Another claim of abusive 'TERF's against the poor helpless trans women

[Blocker]

I'm a bit of a lurker here but a mother of two daughters and a son, and I strongly support keeping women safe in women only spaces and coming up with another option to keep everyone safe.

Reading the news from my home country and this one sided article caught my eye. Pity there's no evidence or opportunity to see the attack's that we'd made. Hopefully the link works...

We asked a trans woman to speak on our #metoo panel. Then the abuse began. thespinoff.co.nz?p=163247

*that were made obviously

If trans want trans safe spaces why are they not asking their allies to get them set up?

I’d be interested to know if the comments were actually nasty, or just along the lines of, “yeah, not a woman”. The histrionics which accompany even the mildest of criticisms amplifies any comments at all into, you know, literal violence.

But fuck the #wetoo shit. It’s like the #alllivesmatter nonsense. Just for once, white men, step aside, it’s not all about you.

It's very hard when we don't know the people involved or New Zealand law. Also we don't know what they are referring to when they say hate speech. The fight in the UK is against self-ID and a lot of transexuals seem to on our side.

I think it is pretty bad that the NZ organisation and their speaker was attached like that.

It is an organisation that supports all who are survivors of sexual abuse, not solely a woman’s organisation. I am Gender Critical, I have concerns about self id, and I fundamentally object to the anti-free speech shouting down that is part of the TRA movement.

But shouting down, or attempting to shout down, an organisation giving space to the voice of a Transwomen of longstanding about abuse of Transwomen on a panel of an organisation that supports ALL survivors of abuse is actually transphobic, surely?

Agreed. From that article it seems it was a non exclusive sexual abuse survivor organisation - for males and females. Not a female only refuge. So asking a transwoman sexual abuse survivor to speak was actually very appropriate. They absolutely deserve to be heard and listened to. I just don't believe in TWAW

I just found it a very one sided piece, admittedly an opinion piece rather than a news article.

I would just love to know what kind of concentrated attack they came under after asking a trans woman onto the panel, and the complete vilification of TERFs once again.

It sounds a bit like histrionics, but without providing details of what was actually said it's just pitting Trans/ TWAW/ "radical" feminists against each other and feeling the fire further, despite as a PP as pointed out the sexual abuse help organisation describing itself as inclusive already

Well, each and every bad move by Trans : TRAs gets aired . This was a wrong move by anti-TRA feminists, the organisation and the individual was hurt by it, they have a right to blog about their responses.

Bit poor, too, to disbelieve the comments. Disbelieving a woman who runs a sexual survivors group who recounts abuse ?

We don’t do anyone any favours by being blindly partisan.

And I would be very disappointed if any gender critical person denied that Trans people do suffer abuse. Out in the streets as well as sexual, and wished to deny them support in dealing with that or working towards its eradication.

I haven't said I disbelieve the comments, I have said I would have liked to see examples of what was said in order to have a fuller picture

I agree with others, it seems like anti-trans people got involved unfairly slating a trans person at an inclusive event.

Not the same as being gender critical.

This is why I worry about some of the things posted on here and the sources some MNers are getting their news from. There are a big chunk of anti-trans people who are just hateful human beings.

The worst result would be if reasonable gender criticism got involved with that.

If the comments were as vitriolic as indicated in the opinion piece would be a major mistake by feminist groups seeking to undermine/ derail/ however you want to call it a sexual abuse survivor group, which fully deserves support, but it would also go against the grain of what I have seen where opposition is promoted by feminists.

That is where my interest about the narrative of this article has come into it - maybe I am misguided but to date I have not seen a feminist group call in allies and sustain a mass onslaught for multiple days, criticising/ being threatening and offensive etc - that's why I would have liked to see what actually happened.

Surely wanting further details does not transfer as disbelieving it happened or blindly following?

Thanks Whirlwind, you've said it much more clearly than I have

Here are some replies from gender critical feminists on twitter, for a bit of balance

twitter.com/tommygun1964/status/1057029869136007168?s=19

twitter.com/renee_jg/status/1057066619313184768?s=19

Gender critical feminists criticising an organisation that from the start says it supports all survivors of sexual abuse for including one of those survivors on tne panel?

And offering comments that exactly because HELP is a non sex-segregated space, are irrelevant.

Though I am not defending deleting or shutting down discussion.

I want to be able to maintain sex seperated spaces. I am confident of my right to define my identity partly in my biological sex. But having a go at a self declared ‘wraparound’ organisation for including a Trans speaker to talk about the legitimate issue of addressing abuse of Trans people does make these protestors look anti trans.

And surely it is important that we seperate anti-trans from anti TRA extremist hate, being GC and being anti self ID.

^^ this

Maybe I haven't been clear.

If gender critics were commenting on this event AT ALL - I can't see why.

I have lots of personal experience of domestic violence and NZ. It's a big problem there, and while women are overwhelmingly victims the part of patriarchal culture that is scathing towards men not deemed manly enough is a MASSIVE problem in NZ.

It's a cause of dv in NZ and also a massive barrier towards male victims speaking up. #wetoo in this very specific context makes sense to me.

I don't think

Sorry last line redundant there.

I’d be interested to know if the comments were actually nasty, or just along the lines of, “yeah, not a woman”.

This is another way TRAs have really screwed things up for transgender people. When people talk about transphobia I am now more inclined to roll my eyes and say "oh, someone talked about biology in front of you again?" than get up in arms. They've removed all meaning from the word by weaponising it the way they do. Cry wolf. We're all against actual transphobia, but talking about our own biology ain't it.

I would be interested to know what sort of service this organisation provides.

If its a DV service for anyone, then fair enough to allow transwomen to take part.

If its supposed to be for 'women' (and there was a definite current of 'these awful TERFS think that transwomen aren't women' in that article) then I can see why people would object.

I also agree that 'transphobic attacks' now consist of saying 'women don't have a penis' so it's quite tricky to make a judgement about what people mean when they say 'abuse'.

I think it is pretty bad that the NZ organisation and their speaker was attached like that.

That may be so, but what actually happened? There is no information at all about what was said or done.

I can't see any reason for a transwoman not to be on a panel which includes people of both sexes who have been victims of sexual violence.

The feminist critics appear to have been criticizing Sally's bio rather than Sally's participation. Unless the children mentioned are adopted or step, then the real story is that Sally is a heterosexual father who identifies as a woman. A scenario that's typical of late transitioners.

Describing Sally as a lesbian is untrue, appropriative and offensive. Sally is not female. I can see why women were critical.

Maybe it just doesn't work to include men and women in domestic violence organisations.

The responses do seem inappropiate, though they would be just as strong if Women's Aid were to try to run an event like that.

"She may have been assigned a male gender identity at birth but it is her human right to be recognised as female."

What an absolute bullshit sentence. 'Assigned a male gender identity at birth'! That is not a thing!

And the human right to be recognised as female...

but it is her human right to be recognised as female.

No, it really isn’t. It may hurt sally’s feelings to say this, but women are not protesting this to be mean. They’re doing so because to ‘recognise’ a man as female harms the protections women have. And so harms women.

Far more context is needed to have a view on this. Namely, what was actually said, by whom and in what context?