Hostelling Scotland allows men to self ID as women and have access to women's dorms and shower rooms

[leyat]

ManFriday have a piece up about Hostelling Scotland allowing men to have full access to women's dorms and showering facilities - also without informing women that this is the case - so long as these men say they are women when they check in, effectively giving predatory men easy access to women where we are most vulnerable. Which is not only putting women in danger, but also now many women are going to have to self exclude, and since this is budget accommodation it will most likely disproportionately affect poorer women as well....manfridayuk.org/2018/06/15/a-scottish-hostelling-experience/

Jolly are you acting as a freelance transphobic screenshot supplier? Can you give it a rest? It's so aggressive.

Back up in case a man comes near you

Well aren't you the charmer

Back up in case a man comes near you.

Do you think women who fear male violence and harassment are silly? Do you think women's privacy and dignity should be respected?

Starzig your posts are so sexist, it looks like goading

What do you mean by plopping, Rust?

Does this mean that women who identify as men can use the men's facility's .

You could always go out in pairs (If you must). Back up in case a man comes near you

Bloody hell has nick freeman joined us?

Do you think women who fear male violence and harassment are silly? Do you think women's privacy and dignity should be respected?

Agreed, Ereshkigal

"You could always go out in pairs (If you must). Back up in case a man comes near you."

?

This is the idea that it is stupid for women and girls to be cautious of male violence?
While all the time every day we are told to be cautious of male violence?
The woman who was murdered in Australia yesterday, she was alone. The police have said women need to watch themselves. Women say, well this is a bit victim blamey, and it's rodoculous to say we shouldn't go out by ourselves. At the same time though, we do tend to take "precautions". But we're very tired of walking this line of being not scared of men while also being scared of men.

How does your flippant comment relate to all this? You are saying that yes women should be out alone / not be wary of men etc? That it's silly to do so. But, we do get attacked, assaulted, and even murdered. Quite a bit. How do you reconcile this? Women and girls find it hard all over the world to balance our "responsibility" to "protect oursleves" from men (and knowing we will be blamed if we are atatcked) with our desire to be independent, free etc. You seem to have the answer. Please do share it.

In the UK hundreds of women are sexually assaulted and harassed every day. There are men who have an absolute disregard for the boundaries of women and will do whatever they want to do for a cheap thrill, but we're supposed to believe these men wouldn't take advantage of a system which allows one to identify in to the single sex space of their choice.

When a transwomen says they need to be in the women's toilets, changing rooms, dormitories because they're at risk of sexual or physical assault, they are taken seriously and told they can go wherever they feel comfortable and safe.

When women say they want to keep single sex spaces as single sex because we're at risk of sexual or physical assault we're told we're hysterical and scaremongering. We're told to suck it up or stay at home.

The same politicians and activists who threw their hands up in shock over the extent of #metoo are now saying that women's fears of assault and harassment are unfounded. It's madness.

"Does this mean that women who identify as men can use the men's facility's ."

Yes i would assume so, and suspect that many men might well feel pretty uncomfortable with that.

(Although the risks of harm are not as high as the other way around - women and girls tend to be smaller than men and boys, so less of a physical threat, and sex offences are vastly more likely to be carried out by dicky people).

Some responses on twitter about Hostelling Scotland policy. Shows what we are up against.

starzig I did a fair amount of hostelling back in the day and I still use some of the Scottish bothies.

When I was in my twenties, in a single sex dorm I woke in the night to find a man assaulting the young woman in the bunk opposite - luckily there were several women in the room and we managed to pull the guy off her and alert the warden. If she’d been alone in that room she would have been raped.

It is critical that women have safe spaces to sleep, dress and wash in. I would. It feel safe sharing a dorm with a man I didn’t know and trust. No woman should have to.

It is not unreasonable of women to be worried about this.

jolly

It appeared that you were just coming on and 'plopping' virtually the same post on multiple threads with no engagement

How on earth are you supposed to tell the difference between anyone and a predator?

This might have been me.

Just want to clarify that Hostelling Scotland (formerly SYHA) is a completely separate organisation from YHA - although they both have bonkers rules for self-id.

The dorms are for guests aged 16+, but it is worth knowing that children aged 12+ can stay in single-sex dorms if accompanied by an adult. Although would you get a good nights sleep knowing a male stranger was sleeping 3 foot away from your 12 year old daughter?

At no point was I asked for ID. I booked online so they did have my payment card details - but it is possible to walk in off the street and pay cash, so pretty untraceable!

And as said above driving licences are changeable on request so are now meaningless as a form of credible ID.

Phoney concern?

Women are concerned because we have been girls and are women and have personal experience of just how many creepy men there are out there, operating just this side of the law but still intimidating their victims, or stepping over the line of the law.

Depsite metoo and a couple of years back everyday sexism and a couple of years before that something else and so on

Every time men say WOW that is awful why didn't you say something? In fact I find it hard to believe it's that bad... Are you sure you aren't exaggerating / imagining it? In fact, you are probably over-reacting to something innocent a man did. You just hate men, don't you...

EVERY TIME. Men in the main have zero idea of the prevalence of this sort of creepy shit, of how often women and girls encounter men like this, that we KNOW they will exploit any and all loopholes. That they look out for opportunites to get women / girls by themselves and then do their thing (whatever their thing is). Men have zero idea and they don't want to know either.

As long as their name and address match the booking their gender is whatever they say it is.
That is what was tested and confirmed.

Well done BetsyM00!!

thebewilderness

I could easily have given a false name on the booking, no one asked for ID.
On the online booking form address is optional, so I didn't give it!

Whether this is standard practice or not, I can't say - but it was my experience.

Oh for crying out loud Vicky1990, is that the best argument you've got. Maybe men should just stay out of women's bedrooms, fullstop.

At no point was I asked for ID. I booked online so they did have my payment card details - but it is possible to walk in off the street and pay cash, so pretty untraceable!

Some hotels do ask for ID if you walk in and pay by cash so you are traceable but not booking online as credit card details suffice. Thats Premier Inns policy anyway, I checked that out before booking there.

Vicky do you read the Daily Mail by any chance?

My first holiday without my parents was a youth hostel long trip age 17 with 3 female friends from my church youth group on the South Downs Way. We had a great time and stayed in female dorms. This policy is mad. Transgender people should stay in dorms which match their genitals.