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Comment by jamesdeluk | Hacker News Reader

Why didn't they start Women's Sheds?

Women do have their own spaces, at least here in the Midwest US. But women tend to think the men are having more fun over in their male-only spaces, so they want into them, and then those spaces become co-ed, and pretty soon the men are looking around for a new male-only space. Not because they don't enjoy spending time with women, but because there's something about a male-only space that lets a man relax and recharge in a different way.

That cycle tends to repeat, and you don't really see it in reverse. Men are mildly curious, at most, about what women do in their own spaces, and generally don't seek to join them. That probably adds to the perception women have that the male-only spaces are more fun.

It’s because women fight vigorously and scream loudly to keep men out. They call them creeps and that’s almost always effective

Oh, but why if they're having a functional clubs already?

I feel like men only spaces in the UK are frowned upon (see Garrick club narration). No matter the reason, the only way single sex spaces work here is women only.

In UK law, it is generally considered sex discrimination to exclude someone on the basis of their sex, unless that exclusion is a “proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim”. It’s fairly well understood that women have sex-based needs that justify this aim, but very rarely recognized that men might have such needs too. Maybe this is one of them.

The fear will always be that male-only spaces will become centers of power and decision-making that women are excluded from. That’s where the private London clubs sit. Doesn’t seem as likely to happen in a shed, but who knows?

Generally speaking women are more than welcome at Mens Sheds (In Australia, at least). The ratio of men to women that enjoy sanding wood and tinkering with lawnmowers usually leans more heavily to men, but I've seen the girls around the traps too.

>it is generally considered sex discrimination to exclude someone on the basis of their sex

So are women-only gyms not a thing in the UK then? Here in NA they're everywhere, we even have a women-only version of the YMCA (YWCA).

> Here in NA they're everywhere, we even have a women-only version of the YMCA (YWCA).

Despite the names, neither the YWCA or YMCA as broad organizations strictly restrict membership by gender (or religion, for that matter.) My understanding with YWCA specifically is that inclusiveness on gender varies considerably by individual local association.

> In UK law, it is generally considered sex discrimination to exclude someone on the basis of their sex

Whether or not the law prohibits or permits such discrimination, differential treatment (definitely including outright exclusion) on the basis of sex is, obviously sex discrimination, that’s just the meaning of the words.

I'm under the impression that women's only spaces are very much frowned upon in the English speaking world, whether it be in sports, book awards, knitting circles, toilets, or prisons.

This isn't an x-has-it-worse comment by the way. I think every demographic is entitled to self-segregate without shame, and the ladies definitely face their own struggles in achieving this.

Your impression is mistaken.

E.g.

Girl Scouts: allowed to be girls only

Boy Scouts: now “Scouting” because girls are allowed

My intramural sports in college had coed and women only teams

BSA made the decision to allow girls on their own and it's been fantastic for the program.

You actually think this organization made this decision on their own with no outside pressure, or internal pressure from women?

I have a bridge to sell you

The "external pressure" was largely just the pressure of declining membership.

What pressure led to declining membership?

Did it have anything to do with "Boy Scouts is a sexist organization" narratives?

Uh, no, I'm sorry you had to find out this way, but the primary reason was because the boy scouts have rampant sex abuse scandals like the catholic priesthood.

Also Tiktok means fewer young boys so bored that they set things on fire.

Ah yes

Opening up the organization to young girls as well seems like exactly the right fix for

Rampant sex abuse scandals

That's how I would fix that problem too

Nah these decisions actually resulted in membership declines because they lost the Mormon population and with them a huge chunk of the patrons

I'm pretty sure you have the order reversed. They were already losing the mormons.

I mean if we are talking about BSA declining membership, one pretty large reason could be...

https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-supreme-court-lets-246-bill...

Those two scouts programs aren't even remotely comparable, both in substance and prestige. Many girl scout troops barely did any camping/outdoor activity, whereas boys got to earn the prestige of "eagle scout" and go on various outdoor adventures (multi-day treks through the mountains, building igloos and camping inside them, camping on an island only accessible by a canoe, etc). It was a tragedy that girls didn't have the opportunities available to boys.

