Since the dawn of man (and woman) up until the 20th century, the human race has universally recognized that men and women have distinct characteristics that set them apart from one another. Religious beliefs have further defined these gender distinctions as a part of a divine plan of a creator God.
In recent history, traditional and religious views on sexuality and gender have been challenged as people began to question whether humans came from God or some random phenomenon. Somewhere along the line, a theory emerged that each person has a special right to define whether they are a man or woman, and at the same time demand that others accept and recognize their gender preference.
The government is now tasked with sorting out how the right to choose one’s gender can co-exist with the right to define gender which is based on biological traits. This is how public bathroom use has taken the spotlight in America. What has been conspicuously absent from the conversation are the fundamental rights of women and children to privacy and safety. Those concerns have been wholly ignored.
Those who embrace traditional gender identification, and the rights to privacy and safety that go along with that, have a special interest in protecting their children from exposure to certain bathroom experiences that could be traumatic for a young child. It is not cruel for parents to want this kind of protection under the law, as was suggested recently by Leslie Schwalm, a professor at the University of Iowa.
However, it is cruel to assume that child who identifies as transgender now, should be locked into a gender identification that could change in time. It is more likely that adults with an LBGTQ agenda, and not transgender children, who are driving the debate against protections for traditional bathroom use.
