At Planet Fitness, Yvette Cormier wanted to shape up – and instead, she got shipped out! The customer of a Michigan branch found out the hard way that if she wants to exercise her rights to privacy and free speech, she’ll have to find another gym. In a story that sums up the opposition to the Left’s infamous bathroom ordinances, Yvette came face to face with the consequences of giving gender identity a special place in local laws. Imagine her surprise, Yvette told gym management, when she walked into the women’s locker room and saw “a man” standing there.

“Freaked out,” she complained to the branch, who said the man identifies as a woman and had every right to use the facility of his choice. Stunned, Cormier contacted Planet Fitness’s corporate office – where she heard more of the same. According to the company’s PR director, “Planet Fitness is committed to creating a non-intimidating, welcoming environment for our members. Our gender identity non-discrimination policy states that members and guests may use all facilities based on their sincere self-reported gender identity.”

The gym, she was told, is a “no judgment zone” – but apparently not for everyone. When Yvette started warning women about the policy, Planet Fitness revoked her membership. “This is very scary,” she told reporters this week. “I feel like it’s kind of one-sided. I feel like I’m the one who is being punished.” Of course, the irony is that the same Planet Fitness company who said it was a man’s right to disrobe in a ladies’ locker room women kicked a pregnant woman out of the club in South Carolina for showing her belly button! That violates the dress code – but a cross-dressing man doesn’t?

Sound bizarre? Unfortunately, this is the kind of topsy-turvy scenario that will be playing out in public restrooms, showers, and locker rooms across the country if more cities don’t turn back this push to elevate sexual orientation and gender identity above personal privacy and public safety. You don’t have to be a Christian or a conservative to understand the practical effects of these laws. “Tolerance” sounds like a great idea until your little girl is in the restroom with a grown man. By introducing gender politics into an environment like a gym, Planet Fitness is creating a culture ripe for abuse.

All Yvette asked for was privacy – a third set of stalls to accommodate everyone involved. The company accused her of being “inappropriate” and “disruptive” – words that more accurately describe the gym’s sexually-charged policy. Yvette found the presence of a man in the woman’s locker room disturbing. Under these ordinances, the law says America’s objections are disturbing.

University of California’s Star-Spangled Ban-er

There’s a new f-word at the University of California at Irvine: FLAG. Higher education is teaching students to think critically all right – about their own country. In a head-shaking move even by California standards, a 12-member student government body voted to ban the display of the U.S. flag in certain lobby areas because it can be construed as “hate speech.”

The resolution’s text insists that “The American flag has been flown in instances of colonialism and imperialism. Flags not only serve as symbols of patriotism or weapons for nationalism, but also construct cultural mythologies and narratives that in turn charge nationalistic sentiments…” As usual, the Left resorts to throwing the “hate” label on anything it disagree with – no matter how legitimate their opposition may be.

By a 6-4 vote (with two abstentions), the students voted to ban the Stars and Stripes – outraging members like Reza Zomorrodian, who called it “an attack on American values.” “I’m firmly against what they did. I think it was a horrible idea. Only six people voted for this. We have 22,000 undergrads here… the UC Irvine has made huge contributions to bettering this country. This is an elected body that made a decision for the whole and will suffer the consequences of making that decision.” Our college campuses have become so politically correct that they won’t even tolerate their own country!

What a tragic irony. Our soldiers are putting themselves in harm’s way to give these students the freedom to make outrageous decisions like this. In a rare display of common sense, the cabinet overseeing the student council recognized the ridiculousness of the decision and overrode it – but not before it did serious damage to the UC Irvine’s credibility as an institution of serious learning.

Unfortunately, the anti-American zealots at the University of California have partners in viewpoint discrimination at George Washington University, where conservative students are fighting the campus’s out-of-control PC police. When a school association ordered every club to undergo LGBT sensitivity training, Young America’s Foundation resisted. YAF co-chair Emily Jashinsky argued that there should be a religious exemption for students who support biblical morality – sparking a huge firestorm with pro-homosexual groups on campus.

Now, those same pride clubs are trying to make the training a condition of funding – meaning that YAF would lose any financial support simply for believing what the majority of Americans already does! These extremists-in-training must have learned from their adult counterparts how to bully conservatives with the false narrative of inclusion. Like the rest of the LGBT movement, they know they can’t win the debate – so they try to shut it down instead. So much for open-mindedness!

In Beehive State, SOGI Bill Still Stings

While other states slam the brakes on local SOGI (sexual orientation-gender identity) ordinances, Utah is moving stubbornly ahead. Leaders in the state have managed to convince people that they can do something no one else has: strike a balance between special sexuality rights and religious liberty. While small businesses across America continue proving Utah wrong, the Mormon church is intent on pulling the legislation over the finish line.

On Friday, the state Senate voted in a landslide 23-5 to ignore the cautionary tales of the Houston, San Antonio, and Springfield ordinances and give government the license to punish anyone who doesn’t believe in their radical ideas of sexuality. While the LDS church insists the measure carves out exemptions for religious groups, the bill offers about as much coverage as a fig leaf. As usual, the Left trotted out their familiar – but misguided – comparisons between the homosexuality and the racial persecution of times past. “This is the civil rights issue of our time,” one of the Democratic senators exclaimed.

That didn’t sit well with his African-American colleague, Alvin Jackson. Like many, he’s tired of the false – and offensive – comparison between race and sexuality. “To me, their collective efforts have been minimized, when you take that list that has race on it, and you put sexual orientation and gender identity right next to it. I cannot accept that,” he fired back. “I’m a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I’m proud to say that. But my black Baptist roots won’t allow me to accept what’s in this legislation.”

FRC has tried to put these arguments in perspective, even writing an entire policy brief called, “Homosexuality is not a civil right.” As Peter Sprigg explains, “The stories of Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr. have become an inspiring part of American history. It’s not surprising that homosexual activists have tried to hitch their caboose to the ‘civil rights’ train… [But] when homosexual activists talk about their ‘civil rights,’ they are not talking about their constitutional rights, which have never been systematically denied to them as a class (unlike the historical experience of black Americans)…”

Unlike skin color, sexual behavior isn’t immutable, inborn, or involuntary. While homosexuals can change their behavior, a person can’t change his ethnicity. As such, there is no compelling, logical basis for treating homosexuality as a protected category under civil rights laws, or for granting special protection against “discrimination” based on “sexual orientation.” In the civil rights movement, African-Americans were unable to bring about political and cultural change because they were disenfranchised through laws restricting their vote and their voice. The homosexual community that regularly boasts of their political power and financial influence can make no such claim.

This is a publication of the Family Research Council. Mr. Perkins is president of FRC.