DD made to feel uncomfortable in the ladies

[HairyPotter]

So she’s 20 and one of the societies she is a member of also has a trans woman as a member. Although it is affiliated with her university, it is open to anyone with an interest and this person is in their 40’s.

She needed to get changed at an event and went into the ladies to find this person already there. A moment or two later another trans woman came into the loo looking for the first one.

They didn’t do anything but dd felt really uneasy and vulnerable with two male bodied people in her female space. She feels unable to say anything as when she took some woman’s place flyers into uni, someone posted them all over twitter demanding to know ‘what shitty fucking terf’ put these up in ‘her’ uni!

For full disclosure, the trans woman in question attended an event a couple of months ago (where they probably were not expecting to see anyone they knew) but was dressed as a man.

There’s literally nothing dd can do is there? She says she can’t tell anyone how uncomfortable she feels for fear of being attacked.

That's really horrible. Why are we suddenly frightened of reporting this?

I always think the bathroom thing is a bad way to highlight it. Make attendants clean the bathrooms just as much as female. The cubicle you're using is isolated and lockable. It's really a difficult one to argue.

Now, a changing room or nude spa/sauna etc... that's easier to argue that we feel unsafe. She should stiĺ raise it with the uni, particularly the fact that she's had contact with one of them whilst they were presenting as a man so she knows him as a man. But dont be sure of a good response.

The answer really us just unisex bathrooms with their own contained toilet and sink.

Won't he just claim he is non binary?

I really don't understand non binary myself. I understand throwing off gender stereotypes but not buying into them on that level

Male cleaners wait until the toilets are empty before they go in, and make sure no women accidentally wander in.

@Spottycake

No they don't. That's why they all have signs warning you that make attendants will clean. They certainly don't shut the toilets while they clean them in any of the very large shopping centres i regularly go to. The make cleaner is just in there, cleaning. And nobody freaks out.

And I distinctly remember being like, 11 years old at the services at about 2am during the drive home from holiday. I was in the toilets and there was s make cleaner cleaning away. As they do. First time I saw a man in the ladies toilets... But I just carried on!

Male!!!! Not make.

Yeah, he'd probably claim to be nonbinary, but seeing him in full male attire might change the minds of some who didn't yet know how nonsensical things have gotten.

I always think the bathroom thing is a bad way to highlight it. Make attendants clean the bathrooms just as much as female. The cubicle you're using is isolated and lockable. It's really a difficult one to argue.

Male attendants should knock at the door and ask if anyone is using the toilet before entering, and there should be a sign telling women that there's a male attendant.

Many loos don't have closed cubicles, there's space at the bottom and the upper end of the door where a man can put a phone inside and film. Men do it in unisex facilities very often, I think one uni even considered changing back to sex segregated after a lot of women complained about this.

It is not really difficult to argue. It is just that they won't listen until there's at least absolute certainty that men will look at naked women and there's a high risk of rape.

There's some trans allies who will agree that males shouldn't be in women's prisons, but they are not willing to admit that males in women's prisons are the inevitable outcome of pretending that transwomen are women.

I think female bathrooms - ones with rows of cubicles and sinks outside have become more than simply where you do your business

On one hand doing our business- it's quite humiliating depending on your age if you need to change your sanpro or if you've ever been caught panicky and decided to do a pregnancy test on the spot for men to overhear you

But it's also a space we congregate in - we escape to it to talk to other women away from male ears

Sometimes we go there for a private sob away from male ears

We do our makeup and our hair

We don't only use them to do our business tbh

Spottycake, the problem is that male cleaners aren't in the ladies loos to validate their fetish of females being included in their scenario.
And the problem with unisex loos is that men piss on the floor and piss on the seat. And going by accounts seen recently on this site, of newly created gender neutral toilets, men also piss with the cubicle door wide open. So you think that women should have to put up with all that too, should we? Nice.
Not to mention the other things that men seem to spend excessive amounts of time doing in the toilets that the vast majority of women do not - long bowel movements and wanking, to name but a few.
See also voyeurism/planted camera incidents arising in relatively new unisex toilet set ups.
Seriously, do you think critically at all when you type??

I work with a lot of large centres; you really think in a shopping centre where the ladies toilets have more than 30 cubicles, that a male attendant can knock at the door? And then make sure no one is there?

