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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Are you scared?

208 replies

Jeanhatchet · 03/05/2018 07:06

I. Am. Terrified.

The pace and scale of the attack on women and specifically feminists is like nothing I have seen in my lifetime.

Women are being arrested for speaking about being female. Women are insulted with derogatory terms for using words referring to their own bodies and the functions of those bodies. Suspended from their own political parties. Hounded from their jobs. Thrown out of their online spaces and denounced as bigots. Prevented from meeting to speak together. Prevented from hiring spaces to speak to each other. Being forced to say things that aren't provably true and that they really don't believe. Called terms that make them unsure of themselves. Gaslighted into accepting those terms. Made to feel guilty for wanting space where they feel safe and that has always been theirs and protected legally. Feeling uncomfortable for wanting to assert their legal rights. Feeling uncomfortable for saying no to male bodied people. Feeling uncomfortable for being lesbian and wanting only female partners. Feeling unsure if they can speak because they are terrified of upsetting a body of people who seem to have more power in every area of their lives even though those people are a tiny tiny minority.

As I just said elsewhere.... some women can take the temperature of the social/political/cultural water and feel their feet getting hot. I hope other women can feel this happening before women as a sex class is boiled alive. It is already uncomfortably hot for women speaking out. We are risking an awful lot.

I continue speaking out. I will be speaking at events wherever I'm invited about what is happening. Am I scared? Damn right I'm scared. Speaking about my body and beliefs about that body has become a revolutionary act.

Rather than ask if I'm scared that women are under such an organised, aggressive and escalating programme of attack I ask this of women who aren't scared .....why aren't you?

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SheCameToStay · 07/05/2018 11:11

I am worried about ROGD for my daughter. DH worries too and relies on my research here and elsewhere to make sure we have the right information to fight it, if necessary. I think ( hope) we'll be OK. Forever grateful for the work put in by all of you and especially those facing problems with the police because of it. I will certainly contribute to any legal fees. More broadly I am very angry that the most radical thing you can say in UK today is "Women do not have a penis". It is fucking nuts. I am not scared. I am galvanized. Looking forward to going to a Womans Place meeting when in London. I am talking to my own 78 year old mother about these issues. Once I thought her terribly " un PC" now I love her straight talking. Women do not have a penis. She knows it.

SirVixofVixHall · 07/05/2018 11:17

I’m scared too. I have two. Daughters, 11 and 13. I am so worried about what is ahead for them. Specifically the destruction of womens’s right To angle sex space, and the enormous impact of pornography. This feels like a culture that hates women.

SirVixofVixHall · 07/05/2018 11:18

Er single sex space obviously. Bloody iPad.

DancelikeEmmaGoldman · 07/05/2018 11:25

Bloodmagic I am on my feet giving you a standing ovation!

Pratchet · 07/05/2018 11:45

Blood magic: that's completely brilliant. It's so observant, so true and so comforting!

ReluctantCamper · 07/05/2018 11:51

@Bloodmagic

Amazing post. going to come back and read it again when I'm not rushing out of the door!

ToeToToe · 07/05/2018 12:10

Bloodmagic - excellent post, and I've long thought along similar lines. I believe it is called "man-hating" in certain circles.

This: If we all decide 'You know what? Humanity has had a good run, you fucked it up, and we're not having any more people'. That's it, end of species.

Is surely the basis of the Handmaid's Tale? Those selfish women described in Aunt Lydia's lectures, choosing not to have babies.

I watched the "toxic masculinity" debate on BBC yesterday - Nicky Campbell's show. There was some bloke on there actually saying this stuff - that the birth rate of 1.4 per woman in W European (white) societies is not high enough - not at replacement level. Also talking of eostrogen in the water, dropping testosterone levels in men. Disturbing theme, huh? There are men who actually think like this - and that is the pre-cursor to the Handmaid's Tale - the ultimate control over women's fertility.

JeanHatchet - yes - I'm bloody terrified. This is a backlash against women's rights and freedoms - and it's a vicious one - one that is dehumanising women.

SonicVersusGynaephobia · 07/05/2018 15:15

Bloodmagic your post is fantastic. Really interesting perspective. I think I might save it to read over and over again.

I am scared, but also feeling resolute that This Will Not Happen. I will not ever comply, and no man can make me.

I see things getting more and more absurd, and have a panic, and then the realisation that this is good, because the more absurd, the more people will be impacted and become aware.

Bowlofbabelfish · 07/05/2018 15:43

bloodmagic great post.

Agree with all of it except the fact that we’ve won. I honestly think men would rather have us in chains than have us free.

womanformallyknownaswoman · 07/05/2018 15:57

Bloodmagic

Great post - I think men are angry as they know our power, if we choose to wield it. They are afraid that we will collectively wake up and realise we don't need most of them - especially the alpha ape type that cause all the conflict. There's so much displaced anger onto women from toddlers in male adult guise.

