Perth Carpark adds "Women Only Bays"

[gimmepie]

https://www.perthnow.com.au/news/we...ialSF&utm_source=PerthNow&utm_medium=Facebook

Okay, so I know people don't usually care much for Australian news - let alone Perth news - but this needs discussion. Oh my God, this is so ridiculous. There is so much wrong with this. The insinuation that men can't be victims, that women are the weaker sex and that the safety of women is more important than the safety of men is just so infuriating. If there's been problems the whole carpark should be receiving better lighting and CCTV coverage, not a few woman-only spaces.

Men apparently won't be fined (at least during the trial period) for using these spaces, but that doesn't make it much better. If I come across one of these I'll be parking in it out of protest.

 

[Her]

I'm just reeling from the fact that this was done in Australia, let alone Perth.

 

[gimmepie]

I'm just reeling from the fact that this was done in Australia, let alone Perth.

I'm reeling from the fact it was done anywhere at all. It makes me ashamed to live here.

 

[Midnight shadow]

I'm shocked and appalled not only by the insinuation that men aren't at risk from attacks but that at the bottom of the article is says

But some have copped criticism for making the car spaces wider, implying that women are worse at driving than men.

That's seriously the only criticism they have had so far? Give me a break. I'd love to hear from the feminists here on what they think about this idea.

 

[Pinkie-Dawn]

Are Perth carparks private or public? If the latter, then isn't public segregation technically illegal now? This is one of the many reasons why modern feminism is fully despised from the internet community and why these shouldn't be the main priorities modern feminism is focusing on. *points to third world countries*

 

[Psychic]

This sounds ridiculous. If safety is an issue right now, make the whole parking lot safer. Offer a service to escort customers. If there is hard data on attacks and other issues happening here, I'd be curious to see it to understand why they felt this necessary.

This is one of the many reasons why modern feminism is fully despised from the internet community and why these shouldn't be the main priorities modern feminism is focusing on. *points to third world countries*

I'm pretty sure we have been over this in previous threads, but people can focus on issues in their own country AND those abroad. While I'm not defending this particular instance, that mindset is really unhelpful. There are also plenty of reasons why interfering in third world countries willy-nilly is a terrible idea, so I'm really tired of hearing that as an excuse. Just saying.

~Psychic

 

[gimmepie]

Are Perth carparks private or public? If the latter, then isn't public segregation technically illegal now? This is one of the many reasons why modern feminism is fully despised from the internet community and why these shouldn't be the main priorities modern feminism is focusing on. *points to third world countries*

I dislike feminism just as much as you do, but I doubt feminists are the reason this has happened. Most feminists are likely to be pissed off by this than to push for it. For once I agree with them.

As for Perth car parks, they can be either government owned or privately owned. It depends.

 

[Esper]

I have to be devil's advocate here. Why is this a bad thing exactly? If there seems to be a need for it, why not have it? I get that it seems discriminatory, but is it better or worse to take a discriminatory action as a way to curtail other discrimination if that is the only action that can be taken? In other words, if there's some kind of discrimination facing women and the solution we'd all like is "make all of society equal" but that isn't something that can be immediately accomplished, but as a stopgap measure something like this is introduced, is that a bad thing?

I'm thinking of the women-and-children-only train cars that run during commute times on Tokyo subways. The trains there do have a problem with assaults (groping, etc.) during busy times so this was a solution that they came up with because, well, what else could they do? Ignore it because their best solution was discriminatory and we can't have discrimination?

 

[gimmepie]

I have to be devil's advocate here. Why is this a bad thing exactly? If there seems to be a need for it, why not have it? I get that it seems discriminatory, but is it better or worse to take a discriminatory action as a way to curtail other discrimination if that is the only action that can be taken? In other words, if there's some kind of discrimination facing women and the solution we'd all like is "make all of society equal" but that isn't something that can be immediately accomplished, but as a stopgap measure something like this is introduced, is that a bad thing?

I'm thinking of the women-and-children-only train cars that run during commute times on Tokyo subways. The trains there do have a problem with assaults (groping, etc.) during busy times so this was a solution that they came up with because, well, what else could they do? Ignore it because their best solution was discriminatory and we can't have discrimination?

Even assuming that there have been enough attacks over women than men, there's still plenty of stupidity here.

1. 28 bays out of like 700? Well that's great, there's still 672 bays where women are just as screwed.
2. It's still placing the safety of women above the safety of men, which is messed up.

 

[Esper]

1. 28 bays out of like 700? Well that's great, there's still 672 bays where women are just as screwed.

Is a halfway measure worse than no measure? Many parking lots have handicap spaces, but sometimes it's just one or two out of a hundred. Still, I think that's better than none even if it means the third handicapped person to park there doesn't get one of those spots. The first two did.

2. It's still placing the safety of women above the safety of men, which is messed up.

Is it placing the safety of woman above men or is it addressing that women are more likely to be in danger? If no action were taken, would there be an equal amount of attacks on men and women? (Not sure, but I can guess.) Again, ideally, the response would be to protect everyone and give the best service to everyone, but if if you can't stop the source of danger at its, uh, source, then wouldn't an approach like this be at least doing some good?

