Right to equal regulation

The proposed right

No person shall be required to comply with particular appearance, wearing of particular clothing or accessories, or particular conduct in a public or commercial space due to a protected personal characteristic.

No person shall be prohibited from any particular appearance, wearing of particular clothing or accessories, or particular conduct in a public or commercial space due to a protected personal characteristic.

Definitions

* Public Space
* Commercial Space
* Protected Personal Characteristic

Intent

To prevent harmful biased discrimination against people based on their protected personal characteristics.

The right to equal regulation is not intended to limit a private association from creating arbitrary dress or conduct rules, because membership in a private association is optional and is protected by the proposed right to peaceful association.

Discussion

The right applies to public and commercial spaces such as the wilderness, city streets, restaurants, offices, public or commercial transportation, and so on. This is because people in a society depend on their ability to be in public and commercial spaces for essential needs. The right does not apply to private spaces such as someone’s home or a private club where participation is optional.

If a space is owned or operated by the government, or not owned by anyone, it is a public space. If a space is being used or operated by a company such as having employees working there or buying and selling things there, or having customers who previously bought or sold things there for the purpose of completing the transaction or benefitting from the transaction, it is a commercial space. For example if a customer buys a bus or airline ticket, the passenger area of the bus or airplane and all areas through which the customer is required to pass in order to arrive at the passenger area and eventually leave the passenger area are all considered commercial spaces or public spaces.

The right to equal regulation means that there can either be a rule that applies to everyone, or there can be a rule that applies based on non-protected characteristics, but there cannot be a rule based only on protected characteristics.

Employment is not a protected characteristic so employees may be required to wear or prohibited from wearing specific clothing based on their job, and this is allowed because it’s based on the job they have and not based on their protected personal characteristics.

A private association may have dress code rules because membership in that association is optional. For example, a ballroom dance club may have a monthly dance event in which it requires women to wear dresses and men to wear suits. This does not violate the right to clothing because anyone who objects to those rules is not required to be there. A separate ballroom dance club could be formed to host events at which the dress code is different. However, if an association is public, such as a homeowners association that requires anyone living in a certain area to be a member, then the association cannot impose a dress code in any of its facilities such as at the gym or pool that requires men and women to dress differently. Another example is a dance club that charges anyone who wants to enter a fee for admission, it is a commercial space and that club may have a dress code that applies to everyone but it may not have a separate dress code for men and women.

In the event of a pandemic, the government may require infected individuals to wear a conspicuous clothing accessory so that other people know to keep their distance or don personal protective equipment before interacting with infected individuals.

In the case of a pandemic, although a person cannot control whether they become infected, and may not even know that they are infected, once their infection becomes known it is not considered a protected personal characteristic. This is because if the infected person were to approach and infect someone else, the other person’s health and possibly their life is in danger, whereas the protected personal characteristics of sex, skin color, birthplace, etc. do not pose a danger to anyone else.

Examples of regulations that would violate this right:

* Requiring Jews to wear yellow stars (Nazi Germany)
* Requiring gay men to wear pink triangles (Nazi Germany)
* Requiring Jews and Christians to wear yellow belts (Caliph Harun al-Rashid)

Examples of regulations that would not violate this right:

* Requiring men to wear a yarmulke inside a Synagogue (because it is a private space, not a public or commercial space)
* Requiring everyone to wear sandals or shoes in a restaurant
* Requiring everyone to cover their genitals in public
* Requiring infected people to wear a red arm band
* Requiring prisoners to wear prison uniforms
* Prohibiting convicted criminals from wearing hats or masks or body armor