MNHQ want money from us

I think that there's a misconception that FWR is still the only place where women's rights can be discussed with any openness at all. It might have been credibly called that at one point, but it's not now, and not only is it not the only place, it's not even the best.

In fact, right now, FWR is hosting a prostitution thread full of the usual astroturfers who usually show up whenever women here discuss it, a couple of threads trying to pose questions to stimulate feminist debate which are over-run to the point of farce by open misogynists and simpering WATMers and a thread started by a trolls which is an hilarious off beat recipe thread.

I enjoy batting away trolls with recipes and bantz on occasion, but seriously, if I want to have a serious feminist conversation now, FWR is not a great arena for it.

So what I'm getting is a message that Justine has taken a financial hit specifically because of being principled about FWR remaining slightly committed to quasi-free speech.

With respect, I think that's pure bullshit. The site is technologically clunky, and is quite the shadow of it's former self as a brand. The security breaches are one thing, for sure, but forums have been slowly going the way of the dodo for a very long time. Only a few are hanging on, and most have a very much better tech set up than this one. Agile social media platforms have been chipping away at dinosaur forums for a while now.

I don't doubt that MN are struggling, and that a subscription model is a reasonable attempt at a rescue plan. People are free to weigh the cost/benefit ratio to themselves, of course.

But no, a brave commitment to FWR despite the pressure of advertisers demanding it be removed is not the death knell for this website. It's highly disingenuous to suggest it and attempt to leverage the women here further. Justine is not 'on our side', she is on her own side, and I don't blame her for that, she's running a business. But please, keep the soft soap nonsense about the women of FWR being under some sort of moral obligation of thanks to prop up a business model that is very clearly on the way out anyway. You might as well suggest investing in YahooGroups.

No. What they are saying is she's handled the situation badly. She is not responsible for it!

Who is holding Justine responsible? Seriously. Be logical.

This board, in general, believes that MN should take the hit when advertisers pull out because they've been bullied by transactivists and that they should not attempt to mitigate that loss by putting some limits- to a far less extreme degree than other sites - to how posters discuss the issue.

And when they did, you accused them of gaslighting and handmaidery.

I think the analogy is perfectly logical.

i'm finding the message coming from FWR to be surprisingly counter-productive

FWR like everyother board on here is made up of individuals

It strikes me that in holding Justine responsible for the toxic landscape in which we find ourselves, we are doing precisely what we despise in others: holding women responsible for what men have done

I’m holding Justine responsible for nothing more than a massively inappropriate and poorly worded request. When you run a business you HAVE to consider good PR and what constitutes poor PR.

It strikes me that in holding Justine responsible for the toxic landscape in which we find ourselves, we are doing precisely what we despise in others: holding women responsible for what men have done.

Who is holding Justine responsible? Seriously. Be logical.

Many of us are well aware of some of the specific pressures bought upon Mumsnet by predominately male transactivists & allies:

Wed 02-May-18 OP leyat wrote:

'Trans Media Watch has written to parliament saying 'trans identified male' can be considered as hate speech, and that Mumsnet users referring to penises are being transphobic
"Trans Media Watch appears to want the term 'trans identified male', or indeed referring to them as 'men' to be understood as hate speech and deems Mumsnet 'of particular concern'. This really has to be read to be believed; here is their written submission to the Home Affairs Committee: data.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/committeeevidence.svc/evidencedocument/home-affairs-committee/hate-crime-and-its-violent-consequences/written/82105.pdf. It is quite the collection of lies and misrepresentations designed to completely malign women, the only good thing about it is that it is so obviously one-sided that most rational people would see that.

Worth sharing this article on how the committee has been approaching the matter, and how at least some MP's want women silenced: blogs.spectator.co.uk/2018/05/why-are-some-mps-trying-to-shut-down-the-transgender-debate/

Keep resisting!"
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3238618-Trans-Media-Watch-has-written-to-parliament-saying-trans-identified-male-can-be-considered-as-hate-speech-and-that-Mumsnet-users-referring-to-penises-are-being-transphobic

It strikes me that in holding Justine responsible for the toxic landscape in which we find ourselves, we are doing precisely what we despise in others: holding women responsible for what men have done.

Anyone is welcome not to hand over money for whatever reason.

There's a significant number of members saying they would chose to support financially but cannot under the current arrangements.

The OP asked,

"Perhaps now is the time to tell MNHQ what we want from them.

eg
Relaxation of the anti-women censorship rules.
Reinstating banned respected posters like LangCleg."

I agree with much that VitreousHumour has written. It's clear to me that Justine has put her business at a disadvantage in enabling the debate here over trans issues. She's clearly struggled over this and has made mistakes but her instincts, overall, have been right, or right enough (for me at least).

I've not been convinced by all sorts of issues that Justine has no control over being drawn into the debate why her request for support should be dismissed.

I'm finding the message coming from FWR to be surprisingly counter-productive. I could imagine TRAs reading this thread finding additional reasons to rejoice.

