The MNHQ Moderation Team: Thread 2

[BarrackerBarmer]

Follow on thread regarding the data breach situation:
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Dear MNHQ

I'm very grateful for the commitment to free speech you've publicly taken, and for Justine's courage this week.

A former disgruntled employee of MN is writing on Twitter about the 'transphobia' of MN staff, and calling you TERFs. She is showing a great deal of bias and intolerance towards women with feminist views, this may well be her honest opinion, which is no big deal I suppose, since she is no longer an employee.

At least, it isn't an issue until she calls a shout out to her
'friends who still work at MN' to report and take down posts by 'transphobic scum', by which she appears to be referring to any poster objecting to being called TERF by her friend.

Regardless of the personal views of the MNHQ staff, who should be as free to hold their own views as I am mine, I am disturbed that there may be a small contingent of employees who are invested in unfair moderation and will not be applying fair-handed principles, at least if the claims of this ex-employee are credible.

Can you please give posters some reassurance that the difficult job of fair-handed moderation isn't being abused by the 'friends' of ex-employees who are 'reporting it all' and taking down posts because any gender criticism means the poster is 'transphobic scum'?

Thank you.

These good internships are not common, it would be good to see more outreach to less privileged communities to find future interns - maybe from backgrounds where mummy and daddy can't bank roll them if they don't get a paid job.

Justine did say that they are looking at introducing 'returneeships' for women returning to work after time out for families, etc.

Oh my God.
That CAMRA article HAS to be satire.

Which one of you wrote it?
Author HAS to be a mumsnetter FWR regular.

My real ale campaign will be intersectional and include alcopops, or it will be bullshit and exclusionary.
Other drinks are valid too.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-43841175

they are looking at introducing 'returneeships' for women

Yes, both would be good. We have introduced returneeships recently although its at very early stages.

I think we actually do more good though through outreach to state schools to encourage ordinary kids to apply for apprenticeships - we definitely do get a much more diverse intake through that route, kids who would never even go to university if they had to take out big loans.

By reputation we are a premium Oxbridge employer, many of them wouldn't even apply without some form of outreach.

A significant portion of EH's rap/song was about securing more money for students studying overseas. It did strike an odd note with all the DIVERSITY!! because many, many students would not be able to take up overseas study no matter how many bursaries were thrown at them.

'Young, white and privileged' indeed.

They claim she was a moderator when she wasn't

Technically that is correct. She had moderator role/privileges, therefore irrespective of her job title she was also a moderator.

The protesters really weren't very intimidating. Unless you're intimidated by the LGBTQ club at UWE.

There are good reasons to feel intimidated and the threat of intimidation & violence is justified by some activists.

As Helen Lewis wrote in the New Statesman yesterday, "You would have thought that a feminist getting punched in the face would be reasonably large news – particularly if her attacker had boasted online earlier of wanting to “fuck up” some feminists, comparing them to fascists. But the conviction of the person who attacked 60-year-old Maria MacLachlan at Speakers’ Corner last year didn’t trouble the pages of the Guardian, where I would normally expect to hear about something that veers close to being a hate crime, or the LGBT website Pink News. Why? A clue comes in the fact that MacLachlan was slapped by a 26-year-old transgender woman called Tara Wolf, who explained to the court that MacLachlan was a “TERF” – a term commonly used to stand for “trans exclusionary radical feminist”, ie one who doesn’t believe that trans women are “real” women, but which Wolf defined as a “trans exterminatory radical feminist”.

The implication was that MacLachlan, now 61, wants all transgender people dead – something that seems absolutely barking until you realise this is quite a common accusation in activist spaces"

recognising the impact of ideology and activism is important...

www.newstatesman.com/politics/feminism/2018/04/madness-our-gender-debate-where-feminists-defend-slapping-60-year-old?amp&__twitter_impression=true

@Ihavenofuckstogive
The protesters really weren't very intimidating. Unless you're intimidated by the LGBTQ club at UWE

I don't know what you consider intimidating, but I read the facebook posts of a woman who attended, she updated constantly as she waited to be allowed into the venue, and it was terrifying. A masked mob shouting insults and threats, and when they finally got into the venue they could hear the door being pounded.

In what deranged univers is it OK to have masked men threatening women who want to meet? If we saw women in a third world country being harrassed like that we'd be up in arms, but because people claim that 'women' are privileged it's considered OK?

Could this be by a MN-er?
idgeofreason.wordpress.com/2018/04/20/emma-healey/

It was written by Lisa Muggeridge. I don't know who she is but I have seen her name on here. It is very badly written - in tone, style , content and grammar.

