JK Rowling on Billy Bragg and other progressive male class warriors

they’ll take shameless refuge in accusations that we, the women criticising the injustice and insanity of gender identity ideology, were enabling the far-right.
We've had these accusations on FWR threads recently: 'Ooooh, you mustn't like her, she's a baddie, she goes on GB News!' and similar.

If the fucking Left had done its fucking job, women would not have had to rely on the right-wing media to get the word out. And then when we read an article in the Mail, or have admiration for some of the policies or speeches of certain right-wing politicians, we get shouted at for giving succour to the right.

Well, boys, perhaps you should have seen that coming before you decided that women didn't matter.

@TempestTost - It's long been less clear that going out to a ft job is a win for women in wc families. Unlike professional mc families, the wage the woman would get may not really cover much more than childcare and the costs associated with working. And for women in a "job" rather than a career, leaving their child at home to go out and work at that job that might not be all that satisfying. Even with two wages, families like that might not be able to afford extra help to make up for time spent working.

I think one thing that has changed in the last fifty years or so is that it is far easier for women to leave unsatisfying or abusive marriages, and in that situation it is vital for women to have preserved their own earning potential regardless of whether they have children or not. I think one thing feminism has done for us is make us far more aware that we really matter as individuals and not just as support humans.

Yeah, this is somewhat what I was getting at. Gender ideology is part and parcel of their approach to to race politics, and I would argue also to feminism in many cases. It's all seen through the lens of identity politics.

They are vulnerable to GI because they accept the underlying ideas of id pol. It's not some kind of abberation.

A lot is about the organizations doing the lobbying on these issues.

I think there is some truth in this, however you want to take it. Partly it is just sexist attitudes, but there was also more of a view that the workers movement wasn't just about treating everyone the same, so much as making life managable for wc families.

It's long been less clear that going out to a ft job is a win for women in wc families. Unlike professional mc families, the wage the woman would get may not really cover much more than childcare and the costs associated with working. And for women in a "job" rather than a career, leaving their child at home to go out and work at that job that might not be all that satisfying. Even with two wages, families like that might not be able to afford extra help to make up for time spent working.

A better model for families like that can be the man in a good ft job, taking what overtime he can, while the woman manages childcare, picks up part time of casual work, or works in some kind of cottage industry, and makes it possible for her husband to get those extra hours and benefits.

That's why this period produced ideas like the mother's allowance, designed to protect women from husbands who were unreliable, and allow them to have some stable income of their own.

She's amazing. Could've put her feet up, retired to an island and lived out her days in luxury but instead is fighting in the trenches. Fighting and leading with style.

What a woman.

One aspect of the issue of PMCW which imo permeates the left, is that they always want the issues to be simple - good v bad. They support "trans rights" because they imagine a meek old school HSTS and they don't want to grapple with the fact that allowing him in also allows in any other bloke who so fancies. Anyone pointing out the shades of grey is construed as working against them, rather than helping to construct a workable solution such as third spaces.

Tbh I've always been a bit dubious about PMCW commitment to class struggle as well. I come from a trades background and have raised the issue of the apprenticeships many times, only to be told by some sneering intellectual that men in the trades aren't really working class because they're self employed.

So: labour rights for strippers? Yay! Apprenticeships for WC boys? Too aspirational and little England for the PMCW.

JKR is a hero, she has used her enormous fame and clout to defend human rights and helped shine a glaring, bright light on the mysogyny, homophobia and virtue signalling, especially on the left and from men. She's incredible, lots of other influential people could do worse than to take a page out her book! I hopes she writes a fantastic expose of identity politics and the bile directed at those speaking out.

Why is everything the fault of the left, particularly when for the past 14 years, the Tories have been in office? Aren't the left politically toothless? They cannot influence policy or funding, apart from debate. How can they cause "serious harm to troubled young people, trample all over women's rights and seek to remove single-sex services from the most vulnerable"?

It's not just about who's in power at Westminster. What about local councils who do decide 'policy & funding'? What about local Labour groups? Unions? Universities? Groups & networks within other organisations? Activists & 'protestors'?

Yes he didn't cover himself in glory either.

I didn’t know that. I do remember Blair sacking Mo Mowlam after she’d already achieved so much and cynically wondering if it was so he could take the credit himself.

