What do you use the womens’ toilets for?

[FancyRibbon]

Inspired by recent posts on the Radio 4 thread.
I realised that the whole ‘Why do you even care who is pissing in the cubicle next to you?’ argument against single sex toilets underestimates how I think many women actually do use/need the ladies’.

It’s not just about the cubicle being private to you as an individual woman (though this is really important), it’s also about knowing there is a door behind which there is a women-only space that can be really important. Some of that is specifically about it NOT being a male space.

So eg what I use the women’s toilets for is:

• pissing, crapping, dealing with periods, POAS
• a place to cry especially at work when you don’t want anyone else to see
• a place to go and just sit and feel exhausted because your baby is not sleeping and you’re back at work

-as above washing and drying breastmilk leaks on clothes which involving standing about with some stuff off

• a place to sort out falling down tights and gappy shirts, -against adjusting/taking off clothes possibly while checking in a mirror
• somewhere to talk to other women privately knowing men won’t be around
• in bars and clubs, a place to get away from male hassle

I just don’t want to share women’s toilets with men. Self ID will be making that not my choice any more. I feel that I won’t be able to just avoid gender neutral toilets and look for a women’s any more, because women’s toilets won’t exist and campaigning for them will be hate speech.

Idontdowindows

True.

But I think there are bigger issues in all of this. Prisons, women’s shelters, swimming pools.
There is only one issue. Women's right to safety and dignity.

I don’t see the issue with a trans woman who has no penis being in a ladies toilet. I can see the issue when that trans woman still has a penis, however.

So, how do we check?

@Datun argh "midge gender"
= typing when cross after red wine.

Sorry, I cannot give you any more info on the Hurricane Katrina incident because it was on one of the temporary message boards we had set up for coordinating relief efforts.

Hospitals are being cautioned on how to speak to patients (ex. chest feeding/pregnant person).

I’ve mentioned this on here before but my ex-colleague was cautioned by a medical student not to ask a patient when they last menstruated as it was problematic.

Thanks though thebewilderness I hadn’t heard about this and I am utterly shocked.

We have an all people loo at work with a lock on the loo cubicle and a lock on the door between the corridor and the sink/bin area. No problem. I always lock the corridor door. I wouldn’t want to share larger loos and washing facilities with men.

I have slept/passed out on the floor of a loo after taking painkillers for crashing period pain. I have also taken painkillers and water to a colleague on the floor of a work loo who was in a terrible state and sat with her until she recovered enough.

Last week I discovered that I didn’t even like sharing a corridor with a man I didn’t know, much less a loo.

I came out of my office at the end of the day and shut the door behind me. A bloke came through the door from the stairs (at the top of an old building). I tensed slightly. He was a nice/NAMALT man and lowered his gaze and turned and walked to the office down the corridor.

One evening DH and I were out walking dogs near woods at dusk. DH said he felt spooked and gripped the dog leads in his hand. I asked him what he was afraid of and he said, “Badgers.” I laughed and he asked what I was frightened of in the dark. “Men,” I said.

I’ve mentioned this on here before but my ex-colleague was cautioned by a medical student not to ask a patient when they last menstruated as it was problematic

And a medical student can't see how not knowing when a female last menstruated is problematic?

That approach puts women and foetuses at risk. I've lost count of the number of times I've been asked "could you be pregnant?" By HCP's; emergency responders, dentists, Drs, pharmacists.... It's an essential piece of knowledge prior to many, if not most, treatment.

This is evidence that women and children are at risk NOW; not in some hypothetical future after consultations and legislation. This is scary.

Eek that’s a bit difficult - periods are a pretty important part of health. I’ve been asked if I “take periods” by HCPs not as a gender issue, but to get round the (delicate) possibility of being in the menopause at 21. I guess there are ways of phrasing things to avoid offence but to avoid completely is crazy. And dangerous.

This is evidence that women and children are at risk NOW; not in some hypothetical future after consultations and legislation. This is scary.

It’s not really evidence though, is it. It sounds like one individuals misguided attempt at inclusion - it’s not exactly widespread.

It sounds like one individuals misguided attempt at inclusion - it’s not exactly widespread.

Well, that's ok then, isn't it? Because it'll only be the patients in contact with that individual who are at risk.

What scares me is that this was a student Dr - the HCP who is usually charged with the menial task of taking a medical history. If this individual student is conscientiously objecting and refuses to ask any medical questions that relate to the patients SEX, then I think it's fair to say that those parents are at risk.

I think the general phrasing I used in my old job goes thus

“Do you have regular periods? Is there any chance you could be pregnant? Do you remember when you last had a period?”

Those are pretty basic questions, that ideally would need to be asked with minimal fuss and without alienating or confusing language. And an inability to answer the pregnancy one or last period could lead to delay in necessary treatment. How could it be phrased any better?

Trying to get my breathing under control when my ptsd is triggered (caused by rape...and the last thing I need is an Adam's apple anywhere near me at that point).
Periods, they aren't particularly heavy but I have had accidents including getting blood on the floor/my hands.
Cleaning up leaking breakmilk/colostrum (still got 2 months to go in this pregnancy and already leaking, I hate my body).
Vomiting/retching with morning sickness.

As a HCP I was asked for advice on alcohol consumption by a trans women. We added up units they consumed weekly and then looked up recommend weekly units for men.

The patient who was reasonable did not object because she has a male liver. In this case the recommended units are higher for men so it was an easier target.

Of course I was not misgendering her. I used her preferred pronouns etc. I respected her chosen gender but she hasn’t changed her sex and I have to offer care accordingly.

