Some people might think that washroom inclusivity is a no brainer, and wonder why it is necessary to keep the discussion of transgender washroom rights active after the 'bathroom bill' has been passed. This morning, as I was trying to figure out what to write about on our blog I saw the following article With a little searching I found this one debunking it. The encounter alleged in the first article never happened. The fear that trans women's genitalia is somehow a threat to cis people is a fabrication of cis people's (non trans) imagination. I want to dig into the hoax of the Toronto Star article a little further, it provides an opportunity to examine a few problems that could do with a little bit more open discussion. In section one the author unquestionably defends the right of trans women to use the women's change room, which is important, but goes on to make two critical mistakes. The first, seemingly small but still very important, is that he says “Transgender women, regardless of their status regarding surgical intervention, have the absolute right to use the women’s change room.” Even though this article is written about an encounter involving women he should have said something like “Transgender people have the absolute right to use the change room of their choice”. It is not necessary to talk about surgeries, and it is really important to include all trans people when discussing rights, not just trans women or men. A bigger problem though was the following sentence “It’s easy to sympathize with those who are surprised to see male genitalia in a woman’s change room”. The genitalia of a trans woman is, by default, women's genitalia. Some women have a penis, some women have a vagina, if the genitals are attached to a woman then they are a woman's genitals. Full Stop. Let's not talk about this any more. I am going to leave you with a link to a video by Red Durkin, a comedian who has a number of short videos online specifically addressing trans feminine topics. This one addresses the idea of questioning a womens gender, which is the core of what is happening when cis people fear trans people using the correct washrooms