Zara - male bodies in female changing room

[BoreOfWhabylon]

An unimpressed Editor-at-large of the MoS was also there

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10275757/CHARLOTTE-GRIFFITHS-facing-dilemma.html

I don't assume men are out to attack

You keep saying this.

It's not just about fear of being attacked.

It's also about wanting respite from the male gaze

Being a female in society can be exhausting especially when younger.

Constantly policed, appraised, accosted.

It's very tiring

We just want somewhere where our guard doesn't have to be up all the time. Where we can relax jut a teensy bit

I know my lovely husband would never want to make a woman uncomfortable but there are too many men who actively get off on demanding our attention and imposing their presence on us

We just want to get changed in peace.

Please men stop hounding us, hunting us down and forcing us to centre your needs

OK

So after she was dressed, she should have found them and asked them:

Editor for Mail: Excuse me? I notice that you are two males standing with me in between you talking over the top of me while I am here in my bra. Could you please tell me why you think that this female changing room is appropriate for you?

Also Editor: Could you please also tell me why you think it is appropriate behaviour to talk over the top of me while you can see I am very uncomfortable standing here with you? Please tell me why you did not move away as soon as you saw I was here in my bra?

And she should have in no way used this as an example to highlight the situation. She should have spoken only in generalised terms and when activists told her that she was simply lying or making up a story, she should have just taken it all on board.

Because NO male should ever be made to feel like their sense of entitlement to be in the female changing room is being challenged. Or call out (anonymously or otherwise) for their behaviour.

Why?

More than 750 comments under the article now. Top-rated comment with more than 23000 'likes'

Any shop that allows men in women's changing rooms for ANY reason loses my custom. I'm not interested in 'cultural' differences or unisex whatever, it's simply not acceptable.

don't assume men are out to attack but I just wouldn't have thought to at the time.

The men who go into women's changing rooms are enjoying being there, the enjoyment heightened with women unable and afraid to say no. Why would any woman be happy with that?

Also I wouldn't write a public article complaining about individuals without knowing the full story

The full story is that two men were in the women's changing room whilst a woman was in there half dressed. She did not agree or consent. She believed the changing room was as it advertised itself as, a woman's changing room.
That is all you need to know.

Enough with the woman feelings. They are men.

There is no "full story" other than the one that male people should not be waltzing into female changing rooms.

@EricCartmansUnderpants

That has been proposed time and time again. Transwomen will use women's private spaces because it gives them validation. They won't use mixed gender because it doesn't

I know. Which is why the law needs to be applied and enforced. Because otherwise these men will carry on doing this. And the reason it doesn't get applied because those in positions of policy power are choosing to ignore the equality act and offer women up, without their consent, to men. I suppose change is happening bit by bit. But this should never have been able to happen in the first place. Complacent population I suppose. Myself included. I didn't know of the extent to which this is happening.

For that to happen banned conversations about how AGP exists need to be allowed without deletions because it either offends or suggests that transwomen are all perverts. Merely acknowledging its existence does not say this. We know that sex offenders are more likely to be men and we are allowed to say that though.

The context here is how transwomen in prison are disportionately sex offenders compared with the general prison population. This is a problem.

Unless we can be honest and transparent about there being a pattern that raises safeguarding questions and how that mean we action to protect woman and those transwomen who aren't an issue there is a problem.

And this is it. If you are an adult who runs a children's group there are certain situations you don't put yourself in - being allowed to alone with a child in certain settings for example. This is to protect your own interests as well as safeguarding children.

Realistically transwomen need facilities that are appropriate to them, protect women and protect themselves both physically and from finding themselves in a questionable situation.

What gets me here is the number of transwomen who must know that their presence upsets and might lead to them being accused of perving. And they still insist that their right to be there is the priority. There isn't a willingness to use alternative facilities even when available by some.

What is this revealling?

This is why free speech members.

We need to get to the bottom of issues and find solutions which are workable and in everyones best interests. Not just the shouty male ones.

Also I wouldn't write a public article complaining about individuals without knowing the full story.

