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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to feel overwhelmed by non-binary, cancel culture, and woke society?

683 replies

FordSiesta · 08/02/2022 20:57

I've got to the stage where I feel quite apprehensive about the future. It just feels like there will be no 'men' or 'women' or 'boys' and 'girls' and everyone will need to conform to various gender identities and have to remember all the different ways people identify so as not to accidently offend anyone. I'm supportive of transgender people and understand people changing from male to female or vice versa but now there's all this non-binary stuff it's getting confusing.

All these things going on in this 'woke society' and if you aren't seen as wanting to conform with all this new stuff then the 'cancel culture' comes at you.

I just feel like I would be happy if there wasn't so much pressure placed on people to get pronouns correct if for millions of years we've used he/him and she/her and now we need to say they/them when we were taught in school they/them was plural.

I don't have kids yet but I do wonder if I did what the world would be like for them growing up.

AIBU for wanting to just continue with two genders?

OP posts:
Thread gallery
5
EeeICouldRipATissue · 09/02/2022 16:17

Anyway my point is that people post scantily clad pictures of themselves all the time.
Might not be something I'd ever do myself, but I'm not about to start policing others bodies and telling them what to do with them or to cover up or whatever

lifeturnsonadime · 09/02/2022 16:19

@EeeICouldRipATissue

Anyway my point is that people post scantily clad pictures of themselves all the time. Might not be something I'd ever do myself, but I'm not about to start policing others bodies and telling them what to do with them or to cover up or whatever
Yes sure people can post what they want.

It's not the pictures that are the problem it is the fact that the person says they are a woman and are female. Neither of which are true.

FOJN · 09/02/2022 16:34

thinkingaboutLangCleg

It was definitely a typo, my autocorrect hates me. I noticed as soon as I'd posted but it was too late by then.

babyjellyfish · 09/02/2022 17:01

Here we go with the women do the cleaning up shit
I find people moaning and complaining about being a woman means all they tidy up and do all the shit and oh how crap being a woman is!

But "women do housework" is a gendered stereotype.

Being trans means precisely nothing beyond conforming to gendered stereotypes typically associated with the opposite sex.

So it's interesting which gendered stereotypes they choose to conform to and which ones they don't, isn't it?

ShrillSiren · 09/02/2022 17:24

No one actually sees that person as a woman, they may lie about it or ignore the question (see above), but not actually believe it.
They may think they're being kind but they're not.

peaceanddove · 09/02/2022 17:24

I am not stressed by any of it because I refuse, point blank, to engage with any of this arrant nonsense.

peaceanddove · 09/02/2022 17:29

It reminds me so much of your first few days in Halls of Residence and you get a handful of students who have, clearly, tried to assume a new identity in order to appear more interesting, controversial etc.

Invariably, they remained deathly dull and normal.

LondonWolf · 09/02/2022 17:33

OP only. You're not being unreasonable and in my experience anyone who says Cancel Culture isn't a thing or asserts it's just people "being held accountable", are the ones doing or cheering it on and delighting in it. They can't admit that though because they know at the back of their mind it's terrible, sly and dangerous but they just like it and enjoy seeing people they don't agree with be quietened, attacked and removed.

woodhill · 09/02/2022 17:52

@Shehasadiamondinthesky

When there is a really serious national emergency like a war or mass flooding and starvation people will forget all of this crap. There are no "them/theys" in Afghanistan, Syria, Darfur. They are too busy starving to death or being murdered and watching their children die. All this gender nonsense is a privilege or rich white countries with nothing else to think about.
Exactly that
Scianel · 09/02/2022 17:55

There are no "them/theys" in Afghanistan, Syria, Darfur. They are too busy starving to death or being murdered and watching their children die.
All this gender nonsense is a privilege or rich white countries with nothing else to think about

I agree strongly with this. I very much don't include homosexuality in this (as I'm sure the poster I am quoting does not either), as I'm well aware that people are still being persecuted for their sexual orientation, including to death, in parts of the world. I'd imagine "misgendering" doesn't seem that bad to someone about to be stoned to death because of who they love.

babyjellyfish · 09/02/2022 18:03

There are girls in Afghanistan pretending to be boys so they can get an education.

I wonder what they'd make of all this nonsense.

