Utah’s Republican-controlled House voted Friday to pass a sweeping proposal to keep transgender people out of restrooms and locker rooms that match their gender identity in taxpayer-funded buildings, sending the measure to the state’s majority GOP Senate for consideration just three days after the start of the session.

House Bill 257 aims to prohibit individuals from using gender-designated facilities that differ from their sex assigned at birth in government buildings, correctional facilities and domestic violence shelters unless they have undergone a transition-related surgery and legally amended the sex on their birth certificate.

The proposal would require new government buildings to include single-occupant restrooms and changing rooms while existing ones must be studied to assess “the feasibility of retrofitting or remodeling” facilities to improve privacy.

The bill, if passed, would make Utah the third state to adopt explicit restrictions on transgender bathroom use in buildings other than schools. A Florida law passed last year prevents transgender people from using facilities consistent with their gender identity in all government-owned buildings, and a North Dakota law restricts bathroom use in correctional facilities.

  • Blaster M
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    192 years ago

    So, I guess, instead of his and hers, they just make a bunch of individual rooms? No gender bathrooms, just like you have at home. I mean, that would solve all the problems right there.

    • 1ostA5tro6yne
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      62 years ago

      gay bars are light years ahead of everywhere else on this issue. there are two bathrooms. you pick one, go in, do your business, and hopefully wash your hands. and if you cause trouble you get your ass kicked because it’s not cool with anyone.

  • Maeve
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    42 years ago

    When you’re too weak and scared to do the hard, dirty shadow work, rely on othering.

  • @[email protected]
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    82 years ago

    When they say taxpayer funded do they mean state buildings? Under federal law this is discrimination and couldn’t apply to federal buildings.

  • @[email protected]
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    312 years ago

    Everyone involved in passing this law should be barred from working in government. We’re facing an existential crisis from climate change, an ongoing gun violence crisis, mounting wealth inequality, rising right wing extremism that’s already reached coup levels, and more, and this is what they’re spending time on?

    Three Republicans joined all Democrats in voting against it.

    At least three republicans have some tattered remains of a soul, maybe.

    Let me take this time to remind all of you that Jury Nullification is an unavoidable part of our legal process. If you’re on the jury, you can give any verdict you want. You don’t have to show your work! So that means you can say “Not Guilty” for any old reason.

    Now, this can be used for Evil, like a southern jury not convicting a white man for murdering a black man. But it can also be used for good! You can nullify laws that are unjust. If someone is being charged for marijuana crimes, for an unrelated example, you can just say Not Guilty. They can’t do anything to you.

    So go forth and nullify, friends, any and all unjust laws. Tell your friends.

    • @[email protected]
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      2 years ago

      Do it.

      But be quiet about it. Talking about it in the courthouse can get you thrown off the jury or into a bunch of legal bullshit.

    • @[email protected]
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      42 years ago

      A guide to jury nullification, which you can follow or not. I ain’t your papa.

      • Look it up
      • Don’t talk about it at or near a courthouse
      • Only nullify laws you think shouldn’t be there. Let’s keep murder as a crime for example
      • Never lie to the judge. If you are asked if you could convict a person for an unjust law go ahead and say “yes”. Because it is true, since it is something you COULD do. Nothing is physically stopping you therefore you could do it.
      • Don’t say that you are nullifing. Continue to argue the evidence and testimony are corrupt and non-convincing. No one in the jury room is going to be able to read your mind. Call the cop a liar, say the footage was shopped, etc.
      • No matter how often the judge tells you or the video tells you that you are to make a decision based on the fact not on the law just remember there is a reason why they are telling you this. They are terrified of what our power really means.
  • @[email protected]
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    512 years ago

    I was going to go through YEARS of expensive and intense therapy JUST so I could go into the girl’s bathroom and RAPE people but I’ve been FOILED by this new law!

    • GladiusB
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      92 years ago

      Does making all bathrooms unisex help anyone? Or is that just dumb? I mean the plumbing from the toilets all go to the same place.

      • @[email protected]
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        42 years ago

        Sorta is. They got family bathrooms now in a lot of places. Which is easier if you have small kids.

        • @[email protected]
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          22 years ago

          You ever seen the opposite? I went to see a MMA fight and the line was ridiculous! There was no line for the women’s restroom. lol

  • toomanypancakes
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    342 years ago

    In every state that passes a bathroom ban I think we should just piss on Republican lawmakers cars instead.

    We gotta go somewhere, fuckers.

    • 🗑️😸
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      102 years ago

      I couldn’t agree more. I’m so sick of the projection from the right. Just because you’re a disgusting pervert doesn’t mean everyone else is!

  • @[email protected]
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    912 years ago

    Uhhh, once the door closes, HOW DO YOU KNOW IF A TRANS PERSON IS IN THERE?

    Wouldn’t surprise me if they tried sending people with mirrors on sticks into johns, to save the children of course.

    • @[email protected]
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      142 years ago

      They don’t. They’re just going to use it as an excuse to harass and persecute a whole bunch of masculine-looking cis women.

    • @[email protected]
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      562 years ago

      They don’t give a shit about logistics of this, they just care that people who vote for them will cheer.

    • cmat273
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      32 years ago

      My guess is some random transphobe calls the police on you and that’s that

    • Kairos
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      82 years ago

      There’s a post I saw about a transgender (I forgot which way let’s just say woman) went into the men’s bathroom and someone (or multiple people) thought she was a trans man and beat her up, DESPITE HER DOING EXACTLY WHAT THE LAW SAID.

    • @[email protected]
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      62 years ago

      The secret is that it primarily targets low-passing trans people, which are the ones they dislike the most.

  • GodlessCommie
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    62 years ago

    In the years that have passed since bathroom bills started surfacing, what has the DNC done to counteract and protect the rights of trans individuals?

