What’s the deal with MRAs and urinals? You may recall the highly touted “URLs @ urinals” campaign from last year, a plan to plaster little posters over urinals in public bathrooms to lure peeing men to Men’s Rights websites; evidently the way to a man’s heart is through his urethra?
Then there was that big to-do in the Men’s Rights subreddit when a Canadian restauranteur removed a urinal shaped like a woman’s lips after some feminists complained about it.
Oh, and who can forget GirlWritesWhat’s weird FemRA lament that men hanging out in men’s bathrooms can’t even bitch about women any more due the encroachment of evil mangina language police. (Note: Men in public bathrooms do not actually talk to one another.)
Well, now the MRA videoblogger who goes by the nom-de-internet of ManWomanMyth has weighed in on the Urinal Problem in a long and rambling blog post titled, and I am not making this up, “Urinals – a genesis for male psychology?”
MWM (let’s just call him that) argues that “male spaces” have been so encroached upon by evil feminists that men have no place they can truly call their own.
Why are female spaces inviolate and male spaces forcibly opened to females?
Why are males spaces not seen to be equally as important as female spaces?
I’ll tell you why, it’s because under our Feminist governance, anything that maintains or leads to any concept of male camaraderie or the enhancement of male self-awareness is actively attacked and suppressed. It’s vital in our society to strip men of their identity as ‘men’ so that they can be assaulted in the myriad ways. …
By preventing the development of male-bonding and understanding between men (which is difficult enough, even under the best of circumstances) men are successfully kept isolated from each other and more easily used and abused.
Seriously, he’s got a point here. If you look at the various photos of corporate Boards of Directors I gathered together in this old post, you’ll notice that a couple of them even have some ladies in them!
So what does this have to do with urinals? MWM explains:
This is where urinals-in-the-home comes in. …
By installing one in your home, what I think is being done is making a claim to a portion of space and making that claim based solely on the fact of your manhood.
Only men can successfully stand up to pee, women have no choice but to sit down. This is a point of difference that has little relevance in normal daily life, but has every relevance to male psychology.
You see, the urinal is just for you as a man. It’s impossible for her to use it. It’s for you. For your son. For your male friends.
In other words, MWM thinks that men (cis men, anyway) should have them installed in their bathrooms for no other reason than that (cis) woman can’t use them. In your face, bitches! Try peeing in THIS! YOU CAN’T!!
Though I should note that this does not stop women from trying, as this album cover from the 1970s clearly documents:
MWM goes on to explain the logic behind this new crusade:
There is no means by which the exclusive use of the urinal can be taken away from you by any claims of unfairness or any other irrational female claim.
There can be no quotas for the female use of urinals; there can be no Presidential Council for Women and Girls calling for more ‘Women into Urinals’; the UK Minister for Women could create no tax-payer funded programme to encourage girls to be the same as men and use urinals.
It’s yours because you are male and can only remain yours.
Now you might ask yourself, why the fuck would anyone care about this? MWM has an answer to that question as well:
Why is this important?
I think that this is an example of a beginning, a genesis for male self-awareness. Particularly if you have a young boy in the household. It could well be the first thing and perhaps even the only thing he will ever encounter in his young life that is not ‘equally’ open to girls and there is no ‘equalities’ agency that can do anything about it.
Most boys grow up today having to play every sport and share every activity with girls and woe betide him if he seeks to win or is too aggressive. …
The urinal could be the only thing in his life that is for him and exclusively for him and others who are like him in only one essential way: they are also male. …
This is a little space in the bathroom, a little space in his life, where his sister can’t go and doesn’t want to go and couldn’t go if she did want to. It’s off limits because she is not male. …
A urinal is not particularity interesting in itself, but it may well be a first step in the development of a sense of self for boys and men that otherwise typically never happens or else is savagely crushed in men. A catalyst towards a sense of what it means to be male and a first seed of understanding of the essential difference between the sexes which goes beyond mere anatomy. …
This is where anti-misandry starts.
While all this is very moving, I don’t think it goes far enough. Consider the Home Pregnancy Test. This is something that woman can pee on, but men can’t – at least not without being ridiculed by society for peeing on such a girly thing.
Wait, you might say. If (cis) men get urinals to pee on, why can’t (cis) women have these little sticks that they can pee on? Because these pregnancy tests involve little chemical strips that CHANGE COLOR when you pee on them, depending on whether or not you’re pregnant. Urinals don’t change color! And that’s not FAIR!
STICKS FOR DICKS!
Now THAT’S where anti-misandry really starts!
“Not that that’s an okay thing to shout at any kid, but it was an extra level of fucking stupid watching him yell at, say, my friend who stood a whopping 4’9” at age 18 about how she sucked forever because she wasn’t super-great at spiking volleyballs.”
