What is going on with MN?

[AdamRyan]

I used to find it a very refreshing and supportive place to discuss the absolute crap that women put up with in all areas of life. It helped me recognise and start questioning abusive behaviours by mu ex. I think its invaluable to women from that perspective.
Over the past few months though, it appears to have changed

• posts about men "needing" sex when their partner isn't up for it and saying women will only have themselves to blame if their partner has an affair because they aren't getting enough sex
• posts suggesting aggression is a reasonable response to not enough sex
• endless endless "women do it too"/"NAMALT"/"not my nigel" on any thread about male violence
• posters calling women stupid/illogical/rude for questioning the above
• and now loads of sponsored threads about sex toys/"reigniting intimacy" when you've just given birth.

I'm starting to feel the whole tone of the site is becoming very patriarchal, which I never felt before. And it's making me sad. I want a space where I don't have to put mens penis wants first. Aaaaargh.

@FictionalCharacter - Speaking as a man…

I am just kidding, I am very much a woman. I just love their need to declare it. I should start every conversation as speaking as a woman, regardless of topic. Speaking as a woman, I would like pasta for dinner.

I like the Feminist Boards best here now. I have Active up, and read a few threads. I remember this place when it was all fields..... also was here before AIBU, which changed the site irrevocably, can't say for better or worse really.

Change happens within populations. I imagine that the current generation of newish users are different from the original generation of users, different from the newer gen of users in, say,2010 and so on.

I've been using it a lot less than I used to because I hate the app but the desktop site won't run on my (now very) old device. I used to spend most of my time here as I'm so isolated and it was my main source of everything outside my home. I've learnt so much here, experienced so much here, can't quite let it go....

Some users will just get bored with it and go, and some form the new backbone of the site. If it doesn't change with it's population then it won't survive. Expect if there have been changes in policy they'll be entirely to keep the site going and relevant. Inevitably, old users will drop off, find new places where they feel more at home or get busier and more engaged in rl or whatever. MN have to please the current users and attract new ones. All the time.

This looks to me like a phase, not imo a nice one, possibly engendered by the recent political emphasis on VAWG, maybe augmented by the trans stuff. Personally, I find it quite interesting to watch what's happening here and see some of the echoes in my community vis a vis changing values and ideas and attitudes. And it also seems tome that if there are a lot of MRAs here now then they are very very late to the debate but are also proving the point quite nicely.

There are great big chunks of society that are hugely regressive.

Maybe that's what we're seeing reflected here?

I'm starting to wonder whether the kick back against gender critical feminism in some quarters has brought in a whole boat load of people who're anti feminism, and they've stayed around for the craic.

It's like organised patriarchy round here. I hadn't actually noticed but blimey one thread I'm on...

This kind of non-sensical statements that are based on absolutely nothing are part of the problem.

As stated by others, being GC -understood only in relation to transpeople- seems to habe become for some synonym of feminism. In academic circles this is remarkable: a wide range of academics from different disciplines who never published anything from a feminist perspective/women's rights perspective have labelled themselves nothing less than 'radical feminist'. The fact they could not name a single feminist author or refer to any feminst theory with academic rigour despite being academics seems irrelevant.

Any contestation becomes "cancel culture". Freedom of expression is conflated with academic freedom without understanding either. Because those who are "GC" self-identify not only as feminist, but also the only legitimate form of feminism, those who disagree (or even do not engage since they are focused on other women issues) are 'anti-feminist'.

Really? I think people resisting redefining words to match a set of regressive stereotypes have been labelled 'TERFS' against their will. I certainly didn't consider myself feminist. I thought we'd past all need for it, though I saw everyday sexism. I assumed it was in the way out. Now rejecting trans ideology has redefined me as a TERF apparently.

The fact they could not name a single feminist author or refer to any feminist theory

It’s not a prerequisite for posting on a forum but I’m pretty sure many GC posters can do this and have

I made quite clear this was referred to "academic circles". MN feminist forum has a different way of marking authority and excluding whoever tries to engage as pointed out by others

Of course we are always defined by ourselves and by others. That's the whole point of a lot of the debate, isn't it? You cannot just decide to self-identify into a category.

The same way I have lived in this country over 15 years, acquired the nationality, feel very British in many ways, but everyone else sees me as from elsewhere because of my appearance, my accent, etc.

And when I say I feel "British" I would have problems to explain what it means without using ridiculous stereotypes and arguments that don't hold much apart from having a passport. How others see me also influence me, whether Ilike it or not.

Anyway, it is a different topic all together. However, I am one of those who find the feninist forum very unfriendly and not at all focus on women overall.

