To think mixed sex toilet provision has proven to be a flop?

[BlooDeBloop]

Now been a few years since mixed sex toilets have been widely available in all kinds of public spaces from schools to offices to theatres. The water has been tested. AIBU to think the results have been dismal?

I'm prompted to post this as my Y7 boy holds on all day at school as the toilets are filthy. His friend has seen a girl sitting on a toilet. My younger daughter won't use the toilets in a burger chain because adult men have used it or may come in behind her. I had the same experience in a pizza chain restaurant (one neutral, one disabled, one male I kid you not). Art centre I use had one mixed sex toilet that is filthy and everyone uses the public toilets outside on the street that are separate sex still.

I'm told mixed sex toilets are now widespread in secondary schools. How is that being received? Haven't some schools reverted?

Seems to me a major issue is human biology. Men find urinals easier than toilets. Women need sit down facilities and sinks to wash in private.

I’m perfectly happy to use the ‘one room’ closed unisex toilets they have in things like Starbucks. One in, one out type arrangement. Hygiene isn’t my issue, as most public toilets are questionable in that regard.

But I will not and do not use mixed toilets where there is a communal area and multiple cubicles for unisex use.

I don’t feel comfortable in those spaces. As a female, I want complete dignity and privacy from men when I’m using the toilet. I want the same for my teenage daughter.

"They should be banned outright in public spaces, workplaces, schools and the like. The only time a woman should have to use a toilet that a man has used should be in a private home."

Accessible toilets need to be mixed sex.

They are awful. Unsafe and unfair.

All the money that is wasted on this when our public services are stetched. The old system where people of the same sex had somewhere to go where they knew who would be in there. Where the toilets with an main room with sinks and space to get changed or clean up without wiping your trailing hems on a grubby toilet in a tiny space and where if taken ill, or needing help you could be aided, and whrere you could park a buggy or ask a child to wait for you with a foot tucked under your toilet door so you could keep tabs on them (I've done that!) and where the actual toilet cublical space was not entirely closed in so staff (in schools, or cafes or pubs) could monitor both safety and misbehaviour - trysts, smoking, drug taking, truanting class, whatever... well this system has worked ok for deades.

The changes have been ill thought out and need reversing.

I don't encounter them many places, mostly just coffee shops and small restaurants. Never had an issue with them. Only time I saw them truly come into their own was seeing the men having to queue at a pub, was hilarious - they confidently walked towards the loos realised they were unisex and had to retreat to the back of the substantial queue (special event on) we women were giggling but the men had great hygiene I should add, toilets were spotless despite constant use

It was wrong right from the very beginning. WRONG on so many levels.

Btw the bullying in the girls toilets was terrible when we were at school, I never used them, too scared

Interesting. I went to a band last night in an arts centre. I'd guess it was half and half women/men in the 200+ audience. The centre had men only, disabled only and then gender neutral. The gender neutral one I went into had three enclosed loos with washbasins. I had no problem with it at all, apart from timing. I'm a fast turn around sort of woman - in and out in a minute - but women tend to take longer. The queues were awful and a shame for those who desperately need to go. It wasn't so much the gender neutral - just the age-old problem of not enough enclosed loos for women. There were trans people there but no problems - just a hit on the space for women.

Unfortunately I was sexually assaulted in a public toilet as a teenager (by a member of the opposite sex) and ever since I've been quite afraid of using even women's public toilets when there aren't other women around. Mixed sex public toilets terrify me unless they're very busy with lots of witnesses. If I had been at school with mixed sex toilets I would have held it all day too. It's just the worst idea and one that really isn't supportive of sex abuse victims in particular.

@2bazookas

So true, my home bathrooms are unisex, our ensuite is spotless as dp is housetrained and I prefer to clean little and often however the upstairs bathroom is not, that is used exclusively by my dd and his dd, supposedly adults.

Some women aren't clean

The staff who suddenly appear to be able to supervise these mixed sex toilets should surely be available to also supervise the single sex to ensure theres no bullying.