Yeah, that’s definitely its own category of stupid. I really can’t imagine any other type of teacher getting away with that, can you imagine this — “you can’t name all 50 state capitals?! You suck and will suck forever!”? Or “what do I need algebra for?” “to not suck forever!” Yeah, I see both of those ending in the teacher getting reprimanded, yet gym teachers are allowed to be assholes. Gym teachers being more of the “knock it off, just because you’re good at the sport doesn’t mean everyone has to be!” variety would almost certainly help here.
“I don’t think studfinders are magentometers. I think they are some sort of sonar based densitometers. I’ve never had a problem using them.”
Do you buy the expensive kind? The cheap ones I had thought were magnet based, but the expensive ones might actually work.
“I think most of them were san water, though I am sure some has constant flow. They were long projections of enameled iron, so that a woman could lift her skirt and (wearing split bloomers) straddle them and let go.”
Ah ok, I’d known about the trough type, but had thought that fell out of favor with the “invention” of flush toilets (more things Rome did two thousand years before the rest of us…)
“Guys would piss in bottles. Some were bad at it.”
…how do you fucking fail at that?! I don’t really want to know, I just don’t frikken get it…
“The only reason to stand is that I’m in a public restroom (and so am more vulnerable if my pants are down)…”
Stalls have locks, usually, I mastered the fine art of holding the door closed with my foot back in HS. A locked stall seems like more protection than a urinal would provide, but gustibus non disputandum est 🙂
@Ithiliana-well DKM does make a point about provocation that seems to make sense. Every normal person can be provoked and pushed too far at times where they may respond in an unpleasant manner.
I wish PE classes were segregated by ability, regardless of gender. I think both the athletic and the unathletic kids are totally sapped of their motivation when they’re constantly playing games where everyone knows who’s going to win.
I guess being assigned to the “weak group” at PE would be sort of embarrassing? But then you can get some good competition going between the weak kids and make them feel like their efforts actually make a relative difference. And meanwhile you can give the strong kids an actual challenge instead of just letting them win by steamrolling totally intimidated opponents.
JeanM – “I only think murder is okay if the murderer feels provoked” works out to, for all intents and purposes, “I think murder is okay.”
Most murderers consider themselves sufficiently provoked. That’s not special. It’s how murder usually works. That doesn’t make it okay.
“I guess being assigned to the “weak group” at PE would be sort of embarrassing?”
I was thinking it could work if you defaulted to the “meh whatever” group and could opt in to a “yeah I’m good at this” group — that kid who broke my damned toe was a soccer player treating gym soccer like a proper game (and I suck at basically every sport involving a ball, tennis being the only exception).
It’s also quite a leap from a “normal person can be provoked [to] respond in an unpleasant manner” to murder — most people can be provoked into calling you an asshole, maybe even a fist fight, but murder? (And bad timing much? Aren’t we already questioning what makes murderers “snap”? Maybe not justify it for oh, idk, a week?)
You know what would be really awesome? If we could get through a single week without one of the trolls posting something that amounts to “yay, homicide!”.
Ohhh I fucking hated P.E., and mine was gender segregated. The ultra-competitiveness and willingness to stamp down anyone in your way is pretty present in alot of girls that age as well.
If we were given a choice, I used to hang around and play badminton or squash with my friends, and that was cool, but there was nothing so humiliating as being dragged out to play football, shoved immediately into goal and then informed “you have to stop the ball, you know…” >.<
Teachers rly rly didn't help this atmosphere, I think picking teams is HORRIBLE for children to go through, as someone who was often picked last. The two sportiest girls pick one by one who they would like, until you are left standing alone and someone is forced to take you. It still brings me out in a cold sweat now. This mostly happened when I was playing netball, which I was actually pretty good at as it wasn't as intense and gave you time to stop and think.
I went to a great deal of effort to skive off P.E. lessons, and it was nothing to do with being lazy.
(Also changing rooms are fun when you are 'still' wearing a sports bra and forgot to shave under your arms that day! O the horror!)
There are urinals for women in South Korea. They’re the troughs inside the subway station public bathrooms. Ladies: drop trou, grab the handles on the wall, step up onto an elevated platform, swing that ass out over the trough, squat, and let it go. I’m not even kidding. I’VE DONE THIS. Suffice to say I’d rather piss in an outdoor field.
Also, squat toilets in both men’s and women’s restrooms are the pits, especially in winter, ESPECIALLY when having to deal with pantyhose. #Protip: if you’re dressing up in Asia and need stockings, wear thigh-highs. It’ll make peeing much easier.
“I guess being assigned to the “weak group” at PE would be sort of embarrassing? But then you can get some good competition going between the weak kids and make them feel like their efforts actually make a relative difference. And meanwhile you can give the strong kids an actual challenge instead of just letting them win by steamrolling totally intimidated opponents.”
Alot of the ‘weak group’ might be pretty good once they weren’t in an environment where they had to aggressively compete with people who were the best at sport and/or much higher in the school food chain.
Hell yeah to this. Making kids feel like shit about themselves is not the way to imbue them with a love of physical exercise.
