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Feminism: Sex & gender discussions

Owen Jones. Again. This is re Kevin Spacey so some content warning.

63 replies

Elendon · 30/10/2017 19:48

This quote from the article he wrote makes me feel deeply uncomfortable. He is a Guardian Columnist. He is a champion for gay men and gay men only. His empathy doesn't extend to Lesbians in the Lgbtq rights.

It is a deeply personal moment, and only those who use their platforms to further the cause of homophobia (like secretly gay politicians who vote against LGBTQ rights) should be outed against their will.

So he calls for people to be outed against their will, if they are politicians? Has he lost the plot?

This is the article in full, if you can stomach it.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/oct/30/kevin-spacey-vicious-lie-gay-men-accusation-attempted-sexual-assault

What Kevin Spacey did was child abuse and came out as gay at the same time. Oh the horror. Being gay does not exclude you from the panoply of those who will and are inclined to abuse children.

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TheFallenMadonna · 30/10/2017 19:55

He didn't say gay politicians should be outed. He said that hypocritical politicians who vote against gay rights should be outed.

And he is making the point that many people conflate male homosexuals and child abusers. And Kevin Spacey's statement can be seen as playing right to that stereotype. I find it distasteful too.

HouseholdWords · 30/10/2017 20:12

Well, Owen Jones doesn't much care for women generally, it seems to me - or women's rights, at any rate - few political gay men do, in my experience (I lived in Sydney for a bit in the late 80s when the organisers tried to exclude lesbians from the annual Gay Mardigras party - because who wants women around?) And lesbians - well, what use are they? They don't even make good faghags

HouseholdWords · 30/10/2017 20:14

But he's right about the conflation of male homosexuality & child abuse - it is a vicious lie (except for those deranged men in the 70s who advocated boy love, or something nasty like that).

salmonofwisdom · 30/10/2017 20:17

Can you back up your reasoning for not liking him? What makes you dislike him so much? It seems that we need more voices speaking up in the LGBTQ+ community. (I'm just in the business of not trying to spread hate here)

HouseholdWords · 30/10/2017 20:17

OTOH, I think the political practice of "outing" is pretty nasty. But I can understand out gay/lesbian activists resenting those in the closet who are hypocrites and use their power to make life more difficult for out gays/lesbians.

HouseholdWords · 30/10/2017 20:18

Apols for multiple postsings I shouldn't really be here

KarlosKKrinkelbeim · 30/10/2017 20:22

This is rare for me but I actually don’t disagree with anything he has said here.
Wtf is this about spacey coming out anyway - I thought it had been known for years he was gay?

EvilRinguBitch · 30/10/2017 20:22

I'm not a huge fan of Owen Jones, but I think that if closeted gay or lesbian politicians are engaged in homophobic policymaking which is actively harmful to out lesbians and gay men then outing them is defensible.

DJBaggySmalls · 30/10/2017 20:26

Spacey seemed to be deflecting attention away from the accusation made against him. It was a bad time to announce he was coming out. He should have just dealt with the accusation.

'many people conflate gay men and child abuse' is NAGMALTing all over an allegation of child abuse. Owen can't give any examples from the UK, as sexual orientation is a protected characteristic and it would be treated as hate speech.
Owen Jones calls gender critical women 'terfs', even Lesbians; but if I remember rightly, he reserves the right to only have sex with men.

TheFallenMadonna · 30/10/2017 20:40

It's NAGMALTing over a response to an allegation of child abuse that basically says "I don't remember being a child abuser but yeah, actually I am gay".

Elendon · 30/10/2017 21:01

Yes I can. He dismisses the 'cotton ceiling' and yet is appalled at being asked to give cunnilingus.

In brief, Lesbians are really TERFS and the 'cotton ceiling' is a nonsense. To whit, Lesbians replied can you suck my clitoris if I'm trans? To whit, he was appalled at the very suggestion. To whit, he's not a very bright man.

He can never cover his tracks.

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Elendon · 30/10/2017 21:06

But it's no more than women who say 'rape, rape' or young women through themselves to the older, more powerful political man.

