Laurie Penny's Mirror World

[ArcheryAnnie]

Apparently gender-crit women are a cult who don't tolerate dissent.

Laurie, come over here and have a quick look through the threads. Then have a look at your own lot.

Then tell me again who is "cult-like".

*@Lplurker@ And I would respectfully say that if you do find time to research the GG issue you might well revise your opinion that GG are to be trusted when it comes to safeguarding of girls.

I don't trust them, having read the policy. My girls won't be doing GG.

My older girl is already expressing a desire to be in biological female only spaces for changing etc. She has a strong sense of her own dignity and gets very distressed and anxious when it is breached. It's not just about what the trans lobby want. Why is what she wants so unimportant? And how can she even express what she wants if basically any boundaries she puts up are 'transphobic'?

Hey there,

Hackmum, I’m reading through your questions and I don’t have the space today to answer them all individually- I’m sorry. I’m not aware of the original cases in every point you describe- I’ve read court transcripts from the Hyde Park incident- and I believe that there is a lot of simmering tension that’s really pretty disturbing. What I don’t believe is that trans activists are any more or less violent than any other group of activists I’ve encountered. One every side of this issue there are people who feel under attack, who are lashing out, who are finding it hard to remember one another’s humanity. There have been some profoundly ugly things said, including by ‘gender critical’ people. I don’t think what Posie Parker said, for example, is anything but hateful. How is that family’s struggle any business of hers?

In general I don’t think no-platforming is a strategy that works very well at all, but I understand why people feel the need to do it and it’s not my place to tell anyone else how to do non-violent direct action.

But I’d urge anyone reading this to understand that trans women feel just as threatened, just as defensive and just as scared as any cis woman on the other side of this issue.

Child safety is everyone's business

Offred (and others).

Thank you for sharing- that must have been a hard post to write and an awful situation to find yourself in through utterly no fault of your own.

I think I understand a little better now.

What I’m hearing is that women here have been utterly shat on by this government, by cuts, by rising sexism in society and the stripping of vital welfare and institutional support. And that in this context, as you see trans women as men, it seems like men are barging in and demanding access to what little there is left for women.

It seems like there’s also a very real fear here that trans rights will be used as a lever to deny sex- and gender- based provisions and protections.

Am I getting that right?

Thank you for sharing- that must have been a hard post to write and an awful situation to find yourself in through utterly no fault of your own.

Oh do fuck off. That's the position that most women find themselves in you entitled little shit. You have zero empathy for normal people. Didn't you suggest that sex work was a valid career choice for working class men and women?

in a time of imposed austerity and social collapse, more and more women and men are turning to sex work to make a living- and those people need protection, not further persecution.

"When a woman is hungry, the humane thing to do is put food in her mouth, not your dick" Rachel Moran, prostitution survivor-leader.

You're a pimps shrill Penny. Why don't you go and get your own house in order before coming on her playing the innocent...

@Lplurker

I don’t think what Posie Parker said, for example, is anything but hateful. How is that family’s struggle any business of hers?

In this case the mother of the family has given a lot of speeches about her family's struggles. She has set up a charity which advocates for allowing others to make the similar choices as she made for her child. And she uses her child as a "poster child" to promote this view.

In which case she has brought her family's struggles into the public domain.

Is it hateful to use the word castration instead of euphemism bottom surgery?

Ok. I see. I must say, the tenor of this discussion is making it really hard to engage in an honest conversation with those who seem to want to actually do so.

If most of you you just want to slag me off and say insulting, untrue things and speculate wildly about my life, that’s fine, but forgive me if I don’t stick around for that. I get enough daily abuse from men.

Lplurker I'd add to that summary that, as people who have rejected gender stereotypes, it's confusing to see them now seemingly celebrated and reinforced, to the point where they perhaps take precedence over sex. Its hard to really understand how someone can feel they are a different sex, and remedy that not by changing their body but just by changing the way they dress and wear their hair. It seems regressive because I think people should be able to wear what they like, even if goes against traditional stereotypes.

I feel I'm being asked to accept there are fundamental differences between men and women's brains. That women are innately more nurturing or vain, that men are more practical etc. So...idk, that doesn't feel like a good place to be heading.

Side note, ‘little’ being tossed around to dismiss what I’ve got to say- in that case, about protecting vulnerable women from police persecution - is something I’m pretty used to from men, and it’s a shame to hear it coming from women. Nothing about my physical appearance, or anyone else’s, is relevant here.

How is that family’s struggle any business of hers?

Because Susie Green took her child abroad at 15 for a life changing invasive surgical procedure on their 16th birthday which would be illegal in the U.K. and shortly afterwards was ruled illegal in Thailand. Why do you think that might be? And yes, it's a safeguarding issue.

