Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2016 May 25

Humanities desk
< May 24	<< Apr | May | Jun >>	May 26 >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Humanities Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

May 25

Do transsexual bathroom rights come with a dress code or identity check?

The U.S. is in the midst of a big controversy about "bathroom bills". In most of the U.S. now, a transsexual is allowed to use the bathroom of his or her gender identity. But is this right limited by appearance, or by some other formal standard? For example, I suspect a big muscular man (apparently) with a beard would still face skepticism if trying to use the women's rest room, even if he/she claims transgender identity. This raises the question of whether there is some sort of Code of Conduct that transsexuals have to follow to claim their rights, for example, are transwomen required to use lipstick and eye shadow, are transmen prohibited from same, is leg shaving a requirement etc.

The extreme case would be a movie theater, where women line up desperately or despairingly hoping to use the toilet before the feature begins. I'm thinking sooner or later there could be a revolt where some just start saying they 'feel like men today'. (though admittedly, they'd have to be fairly desperate, given the usual condition of men's toilets. Nonetheless, men sometimes resort to sitting on them!) Is the existing situation with transgender access already a de facto recognition that segregated bathrooms are untenable? Wnt (talk) 17:09, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

It's really a non-issue for "manly men" wanting to use the women's room. Why would they want to do that ? As for women using the men's room, I doubt if anyone will call the cops about that, either. But the obvious solution is to have enough individual bathrooms, with one seat only, which can be used by men or women. Small locations already do this, with a single toilet, and men manage to pee in it most of the time (after all, not many homes are equipped with urinals). StuRat (talk) 17:57, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

Hetero men could be willing to use a female bathroom motivated by urolagnia, voyeurism, to annoy, or to attack a female when he supposes she's more vulnerable. Llaanngg (talk) 21:07, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

And all of those are inappropriate behavior in bathrooms regardless of gender or orientation. --jpgordon^{𝄢𝄆 𝄐𝄇} 02:07, 26 May 2016 (UTC)

Haha, they need to write up bills decreeing which bathrooms LGB can use to then if that's the case! Where I'm from women fairly often use men's facilities when there are line-ups and I've seen a few places with multi-stall unisex bathrooms, in 30 years Americans will probably stop caring too. P.S. Their gender is on their driver's license which doesn't change day by day. Sepsis II (talk) 01:11, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

@Sepsis II: That's something I was wondering about. But does a transsexual - or a non-transsexual who happens to dress unconventionally - have to carry around and promptly update a driver's license in order to use the bathroom of choice at a given university or supermarket? What if they don't have one - think of the transsexual illegal immigrants! :) I mean, people really are going to do strange things now and then for whatever reason, and every bar and auto body repair shop in the U.S. is presumably trying to come up with policies to cover them. It's actually a rather remarkable exercise in applied philosophy, though I assume that the "right" answer will turn out to be the one that makes the least sense ... I don't actually know though. Wnt (talk) 14:01, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Biracials probably caused problems when the Americans use to also split washrooms by race, maybe the "right" answer is to stop caring? Sepsis II (talk) 14:22, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Don't be silly. They had to use the "Negro" restroom unless they looked so white that no one could tell. Thus was the discrimination of the South. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 16:24, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

For the specific case of public school students, which is what precipitated the recent attention to the issue, page 2 (3rd page of document) of the US Department of Justice Dear Colleague Letter on Transgender Students states: "The Departments interpret Title IX to require that when a student or the student's parent or guardian, as appropriate, notifies the school administration that the student will assert a gender identity that differs from previous representations or records, the school will begin treating the student consistent with their gender identity." So it looks like there are no appearance or code of conduct requirements other than notifying school officials. ("Public schools" would be more accurately stated as "schools receiving Federal funding".)--Wikimedes (talk) 20:08, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Thanks - this is very progressive but it certainly will be interesting to see what happens when it is tested. Fixed your link (no |). Wnt (talk) 16:55, 28 May 2016 (UTC)

Male and female attraction to breasts

I'm a heterosexual man, and yes, I am attracted to female breasts.

