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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

A query about third spaces

160 replies

SometimesLateAtNight · 21/06/2020 22:43

When people talk about third spaces as a possible solution, do they generally mean that the third space is for anyone who cares to use it, or that the third space is reserved for trans persons only?

I thought I was about as peak trans-ed as I could get but I saw a post today about this issue and suddenly I can’t get past the third space thing seeming.... wrong. I’ll try and attach the post here.

If third spaces are specifically for trans people (of both sexes), how does that provide any dignity for the trans person who has no nefarious intent and truly just wishes to pass and live as the opposite sex? Wouldn’t that be really quite humiliating to have to go, as a passing man or woman, into the ‘trans’ toilets and ‘out’ yourself?

And if the third spaces are for everyone, how is the safety of trans people any better protected than if they used the bathroom which accords with their biological sex? Surely a trans woman who passes poorly or not at all is just as likely to be assaulted in the free for all third space by a man, as in the men’s bathroom?

I can’t stress enough how much (due to past experiences) I want women’s spaces to remain just that, women’s spaces but... I also don’t want genuine trans people to live without the basic dignity and safety im seeking to preserve for myself. How do you reconcile these notions? Or do you not? Is this just an example of TRAs ruining it for everyone?

A query about third spaces
OP posts:
ShinyFootball · 22/06/2020 16:51

They haven't repurposed them!

The men have, presumably due to anxiety over crapping in s cubicle in the actual gents.

OneEndedStick · 22/06/2020 21:11

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

midgebabe · 22/06/2020 21:17

So you want us to spend time find real data to disprove your anecdote?
To be clear do you want evidence from the UK or USA?

Thelnebriati · 22/06/2020 21:39

If the women's toilets are so dangerous why are they fighting us to gain legal access?

I'm guessing the stats aren't used because they will show the people most at risk are women and the perpetrators of most sexual violence against us are biologically male.

ShinyFootball · 22/06/2020 21:39

Are you talking to stick, or op, midge?

Another point.

Loads of men, especially teens and young adults, have been GNC at least since the late 60s. Bouffy hair, makeup, flouncy clothes, eyeliner etc etc

I see men on the tube all the time whose look is well outside masculine standards. When I was young my male Goth friends had eyeliner, nail varnish, long hair, tight shirts open quite a way down the chest etc.

I don't know anyone who got serious trouble.

If a man is a nasty violent bully he will pick on anyone different.

Why do some men get the protection of heading on into the ladies, and not others?

None of it makes any sense.

ShinyFootball · 22/06/2020 21:41

I mean of course they can all come in now, that's kind of the point.

And when the nasty scary big violent man who picks on people (and men like this usually go after anyone and everyone, including women), he says actually I'm a woman and bingo locked in with a load of sitting targets.

midgebabe · 22/06/2020 21:42

Stick

TorkTorkBam · 22/06/2020 21:49

@OneEndedStick Have you noticed that men are mostly larger, more powerful and more aggressive than women? That is one of many reasons why women don't generally attack men.

I see where you are trying to go with your theory
about the women's toilets being dangerous but honestly it is bollocks.

Men getting violent when they see man going into the ladies along with "their" woman/girl. Now, that would be more likely to lead to violence than being a gender non-comforming man in the gents I suspect.

If my DH and friends saw a man in the modern TRA style of dress, i.e. pornified, hanging round the loos where their daughters were changing and he made a move to go in, then yes, I bet there would be a confrontation.

If the same pornified TRA came into the gents they would say nothing, do nothing but would joke about it between themselves forever. There would have been no confrontation.

ShinyFootball · 22/06/2020 21:51

TheInebriati

There are no laws about toilets, it was social convention. Which has now been thoroughly eroded.

Another thought.

If you're a man out cruising or cottaging and you find a man to have sex with, is it safer to do it in the ladies or the gents?

Although most men know where the pick up toilets are I think and avoid them if it's not their thing. Which raises a question. I assume, given that most men are straight, and cottaging is not something sought out by all gay men, why have men not agitated to get it stopped?

And if you were a straight man and got caught short near a known set of public toilets, would you feel more comfortable in the ladies or the gents?

I'm no expert on cottaging obv :D and I have read articles by men arguing it's an important part of gay culture.

But women do not hook up in the same way in public bogs.

The idea that public toilets are a place for sex is a very male thing. Which led to the 'would you want her in the toilet with your husband' thing. With a person in sterotypical 'sexy lady' garb in the gents with all the men looking. I looked for the pic but it seems to have vanished from the internet...

ShinyFootball · 22/06/2020 21:54

I think sticks post has been misunderstood.

