Who to vote for as a feminist

[WorkingBling]

I am really struggling ahead of the elections. I have decided that commitment to feminist principals needs to be a strong part of my voting decision making process. But I honestly am not sure this helps.

Lib dems have terrible track record and while I like nick's wife, I can't vote for a party where there's only one woman I am impressed by.

Instinctively i am more of a labour supporter but with the exception of Harriet H I honestly feel underwhelmed by their female representation and view on women.

This leaves the conservatives. There are a number of woman in the party who impress me. But Dave doesn't strike me as a man who really believes in feminist principals.

Help please. All you lovely informed women must have some thoughts.

I think I'd prefer a safe seat even if it were for a party I don't want. I'm in a seat which was Lib Dem but went to SNP.

If it were a safe SNP seat I could vote for my preferred non SNP candidate and retain my principles. But as it's not a safe SNP I will have to work out who has the best chance of beating the SNP and probably get it wrong.

Not the fucking Greens, if the last couple of days are anything to go by.

I'm so fucking disappointed. I expect the Tories to be awful (there are some great Tory women, though I disagree with them on almost every policy point), and I expect UKIP to be beyond awful, and I expect Labour to disappoint me (though there are some fantastic Labour women, and they did introduce some good stuff), and I no longer expect anything at all of the Lib Dems, they are so fucking useless - but I expected much, much more of the Greens. More fool me.

Their "equalities officer" is a joke.

(I hasn't read the thread when I posted that - just came here to vent as I am SO ANGRY and SO DISAPPOINTED and not a bit frightened at where "progressives" are going. Will read the rest of the thread now!)

No, you're right, their equalities officer is a bloody joke.... and has finally, once and for all lost them my vote.

No, I think another party member put a comments on Twitter about how that whole thing had lead to 'TERFs' not voting Green, and that it was 'no loss'.

I thinK, not had a chance to catch up on it properly as am away.

It's this guy here:

twitter.com/GreenBenali/status/561480660129705985

and how the Greens reacted in general.

He's apparently their "equalities" spokesman.

There's been more today, greens activists using some really nasty slurs about gay men, lesbians and feminists.

However, some of the twitter accounts which have been making the more illiberal comments are now locked and ones that aren't have deleted most of their TERF comments... homophobic ones are still there though.

I will never vote Green now. The behaviour on twitter has been sanctimonious, ill informed & juvenile.

The equalities spokesperson said that!? Doesn't he realise how offensive (and inaccurate) that term is? Wow!

What the hell is going on with the Greens? Seriously, it's a car crash. There was a candidate I'd been told was very good - a trans man standing for an Islington seat - but no, he's also totally fine with doling out the gendered slurs and cosying up to all the other assholes. Fucker.

But the equalities officer is really the one that takes the biscuit. He's a parody of himself, and just another Right On Man who uses SJ issues as just another way to bash women.

I have seen other trans women (who are as angry about Green MRA Equality Officer as I am) speculating that one of the triggers for all this brouhaha - Sarah Brown - is that she lost her seat as a LibDem councillor, wants to return to politics, knows that the LibDems are a busted flush, so is trying to cosy up to the Greens.

Yes Archery I agree with both your posts.

the Islington candidate was saying that TW are spat on which is why he hates "Terfs"

But spat at by whom? Feminists? I doubt it.

Beatrix Campbell of the Greens has been speaking out on twitter. I wonder if she'll be listened to.

Men are the real threat to transwomen - no mention of them by the Green Party. Much easier to attack feminists & also shut down any discussion about gender identity, socialisation.

Sadly Archery, I think you're probably 100% correct. Ms Brown is a deeply violent person, judging by her tweets, and the Greens seem to want to be her pal, so screw women....

Sauce, I don't think the Islington candidate - Charlie Kiss - is the sharpest knife in the drawer. Who the hell says that he's totally ok with abusing some women because others have it worse? He also said as a defence that Labour councillors say "TERF", too. Welp, in that case, carry on, Charlie!

And I totally dispute the "have it worse" thing anyway. Whenever I see the extremist trans activists claim that trans people have it worse, I do wonder if they have the faintest idea that the abuse they undoubtably suffer is old news to most women, who have had to deal with that same abuse for a very long time.

Forgive my ignorance but what's a "TERF" and why is the twitter comment by the Green spokesman so offensive?

www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/2uez88/i_am_natalie_bennett_leader_of_the_green_party_of/

Natalie Bennett answers questions from the public on Reddit here. Unfortunately I didn't hear about this event until it had finished.

I am completely at the tweet from Benalu Hamdache. Cocky, childish and arrogant. Something I would have expected from Conservatives, not Greens. I then looked up what TERF means and marginally disentangled my judgy pants - WTF? www.transadvocate.com/you-might-be-a-terf-if_n_10226.htm There are people who say changing your gender is supporting rape culture? shock Now I am sure the world has gone mad.

I'm back to pondering now. Anyone found any other parties talking about women as humans and wanting to put some policies in place for us? This issue is a bit too layered for me and I am wondering how many people it really effects - how many of these TERFs are there, have I found a particularly biased article to explain them? I'm scratching my head about it all still.

TERF is a pretty controversial term, Lion.

Lion, in a nutshell, some feminists quite rightly question the balance of rights when transwomen are fully entitled to occupy women's spaces (such as public bathrooms) with no regard whatsoever for the concerns or rights of biologial women who are uncomfortable/fearful of people with a penis in a space they had previous been able to consider "safe". Both sides have valid points, but apparently if you even dare to question cases where trans rights seem to trump those of biological women, you get called a TERF. There are worse examples, such as some trans activists who say lesbians who don't want to have sex with transwomen (who still have a penis) are transphobic.

So yes, there are a lot of "TERFs" out there - inasmuch as it is used by trans activists to define women who are (rightly) upset about their rights being eroded by people who were born biologically male and have male social conditioning, no matter which gender they currently identify with (NATWALT, obviously). It is a controversial term and IMO yet another way to silence women who speak up for themselves.

Lion yes you have found an incredibly biased article there and TERF is a term of abuse directed at any woman who questions the current transactivist dogma. You could be accused of being a TERF because you said "changing your gender" and the current dogma requires unquestioned belief that a trans person is their "identified" "gender" from birth and that there is no such thing as a female or male biological body.

has lion's post disappeared or is my browser being weird?

That's weird. There's no deletion message, it's just disappeared. I checked on my phone and it's gone there too.