Open letter from survivors of male violence

[PeakPants]

fovas.wordpress.com/

Showing that any research into this absolutely must consult the female users of these services. Not the staff who are terrified of Stonewall campaigning to have their funding removed, but the actual women who have fled violence and are trying to rebuild their lives.

fovas.wordpress.com/

This is astonishing, it also needs a wider audience outside of FWR.

I agree - that is really powerful & should go beyond FWR.

Reading that, you really have to wonder about women's organisations not standing up for women in this climate. It's absolutely shameful that so many are like this.

I've posted the link on AIBU.

See "AIBU to think this might clarify"

Wow. A hugely powerful letter and the testimonies afterwards are hugely affecting. I'm going to send this to my MP.

I hope it’s ok for me to share this and quote from it, it coincides with something I’m working on. Thank you for posting it.

SturdyEarmuffs

Do you have a link? I can’t find it.

Is it possible to sign it ?
Very distressing read. My only criticism I should that it says that more women are killed than trans people, but doesn’t state the enormous difference, or that statistically in the U.K. a transwoman is More likely to be a murderer than to be murdered.

Shall we send a link to our mps and does anyone have a draft letter?

Here you go Having https://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/amibeing_unreasonable/3340943-aibu-to-think-this-might-just-clarify

Fucking hell. Why is no one listening? We should have a new #.

#listen to women.

I wrote to my MP, and asked her to pass it to the Minister. I received a letter back from PM, but it was the usual bullshit she has been spouting about being inclusive and the exemptions in the EA, which I said would mean nothing if anyone could be a woman.

My MP seemed more sympathetic, but very vague. Perhaps she is one of the gender critical MPs who fear speaking out. I don't know.

I have cried before work, that is not good. For all those women, we have to make this fucking thing not happen.

I am so angry with these fucking men who think they can waltz into women's spaces on their say so....spaces that have been FOUGHT tooth and nail for by women FOR women! What kind of fucking man thinks he has the right to treat vulnerable women like this, to cause them more untold distress and then try to turn it around on women being bigoted? Fuck me..for women to have to practically beg women's organisations to keep them safe from rotten men who wish to distress them, it makes me hate them and hate these men.

I hate these men who are doing this to women, especially women who have been victims of male violence. They're sadistic.

And for MPs and women's organisations and retail companies etc to pander to these disgusting men who seek to infiltrate women's spaces...they're equally as evil.

Hate the organisations that are doing this to women, I mean!! Bastards.

I agree with you CountryGirl. Stonewall and the like are metaphorically pissing all over women's rights. Their misogyny is so evident. They care only about men's rights to be what they want and to go where they want. There is so much evidence of men's violence against women and virtually none to say that trans women suffer the same. Yet women are the ones that are labelled bigoted while trans women are the real victims. As for a male person's 'right' to work in a refuge- words fail me.

Wow, that is incredibly powerful. Humbling, distressing, infuriating.

I know very little, beyond public knowledge, about rape refuges. But I was struck when someone told me they are frequently more like a witness protection programme than anything else you might imagine.

The concepts of a safe house and complete anonymity, being key.

That the women are often fleeing a life. Not just a person.

I think a lot of these transactivists imagine it's more along the lines of a therapists/police interview room.

I read that moderating one's voice, keeping the tone low and even, not even laughing too loud, not slamming doors, and wearing soft soled shoes so as to minimise footsteps, are all crucial.

The opposite of forceful, loud, domineering, male.

I can't help hoping that the refuges themselves are complicit in this letter. If their funding is being threatened on the basis of them allowing access to men, this letter will only be beneficial for them.

I'm hoping, but I'm not convinced.

What an absolutely disgraceful, unimaginable state of affairs this is.

But I was struck when someone told me they are frequently more like a witness protection programme than anything else you might imagine.

They are exactly like that. And it's practical stuff as well as behavioural rules. No shopping online and getting stuff delivered, for example.

Stonewall and the like are metaphorically pissing all over women's rights. Their misogyny is so evident. They care only about men's rights to be what they want and to go where they want. There is so much evidence of men's violence against women and virtually none to say that trans women suffer the same. Yet women are the ones that are labelled bigoted while trans women are the real victims. As for a male person's 'right' to work in a refuge- words fail me.

This. I read the letter last night. So powerful.

This story in the footnotes is a very succinct summary of the issues:

“I would ask you to consider why women are oppressed by men. Why they are the object of so much sexual and physical violence. Because it is NOT because we identify as women. The oppression of women is the oppression of a class with shared biological characteristics. We are oppressed with sexual violence because women have vaginas. We are oppressed with domestic violence because biologically, men are physically stronger than women. And men learn to oppress women socially. It isn’t something they are born with a desire to carry out… they are taught by their parents, their peers, their idols, that dominating women is an acceptable – even desirable – behaviour.

Transwomen are socialised as males. They are taught misogyny in the same way that other men are, and the idea that they can escape that socialisation is as ridiculous as the idea that there is a man on this earth who is not, in some way, sexist without intention. Privilege is being blind to the things that do not affect you, or pertain to you, in any way. No, I do not trust transwomen not to assault women. But even if I did, does it matter? I will never trust men, and the proposed changes to the legislation surrounding gender identity will make it easier for men to infiltrate safe spaces for women as women. I’m told that this is not a concern that I should worry about, but how many times have we seen violent men in prisons attempt to identify as women so that they may be transferred to female prisons? It is not a new concept to posit that men pose a threat to female people. It is entirely rational for women to be afraid of males in spaces that are supposed to be safe. And whether or not people are inclined to agree with it that includes natal males who now identify as women. I will not apologise for the fear I feel as a consequence of male behaviour. That is not my burden to bear.“

That the women are often fleeing a life

This is what trans activists demand of every BAME woman when they tell her that her religion is bigoted. they demand that she leave her family, her husband, her children, her religion, her community and her culture. Because when you live within a strict culture, you don't get to pick and choose which parts of your culture or religion you adhere to.

They are causing a large scale fragmentation not just of women's rights, but of our cultures and networks.

And they only attack the women. They never criticise the religions, or the men who demand, expect and enforce compliance.

To sign the letter email here. [email protected].

UpstartCrow: But surely criticising a religion as "bigoted" is very un-woke, is it not? Aren't we supposed to support people's right to a religious identity? Or only up to the point where it clashes with men's rights to be called women?

My signature is on that letter.

I have recently completed EMDR in order to try and stop the absolute fear of male voices raised in anger, of drunken male voices and of men with zero regard for my admittedly large circle of personal space. On the whole it's worked, but even now, hearing a male voice, smelling a male smell in a space that I expect to be male person free causes me enormous anxiety to the extent that I doubt I ill be able to return to certain places again.

It makes no difference to my adrenal response whether or not the owner of the male voice believes they are not male. Self-ID will reify public space as male space.

, Melanippe.

Mel, thank you. I am so sorry and I HOPE with all my might you and all women are heard now.

It makes no difference to my adrenal response whether or not the owner of the male voice believes they are not male. Self-ID will reify public space as male space.

This