YOU SHOW ME YOURS AND I'LL SHOW YOU MINE: A Public Restroom Conundrum

YOU SHOW ME YOURS AND I'LL SHOW YOU MINE:
A Public Restroom Conundrum
Mar. 22, 2006

A very casual conversation recently with my beau extraordinaire resulted in a profound discovery. (For both of us.) It was major. Women, men, I'm not even sure you should continue reading this. It may just change your entire worldview. But if perhaps you're feeling brave, go to your freezer, pour yourself a shot of vodka, have a seat, and read on.

Here it goes.

Revelation #1 (for me): Men shower together in communal showers in health clubs.

Revelation #2 (for him): Women do NOT shower together in communal showers in health clubs, but have separate shower stalls.

Have you recovered yet? Has you heart started beating again? Are you breathing? No, right? I haven't recovered yet either. I was, and continue to be, absolutely shocked, appalled, bemused, titillated, and grossed out, all at the same time.

Just to think about it -- men, right now, as I'm writing this and as you're reading this, are buck naked and covered in lather within eyeshot of each other. I'm not just talking about the YMCA in East Ripride, Arkansas, either. I'm talking upscale health clubs in major cities. Places where people who wear Ralph Lauren work out. Places that have valet parking. Places where athlete's foot does not infest every tile floor surface, places where the carpets don't smell like pee, places where mold spores aren't more plentiful in the air than catch phrases like “Ciao, baby” and “Great nose, who'd your surgeon model it after?”

My beau was just as floored as I was to learn the equal and opposite to his gender-specific public shower habits. And I actually think some kind of female-locker-room-girlie-fantasy was shattered in that moment for him. “Stalls?” he stammered. “You mean you don't get naked and stare at each other while soapy and wet and talk about. . . whatever it is women talk about. . . like how wonderful penises are?” Okay, he didn't really say that, but I'm pretty sure he was thinking it.

And I was like, “Ummmm, no.” And when one of us is naked in the locker room, I informed him, other women kindly avert their eyes. We're like, civilized. We're not friggin' animals. We're not checking out each other's private parts and making mental notes on some kind of amorphous ruler permanently implanted in our brains. And while I'm on the subject, we're not peeing out in the open air at semi-private urinals either. Hello, we have stalls for that, too. Women, unlike men, kept evolving after the Jurassic Period into something more or less contemporary and refined.

Or did we? And more to the point, why have we been forced to?

Thinking more about these imposed standards, I started getting a bit pissed off. I don't actually ever remember deciding that I was embarrassed to be naked in front of other women. In fact, I'm not. Why would I be? Think of all the potential socializing we're missing out on by being forced into the closet, so to speak, while we shower. Why do men get to enjoy each other's company, conversation, and general male-male bonding while they splay their sudsy butt cheeks to each other and women are expected to cover themselves, feel unclean, generally hide the fact that they may have slight imperfections, flabby parts, droopy parts, big ass moles the size of Kansas or -ohmigod, don't say it - pubic hair. Men, apparently, are allowed to walk around in freedom and let it all hang out in front of each other. I would love to enjoy a man's locker room life for just one day. It's like Iron John meets Clan of the Cave Bear in there. Fun times.

Who are the gender Nazis that are designing these health clubs anyway? I want to know when and why all this started. Are we really content to let standardized locker room culture force us into hiding or exposure, without so much as being given a choice?

I turned to the most reliable source I could think of. Www.restrooms.com. Yes, such a site exists. They, too, have apparently pondered these questions, and an outfit named “Caring Hands, Inc.” (?!) took a poll of 956 men at health clubs (women had no say, for no explicable reason that I can think of other than the fact that we are supposed to be too embarrassed to fill out surveys about such things.) 58% of the men said they would PREFER privacy partitions in the shower area. 25% basically said they couldn't give a damn. 17% said that showering out in the open with other dudes was just fine with them. From this poll, it would seem that men are feeling a little less awesome about splaying their hairy backs and thigh pimples to one another than they may pretend publicly.

