[All these points apply to sex and to gender, so for ease of reading, I’ll just discuss gender]
Gender-exclusive groups are common in many societies, such as men-only and women-only social clubs and casual activity groups like a men’s bowling group or a women’s reading circle.
Sometimes this is de-facto, but sometimes this is enforced by rules or expectations, treating the club as a safe space for airing issues people have with other genders, or avoiding perceived problems with other genders.
I came across this old comment in a garbage subreddit by accident when researching. The topic is Men’s Sheds:
“Here’s the thing. No reasonable person has an issue with women having their own women’s activity groups. The annoying part is that whenever men try to do something similar, that’s a problem. Women either want them banished or demand entry, EVERY time.”
I think their claim is nonsense, grossly exaggerated at best. I also know of many counterexamples of men trying to get into women-only groups (as an extreme case, the Ladies Lounge of the Mona art gallery in Australia was taken to court for sex discrimination, with the creator claiming they would circumvent the ruling by installing a toilet). But nonetheless, I can understand why they feel this way, patriarchal social relations change how most people see men-exclusive spaces vs. women-exclusive spaces.
But my response to their claim is that, I am reasonable and I do have an issue with any group setting up places which discriminate based on gender. These safe places can form as a legitimate rudimentary form of protection, yes, but they maintain and often even promote sexism, and should all be challenged and turned into something better which serves the same purpose.
Of course, I’m limited by my own experiences and perspective, so I’d love to hear your opinions on the topic.
Bonus video: “Why Do Conservative Shows All Look the Same? | Renegade Cut” - a discussion about fake man-caves and sexism.
freedom of assembly and association is always okay
This post has clearly brought up a lot of interesting discussion. I just want to add my thoughts…
I never thought of myself as someone who would benefit from male-only spaces as I tend to not like men, but in my mid 20s I started going to bars and clubs oriented towards gay men because I was exploring my sexuality.
I found that often these places have a strong sense of community and camaraderie that I have grown to see as quite sacred. Part of this sense of community is rooted in a shared experience of our gender identity and sexual identity.
Sometimes having women in these spaces could ruin the vibe and sometimes having women in these spaces had no negative effect or was even positive. It really depends on the attitude of women coming into those spaces. Are they there to gawk? Are they there to seek community?
If you made a blanket rule banning women I think it would be very detrimental. For example there are trans men who havent come to terms with this yet, and cutting them out of a space like this is bad.
It would also be disingenuous to claim only women were the ones ruining the vibe. Some men are creeps, controlling, judgmental etc.
To me the important thing isn’t that we ban non-men from entering into the space and say it’s a men-only place. That excludes people who would be good to have there and doesn’t guarantee you remove all of the bad people from coming. But I do think it’s important to have spaces that we say are for men. This is a place for men that caters to men and if are not a man don’t expect it to cater to your needs.
It’s like if you have a Mexican restaurant in the United States oriented towards serving Mexican customers. You can go there even there even if you’re not Mexican, but it’s disrespectful to get angry if people don’t speak English well.
There are always both men and women, who, upon finding out that a space exists that isn’t for them decide to try and enter those spaces out of protest. I think in most cases it’s probably best to let these people in. Either they will acclimate to the culture or they will get bored and stop going eventually. I know that this will make the space less safe or comfortable feeling for some people, but there’s literally no way to have community without also having people be part of that community that are sometimes unsafe or uncomfortable to have around.
The annoying part is that whenever men try to do something similar, that’s a problem. Women either want them banished or demand entry, EVERY time.
Since this part of the premise is obviously incorrect, there is no point in discussing it further
Gender exclusive groups are OK when there is a legitimate reason. Unfortunately it just so happens that women-exclusive groups have a legitimate reason very often, which is usually “I don’t want to be hit on in every activity I do”.
Why are there women only career events? Because many women experience going to “normal” career events, have nice conversations, thinking they made a good business connection just to be asked out on a date and ghosted when they decline. They don’t get the same benefits out of “normal” events as men do.
