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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To not feel happy with gender neutral toilets at work?

778 replies

BalletBunting · 30/05/2019 13:01

My company has recently relabelled all toilets on my floor as 'gender neutral'. As well as being rather confused as to what the need is for them (there are no trans people at my work as far as I'm aware) I don't like them, and I would prefer to keep the ladies loo as is. The nearest women's toilets is 3 floors up now!

I don't really feel comfortable going to the loo knowing that there are men in there but I don't really know how to bring this up and with who. I work for a large media company, fairly young/progressive and I don't want to cause trouble for myself.

There was also absolutely no consultation regarding the change. If anyone has been in a similar situation and managed to come to a different solution? Or AIBU and should drop it?

OP posts:
RiversDisguise · 31/05/2019 23:40

It's an analogy. It doesn't mean it has to correspond in every regard...

GreytExpectations · 31/05/2019 23:41

The NHS also state Gender dysphoria is a recognised medical condition, for those of your who seem to suggest it isnt real

NKFell · 31/05/2019 23:45

I honestly don’t think there’s as much of a difference comparing race to gender as you think, that’s my opinion. I also care about everyone’s feelings and I doubt we’re all as far apart as we seem. I hate the thought of trans women being hurt or excluded but for me, I see it as a male problem. I have absolutely no issue with FtM trans people using women’s toilets, if the men’s are off limits to MtF trans people then men need to take action.

Nothing really to do with bogs though fiddlesticks Grin this thread is like a wormhole!

RiversDisguise · 31/05/2019 23:49

Yes, agreed, f2m trans should be able to use women's loos.

I'm not from the UK and don't share the reverence for the NHS. It's a government institution though, yes? Therefore politicised.

TalkingintheDark · 31/05/2019 23:55

OK Greyt.

Do you recognise that women and girls (aka biologically female people) are impacted by a specific form of oppression and discrimination that only attaches to female people?

That biologically female people traditionally have been and still are vulnerable and disadvantaged in this sexist, patriarchal world we live in, because of the huge imbalance of power between male humans and female humans, both physical and social/economic?

And that consequently biologically female people, like any other disadvantaged/oppressed group, have the moral right in a just society to define ourselves, to assemble without the presence of any of those who are not part of our oppressed group (ie males, in this case) if we so choose, to expect single sex spaces and services in any area where we may feel specially vulnerable?

That we have the right to centre ourselves in the movement which is supposed to advance our interests, that we are not responsible for the well being of a subset of males who struggle with being male (any more than all human beings are or aren’t responsible for any other human beings), that we have no obligation to pretend they are actually female and include them in the category of women? That we do not have to put their needs ahead of our own, do not have to do things to make them happier at our own expense?

If you’re happy to go along with all that, and not allow either the word “woman” or women’s single sex spaces, service and sports to be colonised by members of the male sex, no matter how unhappy that might make those males; then I take it back, you’re not a misogynist bigot after all.

But if you insist on centring and prioritising males over females in a world that has been doing just that for several millennia, then... you are.

TalkingintheDark · 01/06/2019 00:00

Yes, the NHS even has a page because it os considered a condition

The NHS has been “captured” by transactivists, along with the BBC, academia, the government, all the major political parties, etc etc etc. Their propaganda has been very successful.

Yes, gender dysphoria is a condition as are many, many other psychological conditions. It doesn’t mean that people who suffer from it actually are the opposite sex to the one they really are.

Incidentally, are you aware that in the new world of transgender rights, old school transsexuals who actually had the full surgery and tried to pass as best they could are now regarded with contempt and referred to as “truscum”, a term which is every bit as pejorative as it sounds?

Aridane · 01/06/2019 01:43

Oh come on - it’s been recognised in DSM-III since 1980! A little before the tsunami of trans activism

RiversDisguise · 01/06/2019 02:32

An earlier version of which classified homosexuality under 'sexual orientation disturbance.' Wink

Psychiatry is not my field, but if you cite the DSM (now 5) you should note that that it's a deeply controversial document.

I really enjoy this dissection (by a retired prison shrink) of how DSM-5'S inclusion of intermitent explosive disorder does a disservice to abused wives by suggesting that it's not their husband's fault, provided they beat, strangle, try to kill their women with X frequency.

www.city-journal.org/html/everyone-couch-13613.html

Mummyoflittledragon · 01/06/2019 06:51

I will admit that I am pretty confused about how we construct the notion of gender now, and what is ‘feminine’ and ‘masculine’. Like I wear trousers and work in a trad male role, but I also have long hair and boob. But that’s ok, live and let live.

manners this was your quote. ‘We’ don’t do anything. If you want to understand how gender identity works, ask MRA’s and TRA’s. Personally I don’t have a gender identity. I’m a woman.