They don't. They just go in and do their job. There is usually a "cleaning in progress" stand so it's your choice to go in or not, but they aren't closed.

Using an argument which I just wrong devalues all the other argument used. So don't say "well male attendants knock and wait until it's empty so they aren't in there when women are so it doesn't count". It's not true. And it taps away at our credibility.

I know what you mean about male attendants cleaning the loo, but there would be a warning sign up and I do feel it’s not the same as two (very very) obvious male people just lingering at the mirror/sinks in extremely bad wigs.

This person doesn’t not go to uni, just a member of this society so doubt they would care tbh. Unfortunately dd seems to think that everyone is absolutely fine about welcoming this person into female spaces.

She showed me their fb page when they were complaining bitterly that the Brownies were expecting them to complete some form of disclosure before they were allowed to volunteer with them.

I’m so angry on her behalf, especially as I was at both events and saw them for myself. I wouldn’t want them in my loo and I’m pretty fearless.

Male cleaners wait until the toilets are empty before they go in, and make sure no women accidentally wander in.

That's how it should be.

I experienced both, and I will obviously prefer the place where the male cleaner was considerate in the future. It was a hotel, perhaps that's why.

Interestingly, the place where the male cleaner just walked in like he owned the place and made me feel extremely uncomfortable with not just his presence but also his rude behaviour, was also at a ... "services" in English is also the places next to the road, right?

Probably they think they can behave like this because women have no choice there.

I'm sorry, my above post was not for Spotty, it was for Holstenlane.

@Musthavesbackagain

When did they start putting all male cleaning through a criminal record check? And a psych profile to ensure they have no fetishes? ... I'm pretty sure they don't. But men still get to clean the women's toilets.

A whole load of small, independent shops have a single unused toilet and have has for years. It works fine.

Unfortunately dd seems to think that everyone is absolutely fine about welcoming this person into female spaces.

There'll be others who disagree, perhaps not in that group, but certainly at the uni.

It is just hard to find other feminists.
I try to tell myself that I wanted to be a spy or secret agent when I was a kid, and now I get what I wanted ...

But it's also a space we congregate in - we escape to it to talk to other women away from male ears

That's exactly why males want to invade it.

I just can't get worked up about a man being in a bathroom wirh cubicles with floor to ceiling walls/door; and maybe not even too bothered about that. A bathroom really isn't a social place, and changing Sanpro isn't an embarrassing thing. I get other people will be embarrassed, or want to hang around in a toilet having girly chat but it's a place most of us are in and out of as quickly as possibly.

Changing rooms, places where you are genuinely vulnerable or getting naked... that's entirely different. But I'm never going to be bothered about individual unisex cublices with sinks or the odd 'man' coming in to pee.

Holstenlane
Changing rooms, places where you are genuinely vulnerable or getting naked... that's entirely different.

Did you not read the OP?

She needed to get changed at an event and went into the ladies

We sometimes use the toilets as a changing room.

What's 'dressed as a man'? I'm probably dressed as a man right now.

Maybe some people can’t get worked up about it, but can you really not understand why a young woman would feel uneasy walking into the ladies and finding a 40 yr old male there at the mirror who was quickly joined by another older male.

I would find that uncomfortable especially as I was there to get changed. Her feelings are just as valid as anyone else’s.

And if you are, then you'd be in a locked cubicle. Where the 2 people pushing into the cubicle with her?

A changing room is often one big room. A bathroom has multiple, lockable cubicles.

Dressed as a man?

Wearing a suit with a shirt and tie and no wig. I probably should have worded that better. Clearly male.

Who does it work fine for?? I used to work in a 'small independent shop' with a colleague who used the loo for 30 mins on the dot every day at 3pm. If I had to go in there after him to use the toilet, it was absolutely vile. So you say 'everyone', I say 'not me'. As do many other MNers who we are seeing on this site adding daily to the experience of using public gender neutral toilets, and how it doesn't work "fine" for them.
Just because you're okay with it, does not mean everybody else is. Sex segregation exists for a reason. And yes, womens loos can be grim sometimes, but nowhere close to the state the mens is most of the time (according to my husband).
And you are kidding yourself if you think you can say to the transwoman that it's fine for them to use the ladies loos but not fine for them to use the ladies changing room because you may be naked in there. We both know that's not how it works.