Call for gender critical people in Cambridge, UK

[maniacmagpie]

DISCLAIMER: am not a mum and am relatively young. Have lurked intermittently here and in other feminism spaces, largely interacting with other young people (student age). Due to my age, my main exposure to these issues is from the point of view of someone moving in young liberal spaces, and my call is phrased accordingly, rather than among adult women who have a more tangible experience of systematic sexism in society, medicine and life. PLEASE let me know if this not the appropriate place for this request, and I will step back.

This is a message that I have started to spread: I have not generally been a social person and so am finding it relatively difficult to get started on contacting people. If I can get in contact with other people who share my concerns in person that would be great: if not, I will do what I can.

"Hello.

I am a student at Cambridge University. I have been left-leaning my whole adult life. I have been supportive of trans rights for years. I have always believed, and continue to firmly believe, that discrimination on the basis of being trans is unacceptable; trans people should have access to the care that they need, and do not deserve to be treated as lesser people on the basis of who they are.

Despite this, I have become increasingly alarmed by the discourse surrounding trans activism. For many years I crushed my own thoughts about misogyny, my doubts about my own understanding of sexism, with the thoughts that I must not ‘get’ it as a ‘cis’ female. I believed - or rather, forced myself to believe, when I couldn’t truly believe - that trans people, and specifically trans women, completely understand what it means to be the gender they identify with.

I no longer believe this. Please, before you dismiss me as a bigot, hear me out.

I no longer believe womanhood is a mystical force that can be detached at will from the reality of the female body, I do not believe that femininity is the target of misogyny, because non-conforming women suffer still from misogyny. I do not believe that even trans men are able to escape all misogyny and their own socialisation by transitioning - they are still able to be, and indeed have been, targeted by sexual violence in a way that only male-bodied people can visit on female-bodied people - reproductive violence, that can result in pregnancy, and the associated policing of bodily autonomy that comes with that. I believe that trans women are the targets of misogyny when it is assumed they are female bodied, and homophobia and fear when they are assumed to be male. I do not believe that it is reasonable, or appropriate, to demand that natal women stop talking about reproductive violence due to this misdirected misogyny. I do not believe that this statement is transphobic.

I believe that transphobia - job discrimination, verbal abuse and violence - is unacceptable. However, I strongly disagree that certain actions that are labelled as transphobic among progressives, are transphobic at all. I believe, not only that homosexual men and women have every right to reject opposite-sexed people as sexual and romantic partners, but also that the demands circulated among many progressive forums are damaging to young people’s understanding of their sexuality. Specifically, the toxic combination of female socialisation, lack of resources for isolated girls, and pornsick fetishisation of lesbianism for the consumption of men makes lesbian youth vulnerable to manipulation and gaslighting from mainstream LGBT+ groups, illustrated by the horrific discourse about the ‘cotton ceiling’. Not wanting to sleep with someone is not violence. Inclusivity is not something that is expressed through access to your body. I do not believe that in normal conversation it is at all reasonable to demand that any person, trans or otherwise, talk about their genitals - but sexual relationships are another matter. Sexual relationships should only be engaged with by two willing and enthusiastic participants. Human sexuality is, and should be, exclusive and not a target for guilt-tripping.

I believe that specific difficulties are presented to trans people that they should have the resources to deal with and spaces to talk about. However, I also believe that specific difficulties are presented to female people on the basis of their bodies - and that discussion of these issues is not transphobia. Naming reproductive violence for what it is, campaigning for better understanding of female medical issues in the face of the huge male bias of modern medicine, and recognition of the economic and social penalties endured by female people specifically on the basis of being physically female and not due to an inner identity, is not transphobia.

Gender hurts. Gender is a system designed to trap and control female people from birth through childhood, adolescence, adulthood and old age, because of their reproductive capabilities. This system did not fall from the heavens; it was created by males, to benefit males. Women have always, and continue to, suffer under this system - our economic power restricted, our lives at the mercy of men, our bodies policed, our voices ignored - because we are female, because we are chattel, because of those who believe we are lesser. Gender is the reinforcement of sex stereotypes, that women have fought against and will continue to fight against, as long as it exists.

Many males suffer under this system - gender non-conforming males are at inordinate risk of violence, generally from other males - due to stepping out of line. Boys who show emotion are punished for it. Gender hurts - gender is not a fun hat to take on and off, gender kills boys and men for behaving the wrong way, and girls and women for both resisting and capitulating. Gender is not a fun toy to play with and to swap around. Gender is a system designed to break us down.

