Frakking Bathrooms

Let's talk about bathrooms, specifically public restrooms. Now this doesn't seem like much of a real topic. What are public restrooms? A place to expunge our wastes, wash our hands, and go.

Except...I'm a transwoman.

And as such, much of the battle for my basic rights seem focused on the issues of public restrooms.

Whether or not we have protections from being fired or turned over in hiring owing to our gender identity, whether we can be kicked out of housing or denied aid, whether we can legally be recognized as our actual sex, whether we are allowed access to aid mechanisms or services, and of course, whether our murders are to be investigated or silently left unsolved...all of these issues tend to be debated on the issue of whether or not we should be allowed in "their" bathrooms with their unprotected womenfolk and children and so on.

Now, that's a stupid debate, filled with actions that say more about our opponents than those they attack. Much of it seems to assume that the gender signs on bathrooms act as a sort of magic ward that prevent men who want to assault women from entering unless they "disguise themselves as women". Naturally, such occurrence of cross-dressing attackers in bathrooms never seems to manifest, though some of those who seek to defend from such a menace turn up to be bathroom attackers themselves.

I will, if allowed, gladly fill a column just about the political debate, but that isn't why I've brought it up.

Today, I want to do something different than just arguing for my humanity and my right to poop.

I want to talk about what its like to be a transgendered person and some of the reasons why bathrooms are treated like a fortress that must not be breached. This is a personal narrative of why I hate public restrooms and what they represent.

And as such, we begin with a flashback (please insert doo-de-lee-doos to taste). In August of 2008, I travelled to Denmark to pursue and complete my Master's degree. During that time, by sheer coincidence, I made the conscious realization that I was a woman. I had many clues before-hand, but I had stupid reasons for dismissing that gender dysphoria.

It was during this time that I began exploring the world as a conscious transwoman, experiencing life through those eyes, exploring my personal aesthetic, coming out in life, and planning my future life.

I hadn't noticed at the time, but this was a remarkably good environment to begin this exploration. And the reason for that didn't become clear until I had returned home to the States.

Suddenly, there was an overall shift in perceived safety of going out as myself and a more general pressure that was felt socially. Things were different.

Unsettling.

And the reason for it became clear once I had my first encounter with something we take for granted back in my home country.

The all-familiar male and female restroom signs.

Suddenly, there was a decision to be made. Not to decide whether I was male or female, that was something I had made peace with. But rather which space I belonged and more importantly was allowed into.

I was wearing "feminine" clothes, but in terms of passing, I was not nearly as confident. Furthermore, there are all sorts of stories of assault, confrontations, even expulsions for "wrong choices". Interactions from security, complaints from guests, and of course the stares.

So here was a calculation of safety and more importantly what sex society would see me as. I was not having to decide based on my own sex, but rather what sex I most resembled by society's norms.

What sex would I be read as? What box would others...all others read me as?

Now, it's hard to truly capture what that feels like, because what this induces is generally a feeling of gender dysphoria. A reminder that one's birth sex, perhaps the sex the world sees you as is not your true internal sex (the sex your brain sees itself as). An attack of self-loathing, self-doubt, of being wrong, insecure, and frightened.

One gets to experience all that, because one needed to poop.

This experience hit so very hard, especially, because it didn't arise in Denmark. In Denmark, bathrooms are all labeled WC, most are single person "home bathroom" style rooms or closets that are open to both sexes. There are some segregated bathrooms of the American style in high-traffic areas but they are easy to bypass and are far from the norm.

The average bathroom experience as such was I went to the bathroom, just as a cis-person does, without needing to question or think.

But here, I must plan ahead, making sure I never forget to take care of business before leaving, often accepting the dangerous gamble of entering a very wrong restroom (male) in a skirt, eyes downcast to avoid the taken-back looks of men on the way to the privacy of the stall, hoping none become violent, because I don't yet trust my ability to pass in the ladies room. An inability to meet society's standards. Standards which often turn on say butch women and others who fail to meet society's gender policing.

And one can say, that such is a necessity of our greater concentration. Our bathrooms serve more people more quickly and as such, need the reduced space these segregations give us.

I was willing to give such arguments credence until I came to live in San Francisco.

San Francisco is largely seen as one of the more socially liberal cities in the country. One of the best cities to live in as a QUILTBAG and certainly one of the transgender-friendliest cities, or at least one with the most transgender people in it.

Here, the segregated doors, male and female still abound. And what they abound are single home bathroom style rooms with a toilet and a sink. Places with only two toilets in total have them clearly labeled male and female. What reason is there to segregate these single stalls?

At the LGBT center, a location that sees many transgender individuals and is possibly best poised to understand and empathize with their life experiences, the main bathrooms are male and female. There is a gender-neutral toilet, the same as the disabled toilet. One can enter it by requesting the key at the desk, where one is handed a key on a large wooden box (just like in elementary school). As you go back upstairs to use it, you can see men and women entering freely into the other bathrooms and reflect on how very not alienating this feels.

And that's where we get to the rub. Even in cases where there is no reason to segregate our bathrooms, we do so. It is simply something that is done, because that's what a public restroom is like. We can't seem to imagine a society where going to the bathroom isn't gender segregated. Instead it is where one must decide male or female and where one is encouraged to sort others by male or female to decide whether they "belong" there or not.

This makes bathrooms fraught, alienating, and deeply troubling. Instead of being able to crap and leave, one if transgendered must make complicated calculations of passing and face internalized demons of gender presentation and acceptance. Others are encouraged to enforce the place unthinking and more importantly carry that thinking into all public spaces. Male and female must be seen as different and distinct in public spaces, because that's how the very public spaces are built. If we don't know where you belong, where will you crap? Where will you change? Where will you go?

And this social attitude definitely feels palpable in experience. There was a genuine freedom and easy-going attitude while I was in Denmark. The public spaces were accepting of gender-neutrality and so there was less of a feeling that one was supported in segregating the genders. Mixed spaces were the rule, gender roles less focused on, and teachers hardly blinked an eye as their "male" students did their oral finals complete in skirt and shaved legs.

That is not to say that Denmark was flawless or lacked any gender segregation or sexism. But rather that the social weight of encounters felt less on the side of gender police and bullies versus the non-conforming. And there was less institutional support for social gender-segregation and internalizing it.

The bathroom in America is a sign, a symbol on a door that says Male and Female. That offers a dualistic choice. And for the majority of cispeople, such a decision is hardly ever considered.

In short, such a choice is natural. Gender segregation is a natural, everyday occurrence. And we've learned to become blind to it. It is simply how the world works. There are men and there are women.

And this thinking makes it easy to go from there to further gender policing. What type of men and what type of women? Are they too feminine, too masculine, do they retain any secondary sex characteristics of another sex, should we check?

And I think that's why all transgender rights arguments seem to center so heavily around bathrooms, changing rooms, and dorms. These locations are the last everyday locations of gender segregation. Here is where the question is raised, are you woman or are you a man? Are the people around you women or men? If they are not, they are in the wrong place.

And for those interested in arguing that these populations are distinct and never the twain shall meet (by transition, gender unorthodoxy, or simply being outside of the gender binary), the bathroom seems a natural stronghold to enforce that for society.

And that's why it feels so unsafe, why it serves as a cultural weight against being oneself. And that's just for me, who identifies as female.

Imagine how similar it must feel for unorthodox cis women and men. That is, butch women in masculine clothing, or feminine men in feminine clothing. To have one's personal aesthetic be a source of constant question, to even be demanded to demonstrate "biological proof" of one's sex over the nosiness of others from the privacy of a stall.

And imagine how much worse it must be for those members of the transgendered and intersex communities who identify outside the gender binary. Who see themselves as both or neither or a third sex or something else entirely. When there isn't a "right sex" in that binary question, how do they feel about their place in their country? Do they feel like they are seen to exist at all? Or is the need to poop an invitation a reinforcement of a narrative that they would be better off disappearing entirely?

These are all real questions. And there's no reason why bathrooms should be reinforcing all of these issues when they are simply there to serve a rather basic biological necessity.

But as long as they are, I must continue to dread, fear, and oh yes, hate bathrooms.

Frakking bathrooms, man.

--Cerberus
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Comments

[Lila]

Thanks for posting this, Cerberus. Another example of the privilege I'm soaking in.

BTW, if anyone thinks this is "not that big a deal", check out this NYT story about women in India facing a similar challenge.

