I go to a women’s only gym and I like it that way. However, I have not noticed any gyms just for males in my neighborhood and began to wonder if it was legal for them to exist. I know that there was once an all men’s business club in New York that was ordered to open its doors to women because women were being excluded from business deals. A 1989 NY Times Article stated: “An era has ended and a door has opened. The 10,000-member New York Athletic Club, which for 121 years has been a symbol of masculine exclusivity, has bowed to the forces of change and feminine scorn and agreed to accept women as members. When I searched on line I found a gym franchise called Cuts (Fox News on-line 3/06). It claims to be targeting males 16-64 who don’t feel in shape enough to want to exercise with women. It is similar to Curves for women – a 30 minute workout.
The reason for women’s only gyms has been said to be privacy issues. Harvard University has been shutting down their facilities to men recently for a few hours a week to accommodate women. Because of religious and cultural reasons, Muslim women cannot exercise comfortably in the presence of men and Harvard wishes to accommodate them.(Michigan Journal 3/08). “Coverage of women’s sports frequently focus more on women’s appearance than on their skills” (p.119). Many don’t want to think about their appearance in a gender specific gym and having a gym that is mixed would be difficult not to.
Personally, I don’t think we as a society have to always to be so politically correct. As long as people are comfortable with whichever gym variety they choose, they will get there more often. For those who would rather exercise with the opposite gender, there are always coed gyms.