Why are there women only gyms? Because women want to do sports without being hit on regularly.
Now you could say “Well, but that’s a problem of some men not sticking to the rules. Just enforce the rules.” But the problem is, the rules aren’t being enforced, women aren’t taken seriously or just told to suck it up, that’s part of life. You’re in a public space so it’s OK for a man to ask you out. To which the women’s reaction is: “Well, then I’d rather do X in a private space where there aren’t any men who could hit on me.”
As long as there are struggles that men face exclusively it’s totally ok to have men only groups. The problem:
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men do not face the problem of being put in uncomfortable situations by women almost anywhere they go, so they have less topics or activities where they feel like they need a men’s only group. For most topics/activities men can go to a mixed-gender group and have the same experience as they would in a male-only group. Women can’t.
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a lot of men’s groups do not form around “we want to address a typical male problem” but “we have prejudices about women being bad at x” or “we just hate women”.
And lastly historically the reason why women wanted to join male-only groups was because those groups were often used to make decisions and policies. Business is being made in golf clubs and was made in “gentlemen’s clubs”. Women wanting to join those wasn’t about playing golf. Sure, we can have a women’s club to play golf. It was about being left out of the informal decision making process, the deal making. In my personal experience women are more likely to discuss work matters at work with everybody and at any “women only” outing with colleagues work was hardly a topic. Whereas when it happened that men went drinking with “just the boys” the next day important decisions had been made and suddenly Mark was in charge of the new project. Just my personal experience and I’m not saying it can’t happen the other way around in female dominated fields.
Gender exclusive groups are OK when there is a legitimate reason.
What is a legitimate reason though? Consider…
- men do not face the problem of being put in uncomfortable situations by women almost anywhere they go, so they have less topics or activities where they feel like they need a men’s only group. For most topics/activities men can go to a mixed-gender group and have the same experience as they would in a male-only group. Women can’t.
You seem to be saying that a legitimate reason would be a need to escape from people hitting on you or the equivalent. How about if you just want to hang out with people of your own gender? Is that not OK? Men do not have the “same experience” in mixed gender groups. Socializing in a single gender group is different from in a mixed gender group and both are important. You are dismissing the need for men to socialize among themselves on the basis that they might make an important decision that should have included people outside that group. Now I understand that this has historically been (and in some cases continues to be) an issue with work-based men’s-only clubs/outings etc, and it should be addressed in that context. But it’s not a valid reason to reject the existence of male only groups or spaces in their entirety, is it?
Case in point: I sing in a male voice choir. I enjoy it not just on a musical level, but also for the fact that it is a male space. It’s not about hating women, or having prejudices about women. It’s not actually about women at all, which is kind of my point. I have enough women in my life, what I need is to be around men sometimes. Nor is it about “we want to address a typical male problem” either, unless you consider difficulty with socializing to be a typical male problem, which, yeah, arguably it is in some cases. But guys just like doing things with guys sometimes. It’s a different dynamic and it’s good for us.
I’m not talking about friend groups, just groups that are open to the public. Friend groups are OK in whatever constellation you wish.
Your choir has a good reason to be men only, since that creates a certain sound.
It gets tricky when the point of the group or club is something not related to gender. I don’t think an all-female board game club that is open to the public but only lets women join would be OK. Personally I think you can have your meetings for only people of your gender when you organize them only for yourself. But as soon as you do something publicly, you don’t get to say “everybody can come except group X” without a good reason.
That goes for men and women, I’m also not a fan of “xy only for girls” clubs without a good reason.
Your choir has a good reason to be men only, since that creates a certain sound.
That’s true. Which is why I pointed out that my reasons for joining the choir are not just about the sound. I want a male space, and I don’t think I’m wrong to want that.
I don’t think an all-female board game club that is open to the public but only lets women join would be OK.
