Public toilets and changing rooms should be redesigned to keep everyone safe

[Quinoawoman]

I propose that by changing the design of public toilets and changing rooms, we can keep everyone safe.
Pic 1 - how most public toilets are now. Small, dark doorway into dark space that can't be seen from the outside. I've often worried that there could be someone hiding in there waiting to do me harm. Would not let my daughter in there alone. Would not let my son go in the gents alone.
Pic 2 - unisex cubicles (floor to ceiling) all with an individual door onto the street. Pull open the door and see the whole space - limited room for someone to hide. Door obviously lockable from inside. No more worrying about where to send your child whose sex is different from yours.

Changing rooms could be similar - individual cubicles straight off the shop floor. No more David Lloyd-style open changing spaces where you fear dropping your towel and flashing everyone.

YABU - changing rooms and toilets are fine as they are
YANBU - changing the design would be better for everyone.

If you had to go through life dressed as the other sex and not passing so people knew - which toilet would you use?

Can you explain how this works? Why should the outfit you wear change which facilities you use? I’m wearing a grey sweatshirt and jeans - which facilities should I use? @Squamata

@RichardBarrister I have also used changing villages for years and never been assaulted. If what people have said on this thread is true - that they are dangerous for women - then does my experience, and that of millions of other women who use them, discount that?

Exactly my point, same with very small workplaces who may only have one loo for the building/unit or one loo per floor/section, etc which is used by both sexes.

Or what about having workMEN at your home, do you let them use your household loo or do you pay extra for them to hire a portaloo outside for them to use?

Well, as it has never happened, if it did the moment I opened my mouth or moved they'd know I was a woman because men and women are completely different.

You are new to this right? Feminism doesn't need to include males. Just because one person writes that it should, doesn't make it a thing.

Went to a restaurant over the weekend where the toilets are unisex. Used the loos twice, once on arrival and once before leaving after a long lunch. I was warned by one of my companions that when they'd used the facilities on a previous visit they'd encountered a man peeing in a cubicle with the door wide open. I didn't have to face that but both times I had to put the seat down and both times the loo hadn't been flushed. The toilets weren't noticeably dirty but there was a smell — not one you get in the Ladies.

I want separate toilet facilities for men and women and I won't be spending my money at this establishment again.

"Address the problem...mens violence!"
Exactly! The risk to trans women in male toilets/prisons = men. The risk to people in unisex toilets = men. The risk to women and girls all through history = men.

Ha!! Mate, I’ll start focusing on solving the problem of male rape, when women aren’t raped in such high numbers and society ISNT willing to increase risk to them to try and prevent the tiny number of men being raped.

Talk about male supremacy.

Males have toilets designed for them. With urinals and seperate cubicles. There is no need for any of them to go into a female toilet. If any toilets need to be made mixed sex, those would be the ones to change the sign on the door.

PROBLEM SOLVED.

Why is that an issue that women should solve?

This is ridiculous. If I have workmen in and they don't flush or they pee all over the seat I'll have a word with them and put a stop to it. Same for male family members. It's nothing like walking into a mixed-sex loo in a cafe or a pub and finding urine on the floor and the seat, or the seat left up and the loo not flushed.

No, I am not new to feminism, and just because it hasn't happened to you, it doesn't mean it hasn't happened. www.refinery29.com/amp/en-gb/bathroom-transphobia-butch-women

Just because someone has an opposing view to you, it does not mean that it is any less valid.

Well indeed, here we are worrying about keeping ourselves safe when rape and sexual abuse is at a high and convictions so low, when we should be focused on protecting the tiny number of men who are vulnerable 🥺
BAD WOMEN!

I’m a woman, I am not automatically a victim of anyone or anything. Neither are my daughters. I hate this bloody narrative, yes there are vulnerable people out there, but that is not everyone with an X chromosome.
I object to sharing loos with men because they leave the seat up and piss on the floor, transwomen probably don’t do this so I have no problem with sharing a public loo quite honestly.

Overriding boundaries, deception and tearing apart the scant safeguarding measures we do have are not inherently part of being trans. If you actually stop and think about it, it is extremely transphobic to suggest they are.

This is recent. Transexuals used to have actual dysphoria and on the whole fought for rights as trans people. Many did not use opposite sex facilities and they were very few in number.

Trans rights activism has been hijacked by people whose aims are more in line with men's rights activism. I know current culture has made it difficult to admit this. But seriously, arguments such as "what's stopping men from going into single sex toilets anyway" display a worrying lack of understanding of how safeguarding policies and norms work. Ask yourself this: why is it culturally acceptable in the UK to campaign for single sex toilets for women in rural India who risk rape going to the toilet outside at night? But it's not culturally acceptable to campaign for single sex toilets in the UK. Are western men inherently less inclined to rape? Is that really what you think?

It's not male supremacy. We need to make toilets safer FOR ALL. Part of that is tacking poor/illegal behaviour in ANY setting which is down to reporting suspicious activity, police actually doing something about it, etc.

There are arguments for AND against segregation just as their are for AND against unsegregated facilities. Perhaps we need "Best Practice" for both types, i.e. better lighting, CCTV in communal areas, better layout, better maintenance (i.e. working locks etc).

When you’re willing to increase risk to women in order to decrease risk to men, when men are already at a lower risk, that’s male supremacy.

Someone on another thread said they wouldn't mind being covertly filmed and posted on porn sites by a male so long as they keep TW safe from harm in men's loos.

It's bloody ridiculous the lengths to which TRAs expect women to subjugate to appease men. Many of whom have fetishes and who are emboldened by the fact that they are able to call women bigots for having boundaries.

It's just fucking appalling. And every woman who goes along with this should have a good look at themselves. Why should women have to lower their boundaries to appease any male?

Women wanting safety and dignity isn’t being a victim🙄

Nice way to shame any women who do care about their and their daughters safety though.

Good for you, others have not been as fortunate.

The issue is not just safety but also the privacy and dignity of the women using the facilities. Why should women who have previously been assaulted, frightened, intimidated or coerced have their safe space compromised? Why should women who cannot share with men for religious reasons have their available resources removed?

If your argument is that trans women are not a threat then the UK evidence suggests that trans identified males offend at the same rate as other males.

We can all raise our male children not to rape anyone without being a male supremacist.

Great, let’s do that first then, then we can talk about toilets.