Parliamentary committee Joanna Cherry SNP MP & QC challenge to Twitter representative about abuse of women / 'terf' / why sex is not protected characteristic

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What Katy did last year in response to an enquiry.

Eleanor Scott writes very well, so clear and intelligent.

Very good article by Eleanor Scott.
It seems to me as though the calibre of MPs just gets lower by the year. Where are the clever, decent, brave and true men and women ? There are only ego-driven idiots who patronise women in particular , but also the electorate as a whole.

No please don't Latin I got what you meant by it and I completely agree! That's the look twitter were aiming for sending her. It would have been a very different tactic of they sent a white middle-aged man like most of their execs probably are, which twitter knew. So they sent her to sit there and say "I don't know about anything" instead. But Joanna very calmly and clearly made her points anyway. Great that she cgot her to concede that TERF is a "gendered" slur.

crumpet I completely agree! Sorry I'm not very good at expressing myself on this board which is why I mainly lurk and read! I'm saying I thought Twitter sending in a young woman rather than a senior male (or female, but particularly male given the subject matter) exec was a ploy through which it would be easier to make any MP look like a 'meanie'. I agree Joanna Cherry was calm, clever, logical and dispassionate. Sorry, I'll shut up now and go back to reading.

Yep, I have sent her a thank you card

Joanna Cherry is amazing.

Isn't it called "plausible deniability"?

So twitter bod can sit in the room and truthfully say she does not know xyz because she has previously deliberately absented herself from any discussions that may have informed her of it.

You'd think that someone with the job title 'Head of UK Government and Public Policy' might at least have basic knowledge of those things.

Apparently not.

LatinforTelly, I don’t agree that Joanna came across as a big meanie at all - calm and factual, against which there was no defence possible.

She was simply superb. Evicerated the Twitter lady.

Am only gutted that she is a Yes supporter, but found her hugely impressive both in the panel and also her responses on twitter.

I'm sure she is highly paid, Lizzie but her title sounds to me like a bollocks title for upper middle management PR.

It was a clever move on Twitter's part to put someone in the chair who had no real insight or authority regarding moderation decision-making and could only say 'I'll look into that'. As you point out, it keeps the discussion one step removed. It's known as a good negotiation tactic.

But it is also highly cynical and manipulative on Twitter's part. eg I'm sure it was also quite deliberate that in a discussion about online abuse against women, the person representing the big evil corporation was a young, pretty woman. More easy to look like the big meanie questioning her, isn't it? I'd have had more respect for them if they'd had a scintilla of moral fibre and put a senior (male) exec up there to defend their shitty moderation.

Oh I dunno, I know I'm ranting. It makes me really bloomin' cross. Pathetic, cowardly, big business.

I really don’t feel sorry for the Twitter woman.
I suspect she’s a highly
paid person and she will have agreed to say “I’m not sure about that, I will get back to you”. It’s what all big corps do, in front of these committees. She was just doing her job.
I’ll bet she left there thinking she’d done a great job and would have been pats on the back from those in the Twitter offices.

Tell her how grateful you are!

Joanna Cherry QC MP
House of Commons
London
SW1A 0AA

Great article from James Kirkuk as always

And for Joanna Cherry. Brave, principled and smart woman

ewe

Which just proves that trans people can talk about Male violence because that's why they need to be with us but when women do we are offensive to trans people..

Thank you Joanna for your clear questioning and continuing to bring back the discussion to women's sex protected rights. I hope she will be taking on the younger woke women in her party who maintain the delusional party line that TW ARE women. Eg Mhairi Black.

Sarah I think it's because the context of the tweet that was read out was to do with trans women.

Or at least, a lot of the "men are more violent" tweets that were deleted were from discussions about trans people so she might have assumed it was the case here (or actually knew the context of those specific tweets).

I liked the lead up to the climax. The first questions to the witness were about the abuse directed at female politicians. The witness agreed that they had been targeted on the grounds of their female sex.

The next questions were about why Twitter did not recognise the protected characteristic of sex - despite admitting that the female sex was being targeted. The witness floundered and talked about protecting 'gender' and 'gender identity'.

Cherry persisted. No longer talking about politicians, she asked about the abuse and threats directed at feminists and other women. Why did Twitter not recognise and protect the female sex from abuse, violent images and threats? Why were women's complaints deemed to be unproven and not in breach of the rules? She illustrated her point with particular cases.

Later that evening, she published more screenshots of the abuse directed at her. As if to prove her point, TRAs responded with more abuse, threats and violent images of guns and weapons.

I wish that she was on the Womens' and Equality Committee instead of that useless self-proclaimed "Trans Ally" Anglea Crawley MP (SNP). JC is someone who challenges and probes, rather than someone who accepts guff and spin unquestioningly.

Love you Joanna!

Well that was a bit of a shit show really.

Never seen so many questions dodged in favour of pre moderated stock answers

I actually felt sorry for the Twitter woman she has been trashed with a Job that no one can really train for properly because of the severe bias shown.

Really highlights what's going on doenst it.

And how utterly ridiculous when someone stated they condem abuse against trans people but dared ask about sex that they ve deemed hateful...

But of an own goal with the Twitter lady really. When discussing Male violence she went on to mention trans. No one was talking about the trans stuff then. So is she saying trans women are indeed Male? How did it get brought up?

I watched it last night. Joanna was brilliant.

Tbh I thought sending in that young woman was just another act of misogyny on Twitter's behalf. Make one of your big male, moderator bully-boys take the flak, you absolute bunch of moral cowards.