Hi Mumsnet, if you are asking feminist women to consider whether Mumsnet is for them, please be clear that the space *we* made here is for *all* of us.

[leyat]

So apparently MNHQ is asking women they are suspending for saying things like men are men, to consider whether Mumsnet is for them.

I feel it's important to be clear that we want feminist women to have a home here, we - all the women who engage here - have made this board what it is (I'm relatively new so I am in awe of the women who have been shaping this wonderful space all this time) and we don't want women excluded from this space because they won't lie about biology and acquiesce to misogyny and genderism.

This is meant to be a kind of refuge for us, where we do not have to submit to male authority, where we can let off steam and share without needing to worry about dealing with misogyny, and where we can feel a degree of safety and find sisterhood. I can't think of anything more awful than a woman who comes here to share in this, in this one space we have that's meant to be ours, to then be told she should consider excluding herself because she won't bow to male authority on what a woman is.

So it needs saying, Mumsnet, this is a board for all feminist women, we don't want anyone excluded or made to feel that this space isn't for them too. And please understand many women come here from backgrounds of abuse, we do live in a climate of male violence and misogyny that is currently getting worse, so I hope MNHQ take time to ask themselves how they want to treat women who come here. Mumsnet own the site, but it's the women who use this space who made it the vibrant refuge of sisterhood and resistance that it is, so please don't shit on that or indeed on the women who actually engage on your forum.

And that’s me done, MN Towers. I’m off after 7 years. I cannot believe you are actually suggesting women speaking the truth, when truth is very much needed in the Orwellian world we have slumber-stumbled into, may not be right for Mumsnet. When did it become Net-huns?

"Someone on the mumsnet twitter account is encouraging vocal anti-feminist activists"

Huh? I have missed this - do you have a link or ss?

Someone has set up a twitter account to "monitor" mumsnet for what they decide is "transphobia". They are encouraging other people to screenshot mumsnet and tweet out those screenshots for them. Mumsnet's twitter account, rather than standing up for their members and their website, or even encouraging the self elected "monitors" to join the conversation here (and report here if need be..), has encouraged their behaviour on twitter by thanking them and doing deletions and diciplinary actions back here on Mumsnet.

I'd still hope it's a tactic from HQ, which results in :" show us what you have - it's not a lot, is it? Go away."

Would still like reassurance though.

Woman I thought it's long been known that male psychiatrists gave the misdiagnosis of BPD to traumatised women in the past, rather than complex trauma or CPTSD - hasn't that changed at all? It is disgusting if it hasn't. Because that's the problem, not the use of Cluster B label for hostile men.

C-PTSD is still not listed as a diagnosis in either the ICD or DSM. It's not an offial diagnosis, although some clinicians use it. With the UK/NHS, the ethos is very much still diagnosing BPD (or it's other name, EUPD) but supposedly not stigmatising it, recognising trauma, blah blah. In a severely underfunded service than only has the resources to firefight, that doesn't pan out brilliantly. It's the same old attitudes, covered with a veneer of platitudes. (Bit of poetry for you there )

Women on the autism spectrum also often get misdiagnosed as BPD. That's what happened to me. I've had contact with so many women given this label, and only one was anything like the cariacature. Most were lovely people, so hurt by life but always ready to help others, yet demonised and marginalised. Quite a few of us found feminism this way. So IMO either many, many women are misdiagnosed, or BPD is conceptualised all wrong. Either way, lumping them in with narcissists and referring to "cluster B's" is horrendous. Cluster B is the "dramatic" type PD cluster. Because of course, women in pain, expecially women in pain who don't want to shut up and go away, are just dramatic, eh?

Angry I think most women here know how the BPD diagnosis intersects with feminist issues, and if not and that's something you'd like to discuss further you surely figure out a way to do so without attempting to control other women's language.

Oh yes, much better if you control my language, us pesky mental women shouldn't bother about you throwing us under the bus. If you know the history, how dare you continue to marginalise vulnerable women by lumping them in with their abusers? Perhaps if yours had stood there smiling and agreeing with the psychaitrists whilst they take away your voice, your humanity, you'd understand.

