Entitled male refused access to female changing area (despite wearing skirt)

[ACatCalledPushka]

Well done to the hotel staff. ‘trans ‘woman’ given key to the unisex changing room instead of the female changing room ‘trans woman’ not happy.

https://twitter.com/anneicoombes/status/1683090524641566721?s=46&t=5tHsrgY5T97exTqeFD4LWg

From Twitter, for the benefit of those of us unfamiliar with the changing room set up at the competition venue:

Thanks @Glittertwins so basically Anne could easily have got to the pool some other way but chose to go through the women’s changing rooms

The makes the official response sound even more farcical. Anne had no business whatsoever being in the female changing rooms.

You know, even as a female, I probably wouldn't walk through an open changing area if I didn't need to as there was another route available.

I’ve just sent a short email the Mercure thanking them for doing the right thing - thanks to the person who posted the email address. I just hope they don’t backpedal and apologise. As an aside there is a further Daily Mail story today about this person causing complaint at Sheffield swimming pool during a kids swim meet when they persisted in using female changing area as a shortcut to the pool deck. Clearly on a mission to cause upset.

Ah, OK. Showing my social media tech ignorance.
Hopefully someone will put that screenshot on Twitter for a wider reach.

@PriamFarrl thank you. Similar to Discord then. As a mum of an autistic adolescent girl with a gender-questioning history, I try and keep up to date with what she might come across. I'll add it to my list.

Correct, they could have gone through 2 large glass doors, giving immediate access to the poolside without the need of changing rooms.

Well, quite.

I can see an argument for female officials popping in to announce that event x begins in y minutes but beyond that, no one who isn’t themselves competing needs to be around the girls when they are changing.

These are able bodied girls between 14-19, so perfectly capable of dressing themselves.

here’s the Mumsnetter’s OG post from a few pages back:

that’s great, really measured

There were also para swimmers, some pre-teen, who do need assistance with race suits. These things take a while to put on, even if the swimmer able bodied.

"Over there"... presumably meaning over here on this thread.

@Helleofabore I guess that shows that at least one of the usual posters is on here and staying quiet.

Hello! 👋 Genuinely, please do join in and let's talk about why a third space for Anne (and all transwomen who would feel uncomfortable in the men's changing rooms and toilets) may or may not be a good answer. Surely that's better than Anne feeling the need to resign as an official. I haven't seen anyone trying to exclude Anne from officiating or joining in at the Masters level. It shouldn't need to come to that. There is an answer here, which offers dignity to all. Surely Anne cares more about swimming and officiating in competitions than retaining access to the women's changing rooms?

“Anne, they’re going through your posts over there, time to deactivate.”

Makes you wonder what else that swimming official has been posting about on social media.

So Coombes had that choice but opted for the female communal (no cubicles) changing room with female communal (no cubicles) showers as Coombes preferred route?

And of course those swimmers should have appropriate support (and not have to worry about Coombes looking at them mid change).

But he needed a wee!

The thing that is not related to Anne Coombes, who is probably nothing more than entitled and tone deaf, is the lack of safeguarding put in place by the swimming authorities. You'd think they'd have learned something from the George Gibney case.

People, male or female, can be abusive (as can trans people), and young swimmers in general, and women swimmers, need protection from being exposed to it. The possibility of some privacy while changing or showering would be a good start.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/latestnews/2020/where-is-george-gibney

and it wasn't just Gibney. Swimming was rotten with it, not just in Ireland, and the sport should be, but apparently isn't, providing a model of protecting swimmers from abuse, and innocent adults from being placed in ambiguous situations. Letting Anne or anyone else who doesn't need to be in the changing area use it as a walkway, lays them open to criticism and suspicion, even when that is entirely unjustified.

https://politics.ie/threads/the-search-for-george-gibney-irish-swim-coach-and-suspected-paedophile.235538/

I trained to be a teacher

Rule 101 - don't put yourself in a position where you could be accused of anything

This ⬆️!

Do all the male officials get to “walkthrough” the female change rooms? If so, why? If not, why is this male allowed to?

Believe me, I would think any male official walking through a swimming change area for teenage girls was unacceptable - it doesn’t matter if they call themselves Mary or Mark.

@DeanElderberry

AC is more than entitled and tone deaf. AC is spiteful and nasty when he doesn’t get his own way.

AC wrote a very public article about the woman who objected to him using the womens changing room at his swimming club. He didn’t name the woman, but he gave her the pseudonym “Myra”.

As everyone and their dog in the UK knows the name Myra comes with a horrific legacy. I doubt if many child have been called Myra in the last 60 years.

So out of all the available names in the world AC, writing in the UK ,
chose that name.

Was it a careless error by an educated, articulate and media savvy man, or did he really want to nominally link a woman who was rightly objecting to a man using a womens changing room with a child torturer and murderer? I think there is only one possible answer to that question and it says a lot about ACs mindset and attitude towards women.

sorry I tried to do a link and lost it! If you google Anne Coombes Myra you will find the article.

Very good points @viques .

From the Mail

After implementing stricter guidelines to ban non-competitors entering the changing rooms, British Swimming has also heightened security in changing rooms, while accreditation checks and an email was distributed to remind volunteers not to use the changing rooms as a walkthrough.

Jeez. How many extra rules do you have to put in place to stop these blokes perving on the girls, because you can't say no. Just say women only ffs.

Attempting to block men from accessing women's changing rooms, closing off little avenues as they come up is pointless. No volunteers? What about non volunteers? Don't use it as a walk-through? What if you're competing?

Just fucking say no.

I think it's terrible that a man can't watch unconsenting teenage girls getting undressed without being called a dirty pervert. Poor Anne

It doesn’t work like that though.

Swimmers get changed in the changing rooms, they have a call time to be at marshalling or in the call room where officials are stationed to send them out to the blocks.

There is no need for officials or other event staff to be in the changing rooms.

At big events, if you miss your call time or fail to marshal you don’t get to race. At local events, if your swimmer is missing from marshalling you send another swimmer of the same sex to find them.

I know. My heart bleeds for Anne.