Liveblog: Open Forum on Gender-Neutral Bathrooms and Trans* Activism

I’m sitting right now in 41 Wyllys Room 112 for the Open Forum on Gender-Neutral Bathrooms and Trans* Activism. This forum is co-hosted by WesDEF, Wesleying, Open House, and QueerWes, and will be facilitated by WesDEF – specifically, Mariama Eversley ’14 and Leah Bakely ’16.

This will be a safe space for people to discuss their thoughts, concerns, and opinions of the recent trans* activism that has been de-gendering bathrooms in the last few weeks. Given that this is a safe space, Wesleying (in this case, hermes, sneeze, and I) will not be recording the names of participants. This will also be a serious liveblog. We will be providing an as-close-to-verbatim-as-possible record of what is said in the forum without critiquing opinions with which we may not agree.

We’ll be going over definitions and vocabulary surrounding trans* issues at the start of the forum, but check out TransWhat if you’re interested in a short glossary of relevant terms and information on what it means to be trans*. If you’re bewildered by the fact that this discussion forum exists or are wondering why all the bathroom signs have vanished recently, read my post “All Gender Bathrooms Now” – Pissed Off Trans* People on the DIY Gender-Neutralizing of Wesleyan’s Bathrooms. I’ll also be putting a few more features related to this up in the next few days.

Click past the jump for the liveblog.