Did the title grab your attention? Good. Let me propose something to you and please take the time to really think about this. As a cisgendered person, would you feel uncomfortable with gender neutral bathrooms in your favorite bar, or grocery store, or any other place you may frequent? And to those of you who identify differently, how would you feel if you came into your favorite bar and saw that the bathrooms were uniquely marked for the two types of humans who go out on a Friday night? I believe the response to the latter will be pretty uniform. Let me give you the story of my experience with the public restrooms in this town.
First of all, I am a pre-op, pre-hormone, androgynous, binding, FTM, gender-queer, and I go out A LOT. I used to work at the Good Foods co-op and before the expansion, they had gender neutral bathrooms. Sure, when I would walk out of the bathroom sometimes, a child would tug their mom's clothing and say "mommy, is that a boy or a girl?" but it's a Hell of alot better than a child screaming "Mommy, that boy was in the girl's room!" Or vice-versa.
I'm happy to say that I am no longer employed at this co-op, one reason being that with thier current expansion, they are providing larger bathrooms, which means they feel they need to throw a cut-out drawing of a "man" on one and a "woman" on the other. Some may be surprised at this step back in progress for this particular store, however it is coming from a place where the store manager said (to a cashier who shaved her head) "this is Kentucky, not San Francisco", then made her wear a hat.
I understand that with single stall bathrooms it is much easier to provide gender neutrality in a public space, which only pisses me off more when I see single stall bathrooms STILL LABELLED. To those spaces with large bathrooms providing multiple stalls I propose a third option. A safe option for people like me. I cringe at "Family" bathrooms, but God what a life-saver they are sometimes. Also, I have noticed some department stores provide a third option stictly for wheelchaired persons. In the event that I walk out of one of these and a handicapped person is waiting for me to come out, I will apologize profusely, however, I would rather someone assume I am an insensitive prick then stare me down on the way into the restroom because they feel I need to know just how disgusted they are.
To new owners who are just developing around Lexington (we are seeing a boom here) PLEASE include us in the drawing plans!!!! Buster's just re-opened bigger and better and on opening night I couldn't decide on a restroom (the old buster's was single stall and it didn't matter which one you used) and I had a male friend scope out the men's room and apparently even the toilet stalls have no doors. I ended up pissing in a corner of the parking lot all night.
Now back to my original question: To those of you who are cisgendered, would it really rock the boat too much to see a third space being provided for others? I mean, hey, if you're hateful toward non-gender conforming people, don't you want us to stop coming into your bathrooms?
This could go on forever and I want to see your comments!! Also lets take a moment to thank Third Street Stuff for being the ONLY public space who provide gender neutral restrooms. Thanks.
-Jackson
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3 comments:
I'm really glad that you shared this, thank you. As a cisgendered person (someone who's physical gender and mental gender are aligned), I'm not faced w/ the dilemma of which restoroom to use. I'm realizing just how privileged I am because of that.
This isn't just an issue of feeling awkward about what bathroom to use. It's also a safety issue. Transgendered people are often the targets of physical violence. Having a safe space to use the restroom is a basic right.
I would like to continue to encourage people when they find gender neutral bathrooms in Lexington, to post them on website www.safe2pee.org.
De Las Ondas
Part of cisgender privilege is not having to think about these issues. And I think that, cognitively, most cisgendered people will go a step further and purposely avoid thinking about it. So, I think that for most cisgendered people, if they saw a gender neutral bathroom they would probably not give it a second thought. They (we) have the freedom to choose whether or not to think about it, and given that choice, most won't.
Depending on the labeling.
Which brings me to the next part, labeling (which is nicely related to Ondine's project, hint hint). The main problem with labels is when they are applied by someone else. The second issue is how our own labels are interpreted by someone else. So, I think that a.) The cis-community shouldn't be the ones devising labels for gender-neutral bathrooms, and b.) The label used will have consequences, both positive and negative. Labeling it "Family" or just "Restroom" means leaving cisgendered people not having to think about it. That is positive because it avoids conflict, but negative because it's not challenging anyone's thinking pattern. Labeling it "Gender-neutral" means the cisgender community would be forced to start thinking. But I would imagine that most people don't want to make a social statement every time they need to pee.
Thoughts?
You're right, sometimes it seems a bit strained to have such heavy ideas as gender identity floating around something as basic as using a public restroom, however, I would certainly opt for a third restroom with "gender neutral" written across the door, because really, people do need to realize just how much it affects everyday life and everyday routines.
When steps like this are taken, I also feel that more allies are born from it. Sure, there are people that don't think about this issue because they don't have to, but there is a percentage of them, that given the proper stimulation, do think, and do sympathize. Allies mean a great deal to any movement toward equality for oppressed people. I hope they understand this.
thanks so much for posting your thoughts!
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