Universities including Western Carolina University and Davenport University have been putting women’s feminine products in their school bathrooms to be trans-inclusive.
A video posted by Libs of Tik Tok on Twitter shows tampons in men’s bathrooms. These tampons are “free” but the notice in the bathroom states that the university utilizes student fees to fund the tampons.
This has been going on for a while because back in 2016, Brown University announced that they would start having tampons in men’s bathrooms. Brown’s student body president at the time Viet Nguyen led this initiative that stated the “fact” that “not all people who menstruate are women,” according to Newsweek.
“We wanted to set a tone of trans-inclusivity and not forget that they’re an important part of the population,” Nguyen said. “I’d be naïve to say there won’t be pushback. I’ve had questions about why we’re implementing this in male bathrooms as well. It’s an initial confusion, but people generally understand when we explain it.”
According to Campus Reform, certain students at Davenport University think the menstrual products in the men’s bathroom are ridiculous.
“I’m absolutely appalled that Davenport would go out of their way to provide a product which is specifically intended for the opposite sex,” Davenport student Josh Buehler told Campus Reform. “It’s not wanted or needed, and it contradicts basic biology to think that they are.”
Back in September, the School of Medicine at Washington University announced they would be having products placed in men’s restrooms to “accommodate menstruating people who identify as male.” This is expected to go into effect next year.
According to Campus Reform, Cornell University put menstrual products in all bathrooms back in 2020 and called them “mxnstrual” products,” in order to be more gender-neutral.