We live in an enlightened age which clings to barbaric traditions. Take a look at the inequity of the public toilet.

Pretty much wherever you go, work, shopping, movies, dining, the public toilets are the same. There's one for men, and one for women. That's only fair, right? Wrong.

An enlightened society knows better than a barbaric tradition that women need more facilities than men.

For example, our congregation meets a few times a year with other congregations at a larger meeting facility. From what I understand, the men's toilet facilities are roughly comparable to the women's facilities, down to and including a fold out diaper changer.

What's fair is fair except for the fact that the women's toilet is always crowded, often with a line that backs up into the hallway, while the men's toilet facilities seldom have a crowd, seldom a line, seldom any congestion at all.

There are times when one of the men's toilet facilities is closed to men and opened to women, simply to ease the women's congestion, so to speak.

In other words, men need toilet facilities, in general less often than women, and probably for less time than women. What can I say? We're efficient creatures, and women are, well, uh, perhaps less so.

The problem is obvious. Women need more toilet facilities than men and use those facilities more often and for longer periods of time than men. But the facilities in nearly any public building are roughly the same. That's antiquated if not barbaric.

An enlightened society would recognize those differences, whether physiological, psychological, or whatever logical, and make adjustments in the facilities to account for specific needs, rather than the specifics of equality.

Believe it or not, Ripley, men and women may be equal, but not in every aspect. Public toilets are dens of inequality.