Basically, it is victim blaming. If coming out is so personal and such a big deal, you really can imagine that in order to stop yourself from doing such a deep and personal action that could have devastating consequences in your personal life, you may well sit in government and pass laws that go against the very grain of your being.

It's a highly unsympathetic outlook.

And understandable if you are beyond empathy and just say it anyway.

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QuentinSummers · 30/10/2017 21:12

It's NAGMALTing over a response to an allegation of child abuse that basically says "I don't remember being a child abuser but yeah, actually I am gay".
Yes I agree with this. I understood it as Spacey saying that he may have done tgis while drunk and may have done similar things, and by the way he's also gay. Trying to get all the skeletons out so he came be accused of covering up/subject to exposes in the future.
It does sound like he's dodgy as which is very disappointing but I don't think him officially coming out was avoidable really.
And yes some gay men are child abusers. Just like some straight men are child abusers. Duh.

TheFallenMadonna · 30/10/2017 21:14

I don't understand your argument, sorry.

QuentinSummers · 30/10/2017 21:15

Are you talking to me fallen?

TheFallenMadonna · 30/10/2017 21:16

X post. That was in response to Elendon's posts.

Elendon · 30/10/2017 21:22

I don't understand your post either TheFallenMadonna

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Elendon · 30/10/2017 21:24

Through should be throw. Perhaps that might help Fallen?

If you don't understand the argument, then what can I do?

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Datun · 30/10/2017 21:29

I don’t what Jones’ game is. No-one has started to attack gay men on the basis of linking Spacey allegedly assaulting a minor with the fact that he is gay.

In fact most people seem to be pointing out that they think it’s a deliberately cynical move to deflect from this alleged assault.

So why is Jones pretending that it’s a problem?

QuentinSummers · 30/10/2017 21:32

To be fair elendon it's taken me a few reads too.
Are you saying that you can understand why someone deeply in the closet may have internalized homophobia and there for pass homophobic laws?
And that these politicians deserve sympathy rather than forcible outing?
In which case I agree.
I do think forcible outing had it's place back in the day when so many were in the closet and homophobia was rife, i remember Peter Tatchell doing it and at the time thought it was out of order, now I think it helped advance gay rights by showing how gay people are in all walks of life and many in the closet.
But I think we've moved on now and it's no longer necessary

QuentinSummers · 30/10/2017 21:34

Actually having now read Jones' article I wonder if he can't deal with the attention #metoo is getting so he's deflecting and trying to make it about something else.

Datun · 30/10/2017 21:39

I bet you that homophobic bigots will use Spacey’s case to press the case that LGBTQ people threaten children. It will be used to justify oppression and mental and physical abuse.

This is coming across as a red flag to me.

Swap homophobic for transphobic and that is straight out of the transgender playbook. Is it a coincidence that the last few days have been full of mainstream media reporting unfavourably about the transing of children?

Jones can’t possibly think that Spacey’s announcement is going to result in oppression and violence towards gay men.

But the T in the LGBT will definitely come under the spotlight if the transing children stories carry on.

Is Jones deliberately blurring the lines between homosexual and transgender so that he can make one story fit a different narrative?

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hipsterfun · 30/10/2017 21:40

As deflections go, it’s not a very well thought through one, to say the least.

Ah well, too bad, Kevin.

QuentinSummers · 30/10/2017 21:47

Ooh interesting datun
I heard the guy who wrote this article on the radio earlier
www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.citizen-times.com/amp/812403001

And he started going on about precisely that. About how the conservative movement had always conflated paedophilia with LGBT rights and that's why the Bathroom Laws hadn't passed, because people were convinced that all trans people are predatory paedophiles.

When really, some males are predatory paedophiles, whether straight, gay or trans.

I wouldn't let my boy children into the gents alone when they were younger because of dodgy Men, I let my daughter go to the ladies alone when she was 7 in the supermarket and some man followed her in.

It's being male that's the predictor, not sexuality or gender identity.

Elendon · 30/10/2017 21:49

I think forcing people out is wrong, especially if it's such a deeply personal decision to come out.

He's not argued it well.

And yes to the inference that being gay is being sexually abusive to minors. It's an argument that is patently nonsense and does serve to deflect from the frightening amount of abuse that is endemic in society with older men and younger people.

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