Gym thinks only men can be Drs

Pomeral our bank did the same (wonder if the same bank?) - DP got his own statement and another identical addressed to both. Infuriating. switching to paperless solved the problem, but still irritating nonetheless

I don't think sex should be pertinent, either.

On an ideal level, women shouldn't feel they need a separate changing room in case men make them feel scared (which is, I think, the big reason).

And on a practical level, it is better to have lockable, individual unisex changing.

Of course if it were bespoke software you could just have a field for which changing room they use.

My gym doesn't even have a changing room. You can change in the (one, unisex, accessible) toilet with a shower in it.

Absolutely. They shouldn't have title as a compulsory field at all. I can understand in this case that knowing someone's sex is pertinent (but in many other cases it's not,) But they could have a separate field as M/F/other/prefer not to say.

Obviously anything other than M or F would probably not open any changing room doors at all.

That's still a sexist piece of software design - setting a default rather than leaving it empty when the title does not indicate gender is sloppy design.

It's understandable that it's happened in the first place, through human error (given I have screwed up some departmental statistics for similar reasons this week, but the world has not ended, so it's not that big a deal.)

It's not understandable if they refuse to fix it once it's been pointed out.

Making it the surname isn't much better for me than making it the title - now I'm Fat UnemployedPerson.

I can see someone with a data entry form in one hand

Who 95% of the the time never has to bother with the male/female box, because it is default flled because the title was already Mr/Mrs/Miss/Ms

Forget to bother to pay attention to the gender box, because it is already filled.

They SHOULD have paid attenton, but it's understandable why they didn't.

I would just like to make it clear that I will not be answering to anyone who calls me Emma UnixSystemsAdministrator.

But if it was just a data entry issue, they would have apologised and explained. It wasn't.

Yes, I can see someone with an application form in one hand for Dr Whatever, computer mouse in the other, automatically clicking "male" in the sex field.

Or sloppy data entry on the part of the gym staff (who then blamed it on "computer says no")

True.

And to derail even further on the same lines, some of those names indicate that children were taking their names from their mothers. Names like Brewster have feminine endings, so they must once have referred to a woman who was a Brewer, not a man.

This is one of many reasons why the 'oh, it's just technology not keeping up with modern conventions' line of thought doesn't hold up.

To derail further, many of us do have our ancestors' occupations as our names... Cooper, Smith. Maybe we can return to that system but change our last name by deed poll every time we change job. Then maybe Susan Jane Physicist can also be barred from the women's changing rooms by a similar computer glitch.

DadWasHere, I'm itching to look at the source too. I'm inclining towards sloppy, poorly tested code but would love look.

I'm not wildly convinced, dadwas - I mean, I get it, I just think that you can't really get round the fact that someone, at some stage, had to put their bias into the system or it wouldn't be there.

But, I will say, in Cambridgeshire Dr can't be that unusual a title. It's a county with a couple of large universities and big hospitals.

They seemed to suggest it was a two-system fault, which would make it more a data-pass communications glitch to the key device. Those devices commonly have an exact pre-defined identity, ie Mr John Smith living at 123 ABC Lane, etc, so they can be tested independent of any other system. They are not designed to accept human input and have those defaults overwritten by another software system sending them information. Could be the system was not so much sexist as failing to pass what the device needed to change its defaults, missed in testing because Dr is uncommon and a male doctor using the facility would not trigger awareness of the fault. Damn it would be good to see the source code to see where and why it flaked out. Glitch, sloppy, sexist, any of those is possible.

And fwiw I can't see why we bother with titles anymore, first and surname is sufficient, but when asked if I am miss or mrs I will say dr as that is my correct title, and not just because I am up my own arse.

It was a couple of years ago, I think. I "corrected" my stated gender and I became my brother's sister.

Anothernumber, why would you not use dr if it is your title?

I do, because I am neither a miss or mrs, I am dr.

I rather like that my title doesn't automatically declare my marital status.

I wonder if they've changed it now.

No, it was me, not a very clear post!

But yes ... it's mind-boggling.

Oops, I misread you - I didn't think you really disbelieved me, though, just that it is kinda unbelievable.

I like the notion of being "Director Screwdriver"

Oh, god no! I meant 'dubious' in the sense of, a dubious policy for them to have if they want to claim to be all caring and lovely about gender, which they do.

I didn't mean I doubted you. Sorry!