On Friday, Democratic Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed into law SB 556 — the Equitable Restrooms Act.
The legislation requires all single-occupancy restrooms in “places of public accommodation” to be labeled as gender-neutral.
Here’s part of the law:
(b) This Section applies to any existing or future places of public accommodation or public buildings.
(c) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, every single-occupancy restroom in a place of public accommodation or public building shall be identified as all-gender and designated for use by no more than one person at a time or for family or assisted use. Each single-occupancy restroom shall be outfitted with exterior signage that marks the single-occupancy restroom as a restroom and does not indicate any specific gender.
(d) During any inspection of a place of public accommodation or public building by a health officer or health inspector, the health officer or health inspector may inspect the place of public accommodation or public building to determine whether it complies with this Section.
Some places “of public accommodation,” as defined by the Illinois Human Rights Act: movie theaters, restaurants, concert halls, grocery stores, hotels, clothing stores, and laundromats.
To put it bluntly, this, in my view, is dumb.
Putting wholly aside any issue of transgenderism, the bottom line is this: In an attempt to grant the wishes of a very, very small portion of the populace, the government is telling every independent small business owner in the state of Illinois that — if they’d like to have single-occupancy Men’s and Women’s restrooms — they’re prohibited from doing so by law. This is government way overdoing it. With a great deal of latitude, I believe people should be able to run and appoint their businesses as they see fit.
Also, people already use the opposite-sex single-occupancy restrooms, when it’s an emergency or they’re in a hurry and the other facility is occupied.
So it changes nothing much of anything but signage.
Cody LaDiablita knows what’s up:
^eyeroll*
That's exactly how they all would have functioned before this point anyway… but I guess some people need to be told. https://t.co/0yMvXXvowt— Cody LaDiablita ☠️⚓️ (@cody_k) July 27, 2019
Here’s more social media response:
“Yep. No trans person will think ‘Whew! I can finally legally go here!'”
Honestly, gendered single bathrooms never made sense to me. Why do they exist?
— Dwob (@Dwobers) July 27, 2019
https://twitter.com/as_one_does/status/1155249214420586496
Ridiculous
— Mary Meisch (@mgmeisch) July 27, 2019
https://twitter.com/SeanChampVA/status/1155247442142666752?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1155247442142666752&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.dailywire.com%2Fnews%2F49988%2Fillinois-gov-signs-gender-neutral-restroom-bill-frank-camp
Some think women’ll be getting the short end of the stick
As a man mixed bathrooms are much cleaner. Think women getting the worst out of this.
— Bob (@roberttcu12) July 27, 2019
why do women stand for this (pardon the pun)??? This makes public restrooms much, much worse for them
— New York Is Falling (@RubricMarlin) July 27, 2019
But I have to disagree: Due to past employment experience, I’ve witnessed both sex’s restrooms at the end of the work day. And I gotta say: Guys might be surprised to learn just how absolutely disgusting the Ladies room can be in comparison to the Men’s. Sugar and spice? Not in the john.
The law won’t change anything for one tweeter with a particularly aristocratic name; he’s willing to do his part to not discriminate:
https://twitter.com/DeezNutz4uandu/status/1155246540300140545
Have you much witnessed both men’s and women’s restrooms? Did you notice a great difference? Let us all know in the Comments section.
-ALEX
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