I asked this in another thread but i dont think you have been back there since so i thought i would turn it into a new thread http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1932329&postcount=10
There are many services in universities that are used by only a small portion of the student body. Examples include employment services, financial support, counselling, child care, sports facilities, cinema and other entertainment, student clubs and societies, on-campus computing facilities, religious services. The assumption is that most students will use some services and not others. A user-pays system (which, by the way, is the philosophy behind VSU) doesn't work, because people are mostly selfish. They only want to pay for services they personally use. But in practice this means that the less "popular" services disappear, and all services become more expensive for individual users.
i realise that but the health services are widly used where as these are rarly used but still paid for. now i know services were removed because of VSU but when i asked why employment and health services were being removed while the fully stocked womens only facilities were staying they told me that they were forced to provide those by the goverment. So basically why am i paying for free coffee, books and whatnot for a VERY small percentage of the student population (most women wont even use these service, its only really women from other cultures who do) when one of the most widly used serices (the counciling services) are being cut back it seems stupid because where are we ment to go when we need achademic counciling seeing as those services were also done by the shrinks, not to mention the actual mental health services which they ran
i think the idea is so they dont feel harased, now for "westen" women its not really an issue and vertually none use it (except for the free coffeePlease Register or Log in to view the hidden image!), most of them go to the bar like the rest of us but for muslims and what not who dont want to be around men its fair enough. as i said its not the room itself its the fact that they are provided amenities which arnt avaliable to the general population
James R: The reality is that due to the fact that sex is an immutable characteristic, approximately 50% of the student body will not be able to use a particular service, due to their sex chromosomes. This wouldn't be such a problem if an equivalent service were provided for these 50% (ie. males), but no, of course not. So asguard, in his typical stumbling fashion, makes a good point. Why doesn't the government support services which are routinely taken advantage of by the general population (ie. general practitioners), while funding little organisations which exclude one gender? Asguard: They don't want to be around men? Poor babies!
MH firstly like anyone would want to be around you secondly not everyone has been brought up in as open a sociaty as we have. my sister wouldnt use something like that but then she is an assertive person (way more so than i am) who can look after her self However someone who has just got off the ship from sudan for instance after being raped and happens to be studying english here as part of there visa isnt going to be in the same situation as my sister is
So now you're bringing up rape victims from Sudan? How on earth is that relevant, when you yourself admitted that it was mainly Muslims who hung out in that room (with no mention of the Sudanese in particular?) If there are indeed rape victims from Sudan, they should be placed in support programs. Funding a women's only room on the off chance that the occasional woman who goes to it might have been raped/abused is bullshit, as we both know that mainly the women who go there are radical left wing feminist activitists, and Muslim women who don't like mingling with Western men (due to cultural reasons, as well as xenophobia). And would you support the notion of a 'whites only' room, on the off chance that whites who have been bashed and raped by blacks? Personally, I don't give a shit about women only clubs/services, as long as the student body isn't forced to pay for them. Bad enough that taxes pay for that bullshit.
actually i said it was mainly non eroupean desent females who use it. this includes refugees from all over the place
You should lobby your university for a men's room, if you feel strongly about it. My guess is that there isn't one because there is no demand for one.
actually james its not because there isnt a demand for one, there isnt actually that big a demand for a female room. as far as i was told its a legislitive REQUIREMENT placed on the student union to provide it. i could be miss informed and its a university requirement (i havent actually bothered to ask my sister if her uni has one or not) but i do know it was forced on the union to keep these facilities while services which have a wider use like health, student advocasy, employment and advocasy with departments like centerlink where simply shut down the first service to go (excluding clubs and socs) was the subsidesed physio. then the shrinks were cut down to 1 i think, then employment services were compleatly abolished (along with there finantial counciling and centerlink advocasy). i mean think about that cutting the shrinks who also handle not only mental illness but achademic counciling and mental health advocasy with the achademic staff. how is a student who needs extra time because of an illness (mental or physical they both go through the shrinks) surposed to deal with that? i think disability services are still avaliable but they only handle the long term issues like wheel chairs ect, not issues like depression or anxiaty
The services are probably different at different universities. I know that at least two universities in my state that have good counselling and employment services; they have not been cut following VSU. I have no direct knowledge of other places.
