I'm nearly 65 years old -- and white -- and it still happens to me.It's a big privilege if you never have to think about the bathroom.
We seem driven to instantly categorize the gender of people we meet. I guess that once had a sort of evolutionary value, having the question "can I make babies with this one?" at the top of our consciousness. And for women, it also had (sometimes has) safety implications -- unknown males are more likely to be dangerous than other females.
Please, if you are a woman and perceive a person whose gender seems in doubt in a women's bathroom, look again before you shriek. You might simply be seeing a person whose way of presenting herself is different from your expectations.
2 comments:
Really interesting. Sexual identity notwithstanding, I wonder why we make such a big deal about opposite genders having their own rest rooms. After all, it's just a pee.
Perhaps because women don't want male peeping toms peering through the opening between the door and the stall it's attached to? Duh! Don't tell me all men are innocent of this! Don't be so "modern" in your thinking that you become an idiot!
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