Personally I don’t see what’s wrong with an all female board game club, especially if it’s the kind of board games that tend to mostly attract male players. It may encourage female participation where they would otherwise feel uncomfortable, and male players would probably have their own club anyway in that case. But then in the absence of a thriving all female club, an all male board game club would be a problematic thing, since it would specifically exclude a female minority. Context matters and it’s important to be inclusive, but inclusivity doesn’t always mean putting everyone in a single group.
But as soon as you do something publicly, you don’t get to say “everybody can come except group X” without a good reason.
OK, but what’s a good reason? We often have groups for limited age ranges, for usually good reasons. You’ve mentioned some good reasons why men should be excluded from some women’s groups. So it’s not like nobody ever gets excluded from anything. And while men may have less compelling reasons to exclude women, in general single sex groups are a valuable social thing for both men and women. One of the reasons you don’t see many strictly single gender clubs is because there are de facto single gender clubs which don’t need to apply a rule. People socialize in a single gender category without having to formally exclude anyone. Which is fine, and avoids unnecessary polemics.
I’m just saying that we should recognize the value in this. It’s a shame that male only spaces tend to be associated with patriarchy or toxic masculinity, when they also fulfill a real social need.
I would enjoy some male-only spaces. I used to play an MMO game and we all got on great in our guild, right up until a woman joined. Suddenly the banter started having edges to it, people were putting eachother down to try and gain status to/for the woman.
Not in any way her fault, she wasnt playing favourites or flirting or teasing anyone, she was just playing the game like everyone else, but the vibes starting turning.i didnt enjoy that.
I’m not gonna have an opinion, but I’d like to say that it sounds harsh to exclude someone based on other people being weird, no?
I don’t know if you need a male-only space or a normal-person space (probably the latter).
That being said, I could maybe see how people may not want to make certain jokes in front of certain people, but if youre just having fun and youre not racist or something um idk
It is harsh, but its incredibly similar to the OP issue. Just in my day-dreamed space it would be women getting excluded because some men cant behave, rather than men being excluded because some men cant behave.
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Yes and I don’t care about the rest of the culture war.
My anecdotal 2 cents:
I was in boyscouts and I think it was a space to develop positive masculinity, and to learn things by looking up to older boys who had been through the same experience. I think girls being present would have changed the dynamic, because teenage boys act differently and talk about different things when around teenage girls.
Now that being said I’m certain not everyone in boyscouts developed positive masculinity. Boyscouts is far, far less uniform than people seem to think. There were 2 troops in my home town that were wildly different.
But at least from my anecdotal experience, Boyscouts was a good thing that benefitted from being a boys-only experience, and I wonder how it has changed now that girls can join boyscout troops.
At my university there are CS clubs specifically for women because only like 1% of the CS students in both classes and clubs are female
I don’t think there is a one size fits all answer. The reason why women’s groups exist is because most of history has been men’s only clubs. Don’t need to make a space for that since it’s normalized.
But, as empathy and respect starts to grow in modern society, those spaces may not be needed.
I’m a fan of letting others individual organizations decide for themselves.
That is especially true for sports. I know trans sports is a complicated topic. There are some sports that give men an advantage and some that women are more suited for. There are others with no statistical advantage. I think you need to let experts in those fields make those calls bc they know what is safer for the players than I do. (assuming they aren’t just prejudice of course)
Downvoted you for this stunning example of cultivated ignorance:
I think their claim is nonsense, grossly exaggerated at best.
One only needs to look at the scouts of America to see this in play.
Boy Scouts were sued to open their ranks to girls. That suit won, forcing them to open their org to girls.
Girl Scouts were then sued for the flip example - to open their ranks to boys. The suit was almost immediately thrown out for “misogyny”.
After that “victory”, the then-head of the Girl Scouts admitted in private and off the record that she would rather destroy the org in its entirety - essentially razing it to the ground and permanently locking up the name “Girl Scouts” from being used by anyone else - before admitting a single boy.
