Quote from: Mx. Lonely on August 27, 2013, 08:02:30 PM
A lot of European countries have co-ed open showers. I wouldn't say that Europeans are overly disturbed people or that they are somehow negatively affected by seeing organs that they themselves don't have. It think it must have something to do with religion. Generally it's the more religious countries that seem to have the greatest discomfort with nudity. And America, I think its just because nudity is sexualized by the media so much.
I don't think I'd have a problem seeing people with the opposite genitalia if I
purposely went into a co-ed shower/bathroom. I am someone who's not disturbed by seeing people of the opposite sex and am certainly not disturbed by trans* people. But, I think the problem here in the USA is that there aren't much co-ed bathrooms or showers, so when someone goes in who clearly doesn't pass, people wonder "what's their purpose in coming in here?" Obviously, not everyone is knowledgeable on trans issues, and we've all heard too many stories of people getting raped at rest stops, etc. etc. that everyone has their guard up. I was once in the ladies room at a train station, it was empty except me, when suddenly, someone bursts in to the stall next to me, and in a very deep voice kept saying "too tight, too tight". It was really weird and I immediately though "oh my god, there's a man in here" -- it kind of freaked me out and I hurried out of there. Why? not because I am necessarily afraid of men or their parts (turns out it wasn't a man, but a heavy smoker) but because I am just so used to the gender segregation that it just immediately made my brain put up the alarm. So, it's not really religion that's the cause, just our sense of normalcy and instincts which cause people to get concerned when something is out of the ordinary.
Edit to add: of course this doesn't make something right, as someone above made the analogy to racial segregation, white women in the deep south during Jim Crow laws would've been scared or even got violent if a black woman walked into the white restroom.Of course, religion can play a role in some cases. Some people are just closed-minded bigots, and there's also religions that do have strict gender segregation (like Chassidic Judaism, Shakers, and some followers of Islam. . . ). People who follow strict gender segregation wouldn't be going into co-ed bathrooms or showers, and they'd probably just leave (or perhaps chase someone out of the place) if someone with non-matching genitals came into a shower or bathroom, and would likely be opposed to universal co-ed bathroom legislation. These people have rights too, the issue here though is that so does trans people, and it's difficult to find the right balance at times in our society.