[Nick Kiddle]

//In short, such a choice is natural. Gender segregation is a natural, everyday occurrence. And we've learned to become blind to it. It is simply how the world works. There are men and there are women.//

The worst example I heard was a city somewhere in the US whose travel passes come in male and female versions, with trans people getting whatever the clerk on duty reads them as on the day of purchase. Someone blogged about it, and the comments were quickly filled with cis people defending this as a quick and easy way to cut down fraud.

Tangentially related, my driving licence doesn't identify me as either male or female, and I'm not sure how to feel about that. On the one hand, it's one less piece of gender segregation; on the other, it would be nice to have something unambiguous I could whip out of my wallet and wave at people who challenge me in the Gents.

[victoria]

Cerberus, thank you so much for writing this.

(trying to phrase this so it doesn't come across as "well meaning but clueless cis person to the rescue"...)
i don't know if you or any other trans folks are going to be keeping up with the comments and responding, but if you are wanting another supportive voice speaking out against any trolls that pop in here i will try to make an extra effort to keep up with this comment thread. i'm not an expert on trans issues, but i really feel strongly about keeping ignorant and hurtful comments to a minimum.

[Ms Grey Duck]

Thanks for this. My spouse and I are both in the more gender-neutral range so we have this discussion too when the one of us with a beard has a skirt on. Can't we skip the segregating and have individual doored stalls?

[Lila]

The Grit has two single-toilet bathrooms. They both say "rest room". Yet another thing I love about that place.

[P J Evans]

a city somewhere in the US whose travel passes come in male and female versions

I've never heard of any city doing this - if it's a permanent/long-term pass (like a senior or student pass), they'd have a photo on it, but that's as far as I've ever seen it going. Having separate passes for men an for women would be more likely to attract the wrath of, for example, the ACLU.

[Mattir]

Yep, that's the Cerberus we love on Pharyngula... And you're right, as usual.

Me, I ignore the signs if I have to poop and only the "men's" single-stall toilet is free. I've always figured the labels are stupid - now I know they're stupid and hurtful.

[hapax]

When I worked at a library who kept their bathrooms locked and the keys behind the desk, I had to lobby HARD to simply get the staff to hand *both* keys to the patron and let the patron choose.

Yes, there were plenty of staff who chose to appoint themselves as gender police. And yes, they ALL did it in the name of "protecting the children." (In single-stall locked bathrooms? What, the pedophiles were supposed to smuggle their victims in their pockets?)

[Lonespark]

Protecting the children...from going into bathrooms stalls accompanied by opposite sex parents, too, often as not. It's so stupid.

[Erl]

Though I'm a cisman and not particularly gender-ambiguous, this issue resonates with me personally for a bit of an odd reason.

I have irritable bowel syndrome. In situations of high stress, I often need to use the restroom, with no real option of delay or real alternatives. It's shaped my perception of the world, somewhat. When I enter public spaces, I've gotten very good at rapidly identifying the location of bathrooms, with the expectation that at some point I might be using them. Sometimes I have to disembark trains and search out a business with an available restroom.

I confess that, at first, the issue of gender-neutral bathrooms did not seem particularly overwhelming to me. But when I connected to my own sense of vigilance and urgency, I suddenly realized how much of a Big Frakking Deal bathrooms can be.

So, right on! Public bathrooms are sites of real, universal need. They shouldn't be centers of oppression as well.

(Nowhere should be a center of oppression. Locating them at the center of such urgency, distaste, anxiety, and more, seems like a particularly dick move on the part of the kyriarchy. A system of society that is, admittedly, known for its dick moves.)

[Ophelia]

Nick Kiddle is right. In Philadelphia, your gender appears on your monthly transit pass.

https://shop.septa.org/index.php?target=categories&category_id=9

[Ophelia]

Just to be clear, that's the site where you buy monthly transit passes in Philadelphia. I'm not a spambot, just trying to source my claims.

[relurks]

[Mmy]

@Ophelia: [returns gobsmacked from following the link] - just wow. Why has no one taken them to court over this?

[Ophelia]

Mmy - I'd guess that the people who have the money to sue aren't the same people who have to depend on public transportation.

[Mmy]

@Ophelia: Isn't that always the way it goes?

[MadGastronomer]

Nice piece, Cerberus. Thanks for posting it.

[Laiima]

@mmy, Ophelia, I'm heading off to bed, but I think they started doing something similar in Chicago, one of the times I worked in the city (c. 2000). Supposedly it was to keep hetero couples from "sharing" a pass, and only buying one that was going to be used by 2 people. They are expensive. Mine, iirc, was $95/month.

I never thought of the problem if you were a QUILTBAG.

I did work someplace that needed to come up w a bathroom solution when a pre-op transwoman started the process of publicly identifying as a woman. They eventually made one bathroom unisex because bigoted ciswomen refused to let her use the women's bathroom on that floor. Grr. A few people on my floor were up in arms over "perverts going to rape women in the bathrooms". I made myself even more unpopular by explaining how ridiculous and offensive that was, and said I would have welcomed her in our floor's bathroom. I can't even imagine having the guts to come out as a transwoman in state gov't (mainly conservative Republicans, no matter which agency) in *Indiana*. Yikes. I was an ally though, as best as I could be.

[Mary Kaye]

Bathroom segregation hurts parents as well. Sometimes it would really be helpful to have two opposite-gender parents to juggle the baby. Sometimes the child is a bit old to be tolerated in an opposite-sex bathroom but a bit young to go by him/herself.

And it hurts disabled people with opposite-gender helpers. My state finally made a legal exception for such people, I think, but it shouldn't need to be done, and the exception was bracketed by weird humiliating rituals they had to go through--knocking, shouting, waiting if someone didn't want them in there.

We have a father and daughter pair at the local pool: the daughter looks like a grown woman but probably has Down Syndrome, and functions on the level of a fairly young child. She would be better off with company in the dressing room, but he isn't allowed. (I would never object to undressing in front of him: he is a good hearted person doing an amazing job with his daughter. And frankly, it's the kind of thing one gets used to quickly, even if it's initially awkward.)

And my own emotionally disturbed son--if he doesn't emerge from the pool dressing room in a timely fashion I have to hunt down a male to retrieve him. If he gets in a fight in there I can't intervene.

It's a policy that hugely prioritizes the comfort of the comfortable, at the cost of being inhumane to everyone else.

[depizan]

And there's no reason why bathrooms should be reinforcing all of these issues when they are simply there to serve a rather basic biological necessity.

So much word. As someone who identifies as both/neither/genderqueer/can I leave the tickyboxes blank?, there are two things I really hate doing - going to the restroom in a public place and buying underwear. I don't really want to have to be conscious of which physical sex I actually am and I don't want people to be freaked out by my doing something "wrong." I've scared little old ladies in restrooms before. Despite being a decidedly non-threatening looking person of not-imposing stature. I've been told I was using the wrong restroom. I have people look at me funny. No one should have to go through that because they need to pee or poop.

Why can't we just have restrooms? It's just better for everyone.

[Yoder]

Hey, thanks. That was legitimately eye-opening.

About mid-way through the post, I remembered how, just after I came out as gay, I started to get this tiny additional twinge of nerves every time events conspired to put me at a urinal next to another dude with no intervening unused urinals to provide a buffer zone. ("Eek. Did he see my 'Pride' bracelet? Try to look extra non-threatening.") And I'm cis-gendered and (I think) not especially flamboyant—I can only imagine what it'd be like if I weren't as gender-conforming as I am.

And then I got to the bit where a San Francisco-based LGBT center can't wrap its institutional head around gender-neutral plumbing ... and now I'm officially irate. Frakking bathrooms, indeed.

[Inquisitiveravn]

mmy: Why has no one taken them to court over this?

Hi, Philadelphia resident here. Actually, AFAICT, the only person who really looks at them other than the customer is the salescritter dispensing them, and you can ask for a specific gender. In fact, hearing someone do just that is how I found out what the little colored stickers with a single letter on them meant. At that point, I'd been getting passes for several months. My housemate once got a Transpass that had the wrong gender on it from some under the table source. On the subway, you swipe the pass in a slot on the turnstile and no one sees it. On buses, well, the drivers I dealt with never paid any attention whatsoever.

Well, they're planning on upgrading the payment system in the next few years. Maybe they'll get rid of the stupid gender stickers.

[Martha Mary]

Cerberus, thank you for this.

