The Ladies pond again

[IcakethereforeIam]

Trying to have a vote to make it women only again

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/02/22/transgender-women-ban-kenwood-ladies-pond-hampstead-heath/

https://archive.ph/xbIsK paywall dodge

I'm not holding my breath.

This.

I feel similarly. Another regular swimmer here (I've been swimming at the Ladies' Pond for about 25 years).

In the last few years I've noticed the presence of trans men/transwomen at the pond.

It's likely people who've never been there don't realise what makes it so special. As described above, for many of us it's our happy place, our safe space, where we go in dark times as well as where we experience and celebrate our happiest moments.

The changing room and showers are communal (there are a few cubicles, but usually everyone changes in the meadows or shower room together). We sunbathe topless and can relax (or could) without self-consciousness.

In such an environment, it's absurd to suggest we're "looking at genitals" if we express discomfort at the presence of males. The entire point of the space is to be able to feel comfortable, relaxed, immersed in and connected with our physical experience and sensations.

Personally, I don't feel threatened by trans men/ transwomen in our pond and meadows, but I do possess the basic empathy needed to understand that, for the large proportion of women who've experienced worse abuse by males than I have , it could be uncomfortable, anxiety-inducing or retraumatising.

I haven't tried identifying as male to experience the men's pond, but from decades of seeing the men swimming or sunbathing there and, more recently, their Instagram posts, I don't think the atmosphere and behaviour are dissimilar to those in the Ladies' Pond.

For me, it's very much the physical freedom that having a female-only space allows that makes it so vital and unique. I disagree that it's fetishistic to feel physically relaxed, free and safe in a single-sex space. If it were, there would be no need or demand for single-sex spaces — perhaps, to some, an ideal future to work towards, but certainly not appropriate in today's society.

It’s just a pronoun
it’s just a toilet
it’s just a swimming pool
it’s just grassroots sport
it’s just a different word to describe female only medical events
it’s just elite sport
it’s just all spaces are now mixed sex
it’s just asking for a woman doctor or carer
It’s just overnight trips with schools are mixed sex
it’s just prisons
it’s just people getting fired for talking about sex based differences
it’s just experimental medical care for teenagers

There’s a haystack of straws that are breaking the camels back

For Adrian and others. Women are saying NO to your wants and desire to break our boundaries. We will not give in.

I disagree that it's fetishistic to feel physically relaxed, free and safe in a single-sex space. If it were, there would be no need or demand for single-sex spaces

Exactly. And let's link that across to the political movement causing all the trouble.... male people who very much want women to have single sex spaces, because they themselves want the special, happy experience of being a male in a woman-only space. Provided to them by those women, who must lose their single sex experience (and swallow a lot of manufactured nonsense about how it doesn't matter to try and talk them into this) because a man wants it. And it matters for him but not for them women he's taken it away from.

this fetishisation of female-bodiedness

I do not think that word means what you think it means.

We can certainly talk about fetishism if you wish. Women wanting women only spaces is absolutely unrelated to paraphilia.

Presumably because they won't have such a male name as Tom...

Fetish in relation to women wanting female only spaces is a word I've seen bandied around and said to us by transactivitists, both men and the women acting as enables for those men, and we do pick up and try to argue back with the scripts. The most interesting part really of that idea, is what it betrays.

To a man, with absolutely zero understanding of the experience of actually being a woman and of being in a space where no men are present, it probably is viewed as a very sexual experience. Because that's what it would feel like to him. God knows we've seen the men writing in their articles about their fantasies of women alone together doing titillating things like sharing lipstick, having pillow fights in baby doll dresses, wondering if women walk around these communal areas naked, the thrill of seeing tampon strings dangling. What else would those women be doing? It's not like they have any existence in that man's mind beyond this sort of stuff.

And there's elements mixed in there too of the incel thinking: that he has an entitlement to the sexual experiences he wants which require his use of women's bodies, and those uppity bitches are gatekeeping it from him. And framing that as some gleeful sexual indulgence those women are having and cruelly withholding from him.

