@KateMumsnet - We definitely have not issued a general invitation to Twitter to report transphobic posts.
Here are some screenshots of the MNHQ twitter account issuing a general invitation to Twitter to report transphobic posts. Like I said, we're loyal but we're not stupid. Also we can read.
As I said above, we use exactly the same judgment in considering whether posts break TGs wherever they're reported and whoever they're reported by.
There have been lots of posts deleted over the last few days that would have stood even a couple of months ago. Dictionary definitions of 'woman' and 'female', harmlessly flippant comments like 'bless' and 'yawn' and 'who?', posts respectfully discussing the (widely published and endorsed by the family involved) content of popular TV shows.
I've been most alarmed by the deletions on the thread about the tactics of paedophile organisations.
Many of us who were around in the 70's and 80's remember very well how PIE attached themselves to LGB and managed to normalise child sex abuse to a frightening degree. Those people didn't go away when PIE got dropped from the party invitations, neither did they stop recruiting new paedophiles. They've just updated their tactics for the 21st century.
If this discussion is shut down we will repeat the same mistakes and more children will be harmed.
It's an uncomfortable conversation, just as it was for LGB in the PIE days. It can't be shut down though, not if we are committed to children's welfare, which I assume we are, given this is a parenting website.
More to the point - in involving twitter, a very different process of reporting is in place. Confidentiality is gone. Doxxing is encouraged. I have read that the MN transphobia account blurs out user names. They might as well not bother while MNHQ are suggesting to them that their screenshots would be more useful if they included a link.
This is not moderation, this is inviting the whole ugly manosphere to publicly shame women who have joined and posted on your site.
We wish that civil debate was the norm on all platforms - but the bottom line is that we have no control elsewhere. What we can is to ensure that standards of civil debate are maintained on Mumsnet, and we think that's the right thing to do, because this approach will give the conversation the best hope of moving forward. We know that MNers are capable of conducting a spirited and meaningful debate within TGs - we see it all the time - so we're confident that this will not limit anyone's ability to discuss these things.
You have no control over twitter but you have invited anyone on that platform to screenshot our posts and publicly send them to you with a handy link and you have promised to look at them with a view to deletion.
Why did you do that?
Twitter doesn't let you do that, if you're not logged in you can't report anything. Your new policy is quite extraordinary. No other platform does it, with good reason.
We used to have just about the best civil debate on this topic anywhere on the internet until you did this. A MNer has received a stream of death threats and a disgusting post about her baby as a result of what you have done. Meanwhile, a huge volume of completely reasonable posts, which formed part of this civil debate you say you want to have, have been deleted. Right now, many of us are contemplating whether MN is a place where the conversation has any hope of moving forward. MN is a brilliant place for this debate because it's not an echo chamber. Anywhere we go now will have less diverse voices. If that's the price to pay for being able to use normal words and definitions to describe our class (as protected under the equality act), the oppressions we face and to fight for our own rights, then I will pay it.
I am not at all confident that my ability to discuss 'these things' is not now severely limited. I have absolutely no clue how many of the posts deleted over the past few days broke the talk guidelines. Perhaps you could explain. There are some examples above in this post.