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There's a definite development gap between products designed for men and ones designed for women.
If the product relies on science or medicine, the gap is because of the centuries that both disciplines focused only on men.
If the product is more convenience based, the gap is often due to the lack of women in positions of authority in research, development and marketing.
Then there are the unisex products designed for "everyone" as long as everyone is a reasonably fit 6" tall man.
Reddit user LuinAelin asked:
"What is something designed for women that has obviously been designed by a man?"
Button Downs
"Button down shirts that don't account for breasts."
"If you CAN button it all the way up you have these huge gaps and stretching between the buttons."
~ tenaciouslyteetering
"As a small band size, large cup size this is so true."
"Fits the body? Boobs are hanging out.
"Fits the boobs? Looks like I’m in a sheet."
~ jordisj44
"I literally learned to sew my own clothes because this pissed me off so much."
"I just want to look like a normal person in a button down!"
"Why are my choices between a potato sack or a sexy office worker costume?"
~ 12countcontessa
Biopsy Procedure Tables
"When you get an x-ray needle biopsy, you have to lie on a cold formica table with a sharp edged hole with your breast dangling through it."
"The first time I had to do this, we—me, women doctors and nurses—all commented on the terrible design of the thing."
"When I had another needle biopsy a few years later, the table had been 'redesigned'."
"It was now pink."
~ yttiksesom2
"How are we supposed to know things are for us if they aren't pink, though?"
~ Coop__dee__doop
"I had one of these and it was, by far, the most humiliating and dehumanizing experience of my entire cancer treatment."
"You're laying there like a cow getting your hanging udders stabbed."
~ AgentQwackers
Sports Bras With Removable Pads
"Sports bras and their removable pads."
~ DeeLite04
"I hate that it is nearly impossible to find a sports bra/bralette with fixed padding when there is no benefit to them being removable!"
"Lazy companies that don’t know—or care—what women actually want."
~ hoyvenclavin
"The F*CKING TRIANGLES that fold and get wrinkles, and you have that tiny window to fix them! I HATE THEM SO MUCH!!"
~ darling_lycosidae
"Always get bunched—or somehow go MIA—in the wash. And if you manage to get them back in and vaguely straightened out?"
"BOOM! Weird crease that makes it look like someone tried to fold your boob in half like some sadistic origami."
~ Vintage-Grievance
Menstrual Hand Protection
"Wasn’t there some guys on Shark Tank that made gloves for women to use to change their menstrual products?"
"They were single-use and pink or something."
~ silverandstuffs
"I just had to think about those two stupid men that invented 'Pinky Gloves' to pick up and dispose of tampons because 'they once lived with women' and periods are gross, so here have pink plastic gloves so that grown a** men don't faint."
~ Filisdin
"Wait 'til they hear about a crazy newfangled phenomenon called 'handwashing'."
~ kochka93
"No, no, handwashing was just for the pandemic. No one has to do that anymore. /s"
~ LakotaGrl
"I mean I regularly wipe my a** without gloves, not a problem at all. In the ranking of 'gross' things, I'd much rather get my wife's period blood on my hand than either of our poops."
"Blood is just part of you. I'm not afraid of my own blood, and for someone I'm intimate with/trust, I'm not afraid of their blood."
"Poop, on the other hand, is just pure waste and nasty/toxic by design."
~ alek_hiddel
Belt Loops
"Someone PLEASE put more belt loops on my work pants!"
~ TURBOSCUDDY
"And please confirm that belt loops can hold an actual belt and that work pants belt loops are strong enough to hold a belt AND equipment where relevant without getting stretched out."
~ CatCatCatCubed
Menstrual Glue
"There was a guy who tried to market some kind of vagina glue so girls could get up in the morning and glue their lips shut instead of worrying about menstrual products at all."
"Then when they had to pee the stream of urine would ‘unseal’ the lips and flush out all the blood because apparently the bladder and vagina are just like the testicles and bladder—they use the same plumbing."
"After you wipe you reapply and glue shut until the next time."
"I don’t know how many men he worked with on this idea before someone explained basic f*cking biology to this guy, but there were an alarming number of men who thought it was a great idea."
~ TeslasAndKids
"There is a patent for his labia glue that dissolves when you pee on it to use while on your period to hold the blood in."
"A male chiropractor invented and tried to sell it."
~ Jerkrollatex
"He thinks women pee from their vagina—as opposed to the urethra and bladder—and the menstrual discharge can be peed out."
"Even if his solution solved the blood problem better than pads and tampons, he's not really fixing the most inconvenient part and is, if anything, adding inconvenience."
"His disconnect from anatomy is so profound that he can't even understand why he's wrong."
~ ArthurBonesly
"I remember he got dragged so hard by so many women who pointed out how stupid of an idea it was. He just dug his little heels in, saying something like, 'Well, women haven't come up with a better solution in decades, so shut up!'
~ Spiritual_Ad_7162
Leggings
"Leggings, why put a seam in the crotch?"
~ maridska
"This was one of the major selling points for Popflex leggings early on—seamless crotches!"
~ lilmonkie
"This 1000%."
"I don't know a single person with a vulva who wants leggings with a seam down the front. I like to keep my camel toe to myself, thank you."
~ mehhggie
Bathrooms Stalls
"Every public restroom I've been to that doesn't have a little trash receptacle in the stall."
"Having to walk your soiled sanitary products to the main trash in the handwashing area is adding insult to injury when periods suck enough."
~ gingasaurusrexx
"In addition to that—no hook for a bag."
"I mean, if you’re not gonna give us reasonable pockets, please give us a hook to put a bag so we don’t have to put it on the back of the nasty toilet or the floor."
~ Any-Plankton8960
Gynecology
"Every single gynecological procedure and the lack of pain meds given for it."
