I was harassed at an In-N-Out bathroom for being a black trans woman

“Is there a man in the bathroom?”

I was seated on the toilet in the stall of a women’s restroom of an In-N-Out when I heard the manager yell.

I had stopped at the burger restaurant in the Bay Area for a late lunch last spring, and was alone in the bathroom when the manager entered. “Sir, sir – you’re not supposed to be in here,” she said.

“Ma’am, it’s just me in here,” I responded. I thought she would leave and that would be it. But I’m a black transgender woman, and people don’t just let us live our lives.

The manager came up to the stall door, and started looking through the cracks. She appeared to be scanning my body up and down. I got very scared. I clenched my purse to cover myself. I felt she was trying to look at my genitals, attempting to determine my gender. I asked her to leave while she continued to ask whether I was a man.

Finally, she left. I washed my hands and walked out of the bathroom to try to speak to her about what had happened. I’m a human that deserves privacy in the bathroom. Why did she think this was OK?

“I don’t have time for this,” the manager responded.

I felt demoralized, devalued and powerless. I got back to my car and sat in the parking lot. I had planned to work that day for Lyft in San Francisco. Instead, I drove home to Oakland in a fog. I told my partner what happened and broke down crying angrily.

The incident affected me in many ways.

I’m a musician and was preparing to be a headliner at a Utah pride festival, I had just been featured in Billboard. I was signing a deal to compose for a ballet. I wanted to focus on my career.

But what had happened exacerbated my anxiety, stress and paranoia. For a while, I wasn’t leaving the house – fearful of being harassed. I grew increasingly depressed, to the point that I was dropping the ball on my life. I started waiting to get home to use the bathroom, because I felt like it was the safest thing to do. I had regressed and had to rebuild my strength just to walk in and use a bathroom.

The smell of In-N-Out still bothers me.

I had learned to put my head down and get through things. But I couldn’t just let this go. It felt important for me to stand up and say something.

The US supreme court is about to

hear a case on whether it should be legal to discriminate against people for being trans. The Trump administration is arguing that employers should be allowed to tell people that they can’t work somewhere because of who they are.

The administration is taking a subset of society, and saying it’s OK to treat the people in that subset poorly, to treat them without dignity and respect, that they are less than. Because of Trump, people have been emboldened to think that this kind of stuff is OK, and I’m less safe for it. I don’t know what to do. Being trans and black can feel impossible most days.

Discriminating against a person simply because you don’t like who they are should be against the law. No one is asking for special accommodations.

I know my rights. California’s laws are very clear: I can use the bathroom that matches my gender identity.

So I filed a discrimination complaint against In-N-Out. I wanted changes in policies. I wanted the company to learn and understand. They will have other LGBT customers.

In a recent mediation, In-N-Out’s lawyers made it clear that they do not feel the company did anything wrong. It felt as if they told me I was worth nothing. They offered me a settlement that I found offensive. I said no.

But I won’t be silent. When it comes to black and brown trans folks, it feels like we don’t matter. Why can’t we exist in peace and have the same rights other people have? Why should somebody else’s opinion of what I should be get to dictate what my existence is? I’m asking that we are able to go about our lives and use the bathroom, without you kicking open the door and dragging us out.

There are parts of the LGBT community that have a lot more power and money, and the gay white folks who pushed for marriage equality should be fighting for us, too. We need to be together on this.

If they come for us, they’ll come for other folks. This doesn’t stop at us, it starts with us.

Asked to comment on LeahAnn Mitchell’s claims, an In-N-Out spokesperson said the company did not harass her or discriminate against her and that the manager was not aware she was transgender. A customer had repeatedly “raised the concern of a man being in the women’s restroom”, the statement said.

In an internal company report on the incident, the manager said she entered the bathroom and called out “Sir?” and that when Mitchell answered “Excuse me?”, the manager responded, “I’m sorry – we had a customer let us know there was a gentleman in here so I was just checking.” She said she then exited.

“Where we offer male and female restrooms, our expectation is that our customers will use the restroom consistent with their gender identity or gender expression, regardless of their biological sex,” the statement said.

The company declined to make the manager available for an interview.

LeahAnn Mitchell is a Californiabased musician who performs as Lafemmebear.

As told to Sam Levin