A research study out of UCLA School of Law’s Williams Institute finds no link between public transgender bathroom access and crimes that occur in bathrooms.
According to a September 12 report in the Boston Globe:
Researchers at the Williams Institute, a think tank focused on gender identity at the UCLA School of Law, examined restroom crime reports in Massachusetts cities of similar size and comparable demographics and found no increase in crime and no difference between cities that had adopted transgender policies and those that had not. The data were collected for a minimum of two years before a statewide antidiscrimination law took effect in 2016.
Activists who want to undo that state law through a ballot question in the Nov. 6 election have focused their campaign message on bathroom safety concerns. They suggest that a new right for transgender people infringes on everyone else’s privacy rights, and could be abused by men who want to prey upon women and children in ladies’ rooms. The vote is being closely watched nationwide because it offers the nation’s first public referendum on transgender rights in the state that first introduced gay marriage.
Transgender activists bristle at the idea that the campaign casts them as potential sexual offenders and have argued that there is no evidence that the law threatens anyone’s safety.
A spokesman for the Freedom for All Massachusetts campaign, which is working to preserve the law, said the Williams Institute study reaffirms that stance.
“It really takes the wind out of the sails of our opponents who have been trying to paint this false picture,” said spokesman Matthew Wilder. …
The peer-reviewed study, published in Sexuality Research and Social Policy, focused on the years before Massachusetts adopted a statewide law prohibiting discrimination in public accommodations based on gender identity. Prior to that time, select municipalities had adopted local ordinances that had a similar effect: allowing transgender women into ladies’ rooms and transgender men into men’s rooms.
“Massachusetts was like this perfect petri dish,” said Rachel Dowd, a spokeswoman for the Williams Institute. “Different localities started to adopt it, and there was enough that allowed us to look at crime statistics over two years. And right as we were wrapping up our research, Massachusetts passed the statewide law.”
All Massachusetts can vote to uphold the law that supports equal public accommodations rights for transgender people—not only to public bathrooms but to ALL public spaces—by voting YES on ballot question 3 in the November 6 midterm elections. For everything you need to know about the ballot question and how you can do more to help, go to freedommassachusetts.org.