Now, because they have both boys and girls, the Boy Scouts have tried to drop “boy” from the name, to be called only “Scouts”. This precipitated another lawsuit from the Girl Scouts in that dropping that part of the name will only accelerate their own membership decline.
You literally cannot make this sh*t up.
Men’s-only spaces across the country, like private gyms, are being attacked from all sides on the claim that their very existence is “misogynistic”, and yet service-identical women’s-only spaces in the same city are immune from those same “rules” under the claim that any attempt to apply those same rules to them is also “misogynistic”.
One of the best ways to uncover bigotry is to flip the term in contention and see if it reads any different after that from before. If it does, you’ve found a bigoted pattern in play.
True equality reads identically regardless of how the term in contention is flipped.
Edit:
I have zero issue with women’s only spaces. They are needed. But FFS you cannot eat your cake, and have it, too.
Real equality can only be achieved by applying the same rules equally. If women are to be allowed to have their own women’s-only spaces, men must also be allowed to have their own men’s-only spaces.
Hence the term, equality. Because if things aren’t equal, why even use that word? You might as well call it for what it truly is - anti-male gender bigotry.
liberals trying to understand equality: “what do you mean we need to give only to the poor? it’s only equal if we give the same amount to the rich!”
you need only ask yourself for what reason men-only groups exclude women and for what reason women-only groups exclude men to understand why protecting and elevating women’s groups and dismantling misogynistic institutions are both valid
Wow I’ve never seen anyone actually argue their own hypocrisy with hypocrisy.
Motivations are irrelevant. Equality is equality, you can’t give rights to one demographic and deny to another because you think the other is ‘icky’. That is discrimination. Kinda the very thing we’re trying to argue against, and yet you used it as part of your reasoning.
Everyone deserves a safe space. And for a lot of women, that space shouldn’t have men. I’m a middle class, cis, white guy, almost everything is a safe space for me. It’s crazy people get offended when they are like me and someone won’t let them into their club.
As long as the discrimination isn’t used to hurt people but protect the interests of the group I think it’s fine.
The issue isn’t safe spaces. I mean, in the context you used, you are entirely correct - society in general is largely a safe space for white men.
The issue here is actually men’s-only spaces. And it is in that context that the anti-male bigotry comes boiling out of the societal woodwork under the weaponized mantra of “misogyny”.
As in, women can have all the women’s-only spaces they want or need, because to force them open to both genders is “misogyny”. And honestly, I am willing to let them have that olive branch.
However, they then turn around and demand that all men’s-only spaces be opened up to women, because to keep them men’s-only is also, somehow, “misogyny”.
Sorry, but that’s not how that works. That isn’t how any of that works.
The single most effective tool for determining if bigotry exists is to change the terms in contention, and see if things read identically to before, or oppositely to before.
If the two examples read wildly differently from each other, then congrats - you found a bigoted pattern.
So when you hear about men’s only gyms being cracked open for women to attend, consider how wildly different it would read if it was a women’s only gym being forced to admit men. That sure reads wildly differently, doesn’t it? That’s because there is deep bigotry in having the former being forced through while the latter is being defended against.
And honestly… if true equality in treating everyone with the exact same rules is “misogynistic”, why call it equality in the first place? Just call it for what it truly is: anti-male gender bigotry.
And honestly… if true equality in treating everyone with the exact same rules is “misogynistic”, why call it equality in the first place? Just call it for what it truly is: anti-male gender bigotry.
this only works under the assumption that men and women are on an equal playing field, which isn’t even remotely true as patriarchy ensures women remain a disadvantaged group.
you fundamentally do not understand why women’s spaces even exist. the vast majority of men’s only spaces never needed to be men’s only in the first place, and only are because of bigotry toward women. women-only spaces, on the other hand, exist for two reasons: for women’s safety, and for women’s representation.
men are not actively threatened by violence, nor are men a disadvantaged and underrepresented group in multiple fields that have historically discouraged them the way women are. as long as men maintain the dominant role in society, men entering women’s spaces designed to lift women up only serves to prevent progress toward equality.