‘Pussy grabs back’ - women cry - because the President of the United States said ‘grab them by the pussy’. Not ‘grab them by the feminine essence’ or ‘grab them by the girl brain’ or ‘grab them by the emotional intelligence’. Grab them by the pussy. Grab this creature who exists for his consumption and pleasure, by the only thing that gives them value in his eyes. Focusing on this does not make women genital obsessed. Pointing out that this is the root of our oppression is not transmisogyny. Recognising that we are treated this way because of our bodies is not a statement that it is the most important aspect of our selves, but a declaration that we are more than our bodies - and that we must be able to name the problem in order to combat the problem. Saying ‘this pussy grabs back’ is not transphobia. Recognising the extreme sexism of powerful men is not transphobia.

I retain a deep sympathy for those who suffer with dysphoria and deal with it in the best way they can. My stance on trans identities is roughly that of a medicalist. I believe that trans people are fully deserving of respect, the same rights as every other person, and freedom from discrimination. I believe that what is being asked, by certain noisy factions of trans rights extremists, is not a call for respect but rather a call for excessive privileges at the expense largely of natal females, and a targeted bullying of lesbian females and homosexual males. I do not believe that it is transphobic to point this out.

I do not believe in brain sex, but even if I did I think it is irrelevant - if you carved open a woman to find a clearly, obviously male brain with MAN branded in big blue letters, she would still have suffered sexism based on her body. To those who believe this to be true, that they are ‘born in the wrong body’ and the only way to alleviate this is transition, I respect your autonomy and your right to live as you feel best, but must say this: sexism visited on a man in a woman’s body is no worse than sexism visited on a woman in a woman’s body. Sexism hurts ‘cis’ women as much as it hurts female-bodied people who identify otherwise. I do not believe this is a transphobic thing to say.

I want to raise awareness and spark discussion in Cambridge, both in and outside the University. I want to discuss these issues, in light of the gender self-ID consultation, the silencing of A Women’s Place UK, the violence perpetrated upon women who speak out, and the vitriol being circulated against gender critics. I invite natal women, natal men, trans women, trans men, straight, bisexual, gay, lesbian, questioning, otherwise - anyone who wants to discuss, debate or just acknowledge this topic - to contact me. My wish is to provide a space to debate and discuss these topics outside the false dichotomy of the ‘conservative right’ and the ‘progressive left’. I want to reach out to the women suffering from misogyny, men suffering from enforcement of toxic masculinity, and trans, lesbian and gay people who are being failed by conservative families on the right and by ‘queer identity’ theorists on the left who describe their reality as transphobic, who feel silenced and unable to speak out without being branded as either morally disgusting or as bigots.

Please spread this. PM me. I want to talk. I’m reaching out. I will use the tag ‘gender hurts uk’ (on tumblr, where my blog is 'yourledgerisdripping'), or privately message those of you who reach out to me.

Gender hurts."

[EmilieDuChatelet]

Kudos to you maniacmagpie for what you are doing. Your feedback from the discussions is interesting reading.

[maniacmagpie]

Manderleyagain - when my mother was the age that I was when I entered university women (female women!) had been admitted to my college for only a couple of years. My grandmother was illiterate; women couldn't study where she was. My school - an all girls school - was one of the oldest in England at a hundred and something years old...to say that female-ness has nothing to do with the way we are treated is, shall we say, interesting. Thanks for the advice, I am reaching out to people when I have the time and energy.

I understand where these people are coming from. They truly believe they are sticking up for a minority and that I am attacking them out of bigotry. I will stand my ground because I believe that they are hurting more people than they are helping, even if they do not believe me, and I don't believe they are bad people, just...blinded by the desire to protect who they believe are the most vulnerable minority. I can forgive them for that even if I think (and the rest of us think) that it's misguided, and I hope that if they ever change their minds they find it in themselves to forgive me.

[NopeNi]

(And thank you for the share token)

[NopeNi]

Ah, wrong thread. Always wondered how people did that. Sorry!

[maniacmagpie]

Yo gals,

Saturday 2pm to 5pm again. King's Parade.

