2015 saw one of the most bizarre and outrageous episodes in organized right-wing transphobia targeted at transgender students: the accusation, repeated across publications worldwide, that a 16-year-old trans girl in high school had been “harassing” other girls in the restrooms. This claim, made by the Pacific Justice Institute and uncritically repeated in Christian news sources, was quickly revealed to be false – at no point had anyone reported any instance of harassing or inappropriate behavior by this girl.
That simple fact ought to have been the end of this shameful fabrication, which resulted in the trans girl being put on suicide watch. Instead, the Pacific Justice Institute and their followers made a remarkable pivot: they now claimed that when they said this girl was engaging in harassment, they meant that her mere presence in the girls’ bathroom was “inherently harassing” regardless of her behavior. Incredibly, the group chose to continue their own unwarranted harassment of an innocent student with an entire media campaign, posting a series of videos from other students and their parents lamenting how “uncomfortable” they were with a trans girl in the restroom.
This argument is extraordinary because of what it admits by its omissions. It is a tacit capitulation to the unavoidable fact that claims of danger or risk posed by trans people toward cis people in restrooms cannot be supported by any actual evidence of this supposedly widespread misconduct on our part. Having found no way to demonstrate that we pose any real harm or outsized threat, the Pacific Justice Institute latched on to all that was left, redefining our simple presence and normal conduct as itself a harm to any cis people who are uncomfortable around trans people. ■
