Don't quit Mumsnet

[Dorade]

I've seen quite a few GC women on twitter saying they are quitting Mumsnet.

As a strategy that is beyond bonkers.

While there is inconsistency in moderation and daft moves like allowing people to report posts via twitter, the fact remains that Mumsnet has been instrumental in the backlash against the excesses of trans ideology, and setting up a different forum will be completely ineffective by comparison.

I am sure MNHQ are treading a difficult line but us being able to use this forum is immensely valuable. The media take MN seriously. Lurkers are being converted at a rate of knots.

Do not go. Stay and fight.

Hello everyone. I'm an occasional poster but an avid reader. Like @pepperminttaste I've been sucked into twitter too.

I'm not leaving.

I've been here 13 years.

From the first night I posted for help when I was alone, exhausted and freaking out about not providing enough milk for my 2 week old DC.

The night I found my exH advertising for sex on Adultwebsites.

Through an awful divorce.

Through coping as a single mother, financially alone with no support in a foreign country.

I've had my hand held many times and I'm in a place where I'm strong enough to hold mine out for other women.

I'm going f*cking nowhere.

Oh and I'm feeding my family exclusively on bloody Birdseye now too.

I've not been posting for long - it took me ages to cotton on to this. But now I'm here, I'm not going anywhere, if only because I'm damned if I'm giving those fuckers what they want.

Several very wise posters predicted this would happen. Mumsnet is targeted because it's huge, and because it's working. People are starting to listen - of course TRAs are panicking.

That doesn't mean I'm not disturbed about events this last couple of days, predictable as they might have been.

I'm afraid I'm a natural pessimist and my fear is that MN are saying that they back free speech on the one hand but that they are actually fed up of the FWR boards and the apparent trouble and bad publicity that they cause and would secretly like to see the back of them. That might explain the ridiculous reporting on Twitter policy, banning posters and deleating for pointing out biological reality etc etc.

I fear they're already preparing to throw FWR to the lions in order to try and keep the rest of MN free from attack by TRAs/MRAs and to restore the good reputation of the site but as we all now appeasement never works.

I absolutely do not want this to happen. The MN FWR boards are where I feel at home and I'll stay until I'm forced to go but these are anxiety inducing times...

It is shocking that the pronoun situation has become so enforced so fast.
It really is a case of social compliance like the first step in a Derren Brown experiment.

Has anyone watched 'The Push'?
It's a breathtaking experiment in how to manipulate people step by step into doing something so utterly abhorrent that it's terrifying how successfully it can be executed.

It begins by getting a person to do a tiny task that seems almost inconsequential by itself. Like 'could you just pick up and move that bag for me please?' Or 'could you just hold my glass for a moment?'. And the tiny act of compliance sets a subordinate status and makes the next request harder to resist.

If complying with a request feels wrong - don't.
If a request sounds like a demand - it is.
If there are negative consequences for noncompliance - understand that you are being groomed.
If you see the ground is shifting beneath your feet get yourself back onto safe foundations.

I'm staying.

Mumsnet has done loads to get this issue into the light (and of course that is why MN is being hounded now).

We have to stay in the mainstream, that's the only way to get ordinary people to find out what is actually going on.

I think it’s a hell of an own goal by the TRAs.

Close down FWR and where do the discussions go?
On AIBU and Chat, that’s where. Right at the heart and on the busiest boards on Mumsnet.

Where everyone can see them!

I'm stubborn as an ox and no way are pathetic little men going to force me to leave! They need a hobby. Or a job. A job would do them the world of good.

My fear is FWR will shut down but MN will do it in a way where the posters can be blamed for bringing it on themselves.

If the FWR posters try and raise the subjects in AIBU or Chat they will go pouf.

All of it will be done to make us look like the unreasonable troublemakers who wouldn't play nice.

I know I'm cynical but at the end of the day I don't 100% believe that MN has our backs and it doesn't make me happy to say this.

Saw this blog post on it today: gendercriticaldad.blogspot.co.uk/2018/05/some-thoughts-on-mumsnet-and-their.html?m=1

I tend to agree terry

YesIts, although I am not sure of the size of the user base, or the traffic on the other forums, I would assume just more of a blip. Although, don't forget, all the little TRA spies checking up obsessively every five seconds drives up the hit rate - so maybe it will be a bigger hit than expected.

Perhaps the strategy is to keep the controversy going, keep just enough of the regulars posting here?

Yes that's interesting. And not the first time I've seen Danegeld referenced, it's a good analogy.

So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say: --

"We never pay any-one Dane-geld,
No matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that plays it is lost."

Yeah people leaving is exactly what the TRAs want. They want to ruin the site, they hate anywhere thats female only, or mainly female people. Infact, it seems they just hate female people alltogether.

I understand people leaving. I had a bit of a wobble yesterday about a couple of deletions I got in the paedophile thread that were not abusive at all. But then I thought, there is literally only one other place I can talk about this, and thats the other forum I moderate on (I convinced admin/other staff to loosen up on rules as previously we actually banned for 'wrong' pronouns and such) and there are not that many members there. Thoiugh I have 'educated' near all of them on this topic, I think they are sick of me talking about it. There is also reddit however I do often see dreadful transphobia there and it makes me feel a bit ill, plus so many are really nasty. Twitter I don;t really like, plus I have had a visit from the police due to a twitter post, so fuck that.

In short I do understand those who are leaving. But I do hope too many do not go.