Exactly! It's shockingly bad in places. Horrendous victim blaming.

I agree. I got a massive kicking recently when I pointed out how far to the right (by which I just meant Tory - definitely not accusing anyone of 'getting into bed with the Far Right) the tone of FWR had become and that I was depressed that literally any mention of a liberal-left-ish analysis, any suggestion that women's rights weren't completely silo'd in society, was shut down as being elitist or a purity-spiral. One of the core posters started talking generally about accusations of racism being 'so frequently bollocks', but amazingly no-one agreed that they were somewhat proving my point or that it sounded like something that might be said by, you know, a racist.

Hello @Jux I remember you and I know exactly what you mean about not being able to stay away because of a kind of loyalty (maybe even longing for) what MN once was.

I think there's a huge swing underway. A pushback to the purity spirals and accusations. I'd expect it to settle somewhere sensible- it's a left leaning community. Just, very disenchanted and ratty at the moment. For good reason.

It is a left leaning site and generally if you’re not a Labour voter people will get pretty angry at times along with attacks.

FWR is better imo. More balanced but I can see the left might not feel as comfortable

Having said that I recognise many posters are actually to the left but I like that conservations can be had with GC as the common denominator. Which is better than other areas of the site.

for good reason yes, I do see your point @picklemewalnuts and I hope you’re right about an eventual balancing.

See actually when I wrote this I wasn't thinking about FWR. I don't really mind that they are pretty hostile to perceived outsiders.

I meant more like, I'm on a thread where a poster says her husband came in drunk and was aggressive with her because she didn't want sex. And some other poster pipes up with "well from the other side if he never gets sex maybe he's frustrated at not having his needs met and it came out while drunk". Even though OP had said nothing about their sex life to indicate her husband wasn't getting any.

Or another poster who told me the only people who bear no responsibility in an abusive relationship are the children, women choose to stay and be victims.

Or the posters popping on to the threads about Emma Pattinson to imply she was abusive and her poor husband just snapped.

Or the posters on rape threads saying that "innocent until proven guilty" even when the men involved have admitted some gross behaviour in court (Paddy Jackson/Mendy/Ched Evans/Johnny Depp etc)

Posters calling use of prostitutes/webcam "infidelity" and implying women are prudes if they don't like it.

Posters telling women they are breaking up the family if they post about leaving on AIBU.

It's just unrelenting and I'm sick of it.

When mumsnet ran the "we believe you" campaign they used to delete victim blaming posts and post about rape myths. Not seen that for ages.

Oh, and getting all offended about being called a "cool girl" for boasting on about how much they love anal.
Or implying "handmaiden" is the worst insult ever....when they've said something handmaiden-y

This is totally off topic... can you explain to me why calling someone handmaiden is not victim blaming? Apologies if this is obvious and I look like a fool

Sorry, forget my former post. I have done now what I should have done before asking and search other mumsnet posts about it and there is one. I am now convinced handmaiden should not be used at all as an insult to other women.

I agree.

Yes sorry @AdamRyan to continue the derail - I agree with you that the general levels of misogyny both internalised and outright have absolutely skyrocketed and it's a long time since I saw rape-myths being deleted.

The latter is a massive fucking shame. The former - I dunno, a function of both the increase in visitor numbers which also means that the demographic is less mono-class, alongside a veer to the right across huge swathes of society, alongside a feeling amongst people who have those views that they don't have to keep quiet post-brexit, alongside a feeling of being part of a pushback against 'woke-ism', alongside a quite cynical attempt to include all liberal views withing 'woke-ism', which is quite possibly a response to fucking 'progressives' doing their insanely unprogressive thing of putting an individualist emphasis on 'truths' and 'journeys' over a materialist, structuralist analysis of power/inequality? TLDR: we're fucked.

The way I understand it, A handmaiden is choosing to support the patriarchy at the expense of women. It's possible they do it in self defence, but generally it's more internalised misogyny that they haven't questioned.

But I'd never use it. I don't find that kind of rhetoric conducive to mutual understanding. And why would you talk, what's the point if you don't want to know why the other person thinks that way.

But you know if we don't report them, they won't get deleted.

Are they being left up?

I don't use the terms handmaiden or cool girl either. But a certain type of poster likes to post things that will attract that kind of comment, then post everywhere about being "silenced" and how women criticising other women is the worst thing ever. Drives me demented.

Thank you for the response. I was unsure I was understanding the word fully since English is nto my native language, but I do and i think I get the intended meaning. Still seems not appropriate to use it to refer to other women.
Anyway, thanks and sorry for derailing further