Hampstead Heath Women's Pond

Personally, the next time I'm in Hampstead I will go into the men's pond. I'm male and gay.

My genitals are my business.

Surely all women should have the same rights?

Yes, Ursula, of course they should

Sweetie.

In the light of the statement from KLPA can as many members/swimmers as possible write to them to say they have been misinformed as to their rights and obligations under the Equality Act 2010, and that you would like an explanation of why they have not invoked the exemption (Equality Act 2010, Schedule 3, Part 7, Paragraph 28) that is available to them and that would have permitted the Pond to remain single-sex without any contravention of Equalities law.
You might also want to add your own experiences of the pond, and why it remaining single-sex is important to you.
You might also want to ask how they will differentiate between legitimate and illegitimate claims of womanhood made by males, and what liability the association would accept in the cases of voyeurism or other improper intrusions.
You might also want to note the lack of consultation and the apparent complete failure to get independent advice etc

Sadly I am not a member or user of the pond, so can't write 'as a member/swimmer', though will write as a concerned member of the public. However, it will be the members/users letters that count.

Send letters to Co-chairs, Julia Dick and Nicky Mayhew c/o [email protected]

From the bottom of the BBC article

Hannah Norman wrote: "I can't believe they have stopped a session that enables women the opportunity to feel safe and confident. How ridiculous. They should have just made a men-only session too."

This is exactly it, and why it's not bigotted. These people making these complaints don't actually want men's only swimming, they just don't want women to have women's only swimming.

This is why it's also different to golf clubs - women wanted to play golf and were being stopped from doing so - they didn't want to stop men playing golf.

pisa there was a petition pointing out that single sex swimming can be single sex under the law and the session was reinstated.

The complainant who got it shut down in this instance was a man who was angry that women had an hour a week for a swim. They should have said that if he found enough interest they'd be happy to provide a men only hour as well. Because fact is men who complain about this sort of thing don't actually want it themselves, they just want women not to have it. Of course if there was interest then they could have their hour and you wouldn't see women trying to get it shut down.

This is not quite accurate. The Equality Act says that anyone merely THINKING about becoming trans is trans. So a 25-stone hairy fat bloke with a beard is as much trans as someone who has had ops, puberty blockers, etc.

This to me, is wrong and should be changed. We need more gatekeeping, not less.

Here's another case where the Equalities Act has shut down women's spaces:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-gloucestershire-40887393

"From reading it seems like the only way to stop this is for there to be a change in the law recognising tw as legal women. They quite clearly state that of course to not allow a legally recognised woman in is of course discrimination."

This is not quite accurate. The Equality Act says that anyone merely THINKING about becoming trans is trans. So a 25-stone hairy fat bloke with a beard is as much trans as someone who has had ops, puberty blockers, etc.

That said, the Equality Act does allow you to make exceptions, but it's for you to prove they are justified - IMO single sex swimming would be justified since many (religious, etc.) women would not otherwise be able to swim. But the default position is that blokes can do what they like, women have to rebutt that and spend money on lawyers, or just roll over meekly and let the perves and paedos have their way.

Or stop this nonsense that no one is allowed to know if someone has a GRC or not.

with all due respect to the ladies supporting the trans use of the pond - they refer to the "difficult process" of transition and it makes me wonder if they are thinking as per the Helen Bidd way - that the old fashioned transsexual stuff applies, not thinking that it's really just men wanting to use the women's pond.

pisacake Thanks for the article. From reading it seems like the only way to stop this is for there to be a change in the law recognising tw as legal women. They quite clearly state that of course to not allow a legally recognised woman in is of course discrimination.

Pisa I can guarantee they aren't taking the needs of all the femail members into consideration. The handmaidens will be good little women because they don't want to hurt the poor mens' feelings, while telling those women that have genuine concerns, that they're bigots. Isn't it funny that so many women are conditioned to be nice to the poor men, while treating real women like crap?

The local rag has something from the Ladies Pond Committee saying basically, we want trans-identified men to come here:

www.hamhigh.co.uk/news/transgender-women-are-welcome-in-the-ladies-pond-say-hampstead-heath-swimmers-1-5339359

Thanks certain had missed that!

Oh god, why did I read the comments?! So many people who simply cannot read.

Not derailing re behaviour at the men's pond. Responding to -

The majority of men probably do not go to men only saunas and indeed the men's pool at Hampstead, because of the behaviour or possible behaviour of some men

I was speaking to my DH about this earlier and he laughed and said it was women's karma for taking away male only spaces such as the scouts and working men's clubs.

I know this post has already been answered, but it's utter bollocks, so I'm going to answer it again.

The Scouts was dying. They simply didn't have enough boys interested in joining to be able to sustain the number of packs and troops they were running. They were also struggling to find enough volunteers to run the ones that were sustainable, so they opened it up to girls. This meant that they got an influx of new members, because Brownies and Guides were and are massively over subscribed and a new pool of volunteers and survived.

So "women's Karma" there would have been to let the bloody thing die, is this what your DH would prefer?

And others have written about the way women stepped in to run soup kitchens, clothes banks, food banks, jumble sales and charity drives during the industrial unrest in the 80's in places where working men's clubs were the social centre of the area, and it was men who decided to allow women full membership of them afterwards. It had to be men who did that by pure dint of the membership committees being all male. The only thing that changed was that women were allowed to be members, women had always been welcome to go to WMCs and they still run most of the fundraising.

Facts are a bastard, aren't they?

Great post Agony

Outside of high summer the men’s pond is mainly frequented by hardcore year-round swimmers, most of whom seem to be middle-aged or older blokes, plus a contingent of charedi Jews. Pretty similar to the Ladies Pond, although far fewer orthodox Jewish women than st the men’s.

But in high summer the lawn outside the Men’s Pond becomes gay hangout central. It’s quite funny to observe when you walk past, but perhaps a little weird for straight men.

My then teenage son went with a group of his mates on a really hot day a few days ago, and came back a bit weirded out by the experience of being so openly checked out. As he was describing his experience his two sisters were giving him the ‘welcome to our world’ slow head shake.

Most straight blokes are blissfully unaware that ‘The Male Gaze’ is in fact a thing. And when they do encounter it, unsurprisingly, they don’t like it. Women are surrounded by it all the bloody time, and what makes the Ladies Pond so special is precisely that absence of the male gaze.

I know what you mean. But most men are so complacent. So many posters saying their husbands think they're "bigoted".

Do we need to be weird at them though? And they won't feel any physical threat. Not sure it will work, the dynamics are all wonky.

Thing is women have no real desire to impinge on spaces like this. We know it's a shitty thing to do.

That's the thing. I agree. But most men don't get why we're so angry as it doesn't affect them. So maybe we do need to show them a taste of it.

Oliversmumsarmy
An easy target yes, but I believe that all women only places will be targeted, no matter what they are or how vulnerable the women are who use them.

I can't remember anyone saying that men had problems at the men's pond, have I missed something? Seems a bit of a tangent and not sure where it's come from.