We're waiting for the slave master to free us when we have to free ourselves.

Jeanhatchet · 07/05/2018 16:27

@Bloodmagic please write this into a blogpost that can be shared. It is glorious and beautifully written.

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StormyDaniels · 07/05/2018 19:28

Just another person coming to say 👏🏼👏🏼 bloodmagic. Brilliant post.

Chocolatecake84 · 07/05/2018 21:30

I am scared.

Mostly I fear for our children, especially girls. This world they are growing up into is terrifying.

I am furious too. I am really really angry.

Bloodmagic - a wonderful post. Thank you.

IdentifiesAsMiddleAged · 07/05/2018 21:42

Bloodmagic

Great post!

CAAKE · 07/05/2018 21:53

@Bloodmagic brilliant writing 👏

Jeanhatchet · 08/05/2018 07:08

@Bloodmagic if you don't have your own blog

  1. Why not???
  2. I'd be happy to host this on mine - as your work obviously! But please get it out there. It's a fantastic piece of writing.
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AngryAttackKittens · 08/05/2018 07:26

I'm 100% in agreement with Bloodmagic's theory of misogyny. MRAs know it too, amusingly enough - they talk a lot about male disposability, and their solution is to try to stop women from noticing it by making us feel like we're the ones who have to compete for mates (lol) and if that fails controlling us by brute force. Incels are willing to sacrifice democracy and freedom for everyone to force women to fuck them. Their spaces are basically primal screams of rage, but the thing is, there is no ethical way to change the situation they find themselves in, and male socialization prevents them from accepting it.

Things are going to get a lot uglier before all of this is resolved, but it was ever thus, etc. TRAs and the social support for them among men are just the latest manifestation of the patriarchy trying to claw back power however it can.

larrygrylls · 08/05/2018 08:25

Bloodmagic

'While there have always been men who were unhappy with the expectations and social roles placed on them, just as there were women who were unhappy with theirs. The idea that they 'were always really the opposite sex on the inside' and should be treated as such seems to be relatively new.

I believe it's a backlash against women's progress.

In Australia we got a women's AFL team and IMMEDIATELY they changed the rules to let a man join it. Because we can't go around pretending that women are REALLY equal or worthy of their own spaces and recognition.

We got a womens weightlifting division in the 2002 commonwealth games and in 2018 (4 games later) a man on the team. No one was fighting to change the rules to include transmen or tranwomen in weightlifting before 2002.

We finally remove restrictions on which roles women are allowed to serve in the military, we immediately change the rules to allow men to serve 'as women'. No one gave a shit how I identified when I was told I couldn't be a combat engineer because it's considered a front line role, and no one asked any of the men who were doing it how they identified. Now that women are treated somewhat fairly (or at least not discriminated against as openly), suddenly identity matters and men are entitled to women's spaces and to be counted as women.

No one gave a shit about identity when women were not allowed to vote. No man in politics identified as a woman when there were almost no women in parliament. But as soon as there's quotas and women making real progress in representation they will try ANYTHING to give some of it back to men, even if those men are 19 year old with squeaky voices and skirts.

Even my very conservative Aunt is seeing this shit happening in her church groups. In the last 5 or 10 years people have started talking about women being silent in church and obeying their husbands. Right around the time groups like the Church of England finally started ordaining women as bishops and so on.

Looking at history, this always happens. When women first got the vote in the UK the mens voting age was set at 21 and the womens voting age was set at 30. Because if the ages were the same women would have outnumbered men, and of course that couldn't be allowed. We make progress towards equality, and suddenly a subgroup of men panic and try to snatch back as much power as they can in the name of 'equality'.

This is just another facet of the exact same knee jerk patriarchal panic we've always seen.

It's more subtle and underground this time, because it has to be. Because we as a society have stopped allowing it openly. This is good. This is progress.

Our grandmothers fought for their rights; to vote, to marry as they chose, to divorce as they chose, to work, to be paid fairly, to be represented in politics, to have their voices heard. It's just our turn to keep going.'

So far so reasonable, not we get to the really doolally bit!

'If I may digress for a bit, I've recently FINALLY understood that the WHOOOLLE thing, the whole patriarchy, misogyny, trans thing comes from one unfortunate and inescapable truth:

Men don't matter.

On a biological evolutionary scale, men aren't really important.'

They possess half the DNA of humanity, I would say that makes them important!

'If you have 100 men and 100 women you get 100 babies in the next generation. If you have 1 man and 100 women you get 100 babies. If you have 100 men and 1 woman you get 1 baby and the tribe goes extinct.

99% of all men on the planet could die right now, and while we would all be very sad, everything would keep on spinning. We've already had nearly that exact thing happen when men went to war and women stepped into their roles. Women already do the majority of work on the planet. And the next generation would most likely have the exact same number of people as if all the men had lived.'