Great post OP, I totally agree, not only shouldn't we go anywhere, we should post more. Only this morning I came across a tweet saying there was no experience that women have that transwomen don't have. We are fighting the most misogynistic delusion here.

@FlaviaAlbia what is your problem? I am the person who posted those threads, i.e. the person you are insinutating is a liar even though there are people on here who have said that they have also seen people say that there were banned on twitter just as I said (although I was clear the person I spoke to was temporarily banned) and there have been a number of women in various threads saying that their posts were deleted for really daft reasons, in fact I have also been directly contacted in PM by one person on here about the same thing. You seem to have a problem with people posting here who are fairly new because that is the only difference between me and the other women saying the same thing. Of course you can assume all these women are lying, but I don't assume that with other women, I believe them.

I joined MN initially a while back but like someone else said in this thread I came on here a few days ago to post much more because of Mumsnet being targeted. MNHQ are very clearly capitulating if they are deleting posts for things like 'misgendering' and for discussing details from tv shows and for discussing similarities between trans activism and other forms of men's rights activism and indeed ways that it's manipulative etc - all things other women have said their posts have been deleted for, and all things we should be able to say and discuss here because Justine said she was upholding freedom of speech here.

So despite TA's and anyone else who has an issue with new people/people with certain views, I will definitely be posting here and engaging even more now that Mumsnet has been targeted and I hope that others stay and keep doing the same. This is our space.

I've never been able to get my head around this policing of the pronouns used by ANYONE. On the face of it, it's insane.

Most people have been used to referring to someone they know as a man as "he" and as a woman as "she". Its a natural thing after decades of doing it and hard to break.

And even if it is sometimes done so-called "maliciously" so what? It's not illegal. I'm allowed to call Trump a cunt. Its my OPINION.

Just like it's my opinion that a Transwoman is a "he". It's a biological truth for one thing and since I don't believe in gender-feelz, it's MY truth on every level and I'm entitled to it. Why are people I don't even know trying to make me lie?

@terryleather admittedly I am quite new here, but I struggle to understand how they could delete all feminist chat from other parts of the site if they closed this board, it would literally be banning any form of feminist speech and I can't see that. I actually really don't think MNHQ will delete the FWR board, it would just look awful for them. One minute standing up for free speech and the right for us all to discuss this, then the next minute closing the board. I mean even though they are deleting some posts the vast majority remain, which demonstrates that the board is not full of problematic posts, so they couldn't claim that it was full of transphobia or anything like that, cos the vast majority of posts are deemed fine even after they have acquiesced somewhat to TA's. In this climate the optics would be terrible, it would be the start of something not the end of something. I just don't think they'd do it.

@barrackerbarmer and @cattinahat yup for me it feels really wrong that we are expected not to use pronouns based on sex now, that really is taking a position and not allowing free speech. I'm gonna start using initials for any trans identified male I mention, I don't think MNHQ should be deleting posts if we do that, well I don't think they should anyway but if their point is that naming a person makes it personal, then not actually naming them should be fine. It would really help if MNHQ actually said something though, they seem to have changed posting rules without telling us what the new ones are.

(when I say using initials, I mean initials so I can use the correct pronouns, not the preferred pronouns, I realise that wasn't clear in my post...)

ElenOfTheWays
Thanks for introducing me to the Dane geld poem! I had never heard of it before.

Sorry - I meant Tinkletinklelittlebat I think.

@leyat
I very much hope you're right, and as you say if they did ban us then it could "be the start of something not the end" - as a pessimist I like your optimistic view!

@leyat I almost never criticise anyone on a personal level. I avoid threads that do so. As far as I'm aware, I have never had a post deleted.

I am not here to hurt anyone. I will not attack anyone, unless they are directly attacking me. I feel that happened yesterday to the collective women who post here, with the backing of anybody who supported it.

I have even argued before for the use of "transwomen". Gradually I have come to see that every concession we give is greeted with that greedy derision that I have only ever seen before from abusive men.

So here I am, now one of the "hardline" women who refuses to avoid telling my truth any longer. And I have been pushed here by those abusive men who are transactivists. I still have sympathy for those transsexuals who are caught in the middle, but the only way to fight bullies is to stand up, en-masse and refuse to be cowed.

@CATTinahat your words are perfect, exactly it, I totally agree.

@terryleather haha maybe we can balance each other out :D

"If the FWR posters try and raise the subjects in AIBU or Chat they will go pouf."

They will still be seen by a lot of people before they're deleted - if they're deleted. People will question why the fuss.

TRAs have tried in the past to get the discussion moved to the Feminist boards, out of sight.

Now they're trying to get the Feminist boards closed. The discussion will switch back to AIBU and Chat - exactly what they didn't want to start with.

Oh, go on, let's have the whole poem:

It is always a temptation to an armed and agile nation
To call upon a neighbour and to say: --
"We invaded you last night--we are quite prepared to fight,
Unless you pay us cash to go away."

And that is called asking for Dane-geld,
And the people who ask it explain
That you've only to pay 'em the Dane-geld
And then you'll get rid of the Dane!

It is always a temptation for a rich and lazy nation,
To puff and look important and to say: --
"Though we know we should defeat you, we have not the time to meet you.
We will therefore pay you cash to go away."

And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
But we've proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane.

It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say: --

"We never pay any-one Dane-geld,
No matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that pays it is lost!"

I'm going nowhere.