But these polls aren't too reliable, it seems. At www.misterpoll.com, another all male survey written by someone named “TowelBoy2” (as if having one TowelBoy in the world wasn't enough) found that 58% came under the category of “Heck, I'm proud of what I got. Take notice,” and 21% said “I don't care at all. Stare all you like,” and another 8% actually said “I'd prefer you join me in my stall.” At the bottom of the survey, someone from the UK comments that Yanks are way too modest and that where he is, showers are coed. Now there's a concept.

So I'm thinking perhaps Bimbopolitics, arbiter of all highly scientific information, needs to perform its own survey on the subject - which will of course include the say of women, men, and all other genders out there. Go ahead, click below on the ol' comment button, and tell me your thoughts on the public shower portion of YOUR life!

3/22/2006
Hey Julie: This is a peeve of mine. I've got three daughters and as far I can tell they haven't seen each other naked in the last six years. When I was a kid they made us swim naked at gym class, and we all showered together--a practice I proudly carry on at BWAC in beloved Pittsfield. It might be a generational thing. I'm not sure boys are getting naked with each other any more. When Nancy went to Yale (early woman's class) there were still times when the pool was off limits because old guys were swimming naked in it. I have one suggestion: we should all take a long vacation to Finland, where families get naked together.

3/22/2006
First of all, b-b-b-b-b-oys swimming naked together in gym class? W--w-w-w-what? Whoa. There is soooo much I do not know about in this world. Where did you go to school, Mars? Second of all, you're so right about Europe. Damn our Puritan beginnings in this country. I lived in Madrid for a time during college, and found they had a much more relaxed attitude about nudity. And even moreso in Germany, where I spent a summer a few years back. People actually gave me strange looks at one beach for wearing a bikini top while I laid in the sun. Their faces read "She's GOT to be from the US." Yes, let's all go to Finland sometime.

-Jacuzzi

3/22/2006
Michigan not mars. And our boy scout troop took a field trip to the UM pool and swam naked with our grisled old troop leaders. I have to admit, it always seemed a bit weird to me. But that's the way it was. Probably some kind of initiation into something..

3/22/2006
When we lived in Florida, my son went to swimming lessons at our local pool. They were required to shower off before entering the pool, so off he went to the men's locker room. He came back with a look of abject horror on his face, it took me several minutes just to get him to speak. A few moments later a morbidly obese and furry man walked out of the locker room, his privates now covered with a speedo. My son was not so lucky. He had seen this grotesque being in all his glory. We sued the dude for indescent exposure and the city for child endangerment. The case was almost thrown out until we produced a lifesize picture of this man as God never made him, it was Exibit A. Exhibit A won us enough money to last the rest of our life. So as far as public showering goes, I'm for it!

ts

3/22/2006
You had me going there for a minute, ts.

Jacooz

3/22/2006
Back to the boys swimming naked together in gym class, scout meetings, Yale lap sessions, etc., anyone else have anything to add here? Did this happen with girls in gym class, too? Cause trust me, I obviously grew up in an alternate universe.

Jacooz

3/23/2006
When I was a little girl, my mother would have us girls go to the beach with our top off. We were very little. Unfortunately, as we got older, she failed to realize that we had developed modesty but the top still came off. I remember walking around covering my top with my hands. Mother had many great ideas. My point: nudity should not be pushed onto children.

3/23/2006
As I recall the current Japanese custom is for families to bathe together naked. Russian men steam and sauna together naked. Ancient romans bathed together naked (and had sex at the bathes, with men and women). My high school had communal showers for men and small partitions for women, but they walked to and from naked, with towels covering or not. See "Porkys" for fantasy re women's showering. I am comfy with my imperfect bod, so I don't see what the fuss is about! I don't ogle other males as I am straight and could not care less about the size of their genitals.

