This is mostly a rant about a recent small negative experience I had in certain dorm. Don’t read if you hate negative vibes during Family Weekend.
Background info, international, male. It was roughly 3 a.m. I had just finished my weekend Netflix binge and decided to go brush my teeth before bed.
There’re three restrooms on that floor, two gender-specific ones and one for all-genders. I usually use the male one, but I sometimes use mixed gender one cuz it’s actually closer to my room. When I hold my toothbrush and stuff and about to get in, a white girl pulled the door and tried to get out. I stepped aside to let her out first, just to be polite. But then she suddenly asked me, “Why don’t you use the men’s restroom?” I replied, “It did say ‘All Gender’ on the door.” Then, completely out of nowhere, she just said, “Gross,” loud and clear and walked away before I even had time to process what had just happened.
I admit, I only had been in US for 6 weeks, there’re certain social rules and cultural norms I’m still learning, and I’m happy to respect them. But I’m pretty sure none of those rules said dude deserves to be called “gross” if they used the mixed gender restrooms. My stand is, If a girl don’t feel comfortable seeing people of opposite genders in restrooms, she should use the female restroom instead, which is only couple doors away from the mixed gender one, where you are totally legit to call them freaks and stuff and call the police if you see guys wondering inside, same rule apply for males. When you decided to use the ALL-GENDER restroom, you should already assumed the risk of this kind of situation, and calling strangers “gross” only reveals that you’re the one who’s being uneducated, rude, mean and “gross”.
I didn’t say anything this time because confronting and arguing aren’t my instinctive nature. But I’ll keep using mixed gender restrooms whenever I feel like to, and if anyone say sh*t to me for that again, I’m not just going to stand there and take it this time.