Mona: Australia women's-only museum files appeal to keep men out

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Submitted ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨BrikoX@lemmy.zip⁩ to ⁨globalnews@lemmy.zip⁩

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cd1wpegrnrxo

Australia’s Mona asked a court to reverse its ruling that allowed men inside a women’s only space.

Archived version: archive.ph/oHT6U

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TheControlled@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
There shouldn’t be such thing as gender x only spaces. Or race, or sexuality. The women aren’t wrong about their points, but that doesn’t make it an acceptable or thankfully, legal thing to do. I’m sure the guy who sued them did it for all the wrong reasons though. Both sides seem a bit slimy.

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- Kacarott@feddit.de ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I didn’t read into this particular issue, but I know the museum in question, have been there a couple times, so some context:
  
  it was founded by some eccentric multi millionaire, who basically just does whatever he wants. The museum was originally free for everyone, until eventually he realised he was draining money really fast, so now it’s only free for locals.
  
  the museum changes it’s “theme” changes somewhat frequently. One time I was there the whole place looked like a grocery store, and the stairs to the actual museum was like hidden away in part of the store.
  
  the museum seems to thrive on getting strong reactions from people. Much of the art inside is quite shocking or provocative. They have an app where you can rate how much you like each artwork, and apparently they actively remove artworks which are too universally liked.
  
  So it doesn’t surprise me at all that the museum is trying to be women only, but I really doubt it will be permanent, and I suspect that the strong public reactions is exactly the point.
  
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  - TheControlled@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I kind of suspected this. Usually forseeble controversy like this is a ploy, especially with art and art spaces.
    
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  - TassieTosser@aussie.zone ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Depends on how much money the exhibit draws. Iirc the Wall of Vaginas was supposed to be temporary but it’s still up as far as I know.
    
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- refalo@programming.dev ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  You know who actually want women-only spaces?
  
  Women.
  
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  - Ookami38@sh.itjust.works ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    What about a space for rape victims, male or female? Spaces for survivors of things, people dealing with things, etc. are fine, and if those things only touch women, it’ll naturally only be women, or men who are (let’s argue good faith, here) trying to support someone else. Rape isn’t a female only problem, and so segregating it artificially may feel like a good idea at first glance, but creates other issues.
    
    What about a space for black cop abuse survivors? I’d think that’s pretty inappropriate. It’ll already be mostly black, for sure, and a lot of that perspective will come through, but it’s not a black only issue.
    
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  - TheControlled@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Museums are usually pretty safe spaces. Sorry you went through that and that trauma is is with you.
    
    I’m a man, and also a victim of sexual assault from a man.
    
    This isn’t the way.
    
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  - Sethayy@sh.itjust.works ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Man I hate to say it but cutting off 50% of the population due to trauma is a tauma response and solely that.
    
    Its horrible you ever had to go through that and not even knowing you personally if I had a time machine to help I would; but that was one bad person, not a bad populace.
    
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- Peddlephile@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I’m all for segregation spaces as long as essential spaces are open to all such as hospitals, parks etc. There are women only gyms where I am and I used to go to them because I felt safer and more comfortable.
  
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  - TheControlled@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    This is a slippery slope to things you wouldn’t want to be excluded from, if this appeal wins and creates precident to make much worse places. Thinking this is a feminist battle is narrow minded, selfish, and will absolutely backfire.
    
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  - rickyrigatoni@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Next we can half separate but equal water fountains for coloreds and whites.
    
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  - SomeGuy69@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    From now on, men have decided to declare every build and every bridge, build by men, to be men only. Build your own stuff please. /s
    
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- KISSmyOSFeddit@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  So there shouldn’t be girls’ locker rooms either?
  
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  - hitmyspot@aussie.zone ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Why do we need girls locker rooms when we’ve had the technology for mixed gender locker rooms for generations? We call them doors and use them even in single gender bathrooms.
    
    Certainly it’s inappropriate for sexual predators to be able to leer at girls or women, but there I also no need to have a lack of privacy from those of the same gender, if that’s what people wish.
    
