This morning I was reading about a "men's only" club in the city in which I live, that was established about 150 years ago. While it is no secret, many seem to view these kinds of things like some kind of secret society full of misogynists, but it seems to be more the kind of place guys just hang out together, play some pool and talk. The representative questioned said they have talked throughout the years about admitting women into the club but it has always been rejected because,
"It’s somehow more relaxed and free. If women were present, everyone’s demeanour would change somewhat, but for some, it would change a lot,"
Isn't that fair?
For the record, there are plenty of "women's only" social clubs in the same city, often with national representation. There are women's only gyms as well, and public sauna shifts etc. Yet, one of the very few clubs for men, gets treated as a negative. But is it?
Having been a man most of my life, and a boy before that, I can say that all people do change depending on who is around them, men and women. I would suspect that if one of the women's only clubs had a couple men join, they too would change their demeanour somewhat, and some change a lot. It is natural, because we are humans made to change our behaviour depending on the social conditions. That means, depending on who is in the room with us.
A men's only club sounds like a sausage fest to me, but I also think that it is fine if people want to hang out together with people they think they will have a good time with. Groups of guys go out to the hockey games, and groups of women go out to brunch here, and no one complains. It is a social arrangement. But once there is a "rule" that explicitly excludes people, it is frowned upon - at least if it is men excluding women. Women excluding men is celebrated.
I don't mind hanging out with a group of guys and we do on occasion with the neighbours, but I wouldn't want to spend most of my time in those conditions, because they bore me quickly. I prefer the dynamics of mixed groups, because I prefer the increased volatility and uncertainty that comes with the unknown. Men are more predictable and repetitive than women from my perspective, because I am more familiar with the range of male tendencies. Women bring far more energy into the conversation, because they are more likely to have differing experience to my own, so it is more attractive to engage with.
But I also get that some people today (no matter what group they subscribe too) are feeling like they don't have a space that is theirs to be a version of themselves that they can't be in normal conditions. We all have multiple versions of ourselves depending on circumstances, but some are more actively being repressed than others, especially in the hyper-sensitive, politically correct public discourse. Many assume the worst intention rather than the best, even when they know that it wasn't intended that way at all.
But a group of friends aren't politically correct.
Because they talk about things that are personal. A group of friends aren't citizens governed by the state, they are individuals who have thoughts and feelings and the desire to share with others, to both get their views across, or question their views. Repressing opinions means that they don't get air and light, but still exist there in the darkness, festering, with questions unanswered. A group of good friends is like a sounding board to test hypotheses and discuss alternatives.
And a lot of people don't have good friends anymore.
So they look to find alternatives in groups that they think will fill the void, but what they might be doing is finding groups that perpetuate the problems further. We see this in lots of groups that become extremist and violent, where "like minds" gather to speak their truth without questioning if what they believe is true at all.
Men and women do this.
I was listening to the song "Glory Box" by Portishead the other day and these lyrics stood out,
Give me a reason to love you
Give me a reason to be a woman
I just wanna be a woman
So don't you stop, being a man
Just take a little look
From our side when you can
Show a little tenderness
No matter if you cry
The song was released in 1994 and has a few themes included in it, but what should also be recognised is that it is generally about having the space to be a woman, to express herself as a woman, but also that men needn't stop being men and that a man can still be compassionate, show tenderness, without losing their status as a man. But it isn't about equality, is it? It is about equity.
The needs of the individual met.
And those needs can be different and generally are different between men and women, which means that there need be different structures and approaches put into place in order to provide an equitable outcome for all. For some, that might be a place where they can work out without feeling judged, or play pool and joke about without feeling judged. If men are conditioned (nature and nurture) to continually judge women, isn't it fair to assume that women are also continually judging men?
I know my friends, family and partners do this. Constantly.
We do not live in a judgement-free environment, which means that at least publicly, we are all under scrutiny. The only time we are not is when we are alone, and that still comes with the personal judgements that are conditioned by the environment anyway. Yet, we also need to share ourselves, and be acknowledged, and get feedback, and partake in intimacy and friendship and whatever else a person might need to be well-rounded, rich, and understanding.
I think understanding is being reduced.
Rather than understanding the conditions and then judging the outcomes, we are judging first without understanding what the causes are. So rather than improving the conditions, we are making things infinitely worse, as people are judged without being heard, criticised by people who don't have the decency to ask first. It is all bad social behaviour that leads to more separation, disconnection, and conflict.
