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
There shouldn’t be such thing as gender x only spaces. Or race, or sexuality. The women aren’t wrong about their points, but that doesn’t make it an acceptable or thankfully, legal thing to do. I’m sure the guy who sued them did it for all the wrong reasons though. Both sides seem a bit slimy.
I didn’t read into this particular issue, but I know the museum in question, have been there a couple times, so some context:
- it was founded by some eccentric multi millionaire, who basically just does whatever he wants. The museum was originally free for everyone, until eventually he realised he was draining money really fast, so now it’s only free for locals.
- the museum changes it’s “theme” somewhat frequently. One time I was there the whole place looked like a grocery store, and the stairs to the actual museum was like hidden away in part of the store.
- the museum seems to thrive on getting strong reactions from people. Much of the art inside is quite shocking or provocative. They have an app where you can rate how much you like each artwork, and apparently they actively remove artworks which are too universally liked.
So it doesn’t surprise me at all that the museum is trying to be women only, but I really doubt it will be permanent, and I suspect that the strong public reactions is exactly the point.
Why do we need girls locker rooms when we’ve had the technology for mixed gender locker rooms for generations? We call them doors and use them even in single gender bathrooms.
Certainly it’s inappropriate for sexual predators to be able to leer at girls or women, but there I also no need to have a lack of privacy from those of the same gender, if that’s what people wish.
I mean, I can see where you’re coming from but locker rooms are a significant part of sport.
Comradery is built in locker rooms and they are where young athletes spend a large portion of their sporting time. This is especially true for certain sports needing significant prep time like (ice) hockey.
With young people already facing a loneliness crisis, we don’t need to be isolating them further to solve a non-problem.
Got this one from tumblr but its something along the lines of we go to the bathroom to shit, not have some special women fun time in there.
If there was a way to have my own room entirely without anyone else that’d be 100% preferred, but gender is the last thing im thinking about when someone’s peeking down the cracks of my stall
Idk, everytime I go partying with friends it definitely seems like womens bathrooms are a communal activity.
I’m all for segregation spaces as long as essential spaces are open to all such as hospitals, parks etc. There are women only gyms where I am and I used to go to them because I felt safer and more comfortable.
This is a slippery slope to things you wouldn’t want to be excluded from, if this appeal wins and creates precident to make much worse places. Thinking this is a feminist battle is narrow minded, selfish, and will absolutely backfire.
But the idea is that everyone can open their own and run it by the rules they want. If you or a group don’t like how one thing is run, there is freedom to open up the same thing but make it open for all. This museum is a private one, rather than run by the government, and therefore they can do what they like. The government ones should be open to all because they are elected by the public.
I’m not at all in favour of forcing everyone to comply to uniformity for the sake of inclusivity but I’m all for ensuring that there are spaces available that are inclusive and that there’s freedom to operate how you like, provided that it doesn’t hurt anyone.
Next we can half separate but equal water fountains for coloreds and whites.
I would consider water fountains to be part of public infrastructure and essential, and therefore doesn’t fit into the model that I’m putting forward.
I’m not proposing that essential things like roads, water etc. are segregated but, rather, private businesses can choose how they operate. The risk is public backlash and hurting the bottom line and other businesses can choose to be open and accepting.
For example, queer bars vs het bars. It’s not segregated per se, but a business can choose how they want to operate to draw in the customers they want.
From now on, men have decided to declare every build and every bridge, build by men, to be men only. Build your own stuff please. /s
You know who actually want women-only spaces?
Women.
Please share your mental gymnastics for how a rape survivor is supposed to feel safe in your space.
Sincerely, a rape survivor
What about a space for rape victims, male or female? Spaces for survivors of things, people dealing with things, etc. are fine, and if those things only touch women, it’ll naturally only be women, or men who are (let’s argue good faith, here) trying to support someone else. Rape isn’t a female only problem, and so segregating it artificially may feel like a good idea at first glance, but creates other issues.
What about a space for black cop abuse survivors? I’d think that’s pretty inappropriate. It’ll already be mostly black, for sure, and a lot of that perspective will come through, but it’s not a black only issue.
I think the intent behind a safe space is that it is separated from potential triggers. So people who were abused by a man may wish to be in a space with no men, since the sight of men might bring up past trauma. Same for people abused by women. Putting men and women together, even though they have all experienced abuse, may still be exposing them all to the same triggers they want to avoid.
Of course all these people have the same right to having safe spaces, but those spaces don’t have to be in the same place.
Men and women are not the same. Rape is experienced differently for men and women. I’m not saying it’s worse for one than the other, but it literally involves that person’s genitals and is an intensely personal and gender specific thing.
The fact that you would lump male and female rape survivors together says a lot about how little experience you actually have with the subject.
There’s nothing wrong with having male-only rape survivor groups, especially if someone going through that trauma feels threatened by the other gender.
Man I hate to say it but cutting off 50% of the population due to trauma is a tauma response and solely that.
Its horrible you ever had to go through that and not even knowing you personally if I had a time machine to help I would; but that was one bad person, not a bad populace.
