In my mother's tongue there are no pronouns that tell you which
sex you are talking about, so it could be this discussion is
even more silly to me than it would be for a person coming from
a culture where they feel that every sentence uttered about them
is claiming knowledge about their being that is actually never
spelled out. In my language it in fact gets quite clunky if you
insist on putting the sex in the sentence. You would be saying
something like "The woman went into the loo" and the "woman" in
the sentence screams that she was put in there artificially.
Because usually you would just say "She/he went into the loo".
(My dialect goes even further and would just say "It went into
the loo" not making a difference between a person and an object.)
There are words like "workman" and "policeman", though, so the
language is not gender neutral in all aspects.
Well, in any case, to me this thing about pronouns that is going
on seems like it should either not happen or it should go further.
I care very little if you perceive me in the context of whatever
gender when I am writing my thoughts here. But I do care about
things like not being able to go to a spa with mixed sex group
since there is segregation that basically cripples the activities
unless you all are of only one official sex. Like, there could
be a big sauna section in the spa that is nude so they have
decided to separate the men and the women on different sides.
So, apparently you are not supposed to have friends on the other
side of the divide?
Basically I think that if we are to continue talking about
pronouns, we should also talk about stopping this segregation.
There is a unisex toilet in the library in our capital. It is
incredible in a very boring way. Like, obviously there is nothing
special about people going to take a shit or a pee. But it sort
of spells out the ridiculousness of the whole enterprice of
keeping the sexes separated and making people define themselves
when they walk through one door or the other. The toilet is made
in good taste. There are no urinals in view. There's just a big
area for handwashing and make-up and there are booths on the
sides. In the booths there are also mirrors and a sink I
believe, so you could do your make-up there as well if you want
privacy for that.
No big deal? Well it kinda is a big deal. You walk there
and you are wondering if you missed a sign, did you accidentally
walk into women's room (because there are no urinals). There is
some lady changing a baby's diaper. It is really quite a mind
bender, I dare you try the biggest unisex toilet you can find
once this corona thing is over. It highlights that this whole
discussion of pronouns is just skirting at the edges.
My answer is: Get rid of pronouns, get rid of segregated areas
in all cases where they are not protecting some vulnerable group.
Like, a person in a wheelchair will need a space designed for
them. But still it would not have to be completely separate of
the communal area. I think the separation is most likely doing
more harm than good even in many cases where the person is in
some special vulnerable group.
What's so great about this answer? You need to build zero new
toilets. You need only push down some walls. Very practical.
