Australia’s Mona asked a court to reverse its ruling that allowed men inside a women’s only space.
Archived version: https://archive.ph/oHT6U
Thinking about how to make women feel safer in for example gyms seems like a better long term solution for absolutely everyone, but also doesn’t feel like it’s talked about a lot.
That’s because it ends up being the bear meme discussion in microcosm. (At least every time I’ve seen it come up.)
Context - cisgendered man here, FWIW.
Every time I’ve seen any discussion of helping women to feel safer in any context, that discussion is full of men who are offended that women even feel the need to be safer, because they tend not to believe that sexual harassment is as common for women as every woman in my life has repeatedly told me it is. So the conversation becomes about the women being “oversensitive” (or similar euphamism/synonym), not about making the discussed environment safer.
I can’t fathom why I’d give a shit about not being able to go work out a particular gym because women wanted a place to feel safe, unless it was literally the only gym within 50 miles. (And I’m doubtful that’s a common scenario.)
So, the short version of this is that you feel explicit sex discrimination is not only acceptable but good, but only in cases where it makes women feel better?
Because I guarantee you most of the people who make the kinds of arguments you are here are not broadly in favor of businesses being allowed to discriminate with respect to sex in general, in large part because it would sometimes inconvenience women.
The short version is that I think safe places for people who have a reason to need them should be encouraged not discouraged. Focusing on equating that to scenarios where people are just being bigots feels fairly disingenuous to me.
I guarantee you that the folks who make the sorts of argument you and others are making here are broadly folks who live in an environment that is and has always been architected in a way that is generally safe and supportive for folks just like them and possibly not so much for folks who aren’t.
Edit:
Thinking about how to make women feel safer in for example gyms seems like a better long term solution for absolutely everyone, but also doesn’t feel like it’s talked about a lot.
That’s because it ends up being the bear meme discussion in microcosm. (At least every time I’ve seen it come up.)
I would also suggest that in your rush to imply I’m a hypocrite you don’t ignore the opening statement to the comment you replied to.
What I said always happens is what we are doing here. So if you have some constructive ideas on how to help women who need it to feel safer in particular spaces (like the gym for example) that works better than letting them open their own damn gym I’d love to hear them.
Bigots be like:
Women feel unsafe in presence of men? “Outrageous! NOtaLLmEn”
Trans women want to use the bathroom? “They will rape them because they are biologically men.” OR “A male rapist will pretend to be trans to rape them”.
You can’t beat that logic. That’s why the nazis like it. Next step is “black men”.