Women pay the same, but aren't allowed Saturday Morning Tee Times....

[Fish]

There's a 30 minute buffer after our competitions which is the same as the men get after there times. Do the men not have a buffer at Nairn?

What happens if the first men's group out catches up with the last ladies, do they let them through?

When this lady first started going to social media months ago with this complaint, I asked her twice openly and once in a PM if she would give up the Ladies Day for inclusion of playing equally on Saturday's, she didn't respond! However, a member of Cotterill Park did respond to me and they (the ladies) voted to keep Ladies Day, thus reversing the 'equality' they are demanding!

At a previous club I went out on a Tuesday 30 minutes after (the buffer zone) the last ladies slot, which hadn't had any ladies go out for nearly an hour before but 3 always turned up right at the death so their slot couldn't be challenged and reduced! Anyway, we were catching them up quite quickly, even though we were a fourball and them a three, as I was walking down the 5th fairway, one of the ladies from that last group walked over from the 6th fairway going the other way and 'told us' to drop back! She said we had no right to push on them and make them hurry and they felt intimidated by us!! FFS, how much of a buffer did they need, and if they feel intimated by men nearby on a golf course, do they never play in mixed events and want sole use of the course for the day?

Where I am now we combine our Monthly Medal (strokeplay) comps with a board comp, whether it a qualifier to go through to a shorter field, matchplay knockouts or outright winner, this way the ladies can't enter, but I don't think any at ours would want to play anyway, they love their Tuesday's, it's well attended, they contribute throughout the club and we see them on Sunday's around our large roll-up, they are as quick as most men as they don't get in much trouble (looking for balls in trees) and they are quick to let you through if they see us coming up fast behind them. They do go out on Saturdays immediately after our last tee times, circa 3pm.

Personally and unfortunately, you'll have ladies like this one who simply want to kick up a storm but don't want to compromise, all this does is alienate and create more divides between ladies & men, who in the main, work and play well together, but I think this will scare a few sensitive committees and a few ladies will jump on the band wagon, but still won't compromise!

 

[chellie]

What happens if the first men's group out catches up with the last ladies, do they let them through?

No I don't think they would be let through. But then they wouldn't catch them up. The men however definately wouldn't let us through. It's the men's competition rounds that take ages at ours not the womens.

 

[Fish]

No I don't think they would be let through. But then they wouldn't catch them up. The men however definately wouldn't let us through. It's the men's competition rounds that take ages at ours not the womens.

The second sentence has nothing to do with the question.

The first sentence comes across as tit for tat and 2 wrongs don't make a right.

**you edited your first reply**

So, are you saying that a last group of 3 ladies who are happy to amble with no purpose, all chatting with each other going to each others ball and zigzagging up the fairways like a group of schoolkids chasing a football rather than going to each ball individually, almost in defiance, can hold up a course because, well just because they feel they can and to hell with general etiquette?

Surely this attitude only fans the flames and builds more walls of divide!!

 

[chellie]

The second sentence has nothing to do with the question.

The first sentence comes across as tit for tat and 2 wrongs don't make a right.

**you edited your first reply**

So, are you saying that a last group of 3 ladies who are happy to amble with no purpose, all chatting with each other going to each others ball and zigzagging up the fairways like a group of schoolkids chasing a football rather than going to each ball individually, almost in defiance, can hold up a course because, well just because they feel they can and to hell with general etiquette?

Surely this attitude only fans the flames and builds more walls of divide!!

But we don't have groups of women at ours who play like that.

And my first reply was edited as I said they wouldn't be let through as they wouldn't catch up.

 

[bobmac]

Isn't life a compromise?
Sure, we would all like to get our own way all the time but why should everyone else bend over backwards to satisfy one person.

Cottrell Park has two 18 hole courses so I'm sure there is room for everyone.

 

[Fish]

But we don't have groups of women at ours who play like that.

And my first reply was edited as I said they wouldn't be let through as they wouldn't catch up.

Well your club's ladies must be unique compared to many others, which is good if that's the case. However, other clubs I've been a member of, not my current club, certainly played like that and displayed that poor attitude, just like this lady in the OP is, she wants, wants, wants but doesn't want to compromise the Ladies Day to get what she calls equality, and yet wants to reverse it in the ladies favour?!

If we are to have gender free tee's, open comps at weekends, then what of Formby with divided clubhouses and even Formby Ladies as a named golf course? I'm sure there are many other examples..

I'm not against inclusion in any way, but the pendulum has to swing both ways..

 

[simmb]

Well your club's ladies must be unique compared to many others, which is good if that's the case. However, other clubs I've been a member of, not my current club, certainly played like that and displayed that poor attitude, just like this lady in the OP is, she wants, wants, wants but doesn't want to compromise the Ladies Day to get what she calls equality, and yet wants to reverse it in the ladies favour?!