3/23/2006
I wholeheartedly agree that the view of nudity in this country is perverse. Instead of it being something natural and commonplace, it is taboo and therefore interpreted as "pornographic." Even works of art that happen to feature nudes become something that we impulsively turn our eyes from, when in reality the human body should be celebrated. Perhaps there is something that should be said about bonding with fellow human beings in the nude. It brings us back to basics; we, the mortal flesh made beings that we are. Too often outerwear hides our imperfections and in turn, the human condition.

3/23/2006
To appreciate how ingrained the female modesty thing is consider that the word "pudendum" is derived from the Latin verb "pudere" - to be ashamed! I believe this had something to do with the patriarchal mentality that found the power of the female as the source of life was WAY too threatening & needed to be chained up at this very deep level. When I lived in Europe, first in Paris, I found the nudity on ads in the Metro & all over TV as a bit startling at first & I was shocked how Puritanized I was just by being an American. I spent an August in the South of France & that was the only time my breasts have ever seen the Sun, despite growing up on beaches in the Bahamas, Delaware & Southhampton, L.I.
I had a friend from Holland visit me in Chicago who described her beach vacations with her family as all topless & when I took her to our country club I had to stop her from taking off her top (lucky she even thought to bring one!) & we started talking about why Americans are so freaked out by female breasts. I thought about all the vacations spent with my father & three brothers & couldn't then & still can't imagine walking around naked in front of them--EEW! Too creepy & incesty! Is that really an American hang-up? I guess so, though I did come across other Europeans who were like us, some Scandinavians, no less. I've also thought that maybe the commonplace-ness of toplessness in Europe desensitizes men to breasts, so they're not as much of a turn-on as they are for us, because that would be awkward, if men walked around all aroused on beaches, and what's good about that? I like that aspect of the veiling, it's more special when one's nudity is for private showings only! ~~ Diana

3/23/2006
About the "shame" derivation from Latin -- in Spanish, the word for shame is "verguenza" (I hope I spelled that right, plus I think there's a double dot over the "u".) Anyway, the word is also used as a euphemism for a guy's genitals. His "verguenza." Any Castellano speakers out there who can clarify this? Is it also used for female genitalia, I can't remember. Perhaps this comes from the Adam/Eve story? Who knows.

I can only assume that you're right about Europeans becoming "desensitized" toward exposed breasts on beaches. Or rather, they were instead never "sensitized" in the first place like we were. I can't imagine that breasts become desexualized completely, though. In a certain context, breasts would still hold sexual and erotic mysticism, I think. Just not in the context of swimming or sunbathing. And then again perhaps it is also possible for Europeans to admire and appreciate bodies on a deeper level than we can -- without always desiring or coveting or becoming arroused.

Jacooz

3/24/2006
Hello my dear Jacooz,

I enjoy your column very much, as any woman in her late 50's would. You make me feel like I have traveled the world, like I am hip, and you make me think I might still accomplish something great. I enjoy reading the google ads as a side dish to the main entre you are serving. How interesting that this weeks ads want us to buy spy camera's and the topic is communal showering!

Thelma Tideweather

3/24/2006
Hello, Ms. Tideweather

I get such a kick out of the google ads, too. Glad you're reading and enjoying--

Jacooz

3/25/2006
Another great column! Here’s my theory — it is part of the big conspiracy to keep women obsessing about their inadequate bodies so they don’t have time to run corporations, change governments, or whatever creative endeavor they are suppressing. There are three times we see women naked: 1) channel flipping through our insomnia, we see naked college girls on Girls Gone Wild infomercials , 2) Playboy, et al, magazines, prominently displayed at the local convenience store or stuffed under the mattress on our partner’s side, and 3) in the mirror when we get out of the shower. That means the majority of the naked women we see are tan, smooth, buffed, young and airbrushed, so when we catch a glimpse of our normal, imperfect and unique shapes, we are horrified and spend our time either pursuing the “ideal” or being ashamed that we don’t measure up. While men don’t realize it (denial is so powerful), this affects them as well — when you are repeatedly told that only a certain look is beautiful or sexy, you will eventually believe what you are told and will miss out on the true beauty and intimacy right in front of you.