I have never thought about public restrooms in that way. Where I live (Poland), the taboos on using the correct bathroom are much weaker. Perhaps this is an European thing - we seem to be, as a whole, less worried about sex and gender than Americans. There are gendered bathrooms, though - but the reaction for someone using a "wrong" one is usually no more than brief confusion. Nobody talks to strange people in bathrooms. However, (clueless cis person talking) I guess this is still hard? You still have to decide whether to do as you would do or as would others have you do. And those brief confused stares can really add up and become really painful...

Anyway, thank you.

[Kit Whitfield]

Bathroom segregation hurts parents as well.

Yep, with you there. I'm the mother of a little boy, and I'm not looking forward to the period where people give me the side-eye for taking him into the bathroom with me.

I read a very sad story in a book about raising boys: a little boy's parents divorced, and that meant he was suddenly having to use the bathroom by himself when out with his mother. He was only seven or eight, so old enough to be physically able to do it - but before, he'd always had his daddy with him, which meant he felt safe. Not unnaturally, being alone surrounded by big, strange men intimidated him. He was too ashamed of his fears to say anything about them, so he just had to be frightened every time he needed to use the toilet. Horribly sad.

And in terms of discrimination, I'd also recommend Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin, an early pioneer of checking your privilege. (He was a white guy who darkened his skin to make himself look black, then spent six weeks touring the American South in 1959. He did not have a good time.

But one of the things that he mentioned was this: bathrooms were segregated and bathrooms that let black people use them were few and far between. The result was that you had to find out where they were as soon as you moved into a new area, and spent an awful lot of your time physically uncomfortable. Here's an extract:

**
'Is there a Catholic church around here?' I asked after a while.

'Yeah - just a couple of blocks over on Dryades.'

'Where's the nearest rest room?' I asked.

'Well, man, now just what do you want to do - piss or pray?' he chuckled[...]

'I guess it doesn't hurt for a man to do both once in a while,' I said.

'You're so right,' he laughed, shaking his head from side to side. 'You're so right, sir. Lordy, Lordy ... if you stick around this town, you'll find out you're going to end up doing most of your praying for a place to piss. It's not easy, I'm telling you. You can go in some of the stores around here, but you've almost got to buy something before you can ask them to let you use the toilet. Some of the taverns got places. You can go over to the train station or the bus station - place like that. You just have to locate them. And there's not many of them for us. Best things's jut to stick cloe to home. Otherwise you'll find you've got to walk half-way across town to find a place.'
**

[Caravelle]

Yep, with you there. I'm the mother of a little boy, and I'm not looking forward to the period where people give me the side-eye for taking him into the bathroom with me.

I did the opposite once, I was accompanying a three-year-old to the bathroom and asked him if he preferred the men's bathroom or the women's bathroom. He picked the men's, and since he was just three I went with him. It's only much, much later that it occurred to me I might have been making the men there uncomfortable.

One other twist on segregated bathroom : the handicapped bathrooms. Very often you'll have men, women, and handicapped bathrooms. What does this say ? That handicapped people aren't deserving of the supposed benefits of gender segregation ?

[Kit Whitfield]

Very often you'll have men, women, and handicapped bathrooms. What does this say ? That handicapped people aren't deserving of the supposed benefits of gender segregation ?

I would suspect that that's more dictated by practicality than by gender politics. In order to be wheelchair-accessible, a bathroom needs to be much more spacious than your standard stall. Most places don't have the space for more than one, and possibly also reckon that the odds of more than one person needing a wheelchair-accessible bathroom at any one time are low. (Though it's not just wheelchair users that use them. I'm able-bodied, but they're the only place you can fit a pram or pushchair, so often it's a choice between using the disabled people's bathroom and abandoning the baby in a corridor. Some places seem to have figured this out and have a multi-use wheelchair-accessible/baby changing bathroom.)

But then being able-bodied, I'm not the expert here. Could be wrong. But I'd guess that it mostly stands as proof that if you take the practicalities seriously, you realise that women and men are perfectly capable of sharing a bathroom - it just takes something as space-consuming as wheelchair access to get many places to admit it.

[Andrew Glasgow]

@Laiima

I never thought of the problem if you were a QUILTBAG.

It doesn't bother me particularly, but some people here have expressed a preference that this acronym be used as an adjective ("QUILTBAG people") rather than a noun.

This issue is pretty troublesome. I am a parent of two 4-year-old girls, and although they're generally OK using the toilet on their own, I much prefer it when I can find a single toilet restroom with a door, because I can go in with them if necessary. (I often don't, however, because they are very grown up girls and are able to handle all the necessities, including hand-washing, quite capably as long as they can reach all the handles and soap dispensers. </Proud dad bragging>) Sometimes there are two one-toilet restrooms with men/women signs on the doors. I ignore them. No one has ever objected that I can recall, nor objected to me bringing them into larger men's restrooms. Maybe I've just been lucky, or maybe I'm just oblivious to any nasty looks people have given me (entirely possible, as I am a very poor observer of other people's behavior).

I've had a trans friend who, fortunately enough for her, could pass pretty well and used the women's bathrooms consistently. She never reported any trouble. I sincerely sympathize with your difficulties, Cerberus.

On the subject of trans rights, the blog that discussed that post on Bioware forums, No More Lost, has an interview up with a professor of game design about including QUILTBAG groups in games. I think he makes a few good points, but perhaps inadvertently seems to be marginalizing trans people, saying that "in a story of adventure and derring-do, the challenges of being a transgendered person really don’t mesh well with the challenges of destroying evil dragons." Well, couldn't one say the same thing about being gay or lesbian? One needn't make the trans character necessarily the main character, either -- I suspect most trans gamers would prefer to choose the gender they personally identify as when wanting to play as 'themselves', and not a trans version of that gender. But you could have a trans character who is just presented as another character, hero or villian, ally or opponent, and being trans could be just another trait, not any more important than any other. There are plenty of archetypes to pick from in a fantasy setting. You could do an FTM who is an aggressive, masculine warrior who rejects his female body, and is seeking or actively using magical or other measures to effect this transition. You could have a character like the Two-spirits or "berdaches"* of many Native American cultures, one whose differences are celebrated by hir culture, and who plays a spiritual role as a shaman or nature mage or priest as a result.

I think the subject in that interview should reconsider his words in reference to trans people and characters, and the interviewer really ought to have called him on it.

*Wikipedia tells me that this term, a French loan word, is no longer used by anthropologists or First Nation/Native American groups, in part due to its origin in meaning a male prostitute or catamite.

[MadGastronomer]

It doesn't bother me particularly, but some people here have expressed a preference that this acronym be used as an adjective ("QUILTBAG people") rather than a noun.

Please? While some of the words that make up the acronym are used as nouns normally, others are not. "A gay," "a queer," "and intersex," and especially "a trans" are all really insulting, and I'm honestly not fond of "a bisexual," either, so it seems inappropriate to use the acronym as a noun.

[kisekileia]

I was aware of the bathroom issues trans people and parents face, but I had never thought of the issue of disabled people with opposite-gender helpers. That's important, and I'm glad someone mentioned it.

While single-stall unisex bathrooms for the physically disabled are probably a matter of practicality, and it's much better to have one unisex bathroom than none, they also carry with them the nasty implication that physically disabled people are sexless--that their sexuality and gender identity are insignificant. We live in a culture that is uncomfortable thinking of people with disabilities as sexual, and I am concerned that unisex bathrooms for the disabled but no one else reinforce that.

[MercuryBlue]

Some places seem to have figured this out and have a multi-use wheelchair-accessible/baby changing bathroom.

I suppose that's an improvement over having the baby-changing facilities only in the ladies' room.

[sarah]

Yeah, I live in Philly, and we have little "M" or "F" stickers on our transpasses. It's rather weird. And, as Inquisitiveraven said, no one looks at the passes besides the person who's selling it to you.

Some salespeople will ask you whether you want male or female; others will just put it on for you. I had this weird moment of "wait, do I look like a guy?" (I have short hair, and I was bundled up for winter) the first time a salesperson asked me if I wanted male or female on mine.

In general, I have a love-hate relationship with SEPTA (which often depends on the reliability of the 10 trolley). They are planning on upgrading the system--though if they take away unlimited transpasses, I'm gonna be pissed--and hopefully this is a relic that'll go with it.

[Neohippie]

I've never understood the need for segregated public restrooms anyway, even when I was a kid. (Though I've always been quite a tomboy and always sorta resented the pressure to be properly feminine.) I remember times when the ladies room was all full, and I had to wait in line and hold it, even though there was room in the men's room. But NOOO, you can't go in there, that's only for MEN! It's like, alarms will go off as soon as you walk in the door!