As for “live and let live”. That’s the fucking problem. A lot of them would be happy to see me dead.

@Deathgrip
I had adeno and endo. Uterus too large to use the coil. You could try that. I had to have a hysterectomy as the pain was so severe I was on morphine in the end. My op was done privately. But if you want ultimate relief, a hysterectomy is the best way if you want / can persuade the NHS. Removal of everything including cervix necessary as endo can grow back on cervix / ovaries. Perhaps go complaining of crippling pain?? Gp gave me 30/500 cocodamol (didn’t work unsurprisingly), gynaecologist gave me tramadol, which I’m allergic to and gp then gave me morphine.

GreytExpectations · 01/06/2019 07:07

But if you insist on centring and prioritising males over females in a world that has been doing just that for several millennia, then... you are.

Please do explain where you got me doing that from? When on this thread have i ever suggested males or females? I havent. You are just putting words in my mouth

GreytExpectations · 01/06/2019 07:07

Should say over not or

Deathgrip · 01/06/2019 08:11

Thanks mummy I’m already on morphine, have been for over a decade. My specialist is happy to do a hysterectomy when I’m ready, but I’m not. I’ve tried every treatment and one of them has fucked up my hormones for over a decade - I’m honestly terrified of doing anything to mess with them again, including ovary removal or even just a hysterectomy (plenty of anecdata about women having hormone issues after just a tubal ligation). I’ve finally got some semblance of balance back after a decade of no libido and symptoms identical to hypothyroidism, which are still there but not as bad. I am just wary of any option right now. I’ve had many surgeries and every treatment that’s licensed for endo. I want my life back but scared of fucking my life up further.

This is what I was getting at really - these are female issues and I can’t identify out of them, just as I couldn’t identify out of being the one in a straight marriage who had to carry the babies we wanted, or pump milk for those babies. I could identify out of the social aspects of motherhood (eg DH could have been the SAHP while I went to work) on paper, but in reality that’s much more difficult to do.

You can’t identify into any of this. To me this is being a woman, not what I want to wear or what toys I liked as a child.

Mummyoflittledragon · 01/06/2019 08:21

Deathgrip

I know it’s only anecdotal but my hormones weren’t affected. I was also terrified more for the pain issue as I have chronic pain / fibro. I also get the terrified for screwing with things. I’ve had two lots of meds, which have terribly damaged my health long term.

Mummyoflittledragon · 01/06/2019 08:24

Oops posted too soon. Flowers yes I know can’t identify out of that....

Greyt
By prioritising the wants and possibly needs of transwomen (natal males) over the wants and needs biological females, you are centring and prioritising males. There is no getting away from it.

TalkingintheDark · 01/06/2019 08:56

Thanks Mummyoflittledragon. I thought I’d been clear, but Greyt seems to be determined not to get it.

Try reading my post again, Greyt. If you can answer yes to all those questions I asked; if you agree that human females are morally and rationally entitled to define ourselves exclusively of ALL male people, including the ones who don’t “identify as” male, you’re centring women. Adult human females.

If you insist that a subset of males are entitled to be included in the category “woman” then you’re prioritising those males at the expense of females, which makes you a regressive misogynist, following in the footsteps of every other misogynist, however much you delude yourself that yours is the voice of compassion and progress.

TalkingintheDark · 01/06/2019 08:58

Mummyof and Deathgrip Flowers for you both. So sorry to hear, it’s hell living with constant pain. So much “cis privilege”.

FiddlesticksAkimbo · 01/06/2019 10:08

Hi Riversdisguise

It's an analogy. It doesn't mean it has to correspond in every regard...

There is a fairly serious flaw in using race as an analogue for sex in all this, which is that sex is very clearly binary (which is why the controversy arises for claims about non-binary gender) whereas race is certainly not binary, and doesn't have any biological underpinning or proper definition at all.

CoffeeMilkNoSugar · 01/06/2019 10:24

Take it for what it's worth, but if I had to share toilets with men at work, I'd make a point out of rinsing a Very Bloody Mooncup right next to them in the sink. And basically make them uncomfortable enough to bugger off.

