Dealing with inflammatory posts re Trans on MN

[womanformallyknownaswoman]

I am concerned to see the message below from MNHQ at the end of the T thread. Regarding posts that I consider "goady", I have a personal policy of not feeding them, not engaging and not rising to the bait. I ignore them. OPs looking for conflict as a way to feed themselves won't get it from me. Firstly, it's exhausting-they are not interested in dialogue, despite what they say, and secondly the best way to deal with them, imo, is to starve them of attention and not rise to the bait. Don't give them what they want i.e. a fight and conflict.

My concern is I predict there will be a lot more new threads and OPs looking for a fight, as the public becomes more aware of the issues and the tide starts to turn against TRAs. They will want to try and get this Place closed down for discussion, and none of us want that to happen.

Personally I have found it empowering to learn how not to engage and to turn it back on them if absolutely necessary, by the use of ridicule and short rebuttals of their nonsense. I am happy to share some techniques if it will help plus learn more from others. There's no point in trying to score points and win all the arguments they make as it's the engagement down their rabbit holes they want - they literally feed off conflict. They're anti-social remember, so any attention is better than none. They want to keep you coming back and arguing, so they can derail, prolong, provoke and generally make life difficult for MNHQ - to force them to take action. The negative attention "turns on" those looking for a fight….so please don't feed them, ignore them and lets keep this place open.

Message for MN:

Hi all

Since this thread is getting near its end, this seems like a good moment to make a really serious point.

We've just made some more deletions on this thread, and we're pretty exasperated tbh - we feel we're running out of ways to say 'please stick within the TGs or risk losing MN as a place to discuss this issue.'

We're really proud of our commitment to free speech, and we put a huge amount of time and resources to enabling this debate to take place - as many of you have pointed out, it's one of the few places left.

To those who haven't yet been able to stop and look at things from our end of the barrel - please understand that you're risking this space for everyone; if you really can't debate civilly with those you disagree with, it might be time to consider that MN is no longer the place for you. We're sorry to have to say this - we don't like it one bit - but tbh nothing else seems to have got through so far: we're at a point of last resort.

Thanks to all those who modify their first instincts and manage to make their points in a calm, considered and civilised manner - even in the face of goadiness. We appreciate it (and so would Michelle.)

Thanks all

MNHQ

This is good on how predators take advantage of female socialisation:

fugitivus.wordpress.com/2009/06/26/another-post-about-rape-3/

Interesting

See, I was thinking of it more as an allusion to the friendly Folk of the Faraway Tree (although the Angry Pixie scared the beejezus out of me) Or 'little folk' - elves, leprechauns and the like.

I hate it when people try and patronise women by unconsciously appealing to our love of fairies.

Also, the garble a quote from Sir Terry, the long drawn out note that must precede every performance to give potential listeners fair warning and time to run away.

It's just the kind of slightly twee language gender identity enthusiasts on social media use to make the ideology seem lovely and warm and friendly.

"There are, however, important difficulties with abuse-focused objections to self-determination."

We've seen those difficulties here before, put in a less prolix way. They tend to be around:

• it won't happen, it doesn't happen

I think we need some snappy statistical soundbites around this. It's part of a generalised "reasonable" "measured" societally condoned denial of male violence. It's hard to name male violence because pretending it doesn't exist is one of the things that keeps society trucking along in the way that it does. This isn't some odd anomaly that we suddenly bump into in this context - it's how EVERYTHING works. Thinking about tackling this is about thinking both small and big - we need something snappy and little and numerical and true AND we need to think about how to address the bigger picture of why women have fought for women-only spaces and how precious they are.

In the wider world I tend not to use "abuse focused" arguments because I think normal people find them alarmist and alienating. I usually just ask if people think that women and girls only spaces should exist? - most do, tho they don't necessarily know why they think this - and take it from there.

In some contexts, however, it is necessary to defend women's spaces as a certain subset of people are now saying they don't actually matter. I see that more online, to be honest. It's more of an activist position.

• it's insulting to transwomen and / or men to suggest they're abusers

It's really important how you talk about the reality of gendered violence in such a way that people don't have an excuse to feel personally aggrieved. We knew this already from a determined refusal to understand class analysis (but ONLY in the case of "men") that feminists have always been up against. At least - if you want to win over that particular individual, it's always been important; now we have a whole very sensitive situation where it's more widely important, for reasons we all know. In the past, some feminists used to take a line something like "I don't care if the facts hurt your feelings; here are the facts." Nowadays we can't start with not caring about people's feelings. We are simply not allowed to talk in pure factual terms without couching everything in cotton wool about people's feelings. I have built a career on enclosing facts in cotton wool and therefore being allowed to include them; it is annoying to have to do so but in most cases you CAN get the facts in with enough care to the cotton wool.

• transwomen can't be abusers as they are people legitimately scared of abuse

I really do not understand this point. Without saying anything about the likelihood of transwomen as a class, or any particular transwoman, to abuse: how can any person argue that there is NO ONE in the intersection between abusers and those who fear abuse? This argument - when used by people with legal training rather than by those who might just be a bit fuzzy thinking - is blatant emotional blackmail. there is NO logic in it. You are simply being emotionally appealed to, to prioritise someone else's fear above your own.

