Virgin active is inclusive. Great

[Howzaboutye]

So my 5yo is expected to just shut up and accept that a male bodied person is changing in her changing rooms at the gym?

But sure, it's ok coz they are wearing a dress. No no no no no.

It is NOT ok and I am really really cross.

How is this not a safeguarding issue?

Any of the men I know would not dream of going into the female changing space. But if they wanted to, and they decide that 'today I identify as a woman, so I will, and you can't stop me'

Fucking hell.
Is anyone from Man Friday on here?

Cancel your membership. Bastards.

I really wouldn't feel comfortable with this. Shoot me if you think I'm being divisive.

Sorry to nit pick, but no, it isn't inclusive, it's removed the right of women to single sex facilities.

That automatically excludes some women from their women's facilities. It's anything but inclusive. Inclusion is a trojan horse word to make removing rights from women sound like something positive.

Vote with your feet.

Move to David Lloyd instead.

Leave. Organise a boycott of like minded people if you can. It’s the only way.

I really don't want to be forced to share changing rooms or even toilets with men who identify themselves as a women. Or with men who identify as men. I am so nervous about all of this.

As a backstory, not that there has to be one, we can feel uncomfortable if that's how we feel(!), but I was assaulted in a female toilets by a man when I was 17. He was very physical and scary, he had a knife.
I am very very scared of using public toilets at the best of times, without men actually being allowed to be in there!! I have a DD and I don't want shared facilities to become the norm.

What can we possibly do to prevent this from becoming the new norm.

I nearly put inclusive in inverted commas. Because it clearly isn't inclusive!

I really like the gym, it really suits us.

I did chat to the head of swimming months ago when she was drying her hair.

I outlined the man Friday stuff. Her face, when I explained, was the horror emoji.

So I don't think all the managers would be keen on the policy.

It's evidently a corporate policy being handed down from hq.

And the thing is, noone round these parts has any clue that this stuff is the opposite of inclusive.

This cannot be reality.
What world have I brought my daughter into?

We could do a 'woman Wednesday' like man Friday, to make the point?

But where do we find brave men to do this?

It makes me livid when this is nicely boxed as 'inclusive'. It's as nasty an act as calling people killed 'collateral damage' or 'acceptable loss', a tasteful cover up of what is really happening. I want people like Virgin to be honest about their beliefs if they're going to act on them. Stop hiding behind the wishy washy words and say straight out, our policy is that we don't believe in the right of women to have bodily privacy from men. We provide mixed sex changing and do not allow single sex spaces. And we believe it is more important to serve the wishes of men than to include women of faiths, cultures, disabilities or personal boundaries, and accept that those women will lose access to our gym.

Come on Branson. Own it. Call it what it is.

I'm surprised that companies are allowed to advertise having separate male and female changing areas, when they have nothing of the sort. I would have thought it would be in breach of trade descriptions.

If you cancel your membership without giving the required notice, if there is such a thing for your gym, and they get stroppy just argue that allowing men into women's changing areas constitutes a material change to the contract you signed. So they can STFU.

Perhaps everyone should do that.

Talk to the other women in the gym about how they feel about the changing areas going mixed sex. And use the phrase mixed-sex - don't talk about trans at first.

I am sick of hearing "trans-inclusive" when what they mean in "mixed sex".

I would speak to every woman you meet in the gym & leave posters/stickers in the changing rooms.
Speak to the men too most understand instantly that there are men who will take advantage (even if they don’t all seem to understand that liking wearing a dress doesn’t mean you’ve changed sex )

Woman Wednesday with the chaps blindfolded & guided by women?

Posie Parker made a good point on one of her videos in that in the drive to be INCLUSIVE to those people born male who want to present themselves as if they hadn't been, these places are EXCLUDING women and girls.

I am disappointed with Virgin, I used to use their gym in my pre child years and it was fab.

I think these companies are working under the assumption that not many male people will use women's changing rooms, or that we somehow won't notice.

I don't know how else they can be so confident that they won't lose business.

Yet another example of how the 'little women' should just put up with it. Feminism is needed now more than ever.

I'm going to find the contract I signed. See exactly what it says.

I'm going to have a think about what I'm going to do.

I'll be back!
Thanks all

Print off stickers which say "Women beware - these changing rooms have been made mixed-sex" and stick them all over the place.

Under the Virgin Active club rules, it says

Junior members under the age of 8 may change in either sex changing room under adult supervision and in designated areas only. Junior members aged 8-15 years must change in designated areas in the changing room of their own sex.

That implies the changing rooms are segregated by sex, not gender. Worth checking.

'Legal stuff' here

www.virginactive.co.uk/the-legal-stuff/club-rules

I want to ask my gym what their policy is, without being automatically labelled a bigot. Has anyone got suggestions for how to phrase the question? The gym is very young/cool with separate changing rooms (open plan no cubicles) and sauna etc clearly labelled Female and Male.

Just reading those, wtf is this??

We reserve the right to use any individual or group photographs or movie shots of you for press or promotional purposes. However, where reasonably possible, we will ask you to sign a use of image rights form (a “Virgin Active photography reproduction authorisation form”) to consent to this usage.

Can they do that?

I'm a Man Friday graduate, I asked my Virgin Active club last year what the deal was - my personal trainer emailed HQ but got a reply that no-one had asked them that before so they were going to think about it and come up with a policy.

I am seriously annoyed they've gone with bonkers "inclusivity" instead of the previous sensible policy of managing it on a case-by-case basis. Membership for me, DH and DS is £90 per month, plus crêche fees on top. I'd hate to cancel but will if a be-penised adult turns up in the female changing room.