Why aren’t we using our democratic right to protest?

I don't buy the arguments that it's due to caring responsibilities or work or whatever. Women had the same, or even more responsibilities in the 80s and yet the Greenham Common camp managed to attract 70,000 at its highest. Marches from the Countryside Alliance to the Brexit protests to the current Israel-Palestine war protest marches have had very high proportions of women participants.

I agree with PPs that it's the fact that the fight to defend sex-based rights takes place primarily on the internet that has resulted in an inability to make the move from the armchair to the street. OP talks about being "not political" - the inability to see that this is absolutely about politics, and that political changes takes place on the street, not on twitter, is part of the problem.

also on a practical level having been involved in other campaigns- what is the clear simple ‘ask’ that we would be asking people to march for?

I agree with @Theeyeballsinthesky I think that, for a march to be effective, you need to be able to explain why you're there in 3 or 4 words to a local reporter or sceptical passer by. So 'Votes for women!' would have worked but 'Protect women's sex based rights' needs too much unpacking - they'll have walked away before you've finished.

But marches aren't the only way to protest and I prefer the idea of more focussed gatherings and street stalls like @PogueMahoneRishi has described. They can take place in any town or city e.g. outside a BBC building to protest the Justin Webb decision or the law courts (referring to Scarlet Blake as 'she') or a local department store that lets men use women's changing rooms.

Where's 'Any Questions' being broadcast from tonight for example? Just a thought.

I've been to LWS events - which are brilliant and proper grassroots activism, though obviously the mainstream media won't admit that or report much on it. Just because we don't hear about this doesn't mean it's not happening. It's part of the misogyny of the media.

But, like many women who know what a man is, i am middle aged with children and caring responsibilities. Some days I barely make it through the long list of things I absolutely need to get done or something dreadful will happen.

I need to arrange childcare / child transport somehow if it's a weekend because DH can't do all the clubs on his own as each child is in different places at the same time. OK, they can miss the odd club, but it's not realistic for me to be doing it regularly. It costs money. I don't have pots of money (sadly) - I have to decide whether to pay into a crowdfunder or for a ticket to London (or wherever) to protest.

For women with small children, who are breastfeeding, it's even harder. Women who are caring for elderly relatives without sufficient support - there are lots of women in this position - ditto.

Older women with infirmities or disabilities or modest incomes can find it difficult to travel too.

The young transactivists have none of these issues because they're not the ones propping up the economy with unpaid caring work. A feature of the transwidows threads is how little the men wanting to be 'women' do of all the unpaid caring work that falls overwhelmingly to XX women.

Also, having been to LWS events there is no fucking way in hell I'd bring a child there. Some of the masked men trying to shut women up look as if they'd like nothing more than beating up a woman. It can be scary, and the policing of these events has been variable - sometimes good, but sometimes they've let women be attacked. We all saw what happened to Kellie Jay in New Zealand, and the elderly woman punched in the head by a young misogynist man. I think some women put their physical health first.

So I think the reasons why more women aren't on the streets are varied and complex.

Part of it is undoubtedly that women don't feel supported by the police to do so safely though.

ie in a week's time Million Women Rise will be marching in London as they have done for I think at least 10 years. But this is rarely reported even though women travel from different parts of the UK. But that's because they aren't violent and dont think protesting means defacing other people's property.

I've never even heard of this!

I am shocked at myself - I thought I was reasonably well up on feminist topics, but I'm obviously not.

😂

I have a shopping trolley.

Perhaps it could identify as a tractor?

Most farmers are pretty clear on the sex binary.

I would guess caring responsibility keeps many of us away. I'm stuck caring for a high need disabled child who the LA won't give an education of school place.. I can't work or socialise let alone attend marches. Many SEN mothers I know want to March over that too but we can't because we have the kids to care for. And of course I'm poor not working so can't financially give to causes I care about either. But I'm a woman so I'm constantly dismissed when I point out what's happening to my child is illegal

Though tbf they don't really listen to farmers.

Sign up to various GC women's rights newsletters - in Scotland at least we still have protests and gatherings. Had one recently about men in women's prisons in Edinburgh.

Gender ideology can be very complex in terms of the sheer issues affected by it - free speech, women's rights, safeguarding of children, medical malpractice etc. It's not easy for people to wrap their heads around it. I think the regular stalls in various towns and locations to talk to people directly and raise awareness of the problems has a much bigger effect.

Large protests are eye catching but these days most protesters have no clear aims or goals. I think the general public are getting sick of all the different public protests which end up being an excuse for zealots to harass and inconvenience people, damage and destroy public and private property and so on, all in the name of "human rights", environment etc.

This is how to change minds!

I love the educate-discuss-talking approach and think that this has more 'stickiness' if trying to change minds. Help people peak and then they go on to peak others. There are so many good arguments on the GC side. But they need to be explained and the terminology is sometimes baffling to man-in-the-street.

Also the TRA side of this argument are very good at street protests/mass demonstrations and it really suits their #nodebate and slogan-which-is-catchy-but-questionable approach.