I spent a while thinking about things after a arguments with a good friend. I admit to getting too far upset and also I definitely didn't have the grounds to be wasting his time with the argument, but anyway.

The path is important when we talk about feminism (preaching to the choir I know) and a lot of what we say about what hurts 'women' is what also hurts 'girls' and also how being a female child - a girl - forges someone into womanhood. The path is important. The more people argue with me about how it's not the more convinced I am that it is. I cannot see a male telling me what to say and think and do, dismissing my 'claim' to womanhood as no more authentic than theirs, as doing anything other than lacking the empathy that all males have for female experiences. It's such an obviously male behaviour - and the fact that I'm being asked to overlook it? the fact that I'm told it's not what it is? is male too.

Sometimes I want to scream that I would be so, so much more open to accepting trans women if they asked natal women what our experiences were like and tried to absorb them rather than dictating down to us what it must be like. I'd be much more ok with Madigan if she said 'I have not experienced some of these things so I must make an extra effort to learn about them' rather than 'I have not experienced these things so they are nothing to do with womanhood'.

The sheer lack of empathy enrages me and hardens me more every day. Obviously the conversation is incredibly toxic right now and I will try not to build up too much resentment, but the absolute lack of empathy - and endless demands for more from me! - are driving me round the bend.

How do I explain that? People think I'm burning bridges and trampling on a vulnerable minority for the heck of it and I just can't, can't explain how little we've got back, that the constant demands for compromise and caution and altering language and accommodation have lost us too much, that it's just unreasonable to keep demanding more and more and act like it isn't going to break us, and then think oh! crazy bitch, I'm making reasonable requests, she's excluding me for no reason. Isn't it weird to them that so many lifelong trans-supportive women have suddenly closed ranks? Don't they understand why we are flipping in droves?

A trans woman is a trans woman and a trans man is a trans man. They may require protection from discrimination and I think that we should take steps to cover this. I have literally no problem with people living a certain way and respect them as what they are. But what they are is what they materially are, a male who looks as close as possible to female and vice versa, in order to live their lives comfortably. Telling me that by not believing the same way as they do is dehumanising is absolute madness. You cannot force me to believe something that I do not believe, and very few believe that a full sex change is medically possible, and I do not separate gender and sex fully because most people don't use language that way, and language is for communicating concepts that people mutually understand. You can't use a personal definition for a word and expect people to understand what you mean and call them bigoted if they don't. That's ridiculous.

I am tired, and worn down. I fully expect Saturday to be very nasty.

Magpie

[Ereshkigal]

Well done OP, I hope it goes well on Saturday

[numptynuts]

Bravo!

Not in Cambridge, but within travelling distance, and v interested in any meeting.



Me too

[stillathing]

Isn't it weird to them that so many lifelong trans-supportive women have suddenly closed ranks? Don't they understand why we are flipping in droves?

This x 100

The absolute lack of curiosity about this. All these women, so demonstrably unbigotted in every area of their lives: women fighting for LBGT rights, marching for Palestine and refugees, caring about the environment, trying to abolish racism, campaigning for disability rights etc; so many engaged, passionate and caring women who can suddenly be so instantly dismissed by journalists and politicians as bigots. WITHOUT A SHRED OF CURIOSITY AS TO WHY? I mean it could potentially be a public health crisis? Something in the water? Don't they care?

And then of course, using one of the traditional tools specific to the oppression of women; to divide us by age. It's only the old women who are bigots. Ah yes of course. No matter that today's young woke women will be tomorrow's old bigots because they too will find themselves silenced, just as they were once themselves the silencers.

OP you seen to be trying to bridge that divide and that is awesome. Huge luck to you.

[Manderleyagain]

OP - good luck at the weekend. In your post today - are you talking about your dealings with individual trans people you know - eg the friend you mention at the beginning? Or are you talking generally?

[Manderleyagain]

Also I would be interested in your opinion on a question asked in another thread. It was basically - do university students all really believe this? Meaning the underlying ideology of sex is a social construct, gender identity is everything etc.

[maniacmagpie]

The argument I had was with a male friend, not trans. The other interactions were with transwomen online.

I got angry and I don't think that was helpful. I was frustrated, and certainly did not conduct myself as I should have in the argument. I apologised for my behaviour if not my views. We are still friends I think, and as I said, I shouldn't really have been wasting his time with the argument anyway. I did get some valuable insights after thinking it over for a while, so I will take the positives from that.

