Group wants to ban feminist books from a women's library - WTF?

[Bambambini]

Who on earth would want to ban feminist books from a Women's Library? Hope that the Vancouver Women's Library stands firm and doesn't bow to this women hating group. Hope the library get's lots if support - this attempt to bully and censor seems to be becoming much more common, unfortunately.

m.facebook.com/notes/gag-gays-against-gentrification/response-to-vancouver-womens-library/379623995740078

Imagine always wanting to be the centre to every single conversation. How is it not exhausting to them?
I recently attended a local feminist meeting where, when the topic came to providing sanitary protection for food banks and if we could raise money for mensturation cups the two main women discussing it (2 straight, white, middle aged women fwiw) were called "transphobic, white cis cunts" and asked why we weren't all discussing trans people requirements at the food bank. It was maddening. You quite literally cannot help mensturating, hungry women, out of the goodness of your heart, without talking about trans issues. Why?
Imagine if you were a fine art graduate at an art course, discussing whatever artists discuss and then someone with a dot to dot book and a 2b pencil rocks up and tells you you are all wrong and surely they are the only true artist in the world and this conversation should now revolve around their needs and ideas. Bore off.

I also now consider "cis woman" an act of violence and should I be referred to as such via social media or in real life I will take criminal action.

Someone asked if there was any news coverage of this. I live in BC (but not Vancouver) and haven't seen anything in any mainstream news. It was the night of several large vigils for the Quebec city massacre, so the focus has been more on Islamaphobia than transphobia at least for the moment.

There is some activism around at the moment centred on Bill C-16 which looks to add gender identity to the characteristics protected under the Canadian Charter of Rights. I googled to see if there was anything about this protest and found an article saying that a campaign called 'Women Means Something' contained 'terrible messages' and was lead by 'extreme social conservative outliers'.

Here is the site: womanmeanssomething.com/about/ it seems to be bringing together many of the concerns that we have talked about here. Women's safety, the meaninglessness of a definition of "women=anyone who says so", the risks to children, concerning co-morbidities etc etc.

Of course I'm sure that some collaborators are very socially conservative because there are a variety of reasons why different groups find the proposed change problematic.

I'm in BC too and it's been FB as far as I can see, rather than mainstream news.

There are already pieces of law, for example Human Rights Code in Alberta, that excludes sex and includes gender. Then tells people at things like pregnancy and sexual harassment are 'included' under the gender group. Which is obviously cobblers what with pregnancy being nothing to do with gender identity and everything to do with sex.

Frankly it's a mess here right now.

It is only possible for someone who has XY chromosomes and the typical body shape that goes with that to say "I feel like a woman therefore I am a woman", or indeed for someone who has XX chromosomes and the typical body shape that goes with that to say "I feel like a man therefore I am a man", if that person has absorbed and believes a fundamentally sexist definition of womanhood and manhood.

People who are not sexist believe that anyone can have the personality, sexuality, likes and dislikes, career choices, clothing choices, and makeup choices etc etc that work for them regardless of whether they are a man or a woman. And that therefore the terms man and woman refer solely to the body shape you have due to whether your chromosomes are XX, XY (or very rarely something else).

Accepting that "a woman is anyone who says they are a woman" is inseparable from accepting a constricting and inappropriate stereotype for what a woman's feelings and behaviours ought to be.

It's also a very odd thought experiment to ask people to pretend that instead of being you you were someone else. If I was reborn as a man I'd not be me. Every single cell in my body would be different. Every experience I would have had over the last 45 odd years would also probably have been different given how ridiculously gendered our society is. I have been female since the moment of conception, it's not an 'identity' it's reality.

Tomorrow I'm going to identify as a multi millionaire and give myself a day off.
Never heard such a load of pants pilly
Don't use the word cis please I reject it.
Being a woman is biology and written into every cell of your body. Its that simple.
I can agree that the library thing is beyond stupid however.

See this is part of the problem. A teenager who can't understand long-division thinks that it is all very clear and obvious, as things frequently are at that age. All well and good. But the thing about being young is... a lot of the actual issues with sex-based discrimination happen in teaspoonfuls or more as you age.

It took me quite a while and a lot of conversations to realize that my mother, grandmother, all my friends and relatives had ALL experienced sexual harassment, violence or rape and/or been massively penalized for being women. All the women in in your life who have been or will have been raped don't all turn up at once and tell you. You find out over time.

Before I got older and took up more space, I didn't realize how much a lot of men hate that. Now, I interrupt if I'm interrupted and talk over people who talk over me. I don't move out of the way automatically and I don't move my leg because someone wants my space. When I was a teenager, I was more self-conscious about that kind of thing.

When I was a teenager, I was policed for dressing: like a prostitute (thanks BF's dad), weird, being blonde and having breasts (pretty much asking for it, also clearly stupid), not happily enough (for not gurning constantly). Now it's being overweight, being older, still not smiling enough. After time you realize, 'oh it's the fucking patriarchy and there's no winning'.

Then I had a baby. And fuckity fuck does that make you realize your body doesn't belong to you.

I listened to older women, WoC, gay women, Aboriginal women, Muslin, Christian, Jewish and Wiccan women, women who have to work in the sex trade, women fleeing violence, women who are homeless, women who have gone through FGM. I found common ground in the hatred of us and the policing of our bodies.

And my outlook changed. I went from a choosy choice, liberal, man-placating 'feminist' to a woman who believes that there are wars still to be fought and they won't be won by being nice. They won't be won by centering men and they won't be won by people pretending that conforming to ridiculous gender stereotypes is liberating.

And don't call me cis.

Brilliant post mrsterry

MrsK

I can agree that the library thing is beyond stupid however.

