Non Binary Gym Changing Rooms

[NevermindNelson]

I’ve just had an email from a gym I use explaining that their changing rooms are going to become gender neutral. I don’t even know where to start to reply. The email states that they’re proud to do this.

I want to reply with the reasons that I’m cancelling my membership, but all I’ve got so far is, “What, seriously?”

Maybe I should just send this - Just under 90 per cent of complaints regarding changing room sexual assaults, voyeurism and harassment are about incidents in unisex facilities. Because they have made the changing rooms unisex, haven’t they?

Edited to correct the term as ‘gender neutral’

He's disgusting. Just because those types of women aren't the most persecuted in the whole entire world doesn't mean it's ok to shit on them and tell them to just stfu about everything.

Could you email him a summary of your discussion so he can see what he said in black and white and note in the email that you'd appreciate his confirmation that the email accurately reflects the discussion.

I wonder what the local press would make of it?

This shows the damaging potential of that ridiculous „wheel of privilege“ mentality which disappears sex entirely or places it below gender identity, & suggests that a few simple sums can determine who is Worthy. I’d quote him back at himself in a „for the record“ email, then share sexual assault statistics with him, & ask where those women stand on his tidy ladder of privilege, as well as how he plans to distinguish that particular quarter to third or so, is it?, of „middle-class white women“ from the other two thirds or so - or whether he expects them to declare themselves on arrival or resign their membership entirely. Or maybe he thinks they’re privileged, too. Which is it? Not that it should be remotely relevant whether a woman has that history or not, but it may get through to him that he’s on thin ice.

I admire your equanimity, OP, as that’s made me quite angry. He has no idea - none - of what this means to women, is being told, & is dismissing it.

This is an excellent idea. A time-stamped contemporaneous record - always useful. It doesn't really matter how he responds. Ignoring it (most likely) is tacit acceptance of your account, anything else is even more of a gift.

Glad you got your money back, OP. He's an utter knob.

Include the line, "Please let me know if your own recollections differ, and I'll update my records to acknowledge this". Then it's fairly explicit - if he doesn't get in touch within a reasonable time period, he's effectively agreed.

he said that he didn’t think that middle-class white women in London were the most oppressed group, but it was politely done.

Sounds a lot like a 'stfu, Karen' though.

He said they’re not advertising and the people who’d turn up would only be jolly decent fellows.

How the fuck can he be the judge of that? There's a lot of blokes who people thought were 'jolly decent fellows' till they got caught doing something indecent and/or violent and/or controlling.

I think the middle class thing was a dig at me - how dare I feel oppression

Funny though how middle class white men who claim to be women are now seen as an 'oppressed' group.
Fucking ridiculous.

Don’t worry Alison, when the news about the new changing room policy gets around the local cross dressers society the gym will have LOADS of new customers!

Important customers, valuable customers, much better customers than all those uppity white middle class Karens.

Does being middle class and white prevent you from being flashed at?

Yes, I wonder what has led him to conclude that middle class white women are not covered under the EA? I agree that you ought to go to the Daily Mail about this.

No, but it was probably your fault. Why didn't you avert your privileged eyes?

So he thinks white women don't get raped? Is that because he thinks white men aren't rapists?

What would he have said to a black woman in your shoes? Or is he confident only a white middle class woman would complain? If so that says far more about him and the world he inhabits than it does about women.

No, he thinks that white middle-class women don't matter: we are at the bottom of the identity hierarchy. The greatest trick that TRAs ever played was convincing the world that white middle-class men are more oppressed than women if they choose to put on a dress.

I agree with PPs that the OP should go to the media about this. You could approach Fair Play for Women or one of the other GC networks, if you don't want to deal with the media directly, OP.

I wonder how many of the gym's customers are white middle-class women?

He not only seems to believe middle class white women aren't covered by the EQA but he also seems to think laws about indecency and even common courtesy don't apply when such women are the complainant.

He is appalling and all the other adjectives, but I suspect he's also been the recipient of offucial or unofficial training in gender-related matters. So he now can't even think straight.

I am constantly amazed by the number of senior managers who think that only some groups have protected characteristics. Other than disability, pregnancy/maternity and gender reassignment, everyone has all the protected characteristics (not being religious counts as a religious belief).

Did you get the chance during your conversation @NevermindNelson to ask him if his lawyers and insurers are aware of his new policy?

Either way, if you do email him with your note of it, you might include a line suggesting that he might wish to forward it to them to reassure himself where he stands on the legal and insurance position.

He's high on his own smuggery and I bet he hasn't thought about it. Some professional advice on his legal exposure might focus his mind.

Surely the men he's accomodating identify as middle class white women, so is he including them in his sneering about not experiencing oppression?

It's proof he doesn't believe they are women.

Excellent point.

OP perhaps show them this story

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12918291/Disturbing-moment-predator-tries-film-15-year-old-schoolgirl-unisex-changing-room-cubicle-Swansea-water-park-fleeing-hes-caught.html

Lockable doors, wee gap at the bottom, predator still tried it on. Thing is, this has come to light because he was noticed. How Jane wanky bastards get away with it? I suspect it's more than one. And the girl's still traumatised.

I thought the cubicles were roofed but I think that's actually lockers.

Another example of the dangers mixed sex facilities pose to women and girls - yet they're so loved by most of our creepy visitors 🙄

A man lay on the floor and put his head under my cubicle - smart phones and tiny spy cameras take
even less effort.

Sick bastards.

I hope you stepped on his nose.

Alas, no, I had my towel around me and didn’t want to lift my leg and show him anything.

I did shout ‘Fuck off you fucking dirty fucking pervert, stop fucking spying on me you wanker’ at the top of my voice and he was essentially pursued from the leisure centre by various swimmers and staff (and my faster-dressing friend from the cubicle on the other side) and the staff called the cops but he was long gone before they arrived.

Those particular facilities had only recently become a ‘mixed sex changing village’ and one of the staff rather candidly told me that they’d had a massive increase in voyeurism and flashing ever since.

I stick to old fashioned pools that haven’t had recent renovations nowadays (and a few years ago we managed to make one of the local pools walk back plans for an entirely unisex change).