~ abynew
"'Just a quick pinch' while I shave off a piece of your cervix with no pain meds, and you literally pass out while I do it from the pain and dizziness."
~ OverTadpole5056
"My Ob-Gyn didn’t tell me he was going to do anything. I thought it was just another pelvic exam and the next thing I know I feel this horrible pain and I start crawling backwards up the exam table."
"He tells me to scoot back down and hold still. After it was done, I came VERY close to passing out, and he was visibly irritated with me."
"I was so disappointed in him because he had always been so very nice before that visit and the one prior."
~ Pea-and-Pen
Personal Protective Equipment
"Personal protective equipment (PPE). Unisex fit, my a**."
~ Moonpiemo
"The worst offenders I've heard about:"
"–Stab-proof/bullet-proof vests aren't built to accommodate breasts. Breasts cause the vest to sit higher, leaving the lower abdomen much more exposed."
"–Lead vests/aprons used to protect against radiation e.g. from x-rays also aren't designed to accommodate breasts, leaving female techs open to increased radiation exposure."
"There are plenty of other examples of safety equipment or policies being designed for men and used by women which endanger women in their workplaces, but these are particularly heinous."
"I work in a lab and have never found a lab coat that fits me properly. Our benches are all too high, and many pieces of equipment are more difficult to use for someone of my height and upper body strength."
"Newer equipment tends to be better, which is good, but it just highlights that these things were a careless choice, not a necessity. My lab is 85% female."
~ milzB
Shoes
"Most women's shoes are shaped to be long, thin and pointy."
"My feet are not long, thin, and pointy; they are foot-shaped, and shoe shopping is a**."
~ Nopetynope12
"But pointy feet are more attractive, doesn’t matter if it’s comfortable! /s"
~ gnatdump6
"Oh god, so much this!"
"I often feel like reverse Cinderella, trying on dozens of pairs of shoes to find one that fits my feet. I finally find a good one, then the next model year they 'improve' them and they no longer work on my feet."
"Oh, and good luck finding cute dress shoes that fit right."
~ Awkward_Goldfish
"I have really short feet. I wear a child's size 3 or 4 without issues. But a woman’s size 5 or 6 is way too narrow while being too long."
"What do they think happens to women that our feet suddenly get narrow after puberty?"
~ LakotaGrl
IntraUterine Device—IUD
"The IUD was invented by Richard Richter in 1909 and the design was updated by Ernst Gräfenberg —after whom the G-spot is named."
~ SundaeEducational808
"The fact that they insert them without proper anesthesia is just crazy."
"I’m on my second one."
"For the uninitiated: they force your cervix open with a plastic needle-nose wrench, and it’s held open while they place the IUD, which should only take a few seconds. Sometimes they smear a 'local' medication on there for numbing, but that’s… not effective."
"It’s about 30 seconds of acute pain, 3 days of cramping, but I estimate it’s worth it because it buys me five whole years of no periods! On balance, it’s worth it for me."
~ EnglishTeachers
"When I got mine, the doctor said it's a 'pinch and two cramps". Easy for him to say."
"The following 2 days, the weekend, were pretty miserable. I did the copper one, so I haven't had to remove it yet, but I'm already getting anxious about December 2027."
~ Sea_One_6500
"Same. They told me it would 'hurt for a few minutes at most'. I barely made it home before throwing up it hurt so bad."
~ TheRealSaerileth
"They know full well it hurts, and how much it hurts. Their patients tell them. It's not like doctors don't understand how words work."
"They just don't give a sh*t. You're out of their office, no skin off their nose if you're at home suffering."
"To be clear, effective anesthetics are available, but as usual doctors ignore women's pain because females are 'overly dramatic' and 'hysterical'."
~ abhikavi
Car Seat Belts
"Car seat belts. Mine slips up all the time, and I have it on the lowest setting."
"I am 5'4" tall. So uncomfortable."
~ Quietly_dangerous
"They didn't even use smaller, female, sized crash test dummies in cars until fairly recently."
"Women are like 74% more likely to be injured in frontal road collisions because vehicles are designed with the 'average male' body in mind."
~ shandybo
"And they slide easily over big breasts and strangle me. Gotta use the Tiddy Bear or other strap!"
~ Fluffy-kitten28
"Also pregnant bellies. When you add in boobs and baby belly those seatbelts are almost useless."
~ baffledninja
Medication
"Most pharmaceuticals, unfortunately."
~ vermilion-chartreuse
"Medical research only included men because women’s hormones could skew the results. Even the lab mice were males! Women were just prescribed a smaller dose as a result."
~ Processtour
"Like if our hormones skew the results, then maybe they also skew the effectiveness in women? Or did they just not care about that?
~ JezraCF
"They did, in fact, not care. Medicine is incredibly sexist. It's getting better, but only in recent years."
"Heart attack symptoms have only ever been observed in men, and subsequently, heart attacks in women are more difficult to detect."
"Endometriosis, which affects about a third of all women, has been ignored for basically forever, which is why we don't know much about it. The list goes on and on and on."
"Basically, male doctors and scientists found women to be 'too complicated' and decided to pay them less attention than was absolutely necessary. It will take generations of hard work to overcome that."
~ jimmy_the_angel
For The Millionth Time, POCKETS!
"Oh, and NORMAL pockets, please and thank you!"
~ TURBOSCUDDY
"I've always maintained that if I ever start a ladies fashion brand it will literally be called 'Has Pockets'."
~ Notmydirtyalt
"POCKETS. I buy men's pants and shorts because of those tiny little fake pockets in women's pants."
"And why do the catalogs that advertise workwear for women still have 'cargo pants' with little pockets practically glued down so they don't open?"
"POCKETS, dudes. We use them too."
~ wddiver
So, ladies, what would you add to the list?