Feb 1, 2021 | Description (G), Graduate, Research |
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
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/04/16/black-man-videotapes-starbucks-refusal-let-him-use-restroom/521233002/
Feb 1, 2021 | Description (G), Graduate, History, public restroom, Reflection, Research, United States |
First came the car, then the interstate, and simultaneously the rest area. The Interstate Defense Act of 1956, implemented by President Eisenhower, allowed for the construction of highway systems across the country to eliminate unsafe roads and traffic jams and ensure speedy and safe transcontinental travel. Many years later, the United States interstate system currently has 46,876 miles of paved roads interconnecting cities and states. Accompanying these interstates incrementally and at the border of each state are rest areas. Built with the same enthusiasm and vigor as the highway system, these roadside pit stops allowed drivers to safely take breaks from monotonous Interstate travel by providing drivers with basic amenities such as toilets, vending machines, picnic tables, and pet walking areas. (History.org)
Before interstates and rest areas there were minor roadside stops for drivers. These roadside stops provided drivers with minimal amenities, most just including picnic shelters.
Rest areas were constructed as part of the interstate highway system. The legislature required that rest areas be constructed on the same basis, quality, and importance of the highway system and match its modernity. Being a prominent part of the interstate system and being deemed a necessity by the Policy on Safety Rest Areas for the National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, most states established roadside development programs that constructed and maintained roadside rest areas. These development programs are managed and operated by the Department of Transportation, and in-house landscape architects and architects design the landscaping, site circulation, and building structures. (Dowling)
The rest areas’ goal is to provide particular points for stopping along the interstate, so the number of automobiles parked along the road is reduced. Rest areas provide drivers with locations to stop and be a safe and comfortable distance from traffic. The excerpt below from the National System of Interstate and Defense Highways gives an in-depth description of the rest areas’ intended use.
“Rest areas are to be provided on Interstate highways as a safety measure. Safety rest areas are off-road spaces with provisions for emergency stopping and resting by motorists for short periods. They have freeway type entrances and exit connections, parking areas, benches and tables and may have toilets and water supply where proper maintenance and supervision are assured. They may be designed for short-time picnic use in addition to parking of vehicles for short periods. They are not to be planned as local parks.”
A Policy on Safety Rest Areas for the National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, 1958
Rest areas serve a dual function for travelers. They provide basic service amenities. They also create a context of place and showcase the identity of the state or region the rest area is located. Rest areas are intentionally designed with unique and colorful expressions of the historical and regional locale to connect people with the regions they are passing through. It is standard for rest areas to have a main theme implemented throughout the site. The toilet building is often the largest building on the site and is designed to serve as the rest area’s centerpiece expressing a certain theme. Picnic areas scattered around the toilet building are designed to support the theme of the rest area. Often, the material or design qualities of these structures are exaggerated to create unique and interesting structures. (Dowling, Balancing Past and Present Safety Rest Areas and the American Travel Experience)
A rest area in Joshua Tree, California. Minimal design made from local materials.
Bibliography
Dowling, Joanna. Balancing Past and Present Safety Rest Areas and the American Travel Experience. https://www.wsdot.wa.gov/partners/nsrac2008/PDFs/A3_1-History.pdf.
—. “Safety on the Interstate: The Architecture of Rest Areas.” Society for Commercial Archeology, 19 Mar. 2020, https://sca-roadside.org/safety-on-the-interstate-the-architecture-of-rest-areas/.
History.org, Rest Area. “Rest Area History.” Rest Area History.Org, https://restareahistory.org/history. Accessed 21 Jan. 2021.
Image Sources
Hansen, Kristine. “The 15 Most Beautiful Rest Stops in America.” Architectural Digest, https://www.architecturaldigest.com/gallery/most-beautiful-rest-stops-in-america. Accessed 1 Feb. 2021.
History.org, Rest Area. “Rest Area History.” Rest Area History.Org, https://restareahistory.org/history. Accessed 21 Jan. 2021.
Jan 31, 2021 | Description (G), Graduate, Research |
There is a sideshow trajectory in male restrooms and these carnivalesque urinals really hit the target. Urinals are rarely a topic of discussion or academic writing, but there is much to be revealed about human nature in this newest trend in men’s restrooms. Carnivalesque restrooms for men have become popular in Europe, UK, Australia, Japan and the USA, especially in trendy commercial establishments. The popularity of carnivalesque male restrooms thrives in affluent commercial venues that celebrate status and exclusivity. With the surge of global capitalism, also rises an amplified promotion of personal desire and hunger for self-gratification, even at the most basic levels of satisfaction, like urination (Bernier-Cast 21).
Russian philosopher Mikhail Bakhtin coined the term “carnivalesque” in the early 20th century. It evolved from the word carnival, referring to the popular festivals that swept across Europe since Medieval times (Bernier-Cast 21). Carnival spirit grows out of a culture of laughter, where seriousness is abandoned for humor or even chaos. It is a radical humor that is liberation from the accepted norms of society. Carnival celebrates our base as humans: birth, death, sexuality, ingestion and evacuation are things we all have in common.