I read it to mean that TW going into the ladies face being beaten up by men who see them go in, while there don't seem to be many examples of then being beaten up in the gents. So they should go to the gents. Because it's the right place, and safer

midgebabe · 22/06/2020 21:58

Oh, I read it as women being accused of attacking. No saying never, just suspect it would be as rare as women attacking men

YI could see that men would protect the social norm which could lead to violence

TorkTorkBam · 22/06/2020 22:12

In my experience men are much less generous than women are about other men's motives for hanging round girls.

ShinyFootball · 22/06/2020 22:17

Poor old Eddie izzard (not a tiny bloke) got treated horribly by some teenage girls when he emerged from the ladies in men's clothes.

They said what are you doing in here.

Luckily this adult men had the wherewithal to shout at them and chase them down the road. From the ladies.

Well done Eddie!

Deliriumoftheendless · 22/06/2020 22:21

Well presumably all those kind male allies will be using the third space to support their trans friends which may make things safer. I mean, that’s what male allies want isn’t it? Not just to get transwomen out of their loos.

I also don’t understand why we aren’t being asked to accept trans people for who they are, instead of acting like there’s something wrong with being trans. When the LGB community fought for rights they did that by showing heterosexuals that they were ordinary, regular people. Gay marriage wasn’t legalised for gay people to say they they lived with a same sex sibling.

Thelnebriati · 22/06/2020 22:23

I know there are no laws about toilets but not many years ago, a man found in a woman's toilet had some explaining to do.

OneEndedStick · 22/06/2020 22:30

No, Midge. I expect people who argue that its 'too dangerous' for some feminine/less masculine males to use the male toilets provided specifically for all males, to provide the evidence to back their own claims.
I'm a little traditional that way: You make the big claim; You provide the proof. Just like, if you claim men are women if they "identify as women" (ie.If they say so), it's up to you to provide the proof.

ShinyFootball · 22/06/2020 23:41

Agree inebriati

In the past you could challenge/ the women would all look askance/ get security if a shopping centre or something.

This was important as a very large minority of men enjoy unsettling women/ making them feel uncomfortable etc. I suppose get a kick out of boundary violation?

And of course they can do all that easily without doing anything illegal.

And that's where a huge problem lies - men in general have no idea what creepy men do, when you try and explain it it sounds trivial, and even when it's bad they prefer to ignore it ( metoo).

The answer given is well if they do anything illegal then you can report it. That's s bit fucking late isn't it.

And say there is some weirdy man hanging around in the ladies, staring, trying to talk to women and girls... That's not illegal. But it sure as fuck makes women and girls feel uncomfortable, scared, threatened.

Even women, many women, give men 'the benefit of the doubt' when other women talk about this stuff.

I just think that men in general are so oblivious to how it is for women and girls, and a lot of that is deliberate because it's in the news etc all the time. And then because they have never been a 5'0 14 yo trying to deal with a creepy man who won't fuck off, they just don't get it, mainly because they aren't interested.

And that's before you get to mixed hosp wards, communal changing for sports, prisons etc.

ShinyFootball · 22/06/2020 23:46

Bottom line is, men are raised more to look after them and theirs and less to look after/ care for others.

This stuff comes under 'women's problem' and they automatically tune out.

Many only really get interested if it's one of 'their' women at risk.

And even then, thinking about it. I've seen loads of threads on here about girls getting harassed/ sexually assaulted at schools and what should I do etc. Casting my mind back, the threads seem to show that the mum talks to the school etc. So even then, it's for the women to tackle. A 'womens' thing.

How can we get anywhere while most men continue in this way?

This situation is a problem about how some men are scared of male violence'.

Why are women expected to resolve it?

Melia100 · 22/06/2020 23:49

This situation is a problem about how some men are scared of male violence'.

Why are women expected to resolve it?

Why indeed!

(Apparently to prove one is not a bitter harridan who only cares for women, according to the OP).

midgebabe · 23/06/2020 06:57

Sorry stick, you are incorrect

The status quo is that Male and female facilities are separated based on sex ( biology. It's why you don't get urinals in the ladies and san bins in the gents )

You want to change that to a gender separation

You have to provide the evidence to support that

WhatTiggersDoBest · 23/06/2020 08:34

I was heavily pregnant in China, Japan, England and Ireland last year (I had to do a lot of travelling). In China, the toilet provision is squat toilets, and I was totally unable to use them because my joints had gone funny and I couldn't physically squat, my knees buckled and I got stuck, and there was often not one single seat toilet (only provided in most parts of China for disabled people, and often not provided at all), I really do think women's needs are different to men's when it comes to toilets and that they think we just have a pretty dress on the sign so it's for people who like to wear dresses.