Anyone is welcome not to hand over money for whatever reason.

& Emma Healey's entirely false allegation that 'women on MN were calling for a new section 28' bounced around influential circles unchecked

See, and this was a complete set up. It was actually a TRA who said it. And then crowed about it on Twitter. And tried to make out that it was a genuine sentiment on here.

Which is laughable given the demographic on FWR.

But Emma Healy ran with it. Whether that was a mistake, or deliberate, I don't really care. She did so much damage.

Well, seeing as one of the issues was the "right" to be able to discuss a person's looks, appearance, what a person wears etc I'd have thought that was one meant?

Is that something that is banned, or should be banned, from being discussed throughout all the boards or just this one?

The screenshotted section 28 post was written by a TRA by the name of 12thGuelph. You can look him/her/them up.

I like Justine and Mumsnet a lot - I wouldn't stick around if I didn't - and I cheered loudly when Justine said in the Times that she believes in free speech and would allow the discussion to continue. I'll never forget that.

But going back the the Emma Healey affair - there was something very odd about the handling of Emma Healey - a real underplaying of what she did, and how serious it was.

I don't think Justine realised then just how threatening some Mumsnetters found it - as Datun said, women have been seriously threatened for speaking out on this - punched, reported to their employers, lost their jobs, had their children's pictures & schools published online, their home addresses published - there are some real nutjobs out there waiting to abuse women for sticking up for women's rights.

So some women were rightly very scared to have an intern able to access their details and publish them online. And then gloat that they have more, which they will publish in future.

Justine completely failed to gasp that - but you'd think the gravity of allowing poster's details be screenshotted, and walk out of the building in an intern's bag would have been taken a bit more seriously. They treated it like a silly mistake.

Sigh... what none of them seem to get is that we have a new section 28, pretty much. It’s still considered unacceptable to be exclusively attracted to your own sex. The difference I see is that even at her worst, Thatcher never suggested that kids who didn’t conform sufficiently to sex stereotypes should be drugged and sterilised.

Emma Healey's blog with its false claims that 'mumsnet are calling for a new section 28' have continued to be republished and quoted by some prominant TRAs, believed by some parliamentarians and absorbed as truth by many.

During Parliamentary special debate on homophobia, transphobia & biphobia:
Thu 17-May-18
"Dawn Butler referred to a social media platform where there were calls for a new section 28."

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3251616-Parliament-debate-on-homophobia-today-tweet-MP-if-you-would-like-lesbian-voices-to-be-represented

The minimising about Emma Healey being a case in point.

18/4/2018
Baroness Liz Barker (LibDems) retweeting the 'childish & unprofessional' false claims by Emma Heaton. ( see picture)

Its still up
twitter.com/LizBarkerLords/status/986646386010619904

19/4/2019 OP MrsSnippyPants wrote:
"Baroness Barker (LibDem) attempts to smear GC women's groups

"Many describe themselves as grassroots campaign groups, and are not registered charities so they don’t have a constitution that sets out publicly how their organisation is constituted or to whom and how it is accountable. And many say that they are funded by supporters, not by government – usually with bank details for people to send in donations."

www.openlynews.com/i/?id=49ee12f8-209a-4e2c-a2ce-7c3a675d9403

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3564115-Baroness-Barker-LibDem-attempts-to-smear-GC-womens-groups

@Binterested I think Justine is brilliant at comms in terms of getting her site in the public eye. There are loads of other sites out there for parents, most have few users. She us bad at comms with the users of the site and seems to think we should be grateful and recognise the struggle she has had. She sees it from her pov and can't seem to see it from a users pov.

Not comfortable with MN having my bank details tbh.
The security has not been brilliant in the past

A good PR person really is worth every penny you pay them. Just saying.

I think Justine is quite poor at comms. She’s obviously built a brilliant site and it has amazing profile and I understand how hard it is for businesses like hers right now. But she needs to not be the voice of the site because she doesn’t come across well and that hasn’t helped in the current situation.

If I knew her or was on the board or something I would tell her. It would really help her to have someone more intuitive as the public voice. She just manages to hit the wrong note often. I’m not great at it either - but I know it and therefore take a back seat at work when these kind of comms are required.

The minimising about Emma Healey being a case in point.

Sorry VitreousHumour - you still haven't told us the source of your very confident analysis here.

No, I haven't.

I work in web analytics. If I shared a client’s website stats with someone, I’d expect to be in deep shit. If I did it in the knowledge that they were going to then post the information publicly on that client’s website, I’d expect to be sacked.

And Vitreous - if you happen to be using one of the services that offers information on other sites’ stats, they’re notoriously inaccurate.

How is that the fault of the people on this board

Bewilderness might not be up yet on the other side of the world, so I'll butt in here, Datun

1st rule of misogyny: Women are responsible for what men do.

That was to Rowantrees comment, cross posted with a few others