Page 28 | To think it is not at all sad that the Women's Institute is now only for actual women?

SingleSexSpacesInSchools · 2025-12-03T11:36:29+00:00

^“Incredibly sadly, we will have to restrict our membership on the basis of biological sex from April next year,” Green said. “But the message we really want to get across is that it remains our firm belief that transgender women are women, and that doesn’t change.”^ [[https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/dec/03/womens-institute-no-longer-accept-trans-women-members-april https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/dec/03/womens-institute-no-longer-accept-trans-women-members-april]] Tellingly - they still think women can have a penis.

ArabellaSaurus · 07/12/2025 10:27

5128gap · 07/12/2025 09:48

Yes. Typically when TW are part of a group of women they are front and centre.
Even if the TW is as shy and retiring as its possible to be, and the women are welcoming, women behave differently.
TW often speak of being 'one of the girls', then going on to describe an experience within a group of women where they've never experienced such friendliness, kindness and support and attention.
They think this is the way women are, not realising that this extra special attention is precisely because other women do NOT see them as one of the girls, and are over compensating to be kind/right minded, while treating each other completely differently, no special attention required.
This has the affect of centering the TW at all times as women take care to particularly include him, affirm him, remember his pronouns, and creates an inequality within the group.

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Yep. Much of that is fawn response as the most socially acceptable of the risk responses.

For women confronted with a male, also in an evolutionary sense, most sensible if you cant flee. Freeze is also common. Very few women go for 'fight', for obvious reasons.

Much of this is subconscious, of course.

But in the same way I found a male driving instructor made it difficult to relax enough to learn (strange male, confined space), a lot of our responses are instinctive and unconscious. Can also be quite subtle - doesn't mean I was actively terrified of my driving instructor, just that it made the learning situation harder.

And given the point of the lesson was for me to learn, a female drivng instructor was the proportionate/legitimate thing.

Given the point of the WI is for the benefit of women, excluding men is proportionate/legitimate.

At base, the point of the WI is to help women, not men.

FuelledByRageAndHaribo · 07/12/2025 11:01

InlandTaipan · 07/12/2025 09:24

I must admit that it's hard to imagine the trauma of attending a lecture on the history of Christmas cake (with tasting) and finding that there's a man in the room.

But yes, if the membership are keen to include transwomen they could vote to admit men generally. I doubt the end result would be very different.

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…or instead of discussing Christmas cake maybe you want to chat about your endometrial cancer diagnosis and subsequent treatment, or your mastectomy, because some of the other females in your group have been through the same thing and can tell you what to expect.
Can’t not have the men present for that can we, they must be allowed everywhere.

Hoppinggreen · 07/12/2025 11:07

Some years ago I attended a 2 day online conference for Business purposes. It was about women in X field.
There was one woman who was really intelligent and interesting and had a lot of insight on the subject, the subject was not sex related in the slightest but was talking about trends in general. On day 2 this woman came with her "female" colleague, it was Covid era and international so all online and I noticed that this smart, funny,intelligent woman was somehow very different from the day before. She deferred totally to her colleague (who was VERY opinionated but had nothing very interesting to say). She was totally diminished and made small
As we were all on camera and not F2F it took me a little while before I figured out that the colleague was in fact NOT female at all
The conference continued and was fine, apart from the new joiner who seemed to know everything and nothing and was very determined to dominate every conversation - the rest of us were confident enough to (mostly) hold our own but I couldn't help thinking how different the woman was when her (male) colleague was there.

IsadoraBathrobe · 07/12/2025 11:49

Whether men can pass as women is irrelevant. These men KNOW they are not women. It’s on them to keep out of single sex spaces and leave our stuff alone.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 07/12/2025 12:11

ArabellaSaurus · 07/12/2025 10:27

Yep. Much of that is fawn response as the most socially acceptable of the risk responses.

For women confronted with a male, also in an evolutionary sense, most sensible if you cant flee. Freeze is also common. Very few women go for 'fight', for obvious reasons.

Much of this is subconscious, of course.