Amy from Colorado

4/7/2006
As I recall Margaret Mead's growing Up in Samoa, only about one-fourth of the cultures she studied had a sexual view of the female breasts, and in those cultures without sexy breasts there was no more reason to cover breasts than elbows. Which is why men sunbathe topless and no one complains. Of course, some people should cover up their bods to avoid aesthetic insult.

4/18/2006
Things have definitely changed over the years. When I was in 7th grade, and started gym class where you actually had to change into a gym uniform, I was forced to shower in a group shower setting. This went on for six years of junior high and high school. It becomes a part of life after while. You just do it and don't get embarrassed about it. I know the boys had to do the same thing. I went to boot camp later on and it was the same way. You don't have individual shower stalls in boot camp. But by that time, I had showered with other girls 3 times a week for 6 years, so who cares if I had to do it a little while longer. I have a daughter in junior high now and they don't shower at all in gym class. We have to pay a towel fee though for cleaning towels that never get used. I guess that is one way the schools make some extra money. Eliminate showering at all and still charge for it. Because I grew up in the "showering together era", I thought nothing about showering with my daughter over the years at the campgrounds each summer. We still do this and she never complains about it either, so I'm not sure why there is such a big deal made about it.

5/20/2006
I do not mind showering after gym class. I have huge "manhood" and i flaunt it.

6/12/2006
I still shower with guys in a communal shower in my health club. I am 40 years old. All ages from pre-teen to old men, and it seems nobody other than maybe first timers are a little uncomfortable. After that 1st time they are all pretty comfortable just letting it all hangout.

7/14/2006
Actually, it may be a regional thing, but women's lockers DO have communal showers in parts of the US. I live in Texas and the downtown Dallas Y is an example, and dozens of woemn shower together every day without apparent hesitation. I went to high school and college in Houston, and the showers for women were communal and widely used.

10/9/2006
This is funny! My 12 year-old daughter just discovered Revelation #1 (men shower together) this past summer. She went to sleep away camp (boys and girls) for four nights for the first time. I asked her if she had fun and she did. But felt sorry (laughing) for the boys’ b/c while the girls had individual shower stalls in their locker room, the boys had to shower in a big communal shower room!

11/17/2006
Apparently noone in the comments displayed thus far are practicing social nudists. In the three resorts I have visited the showers are communal for both genders. I (male) have showered with dozens of women at these places over the years, some with their spouses, and occasionally men, and noone seems to think it is out of the ordinary. Sometimes there is conversation and others have sometimes wandered in and sat down to talk while others were under the nozzles. I have never witnessed any impropiety at these times. pt

1/19/2007
This was shocking to me.I knew that men peed together but knot showering together!And that vodka coment just soothed me troubles away

1/20/2007
It's like, if men pee together, they might as well shower together. I mean, agree? They all pee in the shower anyway, right?

-Jacooz

4/7/2007
Having spent some time in the Navy, Ide like to share that women do shower together.One big wet room,breasts and tiles everywhere,and the only water being dispensed from one tower in the center of the room.
Naomi

5/14/2007
I just had to comment on this thread simply because I "googled" the phrase 'too embarrassed to shower in public' and this is what I found!

I had an uncomfortable situation happen to me and my 9 year old daughter this weekend at a great festival we were camping at. There was a communal shower and we were aware that it would be so I simply had us show up in our swimsuits so we were the ones being looked at strangely. I am fine with nudity, fine with other people's nudity, encouraged my daughter to shower nude if she wanted to(she didn't want to), yet I felt too self-conscious to do so. I never grew up having to shower in the open with others and we didn't ever swim nude as a family to my recollection so I didn't want to be forced to be nude just to enjoy the luxury of a lukewarm shower. It still has me thinking about it and wondering why I am so uncomfortable in my own skin that I use my stretch marks, c-section scars, etc... as an excuse for not doing something so simple and natural.

