coegee rockpool baths

The Coogee Rockpool women's baths have existed for many decades. They offer women-only change rooms, sunning areas and a rockpool entirely used by women, but because it is run by the Coogee Council it is now threatened by being open to transwomen. That would stop many elderly, non-western, disabled etc. women using this pool. I certainly would no longer use that unique facility, as an elderly female-born human being. I am extremely angry, because there is no media or any other publicity to help women protest againt this take-over.

#australia #sydney #coegeebeach #rockpools #womensbaths #swimming #privacy

sexual assault trauma & the security of single-sex spaces

A few years ago while at university my male neighbor followed me into my apartment under the guise of casual chit-chat about a shared professor, and once we were inside he cornered me and groped me. I’d walked home in part to use the restroom since I was on my period and had no tampons left in my bag. I kept talking to him to feel more in control and was eventually able to convince him I really needed to return to campus for a class. I did not visit my own bathroom while home because I was very afraid of what would happen if I pulled my pants down, or gave him much time to think without talking. I walked back to campus with him, blood soaking into my underwear, needing to urinate so badly it hurt. When we finally parted ways I was shaking so hard, and went to a top floor locking single user bathroom because he was walking around the building still. I stayed in that building in a classroom where a couple others were working on projects until a friend walked me back to my place after about 4 hours. Ever since this experience I’ve avoided mixed-sex bathrooms when at all possible because the act of pulling down my pants to pee makes me feel vulnerable when before it did not. I want trans-women to be able to relieve themselves, but I also feel I deserve to feel safe while doing the same in public spaces. Female-only spaces need to remain protected.

#unitedstates #sexualassault #safety #privacy #security #university #universitycampus

ladies' toilets

Around 2016, the conversation around transwomen in women's spaces really began to pick up. I was told by a colleague that it was ridiculous to think that a pervert/rapist would take this as an opportunity to go into women's toilets and harass women.

It wasn't long after this conversation when I was on a night out and went to the women's toilets to find a man in women's clothes. He was a feminine man who was perhaps pre-transition. He came across to me as a friendly gay man in women's clothes who was surrounded by his female friends, but it was strange.

However, in the same night, a man who was not even attempting to be a woman decided to enter the women's toilets. He stood there waiting in the queue as if he had a right to be there and the women looked around at each other silently saying with their eyes "there's a man in here and it's uncomfortable." The toilets were absolutely not unisex. Where do I go now if men are simply allowed to walk into women's toilets?

#unitedkingdom #england #toilets #bathrooms #safety #privacy