Some have argued that House Bill 257, “Sex-based Designations for Privacy, Anti-bullying and Women’s Opportunities,” is not meant to target transgender, nonbinary and gender nonconforming individuals, but rather protect all Utahns, especially women. This is, however, neither logical nor accurate.

First, it is a statistical fact that individuals who identify as LGBTQ+ experience more sexual violence than those who identify as straight. The U.S. Office of Justice’s Office for Victims of Crime has documented shockingly high sexual violence, abuse and assault rates against transgender individuals — between 50% and 66% nationwide. Within our state, Utah Public Radio and the Salt Lake Tribune have reported that lesbian, gay and bisexual Utah residents are more frequently victims of sexual violence than heterosexual people, at rates three to five times higher than those who identify as heterosexual and straight.

Second, according to a study by the Harvard School of Public Health, transgender and gender-nonbinary teens face greater risk of sexual assault in schools, which prevents them from using bathrooms or locker rooms consistent with their gender identity.

Third, there is no evidence that letting transgender people use public facilities that align with their gender identity increases safety risks, as demonstrated in a 2018 UCLA study and also the National Center for Transgender Equality. Transgender-inclusive policies simply and definitively are not a safety risk to Utahns or other Americans.

Safe access to public restrooms is an essential need for participation in civic life, in the workplace, in educational settings and other public spaces, as Bagali, Chaves and Fontana point out in the National Library of Medicine. This is no different for transgender and cisgender individuals. Access to public restrooms according to gender identity, however, as designated in H.B. 257, has sparked controversy to the extent that transgender people face embarrassment and even expulsion from these spaces, along with potential legal ramifications and criminal charges.

The only rationale I can see for H.B. 257 is not based on statistical evidence or fact, as asserted by those who support the bill, but instead on other factors perhaps involving a fundamental belief that people have equal rights for safety, health and wellness unless they are transgender, nonbinary or gender nonconforming individuals. That stance is elitist, bigoted and certainly not equitable, but instead exalts one set of people above others.

Perhaps the fear about non-cisgender people is that women might be replaced or erased? Gender has biological and social components. In the social realm, gender distinctions are largely social constructs. What a woman looks like as compared to a man (clothing, hair, makeup) and what a woman should and should not do, think or feel as compared to a man are societal constructs. In the biological realm, differences between men and women are not just in anatomy and reproductive capability — although, in today’s culture, that is where all of the focus seems to lie. The presumption seems to be that a woman must have developed breasts, a uterus and ovaries, and that is all that is essential to a woman. There seems to be no conversation about the nuances to this.

Perhaps the fear relates to societal expectations of privacy and the potential of seeing anatomy different from one’s own, or having one’s anatomy exposed to a person who differs from ourselves? If that is the case, perhaps we could ensure we have more private spaces for situations where privacy is desired, such as incorporating single stall changing and shower areas in bathrooms and locker rooms, even if simply just curtained off.

Areas in which transgender individuals are currently discriminated against strongly correlate to those in which women historically have been discriminated against, no matter what definition of woman you use, including Utah’s legally mandated definition. For example, there were no public bathrooms for women until the Victorian era, as pointed out in John Maynards research on women’s public toilet-restrooms and the long shadow of the patriarchy. House Bill 257 seems to assume that women need protection against perceived threats that do not fit reality, and there seems to be an overarching misguided belief and espousing that women are incapable of self-protection, agency, or authentic risk assessment, mitigation and management.

Anne Arendt-Bunds is a resident of Millcreek. All views expressed are her own.