If we are to have gender free tee's, open comps at weekends, then what of Formby with divided clubhouses and even Formby Ladies as a named golf course? I'm sure there are many other examples..

I'm not against inclusion in any way, but the pendulum has to swing both ways..

Fish has pointed out what all the news articles are failing to tell people, the other side of the story. The majority of the Women at Cottrell Park don't want to change and voted against the movement because they enjoy the current setup.

 

[Fish]

Fish has pointed out what all the news articles are failing to tell people, the other side of the story. The majority of the Women at Cottrell Park don't want to change and voted against the movement because they enjoy the current setup.

The next story will be, that if the ladies who are happy with their defined Ladies Day and who don't necessarily want to play on Saturday comp days at the expense of loosing that Ladies Day as a compromise, will vote her out of the club, blackball her as she's bringing unnecessary attention and unwarranted negative attention to the ladies membership who are mainly happy with the status quo, and have voted as such!

I'm confident that if the ladies lost their ladies day at the expense of being able to play on Saturdays amongst the men, a lot of ladies would leave, and for what?

This is a single crusade, as the democratic voting system at the clubs EGM has proved imo. The 'club' can do no more than put the 'complaint' to the membership and vote.

whilst many on here are in support of her crusade, I'm pretty confident in ballots across the country the same results would be seen, at most if not all your clubs, as I don't think ladies would vote positively to lose their Ladies Day just to play on Saturdays, and they simply can't keep it to play on Saturday morning comp days.

They pay the same and have the same restrictions, in that, men can't play on Tuesdays at a time period defined by the percentage of the ladies playing in their comps on that given day and the ladies can't play on Saturday mornings by the same degree.

It's an equal compromise, you cannot undo one without the other!!

 

[Ross61]

At our place the ladies can play when they want at weekends except during a men’s comp that is usually starts at 7:30 and is followed by a ladies comp at about 11:00.
Ladies have a block booking of 4 tee slots on Wednesday morning that also has some comps during it.
We don’t have many ladies though at a guess less than 10% of membership.Those that do are probably faster than the men.

The ladies actively encourage mixed events that they organise with regular mixed friendly comps, and we also have intersection ( men’s, juniors, seniors and ladies) team events.

the winter league,Texas scrambles and several others are mixed events.

 

[simmb]

Our mixed knockout has been cancelled this year due to lack of interest, can't help but think all this controversy has just created a divide between the Ladies and Men's section. It's such a shame as the mixed Knockout is a board competition and normally has a good take up.

 

[Deleted member 15344]

Within clubs people need to take the first step towards making clubs as inclusive as possible

Whilst at the moment clubs will have ladies who are more than likely retired and are happy just playing on the Tuesday or wed or whenever during the week

But golf is looking to bring in more ladies from all ages and also couples and ladies that still work that means clubs need to allow for them at the weekends

So what we did was open up all our medals and Stablefords and KO etc to everyone so at the weekend anyone can play whenever they want if in a Comp , if there is no Comp then the tee is available for all - there will be the odd restricted club Comp during the weekend

The next step is to open up the midweek medals to all as well

And then the final step will be to open up the ladies medals and Stablefords to all on a Tuesday

Step one has been done and you get a good amount of working ladies or younger ladies playing on a Saturday or a Sunday either socially or in a Comp - they have also formed their own mini rolls ups and are creating no issues

The midweek comps right now won’t be changed - because the ladies won’t allow it , the ones that play on the Tuesday don’t want men to play within their comps so on a Tuesday they close both tees for of the day for about 40 of them - it causes a lot of resentment from the rest of the club but right now the ladies have zero to complain about at the club but it’s now up to them to change and to develop their membership and branch out - it won’t happen soon though because there are still plenty of old school ladies within the section. They currently have managed to turn back two social comps from “open to all pairs” to Mixed only so the Comp has gone from having 60 pairs play to currently the same old husband and wife combos you see and that’s currently 4 pairs.

A lot of changes need to be made within golf clubs and a lot of the time it’s from the ladies

 

[Blue in Munich]

When this lady first started going to social media months ago with this complaint, I asked her twice openly and once in a PM if she would give up the Ladies Day for inclusion of playing equally on Saturday's, she didn't respond! However, a member of Cotterill Park did respond to me and they (the ladies) voted to keep Ladies Day, thus reversing the 'equality' they are demanding!

Reminds me of part of the reason I left a previous club. If it's equality then everyone has equal rights every day. But it appears that equality to some people means being more equal than others.

My issue with all of this is that a golf club is not an essential service; if the complainant has being denied access to healthcare for instance on the grounds of gender, race or sexual orientation I fully agree that it is discrimination and it is wrong & indefensible. But this is a club which she has chosen to join; surely she checked the Terms & Conditions before joining, and if she didn't like it she was free to try to negotiate herself a better deal or take her business elsewhere?

