Translation Device

Instruction

Please click and hold mouse on graph to interact.

Design Process

I found this API called Refuge Restrooms, from the website it said "seeks to provide safe restroom access for transgender, intersex, and gender nonconforming individuals.". This API is allowed people to submit the restroom that is safe to use for transgender people. I used their API to search New York City to see how many restrooms are submitted as safe to use. There are 19 entries at the time I searched. Then I'm wondering how many public restrooms in the city. The result shows that there are roughly 700 public restrooms, including book stores, coffee shops and cafes. 19 safe to use restroom compared with 700 public restrooms is so minimal.

But I do think the Refuge API dataset is relatively limited because I believe there are more public restrooms that are safe for transgender people to use in NYC. However, it really is a very sad story by knowing the existence of this API because there are groups of people have to confirm safety before using the restroom. I also found that the website allows people to download the unisex restroom sign to indicate safety. The sign composed with three equal sized figure of female, transgender people and male. The sign illustrated a very ideal situation of equity while the dataset gathered from reality just reflects the inequity.

So I decided to translate the dataset combined with the unisex restroom sign to demonstrate the situation in reality. Besides unisex restrooms, accessibility of public rooms and average waiting time to use restroom between genders could be alternative approaches to make the translation device.

Reflection

The ideal graph composed with three equal sized figure. I plot 700 as the height for female and male figure, and 19 as height of transgender figure separately in proportion when mouse is pressed. The result reveals the actual proportion in reality. The quotation then modified as "This is NOT a gender-neutral restroom " and "it's NOT for everyone YET!!!".

I want to let people notice the situation in reality and how far we are away from the ideal situation. Meanwhile, it demonstrates the unequally distributed power that mentioned in data feminism.

The principle I referred from data feminism is "The Number Doesn't speak for themselves". Apparently, the amount and location of public restrooms are public dataset. However, the definition of "public restroom" could be varied and not necessarily to be public and safe. It requires extra research to reveal the hidden truth that public dataset does not illustrate.