The fact that a tossy man "invented" a toilet last year that was angled to stop people sitting on the toilet for too long by making them feel uncomfortable says it all. Men go to the toilets for recreational purposes. They like to use the cubicles to "read a magazine" or whack one off (or to buy/consume illegal substances), with or without another person present. Men don't have to do all the faffing around women have to do in a toilet. They don't have to get their fingers right to the start of the feed on those horrendous "smart one" dispensers to get more than one sheet because it's their period (because they don't have them). They don't have to wipe the seat clean to have a quick wee because the person before them was on the blob and didn't wipe up. They don't have to fiddle with their clothing and find somewhere to put their bag when the hook on the back of the door's been broken because their clothes are designed for function over form with actual, usefully-sized pockets and their tops don't have dangly bits like many of ours do (especially our jumpers).

It says it all that a man looked at the queue leading out of the ladies one day and thought, "I know, they're spending too much time sitting on the toilet chatting and having pillow fights and comparing their breasts, I'll invent a loo that they can't sit on and I'll profit massively from causing women discomfort with my angled toilet solve all their problems."

Natal women physically need to be able to sit down, especially when pregnant. Women's toilet provision in England is already not great compared to other countries; in Japan, all the toilets (male and female) have little fold-out child seat places inside the cubicle attached to one wall, away from the toilet, where you can put your baby safely while you use the loo.

In Ireland, I haven't seen any toilets that didn't have extra space for a pushchair in the cubicle (although I'm sure there are some, somewhere). Per square metre, we are not as pushed for space as Japan, so if they can sort their loos out to work better for women, we can, too.

Bugger spending bandwidth working out all this third space nonsense for people who are about as grateful as that ex-leper from Life of Brian. We should be spending this mental energy making toilets better for actual women and making our own lives easier.

And the rule should be, if you can write your name in the snow with perfect precision, the ladies' loos are not for you. Because you don't need to sit down except to poo, and you probably don't need toilet paper. And you can physically use a toilet even if someone else who can write their name in the snow accurately has mysteriously inaccurately widdled all over the toilet seat and floor. Simple.

WhatTiggersDoBest · 23/06/2020 08:39

(and by "write your name in the snow with perfect precision" I mean "have a penis" in case that's not clear).

okiedokieme · 23/06/2020 08:45

I assume fully self contained and can be used by anyone, in particular handy for dads with daughters and mums with sons too young to go into toilets alone.

With swimming pools, having third areas is common in Europe (called cabins) and they are used by families and couples rather than splitting up into separate areas negating the need for two shampoo bottles and two locker tokens. This was the case at Bath spa too. Worked fine

JellySlice · 23/06/2020 08:49

*Bugger spending bandwidth working out all this third space nonsense for people who are about as grateful as that ex-leper from Life of Brian. We should be spending this mental energy making toilets better for actual women and making our own lives easier.

And the rule should be, if you can write your name in the snow with perfect precision, the ladies' loos are not for you. Because you don't need to sit down except to poo, and you probably don't need toilet paper. And you can physically use a toilet even if someone else who can write their name in the snow accurately has mysteriously inaccurately widdled all over the toilet seat and floor. Simple.*

Eloquent and accurate.

(Unlike the aim of most snow-writers.)

Michelleoftheresistance · 23/06/2020 09:29

(Apparently to prove one is not a bitter harridan who only cares for women, according to the OP).

I think the OP is still in the grip of socialisation that says females not thinking of others before themselves are selfish, unkind and nasty. And that it's rude to have any kind of feminism or care for females only as a group: females look after everyone equally.

I've been there OP. Was there for years.

The trouble is, you do eventually see the appalling entitlement and hatred of women inherent in this political lobby and their demands on government, you see the needs of female people that the lobby want made 'hate speech' to even mention, never mind provide for, and you see that they want what they want for them like a toddler demands, with no thought or care for what happens for the vulnerable females left without provision or care in their wake.

And at that point, I'm afraid 'nice' can get to fuck. I don't indulge that sort of appalling behaviour in my own toddler, never mind overgrown ones who ought to know better. And I care about what happens to everybody, particularly those being stripped of their equality needs to meet selfish, uncaring wants when there are plenty of ways to meet needs that would balance everyone's needs.

And you see already I'm sucked back into 'but I must care about the males in this situation'?

It's insane. The males in this situation care absolutely nothing about the females affected by them. I can find in a second a bunch of rape threats, death threats and tantrums at females who dare to say hang on a minute: I can find absolutely bugger all of any male born person in this lobby saying 'but what about those females we're about to disenfranchise'? Or 'hang on, our values about inclusion and naming own identity actually work both ways'.

That really does never happen.