I always think of troops of merry woodland hedgehogs and squirrels and bunnies

I think that message is MNHQ's way of saying that when they eventually ban us from discussing gender ideology it will be our own fault.

If it was a matter of individuals posting inflammatory things, surely MNHQ would just go on deleting them individually as they have done for years?

I've seen a lot of these threads, and most people are just concerned about what's going on. Very little abuse or goadyness.

On a more serious note, I think "folks" started as a rather clumsy attempt to appropriate African American vernacular by gender identified white kids trying to appear woke, and spread from them to a wider variety of TRAs. It's fairly common usage in parts of the southern USA. Sounds remarkably silly coming from Brits.

This argument - when used by people with legal training rather than by those who might just be a bit fuzzy thinking - is blatant emotional blackmail. there is NO logic in it. You are simply being emotionally appealed to, to prioritise someone else's fear above your own.

Absolutely. It's imperative to keep calling it out in a way that shows it up for what it is.

"In the past, some feminists used to take a line something like "I don't care if the facts hurt your feelings; here are the facts.""

Can I just add: this is in no way a criticism of talking in that way. Hearing it has been vital to my consciousness raising. I am very sorry that I am talking about wrapping this stuff in cotton wool, in the way I am forced to do at work, which is because of gendered power structures and who has all the money and how I get to be allowed to make a living.

It is exactly because it is crucial to preserve places and virtual places that can dispense with cotton wool and have woman to woman "here's the thing" talking, that we need to be so careful at this precise moment in history. Am I weakening the very thing that is so important by advocating for the cotton wool? Could "here's the thing" talking cease to exist if the very people who know what it is for why it is important, stop using it?

A brilliant example of "here's the thing" talking that moved me to tears recently was that statement by the women in Deptford. This is the sort of thing that has to - HAS TO - be allowed to exist

AntiGrinch

I think that's an excellent analysis

I agree that we have to be clever how we couch things.

As kittens said upthread, it's a strength not a problem that we have many different voices expressing our arguments in many different ways. We don't all have to agree on tone or on emphasis. Different tones and different emphases will chime with different hearers.

Oh women are only see abusive men because they don’t see love, if they loved enough they wouldn’t see the hate

Well that’s a new one. Or maybe a reeeeeeally old one...

If it was possible to make all the men in the world harmless via positive thinking women would have done so long ago. It may be possible to convince yourself that nothing bad will happen to you if you're just shiny and positive and loving enough, but unfortunately this is unlikely to convince predators not to hurt you. As a life strategy I wouldn't recommend it.

Perhaps if I had tried harder to see the love in my abusive partner he wouldn't have hurt me so often.

"There are, however, important difficulties with abuse-focused objections to self-determination."

There is if you constantly focus on the abuser rather than the abused.

One in five women will be the victim of some kind of sexual violence in their life. The argument that Sue is making is like the likelihood of the person who abused that woman walking through the door of the toilets.

Not that the woman's boundaries should be maintained, to keep out all men.

Because it is all men. The harmless ones and the predators.

It's not about deciding, from the outside, who is harmless and who isn't. It's about women never, ever being able to tell. So the default position is caution with any and every man.

Magical thinking, innit?

I've posted this link before but since we have some new people it may be worth doing so again.

kateharding.net/2009/10/08/guest-blogger-starling-schrodinger%E2%80%99s-rapist-or-a-guy%E2%80%99s-guide-to-approaching-strange-women-without-being-maced/

The "lets channel love" thing is quite chilling and manipulative.

"If you really loved me you would do this for me."

I understand what is being meant; empathy and compassion. But with empathy and compassion, boundaries and mutual respect still remains. And empathy and compassion goes both ways in adults. Children/ teens are the only people who haven't fully developed the capacity to do this.

No one who is gender critical is denying empathy and compassion towards individuals with gender dysphoria. This thread was set up to analyse maintaining boundaries- which women are used to surrendering so much they are often naive to it - and remaining respectful.

I'm pleased it appears to be maintaining this.

I'm thinking about my own username which was a pun on the fact I can't stand zoflora and have realised I'm actually a radical feminist, once I really investigated and read about what it stood for. Is it offensive? I've never included terf in my username as I feel the term is utterly pointless.

I understand what is being meant; empathy and compassion. But with empathy and compassion, boundaries and mutual respect still remains.

This is my problem with this. Because it is not two way, it's simply a tactic to silence objections and achieve a desired outcome. It's entirely self centred or centring the feelings of a particular group (speaking generally here, not about anyone in particular). And that is a red flag.

It's a demand that women abandon any boundaries that inconvenience other people. Which is not a very kind of loving thing to ask of anyone.

It's not just about schroedinger's rapist though is it. Even if a strange man in my intimate space wouldn't dream of physically attacking me the chances are relatively high that he will leer at me, make a distasteful remark, tell me to 'cheer up', or do something subtly intimidating in order to enjoy my reaction.

Being female in a public space already carries a high risk of being frightened and shamed. Why should we accept a rule change that will make this worse?

YY Tallulah. But public space isn't for us, is it? It's for men.

This is my problem with this. Because it is not two way

I mean, we may be able to give empathy but by not sacrificing our own needs. And that may mean just saying no.

Going both ways - there doesn't seem to be much / any coming back from TRAs towards women.

By insinuating we aren't being loving enough is insinuating we are being hateful. Whereas we are rightfully maintaining boundaries.