplifted the most just because they have the most oppression facing them.”
Trans-women overtaking female voices and gender has been one issue; however, another more pressing debate surrounds the biological men being allowed into women’s bathrooms and locker rooms
As society has become more progressive, reports of transgender women exposing their male genitalia have become more common. Transgender swimmer Lia Thomas, a biological male who took first place during the 2022 NCAA Women’s swimming championship, has been at the forefront of this issue. Thomas was recently back in the news after a former teammate accused Thomas of exposing his genitals to female teammates in the locker room.
Another report out of California surrounded 17-year-old Rebecca Philips, who pleaded for help from her local city council after seeing a naked man walking around the women’s locker room at her local YMCA. When she brought her concerns to YMCA staffers, they shared that the “transgender woman” had the right to be there. Local media also ended up scolding the teen for speaking out, sharing that regarding the trans woman, “she is a woman and she says she is a woman, period. That’s where it ends.”
This follows 80-year-old Julie Jaman, who was permanently banned from her local YMCA after she spoke out against a transgender employee who was present in the women’s shower area. She alleged the predatorial employee had watched young girls undress in the female locker room. The employee refused to respond and Jaman was ultimately banned for “discrimination” per the New York Post. She shared that there were no signs or warnings to women that they would be sharing their showers with biological men who identify as women.
Seeing that this has become an increasing issue, I asked college women if they would feel comfortable sharing their bathrooms and locker rooms with trans-women, and every single woman said yes.
“Trans-women are women just like I’m a woman,” a green-haired student began, “I’m a cis-gendered woman, but just as much as I’m a woman so are trans-women so they deserve every right that I have,” she stated.
Another student shared that unless one was supportive of the trans-community the conversation shouldn’t even be had. She went on to state that she had never heard of any situation in which a trans-woman had exposed themselves in a locker room and felt that it “was not an issue.” These points were repeated by every other woman I interviewed on campus.
I finished by asking the skirt-clad gender-fluid student if any man who decided to “identify as a woman” would be equal to me as a biological female.
“Well it’s complicated because this is a social phenomenon,” he explained, “there’s presenting as a woman, people interpreting you as a woman, there’s also what you feel internally, whether you feel like a woman or not, they’re all kind of intermingled and different,” he stated. He then stated that transwomen should indeed be allowed in female spaces.
