Some conversations are long overdue. In this Elysium discussion, two women who’ve never been shy about speaking plainly sit down together: former Miss Great Britain and model-turned-commentator Leilani Dowding, and Elysium’s own beauty contributor, motivational speaker and confidence coach Mala Moonbeam. Their subject is one that has become among the most charged of our time — the right of women and girls to their own spaces. Across a frank exchange they touch on privacy, safety, fairness in sport and the creeping feeling that common sense has been shouted down. What follows is candid, warm and refreshingly unguarded: two women, talking as women, about where the line should sit and why it matters.
Why Sex-Based Spaces Matter
The debate around sex, gender and access to private spaces has grown louder and more fraught.
Cutting through the noise, a growing number of women are calling for something simple: a return to common sense, and a recognition that the privacy, safety and dignity of women and girls deserve to be protected.
This piece makes the case for maintaining sex-based spaces, and for the kind of open, respectful dialogue that lets society reach it.
Changing rooms, bathrooms, schools, hospital wards, refuges: these spaces have long been separated by sex for a reason: to give women and children privacy and a baseline sense of safety. When those boundaries blur, the result can be real discomfort, and in some cases genuine concern for safety.
Think of a spa, or a gym locker room. The expectation of privacy is the entire point. When that expectation is quietly removed, so is the security these spaces were built to provide. Protecting them isn’t about hostility toward anyone — it’s about upholding a woman’s right to a private, single-sex environment when she needs one.
Safeguarding Childhood
For many parents, the deeper worry is about children. Childhood should be a time for play, exploration and unhurried development. Introducing complex adult debates about identity too early can create confusion and anxiety where there needn’t be any.
Safeguarding, at its heart, means protecting children from life-altering decisions before they are emotionally or cognitively ready to make them, and giving them the space to grow into themselves without pressure. Helping a child feel at home in their own body is one of the most protective things the adults around them can do.
The Right to Disagree
In recent years, saying any of this out loud has come to feel risky!
The fear of backlash, or of being labelled unfairly, has quietened a lot of reasonable people. But when public debate narrows to a single acceptable opinion, society loses its ability to weigh the real-world consequences of new policies before they take hold.
True diversity includes diversity of thought.
Women should feel able to raise concerns about privacy, safety and fairness, whether in sport or in shared facilities, without being cast as bigots for doing so. Honest, civil disagreement isn’t the problem. It’s how we find solutions that respect everyone.
Standing Firm: The J.K. Rowling Example
No public figure embodies this stance more visibly than J.K. Rowling. Herself a survivor of domestic abuse and sexual assault, Rowling has channelled her platform, and a considerable amount of her own money, into practical support for women. In 2022 she founded and personally funds Beira’s Place in Edinburgh, a women-only sexual violence support service, staffed by women and delivered for women, created in response to a gap she saw for survivors who wanted single-sex care.
She has also backed the fight in the courts. Rowling reportedly donated around £70,000 to For Women Scotland’s legal campaign, which culminated in April 2025 when the UK Supreme Court ruled unanimously that “woman” and “sex” in the Equality Act refer to biological sex. Responding to the judgment, Rowling said the campaigners had “protected the rights of women and girls” across the UK.
Rowling continues to live under attack. Just days ago, in July 2026, Amnesty International UK named Beira’s Place in a report on what it calls the UK’s “anti-rights movement,” filing the centre alongside the campaign groups it accuses of undermining women’s and LGBT+ rights. There is something deeply upside-down about a human rights organisation branding a rape crisis centre built by a survivor, staffed by women, for women who have lived through male violence as “anti-rights”, as though offering traumatised women a male-free space were an act of oppression rather than protection. Following public outcry Amnesty retracted the report, but the fact this was published in the first place is telling.
What makes her example resonate is the refusal to be silenced. She has weathered sustained criticism and kept speaking, precisely the kind of open, unafraid dialogue this debate needs. Agree with her or not, she has widened the space for other women to say what they think.
Practical Steps for Advocacy
If you feel strongly about protecting privacy and safety in your own community, a few practical steps go a long way:
- Stay informed. Understand how local policies on school facilities, sport and community spaces are actually being managed.
- Engage respectfully. Keep the focus on the core issues — privacy, safety, fairness — and stick to the substance rather than the personal.
- Show up. School board meetings and community forums are where decisions get made. Advocacy works best when it’s calm, consistent and present.
- Ask for transparency. Encourage organisations to be open about their policies, and give clear, written feedback where one leaves you uncomfortable.
The movement to protect women’s spaces is, at it’s core, about safety, privacy and the wellbeing of the next generation. Society will keep evolving but we shouldn’t lose sight of the practical, everyday needs of women and children in the process. By keeping the conversation open and grounded in common sense, we can build communities that stay safe and respectful for everyone.
