M&S, a safe space

[GloGirl]

The audacity.

Come into our safe space (and while you’re at it but some slacks and an expensive pie, pleeeeese).

Apologise if someone else has said this already (expect many have)

@inappropriateraspberry

Yes, because M&S will be open at night, when the streets are quiet and you're feeling alone and scared! 🙄

YABU to think women are only scared at night.

Thanks eggy.

In this training; did they state who "they" were?

@Msgrumpytrousers
Best rant I’ve seen for a while
I’ll be pinching ‘vacuous corporate bletherings’. Just perfect for these SM brain fart posts.

This anecdote is rather appropriate in today's climate:
During World War One, the Liverpool Echo reported (perhaps fancifully) that a student travelling to London in a women-only compartment had sat alongside two nuns. On the way, the young woman noticed that one of the sisters "disclosed a masculine wrist". The student informed the guard and when they reached their destination, the nuns "found themselves under arrest as dangerous German spies".

Thanks, DdraigGoch That made me laugh out loud! I wonder if it is true?

Don’t M&S have a biological male working in the bra fitting section in one store?

This neatly shows what is wrong with such a lot of inclusion. It is not possible to be 'safe' and 'for everyone'. Because 'safety' quite often means keeping people out.

What exactly makes it 'safe'?

I think they mean it's 'emotionally safe' for men. Not that it's 'physically safe' for women.

@activitythree I know we're not only scared at night, but it is more likely.

I didn't know this about the M&S changing rooms. Thanks for highlighting this as it means I (and my daughter) won't be using the store anymore (actually, I will still go in for a poo sometimes as they're the only store in the retail park that has customer toilets).

@Incogweeto

I didn't know this about the M&S changing rooms. Thanks for highlighting this as it means I (and my daughter) won't be using the store anymore (actually, I will still go in for a poo sometimes as they're the only store in the retail park that has customer toilets).

Why would you assume the toilets are women only, if the changing rooms are for anyone who cares to swan in?

Why would you assume the toilets are women only, if the changing rooms are for anyone who cares to swan in?

There were male and female toilets last time I was in, and locking cubicles. Plus I have IBS so sometimes a girl's gotta go. But you make a good point.

M & S is a classic example of the ideological hold that organisations like Stonewall can have over businesses. M & S cheerfully alienated many of their core female customer base in clear defiance of women's safety and child safeguarding because they chose to ally themselves with organisations who define women as bigots for wanting safe same sex spaces for bra fittings etc. As a business it makes no sense to openly piss off so many customers - yet they did. It was a curious business decision I'd have thought (not being an economist)?
The impact of the pandemic and the closing of changing rooms have no doubt blurred some of the impact of this or I expect we'd have seen a significant number of cases where the secret filmers / upskirters etc took advantage of this open invitation to them.
But at the core of this was their decision to obey Stonewall's directives about mixed sex changing rooms and lose customers. And that's what they chose to do.

@Incogweeto

Why would you assume the toilets are women only, if the changing rooms are for anyone who cares to swan in?

There were male and female toilets last time I was in, and locking cubicles. Plus I have IBS so sometimes a girl's gotta go. But you make a good point.

They’re not male and female. They may be labelled as such but that is deliberately misleading - M&S have stated straight out that their policy is that anyone who feels ‘more comfortable’ (I think was the wording they used?) using the ‘female’ toilets/fitting rooms/bra fitting service & changing rooms, is free to do so.

Nink they have definitely withdrawn that policy. If they haven't then please show me. They were still bloody stupid in the first place, .

Message to people selling stuff - always look at your demographic and if you have teens, who comes with them and pays. Not rocket science

They haven’t, as far as I know.

I can’t show you because there are way too many threads to read through to find the last time it was made clear.

However I’d be very happy to be proven wrong!

I'd also like to know if they have definitely withdrawn the policy of allowing men into female changing cubicles if they say they id as women - I haven't seen anything on this since the original tweets and used to quite like my local M&S cafe