An Ohio University Changes 23 Restrooms across Campus to 'All-Gender' Facilities
- Updated Jan 15, 2019
An Ohio public university has converted 23 restrooms into “all-gender” bathrooms.
Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio also instilled a new policy last month allowing people to use whatever bathroom facility “they deem they need to use” on the campus.
The change, which complies with the university’s discrimination policy, allows “individuals to use the restroom that corresponds to their sex, gender identity, and/or gender expression,” their website stated.
“In some instances, a designated all-gender restroom may contain multiple stalls,” the webpage reads. “For those who do not wish to use an all-gender single stall or all-gender multi-stall restroom, there will be gendered restrooms located in every building,” it continued.
Wright State University’s Chief Diversity Officer Matthew L. Boaz wrote in a letter to the campus that the changes to their restroom policies further the school’s mission of “diversity, inclusion, and accessibility.”
“By providing greater access to restroom facilities, we strive to create safer and more accessible spaces for people with children of a different gender, people with disabilities who need assistance in the restroom from someone of a different gender, and people who identify as transgender and nonbinary,” he continued.
Meanwhile, critics of gender-neutral bathrooms say policies like Wright State’s violate the privacy rights of others, especially women. One student even posted a complaint about the change on Twitter writing, “Can’t even use the bathroom because all the bathrooms at wright state are gender neutral now and there’s men and urinals in all the bathrooms.”
Wright State University responded, informing the student that not all of the bathrooms have been changed and that she needed to "go up or down a flight of stairs" to find a gendered bathroom she was comfortable with.
The Christian Post reports that a 2017 report from the Family Research Council found 21 incidents of men assaulting or violating women’s privacy in public bathrooms.
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