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

No it’s completely different and I would also have got the ick- hence why I keep saying I agree it’s inappropriate! (Honestly at 14 even a women asking me that when choosing a bra would have made me blush) But lots of people seem to be arguing as some kind of of side issue that it would be totally inappropriate for a male person to be anywhere NEAR a lingerie department, as if its some kind of female only space, which it obviously isn’t.

Im sure the girl felt uncomfortable and that’s a shame. Do I automatically jump to the assumption that this person is some kind of ‘filthy, predatory pervert’, as some people on here have? No, because firstly making wholesale assumptions about a group of people like that is really unwise, and secondly I wasn’t there and I have no idea what this person’s intentions were- and neither does the mother. But a lot of people on here are assuming bad intentions merely because the person is trans.

A Young girl was made to feel uncomfortable- not ideal but hardly the end of the world. Let the HR department at Marks and Spencer’s deal with the rest of it. I just can’t understand all this anger!

In your scenario the employee is completely inappropriate. OK, so you wouldn't mind. a) You are in a minority, probably a minority of 1 on this thread. b) He has no idea when he speaks to you that you are that minority of 1. Therefore, it's inappropriate behaviour.

And as we know, he wasn't employed in the lingerie department, just strolled in from another department (inappropriate) and started an unsolicited conversation about bras (inappropriate) with a teenage girl (inappropriate).

I certainly wouldn't be discussing bras with male employees, and it would be a cold day in hell before I'd tell him my bra size.

Do I automatically jump to the assumption that this person is some kind of ‘filthy, predatory pervert’, as some people on here have? No, because firstly making wholesale assumptions about a group of people like that is really unwise, and secondly I wasn’t there and I have no idea what this person’s intentions were- and neither does the mother. But a lot of people on here are assuming bad intentions merely because the person is trans.

Who do you think on here has extrapolated this incident to mean 'all trans people'?

And what mitigating factors do you think apply to this persons situation? What benign intentions might apply? Bearing in mind that he shouldn't have even been in this department.

Im sure the girl felt uncomfortable and that’s a shame. Do I automatically jump to the assumption that this person is some kind of ‘filthy, predatory pervert’, as some people on here have? No, because firstly making wholesale assumptions about a group of people like that is really unwise, and secondly I wasn’t there and I have no idea what this person’s intentions were- and neither does the mother. But a lot of people on here are assuming bad intentions merely because the person is trans.

First off, nobody cares about his identity. We care about the fact he's male. You are enjoying congratulating yourself for not making "assumptions" but the only reason you're elevating this tawdry behaviour and using it for self congratulation is because he has a trans identity. If he were a man who didn't pretend to be a woman, you'd be as appalled as the rest of us over this behaviour. At least I hope you would - probably best not to admit it if you're fine with men giving teenagers unsolicited approaches about their underwear. But because he does pretend to be a woman, you put him in a sacred caste and think you're enlightened. You're not. There's no difference. How he feels about himself is irrelevant. He's a man who crossed shop floors to go talk to a child about her bra and there's no way you can spin it to make it ok. Why do you think he fucked off when he realised her mother was there? Why wouldn't his professional assistance still be useful?

And secondly, I said this earlier, but when a strange man approaches a girl or woman unsolicited, she can make whatever the fuck assumptions she likes and get out of there.This idea you've got that women existing is a public service and they must run an equal opportunities process in their head whenever a man is bothering them is a total nonsense and it primes women to feel they don't really have a right to get away or, heaven forfend, potentially be rude when their safety is in question. No.

You are not enlightened or morally superior because you want to complicate the matter of a man following and approaching a child in an underwear store where by all accounts he was not supposed to be. You claim to agree that he shouldn't have done it, so you can just stop there; no further qualifiers are needed.

As usual, a very simple solution, that reflects how things have been for the 50 years plus that I’ve been on the planet is readily available.

women’s underwear departments should be staffed by females and men’s underwear departments by males. Whilst some do not object to mixed sex solutions, some do - so single sex is an easy, no cost solution.

In a shop like M&S there are plenty of departments where sex isn’t significant so trans employees can work in those.

Any trans employees who have issues with this need help managing their upset and with coming to terms with single sex boundaries.

I think 'reframe their trauma' was the phrase you were looking for....

🤣🤣 I’m trying to model anti hyperbole

Heh, a lesson the TRAs could benefit from.

🎯

i love how you’ve imputed all these ‘ideas’ to me when my posts mention nothing of the sort!! Amazing what a bit of self righteous anger does to peoples reasoning capacity! 😁

I’m sorry that you seem to hate trans people so much. Most of them are just decent ordinary people trying to live their lives. Maybe this person was a pervert - they do exist, male, female and trans. In which case I’m sure they will be dealt with. But it’s sad this case is being used by people like you as a stick to beat all trans people with.

remember to take your smelling salts with you in case you encounter a male in the pyjama department next time!