What I want to ask about, are heterosexual women (especially discounting lesbians) specifically attracted to a man's bare chest? In my own subjective opinion, it feels like "but there's nothing there".

Do women go as far as to feel attracted to the lack of protruding breasts on a man, feeling unattracted to "manboobs"? JIP | Talk 19:40, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

Healthy mean do have breasts, they just are smaller and contain more muscle and less fat. StuRat (talk) 21:13, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

And where does one find these discount lesbians ? How many can you get for a dollar ? StuRat (talk) 21:13, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

• Wikipedia has an article titled Physical attractiveness which is fairly comprehensive. There's several pages of text on male attractiveness, with data and references and the like. It would be a good place for you to start your research on this topic. --Jayron32 21:56, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

Here's an article you may find of interest. If true (and that would be a large "if") it suggests that the answer to your question is "no". If the majority of women have bisexual tendencies (the claim in the article is even more all-encompassing), it would be odd for women to find breasts unattractive. Of course, just because a woman finds women attractive, that doesn't necessarily mean that she would find effeminate (however you want to define that) men attractive. Food for thought, at least. Matt Deres (talk) 17:54, 26 May 2016 (UTC)

Some women perceive wide and/or hairy and/or muscular chests as a masculinity sign. There was a study on how many women in Slovakia and Turkey prefer hairy chests. Women were presented pairs of photos of men with chest hair or hairless. For each pair, they were asked to choose the sexiest photo. Preference for hairy chests was 21%. Brandmeister^talk 19:33, 26 May 2016 (UTC)

Both I and my father think there's some truth to it. Heterosexual women prefer men by a great margin, but as far as I am aware, they're not so averse to female bodies as heterosexual men are to male bodies. I myself can appreciate a shapely, well-dressed man, but there's no way I can feel actual sexual attraction to another man. Is this any different for women? JIP | Talk 19:25, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

I would like to call BS on that statement. It is very possible for you, and other straight males, to feel actual sexual attraction to another man (especially if you do not know their history and what kind of operations they may have had). The Quixotic Potato (talk) 21:12, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

I have to ask... is the dividing line really based on sexual factors? I mean, my personal impression is that "breasts" are attractive but "pecs" aren't, where a breast is defined as a round gentle area that is mostly symmetrical around a nipple and a "pec" is a hard protruding band of muscle above the nipple with little or nothing on the underside. I doubt this is an original distinction, since I have seen people deride female bodybuilders as "masculine" based on their lack of proper breasts, while many (male) actors seem to stay just barely on the breasty side of said boundary. (OTOH I am not entirely clear whether you can be a bodybuilder without using androgens...) I'm wondering if the relevant distinction here is correlated with but not actually dictated by sex. Wnt (talk) 23:11, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Scorsese surname origin

If anyone has any reliable sources for the Scorsese (surname) article they would be gratefully received. DuncanHill (talk) 22:31, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

The article seems dubious, Martin Scorsese's article notes that his father, Charles Scorsese]'s parents were from Polizzi Generosa, which isn't really anywhere near England. The spelling and pronunciation of the name seem plainly Italian as well. Italian name lists Scorsese, and also the -se ending as common.--Jayron32 22:48, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

(The article has been adjusted now: the unconvincing onomastics have been removed). The only reference that had been given wasn't about the name Scorsese, but about the name Score. Tutti i cognomi has a short entry on Scorsese/Scorzese: "Scorzese is practically alone. Scorsese seems to have disappeared in Italy by now, they could derive from the Ragusan toponym Scorsone, or also from the name of the place Scorza in the Province of Avellino." Not the greatest reference. Other sites list it as one of many possible varieties of "scorza", which can also mean bark (Latin cortex >> corteccia/scorza), and the verb scorzare can assume a more ironic meaning than just peeling off the bark, it can mean stealing too, hence names such as Scorzabove, Scorzalupo, Scorzavacca, Scorzavillan.[1] While the origin remains unclear it still remains in Italy, not England. ---Sluzzelin talk 10:24, 26 May 2016 (UTC)