Feminism chat under attack

[InfiniteSheldon]

I'm seeing a lot of threads being started and posts on threads that are subtle and not so subtle attempts to shut the topic down or make it unusable.

To put this into context, it's happening and has happened before. Those of us who voted Leave saw this in the EU boards now there has been an almost total shut down of the Leave voice because of an aggressive and determined close down of speech. Those of us worried about self I'd are being slowly shutdown too. I don't care if you voted Leave or Remain I'm just using this to highlight that this happens we need to not sleepwalk.into it again.

I've seen the #weseeyou and it seems a great response (fairly sure some of the responses to these type of threads are planted too). I know you can't ban posters from engaging and obviously I wouldn't want to. But feeding the trolls doesn't help.

These men, coming here.

I have no idea what you are on about Bewilderness. Put it down to my being thick. I don't care.

Everything which Bobbi has been saying in this thread resonates with me as being accurate. With each post you confirm what Bobbi has said- any alternative view is some sort of personal, targeted attack.

Keep on calling out anyone who disagrees with as being a man or if not a man, then might as well be a man.

The amount of TRA, MRA and TIM's posting here is stupid. There will be more than them than us soon (which I guess is the purpose). Fuckers!

I expect them to request FWR be renamed the HE-Man Woman Haters Club soon, if they haven't already.
The women who left because of the security breach left behind a terrible vacuum that the MRAs are filling.

Sorry if this is off topic and TAAT etc but fucking hell- i tend to only go to FWR but wandered into Active yesterday and on to this thread.. www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3269666-AIBU-to-ask-for-a-handhold-My-DD-has-come-out-as-transgender

The appalling propaganda on there- chucking around fake stats, utter manipulation about suicide likelihood. I reported some of it and posted to say why and was very happy to say MNHQ were very quick off the mark. .

But it really highlighted to me that some people have an extremely loose relationship with the truth and zero qualms about coming on to a parenting forum purely to seek to lobby, in the guise of giving ‘advice’ or ‘sharing experiences’.

It also makes me interested to what extent sock puppetry is in play on MN.

oh fucking hell. could we dial down the bloody paranoia.

I would say at the moment that we have two full-on trolls, one TRA who, though not a troll, is extremely irritating, and a couple of very persistent but genuinely sincere trans-allies. Out of a great many regulars. But boy do those 5 between them manage to make a lot of noise. The trolls however I think end up shooting themselves in the foot - I would imagine they do more to peak-trans lurkers than the rest of us GC posters put together.

oh fucking hell. could we dial down the bloody paranoia.

Sorry RC, bad joke, obviously not as funny as I thought it was.

Totally agree about lurkers reading their bullshit Fermat. peak TRA!

You can't post on a thread without them pouncing with a load of crap and twisting of facts. It's getting to be hard work posting here.

You will NOT chase me away, you think you can take over this board - wrong!

yep, there are plenty of people on mumsnet who aren't on twitter sp don't see the TRA bullshit. I think it's a good thing when they post here (within reason, which I grant you isn't their strong suit), as MN users get to see the nonsense.

as for the sincere pro self ID trans allies, they are posting in good faith and have as much right to be here as we do. it would be great if they were as interested in women's rights as in men's, but yanno.....can't have everything.

Actually I wondered if one was actually a very sad and angry woman who wanted to peak trans as many people as possible and is trying to do it by being as stereotypically awful a TRA as possible? or perhaps I need a holiday.

yeah, i have thought that over the last couple of days MIdgebabe. one of the TRAs we've had can't possibly be real.

I’m definitely envious of the amount of time they all seem to have on their hands

I’m definitely envious of the amount of time they all seem to have on their hands grin
Men at work/snark, was my first thought and then I thought criminy I am going to be accused of calling people men again and then my third thought was wev!

Sorry RC, bad joke, obviously not as funny as I thought it was

probably my bad. am working much harder than normal (constitutionally lazy), with resulting sense of humour failure.

I hope juzza has recovered from being 'called out'

I know things are a bit tense but that was weird

yeah, i have thought that over the last couple of days MIdgebabe. one of the TRAs we've had can't possibly be real

If it's the same one, I said I thought they were a fifth columnist on another thread!

So is it the view that something obviously goady like this; Hey there trans-phobes, how’s it hanging in the Land of Judgement? Which was posted at 00-44 on the binary bride thread should just be ignored?

MNHQ has requested that we report rather than respond.
In other words, shut up and take it but be sure to report so in a day or two if they get around to it they can take a look and decide whether verbal abuse violates talk guidelines, on a case by case basis.

Thank you thebewilderness I am a free speecher so really loathe to report anyone. The quoted post is just stupid name calling and shows the poster to be an ejit to any sane and reasonable person. Theres also the free women's work aspect of reporting, keeping the place tidy and its not even my house. When there was a pile up and people were talking about 'white feminists' I got a bit riled I admit.

Just posting ruminatively really- I thought I did support free speech (but I guess now I can only say I support it in a qualified way- not unconditionally!) i
Political disagreement is healthy but posting misleading and manipulative crap, not so much.

I thought carefully before reporting some of the posts on that thread- but presenting fake suicide stats about thousands of trans people killing themselves (because of people like me apparently ) and posting manipulative insinuations about suicides to parents asking for advice about their kids who have just said they are questioning about their gender. Just doesn’t sit right.

I think it is against guidance from people who know what they are talking about like the Samaritans also so I am going to report that shit.

I’m also fairly sure that some lurkers and newbies come to these thread assuming there’s a 50/50 argument or balance of evidence going on and the rest is just political disagreement.

Obviously there is a disagreement politically and that’s fine. But the evidence split is more like between people who believe that inoculation works so allow their kids to have it and people who believe it doesn’t, so they don’t. Or round earthers vs flat earthers. I think a lot of people unfamiliar with this may not realise that TRAs are just the latest form of evangelical misogynistic dogmatists and because they feel they have a ‘just cause’ that means, like many before them, they don’t care much about the means they employ to the ends that they seek. So they just seek to convert people to their viewpoint- regardless of the practical and autonomy cost to children and young people, families, women, transsexuals etc.

I have had some unpleasant experience of anti choice/pro life tactics and it is weirdly familiar.

More rumination.

I think it's equally inconsiderate to crash a thread where people are talking about FRW to demand a debate, as it is to derail a thread to avoid debate.

It's not an exclusively debate sub, so I think it's fine to swap experiences and opinions without having to justify them to anyone who demands.

But it's impossible to stop people from trying to derail and it's difficult to just ignore.
Maybe we need a debate sub and keep feminist chat a sub that allows women just to chat about FWR.