What broader issues has the trans (lack of) debate opened your eyes to?

This difference in men’s behaviour based on whether they see a woman as a potential sexual partner is what FloralBunting described as “use”. No use for the woman no reason to treat her as a human being.

Even for straight men, any women that they are not interested in sexually (even if subsciously), they tend to dislike them and treat them with contempt, I think. I've come to this conclusion as I got older, more invisible, and noticeably, men treat me differently to when I was younger and prettier.

So for some gay men who are not interested in women, it's like there's nothing really preventing all that contempt and dislike for women.

This really resonates with me. I've certainly learned through experience that being gay doesn't automatically make a man empathetic to women or women's issues. I was embarrassingly naive about that when I was younger, much in the way that so many young women today are about men identifying as women for ONLY the purest of reasons.

It's a bit like the realisation that men can be rightwing OR leftwing and still be massive misogynists - not such a surprise, with hindsight.

You’re right of course Prodigal, but sometimes I wish I’d kept my head firmly under the sand, because I feel quite powerless, personally.

My awakening started with MeToo, I guess. Not so much the revelations of past abuses (because Ive got plenty of my own experiences) but the fact that things don’t seem to have changed that much and in some ways have got even worse. And the reaction of a lot of men (and some women) to the movement have been disappointing, to say the least. How does women speaking out against widespread sexual harassment and assault become reframed as an attack on men?

And now (largely thanks to MN) I’ve become aware of all this trans stuff, which feels like some crazy dystopian nightmare. Aargh. I’m just grateful to the women (and men) who are braver than me and are prepared to stick their heads above the parapet to fight this madness.

In a way, it was the 2 world wars that resulted in the progression of women’s rights. It became impossible to argue that women can’t do something when women have been doing it because men were not available to fill the jobs.

Two generations of women were used (thank you FloralBunting) for essential work, lauded for it, treated with respect for contributing to the country then cast aside at the end of each war. There was even legislation passed to enforce this at the end of the Second World War. A magnificent propaganda campaign was then produced to promote the nuclear family with women at home looking after their families.

The women cast aside at the end of WW2 may have had mothers, aunts, neighbours who had been cast aside at the end of WW1. It’s no wonder that the 60s and 70s resulted in massive activism. Young women supported by two generations of women who were used and disgarded.

Thank you. It’s been something I’ve been thinking about for ages, trying to understand where the backlash, vitriol and all the milder versions of anger against women come from. It is scary.

If you strip it back to basics, every single thing that has resulted in legislation to protect women has resulted in a loss for men. They can’t argue against individual pieces of legislation without taking the position that women are not allowed equality, or bodily autonomy and thankfully the progress that has been made would make that unpalatable to most of society, in the UK at least. But they have as a class had their ability to exclude and dominate reduced. With that comes a reduced ability to succeed and achieve status. It’s not surprising they are angry.

It is scary, but the way I see it is, isn't it better to know what you're up against than to have it blindside you?

Though it’s still scary.

That’s so well articulated 2ndStar.. I’ve only quite recently become aware of incels/MRAs etc., and have been shocked and bewildered by the level of hatred for women that seems to exist. I had naively thought that things had got a lot better since I was a young women in the 80s, because on the surface they seem to have. But what’s lurking under the surface is pretty scary - especially for anyone with young daughters. Your post has helped really me understand what’s going on. Thank you.

Woman centred is something I’ll need to read up on but I definitely do not see men as default human. I see the world doing that despite the fact that women are the ones gluing everything together that allows blinkered men to glide through the areas which require facilitation.

I think the issues we see with lack of attainment in boys, rise of incel culture, sex split in 3rd tier education, general dissatisfaction in men under 40, the appalling statistics for men’s mental health could be attributed to the inbuilt mental world model that’s loaded into men and boys that achievements, personal progress and status will just arrive.

Because it did just arrive for every generation of men before them, and it’s still happening for some of them. These blinkered men believe their successes are due to innate superiority. They were actually achieved because the entire system was loaded to exclude other groups from competing. If you stop half the population from getting on the playing field every single space has a man in it.

It has become more difficult to load the system due to pesky Equalities legislation. The number of competitors has doubled. The spaces that were 100% men are not 50% women, far from it but the numbers have changed to include more women and as a result fewer men.

Generations of women and girls have been brought up to know they’ll have to work hard, fight for access to spaces, do it on your own. These women are rightfully taking up spaces, jobs, university places. They are not primed to become a man’s life facilitator.

My suspicion is the backlash and ram raid on women’s rights is men’s anger as a class at their personal losses in a world that is no longer allowed to innately favour them. They are competing with women at work and expected to contribute to the domestic load. They look at the generations of men above them, who achieved greater success, were 100% facilitated at home and think why is it different for me? It must be women’s fault when it’s actually the rebalancing of society towards sex equality. It must be a lot easier to blame women than accept that your class has benefited from inequity and are not innately superior.

Not that I think women are broken but I have surprised myself in some situations when I realised I was subconsciously seeing men as the default human. I think this goes a lot deeper than we realise.

Please don't take this as an attack as I'm trying to make a general point rather than pick on you, but could this, versus not doing this, be a big part of what radfems used to refer to as being woman centered? I don't think I do this at all, if anything I'm more likely to see women as the mental or emotional norm and men as a class as broken in some ways. The world being designed for men in a physical sense has been visible and infuriating to me from childhood. I'm thinking that if you do see men as the default subconsciously, even if consciously you know that's wrong, then your perspective on a lot of issues would be quite different and you'd probably find yourself bristling a lot when talking to radfems.

