Men in women’s spaces

[BrightSaturn]

Just using this to rant really…

2 times in the past month I have encountered men in women only spaces.

1. I went to a feeding room to breastfeed my daughter in a shopping centre. I walked in and there were two young women in there changing their babies and one of their boyfriends just taking up one of the only chairs just sitting there, sitting using his phone. It’s a small room with 3 chairs in. I didn’t know what to do so I thought I’ll just sit down and get ready slowly and hopefully they’ll leave. I have fed in public but this was a small room so I felt vulnerable and like he shouldn’t be there and I didn’t want to lift my top up whilst he was sitting basically opposite me so I eventually asked if he could leave the room, they looked annoyed but thankfully he did go, after she looked at him and said “it’s up to you”…
2. I went into a changing room in a shop the other day with my mum, imagine a big room with seats in the middle and curtained dividers all round the outside. My mum was only trying on cardigans so really she just needed a mirror but in the middle on a seat was a boy about 17/18 years old. His girlfriend was trying on clothes. I couldn’t believe it! It wasn’t even doors on the changing rooms, just curtains. Why he thought this was acceptable I have no idea. Again I felt vulnerable and this time I didn’t have the confidence to ask him to leave. If my mum had been actually changing I would have probably found a shop assistant but still it’s not fair that we have to ask them to leave, he should not have been there in the first place!

aibu to think women’s spaces are being invaded more and more? How can we stop this from happening?

No wonder men rule the world, with so many women fighting for them to be anywhere they want to be.

Online wasn’t a thing in the 1920’s either yet there is a lot of information around how women got the right to vote.

it’s not hostility to expect people making claims to be able to back them up, neither you or the one other poster claiming this to be true (that other poster also isn’t even UK based) can provide anything other than you remembering it being a thing.

Wrong! You've been corrected on this so many times now. Women campaigned for these spaces so they could breastfeed in private. WOMEN campaigned for these spaces.

or anywhere they’re allowed.

A womens changing room - not ok

a family room or feeding room - not a womens only space so why the heck not?

Rightly or wrongly, the "feeding" rooms have never been women only as they were available to anyone feeding a baby including bottle fed babies. Not only women feed babies.

@cosystripysocks

How is it ridiculous? I would not feel comfortable getting my breasts out to breastfeed in front of a man. My daughter would not either, or any of my friends for that matter.

I don't see how that's ridiculous? That's just how some women do feel. Surely that's ok for us to feel that way?

I think it depends. If I go into my closest city the shopping centre has one and JL (which is in the shopping centre). I can’t think of anywhere else. My closest retail park had nothing of the sort and I’d have to resort to feeding in the car until I built up the confidence to feed in public.

I kind of think that’s a separate problem of its own. There will always be a need for these spaces but I appreciate they take space. I just wish some spaces could exist for women than men didn’t feel entitled to stomp all over. It really should be obvious why the need exists - and why that need is greater than a general ‘feeding room’ open to anyone who feels like it.

Um, how else do you breastfeed but get your tit out?

The majority, not minority, of women are uncomfortable having a man watch them with their breast out.

Women should not have to RE-campaign for something we already campaigned for, and got! A place to.....BREASTFEED. Men don't breastfeed. If men want to FF, the onus is on them to campaign for their own space, just as us women had to.

@Tryingformore1 I am English. I do recall campaigns for women to have somewhere to breastfeed in public places. I recall this being in the seventies.

The internet didn't exist then.

Women campaigned for the feeding room in the specific shopping Center referred to in the OP?

Even if it were true, doubtful since only you and one other person can seem to remember this and you’re not even in the UK so not sure how much knowledge you have about John Lewis in the UK over in Australia.

This wasn’t a John Lewis, this particular feeding room you have no idea if it was a mothers room 30 years ago. It’s simply ridiculous to think feeding rooms were all mothers rooms, when most were installed less than 5 years ago!

If you want a private space to BF then yes please do campaign for them, just like women did near me so now the feeding rooms have private spaces for BF.

