"But toilets in France are unisex"

[JellySlice]

As people have been saying to me, "and I don't feel any different in them than I do in the Ladies' loos."

How to reply?

(Is it even a thing? I have never to my knowledge or recollection used unisex public loos abroad. All communal loos were separated by sex, often with a fearsome female guardian at the joint entrance, ensuring that people went into the correct section.)

Even if they are unisex, what about changing rooms, showers, dorms, hospitals, and prisons. What about anyplace women expect to be able to disrobe and/or sleep? Toilets aren’t the real issue.

Very few toilets in France are unisex in my experience.
Quite a few toilets in France I have come across are the squat over a hole type - does that mean we should adopt those over here ?

At CDG airport i only saw single sex - don’t know about the rest of the country in general.

I was in France recently and didn't notice unisex toilets unless it was in a cafe or somewhere, where there was one toilet for everyone. Which is exactly the same as it is here. And is a totally different situation to rows of cubicles with a communal wash area.

I'd be fine with unisex toilets IF they were individual lockable rooms, with the washbasin inside. Even better if they were all accessible for disabled people too, so they have the same facilities as everyone else. But that's not the reality of current public toilet facilities.

Unisex toilets are not rare in France, though not the norm. You walk past the boys and men using the urinals to get to the cubicles, usually with a half height privacy wall. It's never bothered me.

BerthaTydfil - yes, we should adopt squat toilets. Hygienic (no skin to seat contact), really good for your legs, and a better position for emptying your bowels.

I live on the continent and a lot of loos are unisex but what that actually means is that they are separate locked rooms with the sink inside the room, as treacle describes. They are only unisex if it's in a really small establishment.

I own a small business and this is what we have. By law we are required to have one washroom (it's based on the number of employees), and we don't have space for more than one, but you go in, close the door, lock it, you're in the sink area. Then there's another door, you go in, lock that one too if you want, that's where the toilet/changing table is. Nobody is in there with you. But yes, both sexes use this same washroom.

If we had more employees we'd be legally obligated to have two washrooms demarcated by sex. I suspect that this is the case in France also.

Ah just read ScienceRoar 's post, so I see it's different in France, well I haven't been there! In the countries I've visited including Italy I've never had to walk past men urinating in order to get to a cubicle.

However, here in Greece, for safety reasons, men's washrooms are always the first you come to, women must walk past them in order to get to women's room. This is so that men are never walking past the women's room entrance.

Unisex toilets are not rare in France, though not the norm. You walk past the boys and men using the urinals to get to the cubicles, usually with a half height privacy wall. It's never bothered me.

Great for you. In common with many women and girls, however, I would be unable to walk past men with their dicks out and so would be unable to go to the toilet.

yes, we should adopt squat toilets. Hygienic (no skin to seat contact), really good for your legs, and a better position for emptying your bowels.

Which I've always been physically unable to use, in common with a lot of women with a range of disabilities and degrees of elderly degeneration.

I went to a camp site where the showers were unisex. It was horrible and intimidating. I posted pics on here of the graffiti. Really nasty pics and call outs to little girls for sex etc. Young children were using these showers.

As always, it's probably better for nice middle class establishments where facilities are well maintained etc.
And fuck what happens to working class women and girls.

It's strange, a TRA was using this argument on me last year. Not long after I happened to be in France and looked out for unisex loos. I saw 2 - a single cubicle in a cafe (they had just one toilet) and a bathroom at a museum which was locked with a key you got at reception. Other than that, nothing.

I lived in France. As pp have said it's single sex unless there are more than one.

However, swimming pool changing rooms are usually mixed, with cubicles that aren't floor to ceiling. Most of these seem to be from 80s-90s. Interestingly, in my PILs village their local pool has just been redone and while the changing rooms are communal in that it's all in one area, they've now got separate areas divided by sex for the cubicles. The wall that divides the men's from women's area is floor to ceiling. As is the divider between the corridor and first cubicles. The individual cubicles within each section aren't floor to ceiling.

MsMcWoodle, why the aggression?
Working class women and girls are entitled to well maintained facilities, the same as anyone else. I've not come across toilets that are segregated on the basis of class.

There are a lot of women who for one reason or another strongly prefer single sex. Even for those of us in the 'don't mind' camp, I see it very differently if it is marked unisex, and is unisex, compared to if it is marked 'women's' and is actually 'women plus trans women plus men who have self-id'd as women for whatever other reason'.

Not entirely on topic but the latest thing on I read about France and toilets was www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/09/06/sexist-open-air-urinal-taken-historic-centre-paris-feminist/

Summary is: Men kept being fined for peeing in the streets, and being fined again and again but they'd not stop.. so...
"Several of the letterbox red, eco-friendly urinals had been strategically placed in public spots in recent months as an experiment to counter Paris’s “wild peeing” problem. The stench of urine is all-pervasive in some areas of the capital."

Gwendoline Coipeault of the feminist organisation Femmes Solidaires said: “These urinals are designed to comfort men and reinforce the idea that women aren’t welcome in the public space. It is discrimination and reinforces the stereotypical, sexist idea that men can’t control themselves in any way, including their bladders.”

She added: “I don’t know a single woman who regularly goes to Paris who hasn’t witnessed a man urinating in public – openly on streets, in the metro – which reinforces a feeling of insecurity.”

The men who keep saying that are lying. They're trying to convince you that "everybody else does X so you're just being a prude for not wanting to do X".

I bet there are men in france who say "Well in the UK and USA everybody uses unisex toilets and nobody cares".

Notice that "you're a prude" is not a logical argument/reason to do anything. It's just emotional manipulation.

I do remember walking past urinals to get to the toilets when I lived in France. Pretty horrible. I also remember a higher level of sexual aggression and assault than I have ever experienced anywhere else that I have lived. So I don’t find ‘the French do it’ all that strong an argument. To be fair though, the French state never expected me to be in a changing room with a naked man so that was nice.

I'm not sure what the rate of sexual assaults and voyeurism are in France compared to here or how many women avoid public loos so I couldn't comment on the impact really. How do I know it's fine or not just because they exist.
Although I do feel something that is openly unisex and designed that way gives more choice to the user than something described as single sex which isn't really.

I live on the Franco-Swiss border and am married to a Frenchman. Toilets in France are not unisex, in the vast majority of cases they are single sex, just like in the UK.

More bollox whataboutery from those determined to erode women's rights to safety.

Summary is: Men kept being fined for peeing in the streets, and being fined again and again but they'd not stop.. so..

The purpose of any kind of punishment is to act as a deterrent. In this case, the punishment is not harsh enough. Increase the fine to a level that these men find onerous, and they'll stop.

only time i saw unisex toilets in france last year was portaloos at an event

We came across a couple of public toilets where you walked past a urinal to get to the cubicle in France this summer. My 7 year old daughter was very uncomfortable with it and I don't blame her.

And just because something exists doesn't make it right!

Sexual harassment in certain parts of Paris and France is just awful.
Women are calling it out more and more there but frankly it isn’t a place I would want to take examples for safety for women in loos. I work there frequently and have lived there. Of course it isn’t everywhere though.

@scienceroar

Are you mad? I’m 8 months pregnant and very glad the U.K. doesn’t seem to have adopted ‘squat toilets’. I’m pretty sure I’d fall in/loose my balance. What about the elderly? My gran can’t bend her knees!

The more I hear about Paris the more relieved I am I have never visited.