"I am a woman, and I'm supposed to be here."

Imagine if you had to say that every time you entered a public
restroom.

One woman doesn't have to imagine. She says people mistake her
for a man on a daily basis. Perhaps understandably, she resents
having to explain her gender to strangers.

Khadijah Farmer, a 28-year-old lesbian, filed a lawsuit after
having to do just that. At issue is an incident that occurred at a
New York City restaurant on June 24. That night, Farmer and two
friends decided to grab dinner at Caliente Cab Company, a Mexican
restaurant in West Village. After placing her order, Farmer excused
herself to go to the (women's) bathroom. It was here that a male
bouncer walked in and, believing Farmer to be a man, told her to
leave the restroom and the restaurant immediately. Farmer explained
that she is a woman, but the bouncer did not budge. Farmer and her
friends were forced to pay for their appetizers and buzz off.

Farmer is being represented by the Transgender Legal Defense and
Education Fund (TLDEF), a nonprofit organization "committed to
ending discrimination based upon gender identity and expression."
The suit, filed at State Supreme Court in Manhattan, accuses the
restaurant of gender discrimination by engaging in sex stereotyping
-- treating Farmer adversely because she failed to conform to
societal norms concerning gender-appropriate behavior.

"If Khadijah were wearing pearls and white gloves, would the
bouncer have treated her like that?" asked Michael D. Silverman, executive director
and general counsel of TLDEF.

Answer: Probably not. That being said, she would have been safer
using the men's room.

Let me explain.

In 2002, New York City passed a law that allows people to use
restrooms "consistent with their gender identity or gender
expression." According to the "Guidelines Regarding Gender Identity Discrimination,"
gender identity is "an individual's sense of being either male or
female, man or woman, or something other or in-between." Other
cities have passed similar regulations. In San Francisco, the "sole
proof" of someone's gender identity is "that person's statement or
expression of their self identification." In other words, your
gender is whatever you say it is -- no questions asked. For the
sake of transgender rights, these cities trust but don't verify:
You can go into any restroom as long as you say you belong
there.

Discriminatory by definition, bathrooms let some people in and
exclude others. Anyone looking for segregation will find it in two
words: "Ladies" and "Gents." For transgender people, such
distinctions don't fit easily in their modus operandi. As a result,
they want to overturn the current lavatory system, which they
believe unfairly assigns people to one camp or the other.

"Must we label everyone?" asks an editorial in the New York Blade.

According to "Peeing in Peace: A Resource Guide for Transgender
Activists and Allies," a document recently published by the
Transgender Law Center (TLC), the answer is no. The document,
funded in part by George Soros's Open Society Institute, calls for
a "bathroom revolution": the elimination of "gender-segregated"
restrooms in favor of "gender-neutral" restrooms.

The road to gender-neutral commode is already underway at
American colleges and universities. Gender-neutral bathrooms can
now be found at Harvard, Stanford, the University of Chicago, NYU,
Ohio State, UCLA, Rice, Williams, Tufts, the University of Vermont,
the University of Arizona, and many others. At the University of
Arizona, students can use whichever restrooms they want provided
their chosen facility matches their gender identity. At the New
College of California, you will find only "de-gendered" bathrooms,
marked by their lack of urinals and their door signs that read,
"Lots of people don't fit neatly into our culture's rigid
two-gender system" -- which is another way of saying, "Come
in."

The gender-blurring extends to other areas of campus life as
well. At Brown University, incoming freshmen fill out a housing
questionnaire that includes a "gender-neutral option." At Wesleyan,
students are asked to "describe your gender identity history"
rather than mark "M" or "F" when visiting the health services
clinic. Ohio State has amended its student affairs forms to
inquire, "Gender: M, F, self-identify: ______." At the University
of Oregon and the University of Utah (!), you can change your
gender on your official college record without actually proving
that your gender, biologically speaking, has in fact changed.

These are not rare or isolated examples. They're a natural
result of trying to accommodate students with "gender identity"
issues. And many colleges are trying. Right now, there are 96
colleges and universities that ban discrimination on the basis of
gender identity, which is 96 more than there were in 1995.

More and more people believe that "gender identity" deserves
legal protection. Currently, non-discrimination laws with
explicitly transgender-inclusive provisions exist in 92 cities and
counties in addition to 13 states and the District of Columbia,
according to the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force's latest
figures. That's a total of 106 jurisdictions covering approximately
104 million people (37% of the U.S. population). Of those 106
jurisdictions, only 12 (11%) banned gender identity discrimination
prior to 1997. This means that 94 (89%) have gotten on board just
in the last ten years. That's quite a trend. In addition, Rep.
Barney Frank (D-MA) recently introduced a bill
that would make employment discrimination based on gender identity
a federal crime.

Despite these developments, very few people want to have this
discussion, which means that a bathroom revolution is unlikely to
gather much popular support outside of progressive habitats. Most
people like the system as it is; they want bathrooms to remain
places of one-gender rule, inaccessible to outsiders. The rules are
easy to understand: Go where biology leads you.

Not so in gender-neutral bathrooms. There, your inner sense of
gender, not your inner sense of nature, has the final call on
whether you are at the right place. No need to worry, however. If
you're ever confused, there's always one option: Just say, "I am a
______ and I'm supposed to be here."