Am I 'good enough' to post in this topic?

[KickAssAngel]

Following on from another discussion - there appears to be a bit of a fear about not knowing enough to post over here.

So - what makes this section different from FWR chat? Do people get the impression that they need to be some kind of 'expert' in order to post in this section? What would make a person 'qualified' to post over here?

That's probably enough questions for now. Anyone got any thoughts?

I'm in the same boat as you. But I see there are threads on here about the lack of decent female characters in Watership Down and about whether you were annoyed about being female growing up, so not too esoteric after all it seems. I don't see the difference between this and Chat but I suppose more highbrow stuff must get put here as well.

I don't think it is fear, more just a complete faff having all these separate sub forums, which don't appear to cover anything in particular nor anything which isn't covered in Chat.

I really don't see what the point of the separate parts is.

I would assume that the titles mean we're meant to have more academic stuff over here, and that chat can be like the feminist pub, and may have absolutely nothing to do with feminism, just that it attracts people who are happy to post under that title.

The issue with the other (tumbleweed) forums is that as there is so little traffic posts don't get replies. No one replied to either of these for example.

Prolapse | Mumsnet Discussion
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/feminist_support/2748778-Prolapse

Anyone read 'The Beauty Myth'? | Mumsnet Discussion
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/feminist_book_club/2746068-Anyone-read-The-Beauty-Myth

Boards are very significant on mumsnet. More so than any other forum I've been on.

My understanding is that feminist chat exists because us man hating shrews want somewhere to talk but the average mn user wanted to ignore us.

As I recall, this board exists because more mn users wanted to join the man hating shrews club but they didn't want to feel bad about not knowing what praxis means.

I have read the beauty myth !!!!

I realise that is too little too late but still...

And i dont know what praxis means

But it sounds inappropriate as my darling ds2 would say

I think it's a poncy way of distinguishing practice from theory. In "the real world", as it were, I can't imagine a situation where one would work "praxis" into a conversation.

Sorry Buffy , whilst I am very familiar with the concept of having to make law work in practice rather than it being an academic exercise, I really can't envisage using the expression "praxis".

KickAssAngel wrote - "what makes this section different from FWR chat?"

Even though there is nothing about a theory that necessitates that it must be complicated or difficult, I think the word "theory" in the title of this part of the feminism section of Mumsnet is likely to put some people off posting because they probably think that theory equals very difficult.

I think feminism's basic theory can be presented in many easy-to-understand ways by people who can communicate the ideas in a relevant way to women and girls who don't yet know about some aspect of feminism. BTW, I think some of the women who have posted on FWR or currently post on FWR are very good at doing this.

I wasn't actually intending you to be a target but your reply does rather illustrate why there is so little traffic on the other threads.

"Don't understand what "praxis" means? Not the place for you then"

I have never found that my basic understanding of feminism and tendency to fall for obvious traps laid by MRA trolls stops me from posting in, and getting a lot out of reading, this board.

Buffy always explains what she means when asked, it's not an intellectual competition ime.

Except I don't when talking to clients use language which is obscure to clients. I would use ordinary language.

Or "want to say praxis? Get out of feminist chat and over to theory" is the flip side of it. Really we should be allowed to say praxis or dialectic or any fancy word any where we want.

I noticed that there's a thread in site stuff about reducing the number of forums so it could be worth having a discussion about how, if at all, the feminism section should be divided.

I think that historically some posters in here may have been quite short with those who popped into threads in an enquiring sort of way, rather than already "knowing" everything?

I certainly got scared off the feminist section a few years back, with the impression that I was neither intelligent enough, well read enough, or knowledgeable enough to post here.

This board came about out of the MN/FWR war when folks were saying that there was too much theory on the only FWR board of the time and that was one of the things that stopped them posting.

Hence the hordes of posters on the Feminism Chat board now.

I would assume that the titles mean we're meant to have more academic stuff over here, and that chat can be like the feminist pub, and may have absolutely nothing to do with feminism, just that it attracts people who are happy to post under that title

But that isn't what happens in practice. Almost everything goes in Chat and all of it is to do feminism , the silly stuff goes in the Pub and the other FWR boards are largely ignored - so what are the other boatds' actual as opposed to theoretical purpose?

This thread in "Feminist Support" got 4 answers in almost a year. The OP would have got far more replies if she put it in Chat.

Fear of men | Mumsnet Discussion
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/feminist_support/2532327-fear-of-men

Buffy didn't say the last line of your post, which you put in quote marks as if you were quoting her, Lass.

So, the sections: Back in the dim and dittany distant past, FWR was a single board under a more general topic. (called Feminism and Women's Rights, hence FWR)

Whilst FWR regulars were broadly happy with this, many other posters were not. Hence the creation of a feminist topic with sub boards.

Some FWR users resolved to post largely in Chat as they disagreed, philosophically, with the separation of theory and practice.

SGM started the wonderful Feminist Book Club, which was active for many months until she was pursued by F4J fuckers. So book club is largely defunct.

As chat has the pub for meandering conversations, most threads on various topics go into chat anyway.

And that's the (her)story, from my perspective. YMMV.

*LassI I was gutted when I started that thread, first time I felt brave enough to post in feminism and I got no replies

Sorry to hear that mozfan, it wasn't seen rather than it was ignored!