Virgin Active is a chain of health clubs in South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, Italy, Australia, Singapore, Thailand and the United Kingdom. Picture: Leon Lestrade / Independent Newspapers.
South Africa’s popular gym company, Virgin Active, has announced its exit from social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.
This comes after the company announced earlier this year that trans people would be able to use changing rooms which aligned with their legal gender.
"Virgin Active is committed to creating safe and inclusive spaces for all of our members. To ensure we achieve this, access to change rooms must correspond to a member's legal gender identity. We welcome members of the transgender community at all our clubs and allow those who have completed their full medical transition to access bathrooms that correlate with their changed legal gender," said the company on X.
Virgin Active further said, “Male members cannot access female-only spaces if they are still in transition. To ensure that we maintain this policy, members who have completed their transition must provide official identification documents reflecting their changed gender, issued by an appropriate authority. We also provide special needs/gender-neutral ablutions and facilities at most of our clubs for those who prefer a private space to change.”
Following this announcement, the company was met with heavy backlash on X, with many threatening a boycott of the company, on the basis of Virgin Active not protecting female customers.
Following the controversy around the topic, the company announced on Wednesday that it would be deactivating its X accouint.
Virgin Active said in a tweet, “We need to talk. About you. When we first met, you were sharp, witty & playful. We were literally obsessed. But you’ve changed. Slowly shapeshifting from a social platform into a seething, malignant cesspool over time. We’ve come to realise that we want different things.”
“We want our community to feel safe, healthy and positive and you prefer drama, conflict and negativity. So, we will be ending this toxic situationship on 30 June and taking things to the next level on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and LinkedIn. It’s not us, it’s you,” the company further stated.
Hey @X, we need to talk. About you. When we first met, you were sharp, witty & playful. We were literally obsessed. But you’ve changed. Slowly shapeshifting from a social platform into a seething, malignant cesspool over time. We’ve come to realise that we want different things. pic.twitter.com/lVoDVFhfvY
— Virgin Active (@virginactiveSA) June 26, 2024
Many users reacted to the company’s announcement being baffled.
Take a look at some of the reactions below:
Is this for real? 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
— Johann Biermann 🇿🇦 (@JohannBiermann1) June 26, 2024
This is weird. From a brand. Very, very weird.
— Thando (@AmbiguiTeePee) June 26, 2024
Cancelled every gym membership for my entire family. Frankly, Virgin, it's you who have morphed into an entity incapable of distinguishing reality from fantasy, and you utterly fail to ensure the safety of women, thereby becoming a seething, malignant cesspool. The iron law of…
— Gregory Gravett (@gregorycgravett) June 26, 2024
Elon Musk Please come this Side @elonmusk
— The Unique 1 (@LevyMakwala) June 26, 2024
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