Thread 2: Why can't people respect the rules around toilets!?!?

[Underbudget]

Darn it the thread filled and I wanted to ask @tandora a question. Is this within site rules to start another to do this as I don't seem to be able to tag her? Feel free to report/delete if it is.

Previous thread here: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5372111-why-cant-people-respect-the-rules-around-toilets?page=1

'Tandora · Today 07:51

Eh? Mental health is everyone’s concern that’s why we have a health system.

No one’s rights come “first”- we need to find solutions that respect everyone’s rights.

There is no “female suffering” involved in respecting and including trans people. It will have virtually no impact on your life whatsoever.'

I wondered @Tandora if you'd read my post earlier on that thread, where in my head, children's rights come first? As the basic premise of child protection?

My post (in response to a different poster) if you missed it, was this:

Underbudget · Today 00:51

Slow to reply and expect thread has moved on, but surely you can empathise with a girl victim of csa feeling terrifed at finding themselves alone with a very male bodied person in a public loo between them and the door? Why does that child's feelings mean less than the adult males?
And what if that particular male bodied person WAS a rapist? That people saw entering from the outside but didn't want to "offend" by challenging them. And a child was born from a child as a result?
Doesn't a child's right to safety and protection come before ANY adult's feelings? Especially when a child can be born from rape as a result? As could ONLY happen to a female?
Fellow survivor of CSA here so I can understand you may have issues in thinking around this. I have spent years in therapy due to being overtrusting because my boundaries were fucked.'

I genuinely want to be in a place where all rights are respected, but I can't personally process this risk in any way that makes sense to me. I simply cannot agree with or process that allowing a male bodied person, unsupervised access to a child victim of CSA in a vulnerable space, whether a real or a perceived risk, does not harm that child. As a male, they are not being discriminated against on the basis of their sex, as ALL males are excluded from that situation, rightfully so. No right minded person believes all males are rapists, just as and no right minded person believes all transwomen are. But some of both ARE and that's a fact. I accept that a trans person may feel excluded from having their social transition recognised by not being allowed in the single sex spaces of the gender of their choosing, but equally, a girl in that situation also feels distressed. Why does that adults discomfort trump the discomfort felt by the child? A trans person deserves somewhere safe to go to the loo, but that's not in the women's loos. If that protects just one single child from reliving horrific trauma or worse, then that's what has to happen.

I would truly like to understand your view, ideally in a way that acknowledges the trauma of a child in this situation.

I imagine they are doing it over the summer holiday in direct response to the SC judgement and the subsequent EHRC guidance.

My understanding of the SC judgement was that it created single sex spaces, not removed them? Apologies if I have that wrong.

It confirmed that sex in the Equality Act means biological sex so any single sex female toilets must only be used by females

OK. I believe that transwomen are men. Because I don't believe in a thing called gender that transcends sex, and I don't believe that sex can be changed. However, I accept that there are some men who entirely reject their maleness and either strongly desire to be, or genuinely believe they are, women, and that their wellbeing and happiness is tied up in 'being' women. This is what I think (some) transwomen are. A subset of the biological class of men, who are different from other men in as much as they dont want to be men so have decided to live in a way they associate with being women. So yes, I do think these people are a 'category' of people that exist.

“Would you like to answer my question now as to whether you are willing to find a word - any word - ANY - that recognises trans women as a distinct and meaningful category of persons?”

Totally happy to answer this. Transwomen are Transidentifying men. They are a subset of men and deserve all the same rights and responsibilities as all the other men.

Trans identifying women have the same rights and responsibilities as other women.

Are these differences such that it is reasonable and proportionate to exclude trans women from all and every woman's space

Yes, because men don't need women's spaces as they have reasonably and proportionately been designed to facilitate women, not men.

How is that justified?

Because they are men.

What will be the impacts of that?

They will carry on using the male facilities that they used the whole of the rest of their lives up until the point they said 'I'm a woman'.

The question is - are these differences such that it is reasonable and proportionate to exclude trans women from all and every woman's space. How is that justified? What will be the impacts of that? Those are the questions we need to answer.

Yes - I believe it is, for the same reasons that is reasonable and proportionate to exclude men from all and every woman's space.
If trans women are a third group, then that group should also be excluded, just like men are.

