Photo description: In this photo, lifted from an article in the Toronto Star, people are pictured using the bathrooms at the ‘Ex’ with the ‘We Don’t Care’ symbol indicating that ‘anyone can use them.’
There has been a lot of ‘to do’ about the ‘inclusive’ bathrooms at the CNE (Canada’s National Exhibition) lovingly called the ‘Ex.’ For those who can’t see the symbol clearly it’s a combination of the male symbol and the female symbol that are typically seen on gender spedific bathrooms. A dress on one side and pants on the other. Underneath are the words ‘We Don’t Care.’ It’s been widely hailed as a great step forward.
I, for one, have never understood the bathroom debates that have gripped the nation to the south. Go to the bathroom of your gender – and by ‘your gender’ I mean, the gender you identify with. I have never thought that the expression ‘who gives a shit’ more appropriate to any situation in my life.
But I’m going to challenge all the people who have written articles and blogs about this new ‘we don’t care’ symbol and the brave new world that it ushers in. I’m going to suggest that you still do fucking care because if you look closely at that picture, I can’t use that toilet. See that step? That entirely unnecessary step? That robs the symbol of any right to the claim of ‘inclusive.’ It’s still an inaccessible design complete with barriers. Not one article I read spent any time at all acknowleging that while we as a country and society need to be inclusive on the gender front we also need to back up and hear the voices of the ‘I need to pee’ movement from disabled people.
Listen ‘y’all’ I recent drove through the freaking woods and saw several accessible bathrooms along the way. You know the kind, the places made so drivers don’t have to wipe their asses with leaves after they pooped over a log. You pull in park, and roll into the washroom.
So if they can make an accessible bathroom in the middle of the fucking country don’t you think they could make them in the middle of Canada’s largest city? Oh, I’m sure that there are disabled washrooms off to the side somewhere. Those washrooms that have never cared about gender, those washrooms where parents can take kids, those washrooms that have always been inclusive. Those washrooms? Why didn’t they just make a bunch of those and slapp that symbol on it, maybe they could have given one side a crutch just to indicate that EVERYONE can go there.
I call bullshit on ‘We Don’t Care.’
You obviously do … and don’t think I think that you are oblivious to the smoke and mirrors thing you did to inclusivity – you know the trick where you make us invisible in the discussion.
Once again, I don’t think there has ever been a situation wherein the expression ‘you can all just piss off’ with your self righteous sense of wonder at your generosity and big heartedness. EXclusion is still EXclusion.
