Be Kind

[NoSquirrels]

I’m fed up of how fucking often this is the message to women.

Be kind.

On my Twitter feed people I know are retweeting Guides to the consultation by Stonewall and The Pool with comments like “please fill in this consultation, it’s so important for trans people - should a spouse be able to object to gender reassignment (of course not!)” and Phillip Pullman has tweeted that he finds the whole debate baffling but he’s drawn to the idea of “being kind” and his comments are filled up with “Kindness is always the answer”, “We just want our human rights” etc.

But women ARE ducking kind. We’re kind ALL THE TIME. And as soon as we say “Hang on, this is not actually a great idea for women - we support you trans folks rights BUT NOT IF THEY NEGATIVELY IMPACT OUR RIGHTS WITHOUT DISCUSSION we are harridans, awful bigoted human beings without an ounce of kindness and compassion for other people’s struggles.

The media has never seemed so misogynistic to me.

Men are NEVER told to “be kind”. NEVER EVER.

It’s fucking infuriating.

I get less kind the older I get. Hurray for depleting oestrogen!

We are being asked to be kind, but they mean nice.

Being kind is saying to your kid "you are failing biology because you aren't studying"

Being nice is saying "failing biology? Don't worry, it's all fine. No problem".

Being kind to someone doesn't mean validating their every whim.

Being kind is being truthful in a considerate way.

Saying to someone, "you are wrong", can be a kindness.

To be honest I don’t agree with the OP. I don’t think Pullman’s sentiment was about women in particular being kind. I think his point is that intolerance is so pervacious and common that he’s right that we should as a population be aiming to just be decent to one another.

Philp Pullman’s literature features a lot of strong female characters, I certainly don’t think he is of the view that just women should be kind, or meek, or quiet. Just that it’s obviously a heated and emotive topic and as with most heated and emotive topics it’s best to try and be empathetic and compassionate, it doesn’t mean that you have to agree, accept anything or not voice your opinion. It’s not one of the other, silenced voiceless but oh so nice women in one corner and raging outspoken maniacs in the other, is it? There’s a spectrum, as with most things.

I'm all about the kindness.

Sometimes I have snapped a wounded bird's neck out of kindness. So kindness doesn't mean wimpy acquiescence to abuse and manipulation.

I have taken to asking those who demand kindness from women because kindness is something every woman should be, why they are not expecting the same yielding behaviour from the transgender feminine people that claim they are also women? I mean, if women are duty bound to be kind, surely one of our fool proof ways of telling if someone is what they claim to be, if we can't use biology, is if the claimed women are kind.

If they're not, then I think we can demonstrate that 'kindness' just means 'submission', and while I am all about kindness, submission can fuck right off.

There's a big difference between kindness and pathological, self-harming altruism.

Let's not pretend other than that the latter is what women are actually being asked to provide.

So y'know, just to be blunt about it Philip: fuck off.

Kindness != voluntarily surrendering your throat to the boot of your oppressor

Iris Child expresses it well: I Will Not Say It

And the fabulous Jane Clare Jones:

For those of you out there still sitting on the fence, or who still believe that I, and everyone opposing this ‘civil rights movement’, is just a nasty evil hate-mongering bigot, please, if you give one shit about women and the protection of women, wake-the-fuck-up. This is actually happening, it’s scary as shit, and we may well be running out of time. This is what woman-hating totalitarianism looks like. This is not a fucking drill.

janeclarejones.com/2018/09/26/twitter-trans-rights-totalitarianism-and-the-erasure-of-sex/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

The kindness the would compel from us would bring about the conducive context for increased denial of civil rights to women and girls and establish the comfortable principle of totalitarianism for everyone.

I’m not sure it is kind to try to alter one’s own knowledge of biological reality to fit in with another’s ideas. I think it’s quite a weird thing to do. It shouldn’t be possible to kindness away facts.
I wish Philip Pullman had troubled himself to do a little research instead of resorting to twitter as a source of unbiased information!

"I’m baffled, I’m soooo soooo baffled.” Ah, the luxury.

Go and write another of your daft books. At least Prince Charles likes them.

Give the fellow some credit.

Phillip Pullman isn't baffled, he's allowing the TRAs to make their case, on his timeline and to his audience.

The people he has in his audience are already clued up about child mutilation by religious nutjobs, thanks to his books.

He's giving TRAs sunlight and showing his audience, his followers what the idiots are saying.

birdbandit I wish that were true. But I don’t think that was it. It actually IS baffling that he is baffled. What’s so hard to understand if you properly look at it?

I don’t think Pullman’s sentiment was about women in particular being kind. I think his point is that intolerance is so pervacious and common that he’s right that we should as a population be aiming to just be decent to one another.

Yes, perhaps. My OP wasn’t really really about Pullman though (though I am spitting a bit about it because bloody hell, birdbandit says, His Dark Materials was ALL about people trying to stop the evil of puberty by fundamentally altering children’s natures, and Lyra Bellacqua would have been a prime ‘tomboy/gender non-conforming girl’ if she was real now. But anyway) he was just in my sights when I came off Twitter for a vent here because his timeline was then full of trans people claiming feminists are unkind and they deserve the most kindness and therefore we must be wrong. And he seemed to agree.

I am kind. I am a kind person.

But I am MAD about this shit.

I’m not being UNKIND to trans people, or debating their existence, or denying them any rights. I’m just talking about women and girls.

My instinct is to be kind, yes.

But I was at a cashpoint today when a (presumably) homeless man came and begged for money, and I was so bloody furious about this whole issue of who is vulnerable to whom that I snarled 'Could you stop looming over me, you're half my age and twice my size and it's intimidating.'

(To his credit, he immediately went from whine to quite normal voice 'Oh, sorry!' and I told him where the night shelter was.)

Vipers, Assemble!

Do we need a Mumsnet FWR Guide to De-Programming Yourself From Self-Harming Kindness?

yes please!

I love the idea of telling a little 6yo girl to be "a kind viper". "Be a fair-minded rattlesnake darling". What does she hear? She still hears the message to be kind, but not a doormat. There's a caveat included in the slogan, for her to remember to be fair to herself, not just the other person.

Iris Child expresses it well: I Will Not Say It

wow!

Stand up for yourself against a male person and you’re either a) in danger b) a harpy or harridan, being hysterical, making a big deal out if nothing or c) a bitch/a ball-breaker/full in your insult here.

YES!
we need some technological folk to make us a nice meme about women and kindness. I love 'be kind' as synonymous with 'shut up.'

we need some technological folk to make us a nice meme about women and kindness. I love 'be kind' as synonymous with 'shut up.'

It's not a meme, but Iris Child has on-point poetry again (to the tune of Let it snow ): And We Grow

o, misogyny is just frightful
but you know what's so delightful?
that women are saying 'no.'
and we grow, and we grow, and we grow

-

ohello wrote: wow!

Isn't she just?

Kindness = compliance

It’s not a time to be kind, it’s a time to look at facts and implications, and take action.

If he felt members of his family might be at risk, or that matters had not been thought through and might adversely affect them or him - would he advocate an emotional response, or might he suggest proper investigation and work?

We should always beware of an appeal to emotions, and especially a request to ‘be nice’ in some way.

The hope is that you will be distracted by ‘niceness’, and stop THINKING about what’s actually going on.