An Idea- LGBT Mumsnetters Board

[gayhistorynerd]

I was thinking just before that a board I'd really appreciate on this site would be an LGBT Mumsnetters board; not dissimilar to some of the other "demographic" boards such as the Neurodivergent Mumsnetters board, the Muslim Mumsnetters board, or the Black Mumsnetters board. Currently it seems like most LGBT topics have to be channeled into either LGBT Children or LGBT Parents, and while I imagine many of the LGBT users here are parents it seems that people only use that board to discuss parenting, meaning there's nowhere currently for general LGBT discussion. Much like with the other demographic boards, I find when these subjects come up in Chat that it often devolves into debates the OP clearly hadn't been looking for- so I was wondering if it would be worthwhile to have a similarly-aimed board that stays off of the Active Threads page?

No worries if not, of course! I'm mostly just floating the idea to see if this is something which is being considered, has previously been considered, or even just if it's something other users would appreciate.

Yeah I think LGB and trans boards should be separate. Trans related chat doesn't have anything to do with being gay or lesbian and it would just muddy the waters of the topics being too disjointed.

'Identify' is doing a lot of heavy lifting there. Any man who identifies as a lesbian is a liar.

@libraryorbit

Sorry but what do you mean by "an expectant trans parent"?

I was wondering this too

An LBG forum should be separate from a T forum IMHO, as the issues are distinct (sexual orientation vs gender identity).

Humans are mix-and-match bags of issues, but I think with this, on MN especially, the distinction needs to be firmly drawn.

Well that poster hasn't responded, so I guess we'll never know.

Either a pregnant woman who isn't like other women, or a dad who wants to be let into the mums club
On pregnancy and parenting, this is the place to be. Don't think anyone's going to notice if a woman wears trousers.
Dads are usually welcome as long as they don't mansplain!

I didn't like to assume (we all know what that makes), which is why I left it open for the poster to explain in their own words.

That poster does sound like they could do with some support, I'd encourage them to engage a little longer.

Sadly I suspect they won't find much support on here

The term LGBTQIA+ has been around since the 90's, because there were identities that were never represented in the community. "Q" refers to those who identify as queer, "I" for intersex, "A" for asexual, and the "+" symbol was adopted to include any non-cisgender and non-straight identities that were not specifically covered by the letters in the acronym. Please remember, that it was this community of gay people who determined this was their best representation to be inclusive instead of being marginalized. Not by heterosexuals expecting their approval of someone else's identity that has nothing to do with them. To the Sisterhood of the Traveling TERFS, you will always be judgmental for someone who's not like you and that's your choice. But I was under the impression that the thread was to gauge potential support - not be another obvious way to promote England as TERF Island to the world (TERF Island: How the UK Resisted Trans Ideology). Say what you will - Full Equal Suffrage wasn't instituted until 1928 in England, but the question is why it hasn't even been 100 years since it had been passed and the same tired arguments for equal rights it took 56 years before it happened after the NUWSS was formed. So much hatred gets wasted by the same ones who have "no horse in this race" but still love to despise those who are different from them.

@NumbersGuy you’re wrong. I was on the scene in the 90s and it was called lesbian and gay. There was huge controversy about adding the B. The alphabet umbrella is relatively new.

I did ask, a while back, about changing the board to 'gender questioning' or 'gender incongruent' children rather than LGB 'T' children. MN eventually decided to stick with 'LGBT children'.

OP, I can see why LGB - particularly LB - may wish a separate MN board, but if you set up a board for lesbians you cannot have 'T' included in it without suggesting that lesbians don't really exist as a sexuality. The prioritising of 'gender' over sex renders 'homosexual' meaningless.

And if you create a board for lesbian Mumsnetters, you are unfortunately going to create a target for any amount of tedious men.

I would support an LGB board.

Yes, I remember that too. I came out in the mid-90s & there was a wonderful lesbian community where ‘lesbian’ purely meant ‘same-sex-attracted women’.

And if the repulsive term ‘cisgender’ was around back then I don’t remember it.

