“Loudoun County parents not ‘satisfied’ after school officials testify on transgender policies,” read the headline after the mother of a young schoolboy told the Loudoun County Virginia, School Board that her son came home visibly upset because a girl in his class had entered the boys’ restroom and watched him urinate, which she feels violated her son’s privacy.

Beneath the headline was a photograph of several parents holding placards reading, “Transgender Rights Are Human Rights,” in yet another misguided attempt by activists to obfuscate the matter to their benefit because human rights are neither created nor defined by government.  They are inherent in our humanity and exist independently of any government or political system.

However, the incident does illustrate how transgender activists are conflating civil rights with public policy—two entirely different concepts.  Transgender and cisgender students possess the same civil rights.  Whether transgender boys may use the boys’ restroom or whether transgender athletes may compete on teams designated for the opposite biological sex are questions of public policy, not civil rights.

Public policy determines how restrooms and athletic participation are structured to balance competing interests, including privacy, fairness, safety, and inclusion.  Meanwhile, the Supreme Court has ruled that Title IX does not prohibit states from separating athletic teams on the basis of biological sex and that such laws generally do not violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.  In other words, the Supreme Court has ruled on the constitutionality of the matter; now it’s up to the individual states to decide the public policy.

Governors Gavin Newsom, Kathy Hochul, and J.B. Pritzker know this, yet they continue to pledge to “protect transgender rights”—a slogan that, in practice, is less about protecting equal rights under the law than advocating public policies that would grant transgender individuals accommodations or privileges not afforded to the rest of the population.

Reasonable people can disagree about whether public policy strikes the proper balance between privacy, fairness, safety, and inclusion.  But no one is denying transgender individuals their civil rights by establishing eligibility rules for sex-specific activities.

The Constitution guarantees civil rights, but it doesn’t guarantee an unrestricted right to enter every space of one’s choosing.  Just as state legislators establish qualifications for driving a motor vehicle—a privilege rather than a constitutional right—they also establish rules governing access to sex-specific and purpose-specific environments.

The danger here should be obvious; we cannot characterize every policy disagreement as a denial of rights – civil or otherwise.  Doing so blurs the distinction between rights and public policy, making thoughtful discussion far more difficult than it ought to be.