Wagamama and gender neutral toilets

[TulipsTulipsTulips]

40% of wagamama’s toilets will be gender neutral by September. The last thing I want to do when I go out for a meal is share the facilities with men. We are different and deserve privacy! How have women’s interests become such a low priority?

The numbskulls think they are being progressive, and that they will win brownie points with their clientele.

Complain enough, that you dont like having to see men peeing ( they rarely close the doors to the stalls) and they might effect a change.

Keep up the complaints and they wont be able to claim the decision was business friendly, which will have been the primary reason for this.

Wagas etc, dont care about anything beyond their profit margins.

I'm sorry is saying "I'm cool with" the supposed risk of hypothetical porn spy cameras some sort of mean girl bat signal trap I've fallen into?

'Mean girl' 🤣

Do staff have to change, wash, pee, sob into their aprons, etc in mixed facilities too?

I'm seriously irritated that I'll have to accompany the DC and any friends to the loo now. I wouldn't let my DC, boys or girls (younger than 10) into a bathroom accessed by men. Men are a proven safeguarding risk to young children. If there aren't women only loos, the establishment is not family friendly, and unless the cubicles are accessed directly by doors that I can see from the restaurant then I will have to supervise all the endless and uncoordinated toilet visits of my children. Fuck that. Still, as long as all the trans people get their feelings validated I'm sure no one gives a shit about us

Just googled spy cam toilets . I didn't realise that they were actually in the bowl!

I'm seriously pissed off about this, and I'm heartily sick of reading posters on here telling me this doesn't matter. It does matter, and many, many women are uncomfortable using mixed sex public toilets.

The decline, the chip-chip-chipping away of women's privacy puts women & girls at risk. Attack, abuse, voyeurism, or just women feeling intimidated or uncomfortable in a space where they feel vulnerable - they all happen. They have all happened to women & girls - they're all over the news.

The hidden camera thing is a real risk - you can't just say "I don't believe it is a risk" - it's happened. People (men) have been caught doing it, and lord knows how many go on who aren't caught. The risk rises when men have easy access, as they do in mixed sex spaces.

I'm going to start asking places when I book tables "do you have single sex toilets" and then stop the booking if they don't say yes. I'm going to leave negative feedback on Tripadvisor for those places that don't.

My favourite toilets ever were in a pub we used to visit as a family in my teens. Not the nicest pub, but beautiful women's toilets. Scrupulously clean, music piped in, large fully enclosed cubicles, gorgeous smelling soap and a decent hand dryer that always worked. And definitely no men in them.

We need to tell these places of our concerns, and we need to vote with our feet (and take our ££££ elsewhere), before single sex women's facilities have completely disappeared. We are losing something that women have taken for granted for decades.

I'm going to leave negative feedback on Tripadvisor for those places that don't.

I like that idea.

Porn isn't real. I think it fairly likely that the vast majority of women featured in "spy cam" videos have consented to being filmed
I dont know how you can state that unless you watched some?

The pizza boy probably knows he's in a porno too
No idea what this means if someone can give me a clue?

If you are using a phone now, look at the size of the camera lens aperture above the screen. You can fit that, a battery and the recording unit for remote access, into the head of a screw.

Any pervert who is able to regularly access women’s private spaces unchallenged can install and retrieve one easily.

I know a solicitor who has just dealt with a landlord using one to spy on tenants, and sharing it online.

I only use female specific facilities, I am scrupulous in checking them and I never let my kids use them without going in and checking them myself first.

I forgot I posted a question last night
So here are the replies

Because:-
Single occupancy isn't sharing;

The layout of men's toilets usually includes urinals which would be embarrassing for men and me

The cubicles in men's loos presumably are also the same horrible gaps and flimsy partitions so no better than the women's
So because urinals and/or because men will be embarrassed? The 6000 reasons women have given include embarrassment but that's not valid?

This is such a stupid question. Because I'm not a man and not allowed in a man's toilet. If men are OK with sharing with women does that give them the right to come into the ladies toilet. Whenever this topic comes up anyone who actually prefers unisex toilets gets totally dismissed
Thanks for the reminder it's stupid (silly stupid wonen) but you are allowed in any mens toilet, we keep being told that there is no law, only custom and usage that means men can use any loo.Just walk in and use em. And the whole bloody point that seems to be swooping over your head is that men do have the right to enter the womens. That's why you are being dismissed.

I much prefer gender neutral toilets. Much easier when out and about with someone of the opposite gender who has a disability and needs the loo
So the disabled loo then? Not even what this thread is about.