5/22/2007
If you and your daughter were not uncomfortable, why were your embarrassed, b/c of your swimsuits? Did other ladies, girls keep swimsuits on to shower? You should shower at least one time in the nude at a communal shower spot to try it.

7/4/2007
Communal showers are fine. So what if someone else sees me or I see them. We all have the same things down there, they just don't look identical. Men go without shirts and have bare chests, stomachs, and backs and those upper parts on men don't look identical so big deal if other men see the lower part of other men's bodies that look the same but different.

7/23/2007
I stumbled onto this ist4 while googling for something else. I thought the topic was a llittle odd so decided to read it. Halfway through I decided I was glad that women have more privacy. I for one (I'm 55 =)saw this as a courtesy for women and felt sorry for the uys who were being treated like a heard of animals. Imagine my surprise when I found that quite to the contrary most other women here were or appear to be indignant about it. I don't have a bad body, even at my age, but even if I wanted to show it off, I would want to choose when, who and where =)

8/31/2007
The main university workout gym in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada still has communal showers for men--and you guessed it--individual shower stalls for women. As a student, and a regular gym patron, I have always frequented the locker room, the showers, and especially the sauna in the nude. Having showered in the buff since I was in my teens and serving in the military has made me comfortable with my own body as well as the idea of showering in a open public environment.

I'm in my early twenties, but I find that most of the other gym's patrons who share my liberal attitudes towards locker room nudity are either older men, varsity athletes, foreign/international students, or liberal-minded nudists--in fact, you'll find very few young people my age (18 to 24 year olds) showering or using the sauna au naturel.

The sauna is especially an interesting place--anyone over 30 has no qualms bearing it all in the open, but peers within my own age group either have a swimsuit on or like to protect their modesty by covering up with a towel.

With recent rennovations, another communal shower was installed--replacing a shower area that was once covered with individual stalls! Perhaps the University of Alberta is encouraging more social nudity!

9/5/2007
I was a caregiver for many years, at every location I worked there were individual stalls for women, communal showers for men. The facilities were designed that way simply because men and women are biologically different. There are times during a woman's cycle where more privacy may be desired than at other times. Stalls provide for such privacy, communal showering does not. Men have no such need, so the additional expense of individual stalls was not necessary.

10/22/2007
I'm a guy, and I've never been comfortable with my body. I've tried to lose weight & tone up many times, but the gym and its "communal shower" is a massive deterrent.

I even opted to take two basic-level health classes (textbook only, no exercise) in high school instead of a single gym class just to avoid those showers.

I know I should be more comfortable with who and what I am, but I'm not. Good for you if you're okay with your body, but for the love of God, I wish they'd provide individual stalls for those of us who aren't.

These days, I force myself to go to the gym and bite the bullet in the communal showers, but I'm self-conscious 100% of the time [sigh].

Ironically, being able to go into a communal shower without feeling ashamed is one of the main motivators for my current exercise regimen.

11/2/2007
At school showering after games was compulsory .We had to line up in the Nude (No towel aloud until back in the changing room next door)and go through the communal shower by entering one end ,washing ,then exiting the other.we also had to wash our genitals properly ..anyone seen not pulling back their forskin and washing properly had to go back through the showers ...

11/26/2007
I'm kinda viewing this the other way around. What you see as a sort of over-privacy imposed to women, I see as a lack of privacy imposed to men. Just because I'm a guy doesn't mean I adore walking around naked and flaunting my genitals about. I, for one, think that the women got the better end of this deal.

I'm currently 17 years old, and dealing with a lot of things, some of which are related to puberty. Several times a week, I hit the gym (whether my school's or my local one) and, both times, I have to endure communal showers, and I say "endure" because it is anything but fun to me. The ironic thing is, I'm not even ashamed of my body, really I am not. If anything I am *proud* of it. All of it. But there are other reasons for some men to feel uneasy in communal showers, and if by now you haven't caught on as to what I am referring to, then re-read the first sentence of this paragraph and think.