FiddlesticksAkimbo · 01/06/2019 10:29

I'd make a point out of rinsing a Very Bloody Mooncup right next to them in the sink

I'm not sure that grossing our colleagues out is the way forward? Is that really any better than the men deliberately pissing on the seats to get the women out? Grin

TalkingintheDark · 01/06/2019 10:52

Aridane I know it’s recognised, I said myself it’s a psychological condition. I was referring to the languages and approach of the NHS on this.

Their page on GD is a disgrace given it’s speaking for the state medical system, a system you would expect to be unbiased, apolitical and based on proper medical science.

They use the language of transactivists, like sex being “assigned at birth” (a term co-opted from the intersex community, which is the only valid usage of it, and blatantly absurd in all other cases).

There are the spurious, unscientific theories about “gender identity” having a biological basis, which has absolutely not been demonstrated (in fact, where a trans person is also an identical twin, their twin is much more likely to not be trans than to also be trans).

And then more conflation of trans with intersex issues when they are entirely distinct, and people in the intersex community have asked TRAs not to do this.

This is the “capture” of the NHS by TRAs.

The whole concept of “gender identity” being a real, objective thing that should be prioritised over biological sex is misogynist TRA bullshit. Yes, there are some people who feel deeply unhappy about the sex they are (although increasingly that is not even necessary to declare yourself trans these days; many of the new generation of trans identifying males have no sex dysphoria at all and are very happy to keep their “female penis” and clearly, visibly male appearance).

But a male who has gender dysphoria is not a female, not a woman. Women are not men who don’t fit the man mould. We are human beings in our own right, we have our own reality, that of being born and brought up biologically female, living the reality of being a biological female, not “living as a woman” - which as a concept is in itself really offensive, suggesting that women are just a bunch of walking stereotypes.

We are not a small group or an echo chamber, FFS. We are just over half the population, the ones who give birth to every new human being, the ones who carry out the ENTIRETY of reproductive labour, whose relative physical vulnerability has been used against us by the other sex, the male sex, for all of recorded history.

It is precisely because of the historic and ongoing discrimination against us on the basis of our sex that sex is a protected characteristic in the Equalities Act 2010. The UN recognises that we are a disadvantaged group ourselves:
www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/cedaw.

  • if the evidence of your own life, #metoo, the pay gap, women’s lack of reproductive rights even in the western world, the two women a week killed by male partners or former partners in the UK alone, the horrifying levels of sexual harassment and assault etc etc etc weren’t enough for you.

Any attempt to blur the lines here and replace “sex” with “gender” is flouting that section of the Equalities Act and is an anti-woman action. You’ve got to ask yourself: who benefits?

None of the women here saying they want single sex toilets benefit, that’s for sure. We, already a disadvantaged, relatively vulnerable group, are further disadvantaged and made more vulnerable.

And yes, Aridane, some men DO sexually harass/assault their female colleagues in the workplace; have you really never had any idea that that’s a thing? There are predators in every single demographic of men, men who go to great lengths to seek out opportunities to predate, men who make the most of any opportunities that may arise. How can you be ignorant of this? Have you never read the papers, watched the news?

Did you not see the example I gave upthread of the school Site Manager who installed a hidden camera in the adults’ toilet? Don’t you know that there are whole websites dedicated to this voyeurism, where men upload their footage for other men to wank over? And you want to make it EASIER for these men to do that, you want there to be EVEN MORE female victims of this crime than there are already?

Why?

What is going on with you?

CoffeeMilkNoSugar · 01/06/2019 11:07

@FiddlesticksAkimbo invaders don't have the right to be comfortable

OldCrone · 01/06/2019 11:12

I was referring to the languages and approach of the NHS on this.

Their page on GD is a disgrace given it’s speaking for the state medical system, a system you would expect to be unbiased, apolitical and based on proper medical science.

Here are some of the 'symptoms' of gender dysphoria in children from the NHS website.

disliking or refusing to wear clothes that are typically worn by their sex and wanting to wear clothes typically worn by the opposite sex

disliking or refusing to take part in activities and games that are typically associated with their sex, and wanting to take part in activities and games typically associated with the opposite sex

preferring to play with children of the opposite biological sex

Have we suddenly been transported back to the 1950s (or earlier)?

Helmetbymidnight · 01/06/2019 11:17

great post talking

SpartacusAutisticusAHF · 01/06/2019 12:11

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

MenstruatorExtraordinaire · 01/06/2019 12:12

Excellent post talking the whole gender thing is such utter regressive misogynistic and homophobic nonsense.