Violence Against Women

[EatsBrainsAndLeaves]

Just been reading this blog post which talks about women who Transition as violence against women. I agree with her.

[Warning from MNHQ - this contains graphic images]

dirtywhiteboi67.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/transition-violence-against-women.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed:+TheDirtFromDirt+(The+dirt+from+Dirt)

beach, it is rather inconsistent to claim you don't see something (therefore it cannot be there?!) and to claim you want everyone to be able to express themselves.

Either try to silence other posters by denying there's an issue, or go for free speech ... you can't do both, I think!

"without their tone/posting style/etc being policed?" no but their opinions were policed if it didn't fully accord with one or two posters.

I'm not trying to stop you say you think someone is parodying feminism LRD.

I'm saying I don't see it - just giving my opinion. I'm not saying it's 'not there'. I'm saying I don't see things that way.

Feel free to disagree. No skin off my nose - am not All Knowing and In Charge of Feminism. LOL.

Just glad to see actual women's issues being brought up on this forum and as to why there seem to be so many STFU posts.

"without their tone/posting style/etc being policed?" no but their opinions were policed if it didn't fully accord with one or two posters.

Dunno about that Mini.

I'm just thinking about when the section first started and how it was ok to just, yunno, explore stuff.

Happy days....

Well, lets face it, Beach it was never "happy days", as you say - people's knowledge and posting styles had always been brought into question round here. And a fair amount of v unfair and belittling swipes were meted out.

And on the topic here, yes the radical feminist 'position' as expounded on FWR is simple. It's just that numerous posters disagree/disagreed with it. Largely because, imho, it was just that. Simple.

Sometimes the truth is simple

Simple, Eats? As someone said v wisely in this section, "If all you have is a hammer, then everything must look like a nail".
No sophistication, no accounting for individual experience, no ability to be generous in spirit, no finer filigree of the human experience.
Just a hammer.

Well, again, Pan, I don't see things that way.

I'm of the opinion that it is important for women to explore women's issues. Simply, without tone policing.

Of course there are always going to be disagreements on the subject.

I'm just [bemused] by the STFU here that doesn't seem to be about the actual subject.

People don't disagree with feminism because it is simple, straight forward and instinctive surely? I imagine they disagree because their experience of life has lead them to hold different opinions - which is fair enough.

of course not Beach, but the STFU isn't aimed at the subject per se, it's prob. aimed at 'say something new because this stuff was worked through ad nauseum fairly recently, thank you very much'. Which the OP doesn't seem to care much about.

I don't know beach. It seems like you are reading a different MN than I am tonight.

My problem (and I speak only for myself here) with this thread is that Eats said that she was an expert and has been unwilling to back up that claim.

I think when someone claims to be an expert on something as controversial as this, then they should be able to converse knowledgeably about that topic.

And not insist that she is right and everyone is wrong based on a blog post, that has no neutral scientific base.

I'm quite sad actually, to find that in the last few weeks that I'm often on 'the other side' of the debate to you. Your posts were those that I would slow down and read when scrolling a thread.

I'm also finding the concept of feminism as a 'journey' or something one has to 'learn' as very strange.

Women don't have to learn about women's issues - we live them and experience them. Feminism has never been an academic subject.

Of course there is brilliant feminist analysis, that puts into words in an incisive, trenchant and coherent manner what many of us experience and feel - and it is vital that women can read and use that analysis if they want to.

But you can have a strong 'handle' on feminism without ever having read any texts. Thank god.

A lot of the radicals I know, were always radicals, they didn't graduate to radical feminism. It was perfectly obvious to them before they even knew that that was what it was called.

"I'm also finding the concept of feminism as a 'journey' or something one has to 'learn' as very strange." And the rest of that post.

Lordy, Beach. Really? That's a fairly clear indictment of people who wish to come on here and learn a bit, including myself as a man.

I am hoping you don't actually mean that.

the concept of anything as a journey, other than an actual journey, is strange and annoying in its everywhereness at the moment

from BBC world news to tales from the national parks, follow me on my bbc4 journey this evening

Mme Lindor - EBAL said that she was 'kind of' a medical expert- she didn't say that she was an expert on trans issues, on FtM operations, on feminism or anything else. I have no idea what you do EBAL (and sorry for talking about you in the third person!). I also have no interest in speculating or questioning EBAL on wherein lies your expertise.

There are a lot of women who consider FTM gender reassignment operations as misogynistic and a form of male establishment violence against women.

That's nice of you to say, Mme Lindor, that you used to slow down and read my posts. I don't really see debates as having 'sides' as such - indeed, I try very hard not to and generally just say what I think.

when I say everywhereness I mean ubiquity

on my journey of vocabulary

Um. Have to disagree, again.

Of course we should 'live' feminism but we have to be made aware of certain issues first

I had no idea of the feminism / trans issue till I read about it here. Just one example of many.

People like you, and LRD and SGM have taught me loads.

I love the idea that none of us have to learn, that we all know what we're talking about automatically.

However - as I well remember you saying, beach, when the MRAs were constantly detracting from the topic with basic, annoying 'what about the menz questions, it is deeply annoying to have someone who asks constant, basic questions while pretending to be a learner, and then turns round to take the piss. That is rude. It is offputting to everyone else who wants to talk.

I too am investing in Beach that she didn't mean all that she indicated.

Well, Pan. Are you really trying to understand what I'm saying?

I think Feminism belongs to all women.

It belongs to poor women, defavourised women, illiterate women, women as a group.

There doesn't need to be a journey or book reading or debating on MN to get women's issues.

For some women, it may be a journey or a learning curve. For other women it is obvious and as plain as the nose on their face (often because such women have been shat on good and hard by patriarchal society).

It's great when people want to learn about something and read and bolster their instincts. It isn't a requirement of feminism though.

Yes, Beach I am trying to understand what you are saying, fwiw. And I do see, and know, family and friends (female) who 'know' stuff and are assertive enough to practice it, (both my sisters for eg) without the back up of 'theory'. We all know them. It's your questioning that every woman should know this, and have no need for a 'journey' and enquire on here, when we live in a society that tells them something else.

Mme Lindor that's nice again to say that you have learnt stuff from my posts on MN.

I can assure you that I am an instinctive feminist.

I have read a bit but what i have read didn't 'teach' me anything - it helped me express what I lived and observed and knew.

I love reading well written feminist analysis - not because it gives me ideas or introduces me to unknowns, but because it lets me know that I am not alone in my thinking and gives an eloquence to gut feelings, instinct and lived observation.

Women's rights have always been about women's lived experience.

Books give us the vocabulary and rhetorical tools to express that lived experience.

But Pan, I didn't say that every woman should know anything.

Nor did I say that there is no need for a 'journey' ever for anyone.

I'm just objecting to the idea that 'feminism is a journey' in general. My experience and observation is that 'ain't necessarily so.

Just another simple idea.

I've got to say, it is really nice to hear that, beach.

I wish I had known that sooner, or heard it sooner, from an influential feminist.

I don't think that is the issue here, though, honestly I don't.

eats isn't pretending to be mega-well-read in feminist theory, nor are people disagreeing with her. It's a red herring.

LRD it makes me kinda sad that women need to hear that they don't need to have read books or be academic or have spent a lot of time on a journey of discovery to get feminism.

Feminism belongs to us all - I don't imagine any one here would try to claim that an illiterate woman cannot understand women's rights. Would we?

eats isn't pretending to be mega-well-read in feminist theory, nor are people disagreeing with her.

Well what's the issue then?

EBAL as far as I can see you post cryptically on fairly typical subjects that come up in feminist discussions and expand when questioned. Seems fair enough to me.