Communal showers make me very nervous. While I may be perfectly fine with changing in front of the other guys in PE, I don't mind it because everybody keeps their underwear on. Communal showers, however, offer no such thing and the thought of having to get naked and lather up with other naked guys around, considering what may happen, is not so fun.

In high school, it was simpler. The subject was rather ignored since we kept our bathing suits to shower. It was a sort of silent deal every one of us had made to avoid having to actually get naked. The school I went to last year actually had stalls for men and, even though I thought it was very nice, we still kept our swimsuits on. But now, in college (and at my local gym), that is not so. Guys are frowned at (or called names) for not baring it all. So I actually don't see what all the fuss is about for women not having communal showers. I think stalls give you some privacy, and I find that simply more respectful.

Anyway, I might be overreacting to this simply because we're starting swimming classes in PE next week. =/

2/27/2008
This article gave me a laugh because my wife had the same reaction when I told her about the locker room culture at the YMCA (Houston, TX). She could barely comprehend it! She was stunned (and a little intrigued I suspect) to learn that men showered naked in one big room together,... and even enjoy it on some level! I told her it is very common for guys do a quick check of other guys equipment, and even some guys (usually jocks or muscle builders) seem to enjoy flaunting their junk. I told her that over all the communal nudity seems to be some kind of male bonding thing. I guess it has something to do with accepting your own maleness, and being fully accepted among other males. It feels very normal and healthy...and even fun to some degree. That's about the best I could explain. I have several friends that I see at the Y on a daily basis, and we're all so comfortable seeing each other naked that we don't even really think about it. I enjoy their friendship and acceptance. Too bad women don't experience the same liberty in their locker room culture. Communal showers should be *encouraged* in schools and public places, in my opinion, not torn down and replaced with private stalls.

- Joe

2/27/2008
Hey Joe, really, women should be happy men shower at all, and nevermind HOW. But tell your wife it's okay, we women are all traumatized when we find out for the first time -- that somewhere, during every hour of every day, men are out there, showering together. Nude. NUDE! And still, we consider males the less intimate gender? Ha!! Next time you come home, and your wife asks how your day was, say "It was great, honey, I took a shower with five naked men, and how was your day?" -Jacoozi

4/9/2008
I am only 22 and I can paint a picture of schools these days. In my school (in Texas) the boys had communal showers and slapped each other's butts with towels. They also put soap on the floor and wrestled and slide across the shower floor. The boys athletics and pe classes were throughout the school day and the boys were required to take a shower. now for the girls, athletics and p.e. was held as the last class of the day. and there were no required showers. in fact, the girls locker room had about 6 showers, which were never used. i don't know why or understand how things came to be this way. i find it pretty weird, now granted i am glad it is the way it is. i am a little self-conscious and shy about just revealing myself to anyone, especially people i don't like (which would happen in school). something my husband told me that i found really weird was when we were at a nfl game in houston. i asked him what took so long and he said that the guy in the stall he lined up for was taking forever. i said, what do you mean the stall you lined up for? you guys dont just stay in one line and then when one opens up you go to it? and he said, uh no, why would we do that? im like gross so you just stand outside a stall all creepily while someone is in there taking a poo or pee. and he said yeah! i was like omg! and then he proceeds to tell me that they line up behind someone at the urinals too. ummm that is so weird. it is just an invasion of privacy. also i think it is somewhat irresponsible to promote public nudity, it would entice kids and people in general to engage in promiscuous behavior. something that we dont need more of!

9/12/2008
Love to shower nude in the presence of other men at the health club. Even the worse of shapes can care less what others may think. Men rarely judge but they may take note of those who are well-endowed/hung. Goes to think that no matter how straight you think you are, there's bits of curiosity that may turn you on as much as the boobs can do.

11/4/2008
Yeah... One thing that us guys have that chicks don't: Erections.