I remember one time I was at a Girl Scout overnighter at a church, and we were in line waiting for the women's restroom, even though there were no males in the building at all! Finally, a couple of us were like, screw this, we're going in the other restroom. We felt all rebellious and brave and stuff! And were quite fascinted by the urinals.

I know this is all quite trivial compared to what transpeople have to go through, but I'm still not understanding why we have them to begin with. Is it really because people are afraid of getting raped? How does it help with that? I'm just not seeing any pro-segregation arguments here that go much beyond "that's just how its done."

I go to a twice a year pagan campout, and the campground we rent for it has a bathhouse with toilet stalls and shower stalls and sinks. There are two of them, but they aren't labeled, so people just use whichever one has room (or still has hot water). So yes, I have peed in a stall with a MAN in the next stall! Nothing bad happened to me.

They don't have urinals though. The only thing I can see as being uncomfortable are urinals. But if I was a man, I don't think it would make me feel any better having to pee in front of people even if they were all men too (and I've had male friends tell me it does make them uncomfortable). But when I was a kid, I thought that segregated restrooms were because men didn't want women seeing them pee.

[kisekileia]

I lived in university residences with non-segregated bathrooms for three years. It was awkward if I and a guy friend were in the bathroom at the same time, but I got used to it. It does require the stall walls to be tall enough that men can't see over, but it's definitely a workable option.

[Nev]

Excellent post, Cerberus!

It's dismaying that this facetious "bathroom panic" gambit can be heard from not only social/religious conservative types but also a certain strand of radical feminism.

Seems like it's one of those things where the privileged group considers their discomfort and inconvenience to be more urgent than other people's actual endangerment.

[Lonespark]

Some places seem to have figured this out and have a multi-use wheelchair-accessible/baby changing bathroom.

"Family restrooms" with small toilets for kids, changing tables, nursing chairs, etc. are awesome. They had them a lot in malls and such in Arizona, and they have them at the acquarium and other such places around here. It makes sooooo much more sense for any caregiver to be able to go in with any child or client or family member or whatever.

[Zigforas]

Three months after Hurricane Katrina, I went with a group of college-age friends to help with the relief effort in Gulfport, Mississippi. We were a group of ten: 7 females, 3 males. And we were loosely affiliated with an evangelical campus ministry--we used the denominational connections of a couple people in our group to secure accommodations at a campground that had been created for relief workers by a conservative Presbyterian church in Gulfport, but the group itself was officially non-sectarian. We slept in tents, but there were two trailers set up with a couple showers and toilets in each. One trailer for men, one trailer for women.

To us, it made sense--considering that our group was mostly female, and that we were not sharing the campground with any other groups--to treat the shower/toilet trailers as gender-neutral and simply use them as needed. (Why make the women in the group wait for toilets just because the only available toilets were marked "for men"?) But it caused a conflict with campground caretakers appointed by the conservative church to which the campground belonged. I can't remember how we resolved the issue, but I do remember thinking, "Really? We've spent all day working in the midst of incredible devastation, we're filthy and tired, and there are two open showers in the men's trailer that only the men in our group can use?"

It's amazing to me how, even in the wake of a natural disaster that prompted many people to question the basic beliefs they had about the universe (the stability of life, the certainty of the future, the justness of God, etc.)--questioning gender-segregated bathrooms was still a radical act.

[Zigforas]

All that to say, I now work at a drop-in center for LGBTQIA teenagers, and I'm proud to say that our restrooms are gender-inclusive.

[Ian]

Some gyms have classes that are open to everyone and women's only classes. Would that be OK for washrooms?

No, the women's sign is not a magic sigil, but it really does provide a bit of real protection against voyeurs and assailants. Bystanders are inclined to notice men walking in. That means witnesses, and if the man doesn't immediately walk out shamefacedly they may reach for their phones.

All that would be needed to break the gender binary would be to have people who identify as women use the "men's" washroom more often. It already happens at public events (shorter lines). I doubt that men would mind much. We don't even like having other men in there, it could hardly be worse. (Urinals are not a pleasant experience. Why don't we get stalls?)

[depizan]

That means witnesses, and if the man doesn't immediately walk out shamefacedly they may reach for their phones.

And if the "man" is a woman?

[Zigforas]

And if the "man" is a woman?

Perhaps what happened to a friend of mine last week. She's an African American butch female with a naturally masculine appearance. She used a women's restroom at a conference. Someone called the police because they mistakenly thought that she was a man using the woman's restroom.

I have to wonder how race played into the incident. Had she been White, would that someone have taken a second look to consider her ambiguous gender appearance more carefully? Did someone reach for the phone more quickly because they thought a Black man was using the restroom (at a conference where the majority of participants were female and White)? I can only speculate, but I suspect her race played a role as well.

[depizan]

@ Zigforas
I fear you may be right. Though I have heard of similar incidents with butch white women, too.

@ Ian

A second problem with that suggestion has occurred to me as well - it seems to presume either that cis gender-conforming women are the only ones who need to worry about being assaulted, or the only ones we should protect from assault. If bathrooms are a common location for assault, that is something that needs to be fixed for everyone. And it's possible that individual restrooms would offer more protection there, too.

[Neohippie]

It was awkward if I and a guy friend were in the bathroom at the same time, but I got used to it.

Yeah, this seems to be one of those areas where people are mistaking their discomfort because of not being used to something for real danger. Kind of like how two men kissing still looks a bit odd to me, but I can tell it's just because it's not something I see that often, not because it's something that's WRONG.

All that would be needed to break the gender binary would be to have people who identify as women use the "men's" washroom more often. It already happens at public events (shorter lines).

There have been times before when I was at a place that had two INDIVIDUAL bathrooms, the kind that had just one toilet in there and it was private, but one was marked Men and one Women. The women's one has a line, and the men's one is open. I go ahead and go in the men's one. You should see the looks I get sometimes when I do that.

People are just weird.

I doubt that men would mind much. We don't even like having other men in there, it could hardly be worse. (Urinals are not a pleasant experience. Why don't we get stalls?)

Like I said, when I was a kid I always assumed segregated bathrooms were for the benefit of men, because men didn't want women to see their weenies. ;-) (Thankfully, I was innocent enough that the rape thing never occured to me.)

But then it turns out that men don't like other men seeing their weenies either, so the obvious solution would be small stalls around the urinals. How about Privacy for Everybody?

I did go to a club once (which seemed to cater to a primarily gay clientele, if that matters), and the public restroom there had NO stalls. Just toilets along the wall. What's up with that? It was like nightmares I've had before! I decided to hold it. I just don't like anyone seeing me use the toilet. I dont care what gender they are.

[Karen, who needs to write a new blog post]

Excellent post, and may I second the love for family restrooms? The Nordstrom and Nieman-Marcus here in Austin have them, and I spend way more money at those stores because of it. I have two sons, ages 12 and 9, and the 9-year-old still doesn't particularly like public men's rooms, especially in places where most of the men are adults. Nothing's ever happened to him; he just doesn't like 'em. Also, my YMCA recently remodeled and installed two family dressing rooms, with a single shower and toilet in one enclosed room. This would have been really nice a couple of years ago, since the Y has a rule that opposite sex kids are not allowed in dressing rooms after age 5. A 6-year-old is too damn young to be alone in a dressing room.

As I was typing this, I had one a "check your privilege" moment, since I noticed that Nieman's and Nordstrom's are high-end retailers catering to a specific demographic. Wal-Mart isn't hurrying to adopt family restrooms in its stores any time soon.

[Andrew Glasgow]

@Neohippie

I did go to a club once (which seemed to cater to a primarily gay clientele, if that matters), and the public restroom there had NO stalls. Just toilets along the wall. What's up with that? It was like nightmares I've had before! I decided to hold it. I just don't like anyone seeing me use the toilet. I dont care what gender they are.

Well I suspect being a gay club had something to do with it. After all, one can't be an informed consumer without being able to inspect the merchandise. (This sounds like a stereotype, but some are actually like this, from personal experience. )

[Neohippie]

Andrew, to be fair, I have also been to gay bars/clubs that had lovely restrooms that had both adequete cleanliness and privacy. But yeah, this place was one of the sleazier establishments. I'd rather not go back to that one again (not like I go bar hopping a lot, just for Santa Rampage). I swear, I have NEVER been in a ladies room that didn't have stalls before, except in nightmares. It was very weird.

