Used an 'all genders' bathroom today

Maybe it should in your utopian society but it’s not like that in the real world so in the meantime I would like my female toilet spaces back.

Silly enough that really I shouldn't dignify it with an answer.

Men are desperate to be in women's toilets peeing with women, aren't they? That's the root of all this. Be honest. Offer a third space and it won't do because there are no women in there with their knickers down doing something validating and thrilling for men.

Women are desperate to NOT have to be used by said men, or subjected to the indignity of men being present.

Women delighted to pee and undress with men can go and use third spaces or join the men in the men's provision, no one wants to stop them.

And I really have to wonder about someone who spends so much time trying to shame and coerce women into enabling men at their own expense, and has no respect whatsoever for women's consent.

I’m definitely not excusing it but not everyone has access to good parenting or even a father figure ( or mother for that matter) that gives a shit and as we can’t go back and reeducate all the men that are not wiping up after themselves,

It shouldn't need that. It should be implicit in society's expectations. In our dreams.

Only in your dreams.

Or instead of trying to force a square peg in a round hole to appease a small number of people who believe in an ideology not many others believe in, just keep them single sex. It's worked for a long time. With additional neutral ones (if the building allows) for the cool people who don't mind and think male toilets are no worse than women's.

To be fair, the seat hoverers are likely to be worse in mixed sex loos, so they are likely to be messier than the women's AND the men's single sex options.

But all the talk of "men need to be taught to close the toilet door etc". They don't actually. If men as a group are happy weeing in public toilets with the cubicle door open then that's fine, let them do that. They don't need re-education. They just need their own toilets and women can have they own toilets and everyone is happy.

I haven't read every post, but this story reminded me of a reason WHY women are more twitchy about hygiene in toilets than men are.

https://news.sky.com/story/arsenic-lead-and-other-toxic-metals-found-in-tampons-study-says-13175436

It isn't that we are sweet cleanly little creatures by nature, but we know on a physical level that there are times we are vulnerable, and any women inserting a tampon or cleaning and reinserting a mooncup needs to be confident that they are not going to be introducing bacteria to a place where they can multiply dangerously fast and enter the bloodstream directly.

Even without the toxic heavy metals.

Fair enough but I live abroad and where I am, people are pretty fine with nudity in same sex environments but not mixed. They are not going to update the facilities though so at the moment women snd girls don't have anywhere they are happy to change snd the tw is also not happy because they claim it is their right (and no they don't feel at risk in the men's).

That’s not exactly what I meant but thanks for taking it there. I’m definitely not excusing it but not everyone has access to good parenting or even a father figure ( or mother for that matter) that gives a shit and as we can’t go back and reeducate all the men that are not wiping up after themselves, I’m not sure what the answer is…apart from not allow them in our spaces. (Which I’m all for btw) When children are little there’s an excuse for a misdirection or a ‘not wiping’ up after yourself. Granted.

I think it’s much more to do with the fact they pee everywhere apart from the toilet…Especially when drunk. I live with 3 so do know they have trouble aiming sometimes.

I also live with 3 men, and not one of them leaves any mess. Not since they were tall enough to pee standing up. They wipe up any mess because their father taught them to behave with respect. One does have trouble aiming (for a structural reason) but he also wipes up any mess.

Men behave badly because they choose to do so. Because society enables them. Boys will be boys. It's only bantz. They can't help it. Toxic gendered expectations that men will do as they wish and women will clean up their mess.

Well when we did it we were often having a chat we didn't want in front of men, I don't think I ever thought of safety. Regardless of that the post I replied to was referring to women having to change their behaviour and I wonder if it is a change or what we have done for years.

The 'progressive' types thought it was a fabulous idea. No-one else did.

I went to a pub recently where there were two options: a unisex one and one for men only - no women only option obviously. ALL the men went to the men only option. The women had to queue up for the gender neutral ones because the full length cubicles with wash basins means there isn't so much space, so fewer loos. Marvellous.

I have also experienced men being equally uncomfortable at going into mixed loos, much dirtier cubicles etc.

