"Normal" advice to not walk around at night in Bristol.

[Motherfunster]

As a Bristolan woman I was a bit put out by the police advice that there was no specif threat to women but to take the "normal" precautions of not walking around after dark on your own.I was taken aback at this as theirs nothing bloody normal about it.

I tried contacting the local reclaim the night people but to no avail.The local students need to be advised and the bloody clicky feminist of Bristol need to understand that this is issue that need to be addressed.

I cant do anything about it do to certain circumstances.A word in there shell fellow Feminist MNers please if posable.

If there was a reclaim the night march now, a lot of us would go on it.

Bristol Feminist Network Facebook group

BFN yahoo group

Meetings are held at Cafe Kino in Stokes Croft. I haven't been to the new Kino yet (it has moved across the road recently) but I think the new cafe is wheelchair accessible.

There's also Bristol Fawcett. I posted a link to Fawcett in a previous post. The Fawcett meetings are held on the 2nd Wednesday of every month. In February it will be held at Hamilton House in Stokes Croft at 7.45pm.

If you scroll down to the bottom of the home page there are links to join the yahoo group, facebook group and mailing list. The meetings will be held on the ground floor of kino so will be accessible.

Heroine, I don't think anyone thinks men are expendable!! I think men aren't taught to be afraid of the streets like women are, they are allowed independence which women are denied. Who knows why the media chooses to report some crime and not others, after all the mainstream news doesn't mention the 2 women a week who are murdered.

Will there be singing at the next Fawcett meeting, MumBristol?

Because I'm not coming if there isn't!

Meetings are currently in the evening as those who have volunteered to run discussion groups can only make evenings. But that is not set in stone! And if you would like to run a discussion group in the daytime please get in touch and we will advertise the meeting and book the venue for you. We would love to have daytime meetings but we are obviously dependant on volunteers being able to run daytime meetings.

Also please do join the Facebook group as it is a great hub for info and upcoming events. Are next where are the women event will be on Sunday 6 march and in the daytime.

Riven, if there's enough Bristol interest then maybe the coach from Cornwall will stop and pick up for Million Women Rise.

JessinAvalon, let's see what we can do for the next BF meeting! (warbles: I am Strong, I am Invincible,I am Woman)

MumofRachel I am not a man.

There is some one else on this thread who has seen me lactating and acting like a arse due to PMT.You know who your are,

Being mistaken for a man is one of the reasons I wished to meet up informally, on one of the very few nights I had babysitting.

I have been contacted today by other member's of BFN and they welcome my offer and have sent on working links.

I endeavor to help as much as I can.

Iv been told there was a email malfunction and my email (Offering to come down and show I wasn't a bloody man) was not seen until after the event.(I also acknowledge that my emails look like they have been written in crayon due to dyslexia, but there you go)

I wish to acropolises to the BFN for the my part in the misunderstanding.

One of the things I think will happen will be a swelling of the feminists ranks, in context of the wider issues facing women today from the hooligans that just got into power, and that could mean feminist groups around the country maybe looking into how they are accommodating women who have childcare or access issues to attend meet ups.

When I saw the 'Normal' advice from the local police I was fucken livid. And I forgot that there are sensitivities in regards to the Yeates family, in regards to the march.

However I think it shows a worrying desensitization on the part of the police to this kind of crime.I also have done a bit of looking into the crime rate involving violent sexual attacks in Clifton.

I recommend other Bristolians to have a Googil too.

motherfunster - BFN welcomes men and women, and anyone beyond or between those gender binaries. I very much doubt that anyone from BFN asked you to prove that you are a woman.

The issues of childcare and access are very iimportant, and I agree with you on those issues. However, it's also important to remember that the majority of feminist networks across the UK are run by volunteers, often with other full-time employment and no funding whatsoever. It's amazing what can be achieved with such limited resources. But that does mean that those of you such as yourself, and Riven, who want to join us, but feel that you can't because of childcare or access issues, could work with us instead of against us.

If you are available in the day - why not offer to hold some groups then, and report back to the group? There's really nothing stopping you. If you need a venue with access, instead of critisicising us for holding meetings in inaccessible venues, why not find one that is suitable and help us to hold meetings there? We are only as strong as our membership and as a member I find it really sad that people would rather criticise the hard-working people of BFN than actually do something to help.

Hi Motherfunster

Thanks for your message and glad we have resolved this!

We look forward to seeing you at meetings soon and if you would like to get involved in putting on a discussion group etc then let us know.

You might also be interested in Sistershow Revisited which is an art exhibition and educational event about the women's liberation movement which an amazing Bristolian woman is putting on.

Hi Riven

We are open to men and women, although find that most meetings generally attract only women.

We haven't had any problems with men dominating discussion. In fact, we once had a 'men in feminism' discussion group where trying to get the men to talk was incredibly tricky, as they were very aware about not dominating the discourse!

if, for example, we had a meeting about violence i think we would discuss whether to make it women-only, and the recent workshops for survivors of violence were, of course, women only.

Bristol Fawcett is women only.

A lot of the issues we discuss do effect men too, and of course the patriarchy hurts everyone. We expect everyone to be respectful and observe confidentiality in meetings and have never had any trouble in the past.

Riven - men are welcome at meetings although they rarely come along. The website has more information about this. I believe Fawcett meetings are women only.

It's very well to accuse us of being defensive but this whole thread was started from a very mean-spirited perspective by someone who felt they had the right to criticise us when she has had pretty much nothing to do with BFN in the past.

Whilst this thread has gone into different issues, it's worth bearing in mind that the murder victim Jo Yeates was by far and away most likely NOT attacked by reason of being on the street. Without trawling over details, far more likely that (in one way or another) her killer entered her house. Equally, in the scheme of things, far more likely that he killer was known to her in one way or another than a random psycho wandering on the loose.

I can't give you statistics, but in my work in crime, I can only say empirically that it seems more likely that men will be attacked unprovoked on the street in terms of pure numbers of instances. However, two key issues (amongst many) may be relevant:

1. Men are likely to be attacked for a much wider variety of reasons, whereas attacks on women run the obvious risk of arising from more specific sinister motivation and stand every chance of being more serious for that reason.

1. There are many more men than women wandering around the streets at night.

Anyway, I am glad that the Bristol Feminists have asserted their credentials following the original ill-judged attack. Having witnessed many of the meetings in my house (whilst emptying the washing machine, doing the ironing etc of course) I can verify that singing does not take place. More's the pity. An image of the massed choir of the Fawcett Society banging out "Angel From Montgomery" has been stuck in my mind for an unhealthy period of time.

Any Bristol feminists would be very welcome at the Council licensing meeting, Friday, 2pm at the Council House. They are going to be signing off the incredibly poor SEV (sex entertainment policy) that day. I am taking annual leave to attend and will be meeting MumBristol there.

We are also going to be spending an evening each making a list of loopholes in the policy. If anyone else has time to help, that would be great. The draft policy is available on their website but I will post a link to it later.

Any help greatly appreciated and support at the meeting would be very welcome.

Sorry for the short notice. We only found out about the meeting yesterday.

Hi Riven
It is a public meeting. I'm not sure which item it is on the agenda though. I'll see if I can find out and will post on here.

Thanks! It'll be great to have more support there.

JIA

but it will be dark then. how are we going to get there??

huge spotlights.