Is anyone else finding being gender critical has affected their mental health?

Don't be wearied - be empowered. Stop wasting your energy on those who don't deserve it, and turn your attention to those who do

Yes, exactly this. It is very wearying to realise that many, too many, of my fellow human beings do not regard me as fully human.

It's not being 'gender critical' that affects your mental health, it's the stress of the mental gymnastics required by women to exist and pretend the men in their lives care about them as equals, because to confront their reality would require uncomfortable changes

'Germaine Greer is spot on there. I really didn't realise, well I did as a child in the 70s but thought somehow we'd moved on. Now I see it, a lot of men really hate women. But there are also a lot of men who don't'

Sorry if I repeated this technology is not my thing! This statement is a perfect example of why women remain so oppressed - no matter what their argument, it has to come with a disclaimer that it doesn't include all men. Surely the real issue is not that there are men who don't hate women, but that there are any men who do. Why is this not a pressing issue? Why is it acceptable that any men hate women - and why doesn't anyone question why that is? Women are HALF THE HUMAN POPULATION - globally oppressed despite their cultural differences! Why doesn't anyone question why that is???

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Thanks @MrsOvertonsWindow . I'm kind of making it sound worse than it was. I got hit with a disciplinary interview not for being GC per se, but by being rude about my employer online; in my naivety I hadn't realised they can track you down under a pseudonym. My own managers were on my side.
As for the counsellor, I almost felt sorry for him. He'd been trained to think that trans people were sad because of nasty people who didn't "accept them to be who they are" and he didn't know how to deal with a real live bogeyman on his caseload.
He did me a bit of a favour. His only therapeutic advice seemed to be "Learn to accept the things you can't change." I used to think that was a fair maxim. Now I realise that the bad things of the world aren't so easily divisible into the mutable and the immutable. If you want to change anything at all (even your socks) it takes a certain amount of effort; there are some changes, like combating bullshit and misogyny, which cost an awful lot of effort, time and emotional pain. The question is not whether they can be changed, but whether the effort is worth it, to you, given whatever else might be going on in your life and other battles you might be fighting. Recognising this really helped.

That's appalling. Sounds like workplace bullying and also illegal.

Even if you don't want to take any action, you might find it helpful to take some advice from Sex Matters or one of the other organisations that have evolved to tackle workplace bullying like this? Many workers are finding that organisations suddenly reverse ferret at speed whn they realise that illegally harassing staff for expressing perfectly legal views can end up costing them considerably.
I do hope that things are a bit easier for you now?

Yes, yes, dreadfully so. Helen Lewis put it well a few weeks ago when she said something like, she thought she knew who her tribe were; then she realised she didn't have one. I thought I was, you know, emotionally safe with left-leaning, environmentally-aware people; they mightn't agree with me on every point but they'd be inclined to think of me as a fellow-traveller.
Then I found out I was .. anathema, a heretic, a witch. I didn't care about the threats and the insults but being damned by those I thought were my friends, being expected to make a public statement of adherence to a philosophy I can't share, seeing people like me vilified - all that's hit me really hard.
Last year I was upset because my work had decreed that everyone ought to put their pronouns in their signature, with a cutesy little piece about how good we were to do so. I grumbled about this online and got hit with a disciplinary interview. Then my work sent me to a "counsellor". He told me how personally difficult it was for him to deal with someone like me and advised me to keep my opinions to myself because, "taking on [my employer] wouldn't really work". I toyed with the idea of complaining about him but I was just too crushed to do so. Wankers, the lot of them.

I think I was quite naughty, and have been put right. It's like Mumsnet is my...mum.

@RealityFan You can report the deletion and ask why in your report message. I've done that before and got an answer.

Any ideas how to find out why a post gets deleted? My last one here has, and I have absolutely no idea.

Germaine Greer is spot on there. I really didn't realise, well I did as a child in the 70s but thought somehow we'd moved on. Now I see it, a lot of men really hate women. But there are also a lot of men who don't.

Two people in my life one a sibling one a friend, both men, have washed their hands of me completely after finding out I joined women's gender critical networks.

i know it's completely unhelpful, but sadly a man cutting a woman off for wanting sex-based rights, sounds a lot like hate. Germaine Greer comes to mind.

It's certainly affected my mental health. I first came across the full madness just before the last general election, when that Jo Swinson was shouting 'TWAW!' all the time so I started looking into what was going on and felt like I was suddenly caught in a living nightmare. Someone very close to me, a gay man, put it like this: 'Its a horrible power TRAs have been given by authority for some unspeakable reason - and they know it and want to push everyone to the edge of their tolerance for what they know is filth...the way women are criminalised for 'upsetting' these sadists is what I find most scary of all - the enabling and encouraging of abuse by the very powers that are supposed to stop it'. Well said.

Then a male friend of 40+ years told me one day that he thinks he understands what's behind the rise in the ideology. He told me in all seriousness that 'It's in your head, it's in your heart, it's what you wear'. Really?! It's what you wear?!!! His new wife thinks that it's fine and dandy for men to compete against women, because TWAW, and he's going along with her. He sneered when I spoke of women's need for safety and dignity. I used to have a lot of respect for this man and we had a lot of water under the bridge together, but now realise that he's weak, a follower who will do whatever is necessary to live a comfortable life, while never feeling the impact of what is being done to women. He doesn't even have to think about it as it doesn't affect him. I feel bitter about it and regret that things have turned out this way, but I shan't be contacting him again. He can polish his halo in peace.