[Timothy (TRiG)]

There are two cafés in town which have two single-stall toilets. Labelled male and female, of course. Neither café has a wheelchair-friendly toilet. In both cafés, I've been known to use the gents, emerge, pop into the ladies to get some soap because the gents has run out, and then go back to the gents to wash my hands. I'm not sure why I bother with this charade.

TRiG.

[Interleaper]

Thanks for this article, Cerberus. And thanks again to the Mad Gastronomer for the non-gendered bathrooms in her restaurant.

One of my favorite cafes has "Kenneth" and "Barb" rooms, with dolls in plastic bubbles on the doors. Kenneth is a Barbie in a tuxedo. Barb is a Ken doll with flower-appliqued capri jeans, a fuschia spaghetti-strap shirt, and a purse. The rooms are otherwise functionally-identical single-occupancy bathrooms.

It's dismaying that this facetious "bathroom panic" gambit can be heard from not only social/religious conservative types but also a certain strand of radical feminism.

I've even heard it from a few trans women with passing privilege and all their papers in order. Classic I've-got-mine mentality.

[Ian]

re: "bathroom panic"

Is this an irrational feeling that cis-women have or is there a real danger that they're trying to avoid? I'd been assuming the latter. Am I wrong about that?

Depizan,

"it seems to presume either that cis gender-conforming women are the only ones who need to worry about being assaulted...something that needs to be fixed for everyone." Yes, and having so called "women's" washrooms assuredly does not protect everyone who wants/needs the protection they offer. However, going to all-unisex would take away a form of protection from many people who want/need it. I don't like the idea of taking something away from cis women who want/need it unless I was very sure as to how I would replace it with a more perfect system that would offer the same degree of protection to everyone who wants/needs it.

Unisex-women's washroom arrangements would be less discriminatory than what we have now -- at least everyone would have somewhere they would be welcome to pee. You're absolutely right that it would not be non-discriminatory. I don't know what to say. Less bad is ultimately not good enough, and it may reflect a failure of imagination on my part to suggest it. The reason I suggested it was that it offers a way of making things less discriminatory right now, without waiting to remodel the washrooms. The taboo setting aside men's only washrooms is an absolutely pointless bit of privilege, and it's already not very strong.

"I've-got-mine mentality"
I guess I was thinking that taking what they have away from them is not the best solution.

[Timothy (TRiG)]

The thing is that urinals are cheaper (more space efficient) than full stalls for everyone. So we don't want to get rid of them in busy public toilets. So that leaves unisex/male options rather than unisex/female.

I know that a woman was sexually assaulted (by a man) in a gay bar in Dublin once. A woman I know was spitting about it: "They've had gender-neutral toilets for years, and there's never been any problems, and then for some stupid reason they decide to remodel the toilets and segregate them and then there's an assault. What were they thinking?"

I suppose a practical design would be a unisex all-stalls toilet, and a separate (perhaps adjoining) urinals-only area. Can anyone see any problems with that?

TRiG.

[depizan]

@ Ian

Why do cis, gender conforming women deserve more protection than everyone else?

[Nick Kiddle]

//Is this an irrational feeling that cis-women have or is there a real danger that they're trying to avoid? I'd been assuming the latter. Am I wrong about that?//

I think you're asking the wrong question altogether. The women who make these arguments have good reason to be afraid of assault, but they're also working off incredibly insulting assumptions about trans women. Sometimes it's simple ignorance, sometimes it's a refusal to check privilege, sometimes it's a deliberate and vicious power play.

The fact is that cissexist bathroom policing doesn't make cis women safer, but it does make trans women a lot less safe. Anyone who can't take that on board is not arguing rationally.

//Perhaps what happened to a friend of mine last week. She's an African American butch female with a naturally masculine appearance. She used a women's restroom at a conference. Someone called the police because they mistakenly thought that she was a man using the woman's restroom.//

I read about another woman who had a similar experience - I think she was Black too, so I'm sure there is a racial component. They demanded she prove she wasn't a trans woman, and once she did that they demanded she prove she wasn't a trans man. I just don't ... that implies they don't want trans people to be able to use toilets *at all*.

Since we're on the subject: I took the xCLP into the Ladies today. There was no clearly signposted Gents, and I just couldn't face the prospect of asking someone and being expected to justify my claim to go in the Gents. The Ladies was empty, so we weren't hurting anyone, but it still felt horrible. I have this long-standing paranoia that if I ever set foot in a female-marked space, someone will see me and seize it as evidence that I'm really a woman.

[depizan]

The fact is that cissexist bathroom policing doesn't make cis women safer, but it does make trans women a lot less safe.

And this would only be worse if the bathroom options were "women's" and "whomever." It would institutionalize denying women who didn't match the bathroom police's idea of "woman" access to the women's room. And add to the victim blaming should someone (other than a cis man) be assaulted in the "whomever" room.

Restrooms should be safe for everyone.

[Ian]

@Ian: Why do cis, gender conforming women deserve more protection than everyone else?"

They don't.

It would institutionalize denying women who didn't match the bathroom police's idea of "woman" access to the women's room. And add to the victim blaming should someone (other than a cis man) be assaulted in the "whomever" room.

Ugh. I really wish you weren't right.

[MadGastronomer]

Well I suspect being a gay club had something to do with it. After all, one can't be an informed consumer without being able to inspect the merchandise. (This sounds like a stereotype, but some are actually like this, from personal experience. )

In the women's room? Not so much.

And thanks again to the Mad Gastronomer for the non-gendered bathrooms in her restaurant.

You're welcome.

One of my favorite cafes has "Kenneth" and "Barb" rooms, with dolls in plastic bubbles on the doors. Kenneth is a Barbie in a tuxedo. Barb is a Ken doll with flower-appliqued capri jeans, a fuschia spaghetti-strap shirt, and a purse. The rooms are otherwise functionally-identical single-occupancy bathrooms.

I've been there! We talked about doing something similar for ours -- pen-and-ink drawings of gender-blending people, IIRC -- but got lazy and put up really boring signs instead. Someday I'll get around to doing something more interesting.

Is this an irrational feeling that cis-women have or is there a real danger that they're trying to avoid? I'd been assuming the latter. Am I wrong about that?

There are no known cases of cis men dressed as women attacking women or spying on them in public restrooms. There are known cases, many of them, of cis men dressed as such entering women's public restrooms to peep or to attack women.

However, going to all-unisex would take away a form of protection from many people who want/need it. I don't like the idea of taking something away from cis women who want/need it unless I was very sure as to how I would replace it with a more perfect system that would offer the same degree of protection to everyone who wants/needs it.

Want, sure. But need? Not apparently. As far as I can tell -- and if someone has figures that show otherwise, I'd be very interested to know about them -- unisex bathrooms do not pose any greater danger to cis women than segregated bathrooms. And cis women's comfort is not as important as trans people's safety.

Single-toilet, locking unisex bathrooms (and single, locking changing rooms) are clearly the safest for the most people, but yeah, converting all of them now is not something a lot of people are going to be willing to do. So we need to find other solutions in the mean time. And no matter how uncomfortable unisex stalled bathrooms make some people (er, me included, actually), there is no clear threat to cis women (or men) posed by them, so you can't use that to justify continuing to endanger trans folk.

The women who make these arguments have good reason to be afraid of assault, but they're also working off incredibly insulting assumptions about trans women.

They have good reason to be afraid of assault, but not of assault by cis men dressing as women in order to get into women's bathrooms.

[MadGastronomer]

Me: They have good reason to be afraid of assault, but not of assault by cis men dressing as women in order to get into women's bathrooms.

Which I say because it's the excuse I see given most often. There's no reason to be afraid of assault by trans women, either, but I don't hear that one. I hear either: "They aren't really women," which nobody here is arguing, thank all the gods, and, "But [cis] men might dress as women and claim to be trans so they can attack women in bathrooms!"

[CZEdwards]

My local gym* recently renovated in a family/unisex/mind-your-own-business locker room and shower, but "family" restrooms are pretty common here, at least in new, commercial construction. I am appalled by the why behind our local locker room kerfluffle**, but I'm glad it exists. Many of my fellow QUILTBAG residents use the MOYB locker room; unfortunately, the local "Think of the Children!!" squad is having fits over the possibility of Teh Gayz Germs!!1!!11 so I am expecting this whole thing to become an issue again, and persons without child-in-tow will probably be banned from the MYOB locker-room. I expect to spend next year quite grumpy while we fight this...

