🔗 Share this article

Shortly before Christmas, I encountered an unusual incident. I feel it proved instructive. This occurred at a get-together of some old friends, who are incidentally tooth doctors, but this isn't pertinent. The attending group were solely men, which proves to be key.

An Unfamiliar Predicament

The location was a tavern experiencing a roaring trade. A forgotten afternoon was enjoyed by everyone. Nice food, fine drink and remarkably entertaining anecdotes about teeth. Inevitably, the point dawned for excursions to the gents. Those who ventured off, I vaguely observed, appeared to be absent a considerable while. I didn't contemplate the reason this could be, but when it came to me next, the mystery was solved.

I turned the corner, and what awaited me but a lengthy line for the gents' lavatory. No queue at all for the women’s toilet, but a great long one for the men's. What strange new world was this? This wasn’t a world any of us in this line knew.

A Taste of Common Reality

For the avoidance of doubt, I neither court nor expect pity from any lady here. I am obviously conscious that, for females, being forced to wait to use a restroom is the norm. Repeatedly have I observed women waiting in a line while men in the comparable place have to do the opposite?

In addition to the inconvenience of needing to wait to use a toilet, there’s a tinge of humiliation about waiting there, waiting for something that men typically don’t have to wait for. It was decidedly sobering to experience a dose of it myself, seeing the women walk straight through the entrance while I was obliged to wait patiently in queue with my fellow fellas, angling away at anything we had in our jackets and consulting our handsets.

The Genre of Restroom Line Conversation

There’s a entire conversational genre here – lavatory line banter – of which men have scant knowledge. Women, I imagine, have become adept to be rather good at it, sharing polite remarks and an notable insight or two.

On this I’ve consulted some women of my knowledge. The consensus is that queue-based interaction is restricted to the rare exasperated look and the utterance: “Screw this, I’m going to use the gents'.” A colleague mentioned it’s only at the hand-washing stations afterwards that discussion tends to begin.

If I was a woman, I’d not spend a moment on both pleasantries or quiet. If I was compelled, repeatedly, to queue in a public line simply for the privilege to use the toilet, I’d vent my spleen like there was no tomorrow at the pure injustice of it. A valuable measure for any advanced community would be equal waiting times in toilet waiting times. I’m researching research on this.

Male Chat in the Queue

Back in my queue, I tried to get some friendly chat flowing about this new state of affairs of ours. I sighed a bit, showed exasperation and said something along the lines of: “Ah, this is an disagreeable difference, isn't it lads?”

One person chuckled, a second appeared confused, a third individual looked sheepish. Another shook his head as if this was one more example of broken Britain, cultural decline etc. For the most part, silence ensued. Someone exited, zipping up. The queue shuffled up a position. Two more men joined the rear of it. I let out a breath.

An Unspoken Exchange

A lady emerged out of the adjacent toilet, all fragrant and unhurried. It was all right for some. I beamed apologetically at her, endeavouring to express recognition of this reversed situation. Her response was: “Don’t look to me for solidarity, you jerk. Reappear when you’ve done this another hundred times and at that point I could give you the courtesy.”

Truthfully, she did not utter that. She uttered anything. But I believe that’s what she was implying. And I honestly wouldn’t blame her.