They cant if its in the UK and has over 25 staff

It provision based on sex and staff head count and location.

If you cant access it eg management floor is off limits except to management thats not providing for you.

https://www.hse.gov.uk/contact/faqs/toilets.htm

It didn't create single sex spaces, it clarified that when the words 'sex', 'women' and 'men' appear in the Equalities Act 2010, these words refer to sex 'at birth' (regardless of legal gender).

The EHRC then produced some draft guidance further interpreting/ elaborating on the implications of the judgement for service providers. That guidance has just gone through a consultation and is currently under review. If it is approved by parliament it will become statutory (law).

The guidance interprets the SC judgement as establishing an obligation on service providers to ensure that in all cases where service providers have separate facilities for men and women, they must enforce restriction of these services by "birth sex". (Although providers may also exclude individuals who have undergone gender reassignment from facilities provided for their birth sex).

This obligation will put service providers in a tricky position, as they will some how have to work out how to enforce the exclusion of trans women from women's spaces , and trans men from men's spaces (and also some times from women's spaces), in a non discriminatory way. If they fail to do this, they open themselves up to legal action. No one can work out how they are supposed to do this.

So - long and short - if the EHRC guidance becomes law the rational, risk-adverse option for providers wanted to avoid potential discrimination claims and legal action will be to designate all their facilities mixed sex.
(There are generally no obligations to providers to provide 'single sex' services , apart from in schools and workplaces who do have to ensure sufficient single sex provision, but this can be done also through the establishment of single room toilets with a lockable door that can be used by anyone).

There is a problem with toilets and safety though, because of the design.

When you can’t rely on single sex toilets being single sex the design becomes private.
You have got to think about the reality. The reality is children are safer in single sex toilet cubicles with door gaps. It provides a degree of supervision which will ensure they are less likely to come to harm.

I would argue (and I can back this up with real life cases) that there are dangers that affect children at their most vulnerable in toilets. Children have died, and children have been sexually assaulted in toilets - it’s the cubicle/room privacy that is the problem. No assaulter wants his assault to be witnessed.

Toilet dangers includes: children being led or pushed back into a cubicle (this is why there is a rightful exception for young boys to go into cubicles with a female carer); children with invisible disabilities having medical emergencies; children having mental health crises; children being used in organised sex crime with public toilets as their base; children taking drugs; children having sex with each other; hidden cameras viewing children.

In addition closed cubicles have medically been proven to contain more surface microbes and more pathogens in the air due to decreased ventilation - medically vulnerable children are most at risk.

The health and safety reasons for single sex toilets haven’t changed. These were the reasons to not make toilets outside the home not completely private before.

In 2008 in a comprehensive cross party government report on public toilets which covered all sorts on issues factually, including from gay perspectives, there was no mention of gender neutral toilets.

For the health and safety of everyone we should use the safest designs. Particularly vulnerable children.

Look at this picture. The design on the left is only regulated to be single sex design. If there’s any ambiguity, the designs become private like the ones on the right.

Just as a refresher, the only reason that men started using female single sex spaces such as toilets, was because back in the day, the doctors who were approving 'sex changes' insisted that men had to 'live as a woman' for a number of years and that meant transgressing female spaces and reporting back that nobody had challenged them.

Without ever stopping to think that the reason women won't challenge men in female spaces was the fear of reprisal. The doctors didn't give one single thought for the women in this equation.

The lack of challenge was taken as them 'passing' and formed part of the 'living as a woman' criteria.

If you want to provide a single sex service or facility you need to consider whether this is a proportionate response to achieve a legitimate aim. Separation by sex in places where people will be in a state of undress is always a legitimate aim.

If you decide there is then that single sex service then it can only be used by people of that sex

You don't need a reason for barring transwomen from female single sex services as they are barred already by law. A female single sex provision can only be used by females

What is your version of a lockable door?

It's not "my version", I was stating the law to explain it to that pp.

Ok what would you imagine a lockable door to be?
Would you expect that no one could open it from the outside easily?

Transwomen know they are female.

No they don't. They know perfectly well that they're male.

