Interesting experience with public toilets

[Rosalisa]

Presented with just one comment. I had to fly from Scotland to London last week. Bit bleary and unfamiliar with Luton. Inadvertently opened the door to the men's, I was met with horror so backed out, no bother.

Into the women's. Where a man was coming out of a cubicle, short hair, no make-up, t shirt and jeans, beard. Perfectly pleasant but completely unchallenged by anyone including the male attendant.

I think I've been really sheltered in the highlands.

No thank you.

It's only a matter of time. I won £2.80 last night, £66million is the obvious next step.

@ifIwerenotanandroid

What should the trophies look like? Graphic for novelty value & to get publicity, or abstract & tasteful?

Well my first thought was of a Mumsnet golden toilet brush.... but maybe that's inappropriate, although I think humour can be a powerful weapon.

I just feel so uncomfortable about rewarding organisations for keeping a crumb back of the safeguarding we have been afforded for years.
Yes I do take your point. I guess I'm basically being pragmatic.

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

@Anotheruser02

I like the idea of some kind of reward / recognition system for organisations that have correctly sexed facilities - and unisex space too if additional. I think I saw that suggested on another thread and thought it was a good idea but I can't remember any of the details now.

I just feel so uncomfortable about rewarding organisations for keeping a crumb back of the safeguarding we have been afforded for years. It's ours, we need it. No one's going above and beyond if it isn't taken away, they just have to learn to say NO to the type of man who wants to enter a woman only space.

I agree, & we need to get these rights & practices into law if they're not already there.

But there seems to be a dearth of responsible adults at the moment, so we need a way of getting people to do the right thing.

@Waitwhat23

The reaction of the men when you went into their space says it all, doesn't it? The set up of public toilets in the future will be -

1. Men's toilets
2. Unisex toilets
3. Accessible toilets for those with a disability.

So men get to keep their space. We don't. Unsurprising.

I visited Arundel Castle the other week. Outside the entrance in a public car park there are public toilets. Self contained rooms opening out to the car park. There were approx 4 mixed sex, 2 men’s (urinals only) and 2 disabled toilets. So we are already there.

I think we should organise a day where we highlight women’s importance to the economy and encourage all women to refrain from spending anything for one day. It doesn’t have to be linked to any specific issue - but a way of saying we are here and we matter. I think it would send a small shockwave through the financial services.

@korawick12345

Unsettling, confusing, uncomfortable all of these things absolutely but not ‘fucking terrifying’ for an average woman. I accept that some women have us experiences that would render it very alarming and that is one of the many many reasons toilets should be single sex.

Do you understand how PTSD works?

Do you understand that women who have been subjected to male violence have higher incidence rates of PTSD than soldiers who've been in combat?

Do you understand that in the UK more than 33% of women have suffered domestic violence, at least 20% sexual assault and that the official statistics are underestimating the numbers on both, because the majority of these crimes are not reported, not even in victim surveys?

Do you understand the effect male violence has not only on the victims but also on the female members of their social circle? That's rarely researched in adults, but research on violence against girls in schools regularly asks them if they have witnessed someone being assaulted or if they know someone who has. And then it asks how safe they feel, how scared they are and that number is always far greater than the number of girls who were subjected to violence. By the time I was 14, every single girl I knew had been sexually assaulted. And I'm not talking about a bit of groping, let alone a hand on a knee. Pre-Covid I was regularly in rooms where every single hand went up to answer the question who had been subjected to male violence. Obviously a self-selecting group, obviously not representative but that suggests there are far more women and girls who may react with fear in that situation than you believe possible.

So, finally do you understand that the "average" woman, if she can be said to exist at all, may therefore be someone who does find it terrifying to encounter a male person in a place she expects to be female-only?

@BobbieMarkowe

I think we should organise a day where we highlight women’s importance to the economy and encourage all women to refrain from spending anything for one day. It doesn’t have to be linked to any specific issue - but a way of saying we are here and we matter. I think it would send a small shockwave through the financial services.

I think that's a brilliant idea.

I count myself as quite tough. Not a lot scares me and I have no qualms about travelling alone or walking alone in remote places. But if I encountered a man in a quiet women's toilet my spidey senses would tingle and I would be very alert to his movements because it's not normal behaviour.

@BobbieMarkowe

I think we should organise a day where we highlight women’s importance to the economy and encourage all women to refrain from spending anything for one day. It doesn’t have to be linked to any specific issue - but a way of saying we are here and we matter. I think it would send a small shockwave through the financial services.

Love this idea. I wouldn't go for a day though...I'd go for a week. Women down cards and buy NOTHING. Fathers, husbands etc. use their own cards. Kids can survive for a week on what's in the bloody freezer.

@Ereshkigalangcleg

Or, as another commenter pointed out, can you be sure they weren't a trans man?

Why do you think that's more likely, when you think passing "trans men" would naturally use the men's? Oh I see, you didn't, it's just a silly gotcha.

I don't know - there is so much discussion about this now, and people here and in other places I've seen similar discussions often say, of course any transman can use the ladies, and indeed ought to - I think it's entirely possible some might take the view that is the right thing to do.

I don't find older transmen all that easy to identify in many cases, if they are on the taller side especially. So I'd be inclined to say it was one possibility, along with someone entering mistakenly and going ahead without realising thy were in the wrong toilet, which also happens from time to time.

I visited Arundel Castle the other week. Outside the entrance in a public car park there are public toilets. Self contained rooms opening out to the car park. There were approx 4 mixed sex, 2 men’s (urinals only) and 2 disabled toilets. So we are already there.