(Source: My sister and her friends were the type that would have thrived in boy scouts, but they had to join a "venture crew" run by the same scout leader as our boy scout troop)

Whether a boyscout group sits around and does lame crafts or goes into the woods to start fires and hit each other with sticks is entirely down to the leadership (boys and adults) in that troop. So to is it with girlscouts. There is nothing intrinsic about boyscouts that makes it more exciting, except that it was lead by guys.

> There is nothing intrinsic about boyscouts that makes it more exciting

The chance to obtain Eagle Scout status is itself more exciting. It difficult to deny that it is one of the best leadership programs for children available. The girl scout equivalent is not even close to producing the leaders the Eagle Scouts do. They also have their own network for eagle scouts to connect. It can be an opportunity to get into a Good ‘ol Boys club (future business & money connections) before moving out of their parent’s house.

If a male or female wants to learn more about extracting money from family/shoppers by selling cases of cookies, or learn about female social empowerment and financial skill, instead of learning leadership through self reliance/accountability skills mixed with teamwork, then why not let them choose the programs they want? -- but they are different. Their Gold Award is nothing like earning Eagle Scout status.

The credentials and awards is definitely the least important aspect of boyscouts. As for leadership learning opportunities, there is no reason the girl scouts couldn't have this too.

Flip your own framing around - aren't there likely boys who would have preferred the Girl Scouts coded activities, and being disallowed from membership is therefore also an unfair dis-opportunity?

Yup exactly. Same as all the "feminist" groups campaigning to disallow trans women from such groups, usually using the excuse that they'll get assaulted by the "really just men" trans women a la "won't somebody please think of the children!" when the incidences of this happening is almost 0 comparatively.

Turns out some are allowed to have special clubs, but others not so much. And we only have societal perception of women to blame; the thing they're relying on for all this "they need their own space to protect them" is demeaning, imo. Besides the fact that the majority of victims of crime are male (and before someone points out that the majority of criminals are also male - did you know that's a sexist statement to make? It's judging an entire sex by the actions of individuals).

> I'm under the impression that women's only spaces are very much frowned upon

Centre of the English speaking world here.

My gym has a "mixed" workout area and a "women only" workout area. The pool and sauna have "mixed" sessions and "women only" sessions. Classes are segregated to "women only" or "mixed". Membership fees are the same for all.

The Women's Institute is going strong in the UK. There are far more girls' schools than boys' schools. I don't think female only spaces are frowned on at all, at least here.

>I'm under the impression that women's only spaces are very much frowned upon in the English speaking world

That is the impression you would get from online journalism. The reality is basically the opposite. Women's only spaces are celebrated and the narrative is that they're brave and strong and defiant and resisting sexist oppression. 80-90% of men are totally ambivalent about it.

So there’s at least one type of men’s only space in the UK; some gay club nights are men-only, and enforce this with registration/membership. Was a bit of a culture shock visiting from Ireland, where, as far as I know, this is not a thing (even the most male-oriented club nights _allow_ women, and there’ll usually be one or two; I’ve never known anyone to have a problem with this).

I’m unsure whether there’s a legal issue here (one thing that comes to mind is that I know the UK at least historically had weird laws about what constitutes public sex, so maybe excluding women allows them to legally have darkrooms or something?) or if it’s just cultural.

Anecdotally I heard this was because straight-women would prefer these clubs due to less pressure and more fun, which caused straight-men to try get into the clubs just to hit on them.

As a straight man can confirm

That's because gay clubs/bars have ended up chock full of straight women. People claim it's because it's "safer from all the gross men in other places", which may be partially true. But also I believe it's because gay clubs can just be nicer overall, plenty of interesting drinks like cocktails available rather than just beer, more variety in music, etc. I think they may disallow women because for the bi/pan men in the crowd - their behaviour changes when women are present, they get more aggressive, domineering, chest beating. I notice it all the time in queer but non-gay friends constantly.

Which always annoyed me because I've been to a few Soho "gay" bars since and they're just full of straight women/hen dos. Asked for a cocktail..."we don't do cocktails". How the fuck do you call yourself a gay bar anymore then!

I go to a regular meet and one of the places next door is a drag bar, whose entire purpose seems to be to host hen dos. Ugh.

Ireland has women's sheds I believe

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