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One claim that pops up quite often in the media is that allowing transgendered people to use the bathrooms that match their gender identity will lead to sexual harassment and sexual predation in what should be a safe space.

Donna Miller wrote for Americans For Truth claiming such events have already happened:

Supporters of these bills say that it is NOT transgenders committing the attacks. Critics of the bill say that predators will pretend to be transgender if it will give them access to victims. Here are stories that allegedly support that argument

Have there been situations of people pretending to be transgendered in order to sexually harass or assault women in female toilets?

Sklivvz
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Open Minded
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  • [Welcome to Skeptics!](http://meta.skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/1505/welcome-to-new-users) In the article you provided, no-one made the claim that trans people are, or are likely to, commit assault or harassment. I am not sure that personal safety, as opposed to discomfort about gaze, is the basis of the complaint, so we run the risk of tackling a strawman. – Oddthinking Dec 10 '15 at 04:38
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    Can we find anyone actually claiming that assault or harassment will go up if people are able to self-select a bathroom? – Oddthinking Dec 10 '15 at 04:39
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    I want to get this re-opened, but my Google search results is filled with people *denying* the claim, but no-one making it. The closest I got was [these](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gdqfv9aGbgM) [ads](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iF5NYXYBXoM) that warn of "dangers" without specifying what they are. – Oddthinking Dec 10 '15 at 04:52
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    Unisex toilet are super common, there's even a unicode symbol for them, [](http://apps.timwhitlock.info/unicode/inspect?s=%F0%9F%9A%BB) – Sklivvz Dec 10 '15 at 11:21
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    @EbenezerSklivvze Depends where you live, some places create gendered bathrooms even where the bathrooms are single occupancy and it makes no sense to separate by gender. – called2voyage Dec 10 '15 at 14:27
  • @Oddthinking My edit should establish a notable claim. – called2voyage Dec 10 '15 at 14:33
  • Vote to keep closed, because the claim you edited in does not claim that this has happened. It's a claim that it *might* happen if the rules were changed. That's not a claim we can test. – DJClayworth Dec 10 '15 at 15:20
  • @DJClayworth There are places where the rules have changed already--surely you could do a study based on that. – called2voyage Dec 10 '15 at 16:00
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    There is still a big difference between a claim of 'this could happen" versus 'this has happened before". We really try not to handle "this could happen" claims. – DJClayworth Dec 10 '15 at 16:23
  • @DJClayworth Pending edit provides evidence of claim that this has happened before. – called2voyage Dec 10 '15 at 18:26
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    @called2voyage: Thanks for your edits; appreciate your effort in trying to make this notable. I've made a significant edit to focus on the claim made in the article you provided. – Oddthinking Dec 11 '15 at 04:28
  • I've majorly rewritten the post to make it neutral. I don't believe I've altered the meaning in any way. – Sklivvz Dec 11 '15 at 11:41
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    What do you mean "pretend" transsexuals? Who are you to question their identity? – mike glenndale Dec 11 '15 at 19:24
  • @ebenezer I think your addition of unisex toilets to the question mixes up two separate questions - 1) this question, do criminal-minded men pretend to be transwomen as a strategy to more easily commit sexual crimes in *women's* bathrooms (the examples in the link of “men in women’s spaces” appear to all be in women's bathrooms), 2) do unisex toilets put women in danger of assault from *men*, not from faux-transwomen (a male attacker doesn't need to feign female gender to use unisex toilets, and "unisex" doesn't appear in the link) – user56reinstatemonica8 Dec 11 '15 at 22:50
  • @user568458 the previous version said "monosexual", which is not current English as far as I know. I've corrected it with unisex. If something else is intended, please explain. – Sklivvz Dec 11 '15 at 23:41
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    @Ebenezer I'm pretty sure they were using monosexual to mean one-sex-only (hence mono), i.e. the opposite of unisex (uni= all, mono= just one). [Monosexual is the opposite to bisexual](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monosexuality), i.e. exclusive interest in one specific sex, it's odd to see it used in the context of toilets not attraction but it seems to clearly indicate exclusivity to one sex – user56reinstatemonica8 Dec 11 '15 at 23:48
  • @user568458 better? – Sklivvz Dec 12 '15 at 00:31
  • @mikeglenndale: The claim doesn't appear to be "trans women are committing sex crimes" but that "cis-men will temporarily disguise themselves as trans women just to commit sex crimes". It is a convoluted claim, which is why this question has already been edited five times to try to get it right. – Oddthinking Dec 12 '15 at 00:47
  • But "pretending" to be "transgender" is functionally the same as being it, a crossdressing man is a crossdressing man. – mike glenndale Dec 12 '15 at 02:13
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    @mikeglenndale I'm afraid you are mistaken, a transgender is not a transvestite in the least. – Sklivvz Dec 12 '15 at 02:52
  • I do not know how we are supposed to come up with a quantitative way of measuring transgenderness (which would seem necessary to answering this question). All of the definitions I have seen say simply: "You are whatever gender you say you are at any one time, and typical can choose to retroactively change your gender at will". All of which sort of makes pretending to be transgender impossible, by definition. – Jonathon Dec 12 '15 at 19:01
  • @user568458 While I agree with your usage of "monosexual", [`uni` does not mean "all" by any stretch](http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=uni-&allowed_in_frame=0). Consider `unicorn`, `unicycle`. – March Ho Dec 12 '15 at 22:45
  • @mikeglenndale: Wearning a dress, for example to win a bet, or as claimed here to commit a crime, definitely doesn't make the male wearer transgender because that is something very different, but also doesn't make him a crossdresser or transvestite. It makes him a straight man wearing a dress. – gnasher729 Dec 13 '15 at 00:37
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    @Jonathon I don't know why so many people have so much trouble understanding this. If I don't believe in the bible but pretend I do to troll prayer meetings, I'm not a Christian. If I'm not left handed but write with my left hand to fake my way into a paid study on handedness, I'm not left handed. If I don't live my life as someone whose gender is different to their sex, but fake it to creep in toilets, I'm not trans. In all 3 my behaviour at time X is inconsistent with other times. Being trans is 24/7. – user56reinstatemonica8 Dec 15 '15 at 12:17
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    @user568458 Yes, but you are going to have a hard time proving any of that. You cannot prove someone does not believe in god, any more than you can prove someone is not a transsexual. It is not a measurable quantity and it is definitely not something any external entity has any authority on, therefore it is not provable or disprovable. – Jonathon Dec 15 '15 at 14:33

