Hilarious article

[FoldyRoll]

If you can spare the time between changing 'diapers' and giving each other advice about kittens and knitting changing facilities, get a load of this article about why British feminists are mean and horrid. I am so embarrassed for the girl who wrote this. She's spoiling for a scrap with t**fs on Twitter, but I fear she'll only get snorts of derision.
https://theoutline.com/post/6536/british-feminists-media-transphobic?zd=2&zi=5keu4ifu

I still can't get past the fact that being a 'homeopathy hater' is an insult.

Yes, i think she did mean it as an insult but I found it quite flattering.

If homeopathy works, why fill kids with hormones?

Kat

"Women don't have willies..."

Laughed so hard, I may have had to change my underwear, (knickers?), thank you to the three children my vagina has pushed out.

Wait...that must be imaginary stress incontinence. Because you know, biology isn't actually real or relevant.

I got as far as ‘Mumsnet is to British transphobia what 4chan is to American fascism’ and then I had to stop reading and get on here to get my fill of transphobic fascist ranting before I could continue.

I mean, really?? Mumsnet is a den of hate mongers equivalent to white power fascists just because women on here dare to think critically about the current trends on gender identity? The thought policing here in the US has become impossible.

If your feminism requires you to sneer at Mumsnet specifically because it's dominated by women, many of whom have children and who talk about what having children requires of them, it's a pretty fucking weird kind of feminism

Agree, annandale! I don't imagine she can even see what she's done there. Deary me.

Not a good article. If she thinks mumsnet is like 4chan, then she has clearly spent time on neither.

George

Wait...that must be imaginary stress incontinence. Because you know, biology isn't actually real or relevant.

I'm pretty sure homeopathy could help you with that - maybe if you wave an orange at a glass of water, then drink the water, you'll be right as rain.

In case anyone doesn’t want to wade through this, I summarise:

Women! Know your place!

Conversation is to be restricted to nappies, cafes and change area recommendations. All other conversation is banned.

Burn the witch!

What was the homeopathy haters thing btw? My eyes kept sliding off the rather mediocre prose.

Hang on. My mother, who I dislike, is a homeopathy devotee. I also very much dislike homeopathy. How should I identify?

MrsNathanDrake and I made Twitter! Screenshot of our remarks put up by some youth who seems baffled that anybody could be sceptical about homeopathy. Makes me wonder even more about the standard of science education in the UK.

Review by excelpope:

'The beauty of bad:
How bad can a written article be?'
(extract)

But how bad can a written article be and still have people praise it?

One contender for that must be Edie Miller’s take on why British media is so transphobic.

It’s being praised because it takes a particular stance on the current trans debate, for what it’s trying to say, rather than the confused mess of what it actually communicates." (continues)

"The article can’t even really decide who it wants to shake a stick at. Ostensibly, it’s about transphobia in the British media but, as noted, sceptics are to blame, as are the left (although the right aren’t excused either), Graham Linehan, and biologists (who skirt dangerously close eugenics, argues the author, who presumably couldn’t spare the time to Google the definition of ‘eugenics’), and in-quotes “feminists”, with their in-quotes “women’s spaces”, who turn their back on these women who should be allies.

Eventually, it decides to mainly blame Mumsnet, which is, “to British transphobia more like what 4Chan is to American fascism”, a phrase so awkward in its grammatical construction and so wildly cockeyed in its analysis that, to use the debunking brand of science, it should have formed a black hole of infinity density and consumed the rest of the in-quotes argument.

Mostly, though, this piece drips with the sense of entitlement that so completely poisons the trans-rights movement. It never occurs to the author that the problem isn’t that their case has been distorted, but that it’s never been presented. Men should be allowed to identify as women and be automatically accepted, support from feminists should be a given, access to women’s spaces, both physical locations and roles such as being a Labour Women’s Officer, should be an automatic right, questioning any of this on grounds of risk or of science should be forbidden.

As the author herself tweeted…

arguments are bad

Ultimately, it lays the blame in the wrong place. Mumsnet is a temperature gauge for the nation. It is a huge and diverse audience, some left, some right, some sceptics, some daily readers of their horoscope, some in the media, some who never even turn on the news. If you haven’t convinced them then you haven’t convinced the general public and, until there’s acceptance that there’s an argument to be won, rather than demands to be made, you never will.

Still, look on the bright side, at least it’s given us a new benchmark for how badly written something can be and still deemed praise-worthy."
excelpope.wordpress.com/2018/11/06/the-beauty-of-bad/

I'm not giving that confused youngster the page views.

