Lib Dem’s Equalities R4 now

Women didn’t vote for Clinton because many female voters didn’t like her. She was the establishment candidate in a change election

The Conservatives don't need to attract the feminist vote.

Since more women vote LD or Labour, they can take a different approach.

They can stress the hypocrisy of the LDs and Labour and still act like sexist arse holes because they only need to suppress the feminist vote and demotivate feminists from voting at all. It was the tactic in the US trump election; just deter women and ethnic minorities from voting for Clinton.

Tbh that's really where I'm at though. Because I can't excuse homophobia and sexism anymore than I can justify Islamophobia or Antisemitism.

*I am always amazed at politicians who appear not to have followed this debate at all given its prominence on social media and the coverage it's had in the Times, Mail etc8

I think most people, and especially many women, see it as a side issue to other policy issues. Up until now they may not have much consciousness of what is going on; and may never have experienced anything 'untoward', troubling or uncomfortable themselves. There must be a tendency to think because they have not encountered any issues then the 'problem' does not really exist.

The Conservatives should be trying to woo feminist voters by articulating a strong defense of sex

Unless you see feminism purely as a matter of individualistic personal self interest, then I can't see voting conservative as being any solution to the many of structural issues women face as a class of people in society.

Margaret Thatcher may have been a woman, but she did next to nothing , and even worse ( positive damage), for other, poorer, disempowered or marginalised women.

Child care, maternity leave, Sure Start centres, all manner of local facilities on which on which many women & mothers rely, and which provide necessary life-lines, are always decimated by Conservative policies

I might add that I'm not sure it's any different for any other party. I have closer connection with the LDs than other parties due to my circles of friends.

I do feel that it's part of a wider problem and part of institutionalised sexism within politics.

I've raised the issue personally with

a) the radical association because of the incident with forcing out someone
b) LD complaints over their LGBT twitter account.
c) a senior LD. Who I warned that Aimee Challenor would come back to haunt the party and there would be another scandal involving them. They said that they were aware that the party had a problem with bullying and they'd been a victim of it.
d) local party members who are friends and intelligent types. One has told me I'm a bigot and then made extremely actually transphobic comments when drunk. One who said they weren't interested as Brexit was more important.
e) The local candidate to be an MP who at the time was already being lined up to be the prospective candidate but had not yet got the nod (and I specifically meantioned Challenor to as well as said that the same about them being a scandal waiting to happen).

In every case they were men. Locally they had said they wanted to get more women involved in politics and it was hard to talk about diversity as they were all white middle aged men. I've said that part of the problem was the condescending attitudes and outright sexism I'd directly experienced. I said that having a young son and partner with a heavy job made it particularly difficult as I had certain barriers that men didn't have.

One who was the previous candidate to be MP has told me in the past he has never met anyone who is so politically aware, politically able and engaged and ahead of the curve on issues.

It's not like I've not had these conversations with people. They are not interested and don't want to explore the issue as it's not their pet project and regard it as a I quote "fringe issue". The idea that people like Berger aren't up with the subject is one I find difficult to grasp. I refuse to believe that she's not had correspondence on the issue which is good quality and reasonable in tone.

The fact is I just don't think they are interested and can't be bothered with double checking what they are being told as it's too easy to dismiss.

It's either to pat women on the head and say 'be nice'.

The whole be nice thing is a reflection on how how far removed they all are from this being an issue that has any ramifications for them.

I despair over it.

As others say if they aren't interested over this, then what else do they just shrug and say its unimportant just because their world view isn't coming into contact with a problem.

Lib Dems are horrifically anti-women

I've had a number of LIbDem men on Twitter call me vile names and say they don't want my vote. This was before election was announced. I reported them to the party. Nothing happened.

I would never, never vote Lib Dem as they are a misogynistic party, and seem to regard men's sexual rights as a 'liberal' civil rights issue

Agreed

@RedDogsBeg

That makes her capitulation to this dangerous dogma more shocking and difficult to comprehend

Indeed it does. It's very upsetting.

Have you mentioned the above to her on Twitter as well as your other questions

Not yet no I'm sort of saving it up. Just wanted to keep it to one issue at a time. But I will do.