What I would like to understand from you is if you accept that there is any difference at all between a "transwoman" and a "man"?

They are biologically identical.
Transwomen are men, so there's no difference.

It doesn't matter what "I imagine". Why are you asking me this? It sets it out in the law. I'm not saying I agree with it one way or the other, I was just explaining to that pp the position that service providers are in.

Tandora doesn't understand the law.

The Equality Act says that you cannot discriminate against any protected characteristic unless there is an exception in the Act.

If there were no single sex exceptions it would be impossible to provide a female only toilet as that would be unlawful discrimination against men.

The single sex exceptions state that if there is a legitimate reason for discrimination on the basis of sex then you can do so.

So either you don't use the single sex exceptions and offer completely mixed sex toilets or you use them and offer female only and male only toilets (plus single user unisex in addition if you want to)

What the Act doesn't allow you to do is have toilets for females and some men whilst excluding other men. This means you can't offer a toilet only for use by females plus transwomen

What I would like to understand from you is if you accept that there is any difference at all between a "trans woman" and a "man"?

That’s slightly awkward to answer @Tandora , because it’s essentially squares and rectangles. All square are rectangles, not all rectangles are square.

All transwomen are men. They are a particular subset of men who share a characteristic of wishing to present (or be perceived) as if they were women,

This characteristic means they would like certain additional provisions from society. That can include access to spaces to get changed away from other men, hormone or cosmetic surgery to alter their appearance, and to join social groups set up for and by women.

Society decides how reasonable it would be to agree to this. Space away from other men seems perfectly reasonable, as long as it is an additional space to the existing single sex facilities. It absolutely shouldn’t be taking women’s spaces and giving them to transwomen.

With regards to other facilities for women, that is more complicated. Many women go to the women only session at a leisure centre (for example) because their religion requires activities to be separate by sex. Many go because as survivors of violence and sexual abuse by men, they only feel safe and relaxed in women only spaces. Many just want a break from being around male people.

If one transwoman attends, all those women lose out. That’s clearly unfair. So transwomen can use the mixed sex resources if they self-select out of male facilities. They can absolutely set up groups and spaces for transwomen to have for themselves, excluding other men and women, but they can’t have those things set up for women.

Does that answer your question properly?

Under building regulations, the door has to be easily opened from the outside, outwards. This is because so many people collapse inside public toilets that it’s a way of retrieving a body.
For example, 11% of cardiac arrests happen on the loo.
It’s obvious in a way because where do you rush to when you feel ill? And the process of elimination puts more strain on the body.

I believe that transwomen are men. Because I don't believe in a thing called gender that transcends sex, and I don't believe that sex can be changed.

Right. So this requires a larger conversation about what 'gender' and 'sex' are. But that aside for now..

However, I accept that there are some men who entirely reject their maleness and either strongly desire to be, or genuinely believe they are, women, and that their wellbeing and happiness is tied up in 'being' women. This is what I think (some) transwomen are. A subset of the biological class of men, who are different from other men in as much as they dont want to be men so have decided to live in a way they associate with being women. So yes, I do think these people are a 'category' of people that exist.

OK great.

So now at least we can have a conversation.

I would not agree with your preferred use of language, because I think it's offensive, BUT it doesn't really matter what words we use here, for the purposes of you and I being able to have a meaningful conversation.

As long as you agree that there is a subset of trans people who can be distinguished from a broader group of not trans people, we can have a conversation about what is reasonable and proportionate in terms of policy arrangements and why. There are a lot of mumsnetters who won't even accept this and several who have already stated so on this thread. With those pps it's impossible to have a conversation.

Nope what I wrote is factual.

You have expanded that with your interpretation of the SC judgement, which also aligns with the interpretation in the draft EHRC guidance which is not yet law.

The SC judgement does not specify this interpretation - it has not been tested in law.

OK. And?

@Tandora- didn't quote you and didn't want you to miss my response - am enjoying our conversation

Which bit of my explanation is wrong?

Does the Equality Act permit discrimination on the basis of sex if one of the exceptions is not used. Yes or no?

Do the single sex exemptions refer to sex. Yes or no?

Did the supreme court rule that sex in the Equality Act means biological sex. Yes or no?