Women who were bottle feeding argued that they were being discriminated against if they couldn't use them though so regardless of who campaigned they were never breastfeeding women only rooms.

More unsubstantiated claims, please do back up your view the majority of Bf mothers are uncomfortable doing so in public or around men.

Its not re campaigning. You seem really hard of understanding, even when trying to prove your point you’ve been proven wrong, all your links, signs etc. aren’t helping your argument, you don’t seem to understand that and are oddly ignoring those replies on this thread.

No, it doesn't. Absolutely, there are not enough feeding facilities but there are some. For those facilities that do exist, women should be able to access them without men being present.

I think posters like Tryingformore1 are probably in their 20s so have absolutely no idea of what women campaigned for in the past. Their ignorance, but worse, obstinate willful ignorance, is sad. The amount of women (and men in that Kerry guy's case) who are so ill-informed on this is staggering.

Can someone answer my question on how they'd feel if 2 female parents were using a feeding room, knowing that they therefore obviously find breasts sexually attractive?

Someone posted a link to a mumsnet post from 2010 upthread and that is specifically discussing that JL had both a breastfeeding section and a FF section. It clearly existed then.

Maths not your strong point I take it, or biology. My eldest is 12 nearly 13 ffs.

You also don’t seem to understand what was campaigned for in the past, and weren’t even in the UK when these campaigns were going on so it’s even more strange

You said "how is a woman supposed to feel comfortable" as if it's unthinkable that a woman would feel comfortable breastfeeding in front of men. How do you feel about movements to make people accepting of women breastfeeding in public spaces? That's where most of the campaigning has been in recent times. I feel like a movement to take it back into private rooms so that other people don't have to look at it would be a huge step back.

But why, when they are family or feeding spaces.

If you want special sex segregated spaces you can ask for them. Not deprive others of a service they’re entitled to use.

This hits the nail on the head. It’s really depressing.

Not in the slightest bothered because women (straight or gay) don’t commit sexual assaults on the whole. Men do. Women also understand the need of privacy for their body, regardless if they are lesbians, because men are indiscriminate in their harassment to women. And finally men aren’t motivated to attack women by finding breasts ‘sexually attractive’. They do it for reasons of power and control - for reasons of abuse, not attractive.

It is a grossly homophobic line of questioning tbh.

@cosystripysocks

But surely most women don't feel comfortable getting their breasts out to breastfeed in front of men, or are you saying they do, or should?

I’m male. I am horrified at the recent changes of the law in Scotland and the destruction of women’s rights, and the removal of women’s spaces.

if it’s any comfort, I’m not alone among males in feeling this way. The truth is that men do not want into women’s spaces, generally speaking. We are talking about an absolutely tiny number of absolutely psychotic fetishist freaks who are currently somehow reshaping society to for their fetishes. They are supported largely by women in power and a very small number of weirdo men in beards.

it’s not a men versus women issue. It is a freaks vs women issue.

I know hundreds of adult human males and females. I can think of about 2 who are into this destruction of women’s rights to support fetishists. One is male, one is female and both are complete cunts.

I believe the tide is turning.

I agree, in places where there is a parents room or feeding room they shouldn't be removed or made breastfeeding-only, that takes facilities away. And most of the objection to breastfeeding rooms would come from mothers who formula feed who would consider them discriminatory. The only argument people on here have about making parents rooms into mothers rooms, is the notion that why were mothers rooms first. Which doesn't seem to have an evidence base.

Any decent man would feel uncomfortable for making other women feel uncomfortable. This isn't the case where a dad was campaigning for changing facilities to be made available outside of female toilets were they couldn't access it. We are talking about men following their partners to bf facilities to "support" them. I find these men quite controlling and actually have known a couple of women who had to flee D&V and one of the patterns I've noticed from the men in these relationships where they followed and waited in the rooms, waited outside the toilets but since having the "family rooms" meant they can flood in there too as there is a toilet there the woman can use.