Dear User of Women’s Hours,
As a male member of the LSE gym, I wholeheartedly support your right to women’s only hours. Although I occasionally face exclusion from the gym, I find the inconvenience a trivial price for a lasting reward. Women have been trammeled by discrimination for centuries; without question, this impediment of human progress has yet to be fully lifted. I was concerned for a time that it nearly had been, given recent gains in social equality. Thankfully, many signs prove otherwise, among them being the recalcitrant wage disparity, sexual mores, and your very own gym discrimination.
I sometimes wonder what spurs your desire to avoid males at the gym. Surely, you have some greater reason than dislike of the more crowded hours. Perhaps you fear that men will stare at you, although I find this hard to believe. The football game on TV is ten times more interesting than your sweaty shoulder press. Perhaps you think a male will simply glance over at you and be overcome by lust. I like this possibility. Maybe we can arrange a few “straight’s only” hours and keep the gym from becoming cluttered by the gay man. But these speculations are irrelevant. The discriminatory outcome is all that matters.
The causes of all modern (including sex) discrimination are manifold, but I have no interest in their diversity. I only want their common end: social division. I am glad to see that not everyone has learned from our American friends and the days of Plessy v. Ferguson. Separate is inherently unequal, and where division occurs one group inevitably gains at the expense of others. As a white male, I am a member of the long-standing beneficiary group, and I am grateful for your support. Yes, it may be I who lacks a few hours of gym access, but it is I who prevails in the long run, where any emphasis on the differences, however spurious, between men and women reinforces traditional sexism, leaving men with greater opportunity. So whether you are dogmatically religious, oversensitive, or just deeply insecure, I commend you for endorsing women’s hours, and on behalf of all who benefit from social inequality, I thank you for doing your part.
Sincerely,
Your Common Chauvinist
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- A CELEBRATION OF WOMEN IN THE NOUGHTIES
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- A-poly-clypse for Kings women’s hockey
- RSPCA put down women’s rugby
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on Tuesday, March 16th, 2010 at 08:43 and is filed under Comment.
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Women’s week is all very well but…
by Your Common Chauvinist on 16 Mar 2010 in Comment
Dear User of Women’s Hours,
As a male member of the LSE gym, I wholeheartedly support your right to women’s only hours. Although I occasionally face exclusion from the gym, I find the inconvenience a trivial price for a lasting reward. Women have been trammeled by discrimination for centuries; without question, this impediment of human progress has yet to be fully lifted. I was concerned for a time that it nearly had been, given recent gains in social equality. Thankfully, many signs prove otherwise, among them being the recalcitrant wage disparity, sexual mores, and your very own gym discrimination.
I sometimes wonder what spurs your desire to avoid males at the gym. Surely, you have some greater reason than dislike of the more crowded hours. Perhaps you fear that men will stare at you, although I find this hard to believe. The football game on TV is ten times more interesting than your sweaty shoulder press. Perhaps you think a male will simply glance over at you and be overcome by lust. I like this possibility. Maybe we can arrange a few “straight’s only” hours and keep the gym from becoming cluttered by the gay man. But these speculations are irrelevant. The discriminatory outcome is all that matters.
The causes of all modern (including sex) discrimination are manifold, but I have no interest in their diversity. I only want their common end: social division. I am glad to see that not everyone has learned from our American friends and the days of Plessy v. Ferguson. Separate is inherently unequal, and where division occurs one group inevitably gains at the expense of others. As a white male, I am a member of the long-standing beneficiary group, and I am grateful for your support. Yes, it may be I who lacks a few hours of gym access, but it is I who prevails in the long run, where any emphasis on the differences, however spurious, between men and women reinforces traditional sexism, leaving men with greater opportunity. So whether you are dogmatically religious, oversensitive, or just deeply insecure, I commend you for endorsing women’s hours, and on behalf of all who benefit from social inequality, I thank you for doing your part.
Sincerely,
Your Common Chauvinist
Related posts:
This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 16th, 2010 at 08:43 and is filed under Comment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.