SEPTA Forces Drivers to Guess Your Gender

by Tom Basgil Jr. · 2011-01-11 10:58:00 UTC
Topics:

Women: Keep that hair long. Men: Grow a beard. Passengers using public transportation in southeastern Pennsylvania who don't look like their respective genders can be booted from the bus

Southeastern Pennsylvania Transit Authority (SEPTA) requires their monthly transit passes to be marked with an “F” or an “M” sticker. You know, “F” for female and “M” for male. High tech stuff, really. In theory, these stickers prevent people from sharing their passes with their friends or family. Of course, this assumes that gals only have male friends and family, and males vice versa, to share their passes with.

Transit drivers have to determine the gender of the passenger before allowing them to board. Failure to look like the gender marked on your card can get you kicked off the train. This has resulted in a lot of confusion as passengers are interrogated about their gender presentation in front of a busload of commuters.

On December 15, Riders Against Gender Exclusion (RAGE), a local organization fighting the policy, unveiled their Bill of Rights in front of a room of transit officials. The document provided SEPTA with an easily adoptable rule to allow trans riders to go to work, school and the deli without fear of being publicly outed. RAGE says that they have received numerous complaints by gender non-conforming passengers who were refused service or had to buy another ticket. In the recession, this means that transgender people can be paying twice as much to ride the bus.

No other major metropolitan areas in the U.S. use gender markers on their monthly passes. The transit company appears to be taking a lot of flak for the policy. SEPTA’s Citizen Advisory Committee unanimously voted to remove the stickers, but management has declined. Equality Advocates Pennsylvania, a statewide LGBT group, has filed a complaint with the Philadelphia Human Relations Commission to no avail. A sane person would just stop putting the sticker on the passes and call it a day. Think of all the sticker trees that get cut down every year!

As we move into 2011, it’s time to put our New Year’s resolutions into effect. I know that I, for one, look silly with a beard.

Photo credit: Buswizard

Tom Basgil Jr. is a queer activist living in New York City.

RELATED PETITION

Get Rid of SEPTA’s Discriminatory M/F Sticker!
SIGN PETITION
3,738 People
PREVIOUS STORY:
Claire Buffie Heads to Miss America on a Pro-Equality Platform
NEXT STORY:
Bullied high schooler convinces MPAA to change ‘Bully’ rating to “PG-13”

COMMENTS (42)

    Comment Policy

    · All fields are required to comment.

    [X]

    Comments on Change.org are meant for further exploration and evaluation of the campaign on Change.org. To that end, we welcome constructive comments. However, we reserve the right to delete comments which, as determined solely in our discretion: (1) are offensive, abusive, or off-topic; (2) include content solely intended to personally attack the campaign creator, (3) are designed to subvert or hijack comment threads rather than contribute to them; and/or (4) violate our terms of service and/or privacy policy. Repeat offenders may be permanently removed from the site at our discretion. Please also be advised that: (A) we do not actively curate and/or monitor in any manner whatsoever the comments made on the Change.org platform, and (B) the creator of each campaign on Change.org may remove any comment at her/his/its discretion.