Dawn Butler and biology

And yet the last ten years can entirely be explained by ‘men, as a class, oppress women as a class, and biology is the basis for that oppression’.

It would describe that as an observation rather than an explanation - that's what we see happening.

The cause is another question. One possibility is that the goal is sex oppression, but it's not the only possibility that would explain the observation in a straightforward way. So long as biological reality is in fact real, it's entirely possible for it to have an effect on outcomes even if there is no conscious of intent to produce such an outcome. In fact when the biological difference is something as significant as sex differences, it is probably the opposite, unless you are going out of your way to avoid different outcomes, you will not be able to do so.

I am inclined to think this might be part of what has happened. As people have more and more accepted the idea that there are no real differences between men and women, they actual differences have reasserted themselves in outcomes.

It also has happened at the same time as a large dose of woke-policing. This is where it raises the hackles of the right, because they dislike political correctness gone mad, the snowflake generation, queer politics and are more likely to be free speech advocates. I think it’s only because of this that women have found any allies on the right.

There are actually already quite a lot of women on the right, who have an interest in their own position and lives, and ideas of their own about how things should be.

but the mechanism here is that the personal 'truth' of the individual, their precarious inner identity, is paramount above any collective concerns

I agree. There is also the hierarchy of oppression paradigm wherein trans eclipses every other group, so women's concerns are simply collateral damage in the rush to promote the interests of the apex of the oppression pyramid.....

It's like they're all vying for some sort of Least Credible Political Figure 2020 prize.

I pity the judge of that award. How would you begin to decide?

The ideology is extremely authoritarian. I also dispute the use of 'individualism' to describe its proponent or its ideology. Conformity is at its core Independence of opinion is not permitted. It is unsurprising that regressive sex stereotypes are at its epicenter. It is almost comical to see the dismal antics of Labour's leadership contenders all trotting out the same incoherent talking points. The reason they are all desperately singing from the same script is because they are craven sycophants who think their careers will spontaneously combust in a Twitter firestorm if they go off piste. There is nothing individual about any of it. It's about state enforced identity politics orthodoxy.

I don't disagree with your reading of 'individualism' there, but I suspect that's because both of us may connect that word to an independence of thought and life.

I think, though, that Authoritarianism alone doesn't grab the full concept we are driving at here - yes, this is state enforced, yes, there is a boggling amount of conformity for something claiming to be a rebellious movement - but the mechanism here is that the personal 'truth' of the individual, their precarious inner identity, is paramount above any collective concerns.

Such an interesting thread - thoughtful, intellectual and women centred. A real contrast to the anti women / hate group / off to the gulag rhetoric currently miring the labour party

languishing I agree. I used to think how lovely it was when I first came to this board to have political discussions with Lang, even though we didn't share the same politics. She was so welcoming and generous. That respectful discussion is so rare online and it is one of the things that makes this forum special.

I had thought it was suffragists who were more across the classes as Mockers seems to indicate.

Anyway, I still say feminism was largely a movement identified with the left for many years. Despite the Tories having had 2 women pm s.

Such an interesting thread - thoughtful, intellectual and women centred. A real contrast to the anti women / hate group / off to the gulag rhetoric currently miring the labour party.

SWERFs and TERFs. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that women fighting for women’s rights on two entirely different fronts can not only be easily dismissed, but dismissed as bigots and haters in 3 words

I think that is a really important insight. This is a linguistic battle, along with all its other components. The proponents of this ideology seriously believe that if they can control the language, they can bend external reality to their whim. This is Newspeak territory and that's why there is an Orwellian resonance to so much of what's happening. The biggest joke of all is calling the women opposed to this bizarre agenda 'radical.' Au contraire. The radicals are those claiming babies have no sex , men can wake up one morning, announce they are female and take a battering ram to sex segregated spaces. And that puberty blockers and surgery are an appropriate medical response to children who don't conform to rigid sex stereotypes.

but the defining part of this political outlook is Authoritarian. This is not a live and let live movement. This is a top down enforcement of untestable individualism, one that ignores class analysis almost entirely (except when it is deemed useful to the furtherance of individualist interests

Floral
I absolutely agree with this. Its proponents repeatedly use state enforcement to punish heresy. Harry Miller is an example of this. The ideology is extremely authoritarian. I also dispute the use of 'individualism' to describe its proponent or its ideology. Conformity is at its core Independence of opinion is not permitted. It is unsurprising that regressive sex stereotypes are at its epicenter. It is almost comical to see the dismal antics of Labour's leadership contenders all trotting out the same incoherent talking points. The reason they are all desperately singing from the same script is because they are craven sycophants who think their careers will spontaneously combust in a Twitter firestorm if they go off piste. There is nothing individual about any of it. It's about state enforced identity politics orthodoxy.

The Pankhurst women were divided themselves over this issue, it really isn't black and white. Almost as though women have their own opinions and stuff.

The Lowe class women would have been too busy looking after the kids, doing crappy underpaid job to keep a roof over their heads, and feared being arrested or jailed (and the kids getting farmed out god knows where).

the suffragettes were largely upper class women

The term Suffragette has come to denote the entire womens suffrage movement. At the time, there was a division.

Suffragettes wanted vote for women on the same basis as men, i.e, a property qualification.

Suffragists wanted the vote for all adults without distinction, and wished to enfrachise men as well as women.