Well if it’s one person...yes. There’s no point getting up in arms about it because the chances are that individual will be re-educated very swiftly. If it was across the board and an actual rule of course it should be challenged. But it’s clearly not. It’s also anecdotal - it could be completely wrong or for a specific reason out of context isn’t obvious.

As you see on here often, individual teachers, HCPs, Just people say or do things incorrectly every so often. It’s not worth getting hysterical over when there is no evidence that there’s a wide spread issue of women not being asked if they’re having periods.

If it's body dysmophia, why make their lives harder?

Why make the lives of many, many women harder to ease the suffering of a small percentage of men?

A massive proportion of men under the trans umbrella do not have body dysmorphia and become very angry at the suggestion that its a part of being trans. They call trans people with gender dysphoria who argue with them 'true scum'. Those men are mostly autogynephiles, who are sexually aroused by dressing as women, acting as women and being in women's spaces among women - the more intimate and women's only the space, the bigger the thrill. Under self ID any woman or girl is available as a non consenting prop in their fetish in public changing rooms and toilets. How is this ok?

This vulnerable (adult) person for example is addressing a 15 year old girl who he felt disrespected by. Does this seem like someone who should be welcomed into women and girls' private spaces?

If it's body dysmophia, why make their lives harder?
Why not? Why should they not be discommoded by their own problems?
We are all discommoded by our own problems. Why are these men the exception?

If he had not told you he was a woman you would swear this was an extremely crude male dominance display.

Lobster you are of course right, that this could be a one off and, if there wasn’t a huge social (and legal) pressure out there to accept that transwomen are in fact women then I would agree that there is no need to worry. However, that is not the situation we are in and all these small anecdotal examples are what forms the larger picture. It is that larger picture that causes the concern.

Is there to be nowhere women can escape the male gaze, other than the home? There is almost no half-minute in which a woman in public is not self-checking her appearance, posture, language, etc., because we are socialized to internalize the male gaze

That is so hyperbolic. There are sound reasons for retaining single sex spaces in some circumstances but the levels of hyperbole on here don't help.

What do I use public loos for? Bodily functions behind a locked door. I would not be undressed in front of anyone. I don't like cubicles with gaps so ground to floor cubicles entered off a corridor would be my preferred option.

I find it depressing that so many women are saying they would be embarrassed at the idea of someone hearing a tampon wrapper being opened. There is nothing to be embarrassed about .

yes it did cross my mind about controlling partners following into the bathroom but then I know for a fact that this happens anyway regardless of the 'women only' public toilets.

And whoever it was that told me to fuck off... right back at u AND the horse u rode in on!! I have been raped multiple times and was beaten from the age of 16 to 19 wen I managed to escape so don't u fucking dare accuse me of having no empathy!!

Christ some1 sed up thread about woman not having to explain their reasons but it's blatantly obvious that only applies to woman who agree with your opinion seeing as I've been accused of alsorts from being a man to having no empathy

Kneedeepinunicorns

That screenshot

Lass
We live in a society where until very recently women were not encouraged to talk about their periods, so shy away from their bodily functions. It is ingrained in our sex to feel shame about them so I can totally see why a rustle of a tampon wrapper would embarrass women.

I also do not want to alert men to a portion of my body being naked.
I still remember boys at school pulling pads and tampons out of our bags and running around laughing and drawing on them with red pen. I hate the thought of my daughters experiencing a more intense form of humiliation than that.

My issue wouldn’t be sharing with a transwoman with a GRC, my issue would be opening up the space to anyone who identifies as a woman and uses that to do whatever the fuck they want and then claim “I have every right to be here”.
I have a really, really big problem with that because I was assaulted by a man on a maternity ward after my last baby was born. He went to great lengths to tell me he had every right to be there, as did the staff even when he verbally abused me. It wasn’t until the police where involved after I was physically attacked that the staff could see how vulnerable I was - covered in my own blood and shit, barely able to walk and trying to establish feeding with a man screaming at me because my baby was crying and he has “a human right to sleep”.
That man was allowed to be in that female space 24/7 whilst his partner was a patient, he had a right given to him by the hospital. He was well informed that he was allowed to be there, he screamed it from the top of his lungs at me and my hours old baby.

If TRAs are so afraid of being in spaces like toilets with men, why do they want self ID? It simply opens up those spaces to dickheads and predators to self identify in order to access the space, them and us.

SnowOnStPatricksDay Sex segregation of high risk spaces is necessary because women are disproportionately the victims of sexual crimes and men are disproportionately the offenders. By excluding men from spaces where the opportunity to offend is higher, the number of victims is reduced.

This.

In addition to the many things mentioned above I have answer toddler questions which over the years have been 'why does your vulva grow hair', 'why is there blood in the toilet/your pants' etc most women enjoy a joke about it but I would be uncomfortable about it in front of men.

I have held babies for strangers so they could pee alone/with their toddler. I have waited with sleeping baby in pushchair so the stranger could pee with the door closed AND not wake the baby.

I have changed many nappies because either the baby change is busy or I dont want to block the disabled toilets.

I have changed children's clothes.

I let my daughter go in alone but she knows to walk back out & tell someone if a man is there/anyone who makes her feel uncomfortable.

I have had the door opened on me & have accidentally done this to others - if it was a man either way round I would be very upset.

There are signs up some toilets saying if there is a male cleaner working in the area - so obviously everyone does understand why women's toilets should be women only.

Oh helping my late GM use the public toilet.