Elightening article by respected feminist about mothers and female only spaces?

[RedHoodGirl]

Has anyone else read this enlightening article by respected feminist Julian Vigo about how mothers are excluded from some strands of feminism? It’s quite shocking what she’s uncovered.

www.counterpunch.org/2018/03/30/the-spawn-feminisms-misandry-problem/

Honestly, those radical feminists, how dare any of them think? And speaking, that's just of naughty of them. Let's block all radical feminists. Anyone got a list?

Clicky link
www.counterpunch.org/2018/03/30/the-spawn-feminisms-misandry-problem/

Thank you @Milvusmilvus for adding the clicky link

That isnt radical feminism as I know it. We usually arrange a creche.

Julian is talking about a very small subset of women who call themselves radical feminists and the article is all about how they really shouldn't be calling themselves radical feminists, given the attitude towards mothers.

She's not saying this is typical of radical feminism. She's saying this is a small group of hyper-privileged people appropriating radical feminism. It's an interesting article and I agree with her that it's yet another example of how identifarians appropriate and corrupt language to misrepresent themselves and their beliefs.

At the outset of austerity, I noticed similar dismissive attitudes towards mothers from people I'd call "media feminists". Those of use who were trying to point out the intersections of austerity cuts - welfare, women's services, legal aid - that would compound so that working class women would have their equality curtailed were told such things as not all women are breeders on the regular.

She does have a valid point that women shouldn't be excluded because they have a male child..feminism should be open for all women.

I have come across women who seem to hate men and it has stemmed from being abused by men. Some women have the misfortune to only have had abusive men in their lives.

That isnt radical feminism as I know it. We usually arrange a creche.

Exactly. All the groups I've ever been part of will include boy children (usually with some age limit, typically primary school/Y6) so that mothers can attend. I think OP may believe they have found a gotcha about radfems in general, but has missed Julian's point - usual radfem praxis is being ignored by a small subset of women calling themselves radfems but who are in reality anything but.

Fascinating that RedHoodGirl posted this shortly after Giuliana_London started making it their propaganda focus for today....

These people call themselves radical feminists but bear no similarity to the actual definition of rad fem

Which other group of people misrepresent themselves as another, and half the world accept it to be true?

I don't know why Giuliana feels able to cast aspersions, when most TRAs dismiss women who are mothers* (it's part of their usual armory agains MN, for example, as a change from when they aren't screaming "transphobe!" at us). And there's no more usual insult among a certain type of woke individual than "mummy blogger", because god forbid women who have procreated ever express an opinion about anything.

*disclaimer: Giuliana and other TRAS dismiss all women, but there's often a special sneer there for mothers.

The phrase 'throw enough shit and some of it will stick' comes to mind....

Also, I agree with some of what she wrote, but I don't believe misandry is a thing. Some women behaving like dicks is clearly a thing, as her article says, but I don't think misandry is a thing.

I've got a boy child, and I was always welcome at women's events with him when he was small - age two and age five was no problem at all. I stopped taking him, on my own account, when he hit that very-difficult-to-define line between being a small child and an older, pre-pubertal child, and he's been totally fine with this, then and now he's even older and man-sized. He understand that not everything is for him. When he was little and I couldn't get a babysitter it did mean there were things I couldn't go to, but they aren't children forever.

Well if they are putting the cut off at Y6 they will be excluding mothers of disabled children who can not be left alone then.

BlackeyedSusan a disabled teenage boy is still a boy, is still male.

I think to treat teenage boys with disabilities as somehow exempt from this is not only disrespectful to the idea of women-only space, but also strides firmly into the disablist trope that people with disabilities are somehow asexual.

Where are all these fucking woke men, then? Why aren't they stepping up to the job on childcare when women want to be political together?

Fascinating that RedHoodGirl posted this shortly after Giuliana_London started making it their propaganda focus for today....