The best solution I've ever seen was in a 19th century house turned office that had been renovated once for M/F restrooms, then needed to be done again years later for ADA compliance and to add showers***. Kludging the plumbing turned out to be a real puzzler, so the architect designed four unisex, accessible full-wall stalls, each full-tiled and with toilet and floor drain, all four arranged around one of those (film version) Harry Potter-esque round handwashing station/fountain/thingies. The handwash area was open to the cloakroom, but around a dog-leg from where we were actually working. (Ah, Victorian houses and their inconveniently placed load-bearing walls!) Not having a door on the handwashing area cut down on office cold'n'flu, too -- social pressure encouraged handwashing and no grubby knobs to push.

It's a decent solution for moderate traffic areas, but it took money and creativity. Until then, I'll be happy if one-holers are just labeled "Rest Room". There's no need for gendered toilets -- it works the same no matter who is using it. I honestly don't know what to do about high traffic areas. Looking at my small town, I feel like building the MYOB locker room actually encouraged the homophobes -- they consider the MYOB room to be just another point of privilege. The Nuker in me wants to lobby to get all public restrooms turned unisex so that we'll all just have to learn to live with each other... but that's not practical, and too many people would be hurt.


***********


* I live in a fairly small town that used to be its own town, but has become a bedroom community. Town is in a very liberal county, and used to be liberal on its own, but some six years ago, got possessed by a fast growing, intolerant-and-lovin'-it mega-church. The old town core (where I live) is a century old, but our Village Nincompoops (aka city council) have a dose of Developer Fever, so we in Old Town are now ringed by ticky-tacky Suburbistan, which mostly houses mega-churchers (which church got such an obviously sweetheart deal that our former town manager is under investigation for accepting bribes (not just from the mega-church)... and now, we're stuck.)(And great Todd, do I sound like I should be yelling at those kids to get off my lawn... except it fubar'ed our tax base, and our drainage, and our water supply, and our schools, and... )

** As I understand the matter, Parent went into N locker room, Kid (who was 9-12ish) went into Z locker room. Kid happened to see Neighborhood Adult in Z locker room. Neighborhood Adult is open about being somewhere in the QUILTBAG spectrum. Kid says hi, Neighborhood Adult says hi, both go about their business. Kid mentions this passing encounter to Parent when Kid & Parent meet at car. Parent, who has problems with Neighborhood Adult due to some HOA problem, beserks and notifies local town clowns, who are the most incompetent buncha right cowboys... Kid denies Parent's accusation, but Town Clowns ignore Kid's testimony. Months of legal crap later, the Right Buncha Cowboys FINALLY check the gym's access swipes (we have a card system) and prove that Kid and Neighborhood Adult were in the same room for no more than 42 seconds, far less time than would be necessary for Parent's accusations to be even remotely within reason. Case closed, no charges filed, all is well, except my town is freakin' gossipy, and Parent has a tongue hinged in the middle. And yes, there's money wrapped up in this, too, so there's local grumphing on whether Parent was maliciously trying to drive out Neighborhood Adult, or if Parent was "merely" being over-protective. Either way, it proves yet again the moral of my story -- Screwtape invented HOAs for the purpose of societal destruction. (Also, that homophobes mess up way more stuff than the QUILTBAG population, and that kids need the right to be believed.) By the time all the legal stuff was wrapped up, the town was already well into renovation.

***Most of us bike-commuted, and we served a largely court-ordered therapy/social work population. Sometimes, our clients' biggest needs were more on the lines of a hot shower and resume help.

[Nick Kiddle]

//"The women who make these arguments have good reason to be afraid of assault, but they're also working off incredibly insulting assumptions about trans women."

They have good reason to be afraid of assault, but not of assault by cis men dressing as women in order to get into women's bathrooms.//

I think I was tired last night and didn't express myself very well. What I meant to say was that the fear comes from an entirely understandable place but it's being expressed in an unreasonable way - rather like the conspiracy theories Lonespark and I touched on in the other thread. I wanted to include the caveat because Ian's phrasing made it seem as if by standing against cissexist bathroom policing we were dismissing cis women's fears, so I wanted to make it clear that no, we can understand the fear emotionally, we just think it's misplaced.

[Andrew Glasgow]

@Neohippie

Andrew, to be fair, I have also been to gay bars/clubs that had lovely restrooms that had both adequete cleanliness and privacy. But yeah, this place was one of the sleazier establishments. I'd rather not go back to that one again (not like I go bar hopping a lot, just for Santa Rampage). I swear, I have NEVER been in a ladies room that didn't have stalls before, except in nightmares. It was very weird.

I've also been in lovely, clean and not-at-all sleazy gay bars (I tend to prefer the lovely, clean and just-the-right-amount-of-sleazy gay bars ^_^) so it's by no means all or even most. However, if this was the women's room, a fact I overlooked before, then that kind of casts doubt on my theory. Unless the women's room was mainly used as 'overflow' from the men's room, but then, the women's rooms in most gay bars do get used by women, so maybe it was just they made the men's room a 'meat-and-greet' and just made the women's the same way. Otherwise, your guess is as good as mine.

And the fact that you've had nightmares about stall-less restrooms is... interesting.

[BrokenBell]

'meat-and-greet'

Out of interest, was that intentional, or just a regular Freudian slip?

[kisekileia]

CZEdwards, the bathrooms in the 19th-century house you describe sound very similar to the ones in the second university residence I lived in with unisex washrooms. The stalls had full walls, floor to ceiling, and decent insulation, although the sinks were normal. It was nice to have the full walls even regardless of the washrooms being unisex.

[Laiima]

I sincerely apologize for using QUILTBAG as a noun.

It was an oversight, as I was manually typing (not dictating), so tryimg to minimize keystrokes. And actually I didn't re-read to edit, so I didn't catch it.

I will make every effort to not do it again.

[Andrew Glasgow]

@BrokenBell

'meat-and-greet'

Out of interest, was that intentional, or just a regular Freudian slip?

Intentional.

[ShifterCat]

What would the solution be for high schools? Kids are typically given only three to five minutes between classes, so single stalls would be impractical, but I can all-too-readily picture assaults going on in a unisex high school bathroom. Ditto gym changing rooms and showers.

[renniejoy]

Just passing this along: 5,000-year-old ‘transgender’ skeleton discovered

History is soooo cool!

[MadGastronomer]

You know, all of this "But women must have women-only bathrooms to be safe!" reminds me of "But think of the children!" It has no relation to reality. There is no danger for cis-women involved in either granting trans women their due rights to use the restrooms they want, nor in having unisex bathrooms, any more than there is danger for children involved in the things that usually provoke "But think of the children!"

And where's the concern for the places where women -- trans and cis -- are actually in danger now? Sooo much concern wasted on hypotheticals, but so little for realities.

[Kit Whitfield]

My wife-to-be is transgendered, and I'm genderqueer.

Ooh, an engagement! Congratulations! When's the wedding? :-)

[Rakka]

Thank you for posting this, and to commenters who have shared their experiences.
Over here in Finland most of the restrooms are gender segregated, the only difference being that the men's side has urinal. It's only when the place is really small and there's only one loo there's no markings. But for what I've noticed they don't matter that much. I regularly skip the line to women's to use the men's, and I definately don't try to pass for a woman a lot of times I use the women's, and if I get nasty looks I pretty much have failed to notice them. Nobody's come to complain either way. (I'm genderqueer or "who gives a damn", and frequently go as non-woman. When I got into my new hobby one person said she hadn't been sure about by gender the first couple of times we met. I was delighted.)
I'm surprised by all the "you don't look girly enough, you can't use this restroom" experiences gq/ciswomen have had. Maybe it's a US thing. They didn't mind restroom sharing even in Poland or the other un-LGBT-friendly countries the times I've travelled there.

[Kit Whitfield]

@Pthalogreen - also, should probably have mentioned this in the first post: so, so sorry for all the abuse you went through. If there's anything the community can do to support you, I hope you'll say. [hugs]

[Asha ( EHHH??)]

I had an odd experience once, and I would like to know how it measures up to other people's experiences. I was part of the Lambda society back in college and we hosted a speaker. While the talk itself was good, I just remember the oddest experience of a man coming out of the woman's restroom and saying that he felt safer using the women's than going into the men's. Was he right to worry? I was still new (and still am, a lot of the time.) Are gay men ever that uncomfortable going into men's restrooms?

