When I moved into Allison Hall on my first day at Northwestern, I was struck by the strangeness of the bathrooms. The men’s and women’s restrooms — though separated according to the traditional gender binary — were identical, with nary a urinal to be found. The high stalls and double-curtained showers provided privacy, and the only time two residents came face-to-face in the bathroom was when their tooth brushing schedules overlapped. Soon, I began to wonder: Why is it that I must only brush my teeth with men? What could possibly be gendered about oral hygiene?

Of course, this is a radical oversimplification of a complex issue. Not all bathrooms at NU are created equal, but the vast majority of them are not gender-open. The University has made a concerted effort to solve this issue through the construction of single-stall, gender-open restrooms in buildings across campus and has also pledged to include these facilities in new buildings. This is progress, but it is not enough.

According to a National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and National Center for Transgender Equality study, more than half of American trans* individuals have been harassed in public spaces, and 41 percent, more than 20 times the national average, have attempted suicide. Fear of assault and harassment in gendered bathrooms is so pronounced among trans* people that it can lead to harmful habits. A UCLA study found 54 percent of trans* individuals in its sample had some kind of physical health problem, such as a urinary tract infection, as a result of “holding it in” for extended periods of time.

Creating safe spaces for trans* students at NU is not a debate. It is a moral imperative. And although gender-open bathrooms are often cast as a progressive issue, every American home I’ve ever visited has had at least one. The same cannot be said for our campus buildings.

I have acquaintances with whom my entire relationship is premised on ranting about the cold. Our school has a shuttle route dedicated to preventing frostbite. Is it reasonable to expect trans* students at NU to brave the polar vortex in order to find a bathroom in which they feel safe?

A cheap way to make our school instantly more inclusive would be to simply change the signs on bathrooms to read “all-gender.” This is, of course, not a panacea. Some students might still feel uncomfortable in bathrooms with multiple stalls. However, I believe it would demonstrate NU’s solidarity with the gender equality movement — a long process with no definable endpoint — and would also give trans* students more bathroom options on campus in the short run. NU would not be alone in this effort. Dartmouth College recently rolled out a similar sign-changing program. Student activists at Brown University and Wesleyan University have simply torn down gendered bathroom signs and put up their own.

A common argument against gender-open bathrooms with multiple stalls is that they encourage sexual voyeurism. I disagree wholeheartedly with this point. The issue lies with the voyeurs, not their genders. People who want to be lewd in a bathroom will do it whether or not it is gender-open, as evidenced by an incident in 2011 in which a man was spotted in the middle of what the University prudently termed “self-gratification” in the SPAC showers.

There is also the question of sexual assault. Assault survivors might feel uncomfortable sharing a bathroom with people of their attacker’s gender. This, I concede, is a reason to proceed with caution and perhaps pilot the sign changes one building at a time. Still, I contend that when weighing the fact that trans* students are commonly assaulted in public places against the possibility that other students might be in gender-open bathrooms, I would rather err on the side of certainty.

In the end I do not hold the power to enact this policy but only to suggest it as one component of a much larger strategy that includes what the University is already doing. NU is on track to be more gender-inclusive in the future, but it’s important to take steps that will benefit trans* students who are a part of our community today.

Noah Kane is a Weinberg senior. He can be reached at [email protected]. If you would like to respond publicly to this column, send a Letter to the Editor to [email protected].