I suppose that technically I'm only a six and a half day member at my club as I can't play on Tuesday morning as it's Ladies Day. I knew that when I joined and was quite happy to join on that basis. I have little sympathy for her.

 

[simmb]

I managed to get a bit more information on this, so out of 34 Ladies 31 voted against gender neutral competitions, 2 voted for and there was 1 abstention. More Ladies attended the meeting than men so if they wanted the motion to be passed they could have easily got the majority. Shame the BBC did not get all the facts before they pulled out the discrimination card.

 

[Fish]

I managed to get a bit more information on this, so out of 34 Ladies 31 voted against gender neutral competitions, 2 voted for and there was 1 abstention. More Ladies attended the meeting than men so if they wanted the motion to be passed they could have easily got the majority. Shame the BBC did not get all the facts before they pulled out the discrimination card.

Hence my comments, I knew about this in some detail as it’s been rumbling on for a few months now, she just obviously wants to be the centre of attention, but with the constant rants on social media and now in the national press, she must be as popular as thrush at her Club!

 

[huds1475]

Isn't life a compromise?
Sure, we would all like to get our own way all the time but why should everyone else bend over backwards to satisfy one person.
.

What I was trying to say last night, but booze didn't help the articulation!

Think you & Mr Fish have it spot on.

Equality is great, and something I fully support. Using 'equality' as a stick to drive an agenda is wrong diddly wrong.

 

[simmb]

Oh my word just heard on the grape vine that this story may take yet another twist. Seems like democracy is now a thing of the past at Cottrell and dictatorship may now be the way forward. Will post more when I know for sure.

 

[louise_a]

We are still to some extent old fashioned, ladies day is Thursday with reserved tees from 10am - 11.30am and 2pm - 3.30pm, although you can play at other times and enter the weekly comp.
Wednesday is mens midweek comp day and tees are reserved from 10am to around 5pm. Saturday is mens weekend comp and the tee is booked until 3.30pm. Men also have the tee reserved until 11 on a sunday.
Ladies can play an alternative day comp on Saturday after 4pm and we do have 1 comp on a Saturday and 7 singles and mixed on a Sunday afternoon.
So on balance ladies membership is a kind of 5 day, but we can play on the others day as long as its out of the mens comp period, but we do pay around 75% of the mens fee

It does work for us, however we are getting more working ladies joining so things may have to change.

 

[Junior]

We don’t have ladies/gents/seniors membership. I didn’t think this was allowed anymore? We have 5 day , 6 day and 7 day and reductions in each category for students.

6 day members can play on non competition days at the weekend. There are around 6 x 7 day lady members and they get a slot in the centre of the gents competition on the weekend. Ladies day is in a Thursday and the tee is booked from 9 till 12. This causes a bit of a stir as obviously no gents can play at this time.

The only fix is to have mixed competitions on Saturdays. Sunday’s and Thursdays but sadly the ladies don’t want this and prefer instead to have their own competiton.

 

[Jacko_G]

It's not about women playing with men or vice versa, it's about having the right to play on the course as equals. If a Club has a category of Ordinary member, open to both men and ladies, both should have equal playing rights on the course. The days of Thursday being Ladies day should be long gone IMO. How are we expecting young teenage girls to play golf if they see barriers to playing ahead of them ? The restricted ladies membership categories will die out as their members pass on. Time will tell, but, if we don't accept change on this front, we are seriously reducing the chances of golf being able to attract younger people.

I'm going to challenge you on this DCB. At a previous club of mine I couldn't play in a ladies medal between 10-1130 on a Sunday nor could I play on a Thursday between 1000-1100 and 1630-1730 which were specific ladies medal/competition times reserved for the ladies section.

I was not allowed to enter these. Ladies had the right to enter a men's monthly medal if they so desired.

I nor did anyone else claim we were being discriminated against. I just find a lot of these stories carry a lot of weight which when striped back reveals a lot of noise about nothing. I'm not saying in this case that the ladies don't have a right to question how the club is being run but I'm confident that there will still be a good number of clubs where males are unable to enter ladies competitions yet ladies can get a tee time in a "men's" monthly medal.

 

[DCB]

Jacko_G, The situation you describe has to be down to the club and the way they run their comps. Not ideal for anyone really other than the ladies who want to play in their own wee bubble. Going from other posts on here it does indeed look as if it is the ladies who have created their own wee bubble and want to live within that. To me that is not going to help the long term future of club golf. The traditional ladies day for ladies competition is great for women who are not working and can play on a thursday morning, have lunch and then head home. Trouble is, nowadays we have a lot of ladies who work and the chances they have to play in competition are greatly reduce if ladies comps aren't played at weekends.

Clubs are going to have to change the way they have run all their competitions in the coming years, what used to work years back will not necessarily be the ideal model going forward. It will take time, but, in ten year the Mixed Medal tee booking will be far more common, the men will play their medal and the ladies will play theirs, on the same day in the same time slot.