Women aren't men without penises.
An analysis of my completely maddening phone call with the manager of a trendy co-working & exercise space in Tel Aviv
I really wish this wasn’t still happening.
Why are women expected to get naked in front of men who may or may not have had their penises chopped off? Will this insanity ever end?
*Please note: It is legal in Israel to record a phone conversation if at least one participant is aware.
Below is an excerpt from my recorded conversation with the manager of Beit Hanna Harabi. Full 13 min conversation you’ll find later in this piece…
Why do stylish co-working spaces hate women?
Before Beit Hanna there was The Wing.
Pictured: The Wing founders Audrey Gelman (left) and Lauren Kassan (right) with Hillary Clinton (center)
The Wing was a fancy short-lived “women’s” social club co-founded by Lena Dunham’s childhood bestie, Audrey Gelman.
The social club was known for its Planned Parenthood sponsored events, Hillary Clinton appearances, and lectures with the pro-porn, pro-sex buying Swedish pornographer, Erika Lust.
It was a liberal feminist oasis.
The only problem was that I had started to unravel the tenets of liberal feminism in the middle of my membership.
I had a brief stint in believing in the concept of ‘feminist porn’ and ‘ethically made porn’ and attended the lecture by Erika Lust at The Wing’s Dumbo, Brooklyn location circa 2018. My disembodied flirt with Lust’s pornography inspired me years later to invite sex-industry expert Samantha Berg to teach the class: Getting Real About Porn: Examining the Industry of Anti-Woman Propaganda. The class is available here and packed with essential information for women unpacking the harms of pornography.
In 2018, the alleged woman-only space was sued by a man named James E. Pietrangelo for its “exclusionary policies”. The official practice of “banning men” from the space was dropped in 2019 after Pietrangelo filed his $12 million gender discrimination lawsuit.
Ironically, The Wing was never actually a woman-only space.
The Wing allowed men with sex-delusions to become members from its inception. I’ll never forget the first time I saw Hari Nef in the space. Hari Nef is a male celebrity and former Wing member who impersonates women. He acts, he models and has had tons of plastic surgery including the removal of his penis.
Pictured: Hari Nef before and after surgery & estrogen
Women flocked to him, admiring him, complimenting him et al. Nothing screams internalized misogyny like women asking men with sex delusions for hair and makeup tips.
Another memory resurfaced during the writing of this substack. I witnessed a female receptionist at The Wing’s soho location, loudly chase off a hispanic delivery man who innocently tried to enter the main space to drop off a package.
So what happened to The Wing?
In 2020 Audrey Gelman was accused of racism and forced to step down as CEO. Two years later, the company ceased operations. The Wing controversy should have been my lesson in never trusting beautifully designed co-working spaces with shinny interiors, 1950s style vanities and tampon dispensers to uphold women’s sex based rights.
Fast forward to 2025 — I’m not in Kansas anymore
“Isabella, this is Tel Aviv.” -Manager at Beit Hanna
I grew up in Greenwich Village. I went to an elitist art school. I’m aware of the new cultural norm to erase women. Men invading women’s spaces becoming common, doesn’t make it just or in some cases legal.
WhatsApp Messages
I think the messages speak for themselves but I would like to point out the choice to include two blushing face emojis 😊😊 after telling me that men DEFINITELY use the women’s changing rooms. Totally sinister.
Full phone conversation
Unpacking the Phone Conversation:
Isabella, did something happen to you in the showers?
The manager opens the call asking me to explain what happened in the showers. Later in the call she expresses confusion, again asking me to tell her what I saw. To be clear: Nothing happened in the showers (to me) because I saw the warning signs and refused to enter the showers.
The mere presence of men (castrated or not) in a woman-only space is wrong. People who believe in gender ideology try to search for a punch or a rape to make it wrong, but the assault actually begins the moment a man enters the room.
During my first day at the Beit Hanna co-working space, I saw a man with lots of plastic surgery, on estrogen working at the cafe’. He was wearing a black sports bra and matching skin-tight shorts. It’s reasonable to assume that he takes classes in the studio since he was wearing a workout outfit. I explain my train of thought to the manager very calmly and clearly but she seems to want to find evidence of what she considers a real man invading the women’s locker rooms. There are moments in the call where she takes on a faux protective/shock response. I perceive it as such; she attempts to care about my sex based rights, in a sloppy customer service sort of way but as soon as she realizes I won’t join her in her -men without penises are women- misogynistic fantasy, she loses interest and wraps up the call.
I encourage all women to verify the spaces they use, are actually women-only before handing over their credit card info. Don’t wait until you’re naked to find out a space allows men in the women’s locker rooms.
Beit Hanna’s Reality Phobic Company Policy
The manager insists the company policy is “very very clear and simple: If some boy make some changes, you know like transgender and he doesn’t have like, any more penis” he is allowed to use the women’s restrooms and changing rooms.
She repeats: “If some man make change, and he is like a woman now, and he don’t have a penis, so yeah it’s like a woman.” “We at Hanna House, we accept everybody.”
Translation: We don’t care if you as a woman don’t want to be naked in front of a castrated man. We at Hanna House believe men have the right to use the women’s locker rooms. We would prefer you get naked in front of men and accept this as the new norm.
We want you to pretend our male employees who have their penises cut off are women, just like you!
“I see him as a woman”
When referring to the male cafe’ worker, the manager says “I see him as a woman.” “He’s not a man anymore.” Why does the manager insist a man with his penis cut off is a woman? I wish I had asked her: Why do you see your reflection in a castrated man? Where is your dignity? Matching pilates outfits ≠ a female sex characteristic.
A prior incident the manager alludes to
Did the manager accidentally reveal that I’m not the first woman to call attention to their anti-woman company policy? What happened in the showers? What just happened “only one time?”
(4:12) “I tell you the truth, this has happened to us just one time and we know this is a woman. So I don’t think it is a problem because I know this is a woman.”
I think it’s obvious at this point that the “woman” she’s referring to is a man. Could there have been another woman brave enough to call out a man showering in the locker rooms at Beit Hanna? Brave woman: if you’re out there PLEASE CONTACT ME.
Later in the conversation, she backtracks.
(4:34) “We…it never happened to us, something like this.”
The Refund
I got the refund, after they accidentally charged me again. I won’t be returning to Beit Hanna despite the manager’s insistence that I would be really comfortable there.
Is transgender ideology that bad in Israel?
Yes. And it’s all happening under the radar with no public debate. Learn everything you need to know about the erasure of women’s sex based rights, a 5000% rise in male castrations and the mutilation of healthy children’s bodies in the Whose Body Is It podcast episode no. 98 with Dr. Tal Croitoru. Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or watch on Youtube.
I want to hear from you, wise women
What would you have done in my shoes?
If you could say something to the manager what would it be?
Let me know in the comments.
How I will be addressing all future memberships prior to signing. Thank you Isabella.
“He’s a woman Isabella.” 😅