Locker Rooms and Toilets — We’re doing it wrong, and it’s not just an LGBT issue.

Recently I’ve been reading coverage of the regressive actions of some US states with respect to transgender people and bathrooms / locker rooms. It led me to reflect a little on my experience of these facilities — and wonder if the question is not which facilities transgender people should be allowed to use, but rather whether the whole system needs change. Why, in this day and age, should we have apartheid of facilities? Why should we segregate genders when we are trying to create equality?

I know I’m very, very lucky. I’m a middle-aged, middle-class straight white man living in Scotland. I am the opposite of an oppressed minority, living in a place that is forward looking when it comes to equality issues for minority groups.

I had a very happy childhood. I loved building electronic thingamabobs, talking to other people via amateur radio, programming computers, cycling, and building space Lego. While I was happy, these things didn’t necessarily help me fit in at school. I had a few friends, but I was a long way from being cool. So I was bullied, picked on, and called names. I was always taller than most kids so I wasn’t subjected to much physical violence, but it was constantly threatened. Where did this happen? Where was it worst?

Toilets. Locker rooms. Changing rooms. Away from the watchful eyes of teachers, in a single-gender space where boys could show off to each other by oppressing those they saw as weaker. Shame of nudity was a particular weapon of the bully — either intruding into toilet cubicles or stealing towels or trunks to force a victim to cower in a corner to maintain any semblance of dignity. As a hairless weedy kid into my teens, I was a particularly amusing target for a bit of body image shaming. I always wanted to be first out of the changing room because I hated it so much. All too often I was last out, as I could only find my clothes and possessions when everyone else had left.

When I went to University the bullying stopped, but I didn’t get any fonder of toilets. Male toilets in pubs, clubs and all too often other spaces too are filthy, and the atmosphere is often misogynistic and homophobic. The things people say in a men’s toilet, and the hygiene habits that seem to be accepted, appal me.

Now I’m older and I have a son I have a different set of issues. I am also constantly disappointed by how often there are no baby-changing facilities in the gents — just the ladies. When I am out alone, I end up changing the baby on the floor or counter of a filthy gents toilet. When I’m with my wife we end up forced into gender stereotypes because she changes him because of the available facilities.

Obviously I never want my son to have some of the experiences I have had in secluded, single gendered spaces. Bad enough if he is a bit of an outsider like I was — but how much worse will it be for him if he turns out to be gay or transgender?

I still hate communal changing rooms too — especially at gyms. There always seems to be some tanned ripped guy strolling confidently out the shower with all his bits swinging, looking with contempt at those of us with a pallid complexion and expanding waistline. Having been taught to be ashamed of my body at school I either feel ashamed of my own nudity, or cowardly hiding behind my towel in the presence of such confidence.

My trivial troubles are nothing to those from minority groups, but I wonder how many other people the current system is failing? Perhaps we should solve the question of “which space should a transgender person be allowed to use” by changing the whole way these spaces work?

Most modern swimming pools have open changing areas with no segregation and individual cubicles. Oh, how my heart sings at such places. No need for nudity in the presence of others.

Some public spaces now simply have toilets, with individual rooms or cubicles for privacy. Any festival or running event with temporary toilets seems simply have a collection of cubicles — no gender differentiation. Sometimes there are urinals as well, and from time to time I see women using them (with an appropriate gadget) as the queues are so often shorter.

If the toilet facilities are not gendered, then there is no question about who can use what. Baby changing facilities become accessible to anyone. There is reduced gender inequality from queuing. I have not seen homophobic or misogynistic behaviour in mixed gender spaces in the same way as men’s toilets. Men even seem to take more care about hygiene in mixed-gender spaces.

Of course to eliminate gendering of facilities requires massive change in infrastructure, and would take time, but perhaps this is what we should aspire to? Perhaps we could mandate it for new buildings and refurbishments first, and at least start the process of change?

Let’s fix this. Single gender toilets and changing rooms perpetuate bullying and inequality for a wide range of people. It’s time to stop it.