M&S apologises over trans employee in bra department (Telegraph)

[WimbledonWhites]

How many “cis” male members of staff do you suppose would approach teenage girls in the lingerie department?
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/08/04/ms-apologises-over-trans-employee-in-bra-department/

https://archive.ph/nTDB9archive.ph/nTDB9

The incident was apparently in the Ayr branch

Apparently this was in Ayr

Apples against apples

He was a member of staff making inappropriate contact not a random customer seeking to purchase goods on display.

He's considerably older than many of us!

(Speaking as a self identifying nasty old hag).

I know they’re separate, of course.

like I said in my post, it’s inappropriate for a male or trans person to be working in the lingerie department. But in terms of other customers, there are going to be other males potentially.

It's also well established that women are better at sexing people than men. I've noticed several men in dresses in public that my husband didn't clock. I also saw that the (polite, friendly and skilled barista) person with a tufty beard who served us in a cafe was a woman. He didn't.

I think many men they feel they've taken a bit of an existential battering in recent years. We've had 'me too' and a certain amount of growing awareness of the scale of sexual.assault and abuse, and men as a sex class don't come out of it looking great.

Most women have experienced abuse/assault/rape at the hands of men by the time they're middleaged. 99% of abuse/sexual assaults are by men.

It's fomented a certain amount of discomfort and defensiveness, and among some men, this may manifest in both anger at women making accusations and relief when they feel they can legitimately hit back and vilify women.for that old trope of 'false accusers'.

If a woman made this accusation about a common or garden male, nobody would doubt her word. Male creeps are unexceptional. But because the man is described as 'trans', an aura has been created, fed by years of messaging, that men who wear womens clothes are some special kind of man, incapable of the acts of other men.

And this means the woman must be lying.

So the 'gender' myth has flipped the narrative quite successfully.

Normally we'd believe a woman who said a man acted inappropriately.

If the man says he's trans, we're supposed to say 'hang on a minute, is she a lying bigot?"

Emma Hilton reposted this thread recently about this very thing:

https://nitter.net/FondOfBeetles/status/1585706250989281280#m

One quote:
“There is plenty of evidence that even though all humans are really accurate at recognising sex, females are better at it than males. This has been described in one academic paper as an evolutionary necessity for females to avoid “angry, adult males”.”

I have been wondering lately to what extent 'trans' got turbo-charged by 'Me Too'. Suddenly a lot of women were given permission to say NO, and to have conversations about the times they weren't able to say NO and how much they wish things had been different.

Very sad times for creepy men who had lived their lives without hearing that nasty little word. But - there is hope. The evil witches can say NO to men, but they can't say it to other women.

And now the men don't have to endure any medical or surgical damage in order to justify putting on a costume and calling themselves Peta, but can complain if any woman had the effrontery to notice that they are still male.

So here we are.

I'm imagining a kitchen table conversation (apologies if I mis-generation the names, I'm old and foreign):

Leah - You'll be going back to school soon, and you need a proper bra. I think it's time you had a clothes allowance and can choose your own, so we'll go to M&S and you can see how to do that.

Amy - But - what if anyone sees us? And will I have to talk to anyone? I don't like having to talk to people I don't know.

Leah - Don't worry, no-one will talk to you, it isn't that sort of shop, you just pick for yourself and pay

Amy - Promise?

Leah - promise.

next day

Leah - see, it's all here in this bit of the shop. When you're a bit taller you'll even be able to see over the display stands. Wait here for a sec while I find the the stuff for your age group.

Amy - Hurry up Mum, I don't like all these people knowing I need a bra.

Leah - (2 metres away, looks over her shoulder) Don't be silly, no-one will bother you . . . .

Peta - (6'2", looms over Amy) Hello, want some help?

And if any of these males went up to a random 14 year to "help her pick out a bra" M&S would have ejected him from the store and likely called the police to attend to investigate a non-contact child sex abuse incident.

And the door staff would likely tip off the other security companies staff who working in the area too.

No, apparently some people believe that their own inability to correctly identify a person's sex is the universal experience.

Imagine thinking that women and girls cannot tell when a male person is right there interacting with them! 'But we don't know if they are trans!', 'They could have been female'. We see it so very often.

