So I was reading about the history of gendered bathrooms, and was kinda disgusted by what I read. I'll include a full quote below, but tldr; gendered bathrooms were invented because men thought women were too weak and frail to use the big boy bathrooms, and they needed to be "protected from reality". Now I'm a skinny guy, much less physically strong than most guys. But I would be extremely disrespected if the government decided I was too weak to use the men's bathroom and built new separate ones just for skinny guys like me. I can look after myself thanks haha. Anyway that's just me, but I've haven't ever seen a woman complain about such condescending treatment. I find it quite strange... do no women see it that way? Or am I just being weird?

But the rules that govern who pees where in public spaces were not created simply because of physical differences between men and women that affect how bathrooms are used. “One might think that it makes perfect sense, that bathrooms are separated by sex because there are basic biological differences,” says Terry Kogan, a law professor at the University of Utah. “That’s completely wrong.” Kogan, who has done extensive research on the history of sex-segregation in public restrooms, tells TIME that the policies came about as a result of social anxieties about women’s places in the world.

Social norms of the period dictated that the home was a woman’s place. Even as women entered the workplace, often in the new factories that were being built at the time, there was a reluctance to integrate them fully into public life. Women, policymakers argued, were inherently weaker and still in need of protection from the harsh realities of the public sphere. Thus, separate facilities were introduced in nearly every aspect of society: women’s reading rooms were incorporated into public libraries; separate train cars were established for women, keeping them in the back to protect them in the event of a crash; and, with the advent of indoor bathrooms that were then in the process of replacing single-person outhouses, separate loos soon followed. The suggested layouts of restrooms, says Kogan, were designed to mimic the comforts of home—think curtains and chaise lounges.

“[Ladies’ rooms] were adopted to create this protected haven in this dangerous public realm,” says Kogan.