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This Media Matters article discusses the topic of transgendered individuals (or non-transgendered individuals pretending to be one) committing sexual assaults in public restrooms.

They interviewed a number of experts on the topic, and none of them were aware of any case of such sexual assaults occurring. A selection of the interviews are listed below:

In an email to Media Matters, Jim O'Neill, legislative liaison and spokesman for the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights in Opportunities, reported no problems as a result of the state's non-discrimination law:

I am unaware of any sexual assault as the result of the CT gender identity or expression law. I'm pretty sure it would have come to our attention. [Email exchange, 3/6/14]

William Hoshijo, executive director of the Hawaii Civil Rights Commission, told Media Matters in an email:

In Hawai`i, the protection against discrimination in public accommodations on the basis of sex, including gender identity or expression, has not resulted in increase sexual assault or rape in women's restrooms. The HCRC is not aware of any incidents of sexual assault or rape causally related or attributed to the prohibition against discrimination on the basis of gender identity or expression.

Des Moines Police Department: "We Have Not Seen That." In an interview with Media Matters, Des Moines Police Department spokesman Jason Halifax stated that he hadn't seen cases of sexual assault related to the state's non-discrimination ordinance:

We have not seen that. I doubt that's gonna encourage the behavior. If the behavior's there, [sexual predators are] gonna behave as they're gonna behave no matter what the laws are.

Considering that a wide range of subject matter experts such as police officers and civil rights commissioners have not heard of any such incidents across the country despite the highly inflammatory and newsworthy nature of any such events, it is highly likely that no cases of sexual assault by transgendered individuals in public restrooms have ever occurred.

March Ho
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    Does anyone really seriously believe that instead of just waiting until nobody is watching and then entering a women's bathroom in men's clothing, a potential predator would dress up in women's clothing, would then enter that bathroom in the open without worrying about being noticed and later recognised, and without worrying about the victim crying for help and help arriving? – gnasher729 Dec 16 '15 at 00:39
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    From the article you quote: "one depicted the supposed nightmare scenario of a young girl entering a toilet, to be followed moments later by a mustachioed man in a dress. " 1,000 times more likely that the poor girl is followed by a mustachioed man in shirt and trousers. – gnasher729 Dec 16 '15 at 00:41
  • @gnasher729 Apparently sufficient people believe that it is the case, otherwise this question wouldn't have been posed in the first place. – March Ho Dec 16 '15 at 01:35