Saying that, I'm making new friends with the sane people out there, women who believe that we deserve our own spaces away from males.

I agree with the pp that the Internet is a weird place: in real life I probably know maybe 2 people personally who are gender ideologues. Everyone else I know is outright gender critical or upon questioning hold gender critical views even if they don't realise it e.g. no trans women in men's sports, lesbians/gay men shouldn't be pressured into dating trans women/men etc. I also have a sneaky suspicion that one of the gender ideologues I know actually is gender critical but is heavily entrenched in groups that have fully embraced gender ideology and dare not be shunned by them.

If this wasn't the car win my personal experience, I think the cognitive dissonance experienced in accepting gender ideology would affect my mental health more.

"Gender critical" movement has a bad name?
Like the "Earth is not flat" movement has a bad name.
And the "Believe in free speech" movement has a bad name.
Maybe amongst flat Earthers and anti-democrats. And those denying biology.

You are utterly wrong. I know several people estranged from their children for being exactly that reason (i.e. being honest). All those parents love their trans children, indeed they love them enough not to lie to them.

I've just been at a training day in my therapy profession. Luckily I'm governed by a light touch regulator that is only partially woke and not really Stonewalled.

We were discussing the oncoming rush of class actions on head injuries in rugby, the concussions leading to permanent personality changes, early dementia etc.

It seems how this will be judged will be what was known at the time re brain physiology and the mechanics of repetitive impact and blunt force trauma.

Right now scores of doctors are sweating looking at their patient notes from treatment, and non treatment, and the liberal attitudes towards, head injuries in the sport from the 70s onwards.

I brought up with the head of the training day my reservations on medical interventions with trans IDd teens, and how "balance of evidence" compares.

Remember, doctors have to provide quality care, but also what's "reasonable", not just on strict terms, but what's reasonable in overall scope.

So, doctors may get away claiming that evidence was ambiguous in 70s - 90s re long term irreparable brain damage from ongoing impact in rugby.

But trans medicalisation is happening in the 21st century, indeed right now. We know everything about osteoporosis, about anorgasmia, about the enormous risks on fertility, bladder function.

And of course, the big what we don't know, the psychological and continued decrepitude of such violent intervention on youth.

I walked away from my day, my head spinning. Doctors will lose many class actions of head trauma in rugby and how they didn't lock down more conservative treatment and enforced player retirements protocols.

Based on science from decades ago.

Yet doctors and surgeons and pharma firms are blindly and willfully carrying out way greater harms, against way greater vulnerable cohort of population, with 2023 levels of highly refined knowledge and data on poor health outcomes.

And yet pushing on and on, a seeming addiction to casting aside "first, do no harm".

My mind cannot compute such brazen risk taking. Because when the class actions mushroom towards decades end, there'll be no hiding place for these individuals, the medical/legal complex, the media that refused to interrogate this unique societal contagion moment.

Clearly if you have studied history you know that it's not uncommon for apparently decent people to go along with harmful and dangerous ideas (see eg the early modern witch trials, Nazism, McCarthyism, Stalinism, Maoism and so on) but it's one thing to know that in theory and another to see it play out in your own time with people you know.

Yes, I think this is the most terrifying aspect. You can see it happening, you can see where it's going but you feel powerless to stop it.

Thank goodness for those incredibly brave women who were able to speak out in those early days (JKR, Sharron, Martina etc.) and just look at how they were treated. It's appalling and so, so wrong.

Very powerful RoyalCorgi. Thank you.
I also struggle with adults who celebrate putting children on a path to sterilisatio, lifelong surgery and medical impairment. Fortunately none of them are in my social circle and we all share a commitment to safeguarding children.

I feel very angry a lot of the time, and sometimes fearful too - trans activists have shown that they can be aggressive and violent, and there is always a risk that they will physically assault those of us who speak publicly about our views.

It has also been very distressing to find that people I used to like and admire have bought into an ideology that is misogynistic, homophobic and racist, and that they endorse the abuse of children. It does make you re-evaluate your friendships and think differently about human beings in general. Clearly if you have studied history you know that it's not uncommon for apparently decent people to go along with harmful and dangerous ideas (see eg the early modern witch trials, Nazism, McCarthyism, Stalinism, Maoism and so on) but it's one thing to know that in theory and another to see it play out in your own time with people you know.

I recall mn HQ would delete any teeny, tiny hint of "misgendering", and had a very strict "3 strikes" rule. You absolutely couldn't misgender anyone - a transwoman rapist MUST be called ber "her" chosen pronouns of she/her.

Now they actually allow users to call a rapist "he" without deleting the post. It's certainly freer here now than it used to be.

It's just such extreme insanity. I watched one young person who declared they were non-binary (born a male), arguing with a professor "but I'm neither sex! So what you're saying doesn't apply to me!" when the professor was making a point that you can't just identify your way out of certain cancers, for example. Or DNA. The non-binary seemed utterly stumped and couldn't believe why he would be at risk of prostate cancer, because....he honestly thought you could change sex and just be neither sex....the professor was baffled that someone could be so ignorant and brainwashed.

Well, quite, @WandaWomblesaurus. It’s delusional. IMHO.

It doesn't affect my mental health but I am concerned about the mental health of people who think you can change sex. And I'm very concerned about children who are being fed this lie.