Is anyone else starting to doubt their own sanity?

The depressing - and fascinating part- is that the person I know is staunchly pro vax and was constantly mocking anti vaxxers as anti science during Covid. Her child is also neurodivergent and she was always spouting the need for evidence based treatments and vilifying those who tried alternative/complementary methods (which she disdains as woo) yet here she is whole heartedly supporting this complete woo. She also posts pro affirming advice for parents in massive parents groups and nukes anything she thinks is ‘bigoted’, which is anything that is not 100% trans celebration. it’s quite fascinating.

I have learned something about myself too. I used to find her amusing when she was like this about things I agreed with her on (although I had started to clock the nastiness even before the trans issue arose) and I’m more thoughtful about how I express opinions as a result.

I actually know her through work, but haven't had any contact with her for about 5 years. I wouldn't like to ask to be honest. I feel we might not get the right answer - although I wouldn't have the same worries about it if she were 20 years younger. It would be entirely consistent with her approach to be grounded in reality. Lots of older childcare and child development experts aren't very engaged with this issue and the narrative that minority groups are oppressed by the less enlightened is very well established. I may be wrong, and I'm not being patronising about her age, but when you've had a long distinguished career it's understandable that you might not want to be on top of the latest issues when you're 88. Experts - clinical or academic - with trans identified friends or family members which she may also have (I'm not hinting that Penny Leach has!), often take the path of least resistance. I'm assuming that that's why so many of them simply avoid the issue.

Yes she is

Christ - very interesting

is Leach still alive? I’d love to know what she thinks about the current shit show

Boys and girls are not the same ....
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2009/feb/15/boys-girls-alone-channel-4

Interesting that Hilary Cass was a signatory to the complaints about the show

Women's minds seem much better furnished than men's, and the stuff is more useful, too. 😀

Women's minds appear to be much better furnished then men's, and with stuff that's a lot more useful. 😀

Yes! That must’ve been it.

I would likely be thrown out of my volunteering if I said anything that wasn't TWAW in public (which means I don't say anything). Possibly find myself in an uncomfortable situation in my place of worship, too. But the tide will turn (and they'll all find something else weird to believe).

No, although manning the bacon slicer would be ok. He/she just can't eat bacon. Selling it is fine, I understand.

Has anyone yet been able to explain to you using reliable data why its NOT a safeguarding issue? Has anyone provided robust scientific evidence about brain difference that is accepted by the majority of experts in the field?
If they have and you persist in believing differently then you might be wise to consider if you're being rational. However in the absence of anything compelling, you're wiser not to believe things people say based on nothing more than their feelings.

Gen X are also old enough to not take for granted things like access to birth control, maternity leave and criminalisation of rape within marriage, and to have seen the impact on previous generations who did not have these rights.

"It cannot be happening because if it was the BBC would report it"

The Prescott memo holed that below the waterline.

Now the BBC are starting to report properly
and GG, WI, Labour party are finally listening to their lawyers.

Kwishner Falkner on Sky News this morning ....
John McDonnell's ration on Xtwitter

Daylight is the best disinfectant.
The BBC have had to raise the shutters and many many more people are starting to see how systematically the Lanyard class has lied to them.

Well, the young relative is only relatively young! I believe early 30s. I suspect she was cautiously signalling that she has GC views, and my friend picked up on that.

Not your sanity. I think this is an odd mix of the typical British need to please everyone & offend no one, mixing with gen z who have grown up glued to social media & list touch with reality which is leading to all this.

Gen X grew up with British encyclopaedia (fact driven) rather than google & Tik Tok, androgynous role models & a goth sub culture (but could tell the difference between men & women). Social & political fights were experienced (amongst others) through the Falkland’s war, Troubles in Northern Ireland and animal rights by the ALF plus women & gay rights,

I appreciate this generation want a cause to fight for but surely they can do better than demanding access to women’s loos for men wearing skirts & make up & resorting to cancel culture. Bit embarrassing really.

You really shouldn't feel like that Dusty 💐

And I find it very interesting that you said a young female relative was positive about the female author. It's always heartening to hear that not all young people are captured by this.

As other posters have said, speaking up can really make a difference. I feel pretty hypocritical posting this as I've been seriously remiss in my emailing and petitioning recently after stepping back a bit (other major life events) - but I've got back in the game and contacted Guides since their announcement.

For anyone else who wants to send a short message, whether to support the decisions, or condemn the statements, or just seek reassurances given their upsetting tone...:

https://www.girlguiding.org.uk/about-us/contact-us/

https://www.thewi.org.uk/contact-us

In the UK, women on here have been backed up 100% by the Supreme Court.

That fact certainly should provides a fair amount of relief to anyone concerned they are BU.

Six or seven years ago, we might have been banned from this board for saying that a Transwoman is a man. Ditto Twitter. No newspaper would report on the issues, we had to speak in code and meet in secret. My god, that was a test for anyone who ever may have doubted their sanity!

Its still a bit hard but we have:

• Forstater, proving that its WORIADS to believe that sex matters.
• The Cass Report
• The Supreme Court judgement to prove that man and woman mean biological sex.
• Politicians from every party speaking up for women, in both Houses.
• Many grassroots groups and networks established, including a couple of charities.
• Coverage in virtually every news outlet, from various angles.

• The Free Speech Union

It's absolutely astonishing how far we've come. This, in the face of hugely well funded and strategised groups who had taken over so many governments and bodies.

Bon courage to all of us.

All adult volunteers in Girlguiding will have had to complete the organisation's safeguarding training. Read into that what you will.

'Happily' [that may be putting it a bit strongly], OP, I'm coming out the other side of the place you are in now.

When the full irrational illogical horror of the impact of the trans juggernaut on everything first dawned on me, my mental wellbeing was shaken in a way it never was before.
It felt like the world turned upside down, and the abdication of common sense and scientific fact.

Fortunately I discovered this board, and followed links, and found out that there was a fightback going on.

Then there was a succession of legal judgements in the UK which reasserted a degree of rationality.

I emphasise 'in the UK' - if you are a UK subject, a resident of Terf Island, OP, you are relatively speaking very lucky. The fightback has gained more traction there than anywhere else.

Be of good heart! Sursum corda! Courage calls to courage everywhere! and various other encouraging thoughts, OP
We'll get there💜💚

‘Online’ is the operative word in your original post. I see people ranting online about the WI / Girl Guides decision. But nothing in real life but nuance, and a welcoming of their return to common sense.

Anyone that has had safeguarding training as part of their career and has worked with vulnerable people can envisage the real world problems for women and girls that TWAW based policies could cause.

It's why they police our speech. They want to use speech to change our thinking.

That sounds like an old and dear friend of mine.

When I saw her recently, she was upset about a weekend she had just spent with relatives, in which she was constantly having to push back against their (apparently) bigoted opinions on a range of political and social issues. The worst instance was when a young female relative said something positive about a well-known children's author, on the lines of "She has founded a lot of charities." My friend saw this as a personal betrayal.

I think the problem is a mindset in which strong opinions are rooted in blind faith rather than reason. If you can't articulate why you believe something, you can't debate or even discuss it. Then any disagreement is interpreted as a form of heresy.

ETA Reading what I've just written, I feel like a right old bitch. But I do genuinely find it troubling. I want to maintain relationships with old friends who have become true believers, but I also think it's important to tell the truth.

Because that won't do at all for the TRAs and their minions.

The whole point is for pretend women to be allowed into women's spaces and organisations when other men aren't. Because that, in their eyes, proves that they are actually women.

If organisations don't want to be single sex, I genuinely don't understand why they don't just become mixed sex, or define their membership by interests or beliefs rather than sex.