Active discussions

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Feminism: chat

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Original poster

Gym thinks only men can be Drs

363 replies

DrElizabethPlimpton · 18/03/2015 18:21

I've just seen a link to a Daily Fail article (I won't link obviously) about a gym in Cambridgeshire

A paediatrician joined and she found that her electronic key wouldn't allow her access to the female changing room. The 'glitch' was explained by staff - apparently her title Dr automatically defaulted to the assumption she was male.
I'm currently speechless.

OP posts:
JeanneDeMontbaston · 20/03/2015 13:21

alex already covered that. What's the problem?

I do speak for everyone. I learnt it from you, when you started explaining how you knew exactly what was going on and could tell us all that it would not have been fixed for a man either.

You wouldn't be being hypocritical would you? Shock

And btw, I know the reason. We've covered it, many times. It's ingrained misogyny in the system. Why you are so resistant to acknowledging that, I don't know. It's as if we explain something, you grasp it for a second or two, and then you're back to 'but what if there was [insert tenuous possibility here]? Maybe misogyny isn't real!'

kim147 · 20/03/2015 13:20

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

kim147 · 20/03/2015 13:17

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

JeanneDeMontbaston · 20/03/2015 13:01

Straw man argument.

No one else thinks it's necessarily the fault of the person on the desk. We just think they had a perfectly simple way of solving the problem, which has been outlined by alex, and which wouldn't involve dismissing the problem the way you recommended.

kim147 · 20/03/2015 12:59

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

JeanneDeMontbaston · 20/03/2015 12:54

It seems like this company failed to take it seriusly.

No shit, Sherlock. That is what we have been trying to get you to realize for quite some time.

This stuff happens to women all over the shop. Sometimes they could sort it; sometimes they could only apologize.

It'd be sorted if a man kicked up a fuss, though.

I can say that with faux-certainty, because I have precisely as much knowledge about this as you do. Yet, I suspect you will still throw your toys out of the pram at me making this unsupported statement, while you expect your own unsupported statements to be taken as fact.

kim147 · 20/03/2015 12:51

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

BuffyEpistemiwhatsit · 20/03/2015 11:54

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

JeanneDeMontbaston · 20/03/2015 11:39

The nearest parallel I can think, would be the sort of experience you might have if you're a male nurse.

JeanneDeMontbaston · 20/03/2015 11:38

It's not a parallel, though, buffy, because for most men that would be such an unusual, novel experience. There's no context for it, for them.

BuffyEpistemiwhatsit · 20/03/2015 11:35

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

BuffyEpistemiwhatsit · 20/03/2015 11:33

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

JeanneDeMontbaston · 20/03/2015 11:27

I'd like to think I'd have left the gym and gone and kicked up a fuss in the papers - and I like that she did.

I don't see why it would be so wrong to demand it be sorted out, though. As alex said, the better way for them to have dealt with it would have been 'ah, there is a problem, so sorry, let me give you another code'.

There is this constant expectation that women shouldn't dream of complaining, and that we should accept 'oh, I'm sure it will be sorted soon ... I'm sure no one meant any harm, little lady, now, just wait a few centuries and we'll evolve our way to a solution'.

It is absurd.

AskBasil · 20/03/2015 11:24

"Women get "misgendered" a all of the time. And we are treated as if we are creating a fuss about nothing if we complain."

And that's when we don't even accuse the people misgendering us, of violence. Because we're not narcissistic enough to define misgendering as violence.

kim147 · 20/03/2015 11:22

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

kim147 · 20/03/2015 11:19

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

alexpolistigers · 20/03/2015 11:17

The tech people are guys because women know that women can be Dr Wink

PuffinsAreFictitious · 20/03/2015 10:52

Oh Flora... get back in your box..... Hmm

FloraFox · 20/03/2015 10:51

kim your repetition of the problem indicates that you don't understand the problem.

mariamin · 20/03/2015 10:47

Women get "misgendered" a all of the time. And we are treated as if we are creating a fuss about nothing if we complain. Women are told everyday in these ways, that women are second class citizens.

ChopperGordino · 20/03/2015 10:27

I tend to use "folk" these days as yonic mentioned

ChopperGordino · 20/03/2015 10:26

I have used "guys" gender-neutrally but I accept that's because I'm used to mixed group = male. As per many languages like french where if all women = elles but men+women = ils

YonicScrewdriver · 20/03/2015 10:17

"Men would never accept a term that means women being applied to them."

True.

mariamin · 20/03/2015 10:16

Guys means men. It is used to mean women too, because culturally the default is male. So women are supposed to accept being called men and feel themselves included in the term. Men would never accept a term that means women being applied to them.

JeanneDeMontbaston · 20/03/2015 10:14

I think so, buffy. IME there's a hierarchy of things considered insulting in terms of titles:

  • calling a man by the wrong one. Shocking! Awful! Forms must default to Mr so this will never occur!
  • calling a woman Miss/Ms when she is Mrs. She is married and has bagged her man! Respect must be given!

[very long gap]

  • calling a woman one of those weird title thingies like Ms or Dr or something, who knows, can't even say them properly. Silly things. Just take what you are given and be grateful our system lets you in at all.