Mall-restroom evictions raise transgender ire

SeattleTimes.NWSource.com – Seattle Times staff reporter

Two transgender individuals attending a weekend conference in Seattle were kicked out of a men’s bathroom at Pacific Place and then ejected from the downtown mall in what could become a significant test involving transgender people under the state’s year-old gay-rights law.

The Aug. 31 incident led about three dozen people who were attending the Gender Odyssey Conference at the Washington State Convention and Trade Center to march on the mall in protest on Labor Day, staging what they called a “pee-in” at the fourth-floor bathrooms.

The two male-to-female transgender people involved in the incident weren’t arrested but said they were mortified as a security guard led them down escalators as shoppers gawked and pointed.