She's not complaining about individuals - notice how they aren't named? She's criticising Zara's policy. It's not like two different 6ft bodies with penises would have been magically better. Their identities are irrelevant.

For that to happen banned conversations about how AGP exists need to be allowed without deletions because it either offends or suggests that transwomen are all perverts. Merely acknowledging its existence does not say this. We know that sex offenders are more likely to be men and we are allowed to say that though.

All men that use women's changing rooms are not the men that women should be sharing with.
If they have AGP, then it certainly should be discussed in this context at the very minimum. If this platform does not allow this discussion about AGP to help people understand and to keep women safe, then why? This is Mumsnet. Obviously not everyone here is female, or a mum. But I would think is a site set up mainly for women and mums. And women need to be able to discuss. Its starting to look like the online equivalent of the women's changing rooms.

[quote DBI78]@NeverDropYourMoonCup

Or she could have written an article highlighting problems with changing rooms without blaming individuals. Ie challenging shops etc to do better and be more inclusive. And I agree I wouldn't have approached customers in that way either although I don't assume men are out to attack but I just wouldn't have thought to at the time. Also I wouldn't write a public article complaining about individuals without knowing the full story.[/quote]
Do you notice how when you say individuals what you actually mean is males?

Your view of their so very great importance and how very difficult and uncomfortable it is to have to think twice about saying no to them is written all over this. 'Inclusion' is actually only inclusion if it means equal ease and freedom of access for all. And that does include female people. Many of whom can only access a space if it is female only. The main problem you have with the article is its equality of thinking instead of being heavily filled with signals to males that obviously they're most important. Obviously their needs are huge and taken very very seriously. Obviously we're not generalising here because that would be awful. So now we've stroked the ego and patriarchy a lot, might we just mention that it would be really nice if male people might consider not excluding women from women only spaces in meeting their own -

bigot? witch? rage/sexual violence threat/police/misuse of the word 'inclusion' suggesting it applies only to males?

Gosh I'm so so sorry, obvs I should not mention female people do better.

The sexism here is so very, very sad. The fear to value females equally. The fear to even mention their needs.

The problem with 'I don't assume men are out to attack' - three things.

1. it's largely said to signal to males that you don't see male violence as their problem, obviously, because that might make them feel bad or that they should take some responsibility. Frankly they need to face this. Its not the job of females to ego nurse and disguise the ugly bits for them because it's a bit threatening to think about and they might call you a man-hater/feminazi/other term of abuse.

2. It suggests that the desire of females for accessible, inclusive space that pays equal concern to their identity, feelings, needs, sense of self, comfort, dignity, all the things you're so concerned about for males, is something irrational and silly, and it's a bit shaming. We're talking about some females losing all access to any space so that males can choose from all the spaces for their better happiness, so framing that as females being a bit silly? Females really aren't a sub species you know. Prick them and they bleed. Exclude them, and they get really pissed off and talk on MN.

3. The whole point is, whether or not a male in a female space harasses, voyeurs, behaves beautifully, attacks or worse - is entirely in the gift of the male . The females only get to find out how generous the male is feeling on that day by whether or not they leave the encounter unharmed. Do you really think that's ok to dump on females as a sex class? What have they done to deserve so very little compared to what you feel males deserve?

Or she could have written an article highlighting problems with changing rooms without blaming individuals.

What, two totally unidentified men?

Without a tangible example of this sexist policy, women are told things like they can't tell, nothing will happen, etc. There are websites and ongoing threads on this very site called 'This Never Happens' listing all the times when it does. Awfully, illegally and fatally. Just to counter the gaslighting.

I'd absolutely like to know from these specific men why they feel entitled to violate women's boundaries. Who told them they could.

But you don't even want them held accountable for their own actions!

@EricCartmansUnderpants

Who are the people in these government positions that have never asked women what they want? Activists? Men who think they should be able to see women undress? And so telling women that men can be women provides the magic key? Women who are gullible enough to believe the lie? Who else?

My guess would be men who have never really thought about it at all because it's never been and never likely to be a problem for them. (Unless their twelve-year-old daughter gets raped by a female-identifying male in an otherwise empty chnaging-room, or pictures of her naked turn up all over the internet, which would quite rightly outrage them.)

