Is the silencing and ridicule of older women necessary to keep women in their place?

[QuentinSummers]

On a thread a while back someone (can't remember who, sorry) said they thought there was a deliberate strategy to stop older women talking to and influencing younger women. For example the no-platforming of Germaine Greer.
I've been thinking about it a lot and I agree. I have been thinking about the treatment if Mary Whitehouse as a crank and religious nutter when i was younger - but a lot of her fears have come to pass.
And the recent thread about asexuality - if older women and younger women talked more openly about their sexuality and women's desire, how women's sex lives are over the years, impact of things like hormonal contraception and childbirtg, perhaps it would help younger women understand and be comfortable with themselves. I can't help thinking that all the labels are people trying to assert that they are different to the rather homogenous, masculine, aggressive view of sex that's everywhere at the moment.
Then the other day I heard a BBC presenter describing the White Widow (female terrorist, high value target for the USA, killed in a drone strike) as a ridiculous and rather pathetic figure. Which seemed really incongruous given how much effort the US have put into catching her. And made me wonder if she was being deliberately ridiculed as she was influencing a lot of younger women to join ISIS (It's a distasteful example but really struck me).

Also tied in here are all the younger women who "get on better with men" (I was one of those myself, I am so embarrassed now).

What can we do to build the credibility of older women? I really think it's necessary to help women overall.

Thanks for reading the wall of waffly text

quentin I couldn't read to the end of that piece it made me so angry. That little brat needs an almighty foot up her arse. And I'm 33 years younger than Germaine, so a different generation and have had many arguments with second wave feminists about all sorts of things, we aren't a homogenous borg-mind. But jesus, have a bit of fucking respect

General groups of women, although not designated women-only, such as school gate groups, "mums" groups, even mumsnet, can be judgemental, nasty and pretty much everything else.
Gosh
Do you feel the same about groups of men or just women?

What about all the older thick women? Not everyone past 50 is worth listening to, what about those who perpetuate gender stereotypes? Who castigate those who transgress them.

There are a lot of twats out there, they too age.

Do you feel the same about groups of men or just women?

Both really. It's just how people are in my experience.
Taking men out of the equation hasn't (in my experience) led to a utopia of wonderful women. Some are, plenty aren't.

Yes although it does depend on your career etc. I get listened to an awful lot because of seniority in work, expertise, experience etc. However that is not the case for many women my age.

I don't do generational conflict. I find good things and wise things said by younger and older women.

We certainly need to fight very hard to keep women in positions of power and move more into those roles in all spheres.

I am not personally silenced or ridiculed but a lot of women are.

Taking men out of the equation hasn't (in my experience) led to a utopia of wonderful women
That's not really my point. My point is male idiots are treated much more leniently than female idiots, and that some older women are treated as idiots when they are very far from it.
It's double standards, but also serves to stop younger women benefiting from the experiences and wisdom of older women.

I would really love some older women friends in real life who can pass on their life experience (I'm 29).

I had a successful 20's in terms of work/being taken seriously. But I'm starting to notice just how screwed women are as they get older and start to have children.

I just had my first baby and have been made redundant on maternity leave and am having a bit of an identity crisis. In the words of Jenny Grogan in Marley and me: 'I've given up so much of what used to make me me (by becoming a mother) but I'm a terrible person if I say that, but I really feel it sometimes'

Anyway I hope that's not too derailing!

Society doesn't value women, but younger women are easier to control.

Depends what you mean
I mean deliberately and consciously excluding males to be 'women-only' (although men who get how this is important can be supportive of it), which does not include the school gates, mumsnet, etc, obviously.

Trojan

Agreeing with a trans-inclusionary approach is a perfectly respectable point of view.

It is different from women-only and doesn't have the benefits for women of women-only.

Characterising those who support inclusion as 'fawning over transwomen' is also a form of arrogance.

I didn't characterise anyone as anything, or mean anything other than - fawning over males including transwomen, is fawning over males including transwomen - which I have witnessed. This behaviour is a symptom of female socialisation rather than any political beliefs in my opinion.

MN doesn't really do worthwhile debate anymore, it's a series of echo chambers and people hiding the stuff they don't agree with.

I don't really know what you mean or where you are heading with this.

I think it's funny that one one hand you get posters saying how important the predominantly female space of MN is, and how it attracts trolls because it's so threatening
I'd agree that a gathering of unabashed female intelligence is extremely threatening.
whilst on this thread isn't been described as not having enough female posters for it to be valid to point out that ageism regularly encountered.
I don't really get what you are saying. Mumsnet is not women-only so it does not benefit from all of the benefits of women-only.

male idiots are treated much more leniently than female idiots, and that some older women are treated as idiots when they are very far from it.

It's double standards, but also serves to stop younger women benefiting from the experiences and wisdom of older women.

^^
This

Mums is predominately female but not predominately women my age (over 50) and that's fine with me. I like women (and men) of all ages.

Older women have often been ridiculed in history - the wicked witch living on her own burned at the stake. Some men think women's purpose is to please them sexually so once women do not have that use they ignore them (not all men by any means of course0. Some men feel threatened by older women. I think it's getting a lot better. We are getting more and more visible older women in all kinds of career sectors but we certainly have to be on the watch to ensure we do not dismiss older women who may have things to say that are worth hearing.

Guardian, on this "I mean deliberately and consciously excluding males to be 'women-only" I just never experience that in my life. Just about everything I do work wise and in terms of hobbies and family never excludes a man. I see a lot more exclusion of women than of men although even there not necessarily because rules prohibit women. If you look at the daily lives of most men and women which is getting up, doing chores, seeing to children, school run, work, home repeast and at weekends TV, the park etc there are not a whole raft of "women" or "men" only things going on.

Yes, consciously 'women only' now seems confined to religious conservatives (which manage to escape MRAs/TRAs targeting as far as I can see) and radical feminists - who get the hate full force.

I remember being genuinely scared of going to a women-only feminist group and really wanted to bring a male with me (I was part of the 'I get on better with men' brigade)... I wonder why I was genuinely scared of women? What misogynist assumptions filled my head?

Anyway it was fairly transformative to just see how capable, brilliant, interesting, knowledgeable and accepting, yet incisive they were - knocked a load of my stereotypes on the head!

I suppose I went to a woman only school as did my daughters so that was women only. Nothing much else in my life is particularly divided by any rule about gender but then I have just been a feminist rather than attended meetings or talks on the topic.

We are seeing a lot of criticism of older people at present which I don't think is very helpful. Pitting people against each other rarely does much good.

Older people often do have a bit of experience and can have a bit more life knowledge than younger people but we can all learn from each other. I have gone out of my way by the way to take the less easy route of doing the more active stressful things and aspects of my work like pubilc speaking, going on radio etc because so many more men seem to do it than women in my field and I want to right the balance a bit.