I am sure that some people will have issues. But the reality is that I suspect that many people simply repeat this as if it is true because to say otherwise would cause contradictions in their mantra laden mind monologue. The one that says, 'TWAW' and 'transwomen are the most marginalised and vulnerable' and 'transwomen are not like all those other male people, they are not men at all!'.

Lots of people are 'face blind'.

Notably, whilst not exclusive to autism it's much more common in people with autism.

So I guess the 'you can't tell' might actually have a degree of foundation in the truth of those who are face blind. But since most people aren't face blind, it's a load of bollocks.

It’s one of the great things about being older, I have far fewer fucks to give - I think they run out along with our egg supply

Of course, that’s not so good for creepy men when they run into women who won’t hesitate to say “Oi sunshine, stop that!” and otherwise make a fuss, complain and stop their nasty pervy little ways. Well, tough tits to that, dudes. Even if you are wearing a frock and call yourself Susan.

I agree with you - and that is why I said it is inappropriate for a male to be working in that department.

The difficulty is, not every trans person is an abuser. In the same way that not every male person is either, but it’s about risk assessment isn’t it… so it’s best that they are just not in that area. The same applies to medical personnel, if I request a female member of staff, I want a female member of staff, not trans.

I don’t understand all this “how do you know he was a man” stuff. I believe the M&S apology states they would make sure the daughter “receives assistance from a female colleague during her next visit”. So the would be fitter she saw during the visit was a man.

I know some people who are 'face blind'. Those that are women assure me that they can indeed correctly identify who is male and who is female. Of course, I am sure some who have any degree of prosopagnosia will also not be able to detect a person's correct sex.

But I understand that some people do lack that ability. I question whether the prevalence that we see on these threads is anything like reality though. I suspect many are determinedly 'sex blind'.

I'm pretty face blind. But I can distinguish between creeping buttercups and meadow buttercups even when being driven past them at speed.

And between human females and human males.

The difficulty is, not every trans male person is an abuser. In the same way that not every male person is either, but it’s about risk assessment isn’t it… so it’s best that they males are just not in that area. The same applies to medical personnel, if I request a female member of staff, I want a female member of staff, not trans male.

Using the correct sex based language makes things much simpler.

Safeguarding training treats everyone as a potential abuser and works backwards from that position.

It means that if you make a decision that puts you into a position where you are innocent but are vulnerable to accusations you have failed to remain within your safeguarding training and can be disciplined for it.

The example on the first page about the teen girl being helped by a lone young male career is actually an example of a safeguarding fail.

And as a reminder, there doesn't have to be any physical contact at all to fuel the motivation of a male person who understands boundaries for appropriate behaviour and yet chooses to violate those boundaries. Meaning, it is completely fucking irrelevant if that violation of boundaries happens in a public area. It could fucking happen on TV with the world watching (and it has in the past) and it would fulfil the motivation unique to that male person.

Violating the boundaries of female people is all too often about power. It is about letting a female person know that the male person transgressing boundaries has the power. And the female person doesn't.

Also remember, our children have been told so very very often that to reject a person's gender identity is hateful and makes that child a bigot. So, of course a 14 year old girl is going to also have this in mind as well. At 14 years old, I would have just left the store and not returned if I had been there alone. I would never have said anything but 'no thanks' and left. But some 14 year old girls, would be like some of the people on this thread and may well have talked to this male member of staff and allowed him to discuss bras with them. Because they either have been trained to believe that this is acceptable behaviour for a male person, or they fight down their discomfort.

I reckon that all outcomes could be desirable ones for a male person who deliberately crosses the boundaries of appropriate behaviour.

With acceptance comes validation or the feeling that he has made a girl uncomfortable but she stayed because she felt she had no choice.

With any sign of rejection, even a micro aggression, comes a claim for victimhood. We have seen this power play with Dr Upton.

It is a win win situation and M&S should never have allowed this to be a possibility .

Yep, I understand. I am level 3 safeguarding children & adults trained. I don’t think a male should be alone with a child at any time.

The problem with the male carer is he (I hope) would have been DBS checked. With all the training, and safeguarding parameters in place, there may always be cases of abuse unfortunately. It happens frequently in health & social care. But “”lone females can also abuse as well…

99% of sexual abuse/assault is committed by males.