https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_gentlemen%27s_clubs_in...
Male-only country clubs also exist although are slightly more controversial and less common, such as Burning Tree, Garden City, Butler National, Augusta National (until the last ~10 years), Pine Valley (until the last few years).
The unfortunate reality for most of us is that these places are among the most desirable and hardest clubs to be accepted to in the world - and we probably wouldn't get in.
They're expensive to run, so they often target a wealthier demographic who can pay.
Em. Nearly all clubs on that page that I checked are open to women or no longer exist.
Several appear to be women-only social clubs, placed on the page by mistake.
They can run into trouble when they allow the public to use their facilities, or grant membership so freely that they start to seem like they aren't really private.
For an example of gender discrimination at private golf clubs:
https://www.golflink.com/lifestyle/no-women-past-rock-chicag... lists Old Elm, Bob O'Link, Butler National, and Black Sheep Golf Club as four Chicago area male-only golf clubs.
> Perhaps no club makes its restriction more apparent than Black Sheep. At the end of the club’s lengthy driveway sits a large rock and the internal slogan amongst members is, “No Women Past the Rock.”
https://forums.golfwrx.com/topic/2013806-black-sheep-golf-cl... has a comment from last year verifying that gender restriction. I have not verified the others.
I say this as a former dude who has spent the vast, vast, vast majority of my life as a man, socializing with men and not-men, in public. I have never had a single issue.
I have seen this ever since the moment me and my friends hit puberty in high school, to this very day. When a group of men is hanging out they are more relaxed. The moment a woman is in the space the vibe changes
I cannot be the only person who has noticed this
A lot of people baulk at this sort of arrangement/tolerance - but I bet it's quite common.
The US marine corps noticed this and it was a huge point of contention (kind of still is).
> offensive to others
Sound like you have issues. It's a club. They meet up to play board games. Maybe you could start a club of people who are offended by everything.
They can, and thats not the point of having men’s groups and men’s spacing. This only reveals your assumptions and biases.
There needs to be some place men can just spend time with other men. Yes, it’s a problem if those men only places become important to business or politics such that it disadvantages women, but there’s got to be something else instead, then.
Women should also have places where they can be together without men.
And there should be a majority of places where men and women can spend time equally.
This is literally anytime, anywhere though. Do just not meet up with their friends? You can go to dinner, get drinks, go hiking, play sports, bike, ski, sunbathe, play videogames and many more things in single-sex groups without raising an eyebrow. The real classic for men of a certain persuasion from a western cultural POV is golf right?
I think there's some strange cultural hangup I'm missing where the entire place needs to be single-sex.
If one has never spent any time in all male spaces or has and thinks that men are defective women, like the average male therapist or counsellor this may not be obvious.
In the US by the 8th grade, 48 percent of girls receive a mix of A and B grades compared to 31 percent of boys. More tellingly, Boys account for 71 percent of all school suspensions. The gap remains through high school and in college, with females representing nearly 60 percent of all college graduates.
“If you treat girls as the gold standards and boys as defective girls, that’s going to be demoralizing,” Thompson says. “What do elementary and junior high girls always say about boys their age? ‘You are so immature.’ If that’s the norm, then this system is just rigged against the boys.”
There's a wonderful bit in a 2013 Time article which illustrates that this predominant viewpoint is often indelibly coded on the (majority female) teaching staff, to the grave detriment of the male students:
https://ideas.time.com/2013/10/28/what-schools-can-do-to-hel...
//Peg Tyre’s The Trouble With Boys illustrates the point. She tells the story of a third-grader in Southern California named Justin who loved Star Wars, pirates, wars and weapons. An alarmed teacher summoned his parents to school to discuss a picture the 8-year-old had drawn of a sword fight — which included several decapitated heads. The teacher expressed “concern” about Justin’s “values.” The father, astonished by the teacher’s repugnance for a typical boy drawing, wondered if his son could ever win the approval of someone who had so little sympathy for the child’s imagination. ... If boys are constantly subject to disapproval for their interests and enthusiasms, they are likely to become disengaged and lag further behind//
