Dealing with inflammatory posts re Trans on MN

I’m not trying to police the threads, but at the same time, I wonder if the sheer volume of posts isn’t damaging.

There are posters who must spend hours daily reading and composing detailed posts often on the same subjects time and again. Some of them are going to occasionally snap.

The number of threads must contribute to the ‘not another trans thread ffs’ sentiment so often expressed or to the appearance of mn being the hotbed of hatred or whatever it was we were described as.

I know it’s not the point of a chat forum really, but I do think we could help ourselves by posting less.

Maybe if someone asks a question we could point them at an existing thread on the same subject or only start new threads when there’s something actually to be said. At the minute we seem to start them every time anything trans is mentioned anywhere - including twitter. Maybe we could start a thread per subject (sports, AWS, refuges, newspeak etc) and capture what we know and update them as we go on so whenever someone says ‘what’s the issue with xyz’ we’ve got something to point them at.

I don’t know, just thinking how we can not shoot ourselves in foot really...

The fact that we are even having this conversation points to how central MN has become to this debate.

Thank you MNHQ for allowing us the platform. I'll do my best to not react to GFs because I see this space as crucial.

It has been a long time since Feminists felt like millions of women had our backs. A very long time. I am grateful to MN for providing a free speech zone for women.

I do think pronouns are sex based not gender constructs though. But will avoid pronouns entirely. ( please shoot me if I ever use zie )

But “cis” is different to referring to someone male as “he” surely ? One is not true, the other demonstrably is. But anyway I don’t want to let my inner pedant take over... I will be careful when posting as it seems to be a communal decision that it is best .

I've taken a step back lately since I've felt really drained by the whole issue.

I think it was perhaps inevitable that we get a tide of new posters who can be divided into 1)goady TRA's 2)newly peaked to the topic and not grasping that there are transfolk out there NOT wanting to be represented by the current wave of TRA's and being out of order towards them.

I've learnt so much from the FWR regulars here but it's taken 2 years of reading, re-reading and patient understanding, for me to reach a point where I can almost articulate myself without making a complete tool of myself. It's a complicated bit of mental gymnastics to navigate the enormity of these issues and I'd be fucking devastated to have this forum taken from us.

So, to myself more than anyone, but to us all, please continue to replicate the dignity and humility and patience that's brought so many of us to peak and beyond. We are an incredible bunch and we shall continue to make progress. Our way. Not their way.

#TGLWGH

I was reading that thread last night, and the ops constant comments about “lies” were hard to take after twenty pages of it. I appreciated the intelligent, measured responses from mumsnetters. It is hard to stay calm, but perhaps that is just me. I tend to feel the rage when Faced with gaslighting. I didn’t comment at all last night for that reason, I was too cross, and didn’t want to post in anger.

I disagree Simon, in that I think using incorrect sex pronouns for people is really unhelpful for women and trans people . I don’t think we should ever have allowed sex on passports etc to be changed

I agree with this, and making the point that gender and sex are different is why I'm reluctant to suggest it; but I think the line can be drawn without deliberately insulting individuals:

e.g. 'They/their' or 'he (a biological woman)' or 'transwoman'.

Pronouns are gender constructs, using them for the 'wrong' sex is not denying biology. We ask gender determinist posters to avoid labelling us as cis. I think we can be courteous and still be firm.

I read most of the T thread, missed the end, but didn't contribute as there were great arguments being made and questions asked. I would be really upset if we lost mumsnet as a place to discuss this issue. It can be so hard to stay respectful in the face of some of the assertions made.Liking the TGLWGH thing.

I disagree Simon, in that I think using incorrect sex pronouns for people is really unhelpful for women and trans people . I don’t think we should ever have allowed sex on passports etc to be changed. I remember reading as a teenager that this was done to avoid attacks on transsexuals by male sexual partners who may have not realised the sex of the person they were sleeping with. That was clearly kindly motivated but it has backfired now. I feel using correct sex pronouns is political, but I will avoid using pronouns at all if it helps all Mumsnet users to be able to chat freely about concerns regarding self id.

