Judge Likens Female-Only Spa Policy to ‘White-Only’

A Ninth Circuit Court of appeals judge likened a traditional Korean spa’s female-only policy to racist “white only” laws.

“If you have a law that says, ‘white applicants only,’ this is ‘biological women entrance only.’ It seems to me they’re quite parallel there,” Judge Margaret McKeown said during a federal appeals court hearing in which Olympus Spa is challenging the state of Washington for mandating the admission of transgender women into the spa.

“And you can’t have ‘white people only’ come into my restaurant, and then you say, ‘Well, no, we have a religious, spiritual nature to our restaurant, and when you get there, we serve you special food.’ This seems quite different.”