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Can You Use the Handicap Bathroom Stall?

Can You Use the Handicap Bathroom Stall?

I recently posted a question about whether or not GaG users ever used the handicap stall in a bathroom on the assumption that they weren't actually handicapped themselves and about 29% said all the time, 33% said sometimes, and 38% said never.

Before you can even get there, trust me, I know, I'm clearly bored, with nothing to do at the moment as I wait for a call, so I decided to do a follow up and look up whether or not handicap restrooms were supposed to be merely handicap accessible or whether they were for handicap persons exclusively. At least in the US, the stalls according to the ADA, are handicap accessible but there are no actual laws excluding anyone else from using them which, I mean, I think we knew that much because some 62% of you have used them before and not gotten a ticket or arrested for doing so.

Now, if you're thinking, what a horrible person you must be, as able bodied as you are, to use a handicap stall when there are other stalls available for use, but I found one of the best responses to the reality of the handicap stall by an able bodied user who was responding to a post about an obese woman who complained that the regular stalls were so tiny, she found it physically impossible to use the stalls and so therefore often used the handicap stalls. That yielded some very upset responses, almost exclusively from able bodied persons rather than actual handicapped ones, but one user came to her defense in quite a reasonable way. They said:

"Reserving the stall only for handicapped people is irrational, inefficient, and could even be seen as offensive. Parking spaces are different. When someone parks, the car may be there for hours, and it's not possible for someone to sit in the aisle of a parking lot (blocking traffic all the while), waiting for that particular parking space to open up. Most of us can easily get out of our cars in a normal-sized parking space, and traverse any bumps or cracks or ice that may exist in the parking lot; for people in wheelchairs, those obstacles could be much more difficult.

Can You Use the Handicap Bathroom Stall?

But there is nothing about being in a wheelchair that means you cannot wait a few minutes to use the bathroom like anyone else. Suppose, at a day-long meeting, a line of 20 women formed to use the restroom. Suppose a woman in a wheelchair was 15th in line. If no one else used the handicapper stall, it would be vacant until the wheelchair-bound woman reached the front of the line, slowing down traffic for everyone, including the wheelchair-bound woman.

If there were room in the bathroom for the wheelchair to get around and to the front of the line (which there often isn't, in public restrooms), the handicapped woman could be allowed or encouraged to go first ... but why should she have to? I am not a wheelchair user myself, so I will defer to the feelings of those who do use them, but I would think that assuming that a wheelchair user must have a stall available immediately, and cannot wait a few minutes, would be like shouting at a wheelchair user on the assumption that they cannot hear, or speaking slowly on the assumption that they are mentally handicapped too. (Naturally, if an "able-bodied" person expects to use a bathroom stall for more than a few minutes, then they probably should avoid the handicap-accessible one ... or wait until the restroom is not so crowded, or look for a different restroom.)"

Can You Use the Handicap Bathroom Stall?

A few people on the question or on other sites, also mentioned the fact that if you have children, a stroller, have other mobility issues and/or are elderly (which does not necessarily qualify you as handicapped), or physically have trouble fitting, regular stalls don't cut it. Handicap persons are always saying, and I believe it too, that they are handicapped, but they aren't incapable of doing what the rest of us can do beyond their physical limitations, so that means, if you don't want to be treated any differently, then wait in line and hold your pee doing the pee-pee wiggle like everyone else.

The amount of times I've actually seen someone who actually needs that stall, has been so rare, that it makes no sense to just have a stall open for the most part just in case essentially, when there are tons of people waiting in line for the restroom and by allowing them to use any stall, that action moving the actual bathroom line along that much faster. If, as the responder said, you want equal treatment as a handicapped person, that means waiting for stall use like everyone else no matter who is inside. Peeing takes a couple minutes, not, as the user pointed out, several hours with no place to wait or obstructing an area to do so. This simply comes down to, when you gotta go, you gotta go, and if there is a stall available, any stall, use it, and move on.

Can You Use the Handicap Bathroom Stall?
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