Transwomen/men were having escorts home arranged via social media in Bristol because they were scared of the terfs. Neither side was particularly frightening. I wouldn't fuck with Magdalen Berns though .

The important question to ask though Ihavenofuckstogive is how the fear within the transgender community has been fuelled... especially online.
Where has the characterisation of women at this and WPUK as baseball-bat wielding, child doxxing, Nazis who view people who are transgender as 'parasites' and want to 'exterminate' them come from?

R0wantrees, I know! There's bizarre amounts of propaganda on both sides.

It was written by Lisa Muggeridge

That surprises me as her Tweets are usually pretty good. The article seems very slapdash, as if it were knocked out in a couple of minutes and uploaded without being proofread.

She had moderator role/privileges, therefore irrespective of her job title she was also a moderator.

Did she have a moderator role though? MNHQ have been very clear that she wasn't a mod. It would have been more accurate to state her actual role whilst saying she also had access to the same functions as a moderator.

Its quite complex though.... and really does deserve close analysis.

I don't believe there is fear of terfs from trans though.
They know they have no physical risk from us because a. We are female and b. We denounce violence and c. We don't follow them or picket their meetings or block their entry or threaten them
The "I'm scared of middle aged ladies: please walk me home from their meeting which i was just shouting loudly at for my safety whilst I wear my ski mask and carry my terfs are scum banner" doesn't wash with anybody.

The only thing TRAs are scared of is calm reasonable logical debate being heard. Of women talking about themselves and being listened to.

Camra will start campaigning for 'trans-ales' - this means that drinks formerly known as 'cider', 'lager' and 'budget beer from Aldi in a can' can all now identify as 'real ales' in their commitment to be more inclusive and allow people who can't stand ale or pubs to claim to be discerning about something.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-43841175

There are though some transgender people and their allies who have been convinced of this narrative BarrackerBarmer...

Not intimidating? One woman was blocked and trapped on a staircase, masked men facing her down from in front and masked men behind her. And given the history and the fact police were there and ALLOWED THIS to happen, not much hope that the authorities would not treat her as somehow at fault.

& the use of mass twitter blocks have intensified the belief in the narrative.

The protesters really weren't very intimidating.

Presumably you were one of the people trying to get into the meeting? I don't think you have the right to speak for others as to what they found intimidating, or the level of that intimidation. A lot of people would find masked protesters trying to prevent access to a meeting pretty intimidating.

Transwomen/men were having escorts home arranged via social media in Bristol because they were scared of the terfs.

One transman was tweeting that they were rounding up their 'cis' friends to walk people home. I read their tweets and it came across as a load of scaremongering to be honest.

Monroe Bergdorf apparently walked out of the meeting because they kept trying to interrupt the women speakers and were told to wait their turn.

NC to write this.

Family member in the police said their unit eye-roll over this. They know exactly who to worry about when young men are in hoodies towering over old ladies and screaming at them, and they think most are just taking the piss.

Having said that though, their diversity training is forceful, and when they're ordered to do something (arrest, escort etc) they have to do it. That's how we've trained and recruited them, so that you can't have police doing their own moral things.

It's worrying given that MRAs are pleading victimhood and winning politically, and the state is dutifully siding with them.

@Magnets, Bergdorf was busy being filmed for Bergdorf's forthcoming starring role in a Channel4 programme - documentary? drama? - so was obvs. pissed off at having to wait for Bergdorf's turn to speak. It's going to be interesting to see what the edit looks like.

there was a live feed from within the meeting... speakers and those who attended described their experience.
www.facebook.com/TheJamJarBristol/videos/793672257494647/

Fuck off magnetic. I was actually in the area waiting to help out/film if anything happened with friends who were too scared to buy tickets (I don't have a fuck to give). There were loads of Police there (who stood down before 8pm because nowt was happening), Channel 4, Bristol Evening Post and other small crews.

Very little happened. So I am a bit to hear about a terrifying masked mob (missed by me, The Police and the journalists)

@jotspur. the funniest bit after Tara Wolf's trial last week was the fist-fight over who got into the best pub. Oh no that didn't happen, the cops were called by the Class War heroes when they saw two of us old ladies walking up the road towards the pub they had already moved into. So we had to wait around then were escorted by a van with ten cops in, to another pub on the other side of the road. This is a guaranteed true eyewitness NUJ-accredited account, though I didn't see the actual phone call.
.

This is how (some of ) they choose to present themselves. They claim the masks are to stop getting doxxed - eg that delicate flower and crowdfunder star Tara Wolf used this as a huge part of their defence re fear of cameras. Would their mums recognise them, still?