A banner for LoveLoud | Photo: Facebook
A transgender woman was told she was ‘in the wrong bathroom’ at last weekend’s LoveLoud Festival – an event set up to promote LGBTI inclusivity.
‘When I was confronted, saying I was in the wrong bathroom, it kind of threw me off,’ said transwoman Bobbee Trans Mooremon told Fox 13 Salt Lake City.
Although the event told attendees it would have gender-inclusive bathrooms, only two bathrooms were gender-inclusive during the concert.
Even the Pride Festival ran into problems with people at the door misgendering people,” said another attendee, Brianna Cluck, who began mapping out the festival’s bathrooms on Facebook.
‘I have that fear every time I go into a bathroom, like what’s going to happen?’ Mooremon said “There’s always a fear no matter what bathroom I go in I’m going to get yelled at or beat up. Which one do I want?”
Ongoing debate on trans bathroom rights
Inclusive or gender neutral bathrooms are a controversial issue in countries like US and the UK. In February, the President Donald Trump rescinded a policy which banned discrimination against trans students in US schools, which had been put in place by his predecessor, Barak Obama.
The concert, which took place in Salt Lake City, was founded by Imagine Dragons frontman, Dan Reynolds. Its official statement says the concert is designed to ‘ignite conversation about what it means to unconditionally love, understand, accept, and support our LGBTQ+ communities.’
The LoveLoud organisers responded to reports of discrimination at the festival in a statement released on Facebook: ‘We are saddened to hear that a few of our LGBTQ+ community members faced discrimination at last night’s festival,’ it said.
‘We have a zero-tolerance policy toward any behavior that makes anyone feel unsafe or unwelcome […] We are committed to learning from our mistakes and will continuously work to improve the lives of LGBTQ+ people in our community and beyond.‘
