DOWNTOWN — A new video released Friday attempts to ease the fears of those still squeamish about the open bathroom access that allows anyone to use bathrooms of the sex they identify with — a right granted Wednesday by the City Council.
Featuring former Chicago activist Jen Richards, "Trans 102: Bathrooms" allows transgender people to explain, one by one, why they should simply be allowed to use the bathroom of their choosing. Richards comes in at one point to suggest that public individual bathrooms aren't such a bad idea either.
In an attempt to ease fears, the video dismisses those who think "the best way to protect privacy in bathrooms is by policing them."
The video, which Richards said could be used as a public-service announcement, was one of several recently produced on transgender issues, with some segments to appear in director Silas Howard's upcoming film "More Than T," but it was rushed up in response to recent North Carolina legislation attempting to demand state identification for bathroom access.
One bearded man in horned-rim glasses and a baseball shirt says of that law in the video: "It would put me in the women's bathroom."
The video also insists that "more U.S. senators have been arrested for public conduct in bathrooms than trans people."
Prepared for release last week, "Trans 102" was pulled back out of sensitivity to the aftermath of the Orlando massacre, but is now set for its debut.
"I'm really proud of them," Richards said of the videos, which she worked on. "I'm really excited to get them out there." After five years as an activist, she found she could readily "distil each topic into one minute."
Other videos on similar topics will follow in the months ahead. The project was supported by the MAC AIDS Fund, which launched a new $1.2 million transgender initiative this year "to support economic empowerment, access to health care and human and civil rights among this community."
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