The Men’s Restroom is a place of almost monastic silence. When men enter the restroom, all conversation ceases. If two men are talking about something and they both need to use the bathroom, they’ll pause the conversation. Once they’re both done with their business and outside the bathroom, the conversation will resume.
If two guys who haven’t seen each other for years meet accidentally in a public bathroom, any reunion conversation would be limited to “Hey, how’s it going?” and “Good.” Any further discussion would have to wait until they were outside.
As a man, you are forbidden to react to someone else’s appearance in a public bathroom. If you walk in and you see some guy wearing a custom-tailored three piece suit and a fluorescent purple spiked mohawk, the most you can do is nod. Once you’re outside, you can say “Nice suit” or “Nice hair” or whatever, but inside the hallowed halls of the Men’s Room, no comment is allowed. It’s as if the material of the bathroom is designed to absorb all sound.
This doesn’t seem to be the case with women’s restrooms. I checked with my Fiancee. Apparently, conversations continue unabated there. According to my Fiancee, if two women wander, chattering, into a bathroom, it’s not unusual for them to keep talking through the whole thing. Their discussion can’t be halted by something as trivial as the metal walls that separate the different stalls. For women, a bathroom is a perfect place to conduct a reunion or to inquire about a person’s coiffure or wardrobe.
I suspect that overcoming the differences in “commode culture” could be one of the great stumbling blocks for cross-dressers.