My OH was very much of the "I know three or four trans women and they are fine and non-threatening and you like them, why do you have a problem with self-ID to make their lives easier?" brand.

He has had to be carefully taught better over several months that not all predatory men are like our perfectly decent friends who are not predatory (and don't have male genitals any more). Exhausting, but it was that or leave him if he used the word "cis" one more time.

I am fairly sure most men in positions of power have no skin in this game at all, they just want to grease the squeaky wheels that make such an annoying noise at them.

DB178
There's men, women, transgender, non binary and other ways to identify. The issue isn't with men and woman it's about changing rooms not meeting all needs.

That should read "and three or four hundred other ways to identify".

And to meet all needs, every shop would need several hundred changing rooms, one for each gender.

The issue, as anyone with a brain can tell after about three seconds' thought, is not with "men and women". It is with men who do not respect boundaries, decency or common politeness.

And even if there were 1000 different types of changing rooms, TRAs would use women's changing rooms to prove a point.

Chances are these two just did because they could. Absolutely no consideration for others. Being challenged would just add to the fun.

So how are we supposed to know someone’s intent?

DB178
There's men, women, transgender, non binary and other ways to identify. The issue isn't with men and woman it's about changing rooms not meeting all needs.

No. It's not about having to supply different changing rooms. It's about men wanting validation from using the women's changing room.

If all the women upped and left, the changing room would no longer appeal. The new space that they occupied would become the focus.

It's got nothing to do with the actual space, and everything to do with the women in it.

Which is why it's a waste of time appealing to provision. Wherever the women are, that's the place that will be targeted. It's about the women providing validation, not a place to get changed.

Women are the resource. Not the shop, the space, the provision.

@DBI78

From your previous comment:
"There's men, women, transgender, non binary and other ways to identify. The issue isn't with men and woman it's about changing rooms not meeting all needs. I think we work better if we all support each other rather than it being woman against everyone else. I'm not gas lighting woman I'm questioning a woman who choose to publish an article about why men should not be allowed in women's changing rooms. but did she speak to the people involved to find out why the woman's changing room was most appropriate for them? She judged and assumed.”

There are two sexes - male and female. They are legally protected characteristics. The changing rooms in the article were designated thus.

There are potentially millions of ways to define one’s own beautifully unique identity, (I find the current political gender ideology list ridiculously limited), but that doesn’t change which changing room you ought to head for, if they are designated by sex. If we can all get our heads around that basic fact, we can enjoy being completely in agreement and supportive of each other quite nicely.

The refusal to acknowledge reality only perpetuates division and mistrust, which is a great shame.

@BoreOfWhabylon

More than 750 comments under the article now. Top-rated comment with more than 23000 'likes'

Any shop that allows men in women's changing rooms for ANY reason loses my custom. I'm not interested in 'cultural' differences or unisex whatever, it's simply not acceptable.

I hope our political parties keep an eye on this. It's a nightmare.

Women's Right Network is doing a #AllIwantforChristmas campaign supporting female only spaces. The more help they get - the better!

twitter.com/WomensRightsNet

The issue isn't with men and woman it's about changing rooms not meeting all needs

What needs? It's a frickin' changing room, not therapy.

Men shouldn't be in women's changing rooms.

How difficult can it be? Seriously?

I feel like I'm dealing with three-year olds here.

It doesn't matter if they aren't dangerous. It doesn't matter if they're well-intentioned. It doesn't matter if they "feel" like a lady inside.

If they're men, they shouldn't be in a women's changing room, any more than a 35-year old should be in the toddlers' ball pit at the local play centre.

I love the women on this board 🤍💜💚

This is absolutely wrong but I'd like a few more men going into changing rooms occupied by senior women in the media in their bras. More sunlight please

@Nichebitch

What an absurd thread. People try clothes in cubicles, no one should be able to see anyone’s bras.

Oh look, another one who is hard of reading.

Hard of reading and differently brained.

I sent Zara a message over FB saying I will no longer allow my daughter to shop there. If several hundred women did the same, they just might take notice.