Dad taking daughters into the ladies or disabled toilets

in fact he mentioned he's had a few positive comments from women saying what a lovely dad to take her in
Yeah sure, that happened…

Some disabled people don't have the privilege to choose. Why should they loose the right to access the only space they can use because of people that do have a choice and choose to be ablest? You said yourself you could access the other toilets with your child, you opted not to in preference of the disabled toilets. That choice negatively impacts disabled people. As you said there are many places that children and their parents can physically access. A disabled person might not be able to use an "interesting" place in an emergency, literally their only option is the disabled toilets.

Disabled people need the special adaptations in disabled toilets for many reasons.
They could soil themselves or pass out if they are forced to stand and wait.
They could need the space to manoeuvre a wheelchair, a walking frame, a crutch or an artificial limb.
They could need the space under the sink to be unobstructed so they can wash their hands.
They could need to use the grab rails to manoeuvre themselves onto the toilet.
They could need access to the emergency cord.
They could need a place to take their medication or someplace quiet and safe to access when they are about to have a meltdown or panic attack.
They could be unable to reach the lock, door handle, sink or hand dryers in other toilets.
They could not have the dexterity to use a typical bathroom lock or taps.
They could require the brail and other markers to know their way around if they are visually impaired.
They could require the special nonslip flooring in the disabled toilet.
And countless other reasons.

I understand if the only baby changing facilities are in the disabled toilets and you need to change your baby. But it is unacceptable to use the disabled toilets because you don’t want to take your child in with you to whatever toilet matches your sex. If you want another option campaign for one.

Don’t use the disabled toilets if you are not disabled

No men should not be entering the ladies toilets.

My DH took my DD to not a cubicle in the mens.

A lot of the time the changing facilities are in the disable toilet so I would think this option as you would often have you take a toddler into disabled toilet to change them.

I am a father of daughters. When they were young this problem did not arise for me because we lived in a place where public lavatories were differently organised than currently they are in UK.

However, I did have decisions to make more recently when I had the good fortune to be involved with care of granddaughters here. (Moved back to UK, some children did likewise; interesting comparisons with more internationally-based children but I will not expatiate.)

I never would have felt easy going into the Ladies. So I never did. First choice was always a 'baby change' facility, something I had got used to when the children/grandchildren had been in nappies. If no baby change place, next choice was disabled/accessible toilets; in the many, many times I did this I never once felt I had discommoded anyone who needed to use the facility because of disablement. Lucky, I suppose, but, well, my grandchildren came first, anyway.

Of course, even in towns/cities, facilities are not always available. I changed nappies and, later, helped little girls pee, in some, erh, interesting places. If neither baby changing room nor disabled toilet were available, a cubicle in the Gents would serve. And, of course, sometimes when even that was not available, holding a little girl over a patch of grass or even a road grid in emergency situations might be necessary: needs must!

Now all my grandchildren can go alone while I wait outside. Or, more often, I have to say, when we spend time together out-of-doors, they willingly wait outside when I am caught short, which happens more and more often as I grow more and more physically decrepit. (Patches of grass/drains? -- I draw a veil.)

All part of life's richness. But tldr it does seem to me women have the right to veto men going in the Ladies; even if some women think it OK, I know some do not, and that is enough for me (and should be enough for other men too).

[How to deal with a small child needing to pee/a change of nappy, when said child is terrified of the noise of hand-driers? -- That is a whole other can of worms with which I am sure some of you are familiar. ... Like most things in life, it passes, I can report, however stressful it might seem at the time.]

No. An adult male cannot enter the ladies. Just no

in fact he mentioned he's had a few positive comments from women saying what a lovely dad to take her in.

Are female people seriously going to virtue signal about being super lovely to male people who turn a non consenting female only space into mixed sex, because it supposedly shows their wonderful progressiveness?

If mixed sex was super lovely and progressive this father would not hesitate to take his daughters into the male facilities.

Likewise the posters who are delighted to share gender neutral spaces and live surrounded by other females delighted to use gender neutral spaces. By all means, enjoy your use of gender neutral mixed sex spaces, no one wants to stop you. But removing female only accessible spaces from females who cannot access them as you can is not exactly kind, inclusive or thoughtful. There are answers that work for everyone.

Many toilets are switching to gender neutral now anyway so it won't be a problem soon. I wouldn't use the disabled loo though.