Every label is exclusionary.
So many people talk about how accepting and inclusive they are, while simultaneously giving themselves and others labels to define them. Every label is exclusionary. For instance, a rainbow is all inclusive of every colour, but as soon as you start separating by saying red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violent - it excludes everything else between. That is the problem with spectrums, because we are all on all of the spectrums, no matter what you call yourself.
But as a species, we are exclusionary, because as a species we need to define our world to build our understanding of it, which means we have to have a word that differentiates between an apple and a rock, in order to say to someone "Don't eat the rock, it isn't an apple". Language itself is a form of exclusion, with each word definition excluding all the other potential definitions it could be.
But let's get back to the "men's only club" to finish off. What label have you ascribed to a member of the club? What assumptions have you made as to what kind of person they are, or how they treat women? What judgements have you given to people based solely on a label, who you have never met?
Are you "all inclusive" in your judgements?
Judgements can never be.
Taraz
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Sounds like a bunch of upper middle class and rich older men. They are looking to feel special and part of something. Surely they have an application process and you have to be voted on the be accepted. Like you said, a sausage fest. That siad, let them. If women can have theirs, why not men being able to have their space. Double standard anyone? Hyprocrisy? I don't know, more woke shit probably? Just leave the poor old wankers alone to their pocket pool and cigars.
Sorry, Im a little aggravated with woke-ness this morning :-)
Exactly. And yeah, there is also a "no ponytails or piercings" rule :D
Totally understandable. It gets out of perspective fast, and then the response is so polarised too. No middle anymore.
Well I guess I better not show them old blue then. :_0
Yeah, sometimes the response to the wokeness is evne more aggravating.
:D
At the end of the day, if a private club isn’t harming anyone and isn’t built around contempt or exclusionary ideology, then letting people self-select into spaces they enjoy seems like a fairly liberal position. Not every social preference needs to carry symbolic weight. Sometimes it really is just people playing pool, smoking cigars, and wanting to be left alone.
Yep, dont really care one way or the other. Bigger problems in the world. If a bunch of old men want to sit around in a hot tub together, let em.
There are places where women feel comfortable simply because they are women, and places where men feel comfortable simply because they are men. For example, where I live, coffee houses are only for men. There's a lot of noise and swearing. If women were there, people would probably pay attention to the noise, swearing, and certain behaviors.
It's the same with Turkish baths. There are baths exclusively for women. On the other hand, there are baths that only men are allowed to enter. A married woman might not want to be in the same place as another married man. We should understand and accept the existence of such places; they are necessary.
I think the conversation about these kinds of places is silly. It is like me demanding to go to a hen's night for friends I don't even know.
Damn, you touched a sensitive topic. There's a men's club around here, but it's for playing pool, poker, card games, watching football matches, etc. The thing is, people see it as a place for losers, just a bunch of vices, people with no job. I've never actually been there, for some reason.
Getting back to the colored flags, if people like that, they should enjoy it. Everyone's free to do what they want, as long as they don't mess with me, that's enough.
And on buses, you see people saying we should be inclusive with ladies, but I've never seen a lady give up her seat to an older woman or yield to another driver... they'll run you over, but if you don't give way to a lady, you're a sexist. The world's crazy, man. Meanwhile, live and let live, and the rest doesn't matter haha.
My point with this though is, if it is meant to be inclusive, we are all on the spectrum. So, people should stop making it exclusive. I don't care what people do, as long as they don't try and force me to do what I don't want to do, just to make themselves feel better.
People should give up their seat for elderly, pregnant, disabled - but a woman with no issues can stand. If a guy offers her a seat just for being a woman, that is sexist ;D
My guess is people just want a place to complain about their wives without fear of retribution. I get it :) There is definitely a double standard for sure.
Well guessed. The double standard is hard to ignore. When women talk openly about partners in women 's-based spaces, it’s framed as emotional processing. When men do the same, it’s often assumed to be disrespectful or regressive. Same behaviour, different moral judgement
Morality and ethics rarely are considered in judgement these days.
And it goes for the women's clubs too. Let those without sin, cast the first stone... or some crap like that. We all judge.
Feminism is most times unfair to men. Women want to have the same opportunities as men, but they've forgotten men have far more opportunities because they are the more capable gender. It's not because of favouritism but merit.