But in the same way I found a male driving instructor made it difficult to relax enough to learn (strange male, confined space), a lot of our responses are instinctive and unconscious. Can also be quite subtle - doesn't mean I was actively terrified of my driving instructor, just that it made the learning situation harder.

And given the point of the lesson was for me to learn, a female drivng instructor was the proportionate/legitimate thing.

Given the point of the WI is for the benefit of women, excluding men is proportionate/legitimate.

At base, the point of the WI is to help women, not men.

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All of this. I find the ott fawning quite hard to deal with, though I understand where it comes from.

SabrinaThwaite · 07/12/2025 12:19

ScotiaCat · 07/12/2025 00:14

Bless you heart, honey. That’s correct. So are y’all going to fight for their rights? Lawful discrimination is still discrimination ubder God’s law.

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Welcome to MN, BTW.

Are you actually a Southern Baptist Texan or just identifying as one?

Easytoconfuse · 07/12/2025 12:24

FuelledByRageAndHaribo · 06/12/2025 08:53

The poor sad elderly trans people could always join the U3A. It’s a mixed sex group that has lots of activities and events.

I’m in the demographic that would traditionally have been attracted to the WI and, after reading on here a few years ago about their stance, I decided not to join. I did attend a local independent hobby class for 20 years and that was women-only, a really lovely place where we could discuss anything and everything, and without a man telling us we were holding the hammer wrong.

Can I ask why you call them 'poor, sad, elderly people' when they are women who had a choice forced upon them by the 'enlightened' They lost friends over it because they chose to walk away.

It would be amazing if the WI reached out (and I hate that phrase) and invited them back and acknowledged the strength of feeling. Compared to setting up 'sisterhood' groups it wouldn't cost that much. Will they do it? I have a strong suspicion they won't but would like to be proved wrong. Any WI members here who can see which way the wind is blowing at branch level? If it were me I'd resent paying for sisterhood groups out of WI funds. It they want them, let them call it something else and pay for it themselves. There again, I am not kind.

BigFatLiar · 07/12/2025 12:27

Time to get back to single sex environments. Cubs and scouts for boys, brownies and guides for girls. No girls on boys sports teams, no boys on girls teams. Women should be entitled to have women only clubs/spaces and men likewise. Back to the old days.

FuelledByRageAndHaribo · 07/12/2025 13:04

Easytoconfuse · 07/12/2025 12:24

Can I ask why you call them 'poor, sad, elderly people' when they are women who had a choice forced upon them by the 'enlightened' They lost friends over it because they chose to walk away.

It would be amazing if the WI reached out (and I hate that phrase) and invited them back and acknowledged the strength of feeling. Compared to setting up 'sisterhood' groups it wouldn't cost that much. Will they do it? I have a strong suspicion they won't but would like to be proved wrong. Any WI members here who can see which way the wind is blowing at branch level? If it were me I'd resent paying for sisterhood groups out of WI funds. It they want them, let them call it something else and pay for it themselves. There again, I am not kind.

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Because someone way up thread commented about the poor elderly transwomen who were being kicked out of the only social group they could possibly attend. I was being a little bit sarcastic in my post.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 07/12/2025 13:06

SabrinaThwaite · 07/12/2025 12:19

Welcome to MN, BTW.

Are you actually a Southern Baptist Texan or just identifying as one?

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Haha I was going to ask the same thing word for word 😂

FestiveYoni · 07/12/2025 13:06

@5128gap excellent summary and I saw this in myself when a male college who used to work with us wore a dress and make up

My liberal acceptance went into overdrive ,don't make him feel odd be over friendly .

FestiveYoni · 07/12/2025 13:07

I actually think in a few months we need a proper investigations as to how we got to this point.
In organisations such as this one and girl guides

sunshine244 · 07/12/2025 13:13

I have xmas work lunch next week with my team which includes a very outspoken colleague. They are non binary and have one trans girl and one non binary child. Exceptionally forceful with their views. I doubt we'll get two minutes seconds into our gathering before they bring the topic up. I am genuinely considering being 'ill' to avoid it, as unless we all 100% agree that WI and GG are evil.and wrong it will be a train crash of a lunch.