I don’t really know where I stand on this issue to be honest as I can see pros and cons for both.
But even if equality did exist (gender, sex, race, religion etc), equality doesn’t necessarily mean that equity is achieved.
Weasel words. Equity and equality are used as cudgels by liberals against the left. End heirarchy and gendered organizations.
Funding is a core concern for organizations like Boy Scouts of America (BSA) and Girl Scouts (GS). GS is funded by cookie sales. BSA was funded by donors.
Intersectionality does come into play with regard to GS versus BSA. I contend gender is only one issue. Class is also playing a role.
We can move beyond gendered clubs. Why not have free associations?
I think the entire equity debate is confusing many of the inputs for outputs - which they are not. They are inputs, and are therefore equality-based, not equity based.
Take, for example, the old meme:
This meme is actually entirely wrong.
In the above meme, the left panel is an example of inequality. because the opportunity provided - the ability to see the game - is unequally provided across the three spectators. There is no equality of opportunity here, no equal ability to see the game due to the differing heights of the viewers despite the addition of boxes for all three.
It is the right panel which is the ideal example of equality - the ability to see the game. Here all three spectators have anny individual deficiencies that they cannot control and cannot overcome without outside help - their heights - made irrelevant by the equalizing effect of the boxes. All three heads are brought to equal and sufficient height for them to achieve equal opportunities to view the game.
Equity doesn’t even factor in here, because the enjoyment of the game is impossible to force across all spectators. To force equal outcomes - equal enjoyment of the game - would be monstrously inhuman and downright evil.
“Here’s the thing. No reasonable person has an issue with women having their own women’s activity groups. The annoying part is that whenever men try to do something similar, that’s a problem. Women either want them banished or demand entry, EVERY time.”
Men exclude women because men view women as inferior, women exclude men because men view women as inferior.
Sure, they’re okay. Honestly we might be a bit too strict about avoiding them, at this point.
Where it becomes a problem is if you’d like to join whatever group, but the only one available is not open to you. Which happened a lot historically, but is rarer now.
I think their claim is nonsense, grossly exaggerated at best.
Can confirm, in my experience the problem with mancaves is that you pretty quickly want to let women in. There’s no tradeoff, we can not talk about our feelings and make a mess in a mixed gender crowd, too.
As a cis man, I think very lowly of men-only groups. Usually (from my admittedly limited experience) if a group goes out of their way to identify as “men-only,” the people there tend to be the kind of men who are very misogynistic and generally insufferable to be around, even for other men. Any group genuinely focused on the hobby or culture they claim to identify with wouldn’t really care about your gender.
Women-only groups though, I tend to sympathize with and respect a lot more, and IMO they are the symptom of the West being a heavily male dominated society rather than an innate desire among women to be exclusionary. If the world didn’t revolve around men and had genuine gender equality, there probably wouldn’t be a need for many women only groups either, but that’s unfortunately not the world we live in.
I can’t really speak on trans/nonbinary exclusion though because I have no personal experience being on the business end of it. I try to only participate in groups where they don’t care about your gender to begin with.
I was in a men’s group once for a few sessions, we talked about everything from anger issues, how to work on improving ourselves, how to handle rough parts of it relationships etc.
It was very nice, we were all very different people with different backgrounds and problems and I believe we all got a lot out of just opening up in a group like this.
This was hosted by the Swedish organisation Man which exists to help men with all the issues modern men are facing, hoping to combat toxic masculinity.
Personally I think a mixed group would’ve worked for me but I am pretty sure some of the people, especially the ones with violent history, felt more secure in a men’s only scenario.
On the flip side, I think men could use more men’s groups because male loneliness is problematic. Women don’t want to feel responsible for men’s loneliness (rightly so), so the natural solution is men need to do better at making friends with men. The problem is doing it in a healthy way
That said, I would suggest the solution is hobby groups without gender exclusion. Like carpentry, basketball, knitting, dance, ballet. Hobbies seem to self select.