[Ross]

but it really does provide a bit of real protection against voyeurs and assailants. Bystanders are inclined to notice men walking in.

Also, if the door only opens out and not in, it provides some protection from zombies.

(I would like to see some actual statistics on rest room assailants before I listen to any more arguments about why we should afflict the afflicted in order to comfort the comfortable. Life is full of very reasonable and logical arguments which make perfect sense but do not actually reflect the reality we all live in, and it seems like every news snippet I can think of about someone getting assaulted in a rest room, it's a man by other men.)

[kisekileia]

ShifterCat, I don't really see why single-stall washrooms would take longer for high school students to use than multi-stall ones. I think single-stall washrooms, along with changerooms that have stalls, would be incredibly valuable in that setting (and in elementary and middle schools), especially since washrooms and changerooms are not usually supervised.

[MercuryBlue]

kisekileia: There'd have to be three single-stall restrooms for every currently-existing multi-stall restroom, is the sticking point there.

[Brin (not Meir)]

>What would the solution be for high schools? Kids are typically given only three to five minutes between classes<

Three to five minutes to navigate the crowds to the nearest bathroom, use it, then get to class? With a group containing menstruating girls? In what universe is that anywhere near enough time?

[Jarred]

I was extremely privileged (and I'm actually using that term in a good way) to listen to two transwomen and one transman discuss many issues they faced a month and a half ago. They spent over five minutes discussing the very issue of gendered bathrooms. It was an incredible eye opener to get a deeper understanding into just how serious an issue this is.

Thank you for bringing it to my attention again, Cerberus.

[kisekileia]

My high school only gave us five minutes because they were afraid kids would take smoke breaks in between classes if they gave us longer. The school was quite large--over 2000 students--and had two buildings with a parking lot in between, so it was nowhere near enough time even if you weren't using the bathroom.

[sarah]

@Brin(not Meir): We had four minutes between classes and a fifteen-minute break in the middle of the day (between 3rd and 4th period, if I'm remembering correctly...). So, yeah. Never enough time--you usually went to class and then asked the teacher if you could run to the bathroom. I graduated in '02; things might be different now.

[Ross]

When I went to high school, and admittedly this feels like the dawn of time now, we had 7 minutes between classes, but you weren't allowed to go to the rest rooms. The rest rooms were locked between classes, except for the breaks during third period when lunch happened. In an urgent situation, you could ask permission from the teacher whose classroom was across from the nearest rest room, and they would unlock it and stand outside the door until you were finished.

[Jason]

I always felt like the time in between classes kind of bordered on ridiculously short when I was in school. A lot of times it was fine depending on where your class was, but if you had to go from one end of the campus to the other, you were screwed. Nevermind stopping by your locker. I carried all my books around with me for most of middle school and high school because I never had time to stop at my locker so I'd just lug the enormous weight around with me.

In college, the engineering building was for some reason very nearly off campus. It was at the farthest reaches of campus to a point where I could not have one my classes in another discipline be immediately before my computer classes, because getting from the humanities building to the engineering building in 15 minutes was humanly impossible, not to mention that some professors weren't really all that good about actually ending class when it was supposed to end.

[Dav]

Also, if the door only opens out and not in, it provides some protection from zombies.

Ross, please accept this brain-shaped internet.

[Jason]

Speaking of zombies:

Slacktigamers, is Dead Rising for the Xbox 360 worth 10 bucks on Amazon?

I plan to order Red Dead Redemption from Amazon in a few weeks and though I might bundle that with it.

[Jason]

I am mildly concerned about reviews that say the text is hard to read on SDTVs.

[Dav]

We're just hoping the law will change down the track, but if it doesn't, then after her surgeries we may have to get divorced, then fly to some country that allows gay marriage, get re-married, and then come back. (Australia only recognises gay marriages that were done abroad in countries/states where gay marriage is legal.)

I think I have to actually, literally go headdesk now.

[Deird, who is impatient]

I think I have to actually, literally go headdesk now.

Oh, Dav, if you want to see some epic headdesking, try talking to the Aussies here about our atheist Prime Minister who refuses to consider gay marriage because marriage between a man and a woman has "a special status". Just try.

[CZEdwards]

@Kisekileia: I think single-stall washrooms, along with changerooms that have stalls, would be incredibly valuable in that setting (and in elementary and middle schools), especially since washrooms and changerooms are not usually supervised.

There's another problem besides multiplicity as MercuryBlue mentioned...


Potential trigger warning

Unisex stalls would be smaller (somewhere around 2m x 2 m seems to be standard), and would require locks on the doors. That would make them incredibly risky places for any student under threat. A multi-stall installation, be it locker-room or restroom, has traffic, and traffic means witnesses. That potential for uninvolved witnesses acts as a deterrent in bullying situations. Further, staff cannot be excluded from multi-stall installations (no lock on door), meaning if there is an assault in progress, it can be broken up. (Not necessarily will, but it is physically possible.) Four people fit pretty well into a 2m x 2m space, and can manage significant harm if there's no way to open the door easily. The ten seconds to get the key in the lock and the door open can be too long.

When I worked in public mental health, I had several just-out-of-prison QUILTBAG clients; all of them said that the most dangerous place for them while inside was in any confined space where the guards or other prisoners could be excluded -- store-rooms, walk-in coolers, closets. Not that they weren't harassed in the general population, but exclusionary zones are where the bad shit happened. (Colorado is currently under DoJ scrutiny because of this. About time.)

I am not saying that high school = prison, but in terms of group safety, most schools are VERY careful about staff exclusionary areas. I recall that my high school music practice rooms all had windows in the door, our theater dressing rooms had windows plus free-standing, light-weight screens; our locker rooms were set so that the teacher could monitor the whole group either via window or surveillance mirrors. These measures did not end low-level harassment, but they did prevent gross harm. In those situations, there are no good solutions -- individual, unisex stalls put all marginalized students (everybody from the band geek to the girl who breaks up with her boyfriend and whose friends decide to take revenge on her) at higher risk of more serious assault, while multi-stall installations put other marginalized students at risk of chronic discrimination.

[hapax]

Congratulations and best wishes to Pthalo and Pthalo-spouse-to-be!

(I like stories with happy endings. I'm glad that the horrible experiences of your life didn't preclude this one)

[Cerberus]

Hey, glad everyone liked the post. Sorry about the late delurk, but I was busy this weekend.

First of all, love the points brought up in the comments. And I think there's an interesting beginning of shift as large stores like Target in trying to accommodate disabled and mixed sex parents are offering gender neutral locations for the rest of us who fall in the margins.

Addition to the earlier link to No More Lost (good read), there actually have been some transgender or genderqueer characters in video game...well done even. Flea from Chrono Trigger who is genderqueer and says: "Male….Female…what does it matter? Power is beautiful, and I’ve got the power!" Bridget from the fighting game Guilty Gear who was born male and identifies male, but was raised female due to village traditions and dresses very femininely and thus passing as a female. Kaine from Nier who is an intersex character and that aspect is the basis of some good character moments. And my personal favorite Naoto Shirogane who is a trans male character who gets a bit of a rushed story, but a very respectful one that allows him to be a full character that includes that aspect, but not dominated by it.

On "solutions" to the problem, I'm going to have to concur with many. The best solution I've seen so far seems to be the Danish solution (also popular in most of Europe). The loss of gender policing really aids the outgroups. High-traffic areas may require other solutions, but low-traffic areas certainly don't need to be artificially segregated. Locked rooms and stalls provide privacy and safety for those who need it and allow those who don't those added benefits while engaging in the pooping process.

It's my personal belief that cases where the restroom is a single room and not high-traffic, there's little reason to add segregation and it just ends up causing a culture of gender policing.

The high-traffic restrooms are a different question, but certainly the current setup is inefficient and not necessarily safer than alternatives.

With regards to CZEdwards-

I can see that argument, but then US-style bathrooms have a number of benefits for those interested in assault. Privacy is beneficial to harassers, indeed, but so is space. The space to assault in a stall or a single room is more limited than the "corridor" arrangement found between stalls and sinks or stalls and urinals. With that space you can get a large group around for assault. Plus, many public assaults also feed off the crowd for "pretense of support" for bullying actions. Punching up a kid for being a freak one on one doesn't carry as much emotional gain for the bully as pummeling them in front of a crowd just big enough to see and intimidate or otherwise treat as silent supports.