Lib Dems are horrifically anti-women. They are pro-prostitution and pro-pornography. They even opposed measures to prevent children - yes, CHILDREN - from looking at violent, misogynistic pornography. I would never, never vote Lib Dem as they are a misogynistic party, and seem to regard men's sexual rights as a 'liberal' civil rights issue

Datun and Arnold, I agree that they should definitely be saying those things about safe guarding sex segregated spaces in hospitals and prisons. But they, like so many others, are probably frightened of being accused of ‘dog whistle’ hate speech

MissLawls Like Luciana I too am Jewish. She will know, as I do, that there are people who pretend to be Jewish in order to defend Corbyn from claims that he is antisemitic. An entire group was set up in 2016 called Jewish Voice For Labour that is purely there to protect Corbyn from claims about antisemitism. Many of its members aren't Jewish. Twitter is often full of #asajew hashtags which has swelled our tiny population to at least twice its size!

So.... how Berger of all people can calmly say that any man who wants to call himself a woman must be treated as a woman, by law, when she knows as well as I do how much this identify-as-I-please nonsense has hurt us Jews is beyond staggering.

That makes her capitulation to this dangerous dogma more shocking and difficult to comprehend. Have you mentioned the above to her on Twitter as well as your other questions?

Nauticant, I agree. Instead of having a set of political principles or a political philosophy, they merely hook themselves up to whoever is screaming loudest on Twitter. It’s quite contemptible

I remember when the LibDems started out and having a row with a friend who said that she would vote for them. I think the exact phrase was "They are a bunch of clowns!".

I take it back, at least clowns are (sometimes) funny although I almost peed myself laughing at this carcrash.

@RoyalCorgi and @Michelleoftheresistance I have a lovely vision of M&S cafes across the country teeming with peak transed elderly folk this morning

Like Luciana I too am Jewish. She will know, as I do, that there are people who pretend to be Jewish in order to defend Corbyn from claims that he is antisemitic. An entire group was set up in 2016 called Jewish Voice For Labour that is purely there to protect Corbyn from claims about antisemitism. Many of its members aren't Jewish. Twitter is often full of #asajew hashtags which has swelled our tiny population to at least twice its size!

So.... how Berger of all people can calmly say that any man who wants to call himself a woman must be treated as a woman, by law, when she knows as well as I do how much this identify-as-I-please nonsense has hurt us Jews is beyond staggering.

I'm deeply disappointed. She follows me on Twitter as - bizarrely - does Layla Moran! I've sent Luciana a DM asking if by any man she includes convicted rapists, perverts and paedophiles. Or men who get off on trying on women's knickers in the women's changing rooms at Marks then post pictures of themselves.

I don't think Lucians is a bad person, far from it. I think she's naive at best. Possibly tho she is stupid. A conclusion I truly don't want to come to.

I like to think we Jews who value education so very much have well-functioning bullshit detectors. Maybe deep down she knows this is bollocks but she has to say what she has to say to be in the LIb Dems? But isn't that worse? Don't we want politicians who are true to their principles?

Can we run a clip of this on the site? On loop would be good.

tv2east.dk/artikel/snart-… In 2021 Denmark will reopen a women only prison due to the ongoing sexual assaults by men in the female estate

Arnold, as nauticant and others have pointed out, I don’t think it’s a lack of nous. I think it’s

A) fear at drawing serious flack from social media and its most aggressive lobbyists

and

B) a grotesque sense of entitlement to women’s votes. This particularly applies to Labour and Lib Dems

I agree with you BovaryX. Somewhere along the line politicians became scared of leading and now follow. Which has given us opportunists like Johnson who'll go along with whichever group is sufficiently noisy and drape himself in their colours.

The lack of nous is staggering.

I agree. It doesn't have to be nuanced, or complicated.

Just go with sport and rapists in prisons.

No one could fuck that up. Make your opponents claim that men should be competing against women, and that rapists should be given access to incarcerated women as part of their punishment.

Thing is the Tories, or any other party, don't need to frame it in terms of trans anything.

They could for example say 'we will ensure you are treated on single sex wards if you have to go to hospital'.

Single sex wards are populat. Trans isn't mentioned. The detail can include 'sex as determined at conception and observed at birth' but most of the public won't read the detail, they'll just see the headline 'protecting single sex wards'.

Then there's the real downside of it being used to as "evidence of transphobia" by the Conservatives.The Conservatives could gain little while being seen as toxic by younger voters.

No doubt that is their calculation. If they have even bothered to think about it at all. This reinforces my point that instead of rigorous debate, what we have is politicians in servitude to whatever is trending on Twitter. I have never had much time for politicians, but I have never felt as much contempt for many of them as I do now

What utterly bizarre times we live in

Bizarre hardly begins to convey the sheer ineptitude of an entire political class that is unable to capitalise of an issue where 85% give or take of the population are in agreement.

What kind of politician ignores 85% of voters on a contentious issue? The lack of nous is staggering.

While turning off most other people who don't grasp the issues and think "why are they banging on about this stupid PC stuff?"