Week of August 10
Gender-Neutral Bathrooms and Language
Multiple articles discussed gender-neutral bathrooms for trans and nonbinary individuals. The federal courts ruled in favor of allowing Andrew Adams, a transgender student, to use the restroom that aligned with his gender-identity. Adams had sued St. Johns County Florida School District when they forced him to use a gender-neutral restroom instead of the boys restroom. One article discussed how trans men and nonbinary individuals are more likely to be unaware of cervical cancer and the need for smears tests. The article listed ways for clinics to counteract this issue by creating a “structurally affirming environment” such as installing gender-neutral toilets and training staff about respecting pronouns.
Gender-neutral restrooms were the focus of most articles this week. Idaho’s Moscow Human Rights Commission has been advocating for city-owned restrooms to be converted into gender-neutral ones. Meanwhile, many parents were upset that Swanmore College had installed gender-neutral bathrooms, feeling as though gender neutrality was being forced. Taiwan’s Environmental Protection Administration has been making improvements to public sanitation, one of which involved installing 60 gender-neutral restrooms.
Gender-neutral language across the globe was another topic featured this week. Although the gender-neutral term “Latinx” has gained recent popularity, a Pew Research study found that only 3% of people who self identify as Latin American use that term, with only 23% hearing it prior. Meanwhile, across Latin America people have advocated for the word “Latine” to serve as a gender-neutral term. Other articles about this community use the term ”Latinx” stating, “Latinx is a gender-neutral term to describe those of Latin American descent.” People in Germany have been using an asterisk to make gendered words gender neutral. However, Germany’s state-sponsored language association, claims that it “does not conform either to German grammar or to the rules of spelling” and it should not be used.
Gender neutrality in the media was another topic discussed this week. The Television Critics Association Awards recently announced that they will have gender-neutral award categories. Nonbinary actress, Asia Kate Dillon, who has been an advocate for gender-neutral award categories, responded stating:
“I applaud the TCA for their gender-neutral acting categories. But it’s important to note that those categories have only ever included non-trans nominees. So yes, they’re gender neutral, which is great. Who selects the nominees and who votes at any award show must be heavily scrutinized and [it should be] a transparent process in order to guarantee recognition of a much broader swath of work created by non-binary and trans folks, especially Black, Indigenous and people of color.”
The video game “Dreamscaper” was praised for its use of gender-neutral pronouns in exchanges between characters.