And then there is Pthalo's case. The US style bathroom still contains a large dose of privacy in a much larger space. Individual stalls, of course, but also usually one entrance for a high-occupancy room that can be guarded and watched. An out-of-the-way multi-user toilet often has the same use as a "private place to harass or assault" as the single-user toilet. With the single-user at least giving the victim a location to hide that's inaccessible. As long as they get there first, they can lock the door and wait it out.

On assault in general:

Yeah, the way it's used as a weapon against transgendered people and others who fall outside a strictly enforced gender binary is bullshit and very reminiscent of other forms of discriminatory "protection". We need to limit black access to white locations because black men will assault our white women. We need to limit gay access to straight facilities (see discrimination against out gays) because they'll assault their straight peers. We need to push the native americans from their homes less they rape our white women, and so on.

Yes, assaults in women's bathrooms do happen...almost universally by cisgendered men presenting as such. The supposed benefits of the US setup failing to protect them from such assaults, peepings, and so on. There has not been a case by my reckoning of a transwoman or a cross-dressing male performing one of these assaults.

In fact, I'd go beyond and argue that gender segregated bathrooms make it a greater target for assault attempts. First of all, those with a mindset for rape and assault tend to have more "traditional" views of male and female and what they mean. As such, the reinforcing culture gives them a sense of cultural approval for an attack. Second of all, it provides a target-rich area. Men are told exactly where there are women and only women. For the homophobic peeping tom or rapist, this lets them now that they will only see victims of their desired range without having to also look at those outside of it. Third of all, it creates a taboo area that can be interpreted by those inclined to respond aggressively to their privilege as a challenge and a threat thus allowing self-justification for their crimes.

Basically, the current setup is less safe and more discriminatory than the single stall setup and carries the added negative benefit of creating a cultural idea of public spaces as space to be divided and policed by gender which is probably the worst aspect of all.

Not to mention that it's interesting we worry heavily about being assaulted only in the gender segregated spaces. Comparitively few worry about being "raped by stranger" in a dimly lit restaurant with blind corners, or in a library, or in a supply closet.

And certainly fewer still worry about the rape statistics that show that overwhelmingly most rapes occur from someone one knows in either one's own home or the home of a family member or friend.

And I speak from some small measure of understanding. My partner is a survivor of multiple rapes from multiple romantic partners which all occurred in her bed or in the home of a close friend. I, myself have been assaulted in the most marginal and minor of terms (public groping, including using the side of my body to masturbate himself). This one occurred in public in a location where I was surrounded by a huge crowd (comic convention during a panel).

While safety is important and I don't want to dismiss that, the illusion of it can't be used as the "good" face of a more darker societal urge.

...And now, I should cut this belatedly long. I did warn in the post that I will gladly rant about that if given the chance.

[radiant_enigma]

Cerberus: Personally, I'm grateful for your "ranting" (I certainly wouldn't characterize it that way!) I've spent my whole life in very conservative communities, resulting in me having known (irl) a grand total of 2 "out" people in my entire life. So, I'm sometimes painfully ignorant about issues facing the QUILTBAG community...so thank you for helping me.

And on that note, is anyone familiar with (and willing to explain) how the United States legal system treats transgendered people? Do they legally recognize the person's new gender, and if so, at what point? If the person is already married, is that marriage invalidated in states where gay marriage is illegal? If it varies by state, what happens when a transgendered person moves from one state to another?

(In another related note, please do forgive me if any of my questions or wording - here or elsewhere - are offensive. I would appreciate correction, but please know that the offense would be coming from ignorance, not malice.)

[Cerberus]

radiant_enigma-

Hoo boy, that one's a long answer. Short answer is that it varies wildly by state and occasionally by city. Some states allow you to file for a legal sex change and are then legally understood to be that sex. Some states that don't allow you to do this, nonetheless recognize it if it was done in another state. Other states not only don't allow this, but refuse to acknowledge it entirely, going so far as to anull marriages or other arrangements that are now deemed "illegal" according to the "new sex".

On top of that, different cities may offer different protections, so you may have certain rights as a transgender person in Kalamazoo MI, but not any of the surrounding cities in Michigan.

Basically this makes moving and road trips about as fraught as traveling or moving while Black during segregation. One must carefully research the exact tapestry of laws surrounding transgender rights in the area you are moving to or traveling through just to make sure you don't end up getting hosed.

Of course on marriage, at least, this could be solved rather easily by eliminating gender restrictions on marriage.

If you are interested in sobbing yourself to sleep, I'd recommend reading about transgender experiences with prisons. That aspect of the legal system definitely seems to delight in torturing transgender inmates or those in holding cells, placing them in the wrong sex areas, failing to protect against sexual assault, performing "corrective rapes", giving them punitive or torturous confinement conditions "due to lacking a place" and much worse.

In short, the legal system with regards to transgender recognition and protection could use some work, but it has been getting a little better.

[radiant_enigma]

I...wow...there's no words.

It blows my mind how easy it is to be oblivious to it all.

I'm sorry.

[Dav]

Pthalo: Gah. That is a giant conglomeration of awful.

I looked into becoming a resident of east Asian country X. It wasn't too bad in theory, but in actuality, it was pretty bad for anyone who didn't already have family there. Strangely, the language fluency tests vascillated widely in difficulty, and the bribes you were expected to pay suddenly skyrocketed.

But I am assured that compared with becoming a US resident/citizen, X pales in comparison.

[radiant_enigma]

On a (I think) slightly less depressing note, is there a substantive difference between "transgender" and "transsexual"? Assuming they're essentially the same thing, is one term generally preferred?

I hope it's okay that I'm asking all these questions. Please don't ever feel "required" to answer any of them.

[MadGastronomer]

On a (I think) slightly less depressing note, is there a substantive difference between "transgender" and "transsexual"? Assuming they're essentially the same thing, is one term generally preferred?

Yes, there is a really big difference between the terms. Here is a good glossary.

Excerpt:

Transgender: An umbrella term for people whose gender identity differs from the sex or gender they were assigned at birth, and for those whose gender expression differs from what is culturally expected of them. The term transgender is not indicative of sexual orientation, hormonal makeup, physical anatomy, or how one is perceived in daily life.
 
Transsexual: Similar to transgender in that it indicates a conflict between one’s gender identity and sex assigned at birth, but with implications of hormonal/surgical transition from one binary sex to the other. Unlike transgender, transsexual is not an umbrella term, as many transgender people do not identify as transsexual.

[victoria]

@ radiant_enigma:

from what i understand, terminology can vary depending on what each person is comfortable with and on how they self identify. If you want to learn more, one place to start is this "Trans 101" from the Sylvia Rivera Law Project, and there are a lot of other good web resources where the nuances of language and terminology are discussed.

[radiant_enigma]

That helps a lot. Thank you.

[MadGastronomer]

Oh! And it has been suggested to me that I mention that "trans" is an abbreviation that usually either includes both transgender and transexual, or means transgender as an umbrella term. It's also sometimes expressed as trans*.

[radiant_enigma]

I'd thought that "trans" was offensive...was I wrong?

[MadGastronomer]

I'd thought that "trans" was offensive...was I wrong?

It can be offensive if you are using it as a noun: "A trans came into the store" is offensive. "Trans" as an adjective (when relevant; no need to mention it in most situations) is part of the standard vocabulary: "A trans woman and I were talking about this very point of terminology just yesterday."

You may be thinking of "genaal," which, despite its use by gay cisgendered men, is a common, and very hurtful, slur against trans women.

[Nick Kiddle]

I've only ever heard of trans being offensive if it's used as a noun ("a trans" instead of "a trans person") A lot of people prefer a space between trans and man/woman, to make it clear that we are men/women who happen to be trans rather than some strange new gender configuration. The word with the biggest potential to be offensive, at least in the spaces I move in, is the one which, in a more innocent age, might have meant the transmission of a car or a transistor radio. (The one that rhymes with Danny.) It's probably best to avoid ever using that one if you're cis, or even a trans man, because it has so much terrible baggage attached.

[Nick Kiddle]

Should I take the lesson that great minds think alike, or that I should refresh before I post?

[MadGastronomer]

Oh, always take the more pleasant one of that set, Nick.

Um. I probably should have added some sort of trigger warning. I'm not sure quite what, but if TBAT can come up with something appropriate, I'd appreciate one being added. Maybe, "Warning: Transphobic/transmisogynist word used to inform someone that that word is a slur". Or ROT13 it? Or something?

[Deird, who burnt her hand - ow!]

I'd rot13 it, personally.