All school toilets in Brighton to become gender neutral

[SapphosRock]

I'm not happy about this at all.

I have a DD and keep thinking how she would feel changing a pad in year 7 or 8 with a group of year 11 boys in the same toilets as her.

It's always the girls who lose out by being 'inclusive'.

Any suggestions on what I can do?

www.theargus.co.uk/news/19361363.gender-neutral-toilets-introduced-brighton-schools/

That doesn't sound right. Are they floor to ceiling doors with washbasin?

womansplaceuk.org/mixed-sex-toilets-ins-chools/

Yes, which is something I suppose:

It suggests this should include “blocks of ceiling cubicle toilets that can be used by all, with bins for menstrual products in each cubicle (‘toilets for everyone’)”.

Separate toilet and washing facilities must be provided for boys and girls aged 8 years and over pursuant to Regulation 4 of the School Premises (England) Regulations 2012, which falls within the exemption provided for in Schedule 22 of the Equality Act 2010

www.transgendertrend.com/schools-resources/

They have a specific critique of this toolkit which is free to download as well as guides to the law around this.

I think some toilets can be like that to provide for children with disabilities etc, but in addition to, not instead of.

Have they done an impact assessment? I'd ask for a copy of that.

Or does this square with the fact that girls in particular are suffering huge amounts of sexual harressment in schools?

Hasn't the government said that all new builds have to have single sex and others have to have a partition. Robert Jenrick is the Communities Secretary who is firming up the regulations so Brighton would be in breech

womansplaceuk.org/2021/05/16/government-to-strengthen-regulations-on-single-sex-toilets/ There is more recent informati9on but I can't find right now. I believe its already been announced

This is so fucking wrong.

I hate how making the doors floor to ceiling is deemed acceptable. It's not. It's just not.

After that article today about the disgusting abuse teenage girls are receiving from their male classmates, the constant requests for nudes, as well as the number who are sexually assaulted in school, what kind of idiot thinks mixed sex toilets are a good idea?

Why has safeguarding gone out of the window for this generation of children? Why do women and girls matter so little?

I really can't see an issue. Floor to ceiling cubicles with washing facilities and a sanibin in each cubicle.

@DirectionsForUse

I really can't see an issue. Floor to ceiling cubicles with washing facilities and a sanibin in each cubicle.

Speaking as a woman who has suffered domestic abuse I very much can see an issue. Not that it is necessary to have gone through that to want separate spaces.

Women need separate spaces. I would not want to use any public toilet and men be in the same space as me.

Surely this is preferable to the old toilet "block" and removes many an opportunity for bullying?

Maybe things are different now but the girls loos were somewhere you only went if you really needed to when I was at school. It was where all the nasty girls (and I'm sure, boys) hung out ready pounce on their next victim safely out of the view of staff.

Women need separate spaces. I would not want to use any public toilet and men be in the same space as me.

Men won't be in the same space as you. It's a self contained cubicle.

@DirectionsForUse

I really can't see an issue. Floor to ceiling cubicles with washing facilities and a sanibin in each cubicle.

I suspect it depends, are the walls thick enough that girls are happy unwrapping Sanpro? Or will boys leap into the next cubicle and start teasing /harrrssing

@DirectionsForUse

I really can't see an issue. Floor to ceiling cubicles with washing facilities and a sanibin in each cubicle.

Actually, although that sounds fine, it isn’t. It puts females more at risk as nobody would challenge a male being in a female facility, and as the cubicles are completely self contained it increases the risk of being assaulted.

@DirectionsForUse

Women need separate spaces. I would not want to use any public toilet and men be in the same space as me.

Men won't be in the same space as you. It's a self contained cubicle.

Yes, but they can be right outside the toilet door as you go out to wash your hands. In separate loos, they can't even be in the vicinity.

And actually, it could be difficult for any vulnerable child. A young gay boy who other boys may pick on can use the boys toilets with some degree of safety as its relatively open, cubicle doors aren’t floor to ceiling. In the proposed facilities, again he could be subjected to assault without anyone seeing.

@DirectionsForUse

Women need separate spaces. I would not want to use any public toilet and men be in the same space as me.

Men won't be in the same space as you. It's a self contained cubicle.

Where do you have to walk through to get to that cubicle? Who could potentially corner you on the way in/out?

Does it? You'd be in there on your own with the waves onto the corridor.

As I said, there were plenty of assaults in the girls loos when I was at school. This sounds far preferable to me.

It reads that these will be an additional provision, so the third space that is repeatedly asked for on here.

Hey it's like parking ... we need diagrams

Oh, hang on, I see you said the cubicle have separate washing facilities in them. I don't really understand this. Why does there need to be cubicles at all then? Why not just have a separate loos accessed from the corridor?

Waves? How did that happen. Door.

I've just been involved in the planning of a new school building like this. It's rows of toilets opening directly into the corridor, as DDA toilets in schools already do (and are unisex).

Anyone who thinks floor-to-ceiling stalls are the solution needs to be aware of autogynephile behaviour in mixed-sex facilities. As well as those who place hidden cameras there are also those who deliberately piss on the floor or wank onto things other people will have to touch, sometimes filming themselves as they do so. In a school setting a floor-to-ceiling stall isn't going to prevent a boy dragging or following a girl into a cubicle. It isn't going to stop a group of boys hanging around outside and humiliating a girl as she uses the toilet.