Is Andy Burnham reasonable to say only a small minority of women object to men being in their toilets? YABU he's right, YANBU he's wrong *titled tweaked by MNHQ at OP's request*

[SingleSexSpacesInSchools]

https://www.dailymail.com/news/article-15830845/Andy-Burnham-men-identify-women-use-female-toilets.html

'I don't think that's a majority view. I think it's a minority view and quite a small minority view, actually. But it is a view so you can't completely ignore it. Possibly they might be women who have experienced male violence at some point in their life. I don't know, that's one way of looking at it.'

But if women go through 'a lot' - say sexual abuse by men for arguments sake - they just have to suck it up and accept men in their space regardless

Wow. That sounds enlightened.

And even if they did - plenty who have have sexually assaulted people subsequently

We are the sex responsible for making it all better.

Id say there's a significant minority who dont mind (and even then it'll be context dependent) and an overwhelming majority who do.

Ah, c'mon. I have the right to drive at the speed I feel most comfortable with, right? And have a couple of alcoholic drinks first, as many as I feel comfortable with, right?

I mean, if we can ignore the law...

Yes. Lots of men are vulnerable. Doesn't render them harmless.

Duncan Bannatyne on X
"Last week I decided to throw my support behind @AndyBurnhamGM for leadership of the Labour Party and on to PM.
But I cannot do that now that I find out he says Transwomen. IE men. Should be allowed to use the ladies toilets. I can never support anyone that does this.
Biological Women must have single sex spaces"
https://x.com/i/status/2057028528776900865

Andy is not gonna win this election I think.

Again as to pp, it is lovely that you personally have no issue with using a mixed sex space (remember it's all situations, rape crisis, being searched, everything, not just 'bathrooms'). Genuinely I'm really happy for you that you have been lucky enough in your life and circumstances that you don't need this facility or understand why other women do. I hope that never changes.

When you say 'people' do you mean women too, or just men with trans identities?

Because they experience a bit more than hurtful and rude if they are not as lucky as you and cannot use a mixed sex space. There is no way to know or list all the experiences women may have had, and it's deeply personal information, but why should they be left unable to use women's spaces, toilets, changing rooms, rape crisis, refuges, etc etc because men are there? It was a bit more than 'hurtful and rude' for the women assaulted and raped in women's prisons by the men there, or the women and girls assaulted in women's toilets wasn't it? There are worse things than dealing compassionately with the anxiety of women whose stories are just as important as those of the men, when they are fearful that the person in the space where they feel vulnerable may be a man, because their experience of the world right now is that it may very well be. And it's a belief strongly surrounded by images and threats of sexual violence: did you see the series of 'your view if you're a terf in my mentions' on social media? Lots of selfies of men with gender identities in women's toilets with weapons like swords and machetes, an open threat to attack and worse if a woman dared to voice her right to a single sex space?

While men with gender identities 'use the toilet they feel more comfortable with' where's the toilet these women can be comfortable in? Where's the equality? The reciprocation? We're talking about women who are just as human as these men are, aren't we?

What's wrong with gender neutral additional options where you and other women who are fine with mixed sex can enjoy that opportunity, where men with gender identities have a space that means freedom from using sex based spaces they are not comfortable with, and we let women with issues that need a bit more understanding and thought than this, have a comfortable space too?

Bit more kindness needed.

also - even worst some of my friends (non-feminine women)

If people really couldn't tell the difference gender non-conforming women would be able to pass as men and gain male privilege. But that never seems to happen outside these stories about toilets.

Bravo to the Daily Mail publicising this at the right moment where it's being seen clearly. And bravo Duncan.

When I was a young woman pre pregnancy, sexual assault and bowel issues, I’d probably have been less concerned about public mixed sex loos or sink areas. If you are lucky enough just to use them for the odd pee, then you can be in and out without worrying about them at all (like a male). You’re quick and therefore minimise the risk of assault whether physical or on your nostrils or sensibilities!

