Does anyone here actually find any of the traditional male/ female symbols erotic, or is Nano strange and different? 
Seeing the symbols above reminded me: I originally thought “director’s chair” instead of “rocking chair” for the woman symbol.
However, the man symbol above doesn’t look exactly like the one that was on the particular restroom where this occurred, though it’s similar. Both “legs” curved outward and the little tick-mark that goes up from the “tabletop” was vertical and in the middle; the symbol as a whole was pretty symmetrical.
I suspect it was a stylized representation of the actual glyph that you’d usually see in writing, sort of the Chinese equivalent of an Art Deco font. I know that a lot of signs over there had what appeared to be a sort of hand-drawn calligraphy look (as if a gigantic person with an extremely large brush had written them), while others looked more smooth, uniform, and “modern.”
It is a disconcerting experience to suddenly be not simply illiterate, but incapable of even recognizing simple patterns.
I always wanted to get some plastic and add mo-hawks to all of the people on the signs.
Moonshine:
Where did I say I had ever seen any that were erotic? I just said that maybe concern over someone’s interpretation of a representation of actual definitive female form as erotic / controversial in some sense was the reason the distinctiveness of the glyph didn’t center on anatomy, but rather on wearing apparel. On the other hand, HeadlessCow mentioned a (doubtless unofficial) glyph, designating ‘women’, that did have breasts of some sort on it. Anyhow, I doubt they’ll start using the profile truckers use on their mud flaps. . .on the argument that such would reinforce the outlook that women are primarily sex objects.
Ray
Since, sometimes when you’re out camping, you might need to find the right door in the middle of the night, an illuminated, animated, very unambiguous glyph would be nice:
[img]http://www.tsoft.net/~raych/girlneo.gif[img]
![http://www.tsoft.net/~raych/girlneo.gif[img]](http://www.tsoft.net/~raych/girlneo.gif%5Bimg%5D){kind=link}
Ray
For unambiguity without getting genital, you might want to use a bearded face for men. Perhaps this is where the idea of using a triangle (pointed down) for male and a circle (beardless face) for female.
And now, a woman smiling…
I’m pretty sure the triangle for the men’s room is pointed up, not down. I was thinking the shapes were more related to cowcatchers and railroad tunnels.
Rick
“Wink, wink, nudge, nudge, say no more.”