One particular aspect that frustrated me very deeply is the sentiment that it's disrespectful to say only a man can be a transwoman or vice versa, when all I mean is that a man is an adult male and a transwoman is an adult male. We were using different definitions I suppose, but I didn't enjoy being accused of something I did not say - I did not say that a transwoman must inhabit the social role of a man, look like a man, or act in specific ways.

I think my issue with the language thing is that there's no recognition that wanting to 'restrict' the language comes from a place of saying that even if you believe the word shouldn't mean that, everyone else does. If you mean, should I do my best to treat a transwoman as a woman in the sense of reasonable accommodation of their names, dysphoria, etc. that's a reasonable request. I probably wouldn't bother respecting Ian Huntley but that's a whole different can (no true scotstranswoman anyone?) But attacking me for saying they are an adult male - a man - is annoying to me (and also to others) because I do not accompany it with 'therefore she must behave/look like this'. It feels unhelpful to redefine a word and then get angry because someone uses the common version of the word instead.

The language policing makes me feel like I'm walking on eggshells around this stuff all the time. It was an honest attempt to be clear on how I materially understand the world. Language is for communicating and if you wanted to, for example, explain this to my illiterate grandmother, you'd reduce it to just the most basic words.

Doubly frustrating - I formulated my current understanding and language use mostly from other trans people (mostly transmen, but some transwomen too). There is a range of views on the appropriate language among trans people and I roughly aligned with the people who are happy to 'admit' to being the opposite sex in the plain terms of 'man' and 'woman' as roughly synonymous with 'male' and 'female', since that's how other people understand language and that's what it means in the eyes of the law.

I suppose personally I think that trying to change the whole definition forcibly from the top is going to prove a mistake and cause very bad backlash against transsexual people. Call me a concern troll I suppose, but I think they really need to unhitch their cart from the identity crowd if they want to escape this. I certainly don't relish the backlash and I don't think it's going to be much fun for anyone involved. I don't think female spaces are an acceptable collateral though and I am struggling to have patience for those who think it could only possibly come from a place of hatred.

It's my belief that most people around me people don't believe sex is completely a social construct. I've had arguments with a few people who are persuaded that it's not really binary, but that is a little more forgiveable to me and comes from a place of trying to do the right thing (I've been subject to all the classic 'chromosomal variations' 'intersex' 'hormones change the body' arguments, which I know others have done a sterling job of sorting out counterarguments to and I've been working through, but damn if it doesn't annoy me. It's an is-ought problem, whether you think we ought to be divided in a binary way, the fact is that we are. I consider it besides the point to have that argument when it comes to feminism, to be perfectly honest. We can just say well anyone with a female phenotype is treated like this and the brain sex/gender identity/intersex argument doesn't actually debunk that. It's an orthogonal problem.)

[Manderleyagain]

I don't think female spaces are an acceptable collateral though and I am struggling to have patience for those who think it could only possibly come from a place of hatred.
You have hit the nail on the head there. You shouldn't have to be patient with that.

most people around me people don't believe sex is completely a social construct. Yep. Almost none of the population believe this fully in my view. It's an interesting idea when it is a topic for discussion in a seminar room - but now it has escaped from the classroom it is dangerous .

Some components of what we think of as sex difference are obviously not binary, but are on a sliding scale. There is some evidence that sex difference has not always been conceived as binary in all contexts, and that the binariness has been exaggerated. But its glaringly obvious that the big differences - reproductive organs and reproductive roles - are binary. That's just material reality.

[maniacmagpie]

In the beginning I hoped there are a few people who I hope would respond better to 'female people have historically made single-sex spaces to escape abusive men (refuges)' and 'female people are at risk of rape from male-bodied abusers in prison' than 'transwomen shouldn't be here because they are not women'. The more this wears on the less optimistic I am: even when you point out male-pattern violence they just go #notallmen and I just despair. It was probably a mistake to appeal to feminism, I should have known that that wouldn't work. I stupidly believed it might with my friend because he'll sometimes say things about misogyny and how people use different language to describe men and women with regards to assertiveness and how that's a problem and lots of weird little things, relatively detailed little things, the little things that many men don't notice - but the superstructure somehow passes him by?