@totallyyesno I'm know I'm right because I'm in a similar boat although it's not entirely the fault of my DH, we have a SN child which has complicated things a lot. That said, like most men he could do better.

The way I chose to look at it is that I get involved and commit to feminist activism in the small ways that I can even if my own life isn't a feminist utopia. There's a lot to be done that can improve the lives of women and girls in far worse situations than my own and that can have a positive effect for future generations.

Don't feel bad about it, sometimes good enough is just that.

Yes I have also noticed a breed of woke bro gay men who are some of the worst misogynists (I'm thinking OJ from the Graudian's ilk).

Even for straight men, any women that they are not interested in sexually (even if subsciously), they tend to dislike them and treat them with contempt, I think. I've come to this conclusion as I got older, more invisible, and noticeably, men treat me differently to when I was younger and prettier.

So for some gay men who are not interested in women, it's like there's nothing really preventing all that contempt and dislike for women.

@Ovahere you are absolutely right. I am very aware of the inequalities in my marriage and I don't feel I can fight back without my children missing out. I think it has ruined our relationship.

rabbitwoman sorry but your friend is not lovely. I had a kind of epiphany about a gay male friend I've had for a long time, it was kind of depressing. He has turned out to be rabidly TWAW and when trying to engage him in discussion, he came out with a lot of really shocking misogynistic crap about lesbians - real contempt and dislike. The scales fell from my eyes - I really hadn't seen his misogyny before and realised I had unconsciously given him a free pass on it because he is gay. Not at all saying this applies to all gay men but in some ways they can be even more misogynistic than straight men.

They don’t even know they are centred at the expense of others. Walking blithely through opened doors, cleared paths, in clean clothes, with full stomachs, hold on what is this - a thing I am not allowed? How can this be?

Yes! Exactly.

Doxxing is absolutely vile. Woman obey, use the speech we tell you to, have these beliefs or be punished. It’s self appointed witch finders who are facilitated by the world to crush women’s lives for not believing.

Doxxing. The tactics of TRAs, it's not just debate, words, there are real life consequences. Any opinions they don't like is branded 'hate speech' and 'literal violence', then they pile on, threaten find out who you are, where you work, and make you lose your livelihood....and spineless most companies are in not pushing back on this nonsense.

How damaging porn is.

That it is possible for a lefty like me to agree with Conservatives (that was really tough), and the occasional thing Piers Morgan and daily wail says, and that actually listening to people on all sides and engaging calmly rather than painting everyone as good or bad is actually a rather good idea.

How poorly lots of people communicate and instead use long words and complicated formulations to try and bamboozle others into agreement.

How violent and vitriolic the twitter pileons are.

I am also seeing inequality and misogyny everywhere, but to my surprise women inflict a lot of it on themselves. It does all seem to revolve around children, childcare, caring responsibilities; I think because I am not a mum myself I can see the inequality much clearer as an outsider. It astounds me sometimes, how my friends call themselves feminists and say they are raising their daughters to believe they can be whatever they want to be whilst taking on such hugely unequal domestic responsibilities.

You are right in that it appears to be clear cut from the outside looking in but as 2ndStar says it's very difficult for most women to override the maternal instinct to do the very best by our children.

This gets hugely exploited and many women know perfectly well (via feminist analysis) that this is the case but will put up with a level of inequality if the alternative is their children's lives are diminished in some way.

In answer to OP, how the Labour Party refused and refuses to acknowledge the rights of women. Never ever did I think I would concur with people like Michael Portillo.

I am fortunate enough to work with thoughtful and intelligent people. Two men in their 30s have been utterly supportive and horrified by the creeping hatred of women and erosion of female only spaces.

I didn’t realise how frightened society was of challenging ideas. There seems to be a wish to placate everyone and anyone - at women’s expense.

And I didn’t imagine that a child or young person feeling confused, insecure and unsure could result in them having surgery which would and does affect their lives. Society allowed that.

Lots of excellent observations here, many that I share, although could not express so eloquently.

For me, one of the top tips I've learnt from this 'debate' is it's useful for every GC thinker to know a good lawyer and to have their phone number to hand at all times.

How many mothers will bargain with their children’s well-being, cleanliness, health, etc etc to achieve equal domestic responsibilities? Not many, and the men refusing equal share know it.

That’s what the line “we forgot about the children” means. I can’t remember which feminist said it, was post 70s

I am also seeing inequality and misogyny everywhere, but to my surprise women inflict a lot of it on themselves. It does all seem to revolve around children, childcare, caring responsibilities; I think because I am not a mum myself I can see the inequality much clearer as an outsider. It astounds me sometimes, how my friends call themselves feminists and say they are raising their daughters to believe they can be whatever they want to be whilst taking on such hugely unequal domestic responsibilities.

It seems as though we have been conditioned to be completely compliant and unquestioning, at the same time as being told we can fight for our rights....

Meanwhile women are socialised from birth to be hyper aware of others needs and put them before our own.

They don’t even know they are centred at the expense of others. Walking blithely through opened doors, cleared paths, in clean clothes, with full stomachs, hold on what is this - a thing I am not allowed? How can this be?