I've thought for a while now that many "allies" jumped on this because they wanted to feel superior and congratulate themselves, not because they wanted to do what was right. If they wanted to do what was right, they'd be open to the possibility that they made the wrong call and they'd rethink once women started getting assaulted by men in rape centres and prisons, booted off their sporting podiums, smashed in the face in boxing rings, and gaslit about it. Most of the British public did, if the opinion polls are to be believed.

But there are those who can't change their minds because it's about them, not about what's right, and to change their minds would be to admit that they got it wrong initially and therefore were not actually the morally superior pillars of virtue they imagined themselves to be. So now they are reduced to two options: see it through to the bitter end like Isla Bumba, who sat there under oath and declared that she didn't know if she's a woman or not, or alternatively, accept that yes, this is wrong, but still add a lot of performative trilling about assumptions and other crap so you retain your feeling of superiority. That is, you can agree a man shouldn't be going up to a child in a bra shop (well done) but somehow you're still better than the terfs because you're still centring him.

Where are you getting the idea that this poster 'hates' trans people?

Why do you think it's acceptable for a male to engage with a teenage girl in the bra department, unprompted?

Punctured vanity, right there. I was right. Absolutely no rebuttal, absolutely no reasoning, just the blind accusation of hating trans people because I know that men aren't women and I don't need to add three paragraphs of self congratulatory qualifiers to the statement "A man should not be approaching a child who's shopping for a bra."

The thought ending clichés are embarrassing, but we all know why they need to end the thinking.

smelling salts added to the list

Remarkable the misogyny that gets rolled out

i love how you’ve imputed all these ‘ideas’ to me when my posts mention nothing of the sort!! Amazing what a bit of self righteous anger does to peoples reasoning capacity! 😁

and yet...

I’m sorry that you seem to hate trans people so much.

No one has ever said we 'hate trans'. We hate MALES in our spaces. Regardless of that male is hetro, hydro, gay, binary, non-binary, unbinary, trans or non trans. It is that they are MALE!! None of us are talking about trans. Only you are!

I am sorry you are filled with such hatred for women you see 'anti trans' everywhere we talk about MALES!!!

Do you accept that many posters do not hate trans people, support M&S hiring the best people for the job knowing that ‘the best person’ could be a trans person, and also believe that transwomen should not be offering ‘help’ to teen girls in the bra section of the shop?

We all need to recognise the contexts in which our presence isn’t appropriate. Transwomen need to accept that contexts that in contexts that are sex-sensitive, they do not count as women. Whilst some don’t object, some do, and therefore, out of respect, they should stay away.

It is perfectly manageable for M&S to gainfully employ transwomen and got them to stay out of the women’s underwear section.

Suggesting these views are hate fuelled or anything other than majority held, balanced and logical is for the birds

‘A young girl was made to feel uncomfortable - not ideal but hardly the end of the world.’

The double standards are jaw dropping. We currently have a male doctor, crying & being escorted to his car, because a female nurse made him feel uncomfortable when she objected to his (constant) use of the female locker room. His employer immediately takes his side before even speaking to the nurse.

In Australia, a man called Roxy Tickle is in court against a female only App because of his hurt feelings that he was rejected, on the grounds he’s not female.

Not to mention of course the constant boo hooing over mis gendering, ie correctly sexing people, how it’s literal violence & contributes to the alleged (made up) high rates of suicide.

But make a woman (in this case a child) feel uncomfortable? Nah, fuck ‘em.

When you don't have an argument, deploy the insults.

We've seen this played out hundreds of times before. We get the pattern 🙄

I wonder what that poster thinks the effect on impressionable young people is, when they are told that if they know men aren't women, and if they know men shouldn't be following children into bra stores, and if they don't believe there should be sacred castes in safeguarding, they simply hate trans people.

I'm old enough and ugly enough to see it for the baseless knee jerk horseshit it is, but what if I weren't? What if I were young and stupid enough to believe it?

No. No. Keating. Some women and girls are allowed to feel uncomfortable about male people being in a service role in the bar department. But discussions about that is foaming, and frothing and we need smelling salts and lack critical thinking.

So, yeah. It was inappropriate behaviour. But discussions about that behaviour and whether M&S male staff should be in this position is to be demonised and dismissed.

A man feeling uncomfortable - totally unacceptable

A young teenage girl feeling uncomfortable - not the end of the world 🙄

The misogyny here is off the charts

So we're allowed to feel uncomfortable, but not allowed to say that.

Is that it?

I bet none have shown any concern about the girl and her feelings

as usual it all about how the poor old TW feels.

They have no interest in the safeguarding of children and clearly that is something that sets us apart.

That was what reading the posts back come across as. But I am sure that anyone suggesting so will be told that they are in the wrong.

But yes. Girls and some women are acknowledged to feel uncomfortable and male people should not be employed to work in the bra department in M&S. However, saying they shouldn’t be is worthy of demonised.

Edited for clarity.

Maybe this person was a pervert - they do exist, male, female and trans.

PP is unable to see trans people as male or female. Trans has to have a special, separate status in order for the usual rules of safeguarding to be disapplied in PP's head.