Its almost as if they want single sex loos to "fail" 🤔

The options should not be filthy unsupervised single sex and cctv and staff and regularly cleaned mixed. Either everyone thinks mixed sex is better therfore all things being equal, cleanliness , stocks of sanpro, supervision and being unlocked etc the unisex will still be chosen. Or everyone knows they are shot and effectively have to blackmail everyone into using them by sabotaging the alternatives and making them them as unpleasant as possible.

Our offices at work 12 floors refurbished all toilets - alternate men and women on each floor. Our floor was women, all good. Some people put flowers in ours and free sanpro and help yourself to unwanted soaps cosmetics etc. All lovely.
Our floor was then changed to mixed for 'reasons'. Vast majority of women stopped using them. Men took over. I'm quite arsey so I did use them from time to time, men would actually look shocked as they had practically forgotten they were mixed as NO WOMEN USED THEM. The lino quickly degraded. They were soon disgusting.
But we complained that women now had unequal provision and they are now women's again. The lino had to be changed.

YANBU. Most men and boys are not comfortable with this either.

@Abhannmor Very true!

So men could use the mens and the mixed sex but women only had three mixed available?

That seems a) unfair that men get single sex but women don’t and b) ridiculous distribution of resources because women need more toilet provision than men, not less. We do more things in there and take longer due to our anatomy.

I ring ahead all venues now as I don’t appreciate such blatant unfairness and discrimination against women.

Ds 18 HATES the mixed sex toilets at school. He feels uncomfortable coming out of a cubicle right next to an 11 yr old girl. There is no sound proofing and mixed sink area.

Just this.

I really hate the mixed sex toilets where they are fully self-contained with a sink, but all coming off a corridor or hall which is separated from the main area with a door.

Creeps me out standing there not knowing if a man is going to be occupying that enclosed space with me, with no witnesses.

Another one I hate is in a restaurant where the male and female toilets are side by side, but open to a shared sink with a suspended two-sided mirror dangling above mirror-image taps.

So nerve wracking if you are on your period and a bloke might see the blood circling the plug hole.

Also, the thing about pee on the seats. I have never experienced the same phenomenon in women’s loos. Sometimes I assume mothers/female carers don’t bother cleaning up after young boys using the ladies - but other than that, no. Mixed sex loos are grim and you need to wipe down the seat first 100% of the time. And a quick glance to check for hidden cameras. And the queues are even worse because a lot of blokes don’t even realise there are urinals nearby and use the former ladies.

Both my DH and my DS sit down to pee. DS almost all the time and DH if it's dark. They don't seem to find it hard at all.

My oldest's high school has just installed a panic button in every mixed sex cubicle. Make of that what you will

Omg

So on one hand school buildings are crumbling, kids arent given books and theres limits on how much photo copying and printing teachers can do because of the cost of ink/supplies. And every school has a parents association/friends of set up where bake sales, mufti days etc are all run to raise money fir basic supplies.

But there's money for gender neutral toilets and panic buttons.

Goodness. Rather good proof mixed sex provision is a disaster! Why oh why are we imposing this on our children when as adults we would refuse, and where the hell is the money for it all? As far as I'm aware none of the reasons actually given for installing MST include saving money

WE are not imposing this. The vast majority of people (male and female) do NOT want shared toilets.

This is being imposed on us, and on our children and young people, by people in positions of power who are acting illegally!

I find it hard to believe that you've used spotlessly clean toilets on public transport . You must have low standards for a clean toilet

Well as your asking, we would love to have our single sex
Sports
Hospital wards
Prisons "see anything about Isla whatsisface"
Changing rooms and anything else that used to be single sex.
Cos yanno that worked just fine.

Now you cant even shop (primark I'm looking at you) without a man trying to enter your space while your trying on clothes.

Women are being gaslighted about being raped on a hospital ward as "no men were on the ward" she must have been lying.
Womens sports are going to be decimated, even if we end this influx into womens sports right now, theres a lot of damage already caused.
Rape crisis centres, run by men, not even kidding here. You want group counselling you better be prepared to do it with a man or two in the room. Ask for women only groups, you are the bigot. In rape counselling ffs, one place you do not want a man in any gender.

And more and more

Here's a very good thread
www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/3348290-It-will-never-happen-resource-thread?page=30&reply=123109522