Since when has someone not agreeing with someone else's opinion make them a hater?

It's their way of changing the subject so they don't have to address the actual criticism. Instead of attempting to refute the criticism, they dismiss the person who put a lot of thought into their objections to transgenderism. It's like when trans chant, "you're a bigot so I can ignore everything you say".

I do think it's interesting that it's only very recently that they've attempted a simi-refutation of our criticisms. Unfortunately, it's more like a pr campaign, spin control, still trying to reframe the issue to anything other than what it is.

So they say things like, "In debates over trans rights, the burden of proof is always on trans people to come up with sufficient evidence for the way we experience the world." Well no. How they experience the world isn't the problem, (though they would prefer we center their needs above our own). The "debate" is that we object to dicks in women's prisons etc and that in losing the definition of women as a class, we lose all the sex-based discrimination laws, which opens us up to every bit of misogyny without any legal recourse which patriarchy wants to shove down our throats.

Spectator article in response:
'Mumsnet and the British media aren’t ‘transphobic’
by Robert Jackman
concludes
"When you look closer, though, you realise that the Trump proposal is essentially the mirror-image of what the self-ID lobby is calling for. And the differences don’t stop there: for a start, both are deeply ideological positions which rely on a religious or political belief and then apply this to all cases. Crucially, neither system is able to apply discretion or accept that – in some circumstances – one metric (biological sex or gender identity) makes more sense than the other.

This is why many British newspapers have expressed concerns about the GRA reform: not because of any underlying bigotry but because it seeks to apply a fringe ideological conviction to an immensely complicated question.

Oddly, the Outline lays the blame for this supposed media bigotry at an unlikely door: Mumsnet. The article claims that some of Mumsnet’s 14 million users have developed an “obsession” with transgender issues. It’s true that transgender issues are frequently discussed on Mumsnet – but why assume this is down to bigotry, rather than the fact that many of these concerns (the housing of male sex offenders in women’s prisons, for example) resonate deeply with the women of Middle England?

The writer isn’t wrong that Mumsnet holds deep influence – just not necessarily with the media. When I spoke to someone who knows the consultation well, they mentioned the “Mumsnet effect” – the fact that the Government had received cautious responses from women all over the UK, representing all ages and backgrounds. The responses calling for the more ideological system, however, tended to be concentrated in smaller clusters, usually from London and university cities – places which typically vote Labour.

Ultimately it will be this kind of political pragmatism which will probably persuade ministers against uprooting the GRA system. Blaming it on the Times and the Guardian might seem tempting – but it’s ultimately untrue."

thread:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3416273-The-Spectator-Mumsnet-and-the-British-media-aren-t-transphobic

threewheeler1 - dribbleshite, yes, it rolls off the tongue.

Love that excelpope review, it's brilliantly scathing! Great Spectator article too. He sounds quite bemused by her thoughts about MN 😁

Can't find Edie on Twitter. Shame as I fancy more of a laugh.

proud author

Oh she's not at all funny - though some of her followers think "mums" are a joke just for giving birth. 💩💩💩

She clearly didn't spend any time here researching MN. We must be too high brow for her🤪

She probably felt she didn't need to do any research here, mums are very easily defined. If you've met one, you've met them all. They're those beige women who wear M&S slacks, wipe your nose, do your laundry and always pander to your feelings. They don't have the intellect to have genuine, well-considered opinions about anything because everyone knows their brains die the moment they give birth. If they do express an opinion it's obviously wrong, because ... mums.

Yeah Mums - where brains go to die and all that.

She probably felt she didn't need to do any research here, mums are very easily defined. If you've met one, you've met them all. They're those beige women who wear M&S slacks, wipe your nose, do your laundry and always pander to your feelings. They don't have the intellect to have genuine, well-considered opinions about anything because everyone knows their brains die the moment they give birth.

India Willoughby expressed the same bigotry and ignorance earlier this year in a Pink News opinion piece.
I.W concluded:
"I would really like some of my women friends in the media to do the same. Whether it’s an article or a broadcast.

A prominent statement of the facts needs to be made, in a cool and rational manner, so someone gets heard. Because frustrations are boiling over. What started as angry words online is now manifesting itself on the street.

Last week, one of these hate groups held an event in Bristol. Trans allies turned out to support the trans community, and there was a confrontation of sorts.

