I got shouted at in the gym today, AIBU?

I'd go to the gym with you! I hope you have a friend to go exercise with. If you were in surbiton .. :) Please don't stop going because of ridiculous angry woman. It's her bad not yours and you are NOT ugly.

Transwomen are men, and as such, studies show they retain male pattern criminality, including propensity to sex crimes and violence.

My images for the last two posts haven't gone through yet.

Where did I hear what? That transwomen are males with a cock and ballsack?
Um, logic.

That transwomen sexually offend 5 times higher? STATISTICS, STUDIES AND DATA. It is very clear you are deeply ill-informed and misinformed.

Transwomen are MALES with PENIS AND TESTICLES. These most certainly do put women at risk, I suggest you educate yourself out of thinking a male in a dress is suddenly 'no risk':

Thats absolute bs you liar. Where did you hear that?

Trans women are women, and thry don't put anyone's safety at risk. Just bigots making scenes.

It is a bad thing. Terms are bad people, with hateful, selfish hearts, who push their beliefs on everyone else, claiming they're trying to protect women. I never felt any danger from any trans people. It's an imaginary issue.

You misunderstand - my post was in no way directed at you yourself. I was very careful to refer to my numbered "tells" as being mixed in among the replies, not your contributions.

I almost always avoid making any call about a potentially distressed OP's authenticity - it feels wrong to do so. And I like to give the benefit, as a vulnerable OP stands to lose more than I do (nothing!), in the upset it may cause them if I get that call wrong.

But now, feeling like I should commit, I'm happy to say that I come down on the side of believing you. These things do happen (cf. complexity, above). The way it happened sounded awful. Good for you for taking action.

Also, FWIW, I've been a bit shocked too by the conviction that sprays are SO bad. Don't get me wrong, I certainly get it - as an asthmatic, I've suffered and felt ill - but I'd not realised that conventions had shifted to the extent that people are so legitimately angered by someone using one. Another thing to worry about when I eventually haul myself down to a gym!

Edited to remove somewhat crazed quantities of exclamation marks, on rereading.

Well done and good luck, OP. I hope having done this will make you feel more comfortable returning in the future.

I said I wouldn't post again, but, having heard this one before (as well as the others beautifully refuted by other posters), I've always wanted to ask...

Is the thinking here that, in Austria, every man, woman and child must use a (specifically mixed-sex) sauna multiple times each day and night as a necessary human function? Or that exposure to mixed-sex saunas cures the kind of PTSD that various posters have referenced above? Or maybe that the mixing of the sexes in such spaces means that universal stats of male-on-female violence are lower in such countries?

(For the sake of clarity, the above is rhetorical - even the last one, which was actually suggested by an activist on FWR recently, whose argument appeared to be that women's wish for single sex spaces may be compounding male violence against them... and they didn't even mean the black-masked kiddies and online threats 🤔).

As regards whether this is a bad-faith thread, I try to give the benefit, especially when the OP appears to be distressed. I have, though, sometimes thought it may be useful to create a handy guide to frequent signs of bad faith. There are a number mixed in amongst the replies above, including:

1. vicarious, repeated references or allusions to nakedness (eg. pulling down pants) - time was, this would have been something of a red flag

2. hyperbole and appropriation of the language of extremism to describe women requesting their rights (eg. "fundamentalism")

3. abusive language

4. strawman arguments (of which I freely admit I'm also guilty in my questions above, while relying on #5, below, mitigating this a little...)

5. ...a lack of readiness to acknowledge complexity or admit fallibility 😳😁

My thoughts exactly. And AS shows they have no other posts to their name.

I wonder if this is all a non issue in countries like Austria where men & women all go into the sauna together naked? 🤔

Here here. All men out whether they are the dress wearing type or not. Stats show the rate of men who are a danger to women does not decrease with a certificate.

Women’s rights to retain sex based spaces can’t be stated enough!

I’m six foot one with short hair.. you get used to this..

Sorry AccidentallyWesAnderson - just realized you had already said it all much more eloquently and succinctly than me 😅

Good luck with your complaint OP.

And everyone else complaining about body spray should approach their gyms for a new policy and stop harassing others in changing rooms.

That's lovely - how very magnanimous of you to want to share intimate spaces with men but you know you can't consent for all females right?
That's the 10 year old girl using the public bathroom alone for the first time, the self-conscious teens, the elderly maiden aunts, the orthodox Muslim and Jewish women, the women with unpredictable gynaecological issues or embarrassing gastric problems not to mention all the women who have suffered sexual assault and haven't been able to process it in the same way you have and actually suffer a visceral bodily reaction to encountering strange men in enclosed spaces (which btw is a very common response to trauma) and any other women, for whatever reason, who just don't want to encounter males in a space where they are unavoidably vulnerable. But hey as long as you're cool with it.

And transmen who actually continue to pass as male after more than a second glance or when they speak are still pretty rare (it's the height, the hips and the hands that give it away) although I'll grant testosterone is a powerful hormone compared to the effects of estrogen in men. But again this is an issue of the TRA's own making so maybe campaigning for additional gender neutral spaces would have been a better use of their time instead of barging into female single sex spaces unasked and then tantruming violently when women have the audacity to say No Thanks!

And I really don't know what 'intersex' (which is an offensive term btw for many people with a difference of sexual development) has to do with anything. People with DSDs are either male or female and will absolutely know which single sex provision to use as no doubt they will have a medical diagnosis and ongoing medical care to support them.
True human hermaphrodites don't exist and there is no third sex!

Report that woman to gym reception, tell them she was also tutting loudly whenever someone looked at you. She needs the gym to have a chat with her.

OP - Sorry you have had such a horrible experience. I am a tall, skinny woman with small boobs and very short hair, and I've been mistaken for a man on multiple occasions, usually in a polite way ("thank you, young man"/"excuse me sir" kind of thing) but once encountered a (male) youth in a Subway who looked and me and then said loudly to his friends "What is THAT??" And laughed. I was a bit hurt but consoled myself on the basis that sometimes people are just arseholes, and I quite like that I look a bit androgenous (as a teenager I was much more girly with long hair, wore more dresses etc etc.) The woman at the gym who shouted at you was appallingly rude and I hope you did report her. Try not to let a total b*tch like that affect your self esteem. SHE should be ashamed, and she should absolutely not get away with behaving in such a despicably rude way.

You shouldn't use any spray in a changing room. It's toxic and unnecessary