I don't think their intent is actually a war between the sexes though.

And yet the last ten years can entirely be explained by ‘men, as a class, oppress women as a class, and biology is the basis for that oppression’.

It also has happened at the same time as a large dose of woke-policing. This is where it raises the hackles of the right, because they dislike political correctness gone mad, the snowflake generation, queer politics and are more likely to be free speech advocates. I think it’s only because of this that women have found any allies on the right.

Love the way this thread has gone, thank you for some really thought provoking comments.

*breed not bread obvs

I would say (warning sweeping generalisation alert) that feminism was not a Conservative movement traditionally; as traditionally, by the very name, adherents of that party wanted to keep things as they have long been, upholding traditional gender roles. (Despite the fact that, I believe, the suffragettes were largely upper class women). The Tory wife was, stereotypically, their to help her MP husband, look pretty at events, bread children etc. Supportive of and behind her husband.

But feminism and the left have also had a tricky relationship, the working man stereotypically also holding entrenched views of the women at home while he went out to work. Working man would have seen women as a threat, would have been against equal pay. Unions were very male when I grew up in the 70s, (probably still are) and the unions would have been expected to protect the working man, (presumably) also from the threat of women taking over their jobs.

I don't thin their intent is actually a war between the sexes though.

Rather, they are behaving as if we are all individuals with no group characteristics or memberships, or no common relations. They are talking as if men and women aren't important categories at all.

But of course they are real, perhaps the most basic and significant division among humans, one that can't be erased. Because that is true, their actions result in a war between the sexes even though they are acting on the basis of individualism. So some of us are saying, "look here, your policies are having this differentiated effect between the sexes," and they are all, "nothing to look at here, it's just a lot of individuals, no pattern in the effects we are seeing".

So they are individualists, and also very much a meritocracy which also comes from the liberal end of things. Whoever can get to the top deserves it on the basis that it must mean they are pretty darn good.

The authoritarian element seems to have come out later I think. The individualists wre evident, maybe even dominant within the 1980s, and I think they must have begun to establish themselves in the leftist parties by the late 70s but my memory doesn't go back that far. The seeds of the authoritarianism were beginning to be visible in the 90s.

I think the terms ‘left’ and ‘right’ used to indicate ideological positions, or even whose side you were on in class struggles. The owners of the means of production v those who have to exchange their labour for money, to use Marxist terminology. In day-to-day politics this also indicated what someone’s view on how wealth should be distributed would be.

These positions have then been used as more or less useful markers on how left and right would position themselves on other issues, e.g. immigration, women’s rights etc.

But these guidelines no longer hold, and even the older notion that the right’ would be individualist and ‘the left’ collectivist don’t hold any longer.

‘The left’ is getting hopelessly lost in what Floral aptly named ‘authoritarian individualism’. I do wonder though, if they really are as individualist as it may seem. Sure, when it comes to their view of women, they are fully embracing individual ‘empowerment’ claptrap, and they certainly believe any man has the right to use women (as people and as a category) if it means he is being his true authentic self.
But isn’t this just individualist rhetoric disguising their collective action for men as a class?
And does Labour actually maintain this individualist ideology on any other issue, other than men’s sexual rights v women’s rights?

Does Labour even have an ideology, other than ‘the white affluent men in the party top are awesome’? -and lately edging ever closer to the gulags for dissenters.

Postmodernism. Where words don’t have meaning and reality is up for grabs.

The more I think about this the funnier it gets, honestly.

Shorter Dawn - A newspaper has reported that I, senior Labour Party member, said something sensible. How very dare they! I would never do such a thing and they should already know that!

It's like they're all vying for some sort of Least Credible Political Figure 2020 prize.

As someone with a maths degree, I know absolutely bog all about the ins and outs of Marxism or liberalism or whatever bar what I’ve picked up from here and there.

Honestly, there are plenty of humanities students in the same boat. Maybe not from the best schools, but lots of schools aren't the best ones. Unfortunately they have learned enough to think they know what they are talking about. And others think, these are educated people, they know what they are talking about.

I think these words are dressed up as modern but really they are just about lazy thinking.

The last conversation we had, she said she was beginning to see those words were no longer meant to communicate specific ideas, they were loyalty pledges, a sort of tribal lexicon, rather than a way to communicate and debate ideas.

Your colleague is bang on. People are using terms to signal compliance and shared goals to each other. The fact that other people were already using those terms and have been left with no effective way to communicate what the terms used to communicate is of no concern to them at all. The correct term for what is happening there, ironically because the people doing it love accusing others of it, is "colonization".

Well, I've never studied politics, though I'm widely read on a personal level and good at analytical linguistic stuff. I was talking to a colleague, a woman in her mid twenties, the other day. She is intelligent, she has opinions, she enjoys thinking and questioning. She's worked in a supermarket all her working life and her understanding comes from reading widely and asking questions - we've had brilliant conversations about feminist and other political issues, and one thing that comes across is that she is absolutely ready to engage politically, but her main concern is that so many terms she thinks she understood turn out to have no solid meaning when you talk to people who claim those labels.

The last conversation we had, she said she was beginning to see those words were no longer meant to communicate specific ideas, they were loyalty pledges, a sort of tribal lexicon, rather than a way to communicate and debate ideas.

Supermarkets are hotbeds of intelligent thought.