Apparently today is the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia...
That's marked on the 17th of May, which was yesterday. Mine was very good, thanks.
I wonder what you will do for the other two parts since this has nothing on Homophobia or Biphobia.
I shall do my part, so here are a few things that might help others to understand better.
The issue around toilets has nothing to do with 'understanding better', but people having different opinions on how to deal with the complex issues around toilets. It's not actually as simply as everyone needs to piss so let everyone in.
In short, why aren't all public toilets individual and completely private?
Because they take up more space and there isn't the funding or enough support by those who have the power to change at this time for most places to bother. They also tend to require a bit more vigilance as single unit ones tend to be targeted more by those who damage toilets. The privacy seems to raise the risk of that, which is why the RADAR key system came into place for accessibility toilets.
The issue isn't only "individual and completely private", it's also where the toilets are placed. If the toilet is put in the most out of way place for "privacy", as is too common, it means if there is an issue that someone needs to "do something about", it's actually very difficult to get help to do something about it.
I've more than once thought in a public toilet that if I were attacked or collapsed or had any other emergency, I would be fucked, no signal and no real way of knowing when I might have been found. As someone who has actually dealt with someone trying to kill me, that is my concern in public toilets and why I generally avoid them.
Trans people aren't thinking about what's down there on other people or anything like that (only perverts are).
Some trans people are perverts - those aren't mutually exclusive groups. Also, some men pretend to be trans women and some of those are also perverts.
No matter how people identify, mixed sex spaces are riskier and have a higher rate of issues than single sex spaces. There are ways to mitigate that and even to make single sex ones safer, with different people having different opinions on the best route - they all have pros and cons - but it's by focusing on how to mitigate problems and getting actual support that it's important, not by telling people everyone pisses so it doesn't matter.
With that in mind, I propose we rename it to "gender-diverse" (like "neuro-diverse"), because "diverse" seems like such a good word at the moment, right?
Gender diverse is already used to describe groups and individuals who do not identify as trans and/or who do not use the current Western model of gender that...let's say 'have an atypical gender presentation for their sex in the culture they're in' for lack of better wording. Depending on what you read, you may come across "trans and gender diverse people" or people talking specifically about gender diverse people around the world to discuss groups that don't use the trans/cis model of gender. It's not an identity, and it's not something anyone I know who uses it wants to become an identity - it's just a handy description.
It's actually really important to acknowledge that not every culture keeps to the trans/cis binary model, that there are other ways of viewing gender and sex roles and gender dysphoria, and not everyone even with gender dysphoria in Western societies identifies as trans (most dysphoric people don't go the medical route, focusing on that isn't helpful to many, it can be harmful).
Saying trans people exist "everywhere" is to colonise the entire world into your model. You might view all gender diverse people and/or all people with gender dysphoria as trans, I've definitely seen it before with people who think everyone should fit into that model, but that's the ideology talking, not actually looking at the 'diverse' reality of the many perspectives on these.
Neurodiverse is a controversial term within communities related to that term. That's kinda the thing - no model on this is going to be universal. Even with sexualities, we can discuss them on a population level based on the sexes, much like trans/cis can be useful to discuss things on a population level, but talking to individuals, there are always those that identify very differently to definitions the Ivory Tower puts on them.
To a society that at present, partly excludes you at best, and at worst tries to kill you. A society where your rights and existence are denied, where people don't believe you, and you spend a long time waiting in uncertainty.
Again, you are universalizing something that isn't. In the UK, thankfully, the risks of a trans person being killed is far less than many other groups and it's pretty harmful to young people particularly to think they're at a high risk of being killed. While it is at times difficult to uphold our rights with the legal system as it is, trans people have the same basic rights and there isn't anyone in power really denying trans people exist.
That's the thing - yes, it's well known many on MN don't like trans women or anyone male in the women's loo -- but no one in power is really stopping that so why harp on about it? Is it really that important to try to get us to be happy about it? To get us all under the same ideals that it's just a toilet, ignoring the many other uses of that space for many women? To get us all under the same trans/cis perspective?
Speaking of uncertainty, trans people have one thing to thank covid-19 for: every single person in the world now knows what it is like to have their live on hold for a long period of time, faced with uncertainties in a situation far beyond their control, in a system that is not prepared to deal with them. Now you all have an understanding of what it is like emotionally to be trans (though without the gender bit)
I've heard this a bit in chronic illness circles - that people now have an idea what it's like to be us, I see it a bit better there as it's comparing not being able to leave the house and having to work around that & how isolating that often is & fatigue around medical concerns that can set in, but we can't universalize the emotional experience of the pandemic or of trans people or of being bed/housebound. I get the appeal of universalising it or even discussing it at a population level which will always have generalizations, but no, individuals have all experienced these differently so no, not 'all' of anyone has the experience of being trans, because trans people don't have the same expeience and neither have all people during the pandemic.
It isn't the body part between your legs that makes a person a danger to society.
Sex traits involve far more than the body part between your legs, and having dealt with many violent women all my life, including assault by penetration and an attempt on my life, I can still see that males are most likely to perpetuate violence and that mixed sex spaces are proven time and again to have more issues.
I don't see the point in ignoring that, I guess it's the easier option which leaves our public facilities worse for the lack of effort put into them.