It’s official; Marks and Spencer have fallen, the sequel.......

[MrsSnippyPants]

First thread getting full and and I continue to be interested in responses received to people’s emails and store visits.

Most women who work in M&S are either young studenty types or older almost retired types

And I’m not sure it’s fair on them to have to challenge what we will invariably be a middle aged male who is much bigger, stronger than they are - knowing that if you do challenge them they will almost certainly get annoyed and angry and starts trying to intimidate you.

they will almost certainly get annoyed and angry and starts trying to intimidate you.

Very true, women are really only just beginning to speak out and often it is with fear.

Perhaps M&S can explain exactly how staff will challenge any inappropriate behaviour and what training has been provided to support them

My DD knew to lock the door behind me every time I left to get her different sizes etc. If I didn't think she was capable of doing that, I wouldn't have left her alone at any point. However, she's old enough to know to do this.

Luckily for you, this guy appears not to have been a predator. But if he had been, and was not accompanied by his wife (not sure if she was in the actual changing rooms area or just loitering outside the changing rooms), he may have filmed your daughter changing over the cubicle wall, or masturbated as he listened to your conversation about her clothing.

And leaving your daughter aside, what about a 16 year old girl shopping alone, or a disabled woman or an elderly woman getting changed in a women's changing rooms? Are they safe at all times if no member of staff is there? Yes, cubicles may be lockable, but at some point, a woman needs to enter/leave the cubicle and would be vulnerable to assault at that point.

@AlecTrevelyan006 please email them to ask, they ignored me the first time so I've asked again. The more people who ask, surely the more likely they are to reply on the matter?

"How to deal with erections when you're doing a bra fitting"

Not a good look M&S

The manager told me that they had a woman who wanted to use the mens changing room and when challenged she complained. So intimating that women want this too. As others have said, this isn't the point and actually M&S could enforce single sex spaces quite well in most of their stores.

In response to Tie's post I still maintain that whilst it goes against what a woman would normally do, making men feel uncomfortable might make more of them complain. We all know men tend to get listened to more than women.

I absolutely do not agree with not doing things because it inconveniences staff. I would never be rude to staff but again, perhaps if they all fed back they weren't comfortable with this, M&S may listen. My view is if you stand by and watch it happen you are condoning it.

I have just ordered a large amount of adult human female stickers from Posie Parker and they arrived today so I may well find myself in Marks and Spencer's changing rooms for a final (clothed) visit ....

M&S is overpriced ready meals, their homeware range quality that I've seen just about matches up to pound stretchers next door to it here. So they'll go down anyway because massive swathes of people arent buying into the keeping up with the Jones's anymore. They only ever survived on school mums who want to look posh to their school mum mates and older loyalists who are probably dying out now. My ex also worked for them and has seen exactly where their stuff comes from and the conditions its kept in.

Anyway. The sex segregation issue.

I could go either way but I struggle to choose a side.

My issue with the side FOR sex segregation is that my experience on that is that they're only for sex segregation when its preventing their suffering. When I gave birth to my eldest I was oggled and violated by 3 of the 4 dads visiting. Curtains wrenched back and full on stared at.

Whenever I have voiced this I've been told "well MY husband would never do that"... "well I would have pulled MY husband up"... etc etc.. if I say here "but MY MTF trans partner would never do X Y Z" it doesnt take away the damage done by the MTF who DO.

My second issue is policing. I'm a 5ft7 petite athletic female born person. Yet have been questioned on my gender. I have been accused of being a man in womens spaces by supporters of sex segregation.

Should women like me have to show other women our vaginas to gain entry? A video of me with my sons umbilical cord still attached and pulsing maybe?

My issue with mixed sex is the AGPs who will take advantage.

My issue with a third space is obviously it wont just be people like me who are afraid of people, its be the AGPs while they still scream about being excluded from female spaces.

And people wonder why I question where I belong in the world.

I dont expect anyone to stay home though. People on both ends terrify me enough that it's me wholly be holed up at home.

It is a real mess. When you consider that TRAs feel confident enough to bully and harass a doula out of an organisation for stating that a woman is an adult human female - a woman who deals every day with the reality of women's pregnant bodies - you see the extent of their overreach and the capitulation of organisations in the face of deliberate targeted intimidation.
M & S are no doubt weighing up their options - vicious bullying and harassment from toxic lobby groups if they don't enable every single dodgy man who claims womanhood or multiple pissed off women withdrawing their considerable spending power.