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  - Sethayy@sh.itjust.works ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Got this one from tumblr but its something along the lines of we go to the bathroom to shit, not have some special women fun time in there.
    
    If there was a way to have my own room entirely without anyone else that’d be 100% preferred, but gender is the last thing im thinking about when someone’s peeking down the cracks of my stall
    
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  - madcaesar@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    But who was nuance 🤔
    
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  - feedum_sneedson@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    You know that’s exactly what they think.
    
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- intensely_human@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I disagree. I love my men-only spaces.
  
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over_clox@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Well isn’t that about some hypocritical shit?!

From the article…

“The lounge, which contains some of the museum’s most-acclaimed works - from Picasso to Sidney Nolan - has been closed to the public since the court’s order.”

Both Pablo Picasso and Sidney Nolan were both men!

If they’re gonna play that ‘women only’ card, then they should remove all works created by men and move them to a proper open museum.

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- state_electrician@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  The amount of people/men who don’t get it is astonishing. Art isn’t just something you can put on a wall. This entire thing with excluding men is an art installation, supposed to generate emotions and a discussion about exclusion and gender disparity. And seeing how many men around the world are frothing at the mouth over an installation at a small museum at the end of the world it is an extremely powerful piece of art. I applaud the museum for this.
  
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  - JovialMicrobial@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    There are still places that are men only. Women can’t join the freemasons for example, but you don’t see this sort of extremely angry reaction to that.
    
    And I agree, this art piece is doing exactly what it was supposed to.
    
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  - fiat_lux@kbin.social ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    
    small museum at the end of the world
    
    The end of the world is a fair description, but small is not. It is the largest privately funded museum in the Southern Hemisphere and has 6000m² (64583 ft²) of gallery space.
    
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  - quindraco@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    You’re applauding a troll for trolling successfully?
    
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  - over_clox@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Yeah, well my late father was a painter, and his number one rule was that he didn’t paint stuff to be hidden away. One of his last wishes was to make sure people see his artworks.
    
    It’s up to the people that view his works as to their thoughts and opinions.
    
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  - Larry@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    “I was an asshole as a work of art, not because I am an asshole”
    
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  - IzzyJ@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    You’re right, but to play devil’s advocate; that’s extremely unintuitive and took me to my 20s to figure out
    
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- protist@mander.xyz ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  You’re doing the thing the artist intended lol
  
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  - over_clox@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Point is, art is art, and a museum is a museum. Anyone mature enough should be allowed to enter any museum they want and view whatever exhibits they want.
    
    That gender specific crap can and does end up going both ways. And it shouldn’t be that way, anywhere.
    
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- intensely_human@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  If they’re gonna play that ‘women only’ card, then they should remove all works created by men and move them to a proper open museum.
  
  Why?
  
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  - over_clox@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    That was a sarcastic thought meant to make people think.
    
    What they really should do is like not discriminate. It’s a museum, every person mature enough, men and women, should be welcome to go view whatever artwork and exhibits they have.
    
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- Liz@midwest.social ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Picasso was a massive misogynist, too. I haven’t any idea who Nolan is.
  
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  - over_clox@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    It didn’t take me long to research into Sidney Nolan, but at the same time I do have more and more reason by the day to doubt historical facts found online… 🤷‍♂️
    
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octopus_ink@lemmy.ml ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Whew, if the bear meme didn’t bring out the usual crowd of assholes, this sure did.

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- HauntedCupcake@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  It’s honestly shocking how many people are missing the point.
  
  They just need to read the article and it basically spells it out. The whole thing is meant to be shocking in order to draw attention to the stupid laws and get them fixed.
  
  It’s right there, both the motive and the solution.
  
  At least with the bear it was less well documented and kinda took some background knowledge and extra thought to understand. But this one is just RIGHT THERE spelled out in the article 🤷
  
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  - TassieTosser@aussie.zone ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Another fun fact, two men actually sued. One dropped the issue after being told the purpose of the art installation and realised he was about to be made a spectacle, the other went full steam ahead.
    
