Okanagan College students using the women’s bathroom at the Center for Learning close closed stable doors to find a surprise.
The GSWS 295 class, studying current issues in women’s studies, installed billboards in the doors of bathrooms to conduct an anonymous survey among students.
The survey asked students to take a moment to dispel “negative thoughts about height, weight, fat burning, discrimination and sexism” and not to flush out “confidence, self-love, strength, fearlessness, inner beauty and courage because you ARE beautiful. “
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The students answered the survey with stickers.
Jodie Miner, a fourth year business student, said it was refreshing to see a unique anonymous survey in college.
“I like the way they did the flushing to reinforce the flushing out of negative ideas people have about their bodies,” Miner said.
“The students are under a lot of pressure and some students feel even more pressured to have a bikini body in time for summer.”
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GSWS 295 students have studied how the fear and hatred of fat bodies reinforce related systems of oppression such as sexism, ability awareness, colonialism, and homophobia, according to a statement posted in the bathroom.
“We invite you to take a moment to reflect on how this exhibition disrupts popular beliefs about beauty, health, idealized bodies and society,” the poster reads.
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Paulina Rojas, a sophomore marketing student, said she enjoyed how anonymous the survey was and that she could see the honest responses of other people who had used the stickers.
“I think it’s a really unique way of asking people who really don’t want to talk about certain topics,” said Rojas.
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