Divided We Sit: America’s Long History of Inequality in Restrooms
How bathrooms are a metaphor for societal standards and social status
Restrooms act as a magnifying glass into the values of a culture. In anthropology, one might say that as the existing roman baths are a look into the lives of the romans, and similarly we could argue that the same truths lay evident in the architecture found in our bathrooms today. Searching for prominent truths about the values of a culture also raises the question of what is de-valued. Certainly, we could assess what groups are considered socially acceptable and what groups are not as it relates to minorities and discrimination through the architecture of bathrooms in modern history. For this reason, we will examine recent history to bring about questions of equality today. As we start to identify periods of time that allowed for outright discrimination against minority groups, likely the most prominent in our minds would be the Jim Crow era of the late 19thand early 20thcentury.
Discrimination was so blatant in the civil right crisis of the early 1900’s that it became the paradigm of segregation, specifically in bathrooms. During this era, it was mandated that based on skin color, public facilities would need to be “separate but equal.” It is a well-accepted fact that the bathrooms provided were in no way equal, but they certainly were separate. Before we examine the architecture behind the discrimination, first we must question the causality. Inherently, making the restrooms separate was just one more way to explain what society had made clear everywhere else: the races were not seen as equal in the social setting. Therefore, those values were to be represented everywhere: using the bathroom as an archetype of the societal stance on race. In “Restroom Restrictions: How race and sexuality have affected bathroom legislation,” Tynseli Spence-Mitchell explains: “On the surface level, African American women and white women were prohibited from using the restroom together because of what it would represent: their integration starkly symbolized social equality” (Spence-Mitchell). Spence-Mitchell asserts that most people assume when discussing racially segregated restrooms that there was a white men’s, white women’s, ‘colored’ men, and ‘colored’ women’s restroom. That assumption is incorrect. It was actually far more common to have just one unisex ‘colored’ restroom, while white users were offered privacy in the form of gendered separation. An example of a restroom that would be commonplace in the given time period is shown in the image below. The architecture was screaming out to the occupants that there were two socially accepted groups, white males and females, while people of color were made to feel non-human. In this setting, separation was added in, as well as taken away, and sends the message that people of color were not welcome.
Black and white image above depicts three doors: “ladies” “men” and “colored.”
We would like to assume that the blatant bathroom barriers presented for people of color in the late 20thcentury have been lifted, but is that truly the case? Can we assume that the architecture present in public bathrooms today promotes equality among races? In order to understand the accessibility of public restrooms based on outward appearance alone, we shall choose a bathroom archetype for comparison of basic scenarios. I propose to select a public setting that is commonplace, known to have available restrooms and would be found in diverse areas: Starbucks. As the primary example of coffeehouses in America and all that we represent, we should be able to examine the Starbucks restroom structure as an example for many other settings that offer small restrooms to the public.
Barbara Penner, in “The Inclusive Bathroom” states that “an inclusive bathroom is a space that does not exclude particular groups either by design or by law: rather, it positively promotes mobility and well-being.” If we are to use Starbucks as the model for accessible public restrooms, then by no means could we say that these bathrooms are inclusive. In the 2018 article, “America’s problems with race start and end at your Starbucks bathroom,” published by the Chicago Tribune, the author details an experience that two African-American men had at a Philadelphia Starbucks. “Before police officers escorted the two black men out of the Philadelphia Starbucks in handcuffs, at least one of them had asked to use the restroom. The manager said no, reportedly because the men had not ordered anything. And if they stayed without at least a cup on their table, it was considered trespassing.” As an international coffee chain, Starbucks says that they have no policy regarding restrictive use of the bathrooms to paying customers. Rather, it was up to the discretion of the staff.
Image above depicts three women holding signs protesting against Starbucks following their refusal to allow a black man to use their restroom and later called police
It is not unreasonable to question whether or not bathroom access would have been granted, or at the very least, police would not have been called if the requesting patron was Caucasian. The article later goes on to explain another case of bathroom discrimination at a Los Angles Starbucks in which a white customer was granted door code access to the restroom while an African-American man was denied. There is even a video recording of the white man acknowledging that he was not required to make a purchase prior to using the restroom while the other man was. By placing a human monitor near the restroom who at their discretion permits access, the design is allowing for discrimination to occur. Architectural elements such as door codes and monitors allow for discrimination. Otherwise, if bathroom access did not need to be monitored by a staff member, then what group would be inherently able to access the restrooms that the company would not favor? This question brings us to our next topic: discrimination against the unhoused.
Works Cited
Cavanagh, Sheila L. Queering Bathrooms: Gender, Sexuality, and the Hygienic Imagination. Toronto;Buffalo: University of Toronto Press, 2010. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=Pyg0UD3eaEoC&oi=fnd&pg=PT2&dq=queering+bathrooms&ots=EQT0 WVn5U5&sig=9iflGHMlAvvXoaeXt2lI1VTgdLs#v=onepage&q=queering%20bathrooms&f=false
Glanton, Dahleen. “America’s Problems with Race Start (but Don’t End) at Your Starbucks Bathroom.” Chicagotribune.com, Chicago Tribune, 20 May 2019, www.chicagotribune.com/columns/dahleen-glanton/ct-met-dahleen-glanton-toilets- discrimination-20180418-story.html.
Penner, Barbara. “The Inclusive Bathroom.” Bathroom, Reaktion Books, Limited, 2014. Pg.199-238. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral-proquest com.libproxy.uoregon.edu/lib/uoregon/reader.action?docID=1707062
Spence‐Mitchell, Tynslei. “Restroom Restrictions: How Race and Sexuality Have Affected Bathroom Legislation.” Gender, Work & Organization, 4 Sept. 2020, doi:10.1111/gwao.12545.
Image Sources:
https://www.stalled.online/historicalcontext-navigation
I have never given much thought to ‘colored’ bathrooms being a gendered space, but I am surprised to learn they were unisex. It seems to prove that the privacy needs or safety needs of having separate women’s rooms didn’t matter if it were a women of color. It is interesting how all these inequalities can pile up on certain individuals without privilege in many forms. I’m interested to see your research on the unhoused. Nice work!
Wow, it’s so interesting and infuriating to see how bathroom discrimination has just evolved, going from blatant to more subtle but absolutely still there. This is such a clear example of architecture being used to discriminate. Well done!
I didn’t know that “colored” restrooms were often unisex. That must have made segregated restrooms feel even more degrading. I wonder if, in practice, men and women were equally likely to use them or if they really catered to one gender over the other, marginalizing the other gender even more.