The reason I’m not hopeful about a board for lesbian or LB MNers is, as @ArabellaSaurus said, it would be flooded by mansplainers & transactivists.

In the same way that it’s impossible to stop parents coming in the MNers without children board & telling us all how great it is to have kids, there’s no way to stop people posting anywhere they want.

In the same way that it’s impossible to stop parents coming in the MNers without children board & telling us all how great it is to have kids, there’s no way to stop people posting anywhere they want.

People do that?!

Fuck me.

Yep.

Just like they go on the Black Mumsnetters board and tell them there's no racism.

Bloody hell, do they?

Yep!
(edit: not Black but have mixed ethnicity adopted daughter so read for occasional ideas re diversity).

That’s absolutely shit.

My dear straight allies, while we do love you - you don’t get to decide what we call ourselves. Telling us that the board “has to be called LGB without the T” is just like a white person saying that the black mumsnetters board is not for people that are white passing, or that mumsnetters without children board is only for the childless and not the childfree.

I think if we are to make one, the admins should pick a name that is consistent with the way we are represented elsewhere on the site - right now it appears to be LGBT parents and LGBT children thus LGBT

As a B member of the community, I can see this board being a place to talk about:

• LGBT relationships and dating, navigating dating sites, sexual and reproductive wellness
• incl. challenges in relationships with others in your life like parents
• coming out to friends and family, work
• pride and other community events, venues
• LGBT travel
• LGBT history, media, art
• LGBT current events, issues and advocacy for example celebrating news about a country making marriage equality legal
• a place for people that are questioning to ask questions (no pun intended), self-discovery
• Heavier topics like homophobia (internalized or not), micro aggressions, outing, living in heteronormative or conservative spaces

I left Reddit and I miss being able to read / talk about these topics

My dear straight allies, while we do love you - you don’t get to decide what we call ourselves. Telling us that the board “has to be called LGB without the T” is just like a white person saying that the black mumsnetters board is not for people that are white passing, or that mumsnetters without children board is only for the childless and not the childfree.

As I said just a few posts ago, I’m a lesbian. I wouldn’t presume to know the sexuality of other posters unless they’ve mentioned it themselves.

My basic rule is that the more letters in the acronym, the less L-friendly it is. What gender someone identifies as / conforms to (if any) is a completely different thing from which sex(es) they’re attracted to.

You are doing a lot of assuming of posters sexual identity here. You don't know how many posters here are LBG.

The SC ruled that biological sex matters, not least because of how much the lesbian community were being marginalised by males saying they were homosexual and demanding access to lesbian spaces.

This is fundamentally homophobic behaviour and the SC recognised this.

MN really should reflect this, as it's user base is primarily women. There are plenty of other places where LGBT forums exist and lesbians and bisexual women are marginalised.

For anyone in the community: I apologize for assuming you’re an ally.

It seemed odd to me that rather talking about whether the community wants have its own general LGBT space, if yes then how it would help and what kind of subjects we would want to see - instead the responders launched into a tirade about the T in LGBT.
OP herself pointed out that “Much like with the other demographic boards, I find when these subjects come up in Chat that it often devolves into debates the OP clearly hadn't been looking for- so I was wondering if it would be worthwhile to have a similarly-aimed board that stays off of the Active Threads page?”

Literally exactly what happened here.

Attempting to return back to the original subject and away from the T debate - are others interested in having a space for LGBT topics, is anyone else interested in the subjects I described? If it’s just me and OP that’s not enough for a whole board :)
I imagine this is what the admins watching this post want to know.

I'm an ally to my female lesbian friends (I hope). None of them have any interest in being forced teamed with the T.
I think your answer is in this thread. Lesbian Mumsnet users would contribute to an L board, not sure if they'd prefer it to be just L or also B. You'd have to do a survey to see if there are enough G to add them in (as an adopter, I do a secret nod when I spot fellow adopters so I've seen a few). But it's clear from many of the above posts you'll have to leave off the T (or ask for a separate board, or, I dunno, go to Reddit) or your user base will be miniscule.