Leftists Have Transformed School Bathrooms into a Nightmare for Students
Bathrooms are no longer a safe place to relieve oneself. Radicals have turned them into a location students avoid due to dangers lurking inside.
I never thought I would have so many discussions as a school board member about bathrooms.
It began in 2020 when the Democrat-controlled Virginia legislature adopted a law requiring menstrual supplies be placed in boys’ bathrooms in all middle and high schools in the state. Oregon followed in 2021 with the same requirement.
Then transgender activists started showing up to school board meetings across the nation demanding bathrooms cease being designated by biological sex. These leftists screamed “bullying and discrimination” because boys weren’t allowed to use girls’ bathrooms and locker rooms. Some school boards relented and now across the nation, girls have their right to privacy stripped from them—just to appease a small sliver of society with a twisted sense of reality.
Today, school districts around the country are rethinking the “traditional” concept of bathrooms. Recently, Arizona’s Peoria Unified School District announced plans to remodel their schools and install private stalls for all sexes with a main gathering place for sinks in an open area. The district will also add doors to urinals.
Rather than standing up to transactivists, taxpayer money is being spent on appeasement.
The issue of female privacy and safety is a grave concern in school bathrooms. The Arizona Department of Education provided an interesting view: “Biological boys who expose themselves to girls could be violating indecent exposure laws and subject to arrest.” Of course, protecting the privacy of females is a concern but that isn’t the only danger in school bathrooms.
Public Schools: Prison with a Night Pass?
Shockingly, violence in school bathrooms has turned into a money-making opportunity. Dunham Washroom Systems is a company that promotes “anti-bullying through school toilet design.” Discipline problems are out of control—especially in school bathrooms. Rather than disciplining students for misbehavior, schools spend taxpayer dollars through an avoidance approach. Administrators believe new bathroom designs will stop students from fighting and using drugs at school.
An organization that conducts school safety audits reports that restrooms are being destroyed by unruly students. I’ve seen recordings of massive brawls in bathrooms with students severely beaten. I’ve also spoken to students who go to extraordinary measures to avoid using the bathroom when they are at school, including limiting their fluid intake.
School violence is getting worse and it’s even happening in elementary schools. In March, a fifth-grade boy and girl in Landover, Maryland fought one another while other students filmed and cheered.
At a Maryland middle school, staff members watched (and took no action) as two female students fought in front of the class. The fight was also captured on video and other students, not staff, were ultimately the ones to break up the fight.
A high school student with special needs in Fresno, California, was beaten up and suffered a concussion when another student jumped over the stall wall and attacked him.
Fights like these occur every day in schools across the nation. To quote a colleague, “Public schools have become a prison with a night pass.”
“Restorative Justice Techniques” Don’t Work
Student discipline has spiraled out of control since former President Obama’s 2014 “Dear Colleague” letter was released. Obama threatened to go after school districts which had racial disparities in discipline data.
Schools then began to implement “restorative justice” and “positive behavioral” methods to deal with student behavior. These practices were abysmal failures because they gave no consequences to students for their actions. Instead, districts tried to encourage students to sit in restorative circles to talk about their feeling or provide rewards for positive behavior but left out the actual consequences for breaking the rules.
Some schools even offer misbehaving students an opportunity to sit in a “decompression room” and be given snacks—rewarding their misbehavior.
Some steps schools can take to create a safer environment is to, most importantly, give firm consequences for misbehavior. To help prevent problems in bathrooms, schools can use an e-hall pass. This system can prevent students who have conflict with one another from leaving a classroom at the same time and meeting up in the bathrooms to fight.
Removing the ability for students to use their cell phones during the school day is another proactive approach to preventing drug deals and fights. Often students use their phones to schedule the meet-up arrangements for illicit activities.
Parental rights are extremely important and with those rights also comes accountability. If a student can’t follow the rules or is disruptive, he or she must be removed from the school and given consequences which includes holding parents responsible. The students shouldn’t just remain in school because it is inconvenient for parents to pick them up or have them at home.
While school leaders certainly share the blame for their “feelings based” approach to student discipline, parents must be ultimately accountable for the actions of their children.
(READ MORE: Leftists Are Losing Their Monopoly On K-12 Public Education)