Why are you doing here? If you want to learn, then read the board. If you wanted to debate, there was no need to announce yourself.

Looks like a massive step in self promotion to me.

SewSwiftly- yes, those are active discussions within the trans community, too. I agree that the idea of innate masculine and feminine characteristics is deeply regressive- all I can say is that there are many ways to be trans, and many ways to express gender. Dysphoria is a different and related thing, and it’s very hard to adequately express to someone who does not experience it at all. But it’s not all about presentation and performance- trans women face many of the same pressures and stereotypes in that way that other women do.

For example- one thing the current GRA does is oblige trans women to ‘prove’ they are living ‘as their chosen gender’ for two years, enough to satisfy doctors who sometimes have old fashioned ideas. This often involves playing up to exactly the tired stereotypes all of us could do without. I have one trans friend who was told by a doctor that she wasn’t committed enough to transition because she turned up to the assessment wearing trousers. That’s one of the reasons the GRA change might be helpful!

APAB,

I came here to learn and to listen- and perhaps out of some misplaced notion that if we talked to each other like human beings something good might happen. I certainly didn’t come here because I enjoy being yelled at, or to promote myself.

What basis for changing your legal gender should there be other than gender dysphoria? Why would your subjective ideas of what a woman is and your feeling that you didn't want to be a man (again entirely based on regressive stereotypes) be indulged in any other case?

It's not that hard. The truth is your compass. The truth is: no one changes sex. No one has a different sexed brain in their body. These are facts. Work the rest out from there. Use critical thinking. Work it out.

Debate happens on this board every single day. There was absolutely no reason for you to announce yourself.

What basis for changing your legal gender should there be other than gender dysphoria?

Or to put it another way, if a trans person doesn't have gender dysphoria, then what does "trans" in this particular case actually mean?

As far as I’m concerned, ‘woman’ is a political category based on many things, most importantly but not exclusively the material reality of reproductive difference. This does not mean that trans women do not experience misogyny- any more than it means that any woman or girl who is not actively able to reproduce for any reason does not experience it.
My experience as a woman who grew up ‘as a girl’ is very different from the experience of my trans friends who grew up ‘as boys’- but it is also different from the experiences of my female friends who did not grow up white, or middle-class.
We can acknowledge these differences and still fight patriarchy. I passionately believe that the campaign against trans inclusion damages feminism, and thereby all women. I know we’re never going to agree on all of this but I sincerely hope that some of us at least can hang on to what we have in common and give each other the benefit of the doubt.

APAB- I think it would have been very dishonest of me to pretend to be someone else on this board.

Woman is not a political category. That is a completely bizarre statement.

When a woman prisoner in a women's prison encounters a transwoman prisoner with a functional penis, who is in prison for raping women, how do the thoughts outlined in your last speech help them?

It's depressing, and baffling, to hear that a doctor can see trousers and think they're men's-only clothing. I guess I'd like to see people in charge like that working from a greater evidence base. I get the impression that many doctors don't feel the medical profession has robust conclusions about disphoria yet (from reading e.g. Marget McCartney in the bmj).

I sympathise with your friend, however, I definitely don't see self id as the perfect solution to any of this.

This shit show will not damage feminism.

The purpose of feminism is liberating us from waves of male domination, just like this one.

Quit playing the victim Penny. We are allowed to critique your work as a journalist and your motivations for coming onto these boards. Stop asking us to educate you - take a look at threads on mumsnet if you need to learn.

You are either ignorant of these debates (which is shocking considering your public positions) or disingenuous in your appeals for education. Considering your very public work on such matters I would assume the latter. Just because we're women doesn't mean we have to be nice to you. You advocate policies which would be extremely damaging for many of the most vulnerable women in society. Can we not talk about that?

We can talk about why you think transwomen are women if you like.

"What I don’t believe is that trans activists are any more or less violent than any other group of activists I’ve encountered."

I find that absolutely astonishing after the examples I gave you. I'm quite a lot older than you and have been involved in activist politics since a young age. I've never seen anything like this wave of transactivism, which is absolutely vicious. Most activism, including gay activism, is pretty good-humoured. Even people demonstrating against extreme right-wing racists haven't gone to the lengths that transactivists are going to in order to silence debate.

When Venice Allan tried to organise an event about the GRA at Millwall Football Club, the club was bombarded with phone calls trying to get them to stop hosting the debate. A staff member at Millwall said they had never seen anything like it.

The truth is that you call yourself a feminist but you are allying yourself with a group of people who want to silence feminists through intimidation, verbal abuse, threats and physical violence. Why you choose to do that is something only you know. But the fact that you refuse to condemn the activists who attacked Maria Maclachlan and Helen Steel speaks volumes.