And if women want to be treated the way men are, they have to step up their game not just aimless agitation.
Sometimes feminist efforts feels like children demanding to be treated same as adults. There are a lot of things adults can do children can't. I feel it's somehow the same with the male and female gender.
The I don't think it is more capable, but we have different capabilities. I also think that for instance in women's sports that don't get paid as much as men, also don't have as many people watching them. Pay is driven by advertising. Technically, if all men watched men's football, and all women watched women's football, the women would earn 2% more than the men, since they make up 51% of the viewers. This is not the case - as most women still will watch men's games, but men might not watch women's, because the quality of play is lower.
When it comes to feminism, the weird thing is that the most judgemental of women, aren't men, it is other women.
i am not clubbing person, but sometime we used to have a all boy party kind of meeting, and such time used to be quite productive as we used to get quite relieved and relax.
Yeah, I think it is pretty natural. If men are meant to be more emotionally in tune, they will also have to learn how to do this in the company of other men only too.
the best part is that if a man does something then he is guily, evil etc... if a woman does the same it's a sign of strenght, independence et... i even wrote a post not that long ago on this topic...
i can understand the need to be on a men only environment like at work we do jokes, some burp, some speak in certain ways that would not be possible with a woman, though i must agree with you, i personally find more engaging and interesting talk to a woman than a man
People take conversation all too seriously, like a conversation is somehow far more impactful than it is. A group of people, even strangers of any sex, should be able to joke around, chat and talk on serious topics, without getting too offended by anything. We have created a pretty snowflaky environment though.
I think your distinction between equality and equity is important here. Treating everyone the same does not automatically meet everyone’s needs, and pretending otherwise can actually erase legitimate differences in how people process, express, and decompress socially. Spaces that allow people to temporarily lower their social guard can be healthy provided they are not built on contempt for others. The existence of a men’s space doesn’t negate mixed spaces any more than women’s clubs negate men.
And I think a lot of people think that a group they aren't included in, must hold them in contempt.
I think people should be able to have all kinds of clubs women only and men only and any other kind of club as long as these clubs do not spread hate or brainwash people or do anything anti-society in general.
I agree. I reckon it might be healthy for men and women to have these kinds of places to spend time in for a bit of a different perspective.
We’ve become so obsessed with categorizing everyone that we’ve lost the ability to just let a group of people hang out in peace. If a 150-year-old club hasn’t burned the city down yet, they’re probably just playing pool and complaining about their knees.
And they probably suck at pool.
Well, I prefer mixed group too. My male Friends have other male friends with nothing in their heads. So it's kinda tooooo boring when we are all together. Ahh with girls the situation changes. It's funniest when we start to argue about any Kpop band or anything that girls love. (And there, is when flirting begins)
I like the feminine energy far more than the masculine, when it comes to social arrangements at least. However, there are times and places for differences.
The different clubs are not being measured in the same way, it seems unfair to me that the men's club is judged a priori, that is part of what is happening in the world.
May it be very good.
Who knows what is good and bad these days. What I think though, is that the opinions of the masses are usually harmful for the masses.
Whether it is a men's club or a women's gym, I think these place give people the chance to be themselves without feeling the weight of societal norms.
Or at least, a different set of norms.
what if they talk about sausage at that club?? :P then is a double sausage club.
Double sausage - it is like denim on denim.
I'm reminded of a friend telling me how he visited our uni (this was several years ago now) and was describing to me the things that had changed, and one of the funniest things that we were shaking our heads over was that one of the clubs that had been proposed was a men's club kind of thing and this was immediately decried as sexist and mysogynistic, meanwhile the women's club that existed for people to be free from the patriarchy and misogyny for a little while was perfectly fine.
I wonder what those people would think of the various Men's Sheds that are around here (as far as I can tell from the description of one of them, they basically hang out and the older guys running it try to be positive role models and also run workshops and stuff to teach some oldschool skills that not a lot of people have anymore).
This should not have been as funny as I found it XD
I don't know if we were actually meant to answer the questions you asked at the end as they seem to be rhetorical but the label that I would ascribe to a member of the aforementioned club is "some guy" and there are no assumptions made (aside from "probably identifies as male"), just a statement that more information/context would be required :)
otherwise I am now vaguely aware that they probably exist and I literally don't care
This is one of the topnotch philosphers: Stories from Thucydides by Thucydides 6/81
Thanks