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- TacoButtPlug@sh.itjust.works ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Yup. Thousands of years of female exclusion - and it still continues in circles to this day, but one museum and now they’re crying about basically re-excluding women from everything as a “thought exercise.”
  
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- TassieTosser@aussie.zone ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  MONA is famous here for doing all sorts of controversial shit. This one time they sacrificed and butchered a cow live on stage. A women’s only space is tame and on brand. Everyone’s been baited
  
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  - Minarble@aussie.zone ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    As a work of art designed to generate controversy I’d say it’s been wildly successful.
    
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- Thcdenton@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Does a bear shit in the ladies restroom?
  
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  - bluewing@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Unless there is a woods in the bathroom, nope. But the bear will steal your picnic basket. (The assholes will also eat all the apples off your apple trees and break the limbs off of them in the process).
    
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- TacoButtPlug@sh.itjust.works ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
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  - octopus_ink@lemmy.ml ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    You either replied to the wrong person or one of us doesn’t understand what the other was saying. (And that person could be me.)
    
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protist@mander.xyz ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
This BBC World article covers how the artist brought the artwork into the courthouse:

Tuesday started with a large group of women dressed in navy power suits, clad in pearls and wearing red lipstick marching into the hearing to support Ms Kaechele.

As the parties sparred, the museum’s supporters were somewhat stealing the spotlight. They had periods of complete stillness and silence, before moving in some kind of subtle, synchronised dance - crossing their legs and resting their heads on their fists, clutching their hearts, or peering down their spectacles. One even sat there pointedly flipping through feminist texts and making notes.

After (Judge) Grueber reserved his decision for a later date, which is yet to be determined, the museum’s posse left as conspicuously as it came in - dancing out of the building in a conga line as one woman played ‘Simply Irresistible’ by Robert Palmer off her iPhone.

Ms Kaechele has indicated she’ll fight the case all the way to the Supreme Court if needed, but she says - ironically - that perhaps nothing could drive the point of the artwork home more than having to shut it down.

“If you were just looking at it from an aesthetic standpoint, being forced to close would be pretty powerful.”

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TacoButtPlug@sh.itjust.works ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Was just saying how I wish there were women only gyms because I don’t feel comfortable in coed gyms. Men are fucking creeps and do not respect personal space in my gym going experience. The reason there are no women only gyms in California is because men’s rights groups sued them for discrimination. So basically there aren’t any safe places to go to the gym for people like me.

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- IzzyJ@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Because that totally won’t immediately be abused for transphobia. Like, I get the complaint, but think through the implications for five seconds
  
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  - AMDIsOurLord@lemmy.ml ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    So misandry is A-OK as long as it doesn’t touch trans?
    
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  - LwL@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    There just flat out is no solution to gender seperate spaces.
    
    Allow only biological women/men? Transphobic, issues for some intersex people, and you now have transpeople that are clearly not the gender their birth sex suggests in the “”“right”“” bathroom, so even for transphobes this doesn’t work.
    
    Have someone stand in front and judge if people are feminine/masculine enough? Absolutely not holy fuck
    
    Allow people based on gender identity? Any bad actor can just pretend. Absolutely the easiest option though, and imo the best one if we have to seperate them. Thankfully also the one usually implemented.
    
    Allow people based on the gender on their ID? Still sucks for trans people as getting that changed isn’t necessarily easy, plus assuming we don’t havr someone check everyone at the entrance, trans people would be more likely to have someone complain and have to justify themselves. If we make it as easy as it probably should be, bad actors can abuse it just the same.
    
    Thinking about how to make women feel safer in for example gyms seems like a better long term solution for absolutely everyone, but also doesn’t feel like it’s talked about a lot.
    
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- TheControlled@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Your comfort isn’t protected by law because it’s far too subjective. Discrimination laws are based on tangible, objective truths. It sucks that you don’t like going to the gym but the law leaves you in the lurch. You have to navigate those problems yourself because being a creep isn’t a crime. If that sounds callous, I don’t mean it to be, but if there were laws dictating social behavior and discriminatory spaces, this world would be a worse place than you can imagine.
  
