Wednesday: Weird bathroom laws versus weird noise laws

I was talking to a friend last Wednesday who happens to be gay, and whose girlfriend is very androgynous-looking, and she was up in arms about the bizarre law that North Carolina imposed regarding transgender people having to use the bathroom of the gender they were at birth. That in itself sounds complicated enough, but more perplexing to me was the fact that the law is called HB2. In my world, that’s a type of pencil, with the H standing for “hardness” and the B standing for “blackness”, so my first thought was that it was also some kind of racist law, but in fact, it’s just a moronic law, and the HB stands for “House Bill”. And that in itself is ironic, because it has nothing to do with the bathroom in your house, but with PUBLIC bathrooms. Then my friend showed me a picture on her phone of a guy who was very muscular, sporting a goatee, and who was covered with tattoos. “Wow,” I said. “He reminds me of Adam Levine.”

“He was born a woman,” she responded. “In North Carolina, he would have to use the same bathroom as you, or he’d be breaking the law.”

“What?!” I exclaimed. “I don’t want that dude in a bathroom with me. I’ve had to CLEAN men’s bathrooms—they definitely need their own space!”

Now, this might sound sexist, but it’s based on empirical evidence from two sources. First, if you’ve read this blog before, you’ll know that I worked in a donut store when I was younger, and the worst part about it was having to clean the men’s room at the end of my shift (I describe it in full detail In My Week 67: Disturbing Trends in Men’s Fashion, where I reveal the origins of the “poo beard”). Second, which you don’t know, is that a few years ago, I worked in a school which converted the 2 staff bathrooms in the main office into “gender-neutral spaces” to accommodate any transgender students we had. It was a great idea for the transgender kids, who never caused any consternation—the staff whole-heartedly embraced the idea of giving them a safe space—but the office ladies were aghast by the end of the week for quite a different reason. Apparently, there was at least one male administrator who couldn’t aim well, and the constant urine on the toilet and surrounding floor was freaking them out. Also, the men were in LOVE with the expensive hand soaps that the ladies had specially bought, and were using them in copious quantities. I was just impressed that they were at least WASHING their hands, but I recall one woman crying out in frustration, “It used to be such a NICE bathroom! Now, it’s just gross, and there’s never any soap!!”

And this is why the North Carolina law is so ridiculous. Well, one of the many reasons. It seems to me that they’ve suddenly entered the Dark Ages, when people believed that tomatoes were poisonous, that demons caused illnesses, that education made women infertile, and that autism was the direct result of childhood vaccinations. But that’s House Bill 3, which I believe the intelligent North Carolinian politicians are working on right now. Then I got to wondering what the underlying agenda might actually be, because I can’t believe people are stupid enough to honestly care what birth-gender the person in the stall next to you might be. Honestly, when I’m performing a bodily function, that’s really not on my radar. So it occurred to me that there might be a hidden rationale for this irrationality:

1) It’s a special infrastructure project designed to increase employment rates. Obviously, NC will have to hire special “inspectors” who will ensure that people are going into the right bathrooms. What KIND of inspection that will involve will probably decide the pay scale. Also, the birth certificate industry will spike, as people will have to carry those with them all the time, in case they need to pee. It’s tremendously forward-thinking—well done, Pat McCrory, for trying to improve the North Carolina economy. The whole world is proud of you.

2) It’s a secret plan to make all bathrooms “co-ed”. Think about it. If you make men who look like women use men’s bathrooms, and women who look like men use women’s bathrooms, then it’s a f*cking free-for-all. Also, it’s very confusing, and just writing that sentence took me three minutes because I was trying to make sure it was logical, and I’m still rereading it to make sure it’s correct. Which makes me think that if I’m having this much trouble with the logistics, then maybe the whole Bill was just a huge misunderstanding, and that it was passed because the General Assembly thought they were just CONFIRMING that men’s bathrooms were for people who looked like men, and women’s bathrooms were for people who looked like women, and no one was worried about transgenderism at all.

At the end of the day, no matter what the reasoning, the whole thing is outrageously stupid. Does anyone REALLY believe that a person would undergo years of therapy, hormone treatments, and painful surgeries just so they can spy on people in public bathrooms? Like there’s a whole crew of guys waiting for “Sally”, who used to be “Bob”, to come out of the ladies room, ready to pepper her with questions like “Was it clean? Was there fancy soap? Did you see any boobies? Did a pillowfight break out?” And women? There’s no way IN HELL that a woman becomes a man just to use a men’s bathroom. Trust me on this.

I asked Ken if he’d ever been in a men’s room with a woman:

Ken: It happened once. I went into the bathroom at ________, and there was a woman standing there, looking at herself in the mirror.
Me: What did you do?
Ken: I went over to the urinal and used it.
Me: Like, right in front of her?
Ken: We didn’t make eye contact or anything. What was I supposed to do? I went in because I had to use the bathroom, so I did. I don’t know if she was a cross-dresser or transgender or whatever, and I didn’t really care. I just wanted to pee.

So there you go, North Carolina—take some advice from a man who lives in the 21^st century and stop worrying about 15^th century problems.

In contrast to the backwater ways of North Carolina, recently the town of Bracebridge, Ontario came into the new age when it repealed an old noise bylaw that banned “hooting and hollering.” Yes, it’s now completely legal to hoot, holler, or make other “human noises” in this Northern town. At least until 2 am, when you could be fined for “drunken singing” or other disruptions to the peace. These are the things we worry about in Canada. Use whatever bathroom you want, but be considerate about where and when you hoot. Here’s the link to the full article, because honestly, I can’t make it any funnier than what it already is. My favourite line is “Stakiw [the Chief Bylaw Officer] said his department hasn’t been dealing with a hooting “crisis,” but had received some inquiries about kids and summer camps, which prompted the town to look into updating its current laws.” Oh, Canada—it doesn’t get better than this. http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2016/03/23/hooting-and-hollering-now-legal-in-bracebridge-ont.html