I wasn't commenting on putting up with it, I was commenting on you saying it wasn't a problem to anyone else. It might be, it would be a problem for me and I can't imagine I'm the only woman who would prefer a cubicle.

What do you mean "pee with men". Are the cubicles being shared?

Why are you so desperate to force non consenting women to pee with men?

"came face to face with a man and we both instinctively apologised to each other. There was this instant understanding that we should not be sharing that space."

Understandable if this is the first time in your lives you have used an all-gender bathroom. But for countries where these bathrooms are very normal (virtually all over Europe), people don't care.

And yes, let's not pretend women's bathrooms are sparkling clean palaces.

Or just keep it separate. Better for women

Tbf ive been in many a female toilet with piss on the floor from the toilet hoverers but I take your point. More education for men about closing doors and lifting toilet seats wouldnt go a miss

I’m not entirely sure men’s urine smells any different but certainly it varies from person to person depending on what they eat or how dehydrated they might be! I think it’s much more to do with the fact they pee everywhere apart from the toilet…Especially when drunk. I live with 3 so do know they have trouble aiming sometimes.

As usual too, the sole reason for the arguing that women do it too/are worse/women's voices and experiences are irrelevant?

Is to take women's stuff to give to men. It is for no other reason than to enable male supremacism.

They can fuck off with that.

Most women on this thread: Loos used by men are generally wetter, dirtier, smellier unless constantly cleaned. Men's urine, like that of other male mammals, smells stronger - ask anyone who's had the misfortune of encountering tomcat pee.

Righteous: Women's loos are as bad or worse, men's pee is specially fragrant amongst the animal kingdom, because reasons. (See also male violence, male paraphilias, etc).

Like I said before, I'd be happy for there to be mixed-sex toilets as long as it is alongside full and properly signposted single-sex provision. And the Righteous should show their allyship by devotedly using the mixed-sex facilities only.

@Lavender14 Cleaning issues are to some extent inevitable. Yes, everyone would like a clean toilet but the fact is, not all toilets are cleaned regularly enough. Let's deal with reality. Unisex toilets have no advantages, especially for women.

@Lavender14 - your experiences are valid, thank you for sharing.

So also are the experiences of many others - it only takes the person in front of you, to leave urine on the seat and on the floor, to make an unpleasant experience for a woman who has to sit on the toilet and pull down her trousers.

The discomfort of being in a state of undress, while there are unknown men around is something that many women experience - it does not mean that all men are rapists but many of us are affected by this feeling of discomfort where we feel vulnerable. These feelings are valid, even if for the most part, we will not be raped in the toilet, the number of women who will experience sexual harassment and sexual violence during their lives is very high. The fact that most of the time we go out, we do not experience rape, does not remove the fear that we might one day experience sexual violence or that we have already experienced it.

Most of us will never be in a car crash - but we wear seat belts, have central reservations on the motorway and our cars are designed to minimise the impact of a crash.

I think most of the times I have been in an 'all genders' toilet, I have come out thinking - ugh.. that was unpleasant... ladies toilet's are less likely to have urine on the seat and floor.

Surely that's a cleaning issue then? Every bathroom should be well enough maintained that it's not smelling to that extent. Any time I've been in a nasty bathroom (the workplace one I mentioned earlier aside because that was clearly an individuals issue) my first thought is that it's not being cleaned properly by the business who's responsible for it? We had to let our cleaner go from my current workplace because she wasn't cleaning the bathroom, I was having to go in and do it after she left because she said it was done but it wasn't. So either she was just refusing or had different standards of cleanliness than I do. I've never assigned gender to the issue. If they stink they need cleaned more or the plumbing looked at.

I've never smelt male toilets bad enough that they reeked from outside.

I have, believe me it was rank. It was a pub in Wolverhampton and was popular with students and office workers. The men's loo was at the back and when the door was opened the smell would rush out and permeate the entire pub, even over the smell of beer and cigarette smoke. A great shame as it was a nice pub.