It's soo stupid that I believe it will be something of an own goal.

Whatever your politics or ideology, not many people think book banning comes from a place of credibility.

Most people have have the insight to understand that if you want to ban books and knowledge there is something that you don't want people to know.

Even Pilly.

Then I had a baby. And fuckity fuck does that make you realize your body doesn't belong to you.

This.

And don't call me cis either.

Datun

Yes, it's not a clever move. I think it's because many of these people are quite clearly histrionic narcissists. I think they have a personality disorder. They have no sense of irony or perspective or empathy with anyone other than people who they personally identify with. They have no sense of what will be viewed as batshit by the wider world and they tend to hang out in echo chambers.

As a pp said it is the existence of women at all that is the problem for them. Yes, even the handmaidens. They hate them just the same, but they need them because they're the useful idiots who make this crap mainstream. They don't go after the men who are actually responsible for real rather than pretend violence against transwomen. Because that's not really what they are focusing on. They channel all their energy into this noble cause of self determination of gender that they personally identify with. Any challenge to that, especially by radical feminist women who are anathema to everything they stand for, is seen as "violence".

Philly you've used the age old argument (i'm paraphrasing here) of "Oh I know loads of transpeople and they're lovely and wouldn't hurt a fly."

No doubt that is true. But that's not really the point.

Transwomen are transwomen. Not women. It does not follow that I hate transwomen, or that I want to deny them healthcare, employment or education.

I just want to deny them access to women's spaces, scholarships, university places/business opportunities that have been earmarked for women. And when they commit crimes including murder or rape (which they do, like any other group in the population) I want that crime statistic to be recorded as committed by a male. Because that is what they are.

If you are still reading, Pilly , I just want to also say how offensive I find the label 'cis'. In the first place, I don't think I am oppressed because of how I feel or I identify, I am oppressed because of my biology, i.e. because I can give birth, because I am relatively small and my muscles/bones are relatively less dense, because of the biology namalts can assault/ exploit in specific ways. The idea that I have identified into thus is utterly offensive. That I would volunteer to be one of the 1/4 in her lifetime, or the 1 of 2 per week, or that I chose to be paid less that my colleagues, or that I want to do so the second shift when I get in, all because I have an innate preference for pink. What utterly offensive bullshit, and anyone touting it can fuck off right now.

MrsT

True, at 19 i was still protected. It wasn't till a few years later when i went back packing and experienced an onslaught of sexual harassment and assault and realised how differently women are viewed and despised by some men (lots of men). Then over the years learned how my mum and her friend were sexually assaulted as kids in the public toulets by a man. How another close relative was raped by two men on her way home from school when she was 10 - these attacks all brushed under the carpet. Then more and more things came out from friends and neighbours.

It can take msny years to get a bigger picture of the world - god, i'm still learning and i'm nearly 50 and changing my mind about things.

an account of what's going on at the library..

Anti-feminist protesters actually showed up for once! They were welcomed inside (snowing, cold, everyone was welcome), but asked to leave when they tried to tear down feminist posters in the space and continued their physical intimidation inside. Police had to be called for fear of destruction of the space and the safety of library patrons inside. The protesters held signs and shouted at people entering the space. They poured wine over the books. They smoked inside when asked not to. They pulled the fire alarm. Some of them tried to bar then pushed women entering the space. As far as we saw, men were left alone to come and go as they pleased.

Women were shamed and blamed for calling the police, for fearing for theirs and others’ safety. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. All battered women will be familiar with these tactics. When we pointed out how we were physically barred then pushed from entering the space, and how threatening that felt, protesters wanted to know how we’d gender the person, rather than discuss the ethics of violence at hand.

and...

Despite clearly stated goals (creation of women’s space for women’s work and dialogue), inclusion (all women), transparency of funding (self & UBC women’s centre), hard work (unpaid), and initiative (frankly brilliant caring GOODNESS of heart, seeking to create A WOMEN’S LIBRARY) the organizers were demonized, targeted, lied about, and all but burnt at the stake.

Link to the article here

Nasty, bullying misogynistic little shits.

I am horrified at this.

Book banning? What next? Ritualistic book burning?
A banned book is far more enticing. As someone posted up thread, what knowledge do they want hidden? What power lies there?
They sound utterly unhinged.

And I concur with posters, woman is biological and I am not "cis" FFS!

Why do middle aged women always cop it, I am thinking of other periods in history too. Is it because the scales fall from our eyes and we see the patriarchy? Is it because we are less likely to be fertile? No idea but society really hates older women.

Older women have strength and wisdom which men do not want passed to younger women. Once we are no longer sexy we are worthless too. The gloves come off when they no longer want to fuck us.

Exactly, growing older means you no longer give a damn so much about what folk think of you. It's quite liberating actually once you pass out of the young, attractive and fuckable years.

"I'm a teenager and I manage to understand it"

That reminds me of a quote attributed to Mark Twain:

"When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years."

I declare MrsTerryPratchett the winner of mumsnet.

Also: magnificent post from MrsTerry.

What's frightening about this is that these people are essentially indistinguishable from Men's Rights Activists. They appear to hate women. And yet they have somehow persuaded a large swathe of the young and gullible that their cause is a progressive one.

No-one seems to be addressing the obvious question: how can "feeling" as if you're a woman make you a woman? The result is that terms such as "men" and "women", which have a sound biological basis, no longer have any meaning. In what other area is a biological reality overridden by "feeling"? I "feel" 25, therefore I am 25? I "feel" black, therefore I am black? I "feel" like a cat, therefore I am a cat? If you said these things, people would laugh at you. But if you try and point out that a biological male will always be a biological male, regardless of how they feel, you will be reviled as a "transphobe" and a "Terf".