Just a reminder of how female toilet spaces are used and why single mixed sex cubicles should not be accepted as the only toilets available in areas outside of very small businesses.
Toilets are not just used behind a closed cubicle door. There are quite a few aspects of female toilet usage that happen in the public space, or even now still occur with a toilet door jammed open.
Don’t forget there is the safety aspect where people may rely on the gaps under doors and walls for their safety. We already had someone mention helping a woman who was on the floor that they could see because of the gap. We have had others on other threads point out that they feel safer with gaps after being attacked in mixed sex toilets that are fully enclosed and no one could see them.
From my personal experience here is a list.
I have had to use the toilet while having a pram / pushchair jammed into the door with groceries.
I have had to have my mum use the public toilet because the disable toilet was not available and had her wheelchair jammed in the door because I couldn't leave her sit to move it and shut the door.
I have had breastmilk leaks / children's vomit / food spilled on my clothes and needed to have an unbuttoned top to dry the top under the hand drier.
I have come across other women quite regularly washing out their tops or their skirts etc and drying them enough to put back on .
I have friends who have miscarried in toilets and needed assistance and for that to be female people to make it more comfortable.
Even with mixed sex cubicles with basins, they don’t usually have the space needed for prams. And if a woman is trying to dry themselves using a drier in the cubicle, it restricts traffic flow. Even if it is just internal pressure that she feels, there will be pressure on her to leave the cubicle quickly. In an open space she will less inclined to feel that pressure.
If you as a female person have not experienced these issues, that doesn't mean it is not happening. I am glad that you have never needed to do this things, it is uncomfortable and can be quite humiliating. But at least, in a female only toilet, it is a little better.
I think when people think of toilet usage, maybe they have never had to use the toilets in any other way other than behind a closed door. That is a privilege in that respect.
But the needs are still there and they are real for many female people to be able to engage in public life.
To allow any male person toileting spaces (over the age of about 8 years old) removes some of the usability of this space for female people.
Demanding that all toilets are changed into single cubicles doesn’t mean that the issues where women and girls need the extra space and privacy for everyday occurrences go away. That style of toilet means female people will just self exclude because of a loss of provision.
So who benefits here from allowing a group of male people to access a female single sex space or from
allowing all toilet provision to become mixed sex cubicles?