Ohio Republican Rep. Beth Lear compared gender dysphoria to people who think they are birds during a House Higher Education Committee hearing Wednesday when she spoke about a bathroom ban bill she co-sponsored.
“If I had a child who thought he was a bird, would I take him to a doctor who would tell me the best thing to do is let him explore what it’s like to be a bird, and by the way, there’s a five-story building next door, so why don’t you jump off and see if you can fly,” said Lear, R-Galena. “We do and allow ridiculous things.”
Lear was responding to a question from state Rep. Casey Weinstein, D-Hudson, about whether she believes transgender people exist.
“I’m offended that you compare transgender people to people who think they’re a different species or something like that” Weinstein said.
Bill No. 183 which would require K-12 schools and colleges to mandate that students only employ the bathroom or locker room that corresponds to their sex assigned at birth. It would also prohibit schools from allowing students to share overnight stays with the opposite sex.
The American Medical Association officially opposes policies that prevent transgender people from accessing crucial social services and public facilities consistent with their gender identity.
The biggest change to the bill, which has already met with both opposition and support, is a ban on primary and secondary schools and universities having multi-purpose gender-neutral facilities.
Lear and his co-sponsor, state Rep. Adam Bird, a Republican from New Richmond, say the bill is intended to protect children but Weinstein asked if there was a need to pass this bill.
“I don’t know of any complaints in higher education or education in general about this,” he said. “Is this a solution looking for a problem?”
Bird, the former principal, said Ohio school officials asked him to introduce the bill.
“I think this is an issue that is important to more and more Americans and more and more Ohioans,” he said. “I think we as a legislature need to speak up and stop sitting on the sidelines while the executive branch in Washington and the judicial branch make decisions.”
State Rep. Munira Abdullahi, a Democrat from Columbus, asked how the bill would be enforced.
“Educational institutions can create policies that are consistent with the provisions of this bill,” Lear said.
Asked what the penalty would be for breaking the law, Bird said the decision would be up to the school and university policy maker.
State Rep. Ismail Mohamed, D-Columbus, asked the bill’s sponsors why not let individual schools or districts decide.
“The safest place for a young woman who is confused about her gender is not to go into a men’s locker room,” Lear replied. “The safest place for young women in college is for a man who is confused about his identity not to go in and watch them.”
State Rep. Joe Miller, a member of the Higher Education Committee, said the bill reminds him of past racial segregation.
“It’s disturbingly reminiscent of discussions in the 1950s about how white women were afraid of black men in this same restaurant,” he said. “I hear the same arguments, it’s disturbingly reminiscent of the racist policies that were in place in the South about special bathrooms.”
Bird rejected that claim.
“I would reject the argument that this bill is similar,” he said. “It’s a security bill.”
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