Yes, I wonder if crispbuttyfan and Sue00001 or Katsu, will be popping back. They were nice to chat to.

I was on that post on Julian's wall and this is not at all how it played out. Her views as expressed there, the contempt she showed towards those of us who wished for our daughters to have the benefit of female-only space (NOTE: male infants were not excluded from this event, her children were simply older than the cut-off point), the accusations of eugenics, calling us Nazis, wishing that the event were invaded by TRAs, the claims that NAMALT (especially the sons of RFs who should, because they have been 'correctly' socialised by admitted to otherwise female-only spaces, and the expectation that the daughters of RFs are supposed to be doing emotional labour is 'educating' and 'setting an example' to these male children was egregious and vile. Her continual wriggling to attempt to cast this as a 'class issue' was similarly insulting, when it was no such thing. She further mocked a woman who related how she had been sexually assaulted when she was 4 years old by a boy of the same age.
She is being extremely selective with the truth, to put it mildly.

Women and girls are entitled to the benefits of female-only spaces. The benefits of these are not merely protective against the possibility of male violence, they are beneficial in and of themselves. Young girls are also entitled to these spaces (on Julian's thread there were calls, supported by Julian, for male children up to the age of 12 to be allowed to attend). The event in question allowed male children up to the age to 3, and female children of all ages. Events are allowed to be child-free entirely, to include all children of both sexes and all ages, or to include female children only.

It is a shame that Julian was not able to attend and bring her children, but many of us for whatever reason are unable to attend every event that we wish to - that is life. Different events are organised differently. THIS WAS ONE EVENT, THERE WILL BE OTHERS. Get over it.

Sorry for typos....

Uterati

This debate is entirely unneeded and unwelcome. Get a fucking grip. A 4 year old child who 'sexually assaults' has been the victim of sexual assualt.

This is not doing women, and specifically feminists, any good at all.

There is a lot at stake and none of it is served by excluding 5 year old boys from women's gatherings. That's as barking as half the shite the TRAs come up with.

(on Julian's thread there were calls, supported by Julian, for male children up to the age of 12 to be allowed to attend)

Have any of them ever met a twelve year old boy? Bloody hell. They are well on their way to being man-sized at that age.

I think any event can choose to be child-free if they want to, but that comes with the knowledge that women (and especially women without resources) are disproportionately affected by this. I think 6 or possibly 7 is a reasonable cut-off point in most circumstances for boy-children, when children are allowed at all. (The Horton Women's Centre, whose policies I generally admire, allows any boy up to their 11th birthday, and in limited circumstances - closed groups, etc - boys up to 15, but I think that's generally too old.)

A 4 year old child who 'sexually assaults' has been the victim of sexual assualt.

And yes, this, too. It doesn't (or at least shouldn't) minimise the hurt and damage done to the girl that was assaulted, but a 4-year-old who sexually assaults is not a knowing predator, nor should they be treated like one.

I think this is a really needed discussion, but what I don't like is that it is playing out in public, and any disagreements will be leapt on by the Giulianas of this world to beat us with.

These articles are being posted by TRAs to expose the "hating" women feminists on mumsnet.

It's getting a bit yawn inducing.

I support the right of women to organize their own events any way they want; female-only, adult-only, mother-only, lesbian-only...

There's a lot of this that overlaps with the "what age do you stop taking them into the women's loos" arguments, too.

Me too, sillage, but a discussion on what the consequences and advantages are for all those decisions is worthwhile, no?

Annie
I'm not saying anyone should minimise the damage done to a girl who has been assaulted, but nor should we assume that it is likely or normal for a 4 year old to assault.

I have a 12 year old son and he is certainly too old to be at a woman only event, at least one with shared facilities. But 4?

Boys are excluded from female spaces at 8. It seems reasonable to concur with this norm

Yes the TRAs will take advantage. They will try to deflect attention away from the inate battshittery of their ideology.

There is no need to give them the means to do it.