We also have an ongoing court case involving a trans women accused of assaulting someone at a demo. The trans woman claims she was acting in self-defence.

I don’t want to see anyone – from either side of the argument – get hurt. Which is why the government and the likes of The Sunday Times, Daily Mail and Mumsnet need to show some responsibility.

The current attack on trans people is unprecedented. Any show of support would be greatly appreciated.

Last week was my first ever visit to Mumsnet. Honestly, I thought it was going to be lots of stuff about prams, or family-related matters. A sort of online This Morning minus Phil and Holly. The reality is more like a Nuremberg Rally. It’s very scary.

And unless the government sorts out it’s act with the Gender Recognition Act, we may find ourselves with a modern-day version of the Stonewall riots."
www.pinknews.co.uk/2018/04/24/india-willoughby-transphobia-opinion-worried-for-my-life-mumsnet/

maybe Edie is one of the 'woman-friends' responding to IW's request?

The Nuremberg Rally, ffs! Comparing women expressing perfectly reasonable opinions to conventions of Nazis would be funny if it wasn't so incredibly offensive, both to the women in question and to people who suffered under the Nazis.

Still, I suppose they are happy to indulge in sexism, homophobia and racism, so what's a bit of casual Antisemitism?!

The Nuremberg Rally, ffs! Comparing women expressing perfectly reasonable opinions to conventions of Nazis would be funny if it wasn't so incredibly offensive, both to the women in question and to people who suffered under the Nazis.

Feminst Current article examining this:
‘Nazi TERF’ misunderstands fascism and ignores the brutal truth about women in the Holocaust
On the 80th anniversary of Kristallnacht, we must remember women victims of the Holocaust, and defend the legacies and collective memory of our sisters who came before us'

NOVEMBER 6, 2018 by JEN IZAAKSON
(extract)
The system of National Socialism positioned women under the direct control of men. Within Germany, any woman caught out at night by the military or police could face a penalty for “anti-social” behaviour. The Ravensbrück concentration camp (which functioned as a death camp) housed women during the Second World War, and serves as a key site for understanding women’s predicament under fascism.

Other than falling into one of the categories of women the Nazis considered “untermensch” (meaning sub-human or inferior people, and sometimes was used to refer to “masses from the East”) — which includes Jews, Roma, lesbians, and physically disabled or mentally unwell women — women outside these racialized and dehumanized groups were sent to the camp for engaging in so-called “anti-social behaviour.” This included being prostituted (even though it is documented that many of the SS, Hitler’s paramilitary guard, used prostitutes), being found drunk outside the home, or holding political beliefs antithetical to the Nazi regime (for example, communism). Any man who wished to take revenge on his wife needed only report her to the authorities for adultery, left wing political activism, subordination, or disloyalty to the realm, and she could be removed and imprisoned in a labour camp like Ravensbrück. This created a situation for women wherein their husbands functioned quite literally as policemen in the home, anytime they chose to.

Within contemporary political discourse, gender critical and radical feminists are increasingly being branded “fascists” and “Nazis” for acknowledging basic biological and social realities. Women are a historically subjugated group due to our reproductive capacity, excluded from holding both social and political power, and treated as resources for male use. Very quickly, queer and trans activists have attempted to reverse reality, by equating women who recognize our status under patriarchy, as women, to violent men who held some of the most oppressive ideologies and genocidal political regimes humanity has ever known. Of course, feminists have been accused of being totalitarians since the first wave.

“Feminazi” has mostly been a term of abuse that right wing men have used to mock and attack feminists, but more recently it has been the left that has sought to frame feminist ideas as “biologically essentialist” in a bid to equate feminism with Nazism’s central tenet: racist eugenics. When women are branded “Nazi TERFs” online for espousing feminism, it is very clear that what National Socialist ideology actually entails has gotten lost. For wanting to escape the social role enforced onto women due to our biological reproductive potential, feminists are awarded an equivalence with those who wish to determine our fate due to that reproductive capacity. In equating these opposite concepts, those who call radical feminists “Nazi TERFs” perform a sick reversal, claiming women who resist social roles based on biology are Nazis." (continues)
www.feministcurrent.com/2018/11/06/nazi-terf-misunderstands-fascism-ignores-brutal-truth-women-holocaust/

I do find it highly amusing the leap from nappies to Nazis.

Particularly when made by men wearing said nappies.

Thanks for posting that R0wantrees, it really puts it into context!

I had a quick look at Jen's blog - that seems interesting too.