In a puzzling and offensive exchange, a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals judge likened a female-only Olympus Spa policy to a “whites-only” policy. The remark was made during a federal appeals court hearing in which Olympus Spa is challenging the state of Washington for mandating the admission of transgender women (biological men) into the spa via the Washington Human Rights Commission.
Olympus Spa is a traditional Korean spa with locations in Tacoma and Lynnwood that operates under a “female-only policy” restricting transgender women unless they have “gone through post-operative sex confirmation surgery,” according to court documents. The spa cites the rule as “essential for the safety, legal protection, and well-being of our customers.”
The policy is based on the owner’s Christian values that demand “modesty as between the sexes” and that “a male and female should not ordinarily be in each other’s presence while in the nude unless married to each other.” The spa attracts deeply religious customers. It also has employees who “refuse to perform massages or body scrubs on naked men.”
But Judge M. Margaret McKeown appeared skeptical of a female-only admissions policy.
“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,” McKeown said. “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.”