Peter Tatchell Challenges Andrew Gold on Trans Women in Women’s Toilets — Then Their Debate Takes a Surprising Turn Peter Tatchell: Your position means trans women should have to use men’s toilets, putting themselves at risk. We’re in a complex situation where either women or trans women may feel at risk. Andrew Gold: Trans people have used women’s toilets for decades, but if biological sex determines access to these spaces, trans men would have to use women’s toilets. Imagine how threatened women would feel. Peter Tatchell: I don’t know what the answer to the trans man question is, but many women are tired of being sexualized by men. They don’t want men in their toilets. I also don’t believe gender identity is separate from sex. I reject that concept. Andrew Gold: Gender identity was being discussed as far back as the 1890s. Magnus Hirschfeld’s work in Berlin focused on trans people and helped many trans women pursue gender reassignment. Peter Tatchell: I see the connection, but to me, the LGB movement was about equal civil rights. The trans movement seems to be asking for a special right that other men don’t have: access to women’s spaces. Andrew Gold: Simone de Beauvoir said, “A woman is not born, she is made.” That’s part of the trans story. Peter Tatchell: But wasn’t she a bit nuts? Andrew Gold: She had a relationship with Jean-Paul Sartre, and her book The Second Sex was pioneering in feminism. Peter Tatchell: But women have evolved biologically over hundreds of thousands of years to be different from men. Andrew Gold: A woman is born biologically, but her identity and role in life are shaped by society. There’s a connection to the trans experience: people are born one way but may make themselves something different. It’s a complex issue, and we need individual assessment rather than generalizations.