I made this thread to understand and examine the views of traditionalists on segregated seating, not for spiritual advice regarding sin. Again, I am not focused on the appearance of others at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, my attention is directed entirely to our Blessed Lord. I simply made the comment about wearing a blindfold to say that I would rather avoid any occasion of lust. It is not something I struggle with at the moment.
But there is wisdom in preventing the issue of carnal desire from arising in the first place by segregated seating.
I would be all for segregated seating, based on the Church Fathers (whose reasoning is even more applicable today, than in their own times):
St. Cyril of Jerusalem (313-386):"Let men be with men, and women with women. For now I need the example of Noah’s ark, in which were Noah and his sons, and his wife and his sons’ wives. For though the ark was one, and the door was shut, yet things had been suitably arranged. If the Church is shut, and you are all inside, yet let there be a separation, men with men, and women with women, lest the pretext of salvation become an occasion of destruction. Even if there be a fair pretext for sitting near each other, let passions be put away. (Protocatechesis, 14, NPNF 2:7)"
St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430):"[See] the masses flock to the churches and their chaste acts of worship, where a seemly separation of the sexes is observed; where they learn how they may so spend this earthly life, as to merit a blessed eternity hereafter; where Holy Scripture and instruction in righteousness are proclaimed from a raised platform in presence of all, that both they who do the word may hear to their salvation, and they who do it not may hear to judgment. And though some enter who scoff at such precepts, all their petulance is either quenched by a sudden change, or is restrained through fear or shame. For no filthy and wicked action is there set forth to be gazed at or to be imitated; but either the precepts of the true God are recommended, His miracles narrated, His gifts praised, or His benefits implored. (City of God and Christian Doctrine, Chapter 28, NPNF 1:2)"
St. John Chrysostom (349-407):"What are you doing, O man? Are you being overly attentive concerning the women’s beauty, and you do not shudder at thus outraging the temple of God? Does the church seem to you to be a brothel, and less honorable than the marketplace? … It would be better for such men to be blind, for it is better to be diseased than to use the eyes for such purposes.
It would be best if you had within yourself the wall to part you from the women. But since you do not desire this to be so, our fathers thought it necessary by these boards to wall you off. I hear from the elders that in the early times there was nothing like these partitions, “for in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female” [Galatians 3:28]. And in the Apostle Paul’s time also both men and women were together, because the men were truly men, and the women were truly women. But now it is altogether to the contrary: the women have urged themselves into the manners of courtesans, and the men are in no better state than frenzied horses. (Homily LXXIII on St. Matthew, NPNF 1:10)"
PS: It is my understanding that some Eastern Catholic and Orthodox churches maintain this prudent segregation until the present day.