No what I meant by that was that one of the things Jeremy Corbyn was being praised for by his fans was helping to end the fighting in NI. When at the time Tony Blair said he was causing more trouble and was actively working against the government by cosying up to the IRA. Mowlam was the NI secretary at the time and was instrumental in negotiating the agreement with both sides. To give the credit to some annoying backbencher who was not part of the government and voted against the GFA and his own party was minimising her monumental achievement in a massive way.

The Corbynistas were desperate to take away the achievements of an outstanding Labour female politician ( Mo Mowlam) and hand it to a mediocre man (Jeremy Corbyn) in relation to NI and the Good Friday agreement

Wasn’t that Tony Blair, not Jeremy Corbyn?

Anyway, I was perplexed to find out about the amount of sexism in the trade union movement. These were left-wing progressives, so it didn’t seem to make any sense.

I can only wonder if it’s a cultural legacy from the days when men supposedly needed to be paid more than women because they had wives and children to support, whereas married women, (if they were allowed to keep their jobs at all), just worked for pin money.

It's not just women. It's also minority groups who don't do what they are supposed to ( be oppressed and downtrodden) and have the audacity to have as much money as they do, or more. Especially if they then make a choice open to all to become Tories, then they are too stupid to understand racism. And the working class who are too busy being xenophobic to become footsoldiers for the Revolution.

Agreed, there have been some very vocal posters on here, browbeating anyone who has the temerity to raise questions about Labour and telling them off for not putting up and shutting up with the misogyny to get the Tories out. It’s so wrong-headed.

...unless we're one of those special 'cool girls' as was coined in Gone Girl.

Is this about male ego? Are jumped up lefty males egoists with tribal thinking? The tribal element being that they are planning the revolution with their fellow males as a pp nails it, and the male ego being propped up by discounting lesser female voices.and seeing us as less than?

I don't think there's anything altruistic in this type of man's support. All three of those campaign points are directly in his interest - his right to enjoy women's bodies on demand without any of the uncomfortable possibilities of being made responsible for a child.

I think this goes right to the heart of it. Most people (including many on the left) are selfish and will support issues that either directly benefit them or are a vehicle for them to virtue signal. When it comes down to it, very few people are willing to put their neck on the line and fight for an unfashionable cause that is not directly in their own interest. Huge respect to those that do.

I joined the Socialist Party in London back in the1990s. Was always very disappointed by their patronising attitude to women and stopped attending meetings fairly soon. I remain a socialist in my views but these Posturing Male Condescending Wankers put me right off.

thank you, that is high praise indeed!

adds ‘more succinct than Andrea Dworkin’ to CV 😁

LOL, this is exactly it. Andrea Dworkin wrote about this phenomenon very well although not as succinctly as you!

There have always been this element within Labour, though. They always get put back in their box, Labour win elections again, then they lose and they roar back again, keeping Labour out of power until they are kept a lid on again. It's the problem with both main parties, caused by our electoral system. They are coalitions of people who loathe each other and have little in common, stuck together l. We need a new proper social Democratic centrist party, but they don't get aywe under FPTP unless one of the main parties majorly collapses and creates a vacuum. I really don't think there are enough of them in the Parliamentary party at least to ditch Starmer. They have never got rid of their own sitting Prime Ministers.

Why is everything the fault of the left, particularly when for the past 14 years, the Tories have been in office? Aren't the left politically toothless? They cannot influence policy
The Civil Service and similar are run by PMCW. Gender Ideology has been allowed (celebrated, even) by the health, social care, education, media, sports, culture, etc sectors. The Left allowed it in by the backdoor and the Tories let them because they didn't want another Section 28 situation.

I think it's a good point that this attitude to women isn't an aberration. When I was a Labour member, there seemed to be a deeply engrained view that women's rights would be sorted out anyway once they'd fixed the NHS and housing etc. etc, the message being shut up and stop being so selfish.

It's also not an attitude that's unique to men. As @mirax reminds us, lots of democrat women shrugged off Clinton's behaviour, presumably because they didn't think there was anything that could be done about it. And every day on this board we have posters telling us we have to take one for the team and vote Labour.

If we accept that the left has a misogyny problem and an antisemitism problem, then there are two current issues that allow some very dodgy attitudes to hide in plain sight.

Starmer thought, and I believe he was sincere in this, that antisemitism was purely a problem of the Corbyn people, and if he sidelined them then all would be well. That hasn't turned out to be the case. And on lefty MRAism, he hasn't even acknowledged it might exist.

I read him as yet another one of these centre left men who pats himself on the back for being a great feminist ally but is incapable of hearing female voices.