Now I’m older and sadly wiser I see the ladies loo as a refuge and essential for existing in public. I need the loo a lot.

Over the years, I’ve observed or helped women vulnerable in different ways in the ladies loos - a colleague who suffered a fit and had clearly lost control of her bowels ( saw her arm and head under toilet door gap), a woman in a shop loo having a miscarriage (she was naked from waist down, very vulnerable and in considerable distress) and several other women washing after menopausal flooding or pregnancy sickness.

Does anyone reasonable really believe that these women don’t deserve privacy and safety from male strangers in such circumstances?

Why is this still a thing apart from to cause division. I work in a place with mix gendered toilets and it is not a problem. You can use any toilet and lock the door and you can be any gender you like. Why is this a thing?

You know when public toilets were created, they only had men’s convienences which trapped women from travelling. We have more to struggle against that the odd person who identifies as a woman relieving themselves in a public convenience.

So if a man (non trans) decides he’s most comfortable in the women’s loos then he should be able to use them?

Wish Duncan Bannatyne or similar sensible individuals who have experience of how to grow a business would stand instead of the clowns and hypocrites we get.

You know when public toilets were created, they only had men’s convienences which trapped women from travelling.

You're so close to understanding it....so close....

You could read the dozens of reasons women have given on this thread perhaps?

Yes, you're quite right. Women are objecting to men in their toilets solely to cause division.

Edited to add: Yes, your toilets are in the place that you work. So presumably you know the people there, at least by sight. And there are other people around. In the daytime.

A public toilet in a train station at 10 o clock at night with no one else around? Very different scenario.

No he isn’t. Another man speaking for women. Great.
This is why I’ll not be voting Labour. Which leaves me, and many other left of center women with no one to vote for.

@PencilsInSpace - I'm sorry I stopped reading the thread at your second post to post this.

Thank you for that perspicacious from Helen Joyce. Very well put from her.

That said I am not sure your first post "Andy Burnham can fuck right off" wasn't as valid.

sorry to trivialise - I shall get back to reading the thread now 😊

And how do these fully enclosed units work for those women I mentioned in my previous post - for epileptics etc? In mixed sex environments you need to avoid gaps below doors - this creates many health and safety issues.

And what would be the grounds for challenging him, if, like many (most?) women, he had just thrown on jeans, t-shirt, and trainers and hadn't done anything to change his appearance?

The flip side of "I don't mind let the men with lady feelz into womens spaces" that NEVER gets talked about, it the vulnerable women & girls who then feel they are perfectly fine using mens spaces.

I know teenage girls with "trans identity" who are doing this.

And the captured NHS who disregarded safeguaring entirely when they put a tiny woman with a trans identity into a mens psych ward to was raped within an hour.

None of this is legal, safe or OK, and safeguarding is being entirely ignored when gender identity gets invovled.

Well, since one in four of us experience male violence in our lives, we are talking about a very large number of women...

Well as I said before I worked in a building with only a bank of unisex loos and the women all hated it. The men left them in horrible conditions and never cleared up after themselves. The also on occasion would go in in and forget they were unisex and start peeing with the door slightly open (nothing nefarious, just thoughtlessness about who might come in to the corridor). You would sometimes see a loo where someone hadn’t come out for ages and had no idea what to do. You couldn’t hear anything through the door so couldn’t tell if anyone was moving. There were often more queues as everything had to be done in the one room rather than the efficiency of someone going to the loo and then washing their hands in the main space. Lots of reasons why communal loos are better.

Semantics. And, just because the DM says it, doesn't make it untrue. We'll have to agree to disagree.

I, too, am concerned about climate change, as I am capable of caring about more than one thing at a time. It's just not what this thread is about. Perhaps start another thread on climate change, and we can discuss it there?

As it happens, I am far more concerned with what Andy Burnham does than what he says. So, we'll see.