It might start with the same number but we give rise to really dependent infants which is why we have pair bonding. Without someone, and in the past that needed to be a stronger male, the children would pretty quickly have been killed. Or the women would not have got hold of enough resources to bring up their children

'Then you have evolutionary sex selection, which can be summarized by the phrase 'dick is cheap' (meaning there's always competition for a female mate, but there ins't really competition for a male mate). You think male peacocks wanted to look like that? Think it helps them? No, the ladies just up and decided they were only going to fuck the shiniest of males, and so all the males became super shiny. Which means in the wild they get killed a lot more often but that doesn't matter because they're not really necessary to the species.
It happens in humans too. They say our population is getting taller because we're evolving or because we're better nourished. Actually ladies just generally want to fuck tall guys and every time they do the genes for both tallness and a preference for tallness get passed on.'

This is a real example of confusing correlation with cause. The main reason for an increase in height is better nutrition. Look what has happened to the Japanese in one generation. Again, dick may be cheap but the capacity to provide resources for the incoming generation which comes with the 'dick' is quite expensive. In addition the 'preference' for 'fucking taller men' comes from the fact that the taller men could access resource and, in general, fight better to defend the family unit.

A similarly stupid argument could be made that breast size is getting bigger as men want to fuck big-titted women. Well, possibly, but far more likely is that breast size is correlated to overall body weight and the western world is getting fatter....

'Women decide which genes will and will not get in to the next generation. We decide what the future of the species will look like.'

Well, clearly not. Pair bonding depends on both parties wanting to fuck one another (to put things in the type of language that you like.

'If we all decide 'You know what? Humanity has had a good run, you fucked it up, and we're not having any more people'. That's it, end of species.'

But it won't happen. Equally if men decide to stop fucking, end of species. Both equally ridiculous concepts.

'There are any number of herbs and natural birth control methods that are actually pretty damn effective (we have been taught that they're unreliable and not to use them, hmm I wonder why) so any time a woman has the ability to access the outdoors and view her own body, passing laws about her reproductive right is rather an academic exercise.'

Really, we are in the land of wooooo now. I think most women want access to RELIABLE birth control and sterile medical facilities with qualified doctors.

The rest of the post kind of follows on from the rather nonsensical arguments that I have commented on.

Seriously, you have to do better than this for a grand theory of patriarchy in an evolutionary context.

UpstartCrow · 08/05/2018 08:35

@Bloodmagic Please can you post that in Feminist theory? Its slower moving than this board, and we can link to it.

TERFragetteCity · 08/05/2018 08:39

Yes yes yes bloodmagic. Spot on.

LaSqrrl · 08/05/2018 08:53

Just echoing 'great post' bloodmagic. Yes, they are, in the majority, rather redundant. They know it, they are shit-scared that women will wake up to that.

Look what happened in Rwanda, after the genocide, leaving the population 70% female. Women took up 65% of the parliament and rebuilt the country.

This number, is actually the golden ratio of females:males, 2:1, and male domination is overthrown, it has happened everywhere women dominate parliament in similar numbers. Woman-friendly, child-friendly, social-friendly. Shock-horror you say?

The other side of the coin, when males dramatically outnumber females? Females are devalued and enslaved (sometimes having to 'marry' a number of related males, like brothers etc). Just look at the countries with millions of missing girls - India and China. More males = bad news for females. It becomes a more rapey version of the Handmaid's Tale. Women are less-valued, not more-valued.

So what is happening in the UK and elsewhere? All-women shortlists being taken over by the male-born, in the name of 'identity'. Women's sports, finally getting minor footing, being taken over by TIMs, and the women generally lose. Trojan horse. In a dress.

larrygrylls · 08/05/2018 09:05

Golden ratio of 2:1 eh. And there are all these posts on the relationships board of women upset that their husband has been unfaithful.

And all ‘feminists’ really want is to wait in the field like a flock of ewes to be tupped by the dominant ram.

Who’d have thunk it?!

ChickenMe · 08/05/2018 10:54

Love the post Bloodmagic

To further develop what has been said-males have always liked females even if all the females wore no make up and all wore whatever they were comfortable in, didn't remove body hair if they didn't want to. Men would still desire women
What concerns me is that when I was a teen 80s/90s, we were "good enough". Sure we made a bit of effort and of course we wanted to attract the opposite sex. But it seems to me that young women now are trying so hard to attract men - I feel sad at the effort it must take now to be good enough

Bekksy · 08/05/2018 11:19

I am fucking scared and even more angry. More angry than I have ever been about anything.

Ereshkigal · 08/05/2018 11:49

I am fucking scared and even more angry. More angry than I have ever been about anything.

YY. Me too.

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