Facility Hostility--Sex Discrimination and Women's Restrooms in the Workplace
![handle is hein.journals/geolr36 and id is 619 raw text is: FACILITY HOSTILITY? SEX
DISCRIMINATION AND WOMEN'S
RESTROOMS IN THE WORKPLACE
The American economy is not going to appreciate the
importance of a decent restroom to the average female
worker until the American economy is run by women.'
I. INTRODUCTION
Women who enter fields traditionally dominated by men often
face an inordinate number of challenges.2 After battling inequities
in pay, promotions, assignments, and even office space, there is
often one battle that remains-the fight for restroom equity.' As
one commentator has noted, a simple way to tell when women have
gotten a foothold in a new line of work is when they get their own
restroom.4 Until that time, however, women entering traditionally
male-dominated fields may have to search high and low for the
closest restroom to their office, or may even have to seek privacy
behind trees.' This Note identifies and discusses the legal claims
and remedies (or lack theregf) for four types of restroom' inequity:
' Gail Collins, Potty Politics: The Gender Gap, WORKING WOMAN, March 1, 1993, at 93.
2 For example, men have long dominated the field of science academia. Sandy Coleman,
At Home in the Lab and Pulpit, BOSTON GLOBE, April 18, 1999, at City Weekly 1. One of the
challenges faced by female professors at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was
securing better office and lab space. Id. MIT recently acknowledged that it had unintention-
ally discriminated against female faculty members after female physicists, chemists, and
biologists compared their office space and labs to those of male colleagues. Id.
a See id. (explaining that after professors were victorious in their fight for equal office
space, restroom inequity still remained). Anyone who needs proof that [science academia]
is a man's world need only look for a ladies room on the floor where [one female professor at
MIT] is. There isn't one. You have to either go down to the basement or up to the third floor.
Id.
4 Collins, supra note 1, at 93.
s See, e.g., id. (explaining that female professor at MIT had to climb two flights of stairs
in either direction to find nearest women's room); DeClue v. Cent. Ill. Light Co., 223 F.3d 434,
439 (7th Cir. 2000) (describing female utility line worker who had to relieve herself outdoors
in front of male coworkers).
s The terms restroom, bathroom, and facilities as used in this Note are meant to
encompass the many types of workplace facilities where separate-but-comparable is the
desired standard, including locker rooms, sleeping quarters, showers, and toilets.
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Facility Hostility--Sex Discrimination and Women's Restrooms in the Workplace
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