I think gym class should treated more like recess, actually. Give kids a variety of play options, be they actual sports or what the fuck ever else, and let them discover something they enjoy doing.
I also think it’s absolutely stupid that gym class is something you get graded for. “Oh yes, your kid is fully qualified to graduate in every other respect, but I’m afraid they didn’t play enough dodge ball.” I ask you, what the fuck is that?
My PE teacher was also the pastoral care tutor. Their solutions to my problems? “Try to fit in” and “play more sports”.
They always have this attitude that everyone likes sport as much as they do, and are as good at sport as they are. I got a lot of “if you tried harder, you’d really like it!” which I thought was balls. I was trying as hard as I could, I just sucked.
On the plus side, I did accidentally hit the pastoral care PE teacher with a rounders bat twice and I also clipped them on the head with a badminton racket, so…
And I broke a table-tennis table. 😀
(It’s all accidents, I’m just clumsy.)
“I also think it’s absolutely stupid that gym class is something you get graded for. “Oh yes, your kid is fully qualified to graduate in every other respect, but I’m afraid they didn’t play enough dodge ball.” I ask you, what the fuck is that?”
Wtf is that = my last year of HS — I needed gym and English to graduate, and could’ve fulfilled the English credit the year before. This did mean I had a whole lot of time free my senior year (which was mostly spent trying to wrangle the GSA into something functional…and doing homework).
In other words, I think they require 4 years of gym just to prevent people from graduating at 16.
“I think gym class should treated more like recess, actually. Give kids a variety of play options, be they actual sports or what the fuck ever else, and let them discover something they enjoy doing.”
And graded pas/fail if you show up and don’t just sit on your ass? As long as the “whatever the fuck you like” option had the pool open, I’d be down with that. (And I don’t mean the nice relaxing “it’s a pool” you normal people do, I mean 50+ laps in 40 min, because I’m part fish or something — you’d have to be a royal asshole to decide that wasn’t worth a passing grade)
@ Effie
I’ve always wondered how people manage with the squat toilets when wearing complicated clothing. I used them in the Middle East, and but it usually wasn’t a big deal because I was wearing either a long skirt or loose pants (since that’s all I was allowed to wear in public). But I know tons of Japanese punk/goth women who wear shorts over tights, and that seems like it would be tricky to manage with a squat toilet. I may have to ask a friend about this next time we’re both drunk.
I think the world would be a better place is there were more swing sets rated to accommodate adults. If folks not getting enough exercise is a concern, why not make an effort to ensure that people don’t think of it as drudgery? What precisely is so wrong with fun?
End rant.
I could totally go for an adult-size version of one of those climbing structures made of wire that they have at playgrounds. Not that I couldn’t use the kids version, I’m short enough, but people would look at me funny.
Cassandra — TMI warning — pull everything down to knee level, not all the way down, idk if it’d work in a full length skirt and stockings, but works well enough in shorts or a shorter skirt (bondage pants with all those straps and buckles and dangling bits are more of a problem, stockings at least stay close to your skin).
Short answer is, of course, that you manage with practice.
@ Argenti
I’m mostly trying to figure out how you’d do it without flashing everyone. With a skirt you can kind of shield yourself a bit, with but shorts + tights I’m thinking your ass would be fully on display. Probably less potential for mess than with a long skirt, though.
Also I’m imagining trying to do this in 4 inch heels, or platforms, so there’s that too. The first time I tried to use a regular toilet that happened to be kind of low while wearing 6 inch platforms I had a moment where I was all, this is like being in a rapidly sinking elevator.
(Booze does not make any of this easier.)
Did some call for more fun? (You know how I always plug Emilie Autumn? The Toy Soldier you all know and hate irks me big time as Dr. Steel’s toy soldiers are my FWB’s pet project to plug, and your TS is not about more fun)
Cassandra — sorry, no clue how you’d do it without flashing everyone. And platforms are evil in general (I can walk in 5″ heels, tiny platforms send me stumbling)
And oh boy is NWO going to have fun with this huh? NWO, you get into a water balloon fight or something, you definitely need more fun.
Argenti – Nifty! Thank you for that.
I think the issue with platforms is that you can’t feel the ground under your feet at all. It takes a while to get used to. I’ve never had any issue with heels, but I nearly killed myself the first time I tried to run down the stairs to catch a tube in platforms, wouldn’t wiped out completely if my friend hadn’t caught me.
Dracula — more fun is always more better, so no problem 😀 [insert mad scientist laugh here]
Cassandra — they’re EBIL, glad you had friends to catch you though, wiping out on stairs hurts (and the most I’ve fallen down was like the bottom 6 or so)
I love my platforms, though. I am a vertically challenged person, and they allow me to actually see what’s going on in crowds.
Forget urinals, I want a bidet.
Cassandra — enjoy them then? My best wishes to your ankles though.
Estraven — not only are bidets more useful, but combo toilet/bidets exist, it doesn’t even have to take up any more space than a toilet
…when’d it get to be light out? Shit, I should go to bed >.<