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- Schadrach@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  The reason there are no women only gyms in California is because men’s rights groups sued them for discrimination.
  
  California has one of the strongest anti-discrimination laws in the country, the Unruh Civil Rights Act: “All persons within the jurisdiction of this state are free and equal, and no matter what their sex, race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, or sexual orientation are entitled to the full and equal accommodations, advantages, facilities, privileges, or services in all business establishments of every kind whatsoever.”
  
  It turns out that yes, male is a sex and that means that no, you cannot discriminate against them as a business in California. The same men’s rights group put an end to differential pricing based on sex at bars (aka ladies’ night). You would likely be screaming about the sexism from the top of your lungs if a business refused to take women as customers, or charged women more for the same thing, or any of that sort of thing.
  
  The group in question (NCFM) is better known for challenging Selective Service, and their VP and lawyer in charge of that case being murdered (the killer would then cross the country and shoot two more men [killing one and wounding the other] in a “misogynistic attack” against a federal judge [the two men were her husband and son] before killing himself). The judge in question presided over a different Selective Service related case that the killer had been a lawyer on.
  
  Hypothetically, a gym could probably get away with women-only hours if they either also had a matching number of men-only hours or charged men a discounted rate adjusted for the fact they’re paying for less gym access.
  
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  - TacoButtPlug@sh.itjust.works ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    |You would likely be screaming about the sexism from the top of your lungs if a business refused to take women as customers|
    
    When has anything women had to say mattered to structures of power, though? Kind of the whole point to any of this.
    
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  - octopus_ink@lemmy.ml ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    
    You would likely be screaming about the sexism from the top of your lungs if a business refused to take women as customers, or charged women more for the same thing, or any of that sort of thing.
    
    There’s a bar right down the street. Ah, excuse me, “private club” where this very thing is true. My reaction? shrug My wife’s reaction? shrug
    
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- intensely_human@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  That sucks. MRAs are idiots, and should have just moved to form their own men-only spaces instead of trying to ruin the women-only spaces.
  
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  - CellarRat@sh.itjust.works ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Some of them did, they were forced by their respective courts to be inclusive to all.
    
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- OsrsNeedsF2P@lemmy.ml ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Wow I would love it if women looked at me as I worked out /s
  
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shadow_wolf@aussie.zone ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Reverse misogyny? misandry is the word your looking for author.

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VirtualOdour@sh.itjust.works ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
All it takes is to dentify as a woman then you can go In, I don’t get why people are complaining just tell them you’re a woman and go in.

I kinda assumed the point was to demonstrate gender is meaningless, or are they excluding trans people and basing it on sex?

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- Timecircleline@sh.itjust.works ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Gender may be a social construct, but I recognize that I’m privileged to not have to care too much about mine.
  
  Now, the point of the exhibition was actually about historical men-only places where women experienced exclusion. The art is not only the exhibition itself, but also the sense of rejection that men feel in not being allowed in. I would be surprised if they didn’t allow transwomen and non-binary folk in, as there are many spaces that don’t welcome them even now.
  
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VerbFlow@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
What about trans women? Will they be pushed out?

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- sparkle@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Yeah this is a reason I think this is dumb. Who decides what a woman is here? Australia doesn’t even have bathroom laws discriminating against trans people as far as I know. How do they enforce this, by just telling people who they think look too much like a man to leave? By asking for their ID and only allowing in people who legally changed their gender?
  
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drathvedro@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
brb gonna change my private school’s status to a urinal because I believe that women’s place is at home and therefore they shouldn’t get any education. For a good a good measure, I’ll do the same to the office building, the driving school, and the airline I own.

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- HauntedCupcake@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  The point is to draw attention to the stupid laws and get it fixed. The initial premise is shocking and I can understand that it’s upsetting, and it’s okay to feel that way. No judgements here.
  
  Just channel that anger towards the correct target
  
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TheControlled@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Those are excluded and you know it. Don’t be a pain in the ass.

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- Kusimulkku@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Men about “gentlemens’ clubs” and other shit:
  
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Kusimulkku@lemm.ee ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
They really really want to be gender exclusionary lmao

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