Are we allowed to talk about women and/or lesbians?

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

I'm referring to the deleted thread from Chat today. It was started to discuss issues arising from some of the statements made by Edinburgh University's ex-LGBT rep, which were anti-semitic, misogynistic and lesbophobic (amongst other things.

This rep identifies as trans. Various posters (both trans and not) were either ignorant of their preferred pronouns, or didn't use them consistently. I can believe some people also deliberately misgendered them; I didn't see. The debate, so far as I understand it, ended with the claim that we should not use 'they' in statements of the form 'This group, they are like this' or 'This group, they do that'.

This may be a valid debate. I don't know. But it seemed to me it was a complete derail of the original debate, and one that replicates the exact type of erasure that LGBT students at Edinburgh were experiencing when they were being made to feel unwelcome.

MNHQ's deletion message included this: We understand folks will want to talk more about pronouns and trans issues in general on another thread perhaps - but we would ask that you do so in way that doesn't rehash or repeat this thread.

HQ, could you please let us know why you think everything has to be dominated by discussions like this? Can't there be some way of restricting them, so they don't take over every attempt to discuss misogyny or lesbianism or bisexuality?

There were posters on that thread sharing very personal experiences, and to delete the thread with the claim that we've discussed pronouns in the wrong way seems insulting.

[MorrisZapp]

Lol at making shit up.

[MorrisZapp]

Sorry, not helpful. It's prolonging the derail and I take it back. Can we move on and ignore.

[MaudGonneMad]

Another awful decision by MNHQ

[Brandnewiggi]

Thanks to the posters who replied to me.
We can discuss the persons actions, yes. But we mustn't put it into any kind of broader context or notice any current trends as this is 'othering'.
But it is a current trend surely, this misogyny toward women, it wasn't around when I was growing up (misogyny obviously was, but not this particular brand!). Ada represents an extreme example of this but if they were a lone voice I doubt they would have been able to sustain their position for long.

[JudyCoolibar]

apparently we are not allowed to complain about a person referring to women with vaginas as cuntscum because failing to use "she"/"they" etc is literally the worst crime you could commit on the internet

This is quite a major misrepresentation of what happened. MNHQ initially specifically posted saying they wanted to keep the discussion going and asking people to stop misgendering. Not only did some people continue, but the thread then degenerated into some particularly nasty bullying of Ego in particular (and Ego was not the only person who objected to the use of sweeping terminology in describing trans people). The issue about misgendering was also not restricted to the use of pronouns: the poster who got banned, in particular, was very specifically referring repeatedly to the transwoman in question as a man - I noticed it because it kind of hit you in the face, so it would appear that some people have selective memories. I suspect that mjingaxx was banned because she was one of the worst bullies, such that a number of people who hadn't previously got involved expressed their disgust. Just before you all start on me, I will say for the record that I didn't actually report anything, but I was seriously considering reporting the bullying when the thread got pulled anyway.

[QueenLaBeefah]

Slow handclap for ego who has managed, yet again, to make it all about her.

[BeyondLovesSweetDee]

I think a thread actually started on the subject of othering might be beneficial?

[ClaudetteWyms]

As Mrs DeVere so eloquently put it, women are being moved from 2nd class to 3rd. Mumsnet appears to be consistently protecting anything which is trans related before women's issues and concerns.

Deleting the whole thread means many didn't get to see some very eloquent and truthful posts, Mrs DeVere's stood out for me too. I am so sick of women being pushed aside, yet again.

[MaudGonneMad]

The misgendering did not continue after the thread was reinstated. There was a lengthy discussion about the use of 'they' and 'othering' but no misgendering of Ada Wells or any other trans individual.

[BeyondLovesSweetDee]

'referring repeatedly to the transwoman in question as a man'

Ada wells doesn't identify as a transwoman? I'm sure I saw Ada is gender fluid or something along those lines? As in part of the trans umbrella but not a trans woman? Hence they/them/their?

[OlennasWimple]

Judy - thank for posting what I was going to say.

If pp think that Ego keeps making threads all about her, how about pp drop the insinuations and accusations? The last thread went wonky over the use of "they" as a sweeping generalisation or preferred pronoun, but almost everyone was responsible for us all going down that particular rabbit hole.

I didn't see Special's deleted posts but I hope that she is allowed to return (if she wants to). I didn't realise that the OP had been banned, but frankly I'm not surprised - it's just not on to go around accusing people of reporting to MNHQ and demanding to know who did. It was bullying, aggressive, needless and pointless

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

I am (personally) less concerned about the ego debate, and more concerned that MNHQ think that we are, or should be, discussing pronouns, so a much more rare discussion about women's sexuality, got shut down.