A different point - when my sons got to big for me to take into the women’s toilets - I really hated when i had to let them go alone into the mens. I would warn then to go in - lock the cubicle - don’t talk to anyone - leave if there was anyone acting weird- and come out quickly. I was not able to go in to the mens to check they were ok.

"If a father was to take his young daughter to a swimming pool with open plan single sex changing rooms, which changing room should they use?"

It would have to be the men's changing room just like he would use the men's restroom. If there's no family changing room, of course. Why should it be any different?

It's much more important that adults of the opposite sex are kept apart from each other than adults from small children of the opposite sex. Children do not compromise privacy like an adult would.

Why does everyone assume only men's toilets are covered in piss?

An eye-opening moment for me when I was much younger was waiting for a free cubicle and walking into it after a woman came out. It was an absolute mess. I didn't even know how it was possible. I'd always assumed toilet seats like that were created by men.

I think - I can only guess - that some women hover and don't clean up after themselves. Toilets can be dire whether they're for women, men or unisex.

At the end of the day, I think we're in this situation because so many architects are men. It's why women's toilets often don't have space for a sanitary disposal bin and it's wedged in next to the toilet bowl as an afterthought. It's why the changing facilities are only in the women's toilets. It's why there are no family toilets designed for parents of any gender, containing changing facilities and big enough to fit a massive pram.

Equality doesn't happen overnight and many buildings are quite old.

Take a time machine to the past and install some female architects and I think toilet facilities would be a million times better now. Women think about toilet issues very carefully.

Or fighting for it to be cleaned more often?

I don't know. Maybe some men need to come up with proposing solutions for taking care of their own children when they are out and about.

I'm guessing one of the proposals would be employing women to take the girls to the ladies because well, women solve men's problems with children have always been better at things like this bla bla ba.

Why is it disturbing that a girl sees a man's penis and yet boys are routinely taken into women's spaces such as toilets and changing rooms where it is all hanging out? Women's bodies and privacy don't seem to be at issue from the gaze of boys.

Having said this, men's toilets are disgusting places and men would do better fighting for a family option.

DH takes DD to the men's. It's a total non-issue. My dad used to take me to the men's, I remember it and I'm not traumatised!

Non disabled people have no right to be in the disabled toilets. and legally vendors can eject able-bodied people from the disabled toilets.

Accessible toilets are provided to meet the requirement for reasonable adjustment under the equality act 2010. There is no legal right to eject anyone from them nor to exclude anyone from them. If there was it would require vendors to ask for private medical information - you cannot tell someone, adult or child, is disabled by looking at them.

Young children also soil themselves - my daughter was not reliable until she was five and even then had occasional accidents - both faecal and urinary - and would need to be washed and changed. I am unapologetic about using accessible toilets for this. Just as I am unapologetic about using them for incidence of faecal urgency for me if it is the nearest available.

He seems to have survived!

If a child I'd young enough to need help to go to the toilet they are not going to be traumatised by seeing the back of a bloke standing over a urinal

Even if they did get a glimps of a penis why would that be an issue. All my boys have seen me on the loo or or in the bath as they bloody followed me everywhere. None of them are traumatised by it . Or by seeing men at urinals

Sadly we liven a world where we all have to make decisions and we don't all agree. I don't think it is appropriate to for an adult male to use female toilets, nor in the case the OP highlights for the daughters to use the male toilets. Sending the children into the female toilets on their own is also not ideal - using disabled toilets in also not ideal, but I think if they are not being used the using them is a solution, occasionally there is more than one disabled toilet. This view is not ''ablest' but it is an opinion, it doesn't mean someone is selfish or inconsiderate it is an opinion.

So dad's are too thick to cover eyes or direct/steer appropriately?

Does it not occur to anyone that the drama around this is created mostly to get out of parenting?

We manage don't we?

We plan our days and our journeys ams our activities with small children so this dilemma doesn't present itself.

Ask any mum and she will be asked to tell you where every toilet on a 3 mile radius is and which ones to avoid.

But men nooooo, men cannot possibly be expected to find somewhere suitable. No they take their kids and find the grottyest venue they can possibly findcomplete with half dead OD'ying tramp to step over and the worlds largest shit left in the toilet bowl.

If that's the kinda place your husbands are taking your.kids then the problem.is your husband.dont make.it my problem.or any other women or girl.

For the people who think its ok...
If a father was to take his young daughter to a swimming pool with open plan single sex changing rooms, which changing room should they use?