On the other side of that, you can’t force something just because you’ve identified it as a trauma response. Deciding that women shouldn’t feel threatened by men (or the other way around) for them and taking away spaces they feel safe isn’t constructive, it’s cruel.
Whew, if the bear meme didn’t bring out the usual crowd of assholes, this sure did.
It’s honestly shocking how many people are missing the point.
They just need to read the article and it basically spells it out. The whole thing is meant to be shocking in order to draw attention to the stupid laws and get them fixed.
It’s right there, both the motive and the solution.
At least with the bear it was less well documented and kinda took some background knowledge and extra thought to understand. But this one is just RIGHT THERE spelled out in the article 🤷
MONA is famous here for doing all sorts of controversial shit. This one time they sacrificed and butchered a cow live on stage. A women’s only space is tame and on brand. Everyone’s been baited
As a work of art designed to generate controversy I’d say it’s been wildly successful.
It’s actually pretty wild how successful it is. All of Walshie’s/MONA’s previous stunts have only generated local controversy. This one has transcended borders. Most of us here have grown pretty desensitised to Walshie’s antics so personally it’s quite fun seeing the world get a taste of undiluted Walshie.
You either replied to the wrong person or one of us doesn’t understand what the other was saying. (And that person could be me.)
Well isn’t that about some hypocritical shit?!
From the article…
“The lounge, which contains some of the museum’s most-acclaimed works - from Picasso to Sidney Nolan - has been closed to the public since the court’s order.”
Both Pablo Picasso and Sidney Nolan were both men!
If they’re gonna play that ‘women only’ card, then they should remove all works created by men and move them to a proper open museum.
Point is, art is art, and a museum is a museum. Anyone mature enough should be allowed to enter any museum they want and view whatever exhibits they want.
That gender specific crap can and does end up going both ways. And it shouldn’t be that way, anywhere.
In a world where there are millions of men who actually believe women are advantaged over men in today’s society, it’s interesting to see the international uproar occurring over this single exhibit that made that belief actually true. A single exhibit at a sex museum in Tasmania that’s literally about gender discrimination.
The amount of people/men who don’t get it is astonishing. Art isn’t just something you can put on a wall. This entire thing with excluding men is an art installation, supposed to generate emotions and a discussion about exclusion and gender disparity. And seeing how many men around the world are frothing at the mouth over an installation at a small museum at the end of the world it is an extremely powerful piece of art. I applaud the museum for this.
There are still places that are men only. Women can’t join the freemasons for example, but you don’t see this sort of extremely angry reaction to that.
And I agree, this art piece is doing exactly what it was supposed to.
Do you have any more examples other than the freemasons? I had assumed we were done with needless segregation (excluding bathrooms and such).
The only thing that makes sense in my mind is that male dominated spaces have non-explicit social barriers in place that are being approximated by the explicit barrier the museum has set up.
In the UK there’s golf clubs that have pretty toxic atmospheres and dress codes but aren’t legally allowed to bar women.
Sorry if this is super ignorant, I’m acknowledging the problem I just want to understand it better
You’re right, but to play devil’s advocate; that’s extremely unintuitive and took me to my 20s to figure out
Well, the mean age here seems to be over 30, so I’d expect a tad more maturity.
Intent matters. If all you just want is to piss off people, that’s trolling. I don’t see this being the point here.
If they’re gonna play that ‘women only’ card, then they should remove all works created by men and move them to a proper open museum.
Why?
This BBC World article covers how the artist brought the artwork into the courthouse:
Tuesday started with a large group of women dressed in navy power suits, clad in pearls and wearing red lipstick marching into the hearing to support Ms Kaechele.
As the parties sparred, the museum’s supporters were somewhat stealing the spotlight. They had periods of complete stillness and silence, before moving in some kind of subtle, synchronised dance - crossing their legs and resting their heads on their fists, clutching their hearts, or peering down their spectacles. One even sat there pointedly flipping through feminist texts and making notes.
After (Judge) Grueber reserved his decision for a later date, which is yet to be determined, the museum’s posse left as conspicuously as it came in - dancing out of the building in a conga line as one woman played ‘Simply Irresistible’ by Robert Palmer off her iPhone.
Ms Kaechele has indicated she’ll fight the case all the way to the Supreme Court if needed, but she says - ironically - that perhaps nothing could drive the point of the artwork home more than having to shut it down.
“If you were just looking at it from an aesthetic standpoint, being forced to close would be pretty powerful.”
Also want to cite an interview with the artist:
As the hugely influential gender theorist Judith Butler argues, gender is a performative construct. To which I’d add: so is the legal system.
Interviewer: Do you mean to say that you think the judge might have been contributing to the art?
I can’t be certain that his ruling isn’t performance. His judge-like ‘comportment’ in the court, the flourish of his language in the ruling … He’s clearly a man interested in art. In his ruling, he compares me to Caravaggio—a great artist but he also murdered someone. I just served ladies champagne.
Reverse misogyny? misandry is the word your looking for author.