Certainly no he/him/them/theys avoiding female genital mutilation in Somalia.

thinkingaboutLangCleg · 09/02/2022 18:13

It was definitely a typo — thank god for that, FOJN! Grin

thinkingaboutLangCleg · 09/02/2022 18:17

@babyjellyfish

Here we go with the women do the cleaning up shit I find people moaning and complaining about being a woman means all they tidy up and do all the shit and oh how crap being a woman is!

But "women do housework" is a gendered stereotype.

Being trans means precisely nothing beyond conforming to gendered stereotypes typically associated with the opposite sex.

So it's interesting which gendered stereotypes they choose to conform to and which ones they don't, isn't it?

You’re right babyjellyfish. I’d be so happy if they were queueing up to look after aged relatives, or demanding low pay, or giving a hand in the kitchen.
FrancescaContini · 09/02/2022 18:20

@Migrainesbythedozen

I'll try again with the images larger, they were too small before. I'm really not good at printing screen and editing unfortunately.
Oh dear, Jacob Grin
DdraigGoch · 09/02/2022 18:33

@EeeICouldRipATissue

Women do take selfies of themselves So what if someone who is trans likes to as well?
Not with that in the background, they don't.

I can't think of any woman in my feed who has ever publicly posted pictures with so few clothes.

DdraigGoch · 09/02/2022 18:34

So it's interesting which gendered stereotypes they choose to conform to and which ones they don't, isn't it?
It's never the "be kind", "know your place", "don't make a fuss" ones, is it?

Curiousmouse · 09/02/2022 18:35

I think "woke" is a stupid term, used by the right wing to slap a label on anybody whose politics they don't like. They always use extreme examples to argue against it.

It's nothing new. They did the same about the left councils years ago, pretending they were only concerned with black bin bags.

fairycakes1234 · 09/02/2022 18:36

i have a pain in my face with it, I feel its being forced into my face the whole time and i am just fed up, having said that my kids havent identified as non binary or trans and maybe my attitude would change if it did.

Furries · 09/02/2022 18:39

@CorrBlimeyGG

So we can all agree then that trans women are not women. So the word will not be taken away from women. Great news.

I am a woman. A trans woman can be a woman as well. Another person using the term does not change who I am.

A trans woman is not a woman. Doesn’t matter how many times you type it on here, it doesn’t make it real.
Jeyesfluid · 09/02/2022 18:47

I am a woman. A trans woman can be a woman as well. Another person using the term does not change who I am.

Transwomen are male. Males are not females. Men are not women.

babyjellyfish · 09/02/2022 18:52

It's never the "be kind", "know your place", "don't make a fuss" ones, is it?

Nope, not those ones either!

mummykel16 · 09/02/2022 18:52

@LondonWolf

OP only. You're not being unreasonable and in my experience anyone who says Cancel Culture isn't a thing or asserts it's just people "being held accountable", are the ones doing or cheering it on and delighting in it. They can't admit that though because they know at the back of their mind it's terrible, sly and dangerous but they just like it and enjoy seeing people they don't agree with be quietened, attacked and removed.
All true
FOJN · 09/02/2022 18:56

No one actually sees that person as a woman, they may lie about it or ignore the question (see above), but not actually believe it.

Refusal to answer the question posed is a tacit admission of gaslighting. Hope the guilty party didn't think it went unnoticed.

ineedsun · 09/02/2022 18:58

@babyjellyfish

So the only person denying that you are a woman is yourself. That's ridiculous.

The rest of us will continue to use the word woman.

What does the word actually MEAN, if not "female person"?

I have no shared gender identity with trans women.

If "woman" is no longer a word that means female people and is now a word for people with the "gender identity" of "woman", including trans women, then it's not actually a word that applies to me.

I resent being forced into some sort of shared identity with people I have nothing in common with - particularly when they want to use this identity that only they actually have to justify being able to use women's changing rooms, be house in women's prisons or compete in women's sports - and denied the vocabulary to describe myself as what I am: a female person.

I have no shared identity with lots of the posters on here, I’m still a mum (as are most of the posters).

Just because someone else uses the term doesn’t mean you can’t.

hattie43 · 09/02/2022 19:04

It's all a load of b@ll@cks

I don't worry about it at all it's just not on my radar .

It's all about an absolute minority of people being hugely loud and expecting to change centuries old narrative .