Some great ideas here. Thanks to MNHQ for helping us think this through

@BoreOfWhabylon @SirVixofVixHall

Thank you both. Writing that made me very uncomfortable. It took me a long time of lurking before I started referring to the campaign against self ID as we and us. The last thing I want to do is start telling people who've worked their arses off on this how to talk.

I agree with the no misgendering.
We have to take the moral high ground here.
Calling any transwoman him/he or calling certain high profile trans women by nicknames is rude and makes us look bad.

Thanks don. Will sidestep from now on then. Have strong feelings re pronouns issue, but I will be careful.

Good post @donquixotedelamancha. I agree with your suggestions.

And also have been thinking for some time that there are a few agents provocateur on these threads.

Have HQ said we must use preferred pronouns then?

You can see for yourself that they don't want to give specific talk guidelines because they can be used by barrack room lawyers and because they don't want to dictate how people should speak.

Not making a point of misgendering sexing individuals who have asked people to use a different pronoun would make it harder for allegations of transphobia to stick.

I hear you there truscum

There have been so many articles in the mainstream media the past couple of weeks referring people to these boards it would only be a matter of time before the TRAs started seeing us as not just a minor inconvenience.

Don’t feed them, keep it respectful and factual. You’re not going to make a sea lion keep their mouth shut, so we’re as well keeping to the facts and letting logic do it’s work.

#TGLWGH

Have HQ said we must use preferred pronouns then ?

Sorry, that became an essay

I completely support people's right to be offended at the awful behaviour of some TRAs, especially in the context of women regularly being expected to sublimate their righteous anger; but name calling and aggression weakens the argument being made.

If people actually want to defeat self ID, restore all women shortlists and protect single sex spaces then we have to bring along a lot of people who are new to this issue and don't understand the anger, they will read it as transphobia.

makes us a bit worried that you've still not really understood the problem. The bottom line is that we can't continue to host the debate if the tone is as antagonistic as it has been

This scares me. I think, sadly, that we all need to start challenging those of us who cross the line.

I would much, much rather that you banned individual (GC) posters than stopped us talking.

This!!!

But it is very time consuming to ask MNHQ to start warning and banning individuals. We can, and should, police ourselves. Might I tentatively suggest some lines, and ask what people think?

1. No name calling.
2. No gratuitously unpleasant comments about famous individuals.
3. No telling other MNers (yes even the wind up merchants) to 'bugger off' etc.
4. Care to differentiate that we are not talking about whole groups (yeah I know...NAMALT).
5. No direct troll hunting- the ways of suggesting caution proposed above will serve fine.
6. No 'misgendering' of individuals? I'm torn on this one, but MNHQ are asking and I think we can make the point without directly commenting on individuals.

Also, having been unfortunate enough to witness TRA tactics on other sites I really wouldn’t put it past a few of the more unstable to deliberately post deliberately goady GC thread should to try to take this space from us.

I have long suspected that there are one or two posters in particular (even before the trans thing got going) who do some kind of weird impersonation of what the DM think a feminist is and just go on random threads winding people up. By reporting and challenging the egregious posts we can do a lot to minimise harm.

Ach. The truth is, we're just not going to be able to describe the 'line' beyond which we'd consider a non-gender-critical poster to be goady - and tbh, the fact that you're focusing on that aspect of things makes us a bit worried that you've still not really understood the problem.

It's not my focus, I'd just appreciate a bit of guidance here. I think I have understood the problem and if you read the rest of what I have posted I think you will see that.

Never mind. I'll continue to do my best. There are lots of good suggestions on this thread.

If enough of us report them quickly enough when they pop up then hopefully HQ will understand it’s nothing to do with us and it won’t count against anyone here.

Or post the acronym and then proceed to give the lurkers a proper mumsnet show.

I think this is the best approach. Report plus acronym.

do think it is a fine tightrope. On the one hand we should be ‘better’ than the TRA’s, on the other, I don’t want posters to start getting deleted for ‘misgendering’ if they aren’t being antagonistic and are just stating facts.

Absolutely agree Truscum.

I've expressed a great deal of anger without being deleted. Play the ball not the individual(s)

Good thinking Certain