Thu 27 Apr 2006
Is it true that?
Gender identity and gender expression has now been added to the anti-discrimination policy here at Williams. Hooray to Morty, the Board of Trustees, and everyone else who made it happen!!
Questions:
1) Where is the official policy and what does it say now? Links are appreciated.
2) What are concrete examples of behavior that were allowed before (note that any sort of harassment has always been forbidden, whether gender related or not) and will not be allowed now? Or is this just a sop?
April 27th, 2006 at 10:31 am
Well, I’ll be sure to “express” myself and my gender identity as “a butch lesbian trapped in a man’s body” so I can use the women’s showers next time I go to Lasell.
Thanks, Morty!
May 1st, 2006 at 6:59 pm
You’re an insensitive asshole.
May 1st, 2006 at 7:43 pm
Ah, ‘08. I was wondering when somebody might respond.
So I’m an asshole for pointing out the logical consquences of an absurd position? Good to know, but there’s very little that’s more of an asshole trait than making ad hominem attacks behind a veil of anonymity… though if I were so inclined, I could probably find out who was assigned 137.165.213.40 at 6:59 pm without too much trouble. Do you REALLY think that you’re anonymous when you leave comments?
Whether witty (which I prefer) or merely rude, I at least stand by my pithy statement critiquing the strong version of the postmodernist definition of “gender” that includes “gender identity” and “gender expression”. I attack the merits of a position by pointing out the obvious absurdities of its logical consequences and sign my name to my critique.
You, on the other hand, attack me personally and then don’t even own up to your ad hominem attack. That’s perfectly understandable, as I wouldn’t want to be known as a supporter of such ridiculous ideas, and certainly not one whose intellectual arsenal was so empty that it only contained the ammunition of personal invective.
Perhaps Ken Thomas ‘93 is right; maybe Williams should have a required course in rhetoric.
But insensitive? Hardly! In fact, you’re the one who’s being insensitive by not accepting my personal expression of my gender identity! Maybe they should send you to Tolerance Camp.
May 1st, 2006 at 9:22 pm
I’ve never heard anyone, much less the Williams administration, suggest that bathrooms or showers should be divided by gender rather than sex, Lowell, so it seems to me that your comment is neither an effective critique nor joke but merely an unfunny misunderstanding.
May 1st, 2006 at 10:08 pm
Ben, it’s far from clear that as currently constituted, bathrooms are segregated by sex rather than by gender. I don’t recall anybody checking either my genotype or phenotype at any point at Williams.
In contrast, by protecting “gender identity” and “gender expression”, then the policy seems to allow (1) somebody to define their own gender and then (2) choose the bathroom that is closest to his or her gender identity, as walking into a gendered/sexed bathroom is clearly an expression and indentification with a particular gender. Forcing somebody to use a bathroom implying a gender with which they don’t indentify thus would discriminate against a person’s self-defined gender identity and their expression of it by walking into a particular bathroom.
May 1st, 2006 at 10:22 pm
See also this article about a bathroom proposal at Chicago.
Ben, I am not misunderstanding anything; rather, you are not considering the implications of this policy, nor the scope of their use of “gender”.
Some choice quotes from the article:
Also see Problem 2 and Recommendation 2 at the transgender law center’s recommendations for schools
(Emphasis added). Just Google {gender sex bathroom} and you’ll see many more examples of this.
So Ben, if I’m “misunderstanding” what this is all about, I’m far from the only one.
May 1st, 2006 at 10:35 pm
Loweeel, I was waiting for this stupid thread to just die an inglorious death. But someone had to go and feed the troll.
You bring anonymity into this, and make a big deal of how you sign your name to your comment. But the real world out there is not your nice little Internet. You don’t get anonymity. You ask “Do you REALLY think that you’re anonymous when you leave comments?” An equally valid question is do you really think you’re anonymous when you’re a dude who goes into the women’s shower to check out chicks? You can’t just change your screen-name or make your life “friends-only” if you do something like that. Most likely, you’ll end up being talked about behind your back as “that guy” for the rest of your time at the College.
The implications you draw and the critique you offer may carry water in some abstract world of argument for argument’s sake, but they fail when you take actual people and social behaviors into account.
May 1st, 2006 at 10:51 pm
Dan, those are all valid points. That’s part of the reason I brought up Lasell in my first (and clearly hyperbolic) its, as it’s much more open to public than dorm showers and bathrooms in academic buildings are.
