We've walked through a doorway we'll never go back through. And we're going to have to address some concerns that are now facing us. If you were born a man, then you are obliged to use the males' restroom.

--Republican state Senator Jim Tomes

Tomes, of course, does not understand the extent of what his bill demands.

Tomes' bill would send someone to jail for up to a year and fine them as much as $5,000 if they were convicted of entering a bathroom that does not match up with their birth gender. Exceptions are made for janitors, first aid providers and parents accompanying children under the age of 8. The measure would also require public schools, including charters, to ensure students do the same, though students would not face criminal penalties.

Please note that this is not segregation by genitalia, as some have pushed...for the safety of the women and children, you understand. This demand of segregation is by chromosomal arrangement. Transgender people who have undergone gender reassignment will be prohibited from using the restrooms of their reassigned gender.

The legislation – SB35 – would have the effect of specifically targeting a population of people for adverse treatment in public facilities making it more discriminatory than the RFRA legislation pushed through the Indiana Congress.

--Peacock Penache

Tomes, of Wadesville, says he's "not trying to single-out anybody or destroy anybody."

That is the most disingenuous statement I've ever heard.

--Camilla Taylor, Lambda Legal, who noted that it singles out people who do not identify with their birth gender

Taylor notes that sections of the bill addressing schools could run afoul of federal education mandates.

Our interpretation is that people would go to jail for a year.

--Steph Mineart, Indiana Transgender Network

The bill’s language confuses sex and gender – something that will definitely harm the bill’s chance of standing should it ever be passed into law. Whereas the American Psychological Association defines ‘sex’ as a person’s biological status and is “typically categorized as male, female, or intersex,” gender “refers to the attitudes, feelings, and behaviors that a given culture associates with a person’s biological sex.”

Tomes’ usage of chromosomes to define gender also conflicts with medical science as intersex individuals often do not conform to correlating XX and XY chromosomes. Mineart added referring to this, “That [language] doesn’t cover intersex conditions, the way they’ve written it. So there will be intersex people who have no recourse to use a restroom, depending on how that’s written.”

Making matters more egregious, many transgender and intersex individuals do not hold physical characteristics of their birth gender and similarly, many cisgender individuals exhibit many traits of the opposite gender. Identifying those using the “wrong” bathroom would literally entail violating a person’s privacy in order to examine their genitals and swabbing for a DNA test to determine chromosomal makeup.

How are you going to test DNA at the doorway of the restroom? How are you going to test that? Are you going to run a DNA test at the doorway of a restroom to determine whether somebody’s allowed to be in the restroom? None of this makes any sense.

--Mineart

It puts, first and foremost, transgender students in the crosshairs. So, we’re talking about our kids, teenagers, who are most at risk for bullying because of their gender identity.

--Jennifer Wagner, Freedom Indiana

The bill also mandates that schools have girls’ and boys’ facilities exclusively, as opposed to gender-neutral bathrooms—an option some schools have turned to as a way to support transgender students.

In this world of 2015 that we live in, we’re dealing with extraordinary issues that, years ago, we could have never imagined. We’re trying to establish some kind of guideline with these recent developments.

--Tomes

He can turn back the clock as much as he wishes, but we will still exist. Tomes and people like him have claimed that a boy or man could pose as a transgender woman in order to enter a woman's facility to prey on young girls. Such has never happened. Ever.

Maybe we shouldn’t focus on targeting a particular group of people in our state and treating them like second class citizens. Perhaps we should do the right thing and update our civil rights code.

--Wagner

Second class would be a step up, Jennifer.