AngryAttack It's not ok to throw a vulnerable group of women under the bus

"Our team". not at all a sad bunch of internet misogynists who want to silence women who understand basic facts

We've been through this before, on this very site, MissMoney, and I told you no then too. I will express myself as I wish in regards to my very unpleasant former boyfriend.

Sorry, end of post went weird. This is actually really upsetting, I keep meanign to post about the way women labelled mentally ill are marginalised by feminism (or feminists, really) but it's difficult when you're living this stuff, and trying to keep living.

Why do you think it is ok to contribute to the damaging stereotype of traumatised women?

Not having much success are they?

I'm curious what the legal framework is that MN is operating within - how unduly influenced has it been by policy by stealth? For example we've seen the press adopt editing policies by stealth that moderate the published language to enable self ID as the "norm". To argue against that is now deemed as hate speech, as the "norm". So all submitted articles have to pass that smell test where language is moderated before publication or they won't get out there. In addition deplatforming is also performed by stealth by not allowing comments on those articles. Twitter operates a similar policy - so the game and rules have already been rigged pretty much.

Similarly HR policies where it's "hate speech" to object in the workplace to having to use proscribed labels for self ID'd people that means I am lying when I use them. Like Maria MacLachlan found.

So any corporate lawyers around??

On the Twitter issue, I suppose it's possible that HQ are just in way over their heads and some not very social media savvy person went "I'll respond to this and that'll be it" without having any idea what they were letting themselves (and us) in for.

If so though...I know having no idea how social media works in 2018 is a bit embarrassing, but better to admit it and seek a qualified person to deal with it than send half your userbase into a panic and the other half into a rage.

How can Mumsnet not understand social media?

Seems a "quiet" account at the mo. My pet spider is busier.

Again, we've had literally this exact conversation before, Miss Money, and I'm not up for Groundhog Day. I will not be engaging any further.

Having read some horrific stuff about women diagnosed with BPD written by misogynists, its weird and frightening to have a fellow feminist agree with the cruel sterotypes. Like the moment you realise a feminist friend has become a transactivist.

How can Mumsnet not understand social media?

That's why it's embarrassing! But it's either that or active malice, because nobody who does understand social media could have possibly thought that engaging with that account and indicating that you welcomed further submissions wouldn't go exactly the way it has gone.

And this is why I'm not engaging with you about this, MissMoney. That is 100% pure projection and not in any way what I said.

Stop.

I usually favour cock-up over conspiracy, but in this case I'm going with active malice. It is inconceivable that they don't understand social media.

OK, everyone, I'm out of this thread. Best of luck, etc.

No, it's not projection. You are lumping in traumatised women with their abusers, calling them "cluster B's". That is not ok. That is what I am objecting to. Yes, my own experience makes that very painful, but it doesn't invalidate my point.

All of mrpans post

I'd still hope it's a tactic from HQ, which results in :" show us what you have - it's not a lot, is it? Go away."...Would still like reassurance though

Yep, yep, yep

@transpeaked please don't go :(

I was misdiagnosed as BPD and had to drag myself through a ton of NHS process to eventually get a diagnosis that did fit and the treatment that helps me manage that. I know what it's like to be given a convenient (and sexist) diagnosis as a way of sweeping aside the traumas I have experienced and the symptoms I am dealing with.

AAK is doing nothing wrong at all in referring to 'Cluster B' disorders. That many women have been misdiagnosed by a sexist institution does not mean that a disorder itself does not exist, or that people who have been abused by other people with these disorders shouldn't name it :/

This is a diversion from the thread so I'll stop but I wanted to say that I don't agree with MissMoneyPlant on this issue, and it worries me that someone is speaking on behalf of all of us in this boat to silence another woman speaking about abuse. I think MMP you need to take a step back tbh.

Any submission to bullies will see the end of free speech on Mumsnet.

Imagine being more afraid of bullies than serving your core user group.