Add to that mental illness is also a reason to lose membership to the Bar Association in many if not all states.

Had the golf club been set up as a special interest group to help support the issues you face as a male golfer, then they would have been allowed to maintain their male golfer membership. However, as they aren't, and merely a golf club with no special interest in promoting a particular section other than 'golfer', then you can't be discriminatory. Hence the pressure not to have silly dress codes and the like. Or at least that's my understanding.



Do these women only areas supply an overlap in the equipment offered and facilities? In which case is there really a justifiable cause for a man to want to use them when the same facilities are available elsewhere in the gym. If men felt abashed exercising in public under the leering gaze of women (and other men) then I'd imagine such facilities may be made available in time. But it'd be a brave gym.

Try setting up a 'male only' golf club. No, really, I'd honestly like to see someone try. I very much doubt they'd get as far as planning permission for the clubhouse before someone official told them to let women in or else. I'm not disputing the aspects the law with you, simply making the point that discrimination happens which is not proscribed by law. And while I'm talking about the specific examples I've been subject to (which is all I really have experience of after all) I'm sure it happens all ways, just that some of it appears to be accepted more than others. I'm aware it would be completely impractical to prosecute everything which could be interpreted as discrimination, however it does appear in my general experience that 'reverse discrimination' is deemed to be more acceptable than the old fashioned kind.


At this time of year, the gyms tend to be very full. New year's resolutions and all that. There are occasions when a particular piece of equipment is very busy in the main gym but the equivalent piece of equipment in the 'women only' section is free. However, I am not allowed to use that piece of equipment and must wait/queue to use the 'public' one, for the one and only reason that I am not female. I'd like you to explain to me how exactly that is different to Rosa Parks being told to she couldn't have a seat at the front of the bus because she was black. Or for black school children to have to queue for a drink because they can't use the 'whites only' drinking fountain.


With all due respect, someone else being uncomfortable with my presence is not my problem, it is theirs. If they don't like me being there, doing them no harm, they have every right to go somewhere else or use the facilities at another time. What it is not a valid excuse for is to exclude me from something simply on that basis. There are plenty of people who do plenty of things that make me uncomfortable, I don't expect them to be excluded from the places I go. And, to be honest, if the mere presence of someone with slightly different chromosomes is enough to make someone uncomfortable, she doesn't need a gym, she needs a psychotherapist.

I also find it interesting that you've used an implied stereotype of men as being 'leering' in gyms. I can't speak for the male population as whole but when I'm 15 minutes into a running session on a machine, I really don't give a jot who else is around me.I'd estimate I have spoken to another person while in a gym three times in the last year. I think you're being insulting to the male gym-going population. You're endorsing the assumption that all men are sexually incontinent and can't possibly be exposed to the sight of female anatomy without somehow losing their self control. Do you not think you're hugely generalising?

Jon

Which is my point, really. Golf is not a gender or race specific activity, unlike the Woman's Institute (an organisation specifically for women) or the Black Police Officers Association. The very nature of these organisations is to promote their members - golf on the other hand, is just a game with no justifiable reason to require a solely male or female membership. Moving on.



Dude, really? The same as Rosa Parks?
Is there about to some emancipation and equal rights for men because you can get on the stepper in the woman's area?




Yup.



Curiously, otherwise normal, well adjusted overweight people might have issues with pouring themselves into jogging outfits and sweating profusely in front of strangers. Weird, I know, but some people just aren't comfortable with it. Some people don't like broccoli.
My sister is by no means overweight, she's a size 10, but doesn't like exercising in gyms.



Well, speaking as a member of that self same population of gym going (although currently lapsed) male population, I quite agree, I am generalising. However, I can understand that as some people who attend my gym are morbidly obese, some are rehabilitating after major surgery, others are simply very old, they would prefer some privacy.
There is a separate room for anyone to exercise in who'd rather not use the main gym area. Is that discriminatory? No, and the rest of the membership respect their privacy.
Now if that population of people who choose to exercise away from the rest of us are entirely female, then that's their choice and I'm not about to hammer on the doors and yell 'Discrimination!' because it isn't. I am not being prevented from exercising in the gym, with everyone else. If, however, it's your gym's policy to deliberately make one gender exercise separately from the other, then yes, have a word.

My use of the word 'leering' sparked an extensive train of thought from you that appears to almost culminate in sexual assault - not my intention to imply that, merely an exercise in trying to understand how others may feel, given my experience of trying to get members of my family in to the gym to take some exercise.

Fair enough.


OK, a rather florid analogy. The example may be much less emotive but the logic is the same. I am getting denied access to something because of what I am, not who I am. That to me seems like a fairly clear definition of discrimination.


I think it's unfair to assume that people in that situation are entirely female. As an aside, you don't have to wear tight clothing and you don't have to sweat. One of the alternative sessions I do is Tai Chi. You don't really raise a sweat, you can do it in any clothing and it's very low impact, but you do know you've done it afterwards. It's also very good as a de-stresser. If you want to encourage someone to take some exercise but they don't 'do' gyms, it's a very good alternative.


I've never been asked if I would prefer to use such a facility. I'd be willing to bet you a significant sum of money that I could ask 100 men who used the same gym and that not one of them has ever been asked if they required such a facility. As it happens I'm equally confident that no women users have been asked either. However the facility was provided for women but not men.


I was - admittedly with a bit of dramatic licence - pointing out that your apparent primary explanation for the existence of the facility was to allow women to exercise without being subject to improper attention (be it passively) from men. I find that to be a generalisation and frankly I found it a little bit insulting to boot. I'm not a sex-crazed 13 year old, nor are the vast majority of men who use gyms round the country.


Well fair enough, I'm sure you didn't intend to offend. I stick to my position though that other people can 'feel' what they like, that's not a basis for allowing discrimination against me. I do appreciate the issues with getting people who don't feel they are particularly suited, shall we say, to gym work to perform some exercise but sin my opinion egregation is not a solution, because the lack of confidence which leads to the perceived need for segregation won't be addressed. It's treating the symptom, not the problem.

I hadn't mentioned this because it actually only just occurred to me but the solution is not only unfair it is also somewhat ineffective. Why? because the 'women only' section is right at the other end of the gym from the women's changing rooms. So anyone wanting to use it has to walk right across the gym floor to do so. Through a 'gauntlet' of all the people they are somewhat intimidated by in the first place. Good grief.

Anyway, we're so far off topic at this point I can barely see it on the horizon. While that's not unusual on 404, I think we're probably wearing everyone else's patience thin. If there's anything further you wish to say please feel free.

Jon

Not really.



Cor, that BNP eh?

Sex crazed 40 year old?



I'm kind of seeing both sides of the argument so I'm not getting involved but I'd like to add that when I joined the Gym I wasnt asked if I wanted to attend any male only classes or such. Just saying.

How did you know I was 40?

That day when you were out at Tesco's. I snuck into the house through the back door, found your birth certificate and made a copy. I've done it with all the forum members. Apart from Bratty. He doesnt have a birth certificate as he wasnt born so much as 'made' (is that normal?).

Or....

I just looked on your profile

memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=77

*corrected