M & S are no doubt weighing up their options - vicious bullying and harassment from toxic lobby groups if they don't enable every single dodgy man who claims womanhood or multiple pissed off women withdrawing their considerable spending power.

I reckon Centre Parcs made a similar calculation. All M&S have to do is copy-and-paste from the Centre Parcs handbook. It might even win them some customers from Debenhams and elsewhere.

"How to deal with erections when you're doing a bra fitting"

Not a good look M&S

^^this.

Exactly how naive do you have to be to not speculate on why men are insisting, using threats, on accessing female spaces??

If it's not predation, fetish or validation of sexist stereotypes, what is it?

The best response to stop going to their clothing stores. That may be the only message they understand.

They don't even listen to that. Lots of women stopped shopping at M&S because their clothes were so horrible. Per Una was terrible for years and they're only now trying to turn it around.

The PP who said it was fine to deliberately inconveniece (mainly female, just above minimum wage) shop assistants is missing that this is being imposed on them as much as their female customers. I'm pretty sure no shop assistant wants to be forced to serve autogynephilic males but jobs are hard to come by and she may have no choice. Making the point to the managers of shops will be far more effective.

I got the stock response from poor old Lauren, who really has drawn the short straw this weekend

I emailed back wondering why, if this is all about making customers feel comfortable, they don’t care about women being comfortable.

Sorry Lauren! Kick it upstairs, mate, let TBTB deal with this, and I hope you’ve got the day off tomorrow.

I think maybe a clandestine mass leaflet dropping exercise should be organised.

I am going to print out a fact sheet setting out M&S’s policy on encouraging men (presenting as women or not, it makes absolutely no difference) to frequent women’s fitting rooms and bra fitting services, and what exactly this means in concert, practical terms, plus the overriding issue of segregation by sex for actual, important reasons of safeguarding and protection, and I shall be going in weekly to leave them in each of the fitting rooms. And on the toilet cubicle doors.

Women need to know what M&S are doing. By the time inappropriate actions are ‘dealt with’ it is too late!

And even if no inappropriate action ever happens, the principle still stands - women are RIGHT to insist on female-only spaces, and PERFECTLY ENTITLED to do so. No further justification necessary.

Sigh. *concrete, practical terms

Monk Can you share the factsheet so we can follow suit?

Thanks for the WPUK link, I'll be doing my email to M&S this weekend.

But just browsing M&S's website has reminded me that they're going to be the new providers for Ocado soon. Is that another avenue people would be interested in pursuing? I only ever do online grocery shopping once a year (Christmas) with Ocado, but obviously not this year if it's with M&S + Ocado.

Ninkaninus I’d love to see this. Maybe to copy...
I’m thinking of trying on lots of coats with pockets. Anything with pockets, particularly if a fact sheet sized pocket. Now I’ve typed pockets several times it’s beginning to look like a made up word!

As I mentioned on another thread, I was once working in a small shop with a single cubicle changing room, and had a women’s lingerie fetishist call me to look at him, naked under a flimsy silk nightdress, with a full-on erection. It was a frightening and horrible experience. I had been told that he sometimes came in and bought things, and that he was “harmless” , so I had let him try some things on. My female boss felt terrible as she was the one who had said he was harmless, and he clearly upped the ante with me. Possibly because I was trying to be kind and I had been told about him, so I wasn’t initially shocked. What he wanted was a shocked and horrified reaction, that was obviously how he got his kicks. I was very young, but I wonder about M&S as an employer, if they are gaslighting their staff into thinking that all the males who want to try on Ladies underwear are transsexuals rather than fetishists.

I think maybe a clandestine mass leaflet dropping exercise should be organised.

Now that’s an idea!

I’d this pushes through then what will the next tall target be? Remember TopShop T and the rant, etc? Then what?

I think Steve Rowe, the Chief Executive executive and the rest of his fellow male directors should volunteer to serve the men who want to comfortably try on clothes in the lingerie changing rooms, including measuring up etc etc. Let them experience a little bit of life on the shop floor.