Note that this is a COLLEGE policy, not a dorm policy, nor a policy that only applies to students and faculty. It’s saying that the College will no longer question these sorts of individual determinations. So again, nothing prevents (in the most horrific hypothetical I can imagine to many on EphBlog) helmet-sport amHerst athletes from going in the women’s locker room after a defeat at the hands of Williams, because we can’t question their identity. If we actually stuck to this abided by this policy, we couldn’t even bring up this hypothetical incident to the Marxist or his AD, because that would be discriminating against their athletes’ gender identity and expression by questioning it and not questioning why their field hockey team used the women’s locker room.
So while the practical considerations you note MAY reduce such opportunistic behavior among Williams students, visitors to the campus are effectively anonymous, particularly in Lasell.
And no, I wouldn’t have responded to the troll if there had been anything in that comment other than ad hominem.
May 1st, 2006 at 10:53 pm
Daniel,
1) I hope that I am not the “troll” that you refer to! I am honestly curious about the new policy and would like to read copies of the relevant documents.
2) Lowell has demonstrated that Ben Roth’s circle of acquaintances is somewhat limited. There really are people who think that anyone should have the right to use any bathroom. I am unaware of any Williams administrators who hold this view, but it will be interesting to see who takes over Stephen Collingsworth’s post at MCC.
3) As to how “abstract” this all is . . . well, I have a story. Twenty years ago female first years were given the option of requesting all female entries on their housing forms. (Men were too, but few requested it.) Those women got all female entries. At the time, this seemed right and reasonable. Reasonable women might want an all female entry and the college was correct to grant this request even though there were costs — mainly some men (who disliked it) living in all male entries.
At some point (when?), female first years lost the option. Even if there are 25 female members of the class of 2010 who want to live in an all female entry, the college refuses to grant them this option.
Now, you may think this wise or foolish. But, from the perspective of 1984 it would have seemed highly unlikely that the college would take away that right from female first years. But went away it did.
Men (whatever their gender identity) are currently prevented by college policy and custom from using restrooms marked “Women” in places like Sawyer library. Will that be true in 20 years? I would not be so sure.
PS. Great video! Loved the Bayesian Data Analysis in the initial scene . . .
May 1st, 2006 at 10:55 pm
*yawns*. *Notes Lowell assumes his female identity would be as a “butch lesbian”* *wonders why* *stops caring*
More seriously, considering most dorms are able to handle having co-ed bathrooms without disaster, as Daniel Klein points out, the only person who would present a problem to a gender identity friendly bathroom is a pervert masquerading as an intersexed or transsexual individual.
*prays for post to mercifully end* *yawns once more and turns on Daily Show*
May 1st, 2006 at 11:01 pm
Oh wow, I just had the most delicious realization.
We currently have a housing restriction that gender-balances all campus residences. I’ve only heard it referred to as “gender-balanced”; never as “sex-balanced”.
Thanks to this new gender identity and gender expression protection, interested students can now completely ignore that restriction. Can’t live with your friends because the house is “too male” or “too female”? Well, pick in anyway!
When they tell you that the house would be over the gender-balancing limit, pull out your printout of the anti-discrimination policy with the relevant gender identity portions highlighted, and tell them that College policy prohibits them from calling you a (male/female) when you identify as a (female/male) and from treating you as one when you “identify” as the other! Further, nothing requires (or can require) one’s gender identity to remain constant from year to year.
I would love to see the administration try to deny such an attempt to avoid the housing gender balance with a straight face. Either the ridiculous “gender identity” policy has to go to save the housing policy, or they carve out a huge exception to the housing policy. No matter what happens, I’ll be happy!
May 1st, 2006 at 11:08 pm
Rory, that’s my entire point — I can claim whatever I want for my gender identity, no matter how ridiculous it sounds or how untrue it is! Questioning that would be discrimination against my identity and my right to define myself.
May 1st, 2006 at 11:48 pm
David says…
From my understanding and from what I’ve been told, that will no longer be true as of this coming year. That said, Dan Klein brings up a very fair point in that it’s highly unlikely some opportunist males will take this as a free pass on entering the women’s communal shower room in Lasell. To Lowell’s point, I find it highly unlikely that a visiting sports team would likewise do such a thing. Granted, the ‘Herst is full of evil swine, but even they could not possibly stoop so low.
May 2nd, 2006 at 1:55 am
This subject would have been suitable grist for Samuel Becket’s mill.