Restroom signs say much the same thing all over the world, but the way they say it says a lot about how view the differences between men and women. Why are women so often depicted as wearing skirts? And why do we have to use separate bathrooms anyway?
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Women’s and men’s washrooms: we encounter them nearly every time we venture into public space. To many people the separation of the two, and the signs used to distinguish them, may seem innocuous and necessary. Trans people know that this is not the case, and that public battles have been waged over who is allowed to use which washroom. The segregation of public washrooms is one of the most basic ways that the male-female binary is upheld and reinforced.
As such, washroom signs are very telling of the way societies construct gender. They identify the male as the universal and the female as the variation. They express expectations of gender performance. And they conflate gender with sex.
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What bullshit.
As Freud said: "sometimes a sign is just a sign".
Of course, one-holers need no segregation. I remember a conversation between my old boss and a colleague:
Guy one: Back when I worked at yadayada, we yadayada in the mail room...
Guy two: You had a male room? We just have one, but it works for both male and female.
In a lot of places here in my area, malls and stores and libraries and such have been putting in a male bathroom, a female bathroom, and a family bathroom. The family bathroom is for all genders and mixed gender groups (like a mom with a little son or a dad with a little daughter). I hear they are also a fairly comfortable option for transgender folks,too, since you don't need to pick male or female or be hassled about your choice.
I don't see that at all. Why is wearing a skirt an inherent variation on being a person? Both images are dress styles, neither is inherently a person. The article points out a few interesting issues with the way gender is constructed, but I think they are really stretching in a lot of places. Also society treats Trans people pretty horribly, but I think public bathrooms are not nearly as serious a concern as other things like threats of violence.
I think that the issue with a unisex mega spaces with stalls would be that many women would likely be horrified when virtually every time they had to sit, then first had to wipe the pee splatters off the seat (unless women pee all over seats too, I have no experience there.) I consider the regularity of utter revoltingness of the seats a factor as to into whether I really need to poop in a public place.
I've heard the horror stories already coming from my female friends visits to women’s washrooms. They swear that women can be even grosser then men. Things mentioned like tampons and pads clogging the toilets. Gender has nothing to do with individual cleanliness.
But my biggest issue with same sex Multiple toilets in restrooms (I am not talking about a unisex, one toilet restroom) would be safety. I would not feel safe using a stall with men in the restroom at the same time.
And one last thing: Because most women (there may be some, I don't know) do not use urinals to pee into, I think there should be at least a 3 to 1 ratio of toilets favoring women. There are never enough toilets at public places for women to use and we have to sit down whereas men can stand up and use a communal urinal.
Trolling aside, the reason why they are separate is because of what Miss Cellania said: urinals. If those were to go away, so would the sex separated bathrooms.
But if they were to get rid of those and combine the bathrooms, I, along with many other men, would probably be upset because we would be losing our express lane that the male society has gotten used to.
The only time I've seen communal urinals were at older ball stadiums and older public beaches, and both were disgusting.
Urinals are usually separate, and the process is faster is because guys don't dilly-dally.
The time females spend in the restrooms is on average about two thirds to three quarters longer compared to the males. That alone would be enough reason to have separated restrooms.
Yet we find also that females use restrooms differently from males. Males just get in there, do their business, wash hands and split. Females use the restrooms not only to do their toilet-business, but also to freshen up, do their make-up, redo their hai, sometimes even to change their clothes or just to rest and retake themselves before they get back into their activities. For females the restroom often is a place to have social interaction. If males have social interaction, it can be for shady deals, do punch eachothers lights out or to have same-sex contacts. But mostly males do not have or even try to avoid social contacts in the restrooms.
Those are all reasons why there is logic to gender-separation of restrooms.
I like family restrooms and changing areas, because it makes it easier to share a locker or bag with my husband, even if we do have to put up with other people's children.
Women also take longer because every time we have to remove a lot of clothing to take a pee, and have to completely re-dress to exit the stall. Women being much more critical of other women than men ever are.
I remember when bathrooms used to be for men with two legs and men with one leg wearing kilts.
THe assumption that the image is showing male as the norm and female as the variation is a prejudicial assumption.
Funny when the ivory tower academics have to grasp at straws to justify their existence.
For those calling for more stalls, consider the logistics - stalls are far more expensive and take up more space. How about women stop being such prudes and just have a sit down pee trough?
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