AIBU to consider leaving our knitting group over its new policy?

We're all people but not all people are women. We're all animals too but I wouldn't be able to take my pets to the doctors when they're ill, they go to the vets.
Men also can have their own support groups. I have no problem not letting me in

Apologies if someone else has already suggested it (I've only read your posts in my lunchbreak), but could you suggest, that as this could be a significant change to the group, that there is an anonymous vote by your members, to decide whether this should go ahead?

After all, it's a big group & one person should not be making decisions for everyone else.

DO NOT let the new Chair count the vote, unless it is done in front of the whole group.

Op is considering trans women to be men, she said if you want to invite men then invite them all. Not just those who identify as women. But fundamentally invite any men changes the dynamic of the group and some members will be uncomfortable. She never said trans men aren't welcome as they are biologically women

Not if you're like OP and those sharing her views though - there's a lot coming at the situation from the view that they're "performing woman face" and get offended as they feel mimicked, and/or that they're sexual fetishists.
So they don't want them around.
Others coming at it with the view that we're all people, don't see a problem and find it daft that some are OK with men in the group, and women, but just not trans women.
It's the definition of othering and prejudice. "I don't mind men being in the group. Or women. Just not you."

No. There's an honesty in the first point, not the second. A mixed group would be ok but she might choose not to go or to go, and to set up another women's group if she doesn't want to. A group that claims to be for women and isn't is just lying and I get that.

So suggest that. Anyone welcome.

But she started in her opening post with I don't want men. Then changed tune to men would be OK
So if men would be OK and women would be OK surely one claiming to be the other would also be OK

No she specifically went from I don't want men to I'd be open to having men in the group and I know a few transmen and they're OK but she definitely doesn't want transwomen
I wasn't talking about groups in general I was talking about her knitting group and her attitude

But, as @BillieWiper said: "I don't know how she intends to market the group specifically to trans people? In most areas of the UK they really are very few and far between".

I am assuming the group does not currently advertise for new members - I don't think @Solentseeker has said. I suppose they could start advertising, specifically in order to state transwomen are welcome, but if they don't need more members to pay the hall rent, why advertise at all?

Assuming that it is the case that they don't need new members, raising the issue of transwomen is just displaying politics for the sake of it; virtue signalling.

Ask for a vote on the topic.

Women claiming to be men are women, so fine.

If it is opened as a mixed sex group then also fine, she can decide if she wants to leave and/or set up a women's group. Which would include transmen if they wanted to join. She may not want to leave, but it needs to be honest about what it is.

That's how I read it.

No.
If it's a women's group-
Women = ok
Transmen = ok
Non binary biological women = ok
Men, non binary biological men and trans women = not ok

If it's becomes a unisex group-
all= ok

But if it changes from a women's group to a uni sex group the women should be able to vote. It's shouldn't be a stupid hybrid situation

But she's OK with trans men
So if I've got this right...
Women = OK
Men = OK (just not at the start of the thread)
Women claiming to be men = OK
Men claiming to be women = not OK

Knitting is knitting. However, there being a club for women doesn’t exclude anyone else from knitting or starting/joining a club that isn’t specifically for women.

OP, I am in an organisations for women that includes transwomen (in a male dominated field). The TW dominate every meeting/group they are part of and its so tedious and depressing.

And that's fine, but only transmen if it's called a 'women's group', and if they want to admit transwomen then it needs not to specify it's a women's group. And they should vote on that. Anonymously, so they aren't browbeaten or embarrassed by the new leader.

The group can already include people who are trans. Transmen are welcome.

Not everything is about making men feel special.

I had this happen in a group I ran. It folded as the original women felt they couldn't discuss 'woman' things. The 'man' always pushed the conversation around to their own needs.

In hindsight, I wish we had voted new members in. Then we could have voted them out. Could this be an option?

Exactly
She's no idea what she wants.
Just an argument by the look of it

Troll hunting is against the rules of Mumsnet. Cringe.

I agree, but given the new leader, practically, that's not going to happen.

Or maybe she's just wanting the group to include people who are trans too and wants them to know that they'd be welcome ( as evidenced by this thread, some are hostile to their very being even if they haven't done anything.)
Not everything's "virtue signalling."

Yeah it sounds daft really. They should have said 'my mate Brenda, who's a trans woman, wants to join, is this ok?'
Rather than claiming they want to advertise to trans people specifically across god knows what platforms.

If pressed on the reasoning/meaning behind it the chair might find herself a bit embarrassed.

It's already set up as a women's knitting group, it was founded on this principle.
Therefore, the ones who are happy for the group to be open to all, are the ones who should leave and set up their own group.

It needs to be a group decision, not a chair's decision. Then you'll know what to do.

I think I would quietly leave, not giving reasons and then keep an eye on what happens with the group.