How would that work for the GC side? Chanting or showing placards declaring Trans Women are not women? (Will passersby or or those viewing footage know that TWs often have male bodies and are not in fact women who want to transition? #Notourcrimes? We are not chestfeeders? Most people seeing this sort of thing on the news or on the street won't know what the heck we are talking about. Coverage could well focus on the colourful counter-protests (which there will of course be). Those have many many flags and a lot of experience in being disruptive.

I would rather leave protests to the TRAs. I am mindful that this is a very complex and wide-ranging issue (we are fighting the GC side on so many fronts). Those that support this issue are not a uni-mind (which I feel is usually a very good thing). But not forgetting that some of the people who are pro-GC are unashamably transphobic. I would prefer to argue the issues with someone like that one-to-one than march alongside them. (Thinks: George Galloway).

I don’t think we’re at a tipping point yet and I don’t know if we ever will be in terms of marching. Too many people still don’t join the dots between how we got to a point where Scarlett Blake was reported as a woman and his crime will be recorded as a female one and their workplace policy that everyone has pronouns in their emails for example. On an everyday level most women won’t see any direct impact on their lives that SB is recorded as female. It all feels very theoretical and meta. So whilst many women are angry, they’re not angry enough because the dots aren’t being joined in a clear and easy way.

also on a practical level having been involved in other campaigns- what is the clear simple ‘ask’ that we would be asking people to march for?

I’d March. There’s been many that I’ve seen on the news I wished I’d known about before the event. I was going to ask where to find out about upcoming protests and Google came up with this

https://www.republic.org.uk/events

Are there other sites that list all protests?

I would agree, we are not near enough to the tipping point yet. Although close.
If OP wants to arrange this (just how is something like this arranged? ) then crack on.

Canada had a one million person March, did you see any of it on the news, reported anywhere?

Count me in. The last few days have made me very angry.

I'd be up for marching. Just bear in mind though, it could get nasty:

Every political movement has factions and divisions and that’s normal because people are passionate about their cause and they might not agree all the time on the best way to achieve it or what to prioritise. Don't worry about that, because you can’t avoid it.

And campaigning needs party political people as well as people who don’t favour any party, because they all bring valid experiences and approaches.

Public protests are important if you’re going on them to rally spirits or if they get media coverage to rally wider public support of people who didn’t know about the issue. GC issues are reality based and don’t revere male sexual privilege as being higher than anything else including women’s rights and child safeguarding… so GC issues will already instinctively get support from a lot of people, once the issues at stake are made clear.

However if you actually want to effect change in a lasting way then we actually need legal change, via courts and Parliament.

See all the crowdfunded cases ongoing and see discussions of what needed to be done in Parliament. Parliament needs to repeal the GRA and make the Equality Act clearer on the meaning of biological sex - the briefings that Sex Matters has written on this can be shared with MPs.

If everyone who cares about this wrote to their MP and election candidates in their area then their concerns could be really influential and effective. Now especially as we are soon to have a general election and they want our votes. There’s never been a better time to email or ask to meet with candidates.

The difficulty at the moment with organizing an effective march is that many of the women’s groups that would have been the foundation for drawing in women have been captured and turned against. Women as a sex class have had to redevelop the grass roots gatherings and that has been hampered by the vile actions of institutions that normally support grass roots organizations like students unions, local councils, etc. who have discriminated against women trying to organize on the basis of their sex class and the dirty war by TRAs to try and shut down our use of general facilities.

The Forstater judgement gives us a chance to start standing up against some of that, but it’s an uphill struggle and women are still scared to speak out or be seen to demand rights for fear of retribution.

all had local grassroot groups that joined in, spread the word

That is the core of the problem. There are very few active local women's groups any more.

In the past all actions grew out of local activism and they reaching out to see if enough other local groups had a shared issue they wanted to work together on.

Now most feminists are isolated individuals on the internet, and are more used to "consuming" what social media feeds them rather than seeing that they need to be the originator / organiser.

Not forgetting that if the core issue was about sex based rights many women would be fearful of being publicly identified because of possible problems at work or even at home.

Hi OP

I think you may have got the wrong impression about women's activism in the UK whether from being on FWR or assuming the mainstream media would let you know there has been a demo. ie the media only reports demos is there is some smashing of windows or climbing statures.

ie in a week's time Million Women Rise will be marching in London as they have done for I think at least 10 years. But this is rarely reported even though women travel from different parts of the UK. But that's because they aren't violent and dont think protesting means defacing other people's property.

The issue is that feminists who are mainly on the internet end up in isolated silos and aren't aware that other women are on the streets or lobbying.

Whether however given the huge divisions between the various understandings of what being a women is, let alone what being a feminist is, it perhaps isn't that surprising that there aren't as many women focused street actions as they used to be.

But there is nothing to say that it couldn't happen again.

And you could be the one to kick start it!

It takes enough women at the same time to feel threatened enough to take group action. The reclaim the night movement in Leeds in the 80s grew out of women being unsafe and not protected by the agents of the state. Not enough women currently realise how dangerously near to losing all our sex based rights we are.