[JudyCoolibar]

It would appear that MNHQ believed that the misgendering did continue, Maud, which kind of supports my recollection. In any event the bullying was inexcusable, and I am astonished people accuse Ego of derailing the thread when it was the OP who kept dragging it back to demands that Ego state whether she reported Special or not, or if not that the people who did report should reveal themselves. And, to be honest, a number of posts on this thread are perilously close to bullying again.

[SenecaFalls]

One of the earliest posts on this thread was a statement clearly critical of Ego and, in my opinion, a misrepresentation of her participation on the other thread. She defended herself. I don't think that is making it about her. It's responding to a perceived unfair statement about her.

[singingsixpence82]

Why don't we choose a term to define the group of people (trans and certain sections of the left) that are causing the problems - I've heard "AFTAs" used before (Anti-Feminist Trans-Activists) which might be an option when referring specifically to trans people who hold these beliefs. Or what about just "genderists" to include all people, trans and non-trans who hold the set of beliefs that it's bigoted to use a word that means "adult person with a male reproductive system" to describe an adult person with a male reproductive system etc? Are we then allowed to refer to them as "they"?

[BeyondLovesSweetDee]

I suggested TRAs (usage like MRAs)

Not that anyone will know that now though, because the whole clusterfuck thread went poof

[Lovecat]

No, Ego, you are the one making stuff up here. I read every post on that thread up until page 12, and I saw no personal attacks on you.

You were asked to stop derailing the thread. You decided that this was you being told to 'STFU' although nobody had actually said that and you kept raising this and further derailing the thread.

The thing is, even though you condemned Ada, you were insisting that their (Ada's preferred pronoun) behaviour was a one-off and nothing to do with trans people. When other posters attempted to point out that actually Ada's peculiar line of vitriol was all too common amongst transactivists (and it was disgusting that it was only when they (see above re pronouns) tweeted about the police that action was taken), you seized on the use of 'they' and started going on about othering, thus preventing/trying to prevent a discussion about how an awful lot of transactivism is poisoning public discourse and how people are too scared to complain for being labelled transphobic bigots. And how that hurts vulnerable students.

You didn't seem to get the bigger picture at all - if you felt attacked personally by it, that's unfortunate but it really wasn't what the discussion was about and yet that's what you kept dragging it back to.

One particularly nasty thing was said, about trans women never passing or being wanted by men, and this was by one very distressed poster who was very upset about the issue, having had personal experience of LGBT help and advice at University and was very concerned about someone in her position coming across Ada or their (their = Ada's preferred pronoun) ilk and being harmed by their (ditto) bigoted misogynistic nonsense. I do not agree with what they posted and I can see that reading it was hurtful, but even that was not personally directed at Ego.

I agree with LRD - MN should not have deleted the thread and their reasoning for doing so is bollocks.

[NotAnotherHarlot]

I quite like TRAs
Interesting that we don't get men turning up to object to the term MRA because it is understood to refer to a specific group of men and their ideology.

[BeyondLovesSweetDee]

Oh is that what special said that was deleted? :( Oh that makes me so sad. :( And now she's banned for it. It's fucking shameful

[StrangeLookingParasite]

Fucking hell, Special and mjingaxx got banned? Why? Special wrote some very important posts on that thread, and mjingaxx was right to bring it to chat.

And there was no 'personal abuse' that I saw. It really isn't all about you, ego.

[singingsixpence82]

I agree that the term MRA is accepted to refer to the group of men who generally behave in a misogynistic way. Even if there are a few cases of men who campaign for men's rights in certain areas where men genuinely don't have equality (sometimes men get fired for having long hair when a woman would not etc) and could legitimately complain.

I read the TRA suggestion but I also heard poster(s) complain about it in that it wasn't fair as not all trans activists are like that and to be fair I am inclined to agree. There are genuinely still big battles to be won by the trans population and there are trans people who campaign on things like employment issues who are not misogynists. Not very many in the public eye sadly but they do exist and so I think we could maybe do with a more specific term. I think TRA will be complained about if used and threads will be derailed.

[KittensWithWeapons]

Oh for goodness sake Ego, would you give over with the persecution complex.

No, replying to a post is not derailing. Lying about what has been said to you and wittering on about how you'll be accused of derailing if you dare to respond to a post is, though.

Now, are we allowed to discuss the topic of the post. Re women and lesbians?