It's funny (but not original) that some people think trying to close a forum amounts to stopping women talking and thinking and meeting. I imagine they'd explode with rage if they stopped to consider that women and men in RL express views all the time, have meetings with politicians, write to organisations etc.
Spectator: 'Mumsnet and the British media aren’t ‘transphobic’'
by Robert Jackman
(extract)
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." (continues)
blogs.spectator.co.uk/2018/11/mumsnet-and-the-british-media-arent-transphobic/
Noteworthy that LAWS (Let A Woman Speak) London meeting sold out within days:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3412631-Radfem-101-LetAWomanSpeak-is-coming-to-London-Friday-30-November