Dittany - where is she now?

[PlectrumElectrum]

Just reading a reference to dittany on another thread & was struck by the feeling that in the current climate she's sorely missed (by me, maybe others too). Did anyone know her IRL? I often wonder where she went, what she's doing now with her feminism. I'd love her to make a triumphant return!

I only lurked back in 'her day' and found her posts challenging (in a good way - made me stop & think & question my own in built ideas, prejudices, and a lifetime of female socialisation - I was a crap feminist, of the 'it's all been done, I don't have anything left to do but enjoy the freedoms already fought for) type. I'm still a million miles behind others but I'm trying to do better

So to you dittany, wherever you are now & thanks for jolting me out of my ignorant feminist slumber

A lot of my feminist views (actually a lot of my views full stop) stem from things my Mum taught / told me - she's exactly the same age as theBewilderness.

My mum had no objection to prostitution on the grounds that what consenting adults do together is none of our business. Mumsnet opened my eye to the idea that 'consent' in this case is rarely freely given, the decision to monetise your body is never made in a vacuum.

lasqurrl I think they’re talking about lass.

reluctant agreed. One of the few places where porn and prostitution are seen as disgusting and not a free expression of people’s sexual desires or whatever shite people come out with.

Think that referred to Lass, not Dittany?

lass frightens me

But bertrand is spot on with her post

(Not sure she needs backup there...another one i hide from )

"Loads of posters have multiple usernames."

What?

Yes, people NC if they will post about a very personal issue they don't want anyone to connect to their regular username but... continuously posting under multiple usernames?

Especially on the same thread? What is the difference between that and sock puppetry?

Lass - LaSqrrl, not Dittany

I am firmly in the Dittany is bloody marvellous camp

And Lass is doing it again on this thread. I remember vaguely when Buffy namechanged and it was certainly not to sockpuppet. And I'm sure that Lass is perfectly aware of that too.

Fair enough. I suppose that might be so in FWR-although there seem to be a lot of liberal feminists there! Maybe It's just a few vocal pro porn posters on the rest of the site that I keep coming up against.

Posting under an alternative NN can be accidental. I'm currently logged in under one of my alternatives and CBA to log out and back in as this one, so I have to remember to change the default at the top of each post.

Aw hi Tabouleh! And the rest of you! 💪

I would love it if we could calculate the number of Bastards who've been Left because of MN. There must be a lot of bullying men in their bedsits right now wondering where their partners found the strength and support the kick them out. 👏

*to kick

Just in case-I've posted on this thread under another name-I changed back because I wanted to be recognised.

Just let quick shout out to AnyFucker - around 2-3 years ago you gave me a kick up the arse regarding my appalling marriage. no one had ever been quite so blunt - but truthful. I left and haven't looked back since.

You asked me to think about my children. it hurt, but it was what I needed. I had to stop thinking of my own misery and consider theirs.

LRD and Buffy were also favourites of mine over here. Didn't know about the Buffy controversy though.

Especially on the same thread? What is the difference between that and sock puppetry?
It was accidental, not sock puppeting. It was not at all how lass has portrayed it. I've seen a lot of posters accidentally post under 2 UNs on the same tgread or name change half way through and forget to say until much later.

Tbh if MNHQ took a dim view of posters doing that they wouldn't allow multiple posting names.

Anyway. Derail but I hate seeing posters misrepresented.

People who are opposed to pornography and prostitution tend to be unpopular on Mumsnet.

What?? Are you joking?! I come across the odd “cool wife” thread but thankfully they’re argued with fiercely in my experience.

Any woman who refuses to identify as a feminist earns my suspicions, tbh.

I feel like it can only be because they’re on a wind-up.

Can you manually change the username you post under Errol?! I had no idea - that's brilliant.

(I can't do it in the web version - do you mean in the app? )

lasqurrl I think they’re talking about lass.
Ah, ok. I am still very new, having trouble keeping up, clearly.

Do you know dittany away from MN then, lasq ?

I only read here back when Dittany was posting and didn't make the connection as to who she was until now (ty thebewilderness). She is an amazing woman who had a huge influence on me many years ago and who I thought the world of. I am sad to hear that she was treated poorly here and was hurt by that.

I hope you find her again LaSqrrl.

“Although actually, the unbridled misogyny and still having female followers, really astounds me. I guess some women are just really not very smart. Or they are just collaborators looking after their own asses, not terribly feminist, and kindly remove yourselves from feminist circles, because you are indeed, anti-feminist.”

I think that, perhaps, you forget those women brought up by misogynists, as I was.
My dad actually went to my school and complained when we were taught about suffragettes. I found my first contact with a feminist - my English teacher - a terrifying experience because, in my eyes, she was so radical and taught us such dangerous things about women’s rights and having our own voices.

Keep plugging. It’s scary at first to disregard the things we were taught by the men we adored, but we get there eventually.

