This Week in Barrel Scraping (TWIBS) is Assigned Media’s oldest column! Every Friday, Alyssa Steinsiek digs deep from the well of transphobia and finds the most obnoxious, goofy thing transphobes have said or obsessed over during the week and tears it to shreds.
Happy day-after-colonizer day, everybody! I certainly won’t berate anybody for stuffing their gullet with friends and family, but let’s all take a moment to remember the historical and ongoing genocide of native Americans and indigenous peoples around the world. Maybe find a native person’s GoFundMe or request for mutual aid and donate to it! Wouldn’t that be cool?
Anyway, enough about weird American holidays. Let’s talk about bathrooms! That’s right, the place you might just be reading this article from if you had a touch too much stuffing yesterday. Sorry, gross, let’s think less about number two and more about number one, and just how damn hard it’s becoming to drain the main vein (or whatever) if you’re a transgender American.
Bathrooms have made headlines a lot, lately, and even Assigned Media has reported twice on crappers in the last week alone! Last Friday we reported on the Speaker of the House banning transgender people from using the correct bathrooms at the Capitol and House offices, which is super messed up, and on Tuesday we reported on a highly localized bathroom ban in Odessa, Texas, which includes a nasty litigatory bonus for any particularly vile Odessans.
Even now, we haven’t had a chance to report on the Ohio bathroom ban signed into law on Wednesday by Governor Mike DeWine, which will take effect after 90 days. Organizations like the ACLU frequently file suit to try and block these bans, but there remain seventeen states where some aspect of law makes it dangerous for transgender people to use the bathroom in which they are most comfortable.
In light of that, we’ve prepared a short list of places where intrepid trans folks might prefer to relieve themselves should they wind up in a locale where public bathrooms are unsafe.
Republicans’ yards
Listen, we aren’t suggesting you trespass on people’s private property to water or fertilize their crops… but if you happen to see some sort of unclaimed land easement upon which a Trump 2024 campaign sign has been planted, and you find yourself in need of a pool at which to drop the kids off… you know? Food for thought. Or, no wait, ew—
Confederate war memorials
To be clear, Assigned Media would never explicitly recommend that you vandalize statues memorializing the bucktoothed cousin lovin’ dipshits who seceded from the union and went to war to defend chattel slavery. We would only ever imply you pee on Robert E. Lee’s boots, through veiled metaphors and clever wordplay.
Mysterious outhouses in haunted woods
Who amongst us has not found ourselves traipsing about fog-laden, unsettling patches of forest under the pale moonlight, shivering from a sudden and inexplicable chill… when we come upon a dilapidated cottage that may or may not be the scene of multiple grizzly murders carried out by an angry father in the 1970s? But listen, while you’re there, consider that the spooky outhouse is gender neutral!
The bathroom in a stranger’s house
Trans people and our allies are always pointing out that we all have gender neutral bathrooms in our homes. A transphobe (like JK Rowling) might argue that she wouldn’t let a stranger crap in her turlet, but I say… why not? And furthermore, who’s going to stop you? Huge disclaimer here, though, double check whether or not your state has a castle doctrine law in place before you start kicking in doors to commandeer the head.
Margaret Thatcher’s grave
I know this isn’t actually in the United States, but it is one of the world’s oldest and most respected gender neutral bathrooms. If you find yourself in London, make sure to swing by Maggie’s burial site and take care of business, won’t you?
Disclaimer: Assigned Media and its subsidiaries do not under any circumstances recommend you go number one OR two in public or on private property without the express permission of the owner of that private property. Any damages incurred by reckless vacating of bowels or bladders in public are not the responsibility of Assigned Media or its subsidiaries or Spot the Talking Assigned Media News Dog.
Alyssa Steinsiek is a professional writer who spends too much time playing video games!
Thank you for adding humor to a hateful law. How else can we survive?
I appreciate the humor but would actually love even more a serious version of this article. I’m really scared to travel these days as more of the country becomes subject to these laws. The urgency for a trans version of the Green Book increases every day.
As you would when house-training a puppy, lay down some fresh New York Times and piss away. After all, it’s not like it wasn’t yellow journalism already.
These is funny, and we need to laugh. It would be good to add something truly helpful though. There is an app called Refuge Restrooms – it shows where to find gender neutral bathrooms nearby and there is usually a description of where to find them within the business listed. We’ve found it helpful. The more people add safe bathrooms to it, the better it will get.
Really appreciate the humor, we sure do need it!
But I am disappointed in the perpetuation of stereotypes about poor rural folks. Can’t really help being buck toothed in this land of luxury bones, ya know? Absolutely no objections to calling them what they were, dipshits who went to war to defend chattel slavery, though!