    • @[email protected]
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      52 years ago

      Democrats don’t like admitting that they consider the filibuster more important than human rights in all cases.

      • GodlessCommie
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        22 years ago

        They use the filibuster as a shield to prevent progress, another one of their rotating villains when they don’t have an actual one to blame

  • @[email protected]
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    122 years ago

    Oh I just read an article about a pastor getting into trouble for helping the homeless. Now I get to read an article about the Mormo–sorry Utah government using it’s power to attack the LGBT for existing. This is more aligned with my preconceived notions about Christianity.

  • AutoTL;DRB
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    42 years ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:


    Utah’s Republican-controlled House voted Friday to pass a sweeping proposal to keep transgender people out of restrooms and locker rooms that match their gender identity in taxpayer-funded buildings, sending the measure to the state’s majority GOP Senate for consideration just three days after the start of the session.

    The proposal would require new government buildings to include single-occupant restrooms and changing rooms while existing ones must be studied to assess “the feasibility of retrofitting or remodeling” facilities to improve privacy.

    Utah Republican Rep. Kera Birkeland, the bill’s primary sponsor in the House, argued this week that the measure is necessary to increase privacy and protect women and children from “bad actors.”

    “We still have deep concerns that the proposed legislation will place transgender Utahns at risk in public bathrooms,” Equality Utah, a statewide LGBTQ advocacy group, wrote Friday in a post on X, formerly Twitter.

    Four states — Kansas, Montana, North Dakota and Tennessee — have similar laws on the books, which LGBTQ rights groups have argued broadly allow discrimination against transgender people.

    In a statement following Friday’s vote, Utah Democratic Party Chair Diane Lewis called the passage of House Bill 257 “a shameful, discriminatory attack on a community that is already extremely marginalized and vulnerable.”


    The original article contains 579 words, the summary contains 205 words. Saved 65%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

  • @[email protected]
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    62 years ago

    while existing ones must be studied to assess “the feasibility of retrofitting or remodeling” facilities to improve privacy.

    Well that’s a nice silver lining…

      • @[email protected]
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        42 years ago

        Fair point…

        Ya know, in '94 I was stationed in Korea, they had bars off base that catered to us military, and they had “juicy girls”, which were basically just women who went around looking for simps to buy them an orange juice for $20 (and they were pretty successful at it).

        Anyways, most of the bars had one bathroom. You’d go in there and use the urinal and occasionally one of the girls would walk right in and use the stall.

        It was weird as hell, but only once… After the initial “wtf” time, it was just meh, whatever, the OB beer’s cheap enough :)

        It’s not actually that serious…

  • @[email protected]
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    472 years ago

    If it looks like a man, sounds like a man, and pees like a man, it does not belong in the women’s restroom! Trans men look like men, sound like men, and sometimes even pee like men and this bill will force them to pee in women’s restrooms! If you want to keep bearded people out of the women’s restroom, you should have voted against this bill.

    • lazynooblet
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      122 years ago

      The law is dumb. But it does exclude those that have undergone transition.

      • 1ostA5tro6yne
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        282 years ago

        not every trans person gets genital surgery, in fact the majority don’t. additionally, in many states your birth cert can’t be amended so then not even everyone who’s had genital reassignment may use the restroom legally. that bit is there specifically to make it sound halfway reasonable to the uninformed who think transition is a surgery.

        • lazynooblet
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          92 years ago

          The comment I responded to said “and pees like a man”, which is why I pointed out the exclusion.

          Whilst I am admittedly ignorant to transition definitions and American law I’m still able to sympathise on how trans people are seemingly being targeted for no reason other than political BS.

          I don’t understand the logic behind it. Who cares what sex people are under their clothes. What do they think is happening in the restrooms that needs fixing?

      • @[email protected]
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        52 years ago

        Why keep trans women without bottom surgery out of women’s restrooms? I assume all women’s restrooms have stalls, so no one would see it anyways. And why isn’t it about keeping vulva out of men’s restrooms?

  • @[email protected]
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    222 years ago

    The thing that scares me about these laws being passed is that they serve to embolden those who want to hurt us. MAGA uses this as a hate feedback loop. They are winning. Any anti-LGBT bill that passes is a W for them and a step closer to the edge of society for us. It’s not going to stop.

    • @[email protected]
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      52 years ago

      It very well could stop, though. The MAGA movement is on life support. Republicans are losing state-wide elections and referendums. They’re losing previously red states and gaining none in return. In November, we have a chance to reelect a President who they call senile. One more loss to the guy who, in their minds, doesn’t even know where he is, would be the end of the national MAGA movement. But if they win, then it’s time to start panicking. Now is the time to organize against Trump

    • @[email protected]
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      2 years ago

      The thing that scares me about these laws is it serves as a blanket permission to use the power of the state to harass anyone who is gender nonconforming for simply going to the bathroom.

      Edit: And having to know the patchwork of discriminatory laws for anywhere I have to go in the country I live in is tiring as hell too.

      • PlasterAnalyst
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        32 years ago

        Turn it around on them. Make them show you their genitals before they go in the bathroom. Then have them arrested for showing you their genitals.

        • @[email protected]
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          42 years ago

          Turn it around on them. Make them show you their genitals before they go in the bathroom. Then have them arrested for showing you their genitals.

          Yes, I see no ways that a trans person asking to see peoples’ genitals in a public restroom in a jurisdiction that is hostile to trans people could backfire.

            • PlasterAnalyst
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              22 years ago

              Get some humongous intimidating gym bros to block the door and tell the tiny weak politicians that is they can’t beat them at arm wrestling to go use the women’s.

    • @[email protected]
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      32 years ago

      It’s not going to stop.

      Not until we strangle the last king with the entrails of the last priest