Mad I think it depends on what part of the board you frequent. FWR has a pretty strong consensus that prostitution and pornography are inherently exploitative and cannot (in virtue of the economic and power imbalance at its heart) ever be properly consensual. Start a thread on AIBU however and you will get a lot of "porn is just fun, all men watch it, trying to object to your husband watching it is like King Canute trying to turn back the tide, you'd break up your marriage over a private lapdance?" type posts. Sadly you also get a similar phenomenon on the Relationships board, with pile-ons from the pro porn posters, where the idea that a woman might want to set and maintain boundaries as to what she considers acceptable in her private life seems totally alien to some posters.

As for name-changing - I do it with reasonable regularity. Partly 'cos I don't want to be recognised in RL and eventually the pieces build up if people can see a long enough posting history. Partly because sometimes I've been "Daily Mailed" - a post of mine appeared on the BBC (preens) with my username, after which I namechanged PDQ because I could imagine internet trolls coming and trolling me on the basis of it. Partly because sometimes I post sensitive stuff about my children which I want to be confidential. (I started a thread under a new name about a situation at DC's school and was instantly recognised by a colleague!) I do try not to do it on the same thread, but sometimes (if a thread's a very long running one) it becomes more or less inevitable. For instance I've de-regged and re-regged due to Interngate, so I can't go back to my original user name on the current pub thread even if I wanted to.

FermatsTheorem Maybe it depends on the thread, but I would say most posters are anti-porn, around a 70/30 split maybe?

There will always be women who side with men because it's easier. Like the poor, they're always with us.

I was on the thread where Buffy posted under two names. It was not at all that she was 'caught' sockpuppetting and she did not 'respond to herself in less academic language', that is out and out bullshit Lass.

I well remember you coming under a few name changes Lass, and not being upfront about it. I also remember how much Buffy's brand of reasonablebut radical feminism made you spit hairs. You couldn't read a post of hers without becoming clearly wound up and if she'd said, "hello, my name is Buffy" you would have taken some sort of issue with it.

Dittany was brilliant, Beachcomber also, and LRD and Buffy and CaptainChaos, CallinDiana (I think that's what her handle was) also LadyBalls, Scallops something. Also Chibi. They were around when I posted more (under a few names - it's super common to have a few namechanges in your time)

I left after another massive round of 'the FWR are all mean plus they use academic language to exclude people' which was tiresome and disheartening after the 10th go round. I also caused a ruckus by static g that I saw other people's choiceychoices as implicated in my own oppression. People took that quite badly and I ran out of steam for all the endless feminism 101ing while at the same time being relentlessly tone policed by those who think feminism would have got on a lot better if we'd all just asked nicely for the end of patriachy

AnyFucker - yes, well before MN

I think that, perhaps, you forget those women brought up by misogynists, as I was.
Excuse me Tanith? My father was, and still very much is, a card-carrying misogynist and racist. And I remember the exact moment in girlhood whereby I realised, I was a second-class citizen in his eyes (I was probably less than 10). My life changed in that very moment. We are talking 'lightning bolt' moment.

If you think I had a very supportive and nurturing childhood, think again. Quite the opposite. Emotional neglect was certainly the theme, the parents barely knew (or cared) if I was there or not there.

laSqrrl, then I’m surprised that you do not recognise why some women are supportive of MRAs. You made no mention of these women who have been conditioned to support them in your previous post.

I don't remember the creation of the FWR boards so that was before my time. It was the existence of the FWR board which made me stick around MN - I'd already done all the parenting malarky on other boards; all the breast v bottle, SAHM v WM so I wasn't really into that when I came here.

I do remember Dittany and the trans threads and I largely agreed back then - but I had read other things before that (like Greer's chapter on this in The Whole Woman). I liked Dittany's posts, didn't agree with everything but she was a force as was Buffy (or is since I am sure they are still like that). No one on these boards brought me to feminism - that happened when I was younger, I read 'The Female Eunuch' and I know I changed a lot after that I can't recall what drove me to read it but I can guess it was based on experiences I had and a blossoming sense of unease about the place of women in the world. I remember Buffy and I personally liked her and her posts. I do recall the the FWR board is scary, mean and I don't understand it threads. I may have rolled my eyes a few times, but then that is me being impatient.

I enjoy this board, I would like it to cover more feminist subjects other than the trans debate but I understand how this happened and the frustration which drives it.

I quite enjoy Lass's differing perspectives, it's good to have other views and anyway I think I'm pretty firmly anti-porn and prostitution so there are areas we do very much agree.

I think there are a lot of valued posters on FWR past and present - they make me feel like I belong to something and that I'm not alone in my views - when I was younger I was often held to task for my feminist views, they didn't fit in with people around me much but I've held on to them, they have changed a bit but on a basic level remain the same. I'd like to offer a bit of fawning to each and every one of you because I value this board and the women contributing, including the ones who piss me off from time to time (because I probably need that )