I don't think single self-contained units onto a parking lot are really mixed sex, unless you are putting more than one person in at a time. By that logic the disabled ones are also mixed sex. I can barely get my backpack into one of the normal ones with me so it would require some determination to fit two people. There is no risk to women's safety or privacy in that scenario.

@SmokedDuck

I visited Arundel Castle the other week. Outside the entrance in a public car park there are public toilets. Self contained rooms opening out to the car park. There were approx 4 mixed sex, 2 men’s (urinals only) and 2 disabled toilets. So we are already there.

I don't think single self-contained units onto a parking lot are really mixed sex, unless you are putting more than one person in at a time. By that logic the disabled ones are also mixed sex. I can barely get my backpack into one of the normal ones with me so it would require some determination to fit two people. There is no risk to women's safety or privacy in that scenario.

There's the fact that unisex toilets are often a bit grimmer than women-only. Plus the danger of hidden cameras or the type of shenanigans someone mentioned upthread.

Women basically prefer single-sex toilets. Anything else is a step down.

In most places the law doesn't require places with toilets that are like a home toilet - completely self-contained and opening up into a public area - to be sex specific.

I've even heard quite a few women complein about it when they are signed that way, for example in a gas station or cafe, because it means they can't go into an open male-designated toilet which is completely identical to the female-designated toilet. (Though many will anyway.) So I'm not convinced that most women object to this kind of arrangement, and in fact I think quite a few prefer it to stalls.

There is pretty widespread support for women's and mens toilets where there are stalls but I think it would be much less so if you start trying to say these other arrangements are now also included.

This whole thread is odd honestly, and points out some obvious contradictions in the GC position on toilets. If a male sex offender wanted to access female toilets for nefarious purposes, surely it would be far easier for him to claim to be a male attendant or to claim to be a trans man than for him to claim to be a woman.

The problem is not some hypothetical trans person. The problem is the classification of space, knowing it is female only, that males are excluded by law, and by convention and by tacit agreement, that it is a space where women can claim for ourselves, without fear or anxiety. That it is our space, where we can set our limits and males know that they are not allowed.

Stop bringing it back to trans people - women reclaiming female space, has really very little to do with trans people.

I am glad that so many people are feeling the need to have a pile on. In reality I hold the same view that you all do that men shouldn’t be in women’s spaces.

Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

We don't hold the same view that it's ok to minimise women's experiences. And calling the experience of a woman being sexually assaulted a trump card is utterly disgusting. This is the whole reason why women need their own sex segregated space. Not for their experiences to be minimised by the likes of people like you

Chickeny 💐, so sorry to hear about your experience.

Wow, I have never heard anyone talk about rape as a “trump card” before. I think that is a new low.

As for hypothetical situations, isn’t that the fundamentals of all safeguarding?

That's what I thought in raising the scenario, if it can happen in daytime, it can happen anytime.

I didn't bring it up to be a trump, I found myself justifying my choice of words, which the PP took repeated swipes at.

I understand that there is now a gender inclusivity mark and for a long time there has been a disability tick mark, plus things like the charter mark. I wonder how one would go about introducing say a sex equality mark. Meeting x standards of equality, results in entitlement to display the relevant logo etc.

@SmokedDuck

In most places the law doesn't require places with toilets that are like a home toilet - completely self-contained and opening up into a public area - to be sex specific.

I've even heard quite a few women complein about it when they are signed that way, for example in a gas station or cafe, because it means they can't go into an open male-designated toilet which is completely identical to the female-designated toilet. (Though many will anyway.) So I'm not convinced that most women object to this kind of arrangement, and in fact I think quite a few prefer it to stalls.

There is pretty widespread support for women's and mens toilets where there are stalls but I think it would be much less so if you start trying to say these other arrangements are now also included.

My experience is that where single-sex sets of stalls were replaced by unisex closed cubicles opening onto a car park, women were definitely not happy about it.

@SmokedDuck

I visited Arundel Castle the other week. Outside the entrance in a public car park there are public toilets. Self contained rooms opening out to the car park. There were approx 4 mixed sex, 2 men’s (urinals only) and 2 disabled toilets. So we are already there.

I don't think single self-contained units onto a parking lot are really mixed sex, unless you are putting more than one person in at a time. By that logic the disabled ones are also mixed sex. I can barely get my backpack into one of the normal ones with me so it would require some determination to fit two people. There is no risk to women's safety or privacy in that scenario.

I don't see any issue at all with the Arundel set up.

So no women’s only toilets? You are ok with the men having access to 6 toilets but women only 4!

@Feelingoktoday

So no women’s only toilets? You are ok with the men having access to 6 toilets but women only 4!

I don't see any need for a "woman only " toilet in the situation described at Arundel.

There are 4 self- contained toilets for both sexes; 2 self- contained toilets for both sexes those who need adapted toilets and 2 urinals which free up the availability of the first , or even , the second set.

In my own particular situation I have a condition which means I can legitimately use the adapted toilet but equally my needs are better served by the mixed sex, non adapted version. They are not served well by the traditional single sex cubicle set-up.

Sorry meant

In my own particular situation I have a condition which means I can legitimately use the adapted toilet but equally my needs are also served by the mixed sex, non adapted version. They are not served well by the traditional single sex cubicle set-up.

Councils etc should ask women what they want before making any changes*. Has that happened anywhere yet?

This 'unisex cubicles plus semi-open urinals next to a car park' thing seems to be the latest fashion. I've seen photos of it from elsewhere than Arundel - somewhere in London, I think.

• I know, it's a crazy idea

If I were asked- the Arundel set up every time. I really dislike the traditional single-sex, stalls with partitions set up.