This reminds me of the affirmative action argument. Do nothing and underprivileged people don't get equal access. Do something and you get accused of discrimination.

 

[gimmepie]

Is a halfway measure worse than no measure? Many parking lots have handicap spaces, but sometimes it's just one or two out of a hundred. Still, I think that's better than none even if it means the third handicapped person to park there doesn't get one of those spots. The first two did.

The problem is that it's going to be totally ineffective. So nobody is going to go and mug someone in those bays, there's still over 600 other bays that are now even more likely to be hit.

Is it placing the safety of woman above men or is it addressing that women are more likely to be in danger? If no action were taken, would there be an equal amount of attacks on men and women? (Not sure, but I can guess.) Again, ideally, the response would be to protect everyone and give the best service to everyone, but if if you can't stop the source of danger at its, uh, source, then wouldn't an approach like this be at least doing some good?

This reminds me of the affirmative action argument. Do nothing and underprivileged people don't get equal access. Do something and you get accused of discrimination.

According to the most recent Australian crime statistics I could find with a quick google, women make up 56% of Western Australian assault victims. I don't think barely more than half the victims warrants special treatment for women.

 

[Kanzler]

This is what I call consumer liberalism.

Does it address gender equality in an appropriate way? That's highly debatable and there's already a lot people have said about that in this thread.

But is the issue really about gender equality and dignity for all people? My answer is absolutely not. This is nothing more than a shallow appeal to the ideal of equality and dignity for the pursuit of cheap profits and political capital. "Look at us, look how nice we are towards women and how liberal we are, now give us your business and give us your political support". It's pandering at its finest. I never knew that being a woman was a physical handicap. You know what would make more sense? Preferential parking spaces for the elderly. But no, being nice to the elderly isn't sexy these days, being nice to women is.

 

[Elysieum]

Dangerous stuff, indeed. It shouldn't take much discussion to conclude that segregated parking spaces is ridiculous and potentially harmful in itself.

The answer to this problem should have been to increase the number of security cameras, or to enhance them in some way, NOT installing exclusively female parking bays.

 

[stzy]

I have to be devil's advocate here. Why is this a bad thing exactly? If there seems to be a need for it, why not have it? I get that it seems discriminatory, but is it better or worse to take a discriminatory action as a way to curtail other discrimination if that is the only action that can be taken? In other words, if there's some kind of discrimination facing women and the solution we'd all like is "make all of society equal" but that isn't something that can be immediately accomplished, but as a stopgap measure something like this is introduced, is that a bad thing?

This would make sense if it were indeed the only action that could be taken. Could they not have hired better security? I see a sign in the photo that says CCTV in use... is it not in use everywhere? If it's big enough an issue to warrant border-line discriminatory car park spaces, then I think some tighter security wouldn't be too far out of the question.

In fact when I think about it that way, this kinda seems like the easy, "cop-out" method. "We're not gonna spend the money to hire trained professionals for this one, we're just gonna go ahead and throw up these signs here and hope you guys can sort it out for yourselves."

And lastly even though I don't agree with this, if they're not even going to enforce the "trial" what's the point? "We're taking extreme safety measures here and absolutely no men are allowed to park here but if you're a man and you park here it's actually cool."

Anyway... hopefully it works out for the best, just personally don't think it makes much sense at all.

 

[Fannie]

Now the rapists know where to target.

 

[Sir Codin]

This is what I call consumer liberalism.

Does it address gender equality in an appropriate way? That's highly debatable and there's already a lot people have said about that in this thread.

But is the issue really about gender equality and dignity for all people? My answer is absolutely not. This is nothing more than a shallow appeal to the ideal of equality and dignity for the pursuit of cheap profits and political capital. "Look at us, look how nice we are towards women and how liberal we are, now give us your business and give us your political support". It's pandering at its finest. I never knew that being a woman was a physical handicap. You know what would make more sense? Preferential parking spaces for the elderly. But no, being nice to the elderly isn't sexy these days, being nice to women is.

In America, there is preferential parking for the elderly. They like to call them "handicap spots."

 

[mew_nani]

Why in the heck do women need special parking lots? We've dealt with unisex parking for about as long as automobiles and even horse-drawn carriages have been a thing, and so far women drivers have survived just fine. I just love how they dress them up in pink to make them scream at the top of their lungs, "GIRL!!," and that the only complaint has been the spaces are bigger and it implies girls are bad drivers. I'm pretty sure there's male drivers with giant vehicles that could use the wider parking spaces; I've driven an SUV as big as a full sized truck and it just barely fits in a parking space.

If the main issue is girls being assaulted in parking lots they need to rectify that with more lights and better security, not by segregating parking lots.

 

[Outlier]

I don't see how this accomplishes anything other than segregation. Sad to see this kind of stuff in Australia.