FestiveYoni · 07/12/2025 13:14

@sunshine244 surely it's tempting to let that train crash !

sunshine244 · 07/12/2025 13:21

FestiveYoni · 07/12/2025 13:14

@sunshine244 surely it's tempting to let that train crash !

Not really because no one will be allowed to express an opinion and it will keep coming up over and over until everyone (pretends to) agree with them. I just want to eat my turkey and have fun.

TheKeatingFive · 07/12/2025 13:33

sunshine244 · 07/12/2025 13:13

I have xmas work lunch next week with my team which includes a very outspoken colleague. They are non binary and have one trans girl and one non binary child. Exceptionally forceful with their views. I doubt we'll get two minutes seconds into our gathering before they bring the topic up. I am genuinely considering being 'ill' to avoid it, as unless we all 100% agree that WI and GG are evil.and wrong it will be a train crash of a lunch.

Funny how it often seems to cluster like that. What are the odds?

ProfessorBinturong · 07/12/2025 14:08

Easytoconfuse · 07/12/2025 12:24

Can I ask why you call them 'poor, sad, elderly people' when they are women who had a choice forced upon them by the 'enlightened' They lost friends over it because they chose to walk away.

It would be amazing if the WI reached out (and I hate that phrase) and invited them back and acknowledged the strength of feeling. Compared to setting up 'sisterhood' groups it wouldn't cost that much. Will they do it? I have a strong suspicion they won't but would like to be proved wrong. Any WI members here who can see which way the wind is blowing at branch level? If it were me I'd resent paying for sisterhood groups out of WI funds. It they want them, let them call it something else and pay for it themselves. There again, I am not kind.

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I think you've misread the post. The 'poor, sad, elderly' people referred to - quoting a previous post - are the trans-identifying men.

BigFatLiar · 07/12/2025 15:37

FestiveYoni · 07/12/2025 13:06

@5128gap excellent summary and I saw this in myself when a male college who used to work with us wore a dress and make up

My liberal acceptance went into overdrive ,don't make him feel odd be over friendly .

No issue with him wearing a dress and makeup just as long as he doesn't call himself a woman.

CassOle · 07/12/2025 17:42

ScotiaCat · 06/12/2025 23:53

Have you?

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Yes.

ByShyRaven · 07/12/2025 17:56

SingleSexSpacesInSchools · 03/12/2025 11:42

The article does say existing male members will have to leave, does not say how. Weird to delay until April as well, assume some males will join prior to that date now maybe.

Oh good. Another trans bashing thread! We hadn’t had one in at least a few hours.

ArabellaSaurus · 07/12/2025 18:04

ByShyRaven · 07/12/2025 17:56

Oh good. Another trans bashing thread! We hadn’t had one in at least a few hours.

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You are able to hide threads if you don't wish to participate.

S1ngS1ng · 07/12/2025 18:09

sunshine244 · 07/12/2025 13:13

I have xmas work lunch next week with my team which includes a very outspoken colleague. They are non binary and have one trans girl and one non binary child. Exceptionally forceful with their views. I doubt we'll get two minutes seconds into our gathering before they bring the topic up. I am genuinely considering being 'ill' to avoid it, as unless we all 100% agree that WI and GG are evil.and wrong it will be a train crash of a lunch.

Yet the trans haters on here can shove their views down our necks ad nauseum.🙄 🥱 Kind of hypocritical don’t you think.

S1ngS1ng · 07/12/2025 18:11

ByShyRaven · 07/12/2025 17:56

Oh good. Another trans bashing thread! We hadn’t had one in at least a few hours.

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I know! One wonders re the MH of posters so utterly obsessed in their vitriol towards a group of people that are already marginalised.

medievalpenny · 07/12/2025 18:12

Ah clocking in for the next shift I see.

Throckmorton · 07/12/2025 18:13

Explain to me how males are marginalized please