A Discussion That Goes Beyond Bathroom Talk

The school district said it worried that allowing her into the locker rooms "would expose female students to being observed in a state of undress by a biologically male individual." The case ended up being settled with agreement involving privacy curtains and accommodations for any girls who wanted additional privacy protections.

Transgender rights lawyers say the reality of such encounters turns out to be less problematic than the imagined intrusions. "We're talking about people who also have their sense of privacy and modesty, and who are not going to want to have everyone see an anatomical part of themselves that they feel should never have been there in the first place," said ACLU lawyer Joshua Block, who represented Grimm.

Still, the implications of requiring equal treatment lead to some challenging situations. If I had a transgender daughter about to start college, I'd want her to have the same opportunity as every freshman to bond with her roommate.

But if I were the mother of that roommate -- if my daughter called and said her roommate turned out to be a transgender girl -- I have to admit I'd be unnerved. Even for people of goodwill, the emergence of transgender rights is going to take some adjusting.

And then there is Ted Cruz, who sunk, typically, to lowest-common-denominator ugliness. "Grown adult men -- strangers -- should not be alone in a bathroom with little girls," he said, seizing on Trump's comments. As if being transgender is equivalent to a propensity to prey on children. Of the same gender.

The country needs a mature discussion of this complex issue, and how to accommodate competing needs. Instead, the campaign drives candidates like Cruz to pander to the worst instincts of the ignorant, and the basest of the base.

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Ruth Marcus' email address is ruthmarcus@washpost.com.