Ruth Hunt in the Guardian

No objection to being a Christian or catholic, but it's a faith. It's not a rational or logical belief, backed up by evidence. I'm sure you can be a scientist and a Christian, a vegetarian who doesn't like cats, an animal lover who eats meat, a misogynistic who loves his mum...
Science isn't the be all and end all of anything anyway, it's a work in progress

I hadn't heard of it before, and I stand corrected.

My opinion of RH is pretty low, and while there may be many opinions among Catholics on the issue, it does seem to be almost the only thing RH is talking about.

Why assume she isn't practising?

I've been aware of her faith since she was appointed.

It's not suddenly news to me.

I don't see how it relates to the gender identity issue. There's plenty of opinions among catholics on this.

I'm just wondering why Ruth Hunt is mentioning her Catholicism (presumably not practising) now. Does she want to pick up another protected characteristic under the Equality Act? Is she hoping for an op ed in the Catholic Herald? Has she realised Catholicism is kind of cool again after Fleabag?

I can't help but suspect that this is a ruthlessly opportunistic move.

Is rape the bar now? Women can only protest if a change means they're going to be raped?

What about privacy and dignity? What about NOT wanting to be subject to what were once called crimes of voyeurism and exposure simply because a male now utters the shibboleth to identify as a woman?

This. Exactly.

Women from catholic backgrounds who really enriched my feminism :
Janice Raymond; Mary Daly

I don't think there's any call for dismissive remarks about catholic women tbh

I get ticked off about Catholics being predisposed to irrationality as well. It's simply not true. Alasdair Macintyre, Charles Taylor, Edith Stein, Ivan Illich, Mary Daly: philosophers who might not all be anyone's cup of tea but one of them were Catholics because they thought it was irrational. And there are plenty of scientists who are Catholic because they think it's rationally supported.

Hunt might be irrational, but it isn't because she's a Catholic.

Is rape the bar now? Women can only protest if a change means they're going to be raped?

What about privacy and dignity? What about NOT wanting to be subject to what were once called crimes of voyeurism and exposure simply because a male now utters the shibboleth to identify as a woman?

What about the fact that the DV refuges and rape crisis centres and women's centres are all places we built with our own hands and own money, long before any government or male agreed there was even a need -- and we don't think we should have to turn over the fruits of our labour to males upon demand? How about demanding instead that males do as we did, and build their own?

And what about sport?

We're allowed to protest more than that we might be raped, FFS.

St Dymphna is my favourite saint too Outanabout (though I'm not actually religious in any way).

IIRC the Humanist Society have had a row about this whole shitshow. This divisive, woman-hating politics is everywhere (unfortunately).

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3342172-Thread-2-Anti-trans-vandals-are-plastering-vile-women-don-t-have-penises-stickers-around-THE-WORLD?pg=7&order=

Her priest must have to seriously bite his lip when she goes to confession.

The other thing that someone has already pointed out, she can't possibly really believe TWAW, no-one does.

I'm feeling a bit guilty now for commenting on her being a catholic. It was because TWAW only works as a faith position, so I saw similarities.

For what it's worth, despite being an atheist myself, I always just look at the arguments people are making about any particular idea. I don't worry about their other beliefs, just can they convince me on the current issue.

many of the big names in the atheist community seem to have swallowed it whole - so much for skeptisism

There’s a schism in the atheist community that drove Ophelia Benson (GC) off FreeThoughtBlogs for witchy wrongthink.

I don’t know whether the skeptic community is particularly vulnerable or whether they have been targeted specifically because if the TRAs can undermine skepticism first the arts can be toppled easily.

Sick to death of her misrepresenting feminist arguments on purpose. And Men are always going to rape women. is just vile. Shes not stupid, she knows the actual arguments, and knows that making things easier for abusive men will lead to more abuse. Yet she cares not one bit. About women or kids, she cares plenty about the bepenised adults.

For anyone interested in female 'saints', Saint Dymphna is one of my favourites.

Take care of yourself, Floral.
I think this whole debate/non-debate is a great lesson (certainly for me personally) in how we shouldn't automatically choose a side based on our personal political or social antipathies, or disregard other people's views as just typical of lefties/Tories, this faith or that faith, etc.

As for Ruth - Julie Bindel and others who know her have said that she knew exactly what might happen with the trans agenda and had told them she wasn't going to let it happen, but here we are. I find it very difficult to believe that Ruth became a TWAW convert after spending time with Alex Drummond and other male-born 'lesbians' at Stonewall. Now all she can do is try and justify her betrayal of women by pointing to Stonewall's balance sheet. She finds the debate 'alarming' because she would rather people didn't talk about her failures when she is about to start her own consulting business. Tough luck, Ruth.

Still waiting for that definition of "woman" that includes women and transwomen but excludes men and transmen. How about Ruth comes up with one of those first, then we can "have a chat about it". The only one I've got so far is "any adult human female that has not obtained a GRC and any adult human male that has obtained a GRC". Even in that very generous position male still =/= female.

"“There is a group of people who believe trans women are men and there is nothing that will change that. There is a group of people who believe trans women are trans women and it’s all a bit puzzling, can we have a chat about it? And there’s a group that think trans women are women and that’s the camp Stonewall supporters are in.”

Ironically, many of Stonewall's actions and behaviours are what drove thousands of women (and men) from being discreetly accepting of transsexuals in women's spaces; right back to the first position.

You made your bed, Hunt and Stonewall....

Extremely poor journalism by the Observer just to write this stuff down rather than ask what the words mean.

The Observer knows full well what the words mean, they are skirting round the issues.

can I derail?
I didn't know much about St Teresa of Avila (apart from the statue by Bernini) until I randomly read The Eagle and the Dove by Vita Sackville West. I can't summon up much enthusiasm for St Teresa of Lisieux, but what a woman St Teresa of Avila was! I memorised her prayer 'Let nothing dismay you' etc and often repeat it to myself.

Cheers :) I actually quite deliberately chose a female saint for my illustration of Catholicity rather than the more obvious and cliched 'as Catholic as the Pope' because I am a daftly optimistic sort who tries very hard to be woman-centred in a patriarchal religion!

Oddly enough I was just thinking about St Teresa of Avila (I shit you not)

I was contemplating the fact that my son's English lit syllabus:

• features not one word of prose written by a woman
• has set texts in which women feature only to get raped, to be sent off to safety before the excitement starts, or to be driven mad as punishment for having cropped up too much in Act 1.

And I was having one of those "hmm, maybe we'd get more from reading a female mystic - at least we'd hear a woman's voice".

As you were (but I am hoping to raise a slight smile floral )

I don't much give a shit how she sleeps at night.

Neither do I. Traitorous woman.

I do, on the other hand, give a shit how you sleep at night, darling.

Sorry everyone. I'm tired, stressed and over-reacted. My point stands, but there's no need for me to be pissy and flouncy about it.