During carnival, rules, restrictions, inhibitions of polite society are suspended to reveal the darker, hidden side of our nature and can be freely expressed. The emphasis being on “living outside of one’s self” when a “second truth” is demonstrated openly (Lachmann 124). The bizarre is on full display; sacrilegious parodies of the sacred are embraced, as well as the “irrational, inane, violent, sexual and vulgar” (Bernier-Cast 23). The breech of accepted social behavior is celebrated during carnival, making carnivalesque the perfect adjective to describe this trend in men’s public restrooms.
Now, more than a century after the first public urinals were installed, specialty men’s rooms have taken on the carnivalesque mentality. The popularity of carnivalesque male restrooms thrives in affluent, commercial venues that celebrate status and exclusivity. Posh hotels and casinos morph the basic need to pee into a performance art experience and they relish in the novelty.
Let us explore several examples of men’s restroom and urinal designs that embody variety of different aspects of carnivalesque mentality. Each scenario, experience and performance caters to the passions of indulgence and self-gratification. Entry into these men’s rooms marks a departure from the ordinary world and sheds light onto the attraction of revealing the darker side of our human nature.
The famous Kisses urinals, made in the Netherlands by Bathroom Mania, crosses a moral line following the carnivalesque philosophy. These banks of female, glossy red lipped, open-mouthed urinals tap the grotesque aspects of carnivalesque and are found in men’s rooms worldwide. Men perversely urinate into the mouths of these huge mouthed working girls. First response may be a laugh and a shake of the head, however, in 2010 a coalition of women’s groups successfully petitioned to have Kisses removed from a Canadian restaurant on the grounds that they promoted aggression, sadism and violence against women (Bernier-Cast 31).
The Sofitel Luxury Hotel in Queensland, Australia plays on voyeurism where projections of virtual women judge, photograph and inspect the men at the urinals. One virtual woman holds a tape measure appearing to size up the penises in front of her. This surveillance and mock recording is all part of the carnivalesque atmosphere (Bernier-Cast 32). An attraction to women who belittle, criticize and put down men is a psychological disorder of some sort, but a carnivalesque game, nonetheless.
As often as urinals can be humorous, they can also be denigrating, which is another facet of carnivalesque attitude. The Century 21 Museum Hotel in Lexington, Kentucky promotes the sensation of being watched, by placing their waterfall urinals in front of a two-way mirror, which allows the user to see into the public spaces. To add to this voyeuristic pleasure, peeking eyes are projected within the mirror. One visitor expressed that he loved the sensory pleasure of urinating on the people on the other side of the mirror. He compared it to “shadowboxing…acting out his aggression with no ill effects to the unsuspecting patrons on the other side of the mirror (Bernier-Cast 32). This passive violence performance solidifies the carnivalesque spirit by mocking decent behavior and creating an alternative reality.
One man’s personal account upon entering a hotel’s stylish all white men’s room was described as a sanctuary. He had been outnumbered in a conference room with 300 women when nature called. Feeling “limp and useless in this new world order” of women, he escaped to the temple of the men’s room. He reminisced of the “ceramic alter” and being “proud, standing there, hitting the mark” before “pulling the phallic handle” to flush felt like a “kind of urinal orgasm. What a delight” (Rubel 3)! His sacrilegious comparison of a urinal to a religious alter is rooted in the carnivalesque mentality and his pseudo orgasm played along. However, this haven was not deliberately carnivalesque. He seemed to be inspired by a dilemma in his own mind, breaking out of an uncomfortable situation. No one knows how long he stayed in there, but human nature revealed its tendency toward the carnivalesque.
Mikhail Bakhtin proposed that carnivalesque acts become agents of long lasting social change by rallying a rebellious spirit in a population. So are these carnivalesque restrooms for men simply platitudes offered to half the population as a promise of social change or are they true beacons of radical reform? Some theorists of the late 20th century, like Umberto Eco and Terry Eagleton, challenge Mikhail Bakhtin’s carnivalesque ideas about creating social change through these provocative urinals. They propose that this liberation is not a rebellion, but a game allowed by authorities in charge to make one feel like they are defiant and free to express their personal desires, when in fact nothing has changed once they zip up and exit the stage of the restroom (Bernier-Cast 33).
Bibliography:
Lachmann, R. “Bakhtin and Carnival – Culture as Counter-Culture.” Cultural Critique, no. 11, 1989, pp. 115–152. https://www-jstor-org.libproxy.uoregon.edu/stable/1354246?
Bernier-Cast, Karen. “Gargoyles, Kisses and Clowns: A Study of Carnivalesque Male Urinals and Restrooms.” Material Culture, vol. 43, no. 1, 2011, pp. 21–39.
Rubel, Christopher. “Porcelain Grace.” Ladyofthedeep.com, 14 Oct. 2018, ladyofthedeep.wixsite.com/christopherrubel/post/porcelain-grace.
Image Source:
“Gargoyles, Kisses and Clowns: A Study of Carnivalesque Male Urinals and Restrooms” by Karen Bernier-Cast