Have just phoned my local Wagamama, their loos are not gender neutral, they are very family friendly & the chap I spoke to completely understood my concerns.

On Saturday I left my DH and our girls in a city centre restaurant while I dashed off looking for a dress. Came back to a husband muttering about how we can’t take the girls there again - apparently the toilets were a row of cubicles half marked F and half marked M in a super narrow corridor, and you had to go past the M ones to reach the F ones. There was a single mirror at the F end of the corridor and two shared sinks.

The girls didn’t like the smell or the lack of female only space so insisted DH accompany them (normally our almost 13 year old DD would take her 7 year old sister) and DH didn’t like having to stand directly outside the F cubicles to wait for them, feeling he was imposing on an F space (compounded by how narrow the corridor was).
He’s a big man with a shaved head and a neck full of tattoos, he knows he looks a bit intimidating and normally makes special considerations to make not make women feel uncomfortable, such as slowing down his walking pace so lone women can get further ahead or crossing the street away from lone women (in his younger days he was ocassionally a padded-suited up ‘fall guy’ for women’s self defence classes).

The food and atmosphere was good, but we live in a big city, so have choices. I wonder if businesses will realise women, men and families will factor toilets into the decision making process?

Porn isn’t real ??

More to the point though, there is an entire genre of ‘porn’ comprised of video footage of women using the loo, taken without their knowledge let alone consent.

And it’s not just McDonalds bathrooms (etc) where it happens... the NZ ambassador to the US was charged with installing a spy cam in the toilet in the Embassy in DC.

I think whoever suggested checking and nail-polishing over any cameras was a good idea - I’m just not entirely sure what I’m looking for 😬

The hidden camera thing is a real risk - you can't just say "I don't believe it is a risk" - it's happened

I think the question is, is it an increased risk in mixed-use toilets? Lots of small establishments with just one or two toilets (coffee shops, snack shops, cafés, etc.) do not separate them by sex – are more hidden cameras found there? Someone said South Korea has a huge problem with hidden cameras, is that because most of their toilets are mixed sex?

Treefloof

Do you actually believe that saying "I don't mind using a single-occupancy toilet that is also used by men sometimes" is the same as being happy to go into a multi-cubicle toilet designated for men only? Really??

2BthatUnnoticed did you miss the part where the poster reckoned all the women in toilet spy cam videos were willing?

Separate male/female facilities are important to me. I will seek out and patronise places that maintain these. I’m not sure enough people feel this way for it to register, but at least we have peace of mind. I do appreciate them announcing it, so there’s that.

I much prefer gender neutral toilets and I'm pissed off at being told my preferences don't matter. I'd much rather my husband could take my young DD to a neutral toilet. I'd much rather I could take my grandad who has dementia to the toilet. It seems your feelings only matter if they agree with the collective view point.

I also think it's ridiculous and clearly inane in the extreme that people think that being happy in a gender neutral toilet is the same as going into a toilet that is marked for the use of men only and will probably have urinals in it. This is not the same and anyone stupid enough to make this argument does a disservice to any rational point they may have to make.

If you would not be happy with a man presenting as a man going into the ladies then you can't claim men would be happy with a woman presenting as a woman using the man's toilets. Going into a toilet not marked for your use is going to cause issues whether or not you have a legal right to be there. Going into a gender neutral toilet will not present any such issues.

The idea that men produces poos more smelly than women's is also ridiculous. If you can't take the smell of a poo don't use any toilet. Women's toilets are quite often in a horrible state because many seem to feel the need to hover over the loo instead of sitting on the seat. On a number of occasions I've also seen discarded used sanitary products on the floor.

Out yes I saw that but seems quite unlikely to say the least! The whole point of the genre as I understand it (not from personal consumption!) is the thrill of spying on women... if they consented it would somewhat defeat the purpose.

User your preferences do matter, everyone’s preferences should. One place I go to has M, F and mixed sex - the latter for the scenarios you mention.

As long as there is an F-only option I’m happy.

If you are taking a disabled person to the toilet, surely you can use the disabled loo for their sex ? Normal loos are not wide enough for two people , the Wagama loos I was in recently certainly were not. Disabled loos are designed to have enough room for a wheelchair and a helper.
I have used these with my Mum.

All the Wagamamas I know have separate cubicles off the main corridor with ceiling to floor doors so what's the issue there?!

I don't think there is no risk of being recorded in a loo. I just think the risk is (a) being overstated (which only serves to frighten women unnecessarily) and (b) not necessarily materially higher in unisex single occupancy toilets compared to other set ups.

So the risk is no higher in a loo where many men use it over any given hour, as opposed to a loo where only a possible male cleaner uses it ?