Gender neutral toilets at the Barbican London

[Laurapalmer90]

Has anyone heard about this? Great that women are speaking up. Why can't there be gender neutral toilets AND retain men's and women's?

www.standard.co.uk/news/londoners-diary/londoners-diary-no-toilet-humour-for-samira-ahmed-at-the-barbican-a3507901.html

[DJBaggySmalls]

I saw this on Twitter today. It just shows that give men the green light to use the women's and they will.
The men's should have been gender neutral., or there should be a third gender neutral bathroom.

[IAmAmy]

Excellent to see Samira Ahmed challenging this nonsense. It's quite worrying that this seems to be spreading; were I to be at the Barbican, I'd not be too comfortable using these facilities given men are clearly using what was previously the women's (even though they'd have had far more of a queue anyway even without the added people).

[Dinosaurus86]

Oh great - no woman will be using the 'gender neutral - urinals', so the men get to keep their space, but the women have to share??

[LassWiTheDelicateAir]

Glasgow Theatre Royal has gender neutral toilets. All toilets are lockable, fully enclosed cubicles with individual basins and mirrors.

[LassWiTheDelicateAir]

It's a daft idea at the Barbican if for no other reason than queues. I might if I were desperate and there was a queue use a cubicle in what used to be the men's ( I don't think there is safety issues in a busy arts venue) but I expect many women won't.

On the other hand there are men who don't like urinals- and they have been given permission to use the one with more cubicles.

[0phelia]

That's all very well but men stand up to pee. How do you know you aren't sitting on a pee seat?

[DJBaggySmalls]

Why dont they put a couple of cubicles in the mens? Are they saying men never need to do more than pee?

[0phelia]

Pee always splashes a bit in a loo. That's why urinals were invented.

[0phelia]

Most men's already have cubicles already.

[LassWiTheDelicateAir]

Why dont they put a couple of cubicles in the mens? Are they saying men never need to do more than pee?

There will be but not as many.

[highinthesky]

Well this has put me right off the Barbican Centre.

This is about so-called inclusivity, but it should be about queue management.

[GlitterGlue]

Glasgow Theatre Royal has gender neutral toilets. All toilets are lockable, fully enclosed cubicles with individual basins and mirrors.

I visited two venues last weekend which had this type of loo. All placed along a corridor. Absolutely fine. But they can fuck right off if they think changing the sign on a standard ladies turns it gender neutral. It doesn't. At all. It just means we get shat on again.

[IAmAmy]

I suppose soon enough any women or girls who don't feel comfortable with people who are ostensibly men but "identifying as women" in the same toilets will be made to feel ridiculous for having such issues.

[IAmAmy]

From my experience of theatres and similar venues, the only change which should be countenanced is expanding the provision of women's toilets, purely from a queuing point of view (though I understand this is difficult in old theatres).

[LassWiTheDelicateAir]

I visited two venues last weekend which had this type of loo. All placed along a corridor. Absolutely fine

The Glasgow ones were clearly specifically designed that way as part of a major refit. This started in 2012 so I would assume the driving force was the most efficient use of space rather than specific trans issues.

[GlitterGlue]

One set was a recent refit, but the other was built that way around 10 years ago? I fully expect it was also a space issue rather than anything else.

[TitaniasCloset]

Well if this carries on there will be no more meeting really lovely drunk women in nightclub toilets and borrowing their hairspray and sharing awful boyfriend stories.

Maybe another reason why the men's want to intrude. We were having too much fun on our own!

I will miss those days. The end of an era.

Next time someone asks why I'm against unisex Loos and don't want to share I shall tell them because I just fucking don't! Is that alright with you mate?

[Datun]

This is what happens when both toilets become gender neutral. Young girls (elementary school) going into the boys and squatting over the urinal.
www.google.co.uk/amp/s/gendertrender.wordpress.com/2014/03/28/arizona-elementary-school-blockades-all-urinals-in-boys-bathrooms-after-multiple-incidents-involving-female-transgender-children/amp/

What would've happened if all those women at the Barbican barged into the gents toilets breezily walking past all the men at the urinals?

[GreyStars]

Seen so many of these threads, I feel more angry each time but I'm glad that it is being discussed. I hate the idea that women will be made to feel ridiculous over this, because it feels so wrong to me.

A row of doors leading to an individual toilet with its own sink off a corridor to be used by anybody, is not an issue for me - unless you count the disgusting state some of them get in but in principle I don't have an issue.

I'd be interested to know if the forward thinking people at the Barbican have actually put sanitary bins in the "men's" or machines, I doubt it.

It makes me so angry

I do however think that most men, the ones I like to spend time with anyway :) don't like this idea either, they wouldn't want to make women feel uncomfortable or intimidated by their presence so hopefully the majority will actually remain out of the "ladies" but of course your going to get the arseholes who decide it's their "right"

[ErrolTheDragon]

Janice Turner's column in The Times this morning has a section on this story, titled 'Equality flushed away'.

[YetAnotherSpartacus]

I've never been to a unisex toilet that wasn't covered with pee on the seat and floor and that didn't stink.

Disgusting.

[YetAnotherSpartacus]

From the article that Datun posted

Anna Henry Elementary in Tucson has blocked off all urinals in boys restrooms for the time being, following multiple incidents of girls who identify as male reportedly squatting over the urinals to void, pulling down their underwear in front of boys, and causing privacy issues with boys who were upset by girls watching them urinate. Closing the urinals to all students of both sexes has been the district’s immediate solution until privacy partitions are installed between all the urinals so that the girls can continue to use them in expression of their personal identification with male reproductive biology

Pretty amazing how quickly there is action when boys are inconvenienced!

[Ding3kids]

I've walked past urinals before to get to a cubicle admittedly didn't realise until after it was the men's!
But i personally don't know any woman that sits on the toilet anyway. Everyone i know squat over, not sit on a dirty public toilet. Although i would wipe clean the seat after but loads of women toilets have pee all over from women squatting.

[ErrolTheDragon]

If you're short (or have kids, for that matter), you have to wipe/line the seat before because squatting is physically impossible.

I'd be interested to know if the forward thinking people at the Barbican have actually put sanitary bins in the "men's"

Good question. If they haven't, they're going to have fun with blocked loos or some blokes complaining about women traipsing around putting used sanpro in the general wastebin. Oh ... won't men from some religious groups have a massive problem with sharing facilities with menstruating women? Anyone want to bet it will be these issues which stop this ill-considered idea rather than the problems it causes women?

[CaoNiMartacus]

Yeah. It's like:

This inconveniences men.
Let's stop it immediately, then.

This contravenes XYZ religion/faith.
What are we thinking? Stop it now.

This inconveniences women.
YOU BIGOT! Pipe down.