Most of my hobbies are female dominated in my conservative area.
good point, but I fear that just creating male only spaces will not solve the problem with male loneliness. as can be seen in x-pill communities.
what men need to heal male loneliness is learn about how patrairchy has shaped their fathers & generations beyond, and how they haven’t learned to approach emotions in a healthy way.
a good book I HIGHLY recommend men to read is Bell Hooks - “The will to change”
she explains what damage patriarchy did to men and how to access and feel emoti8ns fully
I wish for all men to be seen fully in your entire vulnerability. we’re waiting for you.
I agree. I think hobbies are a good middle ground and neutral.
It would be nice if men wrote more books like that. The only men who would listen to a women tell them how to change are probably not the target audience.
I can only say be the change you want to see. It creates a chain reaction that will eventually reach men that wouldn’t touch the book.
even a small step in the right direction of confronting patriarchy will have powerful results.
I think there’s a parallel with other social clubs, too.
My medication kicked in while writing this and it shows. TLDR: in Germany, there are various social clubs including international cultural exchange groups (generally composed of immigrants/children of immigrants and Germans in a roughly 2:1 ratio) and clubs based around specific countries open only or mostly to immigrants from those or neighboring countries (whether openly or simply through convention, selection bias, and social pressure). The former are fun and the latter tend to be toxic unless there’s currently a large wave of immigration/refugees from the country they represent in Germany, in which case they can help coordinate resources and support, as well as help people deal with culture shock and the trauma of needing to flee their home country.
I’m an American immigrant in Germany. I love international groups and being able to bond with people about dealing with German bureaucracy as a non-native. I have zero interest in American emigrant groups.
In international groups, we do make fun of Germany, but it’s not mean spirited. We also commiserate about the actively negative aspects of living in Germany as an immigrant. In American groups, I suspect it would turn into U-S-A chants or something similar.
International groups here welcome Germans as a rule, whereas for groups for specific nationalities, it tends to be limited to people who can speak the language.
There’s a real need served by national groups for brand new immigrants who are overwhelmed by everything being different (often significantly more different than Germany is for an American), and they’re great for creating a sense of community that can be helpful for short term immigrants (though they can hamper long term integration).
I suspect I’ll warm up to American groups as a way to give new immigrants a crash course on German culture if we get a wave of American refugees in the next couple of years, because those are the demographics (large groups of people temporarily displaced from the same country who all come at once) that tend to benefit from these type of groups.
I’ve been told that national groups for Arab countries tend to be full of either bitter, unpleasant people and/or gay people and blatant alcohol drinkers, because everyone else just meets at the mosque. Although given that I have no first hand experience and the person telling me about it only has experience with a handful of cities, it may not be accurate for the rest of the country.
Yes, obviously it’s not only okay, but such groups are very necessary and should be publicly funded and protected. However almost solely in the specific case of excluding cis men. For as long as patriarchy exists, safe spaces and protection from the structural and individual male violence are needed. They’ll naturally drop away as they become unnecessary, if capitalism, which fuels patriarchy, is permanently defeated.
As a woman, I don’t tend to care too much about gendered groups. I’m of the opinion that if somebody doesn’t want me there, I don’t want to be there.
Depending on the context of the group, there’s a valid reason for their existence, for example pregnancy groups (probably sex-exclusive though?) as I don’t really see what a male/man would get out of it.
I’m sure similarly valid groups exist for men, but I can’t think of any right now.
I tend to be more okay with women’s only spaces just because they feel safe – due to certain men displaying overt and unwanted sexual desires and seemingly just unable to control themselves, which can be uncomfortable or trigger traumas – so naturally I believe men should be entitled to their own spaces as well.
If the purpose of the group is that they’re sexiest, I honestly don’t know why the opposite gender would want to hang around them anyway.