The men around me just think that the things women say about men - this man said this, this man grabbed me, this man talked down to me - doesn't apply to them, that they're more evolved than those stupid dinosaurs, and it's just ridiculous and insulting to accuse them of doing the same. It makes me the problem for noticing. If I talk too much about it I'm obsessed and letting it hold me down and should try harder, and if I don't they don't see it, so it didn't happen and it couldn't be a problem.

I'm so tired. I'm struggling to show that yes I do have empathy, yes I have given thought to others problems, yes I tried, I gave until I was a husk and got nothing back and I see what we've lost - what women, female adults, have lost - and you don't see the amount of emotional effort we've already given to you and are angry because we have decided to turn off the tap before we are sucked dry.

I analysed and puzzled over so many of my experiences, being followed by a car of men filming my ass, being cornered in a corridor and forced for a hug and a kiss on each cheek, being stared at on tube trains. I tried to make myself understand that these experiences were my privilege for being seen as female, for the sake of these particular transwomen, and I couldn't, they wanted too much. They pore over my experiences and want to be catcalled. And even for explaining that they behaved that way to me, some other guy will say to me, 'that can't have happened. That's not what I see. You shouldn't paint the trans community that way. They're not representative.'

I'm so tired.

[NopeNi]

Magpie.

I really wish I knew you in real life and could help more.

I'm so amazed at you talking to real strangers about this stuff, but please take care of yourself too, this stuff is exhausting mentally.

It's like you're saying "2+2 = 4" and now everyone says "it equals whatever it feels like and that's the truth". Logic doesn't help. Nothing does. It's also just age old misogyny and that awful realisation that it's never going to end, not in our lifetimes at least.

If you need to try and take a break and distract yourself somehow, please do. Listen to music, try mindfulness, do exercise. I have to every so often or I'll go mad. The world is gaslighting us, but there's still beauty and truth and pockets of sanity in it. Make sure you recharge a bit.

[Manderleyagain]

Yes what Nopeni said. I'm also so amazed you are speaking to strangers about this. I hope it goes well.

I would also suggest to meet people socially who are not connected to the Uni if you can? I think I live in a very unwoke part of the country, and I'm at an unwoke stage in life (middle age!!). It sounds harder to get away from 2+2=5 where you are.

[maniacmagpie]

Oof, sometimes I feel like I can't escape even to the things I love. I love exercise and do plenty of it but even that's getting stained by arguments about males in female sports. That's also compounded by the men who will also say we just shouldn't have women's sports at all because sports is about seeing who is best. (I think that in that case we should also not have age or weight categories and also I think sports is for more than that, but I digress).

You're right that I need to slow down, because it was certainly the case for me that it took a hell of a long time to get to where I am and I want people to understand now now now but the dribs and drabs will have to do.

I originally worked through it all to understand myself better and it was worth it. I finally at peace with being female. For a long while I thought I would be happier as a transman, but I never officially pursued the routes that would have taken me there. I read and bound and trained my voice but couldn't make myself believe it would fix me. Strange though it may sound, it was mostly gender critical transmen and a few gender critical transwomen who settled me in myself the most. I was struck by one transman saying 'you have to be ok with being female' and I realised that to me that was all there was to being a woman, I don't identify as one, I just exist as one and that's ok. It's not my fault and I didn't choose it but that doesn't make me a woman hater. It helped to realise that critiquing the things women do is not hating the woman - I could never pretend that I thought supporting sex work was supporting women.

For me it's not so much about the conversations (though I'm happy to have them...if tired) as the fact that there are a lot of people acknowledging me, even as a 1 second flyby, who are just as frustrated as the rest of us.

I've taken to cuddling a picture of my mum and sister when I feel absolutely empty. If there's anything I can do to reduce the chances of a male sticking a speculum in my mum if she's asked for a female I'm gonna do it. And people's support on here does help.

Gaslighting is exactly what it feels like.

[NopeNi]

I can relate to so much of that, and the way you approach and analyse things exhaustively too.

I thought I was a boy when I was young and didn't become comfortable with my body until probably my late 20s/early 30s. (I'm autistic and ruminate obsessively on topics as well which doesn't help.)

The idea that I prioritise logic and the realities of biological sex out of some sort of hatred for transpeople sometimes gets to me too. I can't imagine hating or even disliking people because they question gender as I did (and do); but I do question society just rewriting the notion of biological sex and everything that logically means for women's rights.

