I came to this board after a dreadful experience dining at a new posh restraurant, needing to change sanitary protection and discovering half way through dinner the loos were mixed sex and not single cubicles either but shared washbasins. I was worried I’d flooded and would need to clean my dress. I was having dinner luckily with my male best friend. He first thought I didn’t like to use the loos as they were full of men and dimly lit and suggested he come in the loos . I had to explain to him that it wasn’t just feeling unsafe but that I might need to clean my dress which was obviously out of the question. He entirely understood and we left and I had to use a disgusting but at least single sex loo at the station. It got me thinking that if I had had a business client with me or a man other than one of my close mates there’s no way I would. have had that conversation. I work with clients all over the world who might visit London and have friends from all backgrounds and religions. I would have been mortified had I selected that restaurant to take a female Jewish or Muslim client to .., I can’t imagine how difficult they would feel. Or if I was dining with a friend who needed to adjust her wig after chemo or prosthetic breast after a mastectomy. No woman wants to be adjusting her appearance under the male gaze .
Needless to say I never went back and neither did my friend. Now usually I would have written a formal complaint to the management but felt unable to do so given the risk of being labelled transphobic.
I dint believe mixed sex single cubicles are the answer either, unless it is in a tiny cafe say with space for only one loo. My objection to them is that they are dirty by design. They are small and the basin is too near the loo. Bacteria can transfer to the basin from the loo when flushed .. faecal plume can go six feet from the loo. So you wash your hands in the basin but it’s not clean. You then have to touch the toilet cubicle door to get out .. dirtying your hands again. This sounds paranoid but it’s basic hygiene. Especially with covid. We all know not everyone washes their hands. There are also other issues that I can envisage like men just peeing in the sink.. it happens . Plus spy cameras
I can see that family loos which are mixed sex could be helpful for parents to take their kids if a different sex into. I was a carer for my father and a larger family loo would have been helpful with his disability. But both men and women need single sex spaces. Make friends of mine say they don’t want to share with women. They feel it would be rude, ungentlemanly, and woukd never use a urinal in a space with women in it and thus reckon they’d waste time queing when they can just pee .