Germaine Greer talk protested

I saw GG speak at an event recently and was appalled. She spent the entire keynote degrading and belittling Sheryl Sandberg which had nothing to do with the event or the topic she was supposed to be speaking about! She also went off on a tangent about how women love to carry handbags because we're traditional gatherers not hunters (nothing to do with the fact that pockets 'ruin' the body shape of women's clothes I suppose?) and other bonkers stuff.

Was honestly so disappointed as I was looking forward to hearing someone with such an incredible history speak, and instead I just felt really uncomfortable and as though I was witnessing something really bizarre.

She's depriving it of the oxygen it needs to live. Good on her.

Brilliant!
Really want to see her now.

"Interestingly this protest was organised by people involved with MESMAC (men who have sex with men)."
I wonder how they feel about Dawson's attitude towards gay men?
“A lot of gay men are gay men as a consolation prize because they couldn't be women”, says trans author Juno Dawson

At least their sign makes sense - trans women exist. Yup - I can see them!
This is not a debate. Also true - it's more of a demand really.

Btw police presence being needed at talks by a woman on the bronte sisters and ecofemisim is a pretty hellish state of affairs.

I love her. I see one of the protestors has noted (on fb) that Germaine is still touring.

She is indeed, in Lincoln and there are still tickets left

I so recommend it if anyone is close, she is tremendous m.ents24.com/uk/tour-dates/germaine-greer

Googling 'Juno Dawson anti-feminist comments' brings up lots of interesting results too.

This one isn't even about feminism but is very funny in a karma sort of a way:

Isn't it shit, Juno, when all you want to talk about is literature and you can't, because of things you've said in the past about unrelated issues?

Too scared?
All woman, right there.

And I love their 'sources' - 'simply google ...'

'People have written some shit about them on the internet'

I love that Germaine treats the whole thing as "men cannot be women, now let's talk about something interesting". There's a lesson there for us all.

I went to see Germaine Greer talk a couple of weeks ago in Birmingham.
The talk was 'women for life on earth'. Germaine spoke really well about environmental issues which she was clearly passionate about and even managed to make her points about tree slime interesting and engaging!

At the end of the talk she opened floor to questions... All about her stance on trans and clearly from the point of view of had she now seen the error of her ways and believed in a more inclusive feminism?

She obviously did not want to get drawn or give it air and she answered really simply, basically no I have not changed my stance, I care about women...now back to the environment.

Next question, how can you justify your stance on trans issues?
Next question, don't you think trans people are being scapegoated??

On it went although had to love the women who asked how to encourage mice and not rats to her home in the middle of all of this!

Wherever she goes, whatever talk she gives it is quite obvious that a section of her audience are simply waiting for a chance to be the one to uniquely and masterfully challenge Germaine Greer about trans, it must be so sodding boring for her.

I'm reminded of that with Julie Bindel and Jane Fae. Fae was also apparently terrified of Jenni Murray.

To paraphrase Bindel, 'Oi! Juno Dawson! You don't know you're born, mate!'

Ridiculous fools.

It's really strange to no platform yourself, especially if your reason is that Jenni Murray is a threat.

I think that's stretching the definition of the word threat somewhat, although these folk have form for stretching definitions till they are meaningless, I suppose.

interesting that they don't actually say what it is GG and JM have said that's so offensive
IIRC, JM questioned that shaving one's legs was an indispensible part of being a woman, and GG said that a man with his penis removed was still a man. Stating the bleeding obvious, and likely to be recognised as such by any passing literature fan.

Good point Pencils. I'll send them an email.

Juno must be pretty fragile if they can't bear being within a festival's distance of JM and GG. Do they really think that older women have so much power?

This will make some people do a double take. There is literally nothing controversial or 'out there' about JM. She is widely respected.

Hehehe

Cop onto yourself, Juno.

It's good they included the email so people can get in touch and congratulate BLF on their common sense and thank them for not bowing to demands for censorship.

Yes wrapped, I have some good male gay friends from over the years but there's a misogynistic streak in the culture..you only have to ask lesbians about that. I had a recent convo with one about how he had no lesbian friends at all and he was very disparaging about them. He said that as a straight woman I had far more in common with gay men than I had with lesbians - he really didn't get it!

"Nothing about trans issues whatsoever."

That's probably half the problem, how dare women speak to women about women and not centre MTT.

Interestingly this protest was organised by people involved with MESMAC (men who have sex with men). Certain amount of hipocracy there don't you think? I do feel that much of this comes from those kind of flippant woman haters that hang out in gay men circles. I say this as someone who has had a deep love for several gay male friends in my life. It's really clear that too many gay men practice a kind of snarky dismissal disguised as ironic admiration of women. There are some real, hostile misogynists among them. When you take this into account it isn't odd how it's ok to criticise older women so harshly. Policing them like this. But no criticism allowed in the other direction.

Oh and remember when Mr Rochester dresses up as an old fortune teller in Jane Eyre? Clearly trans!! I hope Jenni Murray doesn't forget that bit.