I've seen threads where women try, at length, to get those men to understand what a male-free space and time is like for women. They don't get it. They just see something they want and perceive women saying 'but I need that' as meaningless, so reframe is as women holding it over their heads and laughing at them.

These aren't belief systems generally encountered in men with good relationship skills and without additional issues.

Great analysis @Froodwithatowel (and great user name).

And this male name is one of many reason I hate the word 'tomboy' to describe normal girls who are being curious, energetic, strong, assertive, fearless, physically fit and sensible about wearing clothes that enable them to be all that.

I agree re: court case. The authorities are surely breaking the law by making a single sex space available for men, but not providing a similar singles space for women.

It is also effectively discriminating against women of many faiths (Islam, Judaism, Rastafarianism - I'm sure there will be more) who are forbidden form sharing spaces with non-family men, and forcing many others eg women who have had mastectomies and my feel reluctant to expose their bodies in front of men, or women who wish to bathe naked (ditto) to self-exclude.

Realistically, we don’t know that the men’s pond would actually bar a woman who claims she’s a man from entering.

Man Friday explicitly said they were identifying as men to make a point. They went in a group and spent time explaining to the men using the pond why they were there. It may be tempting to extrapolate from the police response that no women are allowed in the men’s pool, but there isn’t enough evidence to say that is the case with certainty.

In fact, they LIKE how it impacts women - it's a power kick for them.

Just watch those woman squirm, boys, when faced (literally) with the Mighty Penis!

But i don't think trans men should be in the men's pond. They should be in the mixed pond.

and part of that reasoning is for the same reason i think there should be a women's pond: some religions would exclude men from places where (partially) unclothed non-related women are.

I agree, Brefugee. What's sauce for the gander is sauce for the goose, to mangle an old saying.

@AdrianPimento

You tell people on here not to speak for others, yet your first post said 'everyone' was happy with the current (unfair ridiculous) situation. You can't have both sides of the argument babe.

Leaving aside the misgendering, if you are afraid to be alone in the presence of a man you don't know, you have a problem that needs medical intervention. That is not normal.

It is one of the things that makes me angriest about 'gender critical' ideology. You promote constant states of fear and vigilance as normal and healthy. You encourage women and girls to feel this way. You fetishise fear, and weaponise it.

I seem to have to state this every time I comment on these issues, even though I shouldn't have to. I have been raped and sexually assaulted many times. I'm not afraid to be in any type of space with a man, simply because he is a man. Some men behave in creepy ways, of course, which is different.

But stop pretending that this constant state of fear you all claim to be in is healthy. Women should be out living their lives alongside their fellow humans of whatever gender without feeling fragile, afraid and vigilant all the time, and it isn't feminist to promote this.

Quite. Men also have the right to privacy and dignity.

This, though, is one of the things that makes it glaringly onvious that the trans ideology is a men's rights movement. Three spaces, one for women, one for men, one mixed, have become three mixed spaces. The result is the men get two mixed spaces and one exclusive space, whereas the women get two mixed spaces and are excluded from the third space.

Some men behave in creepy ways, of course, which is different.

Some creepy men pretend they are women and get access to women's spaces so your only choice is to leave the women's space.

That's the EFFING point. Pretending that women need therapy for not wanting to be in a space with creepy unknown men is just utterly fucking disgusting.

Being a trans woman going for a swim is not creepy behaviour and if that bothers you then you do need therapy.

If they start harassing anyone, sure. But just being in the space, no. If you aren't comfortable with that, your problem.

Your only choice is not to leave the pond. You could get a grip and finish your swim.

All trans women are creepy. Is that what you're saying?

Most of them are very creepy.

Taking this on face value presumably you're just as angry with the TRAs who are hellbent on framing women's words as violence, encouraging children in suicidal ideation and propagandising words like 'genocide' every time something isn't to their liking?

I think men who push themselves into female spaces are creepy, doubly so when there’s already a mixed option.