The thing I do right now that helps is just swimming and pretending I'm getting to an island and have to keep going; I focus on imagining things around me (like sharks and boats and fish). I also use a mindfulness technique where I lie and slowly imagine the exact "feel" of every part of my body, from my toes to my head, and back down and up again. Both probably sound crazy but they help me sometimes?

[maniacmagpie]

I feel like some things need clarifying.

I originally started this thread with the intention of just talking to people about being trans and discussing bodily functions in medical contexts, without reference to actual opinions on what should and should not be done with regards to sex-segregated spaces.

In the intervening time I read through the details of the consultation and I was shocked. I didn't realise that the GRA allowed someone to change their birth certificate. I did know a little about the attempted silencing of A Woman's Place UK, but the real scale had not struck me until recently. I still thought that (for example) intimate examinations were protected by things like the Equality Act - and I read somewhere that a transwoman had insisted on being allowed to perform mammograms and nobody knew what to do and how to balance the competing interests.

I have subsequently hardened my stance on boundaries regarding single-sex spaces. If a female woman wants an intimate examination or rape counselling to be performed by another female, I think that a transwoman should respectfully withdraw. I know for a fact my mother would not be happy with a male doing such checks, hence my comments in the above post. I stand hard by my opinion that such an intimate situation is not the place for gender identity to trump sex. Maybe in the long run, with a cultural shift, people would decide that it is ok. But whether you feel it should be that way or not, most women are not comfortable with such an examination being done by a male, and the choice should remain.

It's so difficult to balance privacy against informed consent, but at the moment the balance seems to be that nobody has a clue what to do, and we should talk carefully about it. There are many, many walks of life where we can respect people's gender but certain situations I can't reconcile myself to. I do still worry about the boundary thing. What would I say if a racist woman said she did not want a black woman examining her? I do have doubts and I haven't really figured out how I escape the racism comparison, except to say that male-on-female violence is prevalent and traumatising across all cultures, and the recommendations of division by sex is borne out by data across many different situations, whereas racism depends on culture and tends to come from a different angle. I'm still not sure.

[TallulahWaitingInTheRain]

What would I say if a racist woman said she did not want a black woman examining her?

Black people face systematic violence and exploitation from white people. Female people face systematic violence and exploitation from male people. So the appropriate comparison is not a racist white woman rejecting a black hcp, but a black woman who has survived racist violence fearing harm or humiliation from a white hcp.

[maniacmagpie]

That's a great point. Out of interest how do you counter people saying that we don't segregate by ethnicity even if one has high crime rates? I'm not saying I believe it but I am struggling a little to differentiate.

Today was interesting.

Most of the interactions were with people who disagreed, although most did not descend to yelling at me. I think some productive discourse happened (then again maybe I just wasted my oxygen). Most people, to be fair, did seem willing to have an actual discussion, even if they disagreed with the way I was going about it. I gave out my email and said I'd have a think about the wording of the sign (although I also said I would not promise not to change my mind).

I don't know whether I got through to anyone about the fact that I and others feel that their discourse is damaging to female rights - I assume they really don't. They really believed that I wanted to uphold sexism by acknowledging it somehow. It was spookily echo like, the things they said. They really believe that we wish them violence and that the things we say are what causes them to die.

I threw a few people when they asked how I identified - I said I do not identify as a woman, I exist as women and I experience sexism based on my body. I think it struck them that I had as a matter of fact thought through how I identified and that I wasn't just another clueless 'cis'. I think that was a point that somehow had really not got through - and why it's so important not to call ourselves 'cis'. I don't have an identity not because I don't know what they mean, but because I do know what they mean. And yet I need to talk about sexism anyway.

They've got so hung up on 'exclusion from womanhood' that they really miss that. I hammered home on the fact that I don't want to say anything about womanhood. I am simply not interested in claiming an identity. But I don't get to not experience sexism just because I say I don't want it. Maybe that got somewhere?

A group of five or so started blocking me at about 4pm, handing out trans rights leaflets. They followed me up and down King's Parade and then I asked why. I did manage to get them to talk to me and they said they felt that I was making the students feel unsafe. We had a bit of a chat about that and I did at least manage to say my piece (how much sank in who knows) and a few seemed willing to listen. One even apologised for them ganging up on me. I gave them my email and carried on. To be honest I think they made things worse for themselves because the crowd attracted more of a crowd. I managed to meet a lady who used to be involved in feminist activism when my mother was but a child and we are in contact. She bought me a gin and tonic. I then hung out with another couple of people who were more cheering on the speaking out and we chatte about the fact that people spend more energy talking the talk (relentless language policing) than walking the walk (actually going after the people who do shit. Although to be fair, language policing has brought gender ideology a very long way, so maybe it was really a good tactic?). They also bought me some gin and tonic. I swear I'm not an alcoholic.

I appeared on CUSU LGBT+'s facebook page with this message:

CN: terf
hi pals just 2 warn there is a terf (w/banner etc) on kings parade!

What is CN? Is it content notice? There was a gap between the two lines?

I literally have no idea what anyone is allowed to say any more.

Tired. Long afternoon. Night gals.

[TallulahWaitingInTheRain]

how do you counter people saying that we don't segregate by ethnicity even if one has high crime rates?

We aren't dealing with a situation in which one ethnicity is committing 9 in 10 violent offences and 98% of sexual offences, largely against another ethnicity.

[maniacmagpie]

Duhh, I apparently was having a total brain fart about that. Of course! Thanks for the infographic.

I got hung up about refuting the argument along ideological lines rather than statistical I think. I suppose I was thinking about the arguments people had about whether or not rape rates were higher amongst certain demographics, with one side bluntly adamant that it was racist to talk about it and the other insistent that it was an issue to be addressed. I am put in mind of the Rotherham child abuse scandal. I'll admit I was torn - I could see how, reported insensitively, these things can result in huge amounts of racism - look at the reports from the US after 9/11, with a lot of muslims (and sikhs, and pretty much anyone who 'looked' wrong) being hounded and harassed or worse. The difference in the end for me in the end is that misandry rarely results in females attacking males, whereas racism definitely results in unprovoked attacks.

In an ideal world I would prefer not to talk about racism, since I do not feel well equipped to deal with it, but it's a common form of what-about-ism that gets thrown about whenever I mention sexism - except it seems when it suits their narrative - it turned out to be a mistake to mention that the transwoman murder rate is only sky-high in those who are prostituted, particularly of those of colour. I immediately got jumped because, roughly, 'they have barely any options so what do you expect how dare you'.

Nobody bothered to address what I'd said about the fact that the murder rate wasn't true for wealthy late-life transitioners. Nor did anyone appreciate it when I pointed out that I doubt the men who attack these transwomen probably didn't decide to do so after reading second-wave feminist rhetoric.

I kind of wanted to talk about transmen, but I didn't want to engage in more what-about-ism. Each murder or attack is a tragedy, absolutely. Nobody should be forced into prostitution whether directly or indirectly through economic impoverishment. I don't want to make light of that. It's so hard when they use the tragedies of people's deaths as a stick to beat you with, and they selectively ignore all the natal women killed by their male partners or the sheer horror of the number of 'missing' girls in places where boys are strongly favoured. I tend not to bring those up either because it's too easy for someone to dismiss it as being a problem in another country, not here where sexism no longer exists.

Bleargh. Y'all on this sub are awesome for compiling the stats and data and so on. I don't want to fight inflammatory rhetoric and exaggerated stats with more inflammatory rhetoric and exaggerated stats. I want the information to be as solid as we can make it, as factual and not overblown as we can manage. But damn it's work.

[VMisaMarshmallow]

Gender doesn’t hurt. Men cause hurt. They use gender to hurt and control, primarily women but also other men.

The same way guns don’t kill, people (men) do, they just use guns to do so.

Yes we need to scrap guns as they exist only to harm but we need to focus on the men that pull the trigger.

I’m no where near you but good for you for speaking up.

[VMisaMarshmallow]

Tallulah we aren’t living with one ethnicity having a much stronger body type than the other. And we are not living with one ethnicity having biology that makes them significantly more vulnerable than the other.

[MIdgebabe]

Not sure because I have not rtt, but is it worth highlighting how some transsexuals( the full surgery, gender dysmorphia group) feel about the proposals and current discussion? How some of them feel under Attack? Why do people want to support those who use the label trans without any respect for those genuinely afflicted people? Making a mockery of them ?

And yip, some people do not appear to have the mental capacity to understand class based discrimination and some people are so sexist that they think that 30% of MPs